Newsletter May 14, 2014

Breaking News!

Breaking News: The construction of the new gate at the top of Beachwood is probably 8 weeks away from completion. This means that, most likely the opening of the pedestrian gate will coincide with the implementation of PPDs. Here's why: The gate which was to take a few weeks to construct is being upgraded. It will be an electric gate. This upgrade is being done out of respect for the needs of Sunset Ranch to accommodate ease of access for their rent riders and boarders. We all want our local businesses to be healthy and it seems that Rec and Parks feels this way as well. This alteration/upgrade to the gate design will require new permits, DWP involvement and considerably more Rec and Parks dollars and yes, more time. Rec and Parks have agreed to keep staff posted to direct cars to Observatory until completion.

More Good News: Since it seems that the opening of the gate will most likely happen at the same time the permit parking signs are installed, we feel it isn't necessary to attend the next Rec and Parks meeting on May 21st. Our best resource tells us that this meeting will take place at Cypress Recreational Center.

The NICE thing to do: Can you generate a letter to the RAP Commissioners thanking them for providing an electric gate for our local Sunset Ranch business? And also, we appreciate the staffing at the top of Beachwood. None of these measures come without some extreme expenditure of cash from Rec and Parks budget. Maybe say a big "Thank You" for all they do and all they will be doing for our community as time goes on.

Copy and paste these email addresses in your To field so that they all get your letters:

Michael.nagel@lacity.org, david.michaelson@lacity.org, valerie.flores@lacity.org, alexander.ponder@lacity.org, mike.feuer@lacity.org, latonya.dean@lacity.org, michael.a.shull@lacity.org, kevin.regan@lacity.org, joe.salaices@lacity.org, yeghig.keshishian@lacity.org, patricia.whelan@lacity.org, rap.commissioners@lacity.org, BeachwoodCanyon@sbcglobal.net

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Neighbor, Bob Mintzer Big Band THIS Friday

May 16, 2014

You've heard Bob play at the Hollywood Orchard and other neighborhood events. Now hear the Bob Mintzer R&Big Band project!

LOCATION: CAP Studio, 13752 Ventura Blvd., Sherman Oaks, 91423

This will be a concert style event - see below for show times and ticket info.

The Bob Mintzer R&Big Band project has been several years in the making. This collection of arrangements and originals pays homage to the amazing African American artists who virtually wrote the book that would inﬂuence all of popular music. And in a similar way to the wonderful songs of Tin Pan Alley becoming the springboard for jazz artists to make a personal statement, these great R&B songs beg for reiteration and some reinterpretation by a large ensemble. Most great music results from an unpredictable combination of strong elements that together form something previously not considered, yet have some connection to things familiar and soulful. To take the music of the 60's R&B artists and fashion it for a big band with all the myriad of texture and timbre possible - that's the objective!

Come see for yourself and be inspired by the timeless and hopeful songs of the 60's R&B scene played by one of the great big bands of present times.

TRUMPETS

John Daversa
Ron Stout
Chad Willis

SAXOPHONES

Bob Sheppard
Bob Mintzer
Remy Le Boeuf
Greg Johnson

TROMBONES

Bob McChesney
Erik Hughes
Vikram Devashali
Jacob Kraft

RHYTHM

Russell Ferrante | piano
Colin Cook | guitar
Edwin Livingston | bass
William Kennedy | drums

CATERING for this very special evening will be provided by specialty Chef GARLAND WHITT! -

The menu for that night is Jamaican jerk Chicken, Couve a Mineira, and Vegetarian Dirty Rice. The Jerk Chicken is marinated in my homemade rub and smoked on a grill just till done. Couve a Mineira is a popular Brazillian street food made of collard greens sauteed with a bit of garlic and onion, tossed with a touch of vinegar. The dirty rice will be made with veggies and Louisiana style spices. There will also be a small dessert.

$10/plate. Dinner tickets may be purchased at the door or online (see below).

This event has two shows.

(The house will be cleared between shows.)

First Show: 8:30 p.m. Doors open at 8 p.m.

Second Show: 10 p.m.

Ticket Price per show:

AT THE DOOR (cash or credit card)

General $30

Student Discount with ID $15

Catered Food $10/plate

PRESALE ONLINE

General Discount $25 + $2.37 fee + Presale Catered DINNER ADD-ON $10/plate + $1.54 fee

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Memorial Reminder - Saturday, May 17, at noon.

Please plan on attending the memorial service for our neighbor and friend, Dino Williams.

DATE: Saturday, May 17th at noon

(the church opens at 11:30 a.m.)

LOCATION: North Church,

Forest Lawn, Hollywood Hills

Dino's son, Greg, asks that, in lieu of flowers, attendees bring a flower or greenery from their garden. "We will incorporate it around my Pop for a floral tribute."

Please arrive early with your contribution to this sweet tribute.

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LAPD Town Hall Meeting

May 21, 2014

Everyone is invited and encouraged to attend. Especially established and newly starting neighborhood watch groups and block captains with their neighbors.

Come meet our new Hollywood Division Captain, Pete Zarcone, and hear crime updates for your area.

This is our once a year meeting with LAPD Hollywood.

Meeting location:

American Academy of Dramatic Arts, 1336 North La Brea Ave., located on the east side of La Brea, between Fountain Ave and DeLongpre. (Click image to download the flier.)

Meeting Flier - Share With Your Neighbors

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Design Review Board Meeting
Thursday, May 22, 2014 at 6 p.m.

There will be two projects discussed:

6068 W. Mulholland Highway and 2981 N. Hollyridge Dr.

The Design Review Board Meets at the Hollywoodland Realty Office in the Village:

AGENDA

http://beachwoodcanyon.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/DRBHearing5-22-141.pdf

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Urban Jungle

Our wildlife expert and neighbor, Officer Gregory Randall was part of this NBC segment on wildlife in our midst:

http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/Humans-Coyotes-Urban-Jungle-258406121.html?akmobile=o

Officer Randall says to keep a short leash on your dog. Retractable leashes longer than 6 feet are illegal. Try carrying an umbrella as opening it quickly will scare off a coyote. When frightened, the coyote will take that information back to its pups so that they will be frightened of people.

Please don't feed the wildlife. They don't need our help. If it weren't for coyotes, we would be overrun with rats. We're fortunate to share space with them and if we are responsible about the way we look after our pets, there should be no problems.

They were here before we were.

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RACO Los Angeles

Be a Reserve Animal Control Officer RACO Volunteer. You can make a difference.

WHAT IS THE RACO PROGRAM?

The RACO program allows volunteers to become Reserve Animal Control Officers serving in the same capacity as Animal Control Officers. The program requires a commitment of 18 hours of volunteer service each month at anyone of six animal shelters for three months prior to the first class. This commitment provides a great opportunity for volunteers to serve and observe. Prospective candidates learn about the care and handling of a variety of animals, interface with shelter staff, and work with supervisors and become familiar with day-to-day operations.

During this three-month commitment, there is an application process. An applicant must be a minimum of 21 years of age, a high school graduate or equivalent, and must have a current driver's license.

A background check, and drug and alcohol screening is performed as a part of the process.

Candidates need to be prepared for a physical requirement check because RACOs must be able to lift at least 70 pounds and sometimes more. Other physical agility requirements, such as stooping, crawling, and bending, are tested.

The training program runs for approximately six months with a schedule of four hours over two evenings, with classroom and field training during the program, Uniforms, equipment and training are provided by the Department (at no cost to the RACO). The Department requires a one-year commitment of 18 hours per month after graduating from the class.

These newly graduated RACO volunteers will be paired with ACOs to assist with services such as promoting and selling dog licenses either door-to-door or at public events, roundups of stray dogs, wildlife calls that could use extra assistance and some may join our Specialized Mobile Animal Rescue Team (SMART).

RACO APPLICATION

http://LaAnimalServices.com

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Beachwood Happy Hour

SEE YOU FRIDAY!

Hollywoodland Antiques is having a happy hour.

5 p.m. -7 p.m. every Friday.

Please come in and have a glass of wine, snacks, and get to know your neighbors.

Dr. Karen and Jeff Meyer

P.S. This is a total good vibe event - we have noticed neighbors walking down the street at around 5 pm on Friday, almost all headed for Happy Hour! - editor

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Feel Good Moment

Kilroy Was Here

So who was Kilroy?

In 1946 the American Transit Association, through its radio program,

"Speak to America", sponsored a nationwide contest to find the real

Kilroy, offering a prize of a real trolley car to the person who could

prove himself to be the genuine article. Almost 40 men stepped

forward to make that claim, but only James Kilroy from Halifax,

Massachusetts, had evidence of his identity.

'Kilroy' was a 46-year old shipyard worker during the war who worked

as a checker at the Fore River shipyard in Quincy. His job was to go

around and check on the number of rivets completed. Riveters were

on piecework and got paid by the rivet. He would count a block of

rivets and put a check mark in semi-waxed lumber chalk, so the

rivets wouldn't be counted twice.

When Kilroy went off duty, the riveters would erase the mark. Later on, an off-shift inspector would come through and count the rivets a second time, resulting in double pay for the riveters.

One day Kilroy's boss called him into his office. The foreman was upset about all the wages being paid to riveters, and asked him to investigate.

It was then he realized what had been going on. The tight spaces he had to crawl in to check the rivets didn't lend themselves to lugging around a paint can and brush, so Kilroy decided to stick with the waxy chalk. He continued to put his check mark on each job he inspected, but added 'KILROY WAS HERE' in king-sized letters next to the check, and eventually added the sketch of the chap with the long nose peering over the fence and that became part of the Kilroy message.

Once he did that, the riveters stopped trying to wipe away his marks. Ordinarily the rivets and chalk marks would have been covered up with paint. With the war on, however, ships were leaving the Quincy yard so fast that there wasn't time to paint them. As a result, Kilroy's inspection "trademark" was seen by thousands of servicemen who boarded the troopships the yard produced.

His message apparently rang a bell with the servicemen, because they picked it up and spread it all over Europe and the South Pacific.

Before war's end, "Kilroy" had been here, there, and everywhere on the long hauls to Berlin and Tokyo. To the troops outbound in those ships, however, he was a complete mystery; all they knew for sure was that someone named Kilroy had "been there first." As a joke, U.S. servicemen began placing the graffiti wherever they landed, claiming it was already there when they arrived.

Kilroy became the U.S. super-GI who had always "already been" wherever GIs went. It became a challenge to place the logo in the most unlikely places imaginable (It is said to be atop Mt. Everest, the Statue of Liberty, the underside of the Arc de Triomphe, and even scrawled in the dust on the moon.).

As the war went on, the legend grew. Underwater demolition teams routinely sneaked ashore on Japanese-held islands in the Pacific to map the terrain for coming invasions by U.S. troops (and thus presumably, were the first GI's there). On one occasion, however, they reported seeing enemy troops painting over the Kilroy logo!

In 1945, an outhouse was built for the exclusive use of Roosevelt, Stalin, and Churchill at the Potsdam conference. Its first occupant was Stalin, who emerged and asked his aide (in Russion) "Who is Kilroy?"

To help prove his authenticity in 1946, James Kilroy brought along officials from the shipyard and some of the riveters. He won a trolley car, which he gave to his nine children as a Christmas gift and set it up as a playhouse in the Kilroy yard in Halifax, Massachusetts.

and the tradition continues...

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Brain Test