Valley Center’s biggest weekend is heading our way, Western Days, May 22–24, with Saturday’s parade led by Grand Marshal Fran DeWilde.
It may not be the hottest weekend, since the weatherman is predicting cooler days leading up to Saturday, with a high in the 70s projected for that day.
If that’s true it will be a mercy for the 73 units in the parade, the latest number according to organizers Craig & Kathy Ames.
Make your plans to include the fact that Valley Center Road will be closed to through traffic by 8:30 a.m., with the parade beginning at 10 a.m.—or thereabouts. It should run until about noon.
And kids, get ready to mark the roads!
The parade organizers, with the blessings of the County road authorities, will pass out chalk to kids along the parade route. You can draw bull’s eyes or whatever, much as was done along the Amgen Bike Race route a few months ago.
The latest word is that Supervisor Bill Horn will participate in the parade as a late entry.
The Roadrunner crew will lead off, handing out festival programs (which most readers also got in the mail this week), although the first “unit” will be the Escondido Mounted Posse Color Guard.
The lineup includes 13 equestrian entries, seven bands, including the Oceanside High School, Helix Highlander (with bagpipes!), San Marcos High School, Valley Center High School, Valley Center Middle School Jazz, the Middle School fiddlers (a section of the Middle School Orchestra) and the Fallbrook High School bands; five walking groups, one bicycle, one commercial float, 12 club and organization floats, 12 classic cars (carrying VIPs such as Miss Valley Center Kristina Joor and Morgan Boberg, Junior Miss Valley Center) nine custom specialties and nine fire trucks—not to mention the Shriners and their dozens of “tin lizzies” and unique vehicles.
Bringing up the rear will be Sheriff’s Sgt. Bob Bishop.
VC’s CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) will be integrally involved to keep participants and audience members safe along the parade route.
A command center for CERT, the Sheriff’s Dept. and Cal Fire will be on the raised berm at the corner of Valley Center & Miller roads.
Announcers and other parade staff will be linked by handheld radios. This will allow emergency responders to act quickly if something happens along the route.
According to Craig Ames, “They will coordinate everything in case Cal Fire has to respond or they need an air ambulance. If someone faints or has an accident, they will know about it quickly.”
The announcers: Jim Byler, Charles Carr, David Ross, Cathy Davis, Diane Conaway and Bob Hutchings will be assisted by Boy Scouts, who will help identify the units as they approach.
Parade staff and CERT members will use Gators all terrain vehicles provided by Powerland Inc. of Valley Center as command vehicles and for parade runners. Later the Gators will be used for various tasks at VC Community Center.
“Right now I think the parade is going to be fantastic,” declared Craig Ames. “With the quality of entries we have, and weather permitting, it’s going to be a really good event.”
Over 20 volunteers, many unsung, will make the annual miracle happen. Additional help will be provided by Ridgeview Church and Scout Troop 619.
Honorary Mayor’s Race
The Honorary Mayor’s race has four candidates: Jim Quisquis of the VC Chamber, Penny Blazej of the VC Rotary Club, Jeanna Slattery of VC Pop Warner and Ron McCowan of the VC Kiwanis Club.
It culminates in the Mayor’s Race finale Friday, May 22 at VC Community Center at 5 p.m.
The winner will ride in the parade and attend various community events all year long.
The evening will conclude with a square dance and maybe a square dance demo by the VC Promenaders square dance club.
Saturday
Saturday begins with the Rotary Club Pancake breakfast held in the Town Center parking lot (corner of Valley Center & Cole Grade Roads) from 7 a.m.–9:30 a.m.
After breakfast everyone will stake out a spot along VC Road to await the start of the parade.
Vendors, exhibits, demos
After the parade the action will shift to VC Community Center where there will be vendors, food booths, exhibits, demonstrations, a carnival with rides for all ages.
A DJ will play tunes all day on the VC Community Center’s stage. Then dance from 7–11 p.m. to the All American Band.
The fairgrounds will have the normal vendors and service clubs. The VC Sheriff’s Dept. plans to have a display and Valley Center CERT will have a booth as well.
Several cartoonist will draw free caricatures all day.
There will be a petting zoo, “the Balloon Guy,” making balloon animals for the kids, magician Magic Mike and an inflatable jumper.
Parade entries will be honored with a ribbon and trophy ceremony at 1:30 p.m. Gunfights will take place at the Western town throughout the day.
Beer Garden
The beer garden will be open Friday night, and Saturday from 10 a.m. until 11 p.m. The beer garden will be run this year by the Valley Center Chamber of Commerce.
4-H Barbecue
The Homesteaders 4-H Western Days Barbecue is back with beans provided by Fat Ivor’s. You will see their meat smoker at the top of the hill by the Community Center. The barbecue will begin after the parade and end at 6 p.m. or when they run out.
Dine downstairs at VC Community Hall. The Homesteaders will serve you. The meal includes beef or pork, beans, potato salad or coleslaw, a roll and a drink. Prices are $9 for adults and $6 for children 11 and under.
Suggested parade detours:
Northbound – Woods Valley east (right) from Valley Center Road to Lake Wohlford. Then north (left) on Lake Wohlford to VC Road. West (left) on VC Road to Mac Tan. Mac Tan north (right) to Fruitvale. Fruitvale west (left) to Cole Grade, north (right) on Cole Grade which will connect with Hwy 76 in Pauma Valley.
Southbound – Cole Grade to Fruitvale, east (left) on Fruitvale to Mac Tan. Mac Tan south (right) to VC Road. VC Road east (left) to Lake Wohlford. Lake Wohlford south (right) to Woods Valley. Woods Valley right (right) toVC Road or continue down Lake Wohlford past the Lake to the intersection of VC Road at the bottom of the grade.
The man in charge of the widening of Valley Center Road and the consultant who designed the accompanying 2.5-mile Heritage Trail May 11 made a presentation on the next phase of project to the VC Planning Group.
Michael Long, project manager, Public Works, Engineering Services, and Tim Henderson of KTUA, a planning, landscape and architecture service, gave the planners an update on the project, whose planning is 30% complete and still subject to change, and which will NOT be used for construction.
“We’re very excited about this,” said Long. “The entire community has been very patient and antsy about getting to this point. Now we can get along with planting the medians.”
The planting of the medians and the trail are being paid for in part by a state grant for environmental enhancement.
The Heritage Trail from Old Road to Miller Road is being constructed with the ongoing project and will be finished by August. The extension to Cole grade and Woods Valley has been funded by the grant for $350,000.
Long was careful to reiterate several times that the project is at the 30% design stage for the trail project.
“We are working hand in hand to come up with something that the community will love, with planting of the trail and making it multiuse,” he said.
Plants along the trail will be of the same native, drought-resistant types that will be used in the media. They will include species such as Coastal live oaks, agave, coffee berry, red and purple sages.
The trail will include hitching posts for horses, lodge pole fencing and monuments to match the stones along Moosa Creek.
Interpretive signage incorporated into the design will talk about the history of of Valley Center.
There will be signs and stone columns along the trail so that the public will no where it is and there will be yield signs for horses.
The trail will include a stone memorial with a plaque to the late Brendan McNabb, who was the original project manager of the widening, but who died several years ago from a heart attack. The memorial will be located at the stone wall near the Country Trader building.
At VC Road and Woods Valley there will be a crossing button including a horse button.
“We’ve tried to create a trail with trees and plants from start to finish,” said Henderson.
Almost 400 trees will be planted along the trails to replace the 56 oak trees and over 500 eucalyptus trees that were taken out.
Just before Keys Creek, where two oaks create a tunnel effect, the plan is to put a picnic table and seating.
At Miller there will be trees spread out along the alignment.
There will be some trees in the center of the medians, in the widest portion of the median.
The 35 mph speed limit will stay in force until the end of the project because there will be work in the median.
The County will plant and maintain the plants in the median for about three years, until they are self-sustaining. Water will be supplied by Valley Center Municipal Water District using conduits that were installed as part of the road.
At the end of the presentation Long repeated that the design is only 30% completed and subject to change.
The fifth annual Valley Center Real Estate Scholarship Golf Tournament held May 8 at Woods Valley Golf Club netted about $14,000 according to the organizers.
Selena Dudley told The Roadrunner, “Once again, even with a difficult economy, the people of Valley Center have supported the annual Valley Center Real Estate Scholarship Golf Tournament. The $14,000 will enable us to provide scholarships to graduating seniors from Valley Center and Pauma Valley.”
Seventy-five golfers participated in this year’s event. Three foursomes tied at 14 under par for 1st place.
After handicap consideration, the tournament winners were David Chavarria, Longrino Belisario and Bob Hoy from Valley View Casino.
Closest to the Pin Men’s—Tim Ghee and Closest to the Pin Women’s was Sandy Peltzer.
The tournament’s top sponsor, and the first ever Platinum Sponsor was Richard Meyers of Archer Western Contractors with a donation of $5,000.
Gold Sponsors were Frank Shoemaker, Frank & Vince Sedio of Palomar Broadband, Inc., David Chavarria of Valley View Casino and Garry Farmer of Preston Hill Properties. There were putting contests, closest to the pin and longest drive contests.
Also participating were 23 hole sponsors and many businesses in the community that donated drawing prizes.
Dudley added, “We would like to thank all those, from within the community and outside the community, who made this tournament possible and for your loyal support. We would also like to thank you, from the many Valley Center and Pauma Valley high school seniors who will be receiving scholarships, on their behalf.”
The land planning process is too complicated, wonkish and opaque.
It is so turgid that most people recoil from it—and deprive themselves of learning about proposed developments until it is too late to influence them.
That’s the reason that Nancy Layne, Anne Geinzer and Larry Glavinic say they are forming a new group to be called something like “the Valley Center town council,” although they haven’t settled on anything concrete as yet.
You could be pardoned for thinking that this same territory is covered monthly by the Valley Center Community Planning Group, an elected advisory group to the Board of Supervisors.
Geinzer, Glavinic and Layne say the planning group no longer represents the views of the majority of VC. They want to put together their own group.
They made a joint appearance at the Wednesday (May 13) Board of Supervisors meeting and gave a 15-minute presentation.
Their point was that the VC planning group is complicit in a community plan that leaves the town crisscrossed by “E-F” level roads (“F” in this instance means the same thing it did on papers when you were in school).
Glavinic ridiculed senior county planner Devon Muto for compiling a county General Plan Update that has 52 failing roads, several of them in VC and for saying that he is “closing the gap between where they are at now” and where they will be.
“You ought to call it the ‘gridlock acceptance plan,’” declared Glavinic, “although really it’s the Magoo Plan [a reference to the blind cartoon character Mr. Magoo.”
He also attacked the planning group for allegedly accepting the County’s plan. “I describe the planning group’s plan as ‘A-gap’ or the ‘accelerated gridlock acceptance’ plan,” he said.
Glavinic was followed by Layne (who made a Powerpoint presentation) and Geinzer. Their combined message was that there are “workarounds” on the proposed community plan that would “place some commercial rooftops on I-15.”
Glavinic is a former longtime planning group member and chairman who left the group a few years ago and earlier this year applied for a vacancy to get back on the board. He was turned down.
Mrs. Layne served on the planning group for over a year before resigning earlier this year—unhappy with the way that land use matters are processed.
Both are sympathetic towards the development being proposed for Old Hwy 395 & I-15 by the Accretive Group, a San Diego firm whose proposal was linked last year with the “road to and from nowhere,” that Supervisor Bill Horn proposed.
That proposal was hotly attacked a year ago by the VC planning group, which won a short-lived victory when the Supervisors removed the development, but not the road that would serve it, from the General Plan Update map.
Note: Randy Goodson of the Accretive Group also made a presentation at the May 13 meeting about the I-15 development that he is promoting a specific plan amendment for. However it wasn’t connected to Glavinic, Geinzer and Layne’s group.
Glavinic says he doesn’t advocating the Accretive proposal, but does think some form of commercial development is needed, possibly in the Circle R area that contains a used car lot.
“Moving development and commuters closer to infrastructure is my preference,” says Glavinic. “It would be easy to stick six thousand people there.”
His main point is that the County can’t say that it has a plan “because the road network is broken. You have fifty-two road segments that are ‘E’ or ‘F.’ What kind of plan is that? You need to stick some rooftops by I-15. Knocking 3,000 homes out of the Villages doesn’t work.”
Layne’s position is distinct from Glavinic’s although you might say that they rhyme.
“The citizens of Valley Center really need to have more of a voice and a part in the planning of Valley Center,” she says.
“What I want is for the community to have more of a voice.” That’s hard, she says, because the language of planning is very wonky and hard to follow. “It’s very confusing to a lot of people.
“That’s what I want to help change, to allow people to be part of the process. Not to supplant the planning group. They are a needed cog. But a lot of people don’t feel that they are part of the system.”
Mrs. Layne’s family has lived in the VC and Pauma Valley area since the 1800s. “I grew up at the old Pauma School House. I grew up riding my horse through this backcountry. My family has deep roots here. I love this place.”
She talks to many people as she takes her kids to soccer and baseball games. “They want to make this process in English. I’m a reasonably intelligent person. Half the time I don’t know what they are talking about. A lot of people feel they are not being represented. Every single one of them without exception said they would be interested in joining this group. We aim to get another voice heard in Valley Center. If we get enough numbers we can make a little bit of noise.”
Mrs. Layne says that developments like the one proposed by Accretive, or something like it, will happen. The planning group’s problem, she says, is that instead of working with such developers, it insists on opposing them.
“There is development that is going to happen. You can either let it happen, or you can drive it,” she says.
Mrs. Layne is looking at having meetings of her group on Tuesdays, perhaps twice a month at first.
“I want to get people involved who are not normally involved. A lot of people in Valley Center are very independent. They are protective of their town. I think it would be better for the town if they had a little more ownership of it. We are a very unique place and I would like to work with the people, to preserve as much of it as we can. I believe that a majority of the people should have a majority of the influence. Virulently anti-growth isn’t what we need.”
Mrs. Layne hopes to soon have an email address for her group as well as a Web site. However, if you are interested in contacting her, you can call 858-361-8713.
The Friends of the Valley Center Library Saturday morning held a celebration and ribbon-cutting to mark the official opening of the quarter- mile nature trail.
The occasion, which was called “All Paths Lead to the Library,” also marked the 30th anniversary of the Friends. It was punctuated by short comments by Judith Kay, president of the Friends, Fifth District Supervisor Bill Horn and County Library Director Jose Aponte (see remarks below.)
Leading off the ceremony was the presentation of the colors by Boy Scout Troop 619.
Mrs. Kay praised the “community effort” that made the trail a reality. “When I walk the path I’m reminded of the beauty of this valley,” she said.
She noted that it is planted with native, drought-resistant plants. The path winds through a “mosaic” of coastal sage scrub, oak riparian, southern oak woodland and chaparral with plants such as laurel sumac, black sage, sugarbush and California buckwheat.
“It’s a place to read, contemplate and relax,” she said.
The meeting also included a short segment devoted to electing a new slate of officers to the 200-member organization, which included president, Judith Kay; vice president, Carol Gartner; recording secretary, Rich Rudolf; corresponding secretary, Tracy White, treasurer, Marilyn Jones and membership chairman, Carolyn Kurtz.
Mrs. Kay replaced Gerry Slusser, who after 16 years at the job decided to retire, although he will remain as “president emeritus.” Also retiring after many years of service as corresponding secretary was Joyce Rooney.
Mrs. Kay promised that the Friends’ agenda this year will “focus on children, the family and services. We want this to be the place for families.”
Supervisor Horn told audience members, “I think this is the best library I have built yet and I’ve built six!” He noted that the County provided $30,000 for the trail and said it was part of his policy of returning a portion of sales tax to the unincorporated areas.
Branch manager Sandy Puccio made a few comments and said that the staff “will be able to enjoy the path every day.”
Rich Rudolf was praised for putting together much of the effort to get the trail built in the first place.
Aponte’s Remarks
“Congratulations to the Friends of the Valley Center Library on your thirtieth anniversary this year! And to President Judith Kay for this wonderful celebration of nature today. Also kudo to library branch manager Sandy Puccio and her terrific staff.
“This Friends group has more than 200 members, operates a successful used bookstore and underwrites more than 200 programs and events in the Valley Center branch each year.
“And many thanks to our Fifth District Supervisor Bill Horn for the Community Enhancement Grant and the Community Project Fund, which allowed this nature path to come to fruition.
“Supervisor Horn takes great pride in the libraries in his district, and has opened a number of them in the past few years, including our beautiful Valley Center branch in 2002. We’re proud to have Supervisor Horn as a library champion.
“Many community members contributed to the creation of this new nature path, in the same way that this community always supports its library.
“This quarter-mile path will be a peaceful setting for outdoor reading, strolling through the oaks and native plants, or simply enjoying the natural beauty of our library setting.
“The first Valley Center Library branch opened ninety-three years ago, in 1916, in a school Valley Center has grown substantially since that time; however, as we look around us today, we can see that the town still retains its rural atmosphere and charm.
“Business also continues to grow in our Valley Center Branch Library. Since this new facility opened in 2002, circulation of library materials has grown by seventy-four percent.
“This new nature path is a perfect addition to the library and the community. I hope you enjoy walking it, while contemplating all of the great books and information you’ll find inside your library.
“And it’s so true, ‘all paths do lead to the library.’ ”
Groups that participated in the grand opening included the Fallbrook Gourd Patch, which gave basket and gourd demonstrations; Iron Hand, a Fallbrook Indian who performed Native American music along the pathway; the Valley Center Art Assn., which provided several art demonstrations by Fred Prior, Jim Honey and Barbara Graham; Ellie Newcomb, who gave wildlife and fossil demonstrations; Paradise Community Services, which sold wish bracelets and dream catchers.
The path was designed by Valley Center resident Susan Moore of Earth Design and executed by Peter Schultz of the Old Julian Co.
By DAVID ROSS
When the dust settles and the wreck emerges from the latest defeat of the governor and the legislature at the hands of the voters I wonder if they will “get it”?
Do Schwarzenegger and the lawmakers in Sacramento understand in what low esteem they are held by the average citizen in this state? Do they know just how ready many of us are to let the whole rotten edifice of California government collapse just to make the point that government—and NOT the people of this state—needs to learn to do with less?
I’m tired of the Barack Obama and people like Al Gore at the federal level and Schwarzenegger at the state level telling me that I have to do with less, that I have to trim my sails, but that they can’t afford cuts to the state budget.
YOU do with less. Get out your budgetary knives and start cutting. Of course, being government bureaucrats you will cut the things that you think will make us all squeal and sobbingly beg you to take it back.
But don’t count on it.
If you leave the potholes unfilled, I will drive around them. If you have to cut state parks, I will make do. Fewer courthouse hours? Make my day.
The education budget? Don’t make me laugh. This is already the largest part of the budget. You increased its size in years when the state’s child population didn’t grow—don’t tell me you can’t cut it now.
Don’t cry on my shoulder. Talk to your buddies the state employees unions. Let them come up with the money.
No more from us! If you don’t listen to this electoral defeat then you haven’t begun to see just how unpleasant things can get for elected officials.
The Valley Roadrunner
P.O.B. 1529, Valley Center, CA 92082
Tel. 760.749.1112 Fax 760.749.1688
Website: www.valleycenter.com
Email: editor@valleycenter.com
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