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NAP Officers’ E-Mail E-Mail Addresses Removed Schoonmaker Scholarship NAP Memorial Scholarship Walt Dougher Retires Forest Service Recommendation: No Rebuilding The U.S. Forest Service has recommended against permitting cabins to be rebuilt and that cabins spared by the Williams Fire should be phased out over the next ten years. Although the official comment period expired in November (we learned about it shortly after sending out the Oak Leaf Special), please write the following folks and protest this recommendation: Marty Dumpis, District Ranger Reference our lot number, 55M. More information from the San Dimas Canyon Improvement Association (cabin owners) and others can be found on our website. By the way, we sent a couple of e-mails urging letter writing as soon as we learned about the decision ... just in time to submit something before the end of the comment period. If you didn’t get them, send an e-mail to the editor’s e-mail address mentioned in the next article to receive future NAP mailings.
NAP Alumni Officers’ E-Mail Addresses In order to make it easier for you to contact the various NAP Alumni Officers we have created the following permanent e-mail addresses: Ok, Editor isn’t new. It has been around for a long time! Each e-mail address will forward any inbound e-mail to the person or persons filling that role.
Due to the ever increasing amount of spam (junk e-mail) sent to e-mail addresses harvested from the web, the Nu Alpha Phi website will no longer display any e-mail addresses. By the time you read this, I will have removed all e-mail addresses from the Oak Leaf archives, the Oak Leaf masthead, and the website itself. The NAP Alumni Directory will continue to provide access to Alumni e-mail addresses, but measures will be taken to make it extremely difficult for spammers to harvest them. I will also be working out a strategy for safely listing the Alumni Officer e-mail addresses described above.
I am pleased to report to you on the 2003-2004 Schoonmaker Scholarship. We have selected Timothy Anderegg, a junior from Grand Forks, North Dakota, to be honored as the Schoonmaker Scholar. Timothy Anderegg, a Nu Alpha Phi member, has chosen a major of Politics, and his extracurricular interests range from computer science to music. Timothy plays flute, and while he performed with the Pomona College band for a semester, he has recently taken up guitar with the aim of forming his own rock band. He is active with the Pomona College chapter of the ACLU, and he hopes to write for The Student Life next year. Timothy is studying in Prague this spring through Pomona College Study Abroad. On behalf of Pomona College, I thank you for acting as the liaison for the Schoonmaker Scholarship. As you know, the support of scholarships like the Schoonmaker makes it possible for the College to maintain its commitment to need-blind admissions and need-based financial aid. Sincerely, Christopher Michno I am pleased to report to you on the 2003-2004 Nu Alpha Phi Scholarship. We have selected the following third year students to be honored as the Nu Alpha Phi Scholars: Nicholas Dreves, from Tokyo, Japan; Thomas Kephart, from San Antonio, Texas; Alysha Lascano, from Aurora, Colorado; and Leeshai Lemish, from Columbus, Ohio. Nicholas Dreves is majoring in Economics and considering a career in International Business, is a starter on the Claremont Colleges Rugby team which is advised by Professor Fred Sontag. The 5 College Rugby team has played in the national tournament 4 years in a row, placing 3rd overall in 2002-2003. Nick enjoys surfing and rock climbing in his spare time. Aspiring to a career in journalism, Thomas Kephart cultivates many interests and possesses abundant energy. A Media Studies and Philosophy major, Thomas is quick to speak of his latest projects. This summer, Thomas recorded an album, began work on a memoir, a novella, and several short stories, began developing a website for Professor Sontag, and drew up plans for several film projects which has begun shooting this fall. Alysha Lascano, is majoring in Asian American Studies/History and coordinates the 5 College Amnesty International Club. Leeshai, who formed the Falun Gong University Club at Pomona College, anticipates a career in human rights activism. Leeshai publishes articles on the faluninfo.net website and co-edits the “Falun Gong in California” newsletter. We are proud of the accomplishments of Nicholas, Thomas, Alysha, and Leeshai. On behalf of Pomona College, I thank the Nu Alpha Phi Alumni for their generous gifts, which allow such high caliber students to attend this College. Christopher Michno Walt Dougher ‘57 #458 Retires City Council The Beach Reporter March 13, 2003 Manhattan Beach City Councilman Walt Dougher will be passing the torch March 18 to newly elected Councilman Mitch Ward. The transition out of office has been somewhat bittersweet for Dougher, who said there is much he will miss as a city official. Although he had the option to run for one more term, he chose to step away from city politics and spend more time enjoying his retirement. While on the council, Dougher cast his vote on a number of major issues ranging from the financial details of the Metlox development and the new public safety building to making policy decisions on the visual bulk of homes in the city, all of which he said he is proud of being involved with while on the dais. The Beach Reporter caught up with the 68-year-old former Edison regional public affairs manager this week to get his thoughts about the past four years as well as Manhattan Beach's future. The Beach Reporter: How are you feeling right now that you are less than a week away from your last day on the Council? Walt Dougher: Well, when you see all the smiling faces on the front of The Beach Reporter, it gives you a little mixed emotions, I think. You tend to think back on all of the good times and they far outweigh the difficult times in the past four years. New doors open. I'm still a very busy person. I'm on the Los Angeles County Beach Commission, the Coordinating Council board, Arts Manhattan board, the Salvation Army board, the Sister Cities board, so those things tend to take your time, but the council requirements were kind of onerous because I was the retired person. I would go to everything that the other people couldn't make. So I enjoyed that, but it filled up my calendar immensely. So we're going to kind of reacquaint ourselves in slow mode, Barbara and I, and spend a lot of time with the grandchildren and recharge the batteries. Who knows? Maybe in two years I'll run again. Oh really? So you're leaving the door open for a comeback? Certainly. Always leave the door open. It's just time for a change of scenery. Part of the bittersweetness of this whole thing is that you meet so many wonderful people and many of them are on the city staff. You get to know them well and work with them and kind of suffer along with them so those shared experiences, I think, result in strong friendships. I'll miss our regulars who come to the council meetings and the people we see all the time who share the Tuesdays with us. Some I will admit I will not miss that much, but just seeing them there, everything is right with the world and everything is in its place. Of course, there are some very nice rewards that you get like feeling good about some of the things that you do, knowing that people are going to benefit from it and that you had a part in that decision. But I think I was the only one who cried on the City Council in the last four years when I was mayor. It was during the 9/11 thing and all the things that were going on. I'll tell you it just triggered some emotions in me that were very, very difficult to suppress. I quavered a little bit during some of my talks about that, but I've tried to keep a balance and not keep that council so serious. I think there's always time for a little fun or a joke or an aside in a way so people are a little less serious. Is there a particular high point that you can recall from your time on the council? The high point is pretty much when I'm leaving. The Metlox and police and fire are on target. When you give birth to something, the gestation period is four or five years. When it finally comes time to give birth and you're watching from the sidelines, that's hard. But you do have the satisfaction of knowing that you're going to be invited. You will participate. There are some misgivings like why couldn't we solve this traffic situation, but we're doing some things that will definitely help. I don't think it'll ever be solved. It's just too late once the city is grown to make streets wider and I've found that it's like a big ball that you squeeze, you fix one little area and it moves somewhere else. It's people's nature to find the shortest distance between two points and very often that means cutting through Manhattan Beach to get there. So, short of creating more acceptable mass transit kinds of things, Manhattan Beach will live with traffic. Do you have any regrets or is there anything you feel like you didn't accomplish? I have very few regrets. Maybe a few things that you'd do slightly differently if you had the chance to open it up and remake the decision, but for the most part I will take the “atta boys” and the slings and arrows for all of the decisions that I made. One of the things I think people don't realize is that they have the ability to change the way you feel about an item on the agenda, either with what they say at one meeting or [what they say] over a long process like Metlox. It really changed my mind over how large that project should be. I was all for the larger version and over a period of time I was convinced that wasn't an acceptable version of that project. The trade-off is the city gets less money, but I just felt it wasn't an acceptable outcome, and now the city will be able to enjoy this wonderful Metlox development and get along fine with less money. Do you have any concerns about the future of that project? I was terribly disappointed that we lost by a few percentage points for the police and fire bond. Where that tends to impact with the state now having its financial problems is the potential of losing some tax work in the parks will just have to be pushed back. Manhattan Beach as I leave it is in good financial shape and that was, I know, one of the things my predecessors were always very concerned about. But we've remained financially viable. I'm kind of a spender though. To save money just for the sake of saving it for a rainy day--I think you spend it so people can enjoy the money that is basically the tax funds they have paid in over time. These are one-time opportunities that we have and I think if we're going to do it, let's do it right for something that is going to last for decades. These are difficult, costly decisions but you look at it and it's like your mortgage. What are some of the issues you feel will be facing the council down the road? Replacing me! You get better the longer you're on because you get this historic perspective and you get more comfortable just speaking your mind. Even after four years, it's still difficult to be the first person to say something about an issue. The challenges will continue to be keeping our infrastructure in good shape and that's one of the things I can say over the past four years the city has spent a lot of money on storm drains and the water system and streets, curbs and gutters, the kind of things you take for granted. You supported hearing a resolution at the last council meeting regarding a war with Iraq. Do you take a stand one way or another on the war? I think I would've changed some of the wording in the resolution Jim had. I'm fearful of the war and I think probably we may need one, but I feel that we should look in every way we can to stall that war or to make it unnecessary short of going to war. A discussion in the council chambers certainly I think would help clarify in my mind, but maybe clarify it for others in the community as well. No one wants war, but it's like gosh we've got to get rid of that guy. It's a difficult issue that affects every one of our lives unlike a lot of issues in this community that affect only a small number of people. I think it's worth a portion of a meeting to discuss that. Peace is so important to everybody. I think councils tend to be a little reluctant to think they can represent a consensus of the community on an issue like that and yet that's what they're elected to do. What would you say is the most valuable lesson you've learned while on the council? To be a good listener. Do your homework. Any advice you'd give to Mitch? Get organized. The requirements of a council member are much more than Tuesday nights. There’ll be a lot of demands on his time that I'm sure he doesn't anticipate at this time. Listen and be someone you can trust. | |||
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