Bits and Pieces 57

Now that the bru ha ha has ended with the dog beach, I bet locals will go back to what they have done for years and continue to take their dog(s) to the beach and unbuckle the leash.

From now on it looks like there will again be fewer opportunities for enforcement types to be on the lookout for off leash dogs frolicking in the surf and on the sand.

I am feeling more comfortable with 463 being (sort of) equal to 463. Many of us have long considered that more on-campus parking spaces have been needed for some time, at Marymount College.

It looks like we may finally get our wish, whether we like the consequences or not.

With the approval of the "minor modification", we might actually see a Marymount footprint that looks absolutely nothing like the illustrations considered, for years, dealing with The Marymount College Facilities Expansion Project.

Our council, by a 4-1 vote, has basically overturned years of consideration, plans, debate, counsel and votes. I think there is no question any longer about the conservative nature of this council and their willingness to change history-making decisions that Marymount officials probably never were really very interested in, in the first place.

Since the vote and now a physical admittance that it was ALWAYS about having on-campus housing at Marymount's Palos Verdes Drive East campus, we all have learned to now only consider that whatever Marymount officials and supporters ask for is the last thing they will do at the college in Rancho Palos Verdes.

If does make for a more enlightened and calming setting for some of us, though.

You can throw away every illustration, made over the years, of the campus throughout each and every one of the proposed and approved phases of The Project.

Was the last ten years of dealings with city staff, the Planning Commission and various City Councils wasted? It certainly now looks that way, especially when you see the newest illustration of the 463 parking spaces proposed for the Marymount campus.

Money spent. Money gone. Time spent. Efforts wasted, in my opinion.

I do think we now have an opportunity to work together with everyone involved if we simply take what we all have learned, put it in the back of our minds and move on...knowing that what we thought we knew was bunk in the first place.

Lots of power pole work has been done and seems to be continuing along Western Avenue, recently.

I hope this means that our too frequent power failures find a very happy ending and homes and businesses using the same main circuits as the side of the street we live on, will end their decades-long short events of blackouts that have caused so many of us to have to reset our clocks and things, for the last 50 years or so.

For as long as I can remember, our side of the street and other specific sides of streets and houses and businesses sharing the same portion of the grid have had short spells of blackouts. I used to think that when the power went out, another car had crashed into a power pole along Western Avenue.

It has always also marveled us that our side of the street would lose power and we would look out across the street and power never seemed to be out, except in a major power failure that everyone suffers with.

I fee we have 'lucked out' this winter and spring as far as San Ramon Canyon and runoff goes. I don't know how long our luck will hold out and that is why I am supporting even an emergency 'fix' that might cost taxpayers a 'mere' 6 Million Dollars, while waiting for all the funds to come in for the permanent fix that MUST BE DONE.

I'm still wondering when the new Environmental Impact Report for Ponte Vista at San Pedro might come out.

Some may not know that the three model homes at Harbor Highlands are  now open and that 134-unit single-family, detached house, condominium project has homes for sale.

The starting prices begin in the "mid-500 K" range for the smallest of the three models.

So, there IS new housing construction going on. There are units sold and being sold at "360" along El Segundo Blvd. in Hawthorne.

Now, let's hope the jobs picture grows near all of us, sooner rather than later.

Youth productions continue to entertain lots of us, all around The Hill and below.

"Mame" opens this weekend at Miraleste I.S. and I have seen production notices from both high schools and from other youth groups in our area.

Please support all of the arts on The Hill and beyond.

The U.S.S. Iowa is heading to San Pedro in May! Work on it is ending at the port of Richmond, Ca and it will be towed to the inner harbor for more work and then being opened to the public, later this summer.

The good folks at The Pacific Battleship Center are looking for volunteers to work on the ship and on associated attractions and other things.

If you have the time, please consider helping out, if you can.