Citizen’s Advisory Committee Meeting

Meeting Summary

7:00 PM on Monday, March 24, 2008

Open Space Authority Administration Office

6830 Via Del Oro, Suite 200, San Jose

Attendees:

Citizen Advisory Committee Members:

Name

Represent

Present

Absent

Susan McKuhen

District 1

-

Vacant

District 2

-

-

Jan Hintermeister

District 3

 

Eric Carruthers

District 4

-

Chris Kangas

District 5

-

Yacanex Posadas

District 6

-

Vacant

District 7

-

-

Vacant

Agriculture

-

-

Vacant

Business

-

-

Vacant

Civic Organizations

-

-

Daniel J. Kenney

Development Community

-

Gloria Dirkmaat

Education

-

David Poeschel

Environmental

-

Son Cheong (C.K.) Kuan

Labor

-

Dorsey Moore

Parks

-

Kitty Monahan

Trails

-

 

Totals

11

0

 

Other Attendees:

Board Liaison Present:

The Honorable Dr. Kulwant Gill – Director, District Seven

The Honorable Virginia Holtz – Director, District Five

Staff Present: Teri Rogoway, Coordinator of Interpretive Programs

Public Present: none

Action Items:

Task

Lead

Due Date

ü

From 3/24/08 Meeting:

 

 

 

  1. Go through  Bay Area Agricultural Land Conservation Agencies Program study and provide comments to Eric

All

 

April 28,2008

 

  1. Develop PowerPoint

Dorsey

April 10, 2008

ü

  1. Eric to do Member share at next meeting

Eric Carrruthers

April 28, 2008

 

 

1.       Call to Order – Dorsey Moore, Chairperson

A.      Approved excused absences – none

B.      Introduction of Guests – Dr. Kulwant Gill, Virginia Holtz, and Teri Rogoway.  Welcome new member Chris Kangas, District Five.

 

2.       Public Presentations for Items not Listed on the Agenda (Limit:  3 minutes)

      No public presentations were made but a request to return was made by Lynne Paulson.

 

3.   Approval of the Meeting Summary of Previous Meeting

·         Moved:  Kitty Second: Jan  Minutes: approved

 

4.  Presentation: Teri Rogoway, Coordinator of Interpretive Programs

a.        Background on Teri - Park Ranger, San Jose, Park Interpreter, State Parks in Santa Cruz, Youth Science Institute, Large Birds of Prey, County Park in New Almaden with Kitty, Park Interpreter for OSA with goal to provoke people to learn more about Nature,  Culture and History

b.        Coyote Ridge

·       Wanted to go and create programs for this area, but has found that there is a need for more in other areas besides Coyote Ridge

·       Adapted Silicon Valley program and has created a 3rd-6th grade curriculum for presentations for schools

§       Trial run at 10am inside the landfill gate on March 29th

§       Trained Silicon Valley Conservancy docents on how to run their own interpretive program

§       Plan to pull out of the SVC at the end of this season and let them run the program on their own

§       Using this as a pilot program to come up with a process on how to train docents

§       Modeled after the effective State Park docent training program

 

c.     Things done last summer

·       Nature Discovery Camp with Grandparents

·       Daily hike dependent on grandparents abilities/limitations

·       Each hike had a different topic:

·       People from the past, Reptiles, Predators and Prey, Insects, Plants in Our Park

 

d.     Blackford Elementary Special Education

·       Develop program to address both physical and developmental limitations

·       Currently working on curriculum for Special Needs children

 

e.     Halloween Celebration 2007

·       First time

·       75 participants

·       Activities included:  games, arts and crafts, and daylight trick or treating

·       Held at Rancho Canada

 

f.       Sayadinal Rose (tarantula) was passed around

 

g.     86 Presentations to 2558 people since last April.  Sample topics include:

1.  Native Americans                   8. Animal Sense            15. OSA

2.  Mountain Lions                      9.  Butterflies                 16.  Creepy Crawlers

3.  Elephant Seals                      10. Birds of Prey            17.  Habitats

4.  People from Past                   11. Folklore & Plants      18.  Bats

5.  Snakes                                 12.  Bugs                      19.  Tarantulas

6.  Predators/Prey                      13.  Astronomy in the Park

7.  Geology                                14.  Water Across the Landscape

 

h.     Other Things that have been done:

·       Aldo Leopold Education Project (out of Nebraska).  Teri is currently the California State trainer of trainers

·       Interpretation for Development of Special Needs presenter at the California parks Conference on April 2, 2008

·       Certified as an Interpreter for the National Association of Interpretation

 

i.       Future Plans

·       Docent and volunteer recruitment

·       Establishment of set menu of programs with creative options

·       Training for educators in the Aldo Leopold Education project

·       Development and implementation of programs of the Guadalupe River Project

 

j.       Teri requested that we each provide her with the name of a principal/school she could contact about providing interpretive program.  Preference is 3-6 grades, but will do K through college level.

 

k.     Eric went to Halloween event and stated he was very impressed by Teri’s people skills and program development.  He requested that Teri provide the group with a one to two page summary of her program/services we could use in approaching schools.

 

l.       Gloria offered to contact County Office of Education to get the word out.  She also suggested contact afterschool programs like YMCA and offering services.

 

m.   Susan suggested that Carmen Montano (formally of the OSA) be contacted as she had been a member of the Milpitas School Board.  This has been a hard district for Teri to get access to because of constraints on strangers coming into the schools.

 

n.     Kitty suggested looking at GATE programs in schools.

 

o.     David said that he felt guilty asking her to come to his child’s school and thought focus should be on schools were the need was greater.  He suggested possibly some schools could partner and even do fund-raisers to provide opportunities for “sister” school to go on field trips.

 

p.     Teri prefers classes that are 20-30 in size so animals can be handled

 

 

5.  Reports

A.   Board Liaison Report 

Ø     Dr. Gill

·         He had heard that the Henry Coe Park may be closed and Kitty said that current information on this indicates that there are things in the works that are looking at alternative ways of keeping the parks open.

Ø     Virginia Holtz

·           Reported that there had been a long discussion on the County Habitat Conservation Plan:

1)       Purpose – to ensure protection of habitat when construction occurs (i.e. building a bridge

2)       County will put in money for mitigation to buy land in another area to provide habitat for identified displaced plant/animal

3)       Stakeholders have a lot of solid experience and have been meeting for the last 2 years.

4)       Now at the stage of going to individual agencies to give status report and get direction on how to proceed.

5)       Virginia has a list of the meetings to be held in the community

6)       Discussion at last OSA Board meeting resulted in Patrick being directed to look for ways that the OSA could be part of the Habitat Conservation Plan as it is being developed (looking at determining how plan will be managed, day to day roles, etc.)

7)       A link at the county website will provide more information on this project.

 

·           CK asked for clarification if the project was just in the exploration stage and Virginia confirmed it was.

·           Dorsey asked Virginia if the OSA had finalized a decision about moving to another building site and Virginia confirmed the move would be in the next few months

 

 B.    Authority Staff Report  - None.

 

C.    Members

Ø         Eric

·       Attended the Annual State Family Farm Conference last month

·       Went on a tour of 3 specialty farms

Ø        Doctor from Kaiser made a presentation  about their commitment to buying food locally for use in their hospitals and providing space for farmer’s markets

Ø        An issue for farmers with small parcels is how to sell produce.  There is an organization called the “Grower’s Collaborative” that has set up a system to network with farmers and major consumers (i.e. Kaiser, Salinas School District)

·      American Planning Association

Ø        43,000 members

Ø        Last year adopted “food policy” to help build more self-reliant local food systems

Ø        Hand out on “Farming the City” was passed out

Ø        Beginning to permeate throughout local areas and supports OSA goals

-  Coyote Valley – City of San Jose and major land owners are stopping development

 

D.  CAC Chairperson:  Dorsey Moore

·      Last Tuesday San Jose City Council discussed recommendation to adopt Green Cities of California Sustainability Resolution  (so far there are 15 communities involved) with goals like purchasing recycled paper, getting rid of the use of single serving water containers, and purchasing locally grown food products.

·      Tour of Silicon Valley Conservancy site is scheduled for 4/13 at 8am

·      May CAC meeting has been moved to June 2 due to conflict with Labor Day holiday

 

6.    Member Presentation – Kitty Monahan

·         Born and raised in San Jose

·         Attended local Catholic Schools and joined a convent

·       For 19 years worked as a teacher in Jr. and Sr. high schools (including Overfelt High School)

·       Learned that humor was important and told story of student unscrewing everyone’s desk

·       Worked with students on political issues.  Took a group of students to the Board of Supervisors to get the Lake Cunningham Park established.

·       Moved in to help a friend in the Almaden area while her husband attended medical school and fell in love with the Almaden Quicksilver Park.  Worked to get $50K and got the county to hire someone to get a plan together for the park.

·         Credited Garnetta Annable for getting her into the Park and Red Commission and involved

·         Lessons learned:  Humor is important as well as persistence and kindness.

·       Really pushed the volunteer program.

·         Worked with Mike Honda and Garnetta for OSA.  Lost first attempt and then got it

·         Worked on the Guadalupe Historic Heritage Trail Park as well as many other trail projects.

·         On the Committee of Outdoor Recreation for parks that has 2300 new participants.

 

7.    Unfinished Business

A.       Bay Area Agricultural Land Conservation Organizations Study Program Project is completed .

1)        Eric asked that any corrections be emailed to him this week and all the agencies in the document were sent a copy and given two weeks to email any changes. There has been one feedback response from Santa Cruz. 

2)        Clarified that this was an informational report not a policy report. 

3)        Kitty asked about the disclaimer on page iii in the last sentence and Eric said the wording might be changed once the Board has approved it, but that would be up to the Board.