The Governing Board of the Cabrillo Unified School District chose its officers tonight.  The Board unanimously elected Dwight Wilson president. Wilson, vice president of the board last year, presided at tonight’s meeting.

The Board also elected Roy Salume to the position of vice president. This is the only position that was contested. Jolanda Schreurs nominated Charles Gardner, who received her vote and his own.  Salume, an apparently reluctant nominee of John Moseley, received votes from himself, Wilson, and Moseley.

Jolanda Schreurs was unanimously elected clerk of the Board. Wilson congratulated her, saying, "Now you can enjoy carpal tunnel syndrome, too."

[This story was posted live from the CUSD Board meeting, which is still in progress.]

Later, the board accepted the presentation of the strategic planning committee and encouraged citizens to sign up for committees. The board strongly supports the process and is really looking for people to participate.  In a theatrical touch, Deputy Superintendant B.J. Mackle brought forward the eight or so visiting members of the strategic planning group and had them alternate reading the list of beliefs that came from the meeting.

The Board’s goal is to create a strategy that will inform its decisions and to push responsibility deeper into the organization.

This is not the first such mission statement the District has created.  In 1992, as part of its facilities master plan, the District created an 11-page mission statement [pdf] that has a lot in common with the product of the current strategic planning team.

Jim Grady is the new mayor of Half Moon Bay and Toni Taylor takes Grady’s old job as vice mayor. After the general election each year, the Council nominates and appoints a Mayor and Vice Mayor from its membership. Grady and Taylor were appointed at Tuesday night’s City Council meeting.

Mayor Grady was elected in November 2001 and served as Vice Mayor last year.  Vice Mayor Taylor was elected by special election in 1999, and reelected in a regular election November 2001.  Vice Mayor Taylor served as Mayor in 2002.

Some of you might be interested to learn that I wrote this story and posted it to Coastsider during the CUSD board meeting using the District’s wifi network. My thanks to the District for opening this to the public. This report is based on a press release from City Hall.

For four nights this year, Half Moon Bay’s Main Street Shops were open late so that we could buy our Christmas gifts locally. With a parade, Santa, a store opening, and belly dancers, this year’s event was bigger than ever.

We walked around and saw it all last Thursday and Friday. Here’s our first installment of photos. We’ll be adding photos of top gift picks from Nights of Light later this week.

Nights of Light may be over, but it’s not too late to do your Christmas shopping on the Coastside.

Dennis Paull and I have been working on a Half Moon Bay weather page. Dennis has a weather station in the Alsace Loraine neighborhood, about four blocks from the beach. He generously offered to supply Coastsider with a weather feed. The feed is in beta testing right now. I will also be adding the basic current weather data to Coastsider’s navigation bar shortly. Please email me if you see any problems or have any suggestions.

Every year, the Coastside Opportunity Center gives us the chance to play Santa for our neighbors. Their Adopt-a-Family program brings Christmas into homes that need some help celebrating the season. This year, they were able to find people to adopt 307 families (30 more than last year) and 71 seniors on the Coastside, from Montara Mountain to Pescadero.

I spent some time Friday night at the Coastside Opportunity Center, interviewing volunteers and taking lots of pictures of this important community project.  Take a look at our album to get an idea of what it takes to make Christmas happen for about 1,000 Coastsiders.

They still need help with wrapping between now and Thursday, December 9.  If you want to help out, call Judy at 650.563.9706

Organizer Judy O’Leary has been with the program for 15 years. There was a large crowd there the night we visited, including several people who had been working there for years:  Beth Bryant, Jean Burch, Olivia Riba, Aileen Olhey, Linda Poncini, Deloras Crabb, and Pat Strohlein.

Charlene Battaglia has been working there 12 years and her daughter Regina Sena has been helping since she was 6 years. Eight year old Yuirana Cabanillas was here for her first year with mom Maria Cabanillas.

Half Moon Bay High School was represented by Ben Stadler, Sasha Chapnick, Kayla Wynkoop, Victor Acevedo, and Amber Samuelson.

The Coastside Opportunity Center provides food through Second Harvest or whenever a family is in need, assistance to families in crisis through counseling and referral, transportation for seniors and the disabled, emergency rental and utilities help, free help with income tax returns, assistance with Immigration, and scholorship programs for graduating high school seniors. No one who is qualified is ever turned away.

The Half Moon Bay Police have identified the victim of the fatal accident at the corner of Highway 1 and Spindrift Way [map] on Friday night as Antonio Garcia, a 62 year old resident of Half Moon Bay. The driver of the vehicle was Annabell Curtis, a 75 year old resident of Moss Beach.

Garcia was struck and killed apparently while he was crossing Highway 1. The vehicle, a 1997 Ford Taurus, was traveling north. The Half Moon Bay Police responded to the call at 6:44pm. Garcia was pronounced dead on the scene, and transported the San Mateo County Coroner’s Office.

Every year, hundreds of steelhead trout die as a sandbar at Pescadero Marsh breaks, according to the San Mateo County Times.  While fishermen think it’s preventable, environmental concerns have kept California State Parks from altering the interface between the marsh and the ocean.

Saturday night at 11:24 pm fire engines from the La Honda and Loma Mar Volunteer Fire Departments, as well as the CDF/County Fire Station at Pescadero were dispatched to a structure fire on Cougar Ridge Rd. off of Gazzos Creek Rd. in the Pescadero area. The fire was several miles off of Gazos Creek Rd. and only a off road engine—similar to the one that the La Honda Fire Dept. is currently raising funds to acquire—could reach the incidents location.

Fire Fighters found a fully involved structure that regretfully burned to its foundation. Fortunately no one was injured as a result of this fire and its cause has yet to be determined.

There has now been a total of four house fires that resulted in a total loss to occur in our rural area since April of this year. In one of these fires two very young childrens lives were lost. This is a reminder to every resident and homeowner on the Southcoast that these types of fires can and will continue to happen here. It should not be taken for granted that a house fire will always affect someone else.

Now is the time for you to assess your homes fire safety.

• Do you have the proper number of smoke detectors, are they working, when did you last change their batteries? Early fire detection can clearly help protect the lives of your family and give the Fire Dept. the best chance of stopping a fire and saving as much of your home and personal property as possible.
• Does your home have adequate water with which to fight a fire? This has been a big problem in three of these fires. If your area is not served by a “Rated Fire Hydrant System” (only about 6 percent of the Southcoast is) you should attempt to have at least 10,000 gallons of water on site and it needs to be plumbed in a way that Fire Engines can connect to it.
• Is the route in to your home marked and does your home have a easily read address?

Per the National Fire Prevention Association December, January and February are some of the deadliest months of the year for home fires. For more information on Residential Fire Safety please see the La Honda Fire Brigades Dec. 2004 Newsletter, it’s due to hit the mail next week.  You may also find valuable information at the following Web Sites: www.firesafety.gov, www.usfa.fema.gov, www.lahondafire.org, and www.NFPA.org

On behalf of all of the Fire Fighters who serve the San Mateo County Southcoast we wish you a happy and safe holiday season.

Audrey Rust is the powerhouse behind the Peninsula Open Space Trust, and she’s nearing her goal of raising $200 million to protect the San Mateo Coastside—the largest fundraising campaign ever by a local U.S. land trust. Rust has $181 million so far.

The Mercury News has published an excellent profile of one of the people with the most influence on the Coastside. It also provides a fascinating picture of how she’s going about raising the tremendous sums necessary to do her work.

In many ways, Rust is in a race. Over the next 25 years, the population of the nine Bay Area counties is projected to grow by 1.6 million, the equivalent of adding a new San Jose and San Francisco.

The opening ceremony for the 2004/2005 Mavericks Surf Contest will be Dec. 10 at 2pm, according to Transworld Surf. Contestant will paddle out for prayer ceremony at Mavericks. Opening ceremonies are open to the public and competitors, sponsors, and media will all be on hand.