1/29/12

TEEN ETIQUETTE CLASS


SUNDAY, JAN. 15TH, 2012 (14-18 Y/O'S)
SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 26TH, 2012 (11-13 Y/O'S)
1:00PM-6:00PM
FOUR COURSE DINNER INCLUDED
INVESTMENT:  $150.00


We will prepare your teen with lessons they will use the rest of their lives.  
They will learn how to proceed with confidence in any social or dining situation.

Topics Covered: (Below is for upper teen class)

General Social Guidelines

  • Rules of Introduction
  • Handshakes and Eye Contac
    • t

Body Language
  • Six Reasons To Improve Your Body Language
  • Ways To Improve Your Body Language
  • Sitting, Standing, Walking

Communication Skills

  • Do Nots & Habits That Detract
  • Cell Phone Etiquette
  • Remembering Names
  • Public Speaking Tips
  • The “One Minute Speech”

Job Interview Skills

  • Resumé Writing For Teens
  • Sample Resumé
  • Job And College Interviews
  • Making A Good Impression During Interviews
  • Interview Attire
  • 7 Steps To Independence
  • Performing Well
  • Creating A Desirable Image
  • They Are Leaders
  • Characteristics That Inspire Trust
  • Business Interviews (What Certain Employers Expect)

Dining Etiquette

  • Set Your Place
  • Dining Utensils
  • Napkin Etiquette
  • American & Continental Style Dining
  • Silent Service Code (Cutting, Resting, & Closed Position)
  • Diagram for Five Course Dinne
  • Finger Bowl
  • Diagram for Eight Course Dinner
  • The Finger Bowl
  • Brief Pointers On Table Manners
  • Table Talk
  • Toasting and Tipping
  • Four Course Dining Tutorial Served
  • Certificate of Completion, Take Home Study Guide and Graduate Photo included.

1/23/12

Residents meet with the big wigs of Pala!


On Saturday, Jan 21, a community meeting was held at the Rainbow Valley Grange to get updated on individual efforts currently taking place against the noise nuisance caused by Pala Raceway and to organize/coordinate efforts going forward. 

Presentations were given by Eli Vedagiri on the scope of the noise problem; Robert Linn, Partner at Mulvaney, Kahan & Barry, San Diego on the status of legal efforts; Bud Swanson on the Noise Study Report issued by Pala; Tom Casey on the efforts with the County/Supervisor Horn; Dennis Sanford on the Rainbow Planning Commission Group and their efforts with State and Federal concerns; and Dee DiPietro on organizing moving forward.

In addition to 37 members of the community, the meeting was attended by Ryan Ouellette, CEO of the company that runs Pala Raceway.  Mr. Ouellette spoke of a few changes made to the track and his understanding of the noise issue.  However, he did not commit to any actions or a timeline.  As a result, Tom Casey, Bud Swanson and Mila Bonner, as representatives of the community, will be meeting directly with Ryan Ouellette to talk about specific noise reduction measures to be implemented and a timeline for implementation. 

Subsequent to the meeting, an email was sent to Shasta Gaughen, Pala’s environmental director, asking for a meeting with Dee DiPietro, Eli Vedagiri and Sheridan Traner, as community representatives, to discuss how Pala might assist us in resolving the noise nuisance issue.  Ms. Gaughen said that she was meeting with Ryan Ouellette next week to discuss the noise issue among other items and would be reporting to Chairman Smith and the tribal leadership to keep them aware of the issues. She has offered to meet with community representatives subsequent to the tribal leadership meeting with a tentative timeline for mid-February. 

A central group to coordinate various efforts, communicate to the community and focus on putting together an Outreach program to identify the homes and families that are affected by the problem was also proposed at the meeting.  This will be pursued until the noise nuisance issue is resolved, so please contact palaracewaynoise@gmail.com if you are willing to assist with efforts going forward or have any questions.

1/19/12

COUNTY WANTS TO RESTRICT PLANNING GROUPS

This document summarizes a situation that is boiling at
the County level....please post the article and if you can, add a note
asking EVERYONE to read the article and send a letter to the San Diego Board
of Supervisors opposing the action to restrict the Community Planning
Groups.  If the BOS votes to restrict the various planning groups, Rainbow
could be under serious attack from developers and runs of risk of becoming
much less rural.

Thanks.


Dennis A. Sanford
714-299-9865 Cell

1/17/12

PALA RACEWAY COMMUNITY MEETING AT GRANGE

We need you, your neighbors and as many people as you can recruit to come to our community meeting against Pala Raceway noise. We need to make an important statement to Pala Raceway that we mean business. Press will be there.

                               Grange Hall
                               2160 Rainbow Valley Blvd
                               Rainbow
                               This Saturday January 21  11 AM

This will be a fast pace informational and organizational meeting designed to better equip and mobilize our community for our continuing fight against this intrusion into our quiet lives. We need everyone's ideas, input and participation.

Please take a minute and drop me a quick e-mail indicating your attendance and the number in your party.

Thank you for your continuing support in our community efforts again Pala Raceway Noise.

1/2/12

Anti-Quarry Protester Photos


  • Hoping to be on TV, anti-quarry protesters rally during a break from the April 26 hearing on Granite Construction's proposed Liberty Quarry project held at Rancho Community Church in Temecula. 
    • TOP 10: Proposed quarry creates stir throughout the year
    •  In late April, more than 1,000 peoplepacked into a church in Temecula to witness the start of the Riverside County Planning Commission's review of Granite Construction's Liberty Quarry project.
    That review, which featured 50 hours of public testimony presented during six meetings held over the course of eight months, riveted thousands of people in Southwest County for much of the year.
    Most of those in attendance were passionately opposed to the project, and they made that abundantly clear by their comments, saying the quarry would sink property values and degrade the area's air quality.
    Late in the year, the Temecula Valley Chamber of Commerce voted to oppose the project, a victory for opponents who had long sought the chamber's help.
    There also were fans of the project, a group that included union members, who urged the commission to create jobs and boost the economy by approving the mine, a 135-acre aggregate rock quarry proposed for land on Temecula's southern border.
    To accommodate all of the people who wanted to speak and to allow the commission members to question experts, the commission scheduled follow-up hearings and meetings.
    This review process was eventually wrapped up in December, with the commission voting to finalize the denial of the project.
    After the vote, there was a round of applause by the small number of people who had driven to Riverside for the meeting. Granite representatives have appealed, setting the stage for a review of the project by the county Board of Supervisors in 2012.
    Although the crowd for that final meeting ---- the culmination of days of testimony and debate ---- was small, opponents predict the crowd that greets the board will be massive.
    Jerri Arganda of Rainbow, one of the leaders of the opposition forces, said people will be coming out of the woodwork to line up against the quarry, no matter where the first meeting is held.
    She's predicting a crowd that rivals or surpasses the audience for that first commission hearing, which she estimated at close to 2,000.
    "I don't think that's going to stop anyone," she said, talking about the possibility of the hearing being held in Riverside. "If we have to, we'll get buses and send them up to Riverside. ... I think people are going to make the difference."
    In addition to the folks expected to show up, Arganda said opponents will deliver thousands of signature cards from people opposed to the project.
    With the crowd and the cards, Arganda said she hopes the board sees the depth of opposition and votes to defeat the project.
    "That would be the perfect ending," she said.
    Granite representatives would beg to differ, however, and they said the company is looking forward to getting a "fair hearing" by the board in 2012.
    Asked about its strategy going forward, Granite project manager Gary Johnson said all the ammunition the company needs to see the project approved is in the environmental impact report prepared by the county.
    That report recommended approval of the project, a recommendation that was not heeded by the commission.
    "It's all in there," he said, talking about the huge stack of technical studies and reports that made up the environmental report.
    Call staff writer Aaron Claverie at 951-676-4315, ext. 2624.
  • Options for Granite if board deniesLiberty Quarry project


    CALIFORNIAN   Sunday, January 01, 2012  

    Options for Granite if board deniesLiberty Quarry project

     by AARON CLAVERIE     aclaverie@californian.com

    Some of the people following the debate over a quarry proposed south of Temecula recently posed an interesting "what if" question.
    If the Riverside County Board of Supervisors votes to reject the appeal filed by Northern California-based Granite Construction, would that sound the death knell for the company's Liberty Quarry project?
    The answer, according to a Granite representative, a Temecula environmental attorney and the county: Not exactly.
    Last month, Granite filed an appeal of the countyPlanning Commission's recent denial of the project, a 135-acre open pit mine proposed for land near the unincorporated area of De Luz, the city of Temecula's southern border and the San Diego Countycommunity of Rainbow. That appeal will be considered by the board early this year.
    If the board rejects the appeal, it would be difficult for Granite to challenge the board's decision via a lawsuit, said both Granite project manager Gary Johnson and environmental attorney Ray Johnson.
    "The likelihood of winning that would be less than 1 percent," Ray Johnson said. "Basically, you'd have to prove the board's decision was made without any factual backup at all. ... There's virtually no chance it could be challenged in court."
    But there is another option for the company: Gary Johnson said Granite could file an amended application.
    In that scenario, there's a possibility the new application would need to be accompanied by some fresh technical studies, or edits of existing studies and environmental reports.
    Addressing that possibility, county spokesman Ray Smith said a new environmental impact report would have to be done.
    "The same studies could be resubmitted, with some caveats. But they would have to be reviewed by staff as completely new studies," he said.
    When Gary Johnson was asked whether Granite was willing to invest money in a new application ---- the company already has spent about $10 million to date ---- he said the company hasn't yet made a determination.
    He said the company's focus is on seeing the project approved and putting people to work.
    Granite has said the quarry will create 100 high-quality jobs and start a positive economic ripple effect in Southwest County because the mine will provide a new local source of aggregate rock material.
    Opponents of the project, a group that now includes the Temecula Valley Chamber of Commerce, say the economic benefits of the project are trumped up and largely illusory, because the mine could end up hurting the area's vibrant tourism industry, in part because of air pollution produced by the mine.
    If the board ends up overruling the commission and approving the project, Ray Johnson said the course of action is clear.
    Opponents would file a suit challenging the county's environmental review of the project, and Johnson, the attorney, said he is confident the suit would have a good chance of succeeding.
    The environmental documentation, he said, is woefully insufficient with regard to the cultural issues that have been brought up by the Pechanga Band of Luiseno Indians and the traffic studies that have been challenged by city of Temecula consultants.
    On the cultural issues, Pechanga leaders have said that the mine project would destroy land tied to its creation story.
    Granite has said the mine is proposed for land well away from the confluence of the Murrieta and Temecula creeks that is referenced in the story as the wellspring of the Pechanga people, essentially its "Garden of Eden."
    Ray Johnson said that argument probably will not prevail because there is documentation that shows the swath of land that the tribe considers sacred extends far beyond that confluence.
    "It's a much, much broader area than that," he said.
    The county Planning Department has defended its review of the project, saying that the large body of documentation produced meets both county and state requirements.
    Call staff writer Aaron Claverie at 951-676-4315, ext. 2624.