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April 10
"Craft Talks"
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May 1
"UCLA Basketball"
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April 9
Spring Tea
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Next Week...
April 10
"Craft Talks"
Dwight Heikkila and Sarosh Motivala
Upcoming Meetings...
April 17
"Economic and Financial Literacy"
Bill Coffin
April 24
"Rotary Foundation"
Steve Day
May 1
"UCLA Basketball"
Ben Howland, UCLA's basketball coach
Upcoming Events...
April 9, 11:30 am
A traditional Spring tea amidst many flowers will be held in the home and gardens of Jim and Carol Collins. All Westwood Rotarians and their spouses are invited. Please make reservations with Margie Downie, 310.394.4827.
May 1, 7:00 am
District Breakfast
Westin LAX Hotel
The speaker will be Patricia Murray, who has served as a major and a pilot instructor for the California Air National Guard. She will provide an eyewittness account of the conditions in the Middle East.
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This Week...
LA RIVER RUNS THROUGH IT – Meg Sullivan at WVRC on April 3rd
PP PETER MORE led us in the Pledge. LENNY came forward to lead God Bless America in his usual enthusiastic manner. LEE DUNAYER filled the Invocation slot, with several aphorisms (always wanted to use that word, somehow). “Trying to tax yourself into prosperity is like standing in a bucket of water and trying to lift the bucket by the handles…A government may “got cut off” which provided great hilarity…A liberal takes us into debt, which he proposes to pay off with your money…Government can be summed up in a few short words – if it moves, tax it –if it keeps moving, regulate it – and if it stops moving, subsidize it. And, attributed to Will Rogers, “I don’t make jokes, I just watch the government and report on it.” Good stuff, LEE.
ELLIOTT TURNER brought a Special Guest, Norm Goldenberg, whom Elliott has known for – he claims – 30 years, but my claim is that we should not hold against Norm whoever sponsored him…LENNY introduced his Son, David, who now runs the store, and of course they were accompanied by SUNNY. Rotaract President KATIA VAISBERG brought along Nikkole Valdez. And ANN SAMSON brought our Visiting Rotarian, Diedre Martinez, who belongs to the Brentwood Club.
ART HENRY announced a possible gathering of just our Club at the Huntington on Monday April 21st starting at 11 a.m. We are privileged to have the curator of the current Jack Smith exhibit speak to the group at that time – please let ART know if you will attend. Some will carpool, and lunch will follow.
ELLIOTT TURNER reminded us of the WAPI Assembly, which will take place at
Westwood United Methodist Church on Saturday April 19th, starting at 0900. They will have soft drinks and pizza, and it goes until 2:30, so please plan to be there.
The last District Breakfast of the year will be on May 1st, 0700, at the Westin LAX. Speaker will be Patricia Murray of the Calif. Air National Guard, relating her experiences in the Middle East. She is a former Miss California – and PP DON NELSON is contact.
St. Albans Parking – We have settled on the fifteen of you who have Official Parking permission. Be sure to display your indicia on your dashboard – and for those who DO NOT have passes, please don’t try to sneak in – it will ruin our deal, OK?
Our Ambassadorial Scholarship program is chaired by SHANE WAARBROEK. Others on the Committee include PEGGY BLOOMFIELD, ELLIOTT TURNER, GORDON FELL, ED WRIGHT, LEAH VRIESMAN, ALY SHOJI, MARK KRAUSE, LORIN RUTTENBERG and SAROSH MOTIVALA. Interviews for the five candidates will be on April 16th at the UCLA Career Center, Conference Room B on the 3rd floor, beginning at 1pm. The Club thanks each of you for volunteering.
Our Senior Yearling – which means he will eventually graduate to Full Status – TOM BARRON came forward, and felt it was helpful to provide a joke before he began his prepared 45-minute address. Seems there was an Irishman named Clancy, who returned home late one night after a bit of drinking. Hoping to sneak in, he somehow missed the first step upstairs, and ended up sitting on the steps. Having a pint bottle in his back pocket did not help – it broke, of course. He almost immediately recognized that his bottom was hurting, so he crawled upstairs to the bathroom. Taking down his pants, he also recognized that the damn bottle had cut up his bottom. So with some effort he got the box of Band-Aids, and preceded to place them as best he could. But lo and behold – let this be a lesson to all of you – his wife woke him in the morning with the loud announcement. “You were drinking last night!”. Trying to appear outraged at this accusation, he asked, “How do you know?” “Well, first off, the front door was still open. There was broken glass at the foot of the stairs, and drops of blood all the way to the bathroom. But the final clue was the dozen or more Band-Aids stuck to the mirror!”
With this intro, he then noted that he was looking forward to being able to sit somewhere else than with all those Yearlings! And on the serious side, he thanked DEBBIE and PP STEVE SCHERER for their wonderful hospitality at the Yearling Dinner they hosted last week. It was indeed special, and he was pleased to be able to tell us about it.
PEGGY BLOOMFIELD introduced our Speaker, Meg Sullivan. Meg is a recent graduate of UCLA’s four-year Extension Landscape-Architecture Program. The title of her Presentation is, “The Return of Stone Canyon Creek” and it is based on a one-year study called The Capstone Program. Meg presently is working at UCLA in the office of Media Relations.
There were quite a number of display boards – maybe ten, total – and as she spoke she moved from one to another. In some cases they were a bit too detailed to be seen from the audience, but they certainly provided an understanding of what she studied. She opened by stating that her proposed project would not interfere with the alley behind the store where her engagement ring was bought – which of course brought cries of “Fine Him” but LENNY apparently escaped. She then asked how many of us thought there was one creek running through Westwood, or two, or three? When UCLA was being built in the late 1920’s, it was flanked by two streams, one to the east in the arroyo and the other meandering on the west. This is the stream that she has studied, and her displays were all geared to it.
The stream runs for about 1/5th of a mile today, through the University Elementary School, to the north edge of the Anderson School. It is then routed underground, since it is continuously flowing (known as a perennial creek). I used to take our Doberman up there so we could play ball. An original faculty member in 1929 was an ornithologist, and he reported there were 115 different species of birds at that time. Today, about two thirds of them are gone. The many native butterflies are no longer there, either.
UCLA, of course, is the densest of any UC campus, so routing it though was a real challenge. This is called Daylighting, by the way, and is an integral part of the Federal Water Act. Remember that the intersection of Wilshire and Westwood is one of the busiest intersections anywhere. The initial rerouting would run the river across the eastern edge of Wilson Plaza, in-between the Men’s Gym and the John Wooden Building, continuing south past Parking Lot Six, and then over to Broxton. It would run down the center of Broxton (the river is five to eight feet wide, by the way), then across to the western edge of the parking lot at Wilshire and Veteran, and from there return to an underground passage. This would empty it into Ballona Creek, as it does now. Three mini-parks are proposed, the first near the foot of Bruin Walk, one near Parking Lot Six, and a larger one on the Wilshire/Veteran space.
One of the unused advantages of having a stream nearby is as an educational tool. Thus the present stream alongside the University Elementary School could be utilized as a study course in various departments, but it is not presently so used. This project appeals to environmentalists, for its obvious advantages to the atmosphere. Meg would like to replace some of the present foliage alongside the creek with native fauna. This includes sycamore, white alder, and laurel. She points out that the present parking lot at Wilshire and Veteran is not an attractive entrance to UCLA, and her proposed park there would be most inviting.
Some of the Q&A – Could the Los Angeles Country Club tap into this water supply? Environmentalist don’t want creek water used for anything else. What sort of cost would this entail? She didn’t figure it on that basis, but ten million would be a very low estimate. Are there other streams nearby that would be affected? No, this is the stream that runs by the Bel Air Hotel, entering UCLA near the Chancellor’s residence. Someone (a plant, no doubt) asked if you were going to close the alleyway behind the store that sold you your wedding rings. Of course not. Thanks, Meg for an intro to a challenging idea.
Before I close, does anyone need a Rotary Pin? I’ll have them with me henceforth.
Words of Wisdom, Albert Einstein
The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax.
