Palo Alto Weekly August 21, 2020

Palo Alto

Vol. XLI, Number 46 Q August 21, 2020

Lightning-sparked fires engulf area in smoke Page 5

w w w. P a l o A l t o O n l i n e.c o m

IN SIDE UE TH I S I S S

Read up-to-the-minute news on PaloAltoOnline.com Q Upfront Police chief: Some reforms go too far Page 7 Q Arts Choirs keep harmonies alive on Zoom Page 20 Q Title Pages Indie booksellers mark resilience on Aug. 29 Page 28

on your list of safe places to go “Stanford Medicine is probably one of the safest places you can be.

We are taking every precaution.”

—Mary Hawn, MD | Chair of the Department of Surgery, Stanford Medicine

At Stanford Health Care, we are raising standards at our locations throughout the Bay Area to create a safe environment for our patients and staff.

U.S. News & World Report recognizes Stanford Health Care among the top hospitals in the nation. Ranking based on quality and patient safety.

• Employees are tested for COVID-19 using methods developed by Stanford Medicine.

• Waiting rooms and clinics are arranged for physical distancing.

• Every individual entering our facilities is given a mask and screened for symptoms of COVID-19. Those with symptoms are directed to a separate waiting area.

• A restricted visitor policy and expanded access to video visits limit the number of people passing through.

• Appointment check-in is available through the MyHealth app, reducing patient queues and use of shared devices.

• Medical teams have sufficient personal protective equipment (PPE), including gowns, gloves, and masks.

• Patients are tested before all procedures and surgeries and when visiting the emergency room.

• Enhanced cleaning measures are in place, utilizing chemicals and UV light.

• Specialized filtration systems eliminate the circulation of airborne contaminants.

We are prepared to provide healthcare through this crisis, with safe in-person care and convenient video visits.

To learn more about how we are adapting care, visit: stanfordhealthcare.org/resumingcare

Page 2 • August 21, 2020 • Palo Alto Weekly • www.PaloAltoOnline.com

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www.sccgov.org/cvtestingfaq

Page 4 • August 21, 2020 • Palo Alto Weekly • www.PaloAltoOnline.com

Upfront

Local news, information and analysis

Eshoo: ‘It’s an election theft in progress’ Congresswoman plans to vote ‘yes’ on bill to fund USPS

by Lloyd Lee and Jocelyn Dong

A

administration’s attempt to “hijack” democracy by undermining the U.S. Postal Service.

With the general election less than three months away, Eshoo said that it was critical to support a service that’s expected to receive

Magali Gauthier

head of a House session this Saturday, Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Palo Alto, held a press conference on Tuesday morning in front of the downtown Palo Alto post office to address what she labeled as the Trump

an unprecedented number of mailin ballots due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

“This fall, the Postal Service will have another task that is vital to our democracy: ensuring the timely delivery of millions of absentee ballots for the general election,” she said.

Eshoo will join fellow House representatives on Aug. 22 in Washington, D.C., to vote on the Delivering

Smoke from wildfires burning outside of Santa Clara County is visible from Page Mill Road in Palo Alto on Aug. 18.

PUBLIC SAFETY

Lightning-sparked fires spread smoke over the Midpeninsula Multiple blazes covering 10K acres in San Mateo, Santa Cruz counties affect local air quality

by Sue Dremann

S

moke from multiple fires burning in the Santa Cruz Mountains and a major fire in San Mateo County entered Palo Alto and other surrounding communities on Tuesday night and has remained.

Stanford Department of Public Safety announced on Wednesday that the Dish area is closed to hikers due to smoke. The city of Palo Alto announced on Twitter on Wednesday evening that Arastradero Preserve and Foothills Park were closed until further notice due to the unhealthy air quality.

Lightning strikes early Sunday morning started the blazes in northern Santa Cruz and southern San Mateo counties, according to Cal Fire. Some of those fires have since merged.

The CZU August Lightning Complex has burned 40,000 acres and is not contained, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire). The fire has destroyed 20 structures and threatens more than 8,600.

More than 28,000 people have evacuated, including residents of the town of Bonny Doon, where structures have burned.

Fire officials ordered evacuations in parts of Santa Cruz and San Mateo counties. As of Wednesday at 8 p.m., mandatory evacuations in San Mateo County included South Skyline Boulevard near state Highway 9; Russian Ridge Open Space Reserve; Middleton Tract; Portola Redwoods State Park and the Portola Heights Community

area; Loma Mar and Dearborn Park; Pescadero Creek County Park; Butano Community area; Butano State Park, including Barranca Knolls community; Pescadero Beach area; Bean Hollow; Pescadero; San Gregorio; La Honda; Russian Ridge Open Space Preserve; Skylonda and Langley Hill.

Residents in Palo Alto who smelled smoke on Tuesday became so alarmed that the city of Palo Alto sent a message to the public at about 8 p.m. stating there was no fire in Palo Alto.

“We recommend that you call 9-1-1 if you see fire or if there is an emergency. Due to the poor air quality, residents should keep their windows closed and limit outdoor activity,” the city said in the statement.

for America Act, which was introduced by Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney, D-New York, to maintain the standards and level of service the Postal Service had in place prior to the pandemic and halt any further changes.

The bill would also provide $25 billion in much-needed funding for the federal agency. Eshoo said she expects the bill to receive bipartisan support.

Mayor Adrian Fine said that he had learned that the Postal Service was planning to remove 70% of Palo Alto’s post boxes before it agreed to delay the plan for several months. City Manager Ed Shikada told the council on Monday the city had received confirmation earlier that day that “the removal that has been in the works has been delayed (continued on page 34)

DEVELOPMENT

Anyone looking to find relief from the smoky conditions can visit the city’s cooling center at the Mitchell Park Community Center’s El Palo Alto room, 3700 Middlefield Road, which was initially opened for residents to find relief from the heat wave. The center was scheduled to be open multiple days this week, including 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Friday.

Anyone who visits the center is asked to wear a face mask and keep physical distance from others. More information is available at cityofpaloalto.org.

The town of Los Altos Hills issued a message to residents on Wednesday that a fire is currently burning in a southeast direction into Boulder Creek and toward Ben Lomond. The fire is located at the Highway 9 and Bear Creek Road intersection in Santa Cruz County, about 3.5 miles from the Santa Clara County border.

An increase in winds could push the fire toward the community of Ben Lomond, Scotts Valley and the Santa Clara County line, the town noted.

Another set of fires, the SCU Lightning Complex, are burning in the eastern part of Santa Clara County and have so far engulfed 102,000 acres, threatening 3,798 structures, according to Cal Fire.

The complex str etches from Santa Clara County to Alameda, Contra Costa, San Joaquin and Stanislaus counties. The fire began Aug. 16 at 4 a.m. and was 5% contained as of 7 p.m. on Wednesday.

Evacuation orders have been issued for areas in the eastern part of the county around the Mt. Hamilton area and east of San Jose city limits.

The county Fire Department coordinates with Cal Fire, the county Emergency Operations Center (EOC), local law enforcement and fire partners, and California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services. If the fire hits the Santa Clara County

by Gennady Sheyner s Castilleja School moves ahead with its plan to rebuild its campus in the Old Palo Alto neighborhood, school leaders are offering a series of revisions to try to appease the project’s loudest critics, including reducing the size of a proposed garage, preserving more trees and retaining two buildings that were previously slated for demolition.

But with two Palo Alto’s commissions now reviewing the latest plans in the school’s yearslong effort, one aspect remains constant: opposition from a vocal group of residents in the Professorville and Old Palo Alto neighborhoods.

Even with the recent changes, the Castilleja project remains too big and too dense and would bring too many cars to their neighborhood, opponents maintain.

The Final Environmental Impact Report for the Castilleja expansion, which the city released last month, was the subject of public hearings by the Architectural Review Board on Thursday morning, which focused largely on the design of the proposed Bryant Street campus. The Planning and Transportation Commission will review the report on Aug. 26 and will consider, among other things, a new conditional-use permit that would allow Castilleja to increase enrollment — the school is seeking to accommodate up to either 506 or 540 students (22% or 30%

(continued on page 29)

(continued on page 10)

Castilleja plan draws mixed reviews School shrinks planned garage, limits special events

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www.PaloAltoOnline.com • Palo Alto Weekly • August 21, 2020 • Page 5

Upfront 450 Cambridge Ave., Palo Alto, CA 94306 (650) 326-8210

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When you’re in a fight, there are many things that happen — some intentional, some unintentional.

—Robert Jonsen, Palo Alto police chief, on proposed police reform policies. See story on page 7.

Around Town COMMITTED TO FITNESS ...

Restaurants aren’t the only establishments that have brought their services outdoors during COVID-19. Gyms have recently joined the trend by bringing their exercise equipment out in the open, including the Oshman Family Jewish Community Center.

Ellipticals, treadmills, rowing machines and other equipment from the center’s Goldman Sports and Wellness Complex are set up outside and available for members’ use. The JCC also has set up a strength-training area under a shade that includes weights and lifting stations. “We have offered outdoor workouts and classes before; however, the ‘outdoor gym’ we have set up this time — we have not done anything like this before,” Todd Milton, the complex’s director, said in an Aug. 13 press release. JCC staff are keeping physical distance between members and maintaining cleaning practices throughout the south Palo Alto campus in response to the health crisis. Procedures also have been changed at the JCC’s Bill Heller Outdoor Pool to comply with health guidelines. The center has plans to bring back group exercise sessions at Freidenrich Community Park followed by interval, zumba and cycling classes.

QUIET REFLECTION ... Religious groups have had to dramatically readapt their traditions since the coronavirus pandemic hit and the Dawoodi Bohras of San Jose is no exception. The group, which during regular times meets at its mosque in south Palo Alto, has adjusted its practices for ‘Ashara Mubaraka, which translates to Blessed 10, a 10-day period of reflection that began on Aug. 19 and kicks off the Islamic New Year. The changes are a dramatic departure from normal customs for the roughly 150-family congregation that practices Shia Islam and is mainly composed of members scattered across the south bay. What is usually a solemn gathering for the believers who remember the martyrdom of Imam Hussein, the grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, will instead take place at their respective homes. “It is a period of gaining education and spiritual reflection,” said Zoaib Rangwala, who has been involved

with the local Dawoodi Bohras group since its founding in 2000.

For two hours and 15 minutes each day, they will watch recorded sermons by the current leader of the community, Syedna Mufaddal Saifuddin, and the past two leaders. During normal times, the congregation would have gathered for two meals cooked by members of the mosque daily over the 10-day period, which requires fasting from sunrise to sunset. This year, some members of the local community will prepare the food ahead of time at the mosque’s commercial kitchen, then distribute the meals to around a dozen pickup sites between San Francisco and Gilroy. The group also has offered a helping hand to the community during the pandemic in recent months, including donating roughly 200 hand-sewn face masks to East Palo Alto residents and seniors at the Palo Alto Gardens apartment complex and delivering a pizza lunch to Palo Alto police officers.

A HERO’S REWARD ... The Four Seasons Hotel Silicon Valley plans to pull out all the stops for one special essential worker through a “dream celebration.” The East Palo Alto hotel is accepting nominations for a community hero who will be treated to a special event, such as a milestone birthday, wedding, graduation party or other occasion, worth $50,000 with the help of its staff and partner companies.

“We are empowering people to nominate (or self-nominate) a community hero who we could provide a fully specialized intimate event,” General Manager Florian Riedel said in a statement. “It could be your friend who has been delivering food to elderly; a neighbor who spearheaded home schooling for local kids; a first responder; or someone you know who is making (a) positive impact and who has put themselves above others during this difficult time.”

The event will take place before Dec. 31, 2021, on a date agreed on by the hotel and the winner, pending local health orders.

Along with the venue, the winner also will receive a customized menu by Executive Chef Martín Morelli, entertainment, flowers and photography and videography services. Submissions will be accepted through Sept. 15 at woobox.com/2strop. Q

Upfront LAW ENFORCEMENT

Some recommended police reforms go too far, Palo Alto chief warns City Council looks to align agency’s policies with recommendations in 8 Can’t Wait campaign

by Gennady Sheyner

W

hen protests against police brutality and racial injustice rippled across the nation in June, the Palo Alto Police Department swiftly responded by banning officers from using the carotid hold, a grappling move that shuts off blood flow to the brain.

But as the City Council prepares to adopt broader police reforms on Monday, the department is pushing back against some of the proposals on the table. These include a proposed policy that would ban officers from using any tactics that restrict blood flow to the head or neck and another that requires officers to exhaust “all alternatives” before firing their weapons at someone.

Bot h cha nges were

recommended by the city’s Human Relations Commission, which last month reviewed department policies for consistency with 8 Can’t Wait, a platform issued by Campaign Zero, a police-reform movement that came out of the 2014 police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. Both are facing resistance from Palo Alto police, which is proposing alternative language that would give officers more flexibility.

Among the biggest disagreements between the commission and Palo Alto police is the proposed change to the department’s chokehold policy. The agency already trains its officers not to use chokeholds and strangleholds, and now

the carotid hold (in which pressure is applied on the carotid arteries in the side of the neck).

While the department supports making the ban on strangleholds and chokeholds more explicit in its policy manual, the Human Relations Commission recommended on July 22 that the city go further and also ban “vascular neck restraints, chest compression and other tactics that restrict blood flow or neck.”

Various other police departments have already adopted broader policies on strangulation. The Human Relations Commission proposal largely mirrors the policy already in place in Miami, Florida. New York City established the crime of

ELECTION 2020

Councilman faces complaint over campaign contributions State agency yet to determine whether to investigate the accusations

M

onths before Greg Tanaka formally declared his intention to run for another term on the Palo Alto City Council, he received a New Year’s Eve gift from a group of local developers: campaign contributions totaling $13,000.

The contributions included $3,000 from 1050 Page Mill Road Property LLC, an entity associated with Sand Hill Property Company, and four Greg Tanaka $2,500 checks from four corporations associated with prominent landowners Thoits Brothers and Sal Giovannotto.

More checks came in two weeks later. Jon Goldman of Premier Properties contributed $2,500 to Tanaka on Jan. 14, while investor Richard Karp contributed $10,000.

The trend accelerated this summer after Tanaka declared his candidacy. After receiving $14,699 in total contributions as of June 30, Tanaka brought in $35,000 between July 29 and Aug. 12. He received $5,000 checks from Brad Ehikian, Charles “Chop” Keenan and John McNellis, all of whom are prominent downtown developers. Michael Powers, a partner in McNellis’ real estate firm, contributed an additional $5,000, while developer Roxy Rapp contributed $10,000 to the Tanaka campaign.

On Aug. 12, Tanaka received two more contributions: $2,500 from Ventana Property Services, a property management company,

by Gennady Sheyner and $1,000 from Christian Hansen, property manager for Wheatley Properties, according to his campaign finance documents.

Support from the developer community isn’t new for Tanaka, who has generally been associated with the council’s more pro-growth faction. In recent years, he voted to repeal downtown’s office cap and he opposed a 2018 citizen initiative that reduced the citywide cap on office and research-and-development growth from 1.7 million square feet to 850,000 square feet by 2030. He has also championed programs to help businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic, including a grant program for small businesses and reduction of utility bills.

At the same time, Tanaka is now facing scrutiny for the December 2019 and January 2020 contributions, which he collected well before his new campaign committee was established. Campaign

documents show that all of those contributions were made to the campaign, “Tanaka for Palo Alto City Council in 2016.” He didn’t file his candidate intention statement, known as Form 501, until July 11, according to the documents. He filed his Form 460, establishing a reelection committee, the following day.

By law, a candidate is required to file a Form 501 “before soliciting or receiving any contributions (including loans) or expending any funds,” according to an election guide put out by the Office of the City Clerk.

Earlier this month, the Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) received an anonymous complaint against Tanaka’s campaign, alleging that he had failed to follow the rules when he accepted funding before creating a reelection committee. (continued on page 29)

CityView A round-up

of Palo Alto government action this week

City Council (Aug. 17)

2353 Webster St.: The council approved a proposal allowing the demolition of a home at 2353 Webster St. and construction of a two-story home. The council also approved a series of conditions to protect a valley oak on the property, including a requirement for the arborist to be on the site during demolition and that the ceiling height at the basement level be reduced to 8 feet. Yes: DuBois, Kniss, Kou, Tanaka No: Cormack, Fine, Kou

“aggravated strangulation” for an officer who is involved in “criminal obstruction of breathing or blood circulation, or uses a chokehold or similar restraint, and causes serious physical injury or death.”

Police Chief Robert Jonsen said that while he supports explicitly banning chokeholds, strangleholds and other techniques that create pressure in the neck area, he does not support a broader prohibition on actions that restrict breathing.

He told the commission that under its proposed change, an officer may fall on an individual during a fight and restrict oxygen flow just by virtue of their body weight. This, he said, should not constitute a policy violation.

“When you’re in a fight, there are many things that happen — some intentional, some unintentional,” Jonsen said. “But you’re really going to restrict an officer’s ability to defend themselves if they’re concerned about every part of their body potentially restricting oxygen.”

Commission Chair the Rev. Kaloma Smith and Commissioner

Steven Lee both favored the broader restriction, with Smith pointing to the 2014 killing of Eric Garner in New York City as an example of why the city should take a more explicit stance against blocking oxygen flow during arrests.

Responding to Jonsen’s objection, Smith said that anyone reviewing an incident in which an officer falls on another person and restricts that person’s breathing will likely be able to tell that the restriction is not intentional.

“We’ve seen several highprofile cases where chokeholds were used,” Smith said. “I’d love to see this language in the policy to show people that this is detrimental action and that even in a scramble, it’s not something that we advocate for.”

The commission also recommended that Palo Alto follow San Francisco’s example and adopt a policy that allows officers to use deadly force “only as a last resort when reasonable alternatives have been exhausted or not feasible to (continued on page 29)

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Architectural Review Board (Aug. 20)

Castilleja School: The board held its first public hearing to discuss the proposal from Castilleja School to rebuild its campus at 1310 Bryant St. and construct an underground garage. The board will continue its hearing on Sept.

17. Action: None

www.avenidas.org www.PaloAltoOnline.com • Palo Alto Weekly • August 21, 2020 • Page 7

Upfront ELECTION 2020

Former district principal is running for school board In bid, parent Matt Nagle aims to prioritize minority students

by Elena Kadvany

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att Nagle, a former Juana Briones Elementary School principal, longtime educator and district parent, has announced he’s making a bid for a seat on the Palo Alto school board in the November election.

Nagle, who was Juana Briones’ principal from 2009 to 2012, said he was motivated to run by his son, a rising Gunn High School freshMatt Nagle man and Mexican American student, and other minority students who he feels are poorly served by the district.

“I’m really seeking to improve the academic outcomes of Latino, Black and low-income students,” he said in an interview. “After all these decades, every Latino, Black and low-income student should share in the same school success that the majority of students are experiencing in Palo Alto.”

He said the school board needs “diverse, experienced educational

leaders” now more than ever, with unprecedented disruption and uncertainty due to the coronavirus.

Nagle started his career as a teacher in the 1990s, following in the footsteps of his mother, a lifelong kindergarten teacher. Nagle’s wife, Claudia Peñaloza, is also a teacher in Escondido Elementary School’s Spanish immersion program. He worked as an elementary school principal in Saratoga and San Jose before arriving at Juana Briones, where he said he was proud of increasing enrollment and bringing a “resurgence and a rejuvenation in energy” to the school.

He left Juana Briones in 2012 because he wanted to move to Marin County, he said. The Weekly reported in 2012 that the announcement of his departure followed tensions at the school, “apparently precipitated by Nagle’s controversial recommendation not to renew the contract of a popular school librarian,” which led to other staff members coming forward with complaints.

Nagle and his daughter moved to Marin County, where he served as principal at West Marin Elementary

in the Shoreline Unified School District for six years. He credited the Shoreline school district with helping his daughter thrive more than she had in Palo Alto Unified.

He described the state of the Palo Alto school district at the time as “the hinges were coming off,” pointing to a student suicide cluster, federal Office for Civil Rights investigations into sexual misconduct and concerns about management and transparency. He said the district has improved since that time but thinks “the board has just begun changing its culture,” which also motivated him to run.

“It seems the current board has stopped most of the bleeding, but they still have a ways to go,” Nagle said.

Nagle’s departure from West Marin Elementary was controversial. He sued the district, alleging he was demoted in retaliation for running against the county’s superintendent of schools. He had been reassigned to a teaching position after losing his bid to unseat Superintendent of Schools Mary Jane Burke. During the campaign, he was critical of her and her response

to closing the achievement gap, according to news articles.

Nagle told the Weekly he “upset the status quo of Marin County” and allegedly the school board had colluded with Burke against him.

The district settled with him earlier this year for $700,000, according to a Point Reyes Light article.

In 2015, Nagle also ran for a seat on the Tamalpais Union High School District board of trustees and lost narrowly in a recount.

The through-line in Nagle’s educational career and political aspirations, he said, is closing the achievement gap. He criticized the current Palo Alto board’s approach to this issue, stating that the members “ignore” minority and lowincome students and “treat them in a deficit model, as damaged, when that’s not the case.”

If elected, he said he would focus on personal, direct engagement with minority and low-income students and their families. He said he wants to use a Google form to solicit feedback and better understand their experiences.

“We need to get their stories and their narratives,” Nagle said. “Too many of our board members talk about data. They only mean quantitative data, which is numbers. My son is not a number.”

As a parent and the spouse of a teacher, Nagle feels firsthand both the pressures and risks of reopening schools.

“I have both forces pushing on me: one force of, I don’t want my wife, a teacher, to get ill or get me

ill, and the other force is I don’t want my son to languish and wither away at home when he should be in school,” Nagle said. “But the question is and my goal is: Can we make it safe enough to bring small groups of students back initially and then larger groups later by June 2021?”

He said the school board should direct the superintendent and staff to come up with “viable” options for bringing small groups of students back to school when safe. He thinks teachers, staff and parents need to have an “honest conversation” about the likelihood that schools could be physically closed for the entire school year.

“I’m certainly not in favor of that, even with the risk to my health and the risk to my wife’s health. I’m not in favor of keeping kids out of school until June 2021,” he said.

Nagle is not filing an official candidate statement, nor is he accepting campaign donations. He’s instead asking people to donate to nonprofits he is passionate about or has connections to.

Nagle is also currently enrolled in the Doctorate for Educational Leadership for Social Justice program at California State University, East Bay. Nagle is one of six candidates running for three open seats on the school board: incumbents Todd Collins and Jennifer DiBrienza and newcomers Karna Nisewaner, Jesse Ladomirak and Katie Causey. Q Staff Writer Elena Kadvany can be emailed at ekadvany@ paweekly.com.

ELECTION 2020

Race heats up for Ravenswood school board Meet the seven candidates vying for two spots in East Palo Alto/east Menlo Park district

Summer Sale

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Page 8 • August 21, 2020 • Palo Alto Weekly • www.PaloAltoOnline.com

by Elena Kadvany even candidates have set seat in this election.

Alexander, a teacher since 1992, their sights on a seat on the Ravenswood City School has worked in Ravenswood since District Board of Education, in- the early 2000s, first as a teacher, cluding one incumbent and six then an instructional coach in science, math and reading. The adnewcomers.

The terms of board members ministrative role provided her with Sharifa Wilson and Marielena a taste of having influence over Gaona Mendoza are ending in No- more than just one classroom of vember. Wilson confirmed she is students each year. In 2018, she not running for reelection after 12 was among the teachers, parents years on the board; Gaona Men- and community members who raldoza plans to run for a second term. lied against renewing the contract “It’s time for some new blood” on of former Superintendent Gloria the school board, Wilson said. “It’s Hernandez-Goff.

“I didn’t like the way it seemed time for the younger people to step up and serve in public office in this that students and teachers seemed to be the last thing on the school community.

“East Palo Alto (has) had a long board’s mind, not the first. I decided tradition of community engagement I wanted to have more influence,” and community involvement,” Wil- Alexander said of her motivation son said. “I want to make sure that to try for the seat on the Board of Education. that continues to happen.”

Alexander now works as a lanBelow are the seven candidates who will be seeking votes this Elec- guage and literacy specialist in the San Mateo-Foster City School tion Day, Nov. 3.

District.

She’s running on a slate with Joel Bronwyn Alexander Rivera, a construction labor manBronwyn Alexander left her long- ager and husband of a Ravenswood time job at Belle Haven Elementary teacher. The Ravenswood teachers School in Menlo Park last year so she could run for a school board (continued on page 30)

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Upfront

Castilleja (continued from page 5)

more than currently allowed) — and set limits on special events held at the school.

The expansive environmental document includes a new alternative that, along with a smaller underground garage, distributes drop-off and pick-up spots to three locations: the garage and looped driveways on Bryant Street and Kellogg Avenue.

The alternative also allows Castilleja to preserve two homes on Bryant Street that would have been taken down under the prior plan.

The group PNQLNow (Preserve Neighborhood Quality of Life Now), which consists of residents opposing the Castilleja project, acknowledged on its website that that the revised plan would save the two Emerston Street homes, but it also indicated that it continues to oppose the expansion.

For PNQLNow, both enrollment

and special events have been sore subjects. Many members repeatedly point to the school’s past failure to comply with the enrollment limit in its current conditional-use permit, a violation that prompted the city to issue a $265,000 fine in 2013.

PNQLNow members also have repeatedly criticized the school for holding too many events, which inundate the neighborhood with cars. The group notes on the website that some of the events at Castilleja are for 500 to 700 people.

“The impact on the neighborhood can’t be understated,” PNQLNow states on its website.

According to data provided by Castilleja, slightly more than half of the roughly 100 events that it holds annually have between 50 and 100 attendees. The rest have been attended by more than 100 people.

Castilleja’s calendars of special events show that the school held 119 special events in the 20142015 school year, 101 in the 20152016, and 100 in the 2016-2017.

Lorraine Brown, director of communications and community relations at Castilleja, said the events are publicized to neighbors on the school’s website, as required by the school’s conditional-use permit. Although she did not have a list of the events in 2018-2019 similar to the prior years, a tally of the events on the online calendar showed 109 events.

Castilleja’s existing permit allows up to five major events per year, which almost all students and their parents attend, potentially bringing more than 1,000 people to the campus. This includes Back to School Night, Founder Day Luncheon and Commencement. The school plans to keep that restriction in place, according to the Final Environmental Impact Report.

The school also proposes to limit to 90 the number of special events it holds with 50 or more guests each year.

Under the proposed conditions, Castilleja would have no events on campus on Sundays, although it expects to hold 22 events on

Saturdays throughout the school year, according to the environmental report. Athletic competitions would only take place on weekdays and would be complete by 8 p.m.

For events that bring between 50 and 80 guests on campus during normal instruction hours, Castilleja would prepare a plan to identify parking spaces that are not used by students in space.

For events that occur outside of instructional hours and have fewer than 160 guests, all parking would be provided on site. For events in the off-hours with more than 160 guests, Castilleja would “use best efforts” to park at satellite parking locations that would provide at least one space for every 1.3 guests, as well as offer shuttle services and traffic monitors to direct event traffic.

Brown noted that Castilleja has already been relying on some offsite parking locations.

Some employees park at First Presbyterian Church on Cowper Street and then walk to campus.

And for events, the school has

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a cooperative relationship with Palo Alto High for when overflow parking is needed, she said.

“For the most part, however, we do not need that parking because for almost all events, cars have been accommodated on Spieker Field (the grass field adjacent to Embarcadero),” Brown said in an email. “For the few all-school events when we need extra parking, Paly has approved the overflow, and we’ve offered shuttles to our campus from Paly.”

On Thursday, there was little neighborhood consensus about Castilleja’s plan. Some residents told the Architectural Review Board that they appreciate Castilleja’s efforts in listening to the neighbors and adjusting its plans based on feedback, while others suggested that the project would be detrimental to both the neighborhood and the city at large.

Nancy Tuck, a Melville Avenue resident who supports the project, lauded the school for being an “excellent neighbor” and argued that the new campus would be “far more aesthetically pleasing” than what exists today.

“This smaller, less impactful project is a result of successful collaboration toward the shared goals to improve the neighborhood and the campus,” Tuck said.

Others remained unpersuaded.

Mary Sylvester, a member of PNQLNow, said that while she enjoys living near the school, she believes Castilleja’s expansion plan, including the new garage, are not consistent with the city’s Comprehensive Plan. On balance, she said, the costs of Castilleja’s expansion to Palo Alto “do not justify the benefits to a small portion of Palo Alto residents.”

Kimberly Wong, who lives on Emerson Street, called the proposed campus “monstrous.”

“This project does not take into consideration neighborhood livability as residents need to bear the brunt of traffic and noise brought in by this massive project,” Wong said.

The board largely agreed that the revised project represents an improvement over the prior proposal, though members also said they would also like to see further design changes, particularly along the school’s Kellogg Avenue façade. Several board members suggested that the massing of the campus along Kellogg should be broken up and requested more details about the school’s landscape plan.

Board Chair Peter Baltay said that it’s not enough for the new campus to simply be superior to the dormitory buildings that were constructed in the 1960s. The city, he said, should hold Castilleja to a higher standard.

“It’s not enough though just do better than before,” Baltay said.

“Castilleja has been around for a long time and they’re a valuable member of our community. We want them to do right by us.” Q Staff Writer Gennady Sheyner can be emailed at gsheyner@ paweekly.com.

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Richard A. Heddleson October 4, 1950 – August 3, 2020 Richard Heddleson died in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, on August 3, 2020, at the age of 69. He was graduated by Johns Hopkins University and received his MBA from Harvard University. He met his wife Linda in Baltimore in 1974 at Equitable Trust Company. The couple moved to California where Richard worked in finance for companies including BankAmerica Corporation, Radius, Resumix, ReSound, Evoke Software, Visioneer, and 3dfx Interactive. In 2004, the family moved to Pennsylvania, where Richard was Regional Director for Ben Franklin Transformation Partners.

Richard is survived by his wife Linda; his children Emily, Caroline Martin (Andrew), and Ace; his grandson Arthur Martin; his mother Mary Ann; and three sisters. He is predeceased by his father Clement.

Contributions can be made to an organization of choice, including two identified by the family: Mental Health America PA and Children’s Literacy Initiative.

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Pulse

A weekly compendium of vital statistics

POLICE CALLS Palo Alto

Aug. 13-Aug. 19 Violence related Roosevelt Circle, 6/30, 7:57 p.m.; child abuse/sexual.

Vista Avenue, 8/9, 12:11 a.m.; domestic violence.

Colorado Avenue, 8/10, 4:13 p.m.; family violence/assault.

San Antonio Road, 8/13, 6:58 a.m.; domestic violence/battery.

Old Trace Court, 8/15, 4:40 p.m.; domestic violence/battery.

Theft related Commercial burglaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Grand theft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 Grand theft attempt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Identity theft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Petty theft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Residential burglaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Shoplifting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Vehicle related Auto recovery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Auto theft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Bicycle theft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Driving w/ suspended license. . . . . . . . 6 Hit and run . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Lost/stolen plates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Theft from auto . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Harvey Cobb

Mary Wilcox

June 17, 1928 – August 9, 2020

April 2, 1928 – August 4, 2020

On Sunday August 9, 2020, Harvey Lowell Cobb passed away. Harvey was born on June 17, 1928 at Palo Alto Hospital and was the second child of William Clifford Cobb and Gertrude Wyman Cobb. Harvey was proud of his California heritage.

Harvey grew up in Palo Alto, sharing many stories from his youth, he enjoyed tinkering with and driving his hot rods, playing golf in Junior High School at the Los Altos Country Club, playing on University Avenue and the surrounding areas. Harvey enjoyed hunting and fishing his entire life, and spending time with his family and friends. Harvey’s favorite place was a property in La Honda where he would enjoy the beautiful outdoors.

He graduated from Palo Alto High School in 1944.

He continued his education at Cal Poly and returned home to Palo Alto after his time in San Luis Obispo.

After returning from college, he started working in the construction industry, building many commercial and municipal properties throughout his career.

Harvey worked on projects throughout Palo Alto and the surrounding areas including the original Hewlett Packard building on Page Mill Rd., Gunn High School, the Walnut Creek BART station, and De Anza College, just to mention a few.

Around 1950, he met Elizabeth Geng, also from Palo Alto, and they were married on July 3, 1952. The couple moved to Sunnyvale where they had their two daughters, Christine and Carol. In 1963, the Cobb family moved to Saratoga, where they remained happily married for 68 years. He is survived by his loving wife, Elizabeth Geng Cobb and his two daughters, Carol Ahrens, Christine Strachan, his son-in-laws, Kent Ahrens, Steve Strachan. His three grandchildren, Jessica Buchanan, Lisa Strachan and Kate Strachan.

He was a wonderful husband, father, and grandfather, loved by all.

A private service will be held at Alta Mesa Memorial Park Tuesday, August 18th at 11:00am.

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Theft from auto attempt . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Vehicle accident/minor injury . . . . . . . . 7 Vehicle accident/prop damage. . . . . . . 5 Vehicle tow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Alcohol or drug related Driving under influence . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Drunk in public . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Possession of drugs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Possession of paraphernalia . . . . . . . . 2 Miscellaneous Found property. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Lost property . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Misc. penal code violation . . . . . . . . . . 1 Outside investigation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Psychiatric subject . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Suspicious circumstances . . . . . . . . . . 3 Unattended death. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Vandalism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Warrant/other agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Menlo Park

Aug. 12-Aug. 18

Mary Kiki Wilcox, born in San Francisco in 1928, died on August 3, 2020, in Palo Alto, CA. She was predeceased by her dearly beloved husband, Wally (Wallace) Wilcox in 1999.

She was a teacher and principal in the San Francisco Unified School District for twenty years, and a senior researcher at SRI International for ten years. Her B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley, and a Ph.D. from Stanford University. In her later years she experienced the continuing gifts of music in her life, as a violinist in small chamber music groups, including Fiume de Musica and the Channing House Trio. Also, to her delight, she found joy and purpose in her volunteer music program in the Health Center of her senior community, Channing House. These experiences were published in her book, A Song Just For Me: Stirred by Music to Conversation and Compassion.

Survived by stepchildren, Lee Wilcox (Carol), Timothy Wilcox (Jana), Wendy Wilcox (Harry); grandchildren Bradford (Jessica), Ellen, Morgan, Nicholas (Amanda), Stephanie (Daniel), and great grandchildren (Emily, Addison, Abigail, Tye, Boden, Mavric, Otis and Rowyn); by siblings Chrisie Koras Kuno, Bess Kerhoulas, Gus Anastole, the late Anthony Anastole; and many nieces and nephews.

During her later years she felt increasing gratitude for the support and blessings of her loving family and cherished friends who transformed her concerns into blessings upon blessings.

Contributions to The Fistula Foundation (www.fistulafoundation. org) or a charity of your choice will be received with much appreciation.

A celebration of Kiki’s life will be planned when it’s safe to gather in person.

PAID

OBITUARY

Violence related. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0 Theft related Commercial burglaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Fraud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Grand theft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Petty theft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Prowler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Residential burglaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Vehicle related Abandoned auto. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Auto recovery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Auto theft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Bicycle theft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Driving w/ suspended license. . . . . . . . 1 Parking/driving violation . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Theft from auto . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Vehicle accident/major injury . . . . . . . . 1 Vehicle accident/minor injury . . . . . . . . 1 Vehicle tampering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Vehicle tow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Alcohol or drug related Driving under influence . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Drunk in public . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Possession of drugs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Possession of paraphernalia . . . . . . . . 1 Miscellaneous Animal call . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Disturbance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Found property. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Located missing person . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Mental evaluation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Misc. penal code violation . . . . . . . . . . 1 Warrant arrest. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

OBITUARIES A list of local residents who died recently: Nancy Tang Francis, 84, a Palo Alto resident, died on July 8. Harvey Lowell Cobb, 92, a longtime Palo Alto resident, died on Aug. 9.

To read full obituaries, leave remembrances and post photos, go to Lasting Memories at PaloAltoOnline.com/ obituaries. Q

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Page 14 • August 21, 2020 • Palo Alto Weekly • www.PaloAltoOnline.com

Spectrum Editorials, letters and opinions

Guest Opinion

Where did the other $713 million go?

by Jennifer Bestor

V

oting to endorse Proposition 15, the Schools & Communities First Initiative, Santa Clara County Supervisors repeatedly mentioned $504 million that proponents predict will flow into county and city coffers.

But, wait! A total of $1,217 million ($1.2 billion) of new property tax revenue is supposed to be raised in the county. Where did the other $713 million go? To local schools?

Sadly, no. Proposition 15 will only distribute $139 million — 11% of new revenue — to schools and community colleges in the county. Palo Alto Unified will get just $1 million. Mountain View and Los Altos schools get $2 million, combined.

From Palo Alto to Gilroy, $529 million of property tax raised for education will leave the county 40% of all new tax levied here. Is this what you expected?

Under Proposition 15, property taxes leave counties for the first time. Just 1% of the new revenue in Palo Alto, Mountain View, Saratoga and Los Gatos districts flows to their schools. And none of the remainder goes to south county.

Those cash-strapped districts get to keep a little more of their own locally raised revenue (see graph above), but then join their neighbors as net contributors to the statewide fund.

Discussing Proposition 13’s 1978 tax reform, people describe a traumatic cut to local revenues and the mechanistic entitlement granted to long-term property owners. Over time, the Cain-vs-Abel battle it created among local governments for

Letters Disappointed in Castilleja Editor, As a Castilleja parent, I remain disappointed as Castilleja continues to press for expansion at the cost of their neighbors’ quality of life.

When my daughter attended Castilleja, the school seemed to pride itself on being a good neighbor and part of the larger community. The classes were small and the students were

the remaining 1% levy — and the complete opacity of the byzantine allocation process that resulted — have proved equally detrimental to California school funding.

An example? Property tax revenues for Ravenswood School District in East Palo Alto are growing by a stunning 12.45% this year.

The district, however, will receive no property tax at all. In fact, state funding deferrals mean Ravenswood will have to borrow from March to October to pay its bills.

All of its property tax revenues have been diverted by the legislature to pay a state obligation to the county and local cities known as “the VLF Swap.” The opacity of this $9.4 billion statewide diversion is a legacy of Proposition 13.

Proposition 15 is another tax reform. It creates a statewide school funding pot. This pot is disproportionately funded by counties located in high-cost areas and those that

allocate a large proportion of property tax to education. Santa Clara checks both boxes. The mechanisms defined in Proposition 15 redistribute at least $1.4 billion from Santa Clara, Orange, San Mateo, San Francisco, Monterey, Humboldt, San Luis Obispo and five other counties.

Who benefits? Counties with low percentage allocations to education or low regional property values. Los Angeles County will be the biggest net recipient. Although Los Angeles has a high proportion of commercial industrial property (30% of the new revenue statewide) and average regional costs, it allocates a relatively low percentage to education. Proponents forecast an impressive 74% of LA’s new local revenue will flow to its county and municipal governments. This leaves very little for schools. Since the pot is distributed based on the statewide education funding formula, and disregards

county effort, Los Angeles would pull out $276 million more than it put in. Other, less surprising, large net beneficiaries: Riverside, San Bernardino, Sacramento, Fresno and Kern counties.

Another problem? The proposition doesn’t just reallocate new revenue that it raises. No, it also subsumes all new construction and every sale of appreciated commercial-industrial property. Proponents’ research shows 30% of new revenue coming from properties that have already changed hands within the decade — typically consolidations for new development and properties bought for renovation and resale.

Note that 12.5% of the property tax revenue now flowing to Santa Clara local governments and schools is the result of new commercial construction and change of ownership over the past decade.

Going forward, the legislature will decide how much remains in Santa Clara County and how much flows to the common fund to be shared statewide. This shift to legislative control introduces an ongoing vulnerability in the growth and stability of local school funding.

Looking at all these new mechanisms, Proposition 15’s authors took an extraordinarily complex approach to “closing the loophole.” To reclaim the $3B annual statewide subsidy to commercial industrial property owners with base years before 1990, they propose shifting a subset of all commercial properties to a market-value assessment system, creating a new statewide education fund with 2019-based distribution rules, granting new tax exclusions and exemptions to businesses and small commercial

respectful of the neighborhood.

After my daughter graduated, the international dorms were turned into classrooms, tuition increased and the daughters of “important people” seemed to be courted. Castilleja exceeded its conditional-use permit and hid actual enrollment, breaking my long- standing trust in the school.

Castilleja stopped being an excellent small girls’ school and began morphing into a larger school requiring more classroom space and generating significant parking and transportation problems. All while breaking their conditionaluse permit; an agreement between

the city and the school.

What kind of example does this deception set for the girls attending Castilleja?

Michelle Obama in her Aug. 17 Democratic National Convention speech, mentioned the false philosophy of “winning at any cost,” no matter the cost to others.

So what if neighbors have clogged streets, four to five years of construction, an underground garage not legally allowed in an R-1 neighborhood and constant events after school and on weekends?

I am amazed when good people equate Castilleja’s expansion with

the hope of educating girls. Palo Alto and nearby neighborhoods have a plethora of excellent public and private schools ALL offering girls a worthy education. Castilleja is not the only school educating girls! To imply this is disrespectful to all the girls attending the other schools and must stop.

Castilleja can continue its proud tradition of educating girls without a garage and without causing horrible traffic problems on Embarcadero Road. The “new” expansion plans remain unacceptable.

Thank you.

Rita C. Vrhel Channing Avenue, Palo Alto

Proposition 15 Revenue Distribution in Santa Clara County School Districts 100% 90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% Mtn. View - Palo Alto Los Altos K-12 Schools

City

San Jose Morgan Hill Other Services

Milpitas

County

Gilroy

Overhead

All County Net Outflow

Sources: Jennifer Bestor, Yes on 15, Legislative Analyst’s Office and USC.

property owners, moving property taxes outside county boundaries, enshrining commercial residential entitlements in the constitution, and centralizing more control in the legislature. Unsurprisingly, $53 billion of the new money raised in the county will go to the assessor, controller, county counsel, and appeals board to try to make this happen.

If it becomes law, these complexities — and their attendant risks — suggest that Santa Clara will need to act decisively to protect local revenues.

Fair warning, though, expect little sympathy in Sacramento. My experience trying to get a regional cost supplement into school funding suggests that the Bay Area is viewed like Capitol City in Hunger Games.

From Richmond to Gilroy, we are seen as the idle rich — and certainly not as tightly packed, hard-laying geese producing the excess $28 billion of golden income tax eggs that provide the backbone of statewide K-14, UC and CSU funding.

Proposition 15 is no great friend to Santa Clara. Contributing a growing $529 million a year more to statewide school funding, without materially helping the poorest districts among us, deserves thought.

Let’s implore local officials to do all the math — not just estimate their cut — and be 100% transparent about the whole picture. Q Jennifer Bestor is a longtime Menlo Park resident who has served as the volunteer research director for Educate Our State, a grassroots, statewide, parentled organization committed to a high-quality public education for all students (educateourstate.org/ impact). She can be reached at jenniferbestor@yahoo.com.

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Arts & Entertainment A weekly guide to music, theater, art, culture, books and more, edited by Karla Kane

Courtesy Janet Silver Ghent

Over 130 singers in the Ragazzi Boys Choir perform “We Are the Day” online.

ike tiny images on a sheet of postage stamps, 130plus boys in navy shirts join voices in the upbeat “We Are the Day.” To the untrained eye, the boys in Ragazzi, an awardwinning Redwood City-based choral group, look and sound as if they’re singing together, as they have done for years. But each boy, ages 6 to 18, is recording alone, singing at home with earbuds or headsets, hearing only himself and his cues. While this particular choral piece, which begins with the words “We are the eyes gleaming with wonder,” expresses hope and joy, it grew out of a devastating pandemic that forced chorales overnight to change the way they operate. A chorus is a group that sings together. COVID-19 made that impossible, giving choir directors a difficult choice: Adapt or disband.

“The biggest challenge that we face is having something that we love to do that brings a lot of purpose to our existences (be) dangerous,” said Jennah Delp Somers, cofounder and co-artistic director of iSing Silicon Valley, which brings together 300 girls from first to 12th grade in five different choirs. “We went through a mourning period.”

In-person rehearsals: canceled. A choral trip to the UK: canceled. A spring concert before an audience of a thousand at Mission Santa

L

Pandemic spurs choirs to Zoom for togetherness

by Janet Silver Ghent Clara: also canceled. The release of the choir’s debut album, “Here I Stand,” “was a fantastic way to end an otherwise disastrous year,” Delp Somers said.

Because a choral performance or even a rehearsal is a “superspreading event” for COVID-19, choirs had to change how they operate.

Instead of singing Mendelssohn’s entire “Elijah” oratorio before live audiences, the Los Altos-based Schola Cantorum produced “Virtually Elijah,” featuring soloists singing at home, pianists playing at home, and the entire chorus virtually joining voices in the glorious “He, Watching Over Israel.”

When choral rehearsals shut down abruptly in mid-March, choral directors with little or no technical training suddenly Zoomed into electronic media. Within four days of the shutdown, Ragazzi’s conductors took up the challenge of keeping their choirs alive. They created audio and videotapes to conduct singers they could neither see nor

Page 20 • August 21, 2020 • Palo Alto Weekly • www.PaloAltoOnline.com

hear, at first relying on parents and volunteers with sound and video skills to transform individual recordings into a choral performance.

“Along the way we produced three virtual choirs,” said executive and artistic director Kent Jue. Among them are a dozen graduating seniors performing “Shenandoah” as their swan song, and a group of 24 singing the rhythmic “Count on Me.” “None of this was a plan. It sort of just developed,” Jue added.

“Once we learned we would have to cancel our season and be remote, we needed a project for the boys to focus on. We came up with these virtual choirs, which, I have to admit I was not a fan of at the beginning because there’s so much work on the back end and so much work on the front end.”

At the front end, the logistics involve creating instructions, collecting recordings and fielding questions. With boys as young as 6, that means parental involvement.

Ragazzi estimates that phase takes about 15 hours, not counting individual singing time. For the nearly 140 separate voice recordings that went into “We Are the Day,” audio and video editing, all done inhouse, took another 30 hours.

Of course, it would be simpler if choral members could sing and record simultaneously on apps like Zoom, but the sound from the home of a conductor or an accompanist does not reach 140 other homes, or even a half-dozen simultaneously. Delays of a few tenths of a second from one place to another would result in choral cacophony.

That’s why choir members must push their mute buttons during group rehearsals.

Jue noted that Ragazzi recently was able to record nine singers simultaneously in real time, but not on Zoom. “One of our board members is a technology genius,” he said, adding that the technology, which is a “game-changer,” is still in the experimental stages.

Making the transition from live to virtual is no easy undertaking.

While Los Angeles conductorcomposer Eric Whitacre combined 17,500 voices from all over the world in his “Sing Gently,” local conductors are working on a more modest scale. Some are focusing on coaching individuals, which they don’t have the opportunity to do during regular rehearsals, when the focus is on the group. By working on their own, the singers are improving.

“I’m confident that when we come out of this, and are able to rehearse in person again, we will be stronger and better,” Jue said.

Delp Somers agreed. “The kids are becoming really individually savvy and responsible for learning notes and pitches,” she said.

“Things that they might have relied on others for in the classroom setting, they’re now individually accountable in a new way. We were surprised to see so much individual growth in such a short amount of time.”

In addition, although the singers are not performing before live audiences, they are finding new audiences in distant places. When Mark Burrows, the composer of “We Are the Day” who lives in Texas, heard Ragazzi singing his song on YouTube, he thanked “all of my new friends” with a YouTube recording of his own. “As a

Arts & Entertainment

Better singing through technology?

A virtual recording only looks easy

by Janet Silver Ghent

W

AmiCare SERVICES INCORPORATED

training. “I found issues with each of my early recordings. It was also hard to get the right setup, with a good background for the video, favorable lighting, and good sound quality and volume level. My husband had to hold up a lamp to illuminate me properly and avoid shadows. I ended up using two different iPhones — one to listen to and one to record on. It was a lot of trial and error.

But, in the end, it felt incredibly satisfying to get a final recording that I was happy with, though, of course, it was not perfect.”

As for me, I had attempted to record “Sunshine in My Soul,” but in the throes of rhinitis, I gave it a rest. However, the final piece is lovely, thanks to the work of Reyen and three Aurora Singers who volunteered their time: producer John Reed, graphics designer Zana Vartanian and audio production engineer Eitan Novotny.

Vartanian, who spent about 10 to 15 hours putting together the video for “Sunshine,” said one challenge was making it look as if “the singers’ mouths move as if they’re singing simultaneously.” She used After Effects, an animation program from Adobe.

“Since each singer started with a series of claps, I could see a waveform display for each singer.

I lined them all up so the claps

were timed together.” The result is that the words, and the mouths, are synchronized.

For Novotny, transforming more than 30 separate recordings into a virtual choral piece took an estimated 15 to 20 hours on “Sunshine” and another 10 on “Over My Head.”

“As you might imagine, when we’re singing together, we have a natural feedback loop of listening to each other that keeps us in tune. That does not work when we’re alone, so if you sing 15 cents sharp (a fraction over pitch), and someone else sings 10 cents flat (a fraction under), it’s not going to blend well,” he said.

“Also, absent a conductor waving their arms in front of us and many hours of rehearsal, many of us cannot get the rhythms accurately enough for me to sync the tracks.”

Using a product called Melodyne, from the Celemony company, he said, “I can edit everyone’s notes both in tone, vibrato and time. I can move notes around, and make everything line up.”

So my foreshortened chords and slurred words?

“I fixed everything,” Novotny said. “I made you sound good.

Besides, every voice helped to make the final piece sound good.”

He was right. Q

composer, to hear a piece in your head and then to hear it in person sound even better than the version in your head is amazing,” he said.

“Thank you for being a message of hope in a world that so desperately needs hope right now.”

Hope is what keeps these chorales in harmony, even amid disappointment. In March, when Ragazzi first soprano Liam Lowitz first heard that COVID-19 would force choirs to shut down, “I started crying,” he said. Lowitz, 12, a seventhgrader at North Liam Lowitz Star Academy in Redwood City, said he “loves singing with my friends,” and not being able to sing together was unthinkable.

But tears dissipated when Ragazzi began meeting on Zoom. And when he heard the finished virtual piece of “Count on Me,” in which he has a cameo solo, “something inside of me just lit up. I think it’s really cool that we’re able to do this.”

For the Palo Alto-based Aurora Singers, Tuesday get-togethers on Zoom are reunions, drawing in former choir members living in Canada, Vermont, Colorado and New

Jersey who join the group in singalongs, share news and participate in virtual choir pieces, recording their parts at home. Instead of performing at senior residences, these days Aurora invites the residents to join them in Zoom sing-alongs, with songs ranging from folk to rock to Broadway. Although these events are not rehearsals, said founder-conductor Dawn Reyen, “our regular online gatherings allow us to maintain our strong sense of community, as well as maintaining good vocal habits, so that when we can resume in-person rehearsals, we will be ready to jump right back in.”

HaShirim, a Jewish community choir also based in Palo Alto, does hold virtual rehearsals on Zoom.

When conductor Billie Bandermann introduces new pieces, pianist Angela Cheng plays the individual choral parts as well as the accompaniment.

“Everybody sings a part they’re not used to, so that nobody is idle during rehearsal,” Bandermann said. Then when the singers learn their own parts, they sing along to a professional choir’s recording, “giving them the experience of what it’s like to sing as a choir.” At the end of the rehearsal, the singers join in on pieces they know by heart, like “Old Devil Moon.”

“We miss getting together,” said Bandermann. “As long as there is

some joy of singing together with other people, that’s what makes choral singing so infectious.”

“It’s nice that we get to socialize with each other and see each other on Zoom, but it’s not the same. It’s hard to sing by yourself,” said HaShirim first soprano Carol Emerich.

On the other hand, she said, this is a choir “without stars and divas, and everybody is so supportive of each other. That comes through for me, the sense of trust and caring about each other.”

When Emerich had a flood underneath her Cupertino townhouse that forced her to evacuate for a week, she was distraught. Emerich, who has been isolating since March, has asthma as well as other immunity issues that put her at high risk. “The idea of staying for a week in a hotel was very scary to me,” she said.

Emerich mentioned her concern during a rehearsal. Fellow soprano Ellen Beaudet offered her guest room, a separate bathroom and use of her backyard. Beaudet also prepared dinner, which they ate outside, socially distanced Said Beaudet: “I love that HaShirim is a community! It’s wonderful to be able to help one another.” Q Freelance writer Janet Silver Ghent can be reached at ghentwriter@gmail.com

Courtesy Janet Silver Ghent

ith the voice of Aurora Singers conductor Dawn Reyen in my ear, coming through my iPhone, and an Audacity app on my computer, I attempted to record a relatively easy song, an American traditional called “Over My Head.”

Easy for someone else, but not for me. After four nasal probes for COVID-19 — one inconclusive, one positive and two negative — my sinuses and nasal passages rebelled. My voice squeaked, and my breath control was pathetic.

I ran out of air at the end of each phrase, and instead of “Over my head I hear music in the air,” what came out sounded like mucus in the air.

I recorded the piece five, six, seven, eight times, never satisfied, and then dispatched a recording with an apology. I felt exposed; I knew somebody would hear my naked voice and gasp.

In a chorus, I’m a blend, not a soloist, and listening to a recording of my solo voice came as a shock. That said, even soloists are not always happy with their first attempts, or even their fifth or sixth.

“It took me three hours to get a good final video and audio recording of ‘Sunshine in My Soul,’” said Aurora president Cynthia Mahood Levin, a first soprano with professional

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995 Fictitious Name Statement STATEMENT OF ABANDONMENT OF USE OF FICTITIOUS BUSINESS NAME File No. FBN666907 The following person(s)/registrants(s) has/ have abandoned the use of the fictitious business name(s). The information given below is as it appeared on the fictitious business statement that was filed at the County Clerk-Recorder’s Office. FICTITIOUS BUSINESS NAME(S): SILICON VALLEY ALLERGY AND ASTHMA INC. 2500 Hospital Drive Building 14 Mountain View, CA 94040 FILED IN SANTA CLARA COUNTY ON: 5/18/16 UNDER FILE NO. FBN617615 REGISTRANT’S NAME(S): SILICON VALLEY ALLERGY AND ASTHMA INC. 2500 Hospital Drive Building 14 Mountain View, CA 94040 THIS BUSINESS WAS CONDUCTED BY a Corporation.

This statement was filed with the County Clerk Recorder of Santa Clara County on July 20, 2020.

(PAW Aug. 14, 21, 28; Sep. 4, 2020) THERAVIE WELLNESS FICTITIOUS BUSINESS NAME STATEMENT File No.: FBN 667335 The following person (persons) is (are) doing business as: TheraVie Wellness, located at 2260 Wyandotte St., Apt. 6, Mountain View, CA 94043, Santa Clara County.

This business is owned by: An Individual.

The name and residence address of the registrant(s) is(are): Rashmi Chidanand, PhD. 2260 Wyandotte St. Apt. 6 Mountain View, CA 94043 Registrant began transacting business under the fictitious business name(s) listed above on 7/1/2020.

This statement was filed with the County Clerk-Recorder of Santa Clara County on August 6, 2020.

(PAW Aug. 14, 21, 28; Sep. 4, 2020) DUTCH POET PRESS ROBERT PERRY BOOK DESIGN FICTITIOUS BUSINESS NAME STATEMENT File No.: FBN667311 The following person (persons) is (are) doing business as: 1.) Dutch Poet Press, 2.) Robert Perry Book Design, located at 4296C Wilkie Way, Palo Alto, CA 94306, Santa Clara County.

This business is owned by: An Individual.

The name and residence address of the registrant(s) is(are): ROBERT HAROLD PERRY 4296C Wilkie Way Palo Alto, CA 94306 Registrant began transacting business under the fictitious business name(s) listed above on 09/01/2015.

This statement was filed with the County Clerk-Recorder of Santa Clara County on August 5, 2020.

(PAW Aug. 14, 21, 28; Sep. 4, 2020)

997 All Other Legals ORDER TO SHOW CAUSE FOR CHANGE OF NAME SUPERIOR COURT OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA FOR THE COUNTY OF SANTA CLARA Case No.: 20CV368845 TO ALL INTERESTED PERSONS: Petitioner: KATE MARIA LOUIE filed a petition

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with this court for a decree changing names as follows: KATE MARIA LOUIE to KATIE MARIE LOUIE. THE COURT ORDERS that all persons interested in this matter appear before this court at the hearing indicated below to show cause, if any, why the petition for change of name should not be granted. Any person objecting to the name changes described above must file a written objection that includes the reasons for the objection at least two court days before the matter is scheduled to be heard and must appear at the hearing to show cause why the petition should not be granted. If no written objection is timely filed, the court may grant the petition without a hearing.

NOTICE OF HEARING: October 06, 2020, 8:45 a.m., Dept.: Probate of the Superior Court of California, County of Santa Clara, 191 N. First Street, San Jose, CA 95113.

A copy of this ORDER TO SHOW CAUSE shall be published at least once each week for four successive weeks prior to the date set for hearing on the petition in the following newspaper of general circulation, printed in this county: PALO ALTO WEEKLY Date: August 3, 2020 /s/________________ JUDGE OF THE SUPERIOR COURT (PAW Aug. 7, 14, 21, 28, 2020) NOTICE TO CREDITORS OF BULK SALE (U.C.C. §6104, 6105) ESCROW #: 0126014628-PC NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN to creditors of the within named seller that a bulk sale is about to be made of the assets described below.

The names and business address of the Seller(s) is/are: Speedy Gourmet LLC 530 Showers Drive, Suite 8, Mountain View, CA 94040 The location in California of the Chief Executive Office of the seller is: same as above As listed by the seller, all other business names and addresses used by the seller within three years before the date such list was sent or delivered to the buyer are: None The names and business address of the Buyer(s) is/are: DeMayo Restaurant Group Inc. 530 Showers Drive, Suite 8, Mountain View, CA 94040 The assets to be sold are described in general as: All stock in trade, furniture, fixtures, equipment and other property And are located at: 530 Showers Drive, Suite 8, Mountain View, CA 94040 The business name used by the Seller(s) at those locations is: Hunan Homes Express The anticipated date of the bulk sale is: September 10, 2020 At the office of Old Republic Title Company @ 1000 Burnett Avenue, Suite 400, Concord, CA 94520.

The bulk sale IS subject to California Uniform Commercial Code Section 6106.2. If so subject, the name and address of the person with whom claims may be filed is as follows: Old Republic Title Company @ 1000 Burnett Avenue, Suite 400, Concord, CA 94520 or E-Fax to 925-265-9040 or Fax 925-363-2276.

The last day for filing claims shall be September 8, 2020 which is the business day before the sale date specified herein.

Dated: August 17, 2020 Buyer(s): DeMayo Restaurant Group, Inc. /S/ By: Woody DeMayo, CEO 8/21/20 CNS-3391263# PALO ALTO WEEKLY

Call 650-223-6578 or email asantillan@paweekly.com for legal advertising.

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Eating Out Desser g ,[ Six locally made desserts you can eat right now Story and photos by Elena Kadvany

W

e all need things to look forward to these days, and in my world, that is very often dessert.

Here are six local sweets I’ve enjoyed of late, from Indian-inspired ice cream to the chocolate chip toffee cookie dough that’s taken up residency in my fridge, and the stories of the people making them. Check out the list below to support these local businesses ... and satisfy your sweet tooth while doing so.

Salted caramel ice cream with ghee fudge KoolFi Creamery, multiple locations KoolFi Creamery founder Priti Narayanan left a career in civil engineering to devote herself to ice cream full time. Her flavors pay homage to the desserts she ate growing up in South India. The name of the business is a riff on kulfi, an Indian milk-based frozen dessert.

“As I love American ice cream and it’s creaminess and richness and the tradition of American ice cream, I did not find the flavors that we enjoyed growing up and I didn’t find a lot of dessert from South India that my mother makes. I said, ‘Can we try the interesting, innovative combination of American ice cream with Indian flavors?” said Narayanan, whose job title is now appropriately “chief ice cream engineer.”

While KoolFi is based in the east bay, you can pick up pints at The Market at Edgewood in Palo Alto.

KoolFi’s ice creams are made from organic Straus Family Creamery milk or organic coconut milk for vegan versions. All the flavors are worth trying — from the classic kulfi to banana jaggery — but the salted caramel with ghee fudge, or mysore pak, might be my favorite. The creamy salted caramel ice cream, which walks that delicious line between salty and sweet, is laced with small chunks of mysore pak, a fudge crumble made from ghee, sugar and garbanzo bean flour.

The chickpea fudge was invented in the Royal Court of Mysore in India in 1935, the educational

label on the back of the pint tells me, and “requires precision of heat, timing and technique” to make properly.

For more information: koolficreamery.com

Indonesian sweets 1,000 Layer Bakery, Sunnyvale 1,000 Layer Bakery’s namesake dessert is an architectural feat: as many as 20 pieces of delicate, 2-millimeter tall layers of cake stacked on one another like a mini-dessert skyscraper on your plate.

The cake, called lapis legit or spekkoek, is a fusion of Indonesian and Dutch sensibilities, owner Jennifer Huang said. “Truly a labor of love,” she bakes one layer at a time, each made from eggs, butter, flour, condensed milk, clove, nutmeg and an Indonesian cinnamon. The result is a notoverly-sweet cake that would be just as good for breakfast with a cup of coffee as it would be for dessert.

Huang, who was born and raised in Indonesia and lives in Sunnyvale, started her baking business after working at corporate cafes at tech companies, including Google and DropBox. She mostly offered corporate catering, business that has completely dried up with offices closed during the pandemic.

Earlier this year, Huang was accepted into San Francisco nonprofit La Cocina’s food incubator program, which helps women, immigrants and people of color start and grow food businesses.

Huang makes a rotating selection of Indonesian desserts and snacks, including nastar, bitesized buns filled with spiced pineapple jam, and kue lapis, a steamed, layered cake made from rice and tapioca flour and infused with grassy pandan and coconut.

(Many of her desserts are made from rice flour so are naturally gluten free and vegan.) She sometimes makes savory items as well, like rolls of sweet rice filled with shredded chicken.

Huang has a weekly menu available for preorder by Wednesday and pickup on Sundays in Sunnyvale or Saturdays at the Ferry

Building Farmers Market in San Francisco. She also offers delivery within 60 miles from downtown Sunnyvale with a minimum order of $99.

For more information: 1000layer.square.site

Lemon chess and pecan pies Shampa’s Pie Shop, Pacifica The best thing about Shampa’s Pies might be their mini pies, which means you can create your own pie sampler without feeling like a total glutton.

I indulged recently in three mini pies ($7 each): lemon chess, pecan and chocolate cream. The super-tart lemon chess and sticky, dense pecan were my favorites.

(I’m definitely getting the pecan for Thanksgiving this year, and yes, it’s August and I’m already thinking about my Thanksgiving menu.)

Owner Haruwn Wesley makes his pie crusts without lard or hydrogenated oils and the fillings from seasonal, local ingredients.

You can preorder and pick up pies at the bakery at 1625 Palmetto Ave., Pacifica, by calling 415-4123592 or ordering online. Wesley also has stands at the Daly City Farmers Market on Thursdays and the Burlingame Farmers’ Market on Sundays, where you’ll find him wearing a mask decorated with pies.

For more information: shampaspies.com

The Cheesecake Basuku Cheesecakes, Palo Alto Charles Chen, a restaurant consultant with Maum in Palo Alto, started baking Japanese-inspired Basque cheesecakes in his home kitchen in Oakland during the shutdown. They’ve become a hot commodity in the Bay Area, spreading like wildfire on Instagram and often selling out within minutes.

The Basque cheesecakes started as a quarantine baking project for Chen, alongside bread and other desserts. But he kept coming back to the cheesecake and eventually turned to a friend in Japan who (continued on page 26)

From top, here are some locally made desserts: Based in the east bay, KoolFi Creamery ice cream can be found at The Market at Edgewood in Palo Alto. Jennifer Huang’s 1,000 Layer Bakery makes Indonesian sweets, including 1,000 layer cake, steamed pandan-coconut layer cake and pineapple tartlets. Shampaís Pies offers a variety of mini pies, including chocolate cream, pecan and lemon chess. Basuku Cheesecakes sells Japanese-inspired Basque cheesecakes. www.PaloAltoOnline.com • Palo Alto Weekly • August 21, 2020 • Page 25

Eating Out

Dessert dash (continued from page 25)

Fresh bombolini (cream-filled Italian doughnuts) have made a triumphant return at Borrone MarketBar in Menlo Park.

made a Basque cheesecake with what looked like a perfect texture.

She attributed this to the quality of dairy and eggs she used.

“That’s a flavor I’ve been trying to achieve in America but it’s extremely difficult to get that quality of dairy around here,” he said.

But he eventually found it in Alexandre Family Farm, a regenerative organic dairy farm in Crescent City, whose cream he describes as the “soul” of the cheesecake. He picks it up the same day it’s bottled, and it goes into the cakes with pasture-raised

organic eggs from Vital Farms, sugar and cream cheese. Chen has honed his recipe, tinkering with ratios and taking the additional step of pouring the batter through a sieve to ensure a smooth, homogenous texture that falls somewhere in between a jiggly Japanese souffle pancake and a firm cheesecake.

What was once a home baking project unexpectedly snowballed into a full-on side hustle that he’s now working on expanding.

“All I’m going to do is I’m going to make this one cake, there’s going to be one flavor, doing one thing and I’m going to use the best ingredients I can find,” he said.

Maum is the only pickup location on the Peninsula for Basuku Cheesecakes. They’re available for pickup at 322 University Ave. via Tock (exploretock.com/ maum); preorders open Mondays at noon.

For more information: @basukucheesecakes on Instagram

Bombolini Borrone MarketBar, Menlo Park Borrone MarketBar, Cafe Borrone’s long-closed sister restaurant, quietly reopened for takeout in late July. Located around the corner from the main cafe, MarketBar is making some of its own specialty grab-and-go items and baked goods, including fresh pasta, sauces and double-baked biscotti, plus a selection of natural wines.

MarketBar’s fresh bombolini also have made a triumphant return. If you can pass by the large, cream-filled Italian doughnuts on the counter and not leave with one, I commend your willpower.

Here’s hoping MarketBar’s seriously excellent focaccia makes a comeback, too.

Borrone MarketBar at 1010 El Camino Real Suite 140, Menlo Park, is open for takeout Tuesday-Saturday, 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.

For more information: cafeborrone.com

Chocolate chip toffee cookies

WANT TO BECOME A PALO ALTO MEDIATOR? • Do you want to volunteer to help your community?

• Do you want to help people resolve their disputes?

• Can you remain neutral when others are upset?

You will help landlords, tenants, and neighbors reach mutual agreements. A 36-hour training on mediation techniques and skills will be provided via Zoom in October. No legal experience is needed, and a two-year commitment is required. Applicants must live or work in Palo Alto or Stanford.

Applications are due by September 4, 2020 For more information contact: PALO ALTO MEDIATION PROGRAM 650-856-4062 pamediation@housing.org Page 26 • August 21, 2020 • Palo Alto Weekly • www.PaloAltoOnline.com

Love for Butter, Palo Alto I recently ran out of John Shelsta’s toffee chocolate chip cookie dough and had a minor panic attack.

Chocolate chip cookies seem to be on almost every restaurant takeout menu these days, so I’ve been sampling them for months as part of a very unofficial research project that was sanctioned by no one except me. Shelsta’s remain the best, in my opinion. They’re made with large hunks of Valrhona chocolate and toffee and have that ideal chewy bite (don’t @ me if you’re a crispy chocolate chip cookie person). He bakes them into delightfully enormous spheres, almost the size of a small dessert plate.

I prefer the cookies fresh when I can get them, but he also sells pints of dough, which means you can make them at home whenever the craving strikes.

Shelsta’s baked goods are available for pickup at Zola at 565 Bryant St. in Palo Alto, usually on Sundays. Sign up for his newsletter at loveforbutter.com to get notified about bake sales.

A small selection of pastries — often including those cookies — are available Wednesday-Sunday at the Tono Coffee Project popup at 369 Lytton Ave. in Palo Alto.

For more information: Loveforbutter.com Q Staff Writer Elena Kadvany can be emailed at ekadvany@ paweekly.com. Check out her Peninsula Foodist blog at PaloAltoOnline.com/blogs.

www.PaloAltoOnline.com • Palo Alto Weekly • August 21, 2020 • Page 27

Book Talk

STORY TIMES ... New York Times bestselling author Drew Daywalt, known for writing “The Day the Crayons Quit” and its sequel, “The Day the Crayons Came Home,” will be hosting a virtual children’s story time at 5 p.m., Sept. 15, through Kepler’s Literary Foundation. Daywalt will read “Sleepy: The Goodnight Buddy,” his hilarious twist on the classic bedtime story “Goodnight Moon.” For middle schoolers, Lev Grossman, the No. 1 New York Times bestselling author of the book and TV series “The Magicians,” will introduce his new fantasy adventure “The Silver Arrow” at 6 p.m., Sept. 10.

To RSVP to either event, visit keplers.org.

AN ACADEMIC GUIDE FOR PARENTS ... Menlo Park author Cynthia Clumeck, a graduate of Stanford University who is an expert in the college admission process, is set to release her latest book, “The Parent Compass: Navigating Your Teen’s Wellness and Academic Journey in Today’s Competitive World” in September. She and coauthor Jenn Curtis, who owns an educational consulting company in Orange County, wrote the book to help parents understand their appropriate role in navigating a competitive academic environment that has resulted in overparenting and even fraud and bribery.

The book provides resources for parents to adopt better parenting behavior and learn to appropriately approach the type of parenting that leads to their children’s academic success and emotional wellbeing. The authors called on the expertise of education thought leaders, school counselors, heads of school, teachers, adolescent psychologists and their own wisdom as mothers.

For more information, visit parentcompassbook.com.

‘WE ARE NOT FREE’ BOOK LAUNCH ... Books Inc. is partnering with the Japanese Cultural and Community Center of Northern California to host the virtual launch of Traci Chee’s new critically acclaimed YA novel, “We Are Not Free.” The book is a collective account of a tight-knit group of young San Francisco Nisei, second-generation Japanese American citizens, whose lives are irrevocably changed by the mass U.S. incarcerations during World War II. Chee will be in conversation with Misa Sugiura, author of “This Time Will be Different.” All copies of her book purchased from Books Inc. will be signed by Chee. Sugiura also will be providing signed bookplates for “This Time will be Different.” For more information, visit booksinc.net. Q

Title Pages A monthly section on local books and authors

Linden Tree Children’s Books in Los Altos is among the local booksellers that will be celebrating Independent Bookstore Day on Saturday, Aug. 29, with virtual events and special online and in-store merchandise. Photo by Magali Gauthier.

Still standing Local booksellers celebrate resilience — and a new era — during Independent Bookstore Day

by Mike Berry

L

ike most booksellers, Chris Saccherie didn’t expect 2020 to be much different from 2019 after he jumped headfirst into the business last September to save Linden Tree Children’s Books in Los Altos from permanently shuttering when no buyers stepped up to purchase the decades-old store.

With no prior book experience, the Palo Alto resident and his former LinkedIn co-worker Florina Grosskurth decided to purchase the shop at 265 State St. with the vision of turning it into a community hub.

“The year started off pretty well, actually,” Saccherie said. “We had just wrapped up the first in-school book fair we had done. ... Sales were strong through the first couple months.”

Fast forward to March, and the duo, along with virtually every other independent bookstore owner, found themselves facing an industry where all the rules had suddenly changed: COVID-19 brought shutdowns and the halt of in-store services. The strategy was no longer about how to compete against big brick-and-mortar chains and online industry giants, but how to reimagine the future of bookselling during a pandemic.

Linden Tree pivoted from inperson shopping and story times to virtual one-on-one video-chat browsing sessions and stay-at-home family book salons hosted on Facebook Live.

“For the first three months, it was all online orders,” Saccherie said. “It was a big change, going from people coming into the store, browsing books and checking them out to being kind of an online fulfillment center.”

Likewise, Kepler’s Books in Menlo Park expanded its online catalogue and this month began

Page 28 • August 21, 2020 • Palo Alto Weekly • www.PaloAltoOnline.com

its Shopping on the Outdoor Plaza program to provide patrons an opportunity to browse merchandise and speak in person with booksellers under a tent set up outside the store. Kepler’s Literary Foundation, the nonprofit arm of the company, launched a new series of virtual events on Zoom called Refresh the Page, which features online discussions, classes, seminars and author events.

CEO Praveen Madan said he felt ready for the unexpected shift, having reshaped the company into a hybrid-business model eight years ago that includes a for-profit bookstore and a nonprofit events organization.

“Because we started the journey years ago, by the time we got the pandemic, we were actually in really strong shape,” Madan said.

On Aug. 29, indie booksellers like Linden Tree and Kepler’s will be celebrating their resilience with special merchandise and author events during the annual Independent Bookstore Day that was postponed from April 25 due to the pandemic. Founded in Northern California in 2014, the event aims to put the spotlight on community bookstores and the joys of reading.

San Jose cartoonist Gene Luen Yang will discuss “Dragon Hoops,” his latest graphic novel, at a free Zoom videoconference at 10:30 a.m. Readers can join other virtual events, livestreamed by Zoom, at indiebookstoreday.com.

This year, the event seems more relevant than ever as booksellers usher in a new era.

“The next 12 to 24 months are just going to look very different in terms of our business market,” Madan said. “We’re trying to build what I call a ‘next-generation bookstore’ firmly anchored in its

social mission, helping people to become better readers, better writers and to engage with each other around important issues of the day. I think that mission is still going to be relevant beyond the pandemic and the 2020 presidential election.”

Elena Eustaquio, marketing and events manager at Books Inc., which has locations in Palo Alto’s Town & Country Village and on Mountain View’s Castro Street, said the store has participated in Independent Bookstore Day since the event launched in 2014. She said the event provides local bookstores the opportunity to bring authors and patrons together for special events and book signings.

The YA @ Books Inc. program is launching its daylong virtual events with debut fantasy novelist Sasha Laurens, author of

“A Wicked Magic.”

Although this year’s event won’t involve in-person appearances, many book enthusiasts can still find the day a great time to try new works by local authors, Eustaquio said. This year, Books Inc. plans to offer exclusive items for purchase on a first-come, firstserved basis.

“I think independent bookstores are part of what makes a community a community. They provide expertise. There’s nothing like a recommendation from a bookseller who has read the book,” Saccherie said. “People are still passionate about reading, and children’s books especially lend themselves to be read in a physical form.” Q Contributing writer Michael Berry can be emailed at mikeberry@mindspring.com.

If you’re interested...

Local bookshops are celebrating Independent Bookstore Day on Saturday, Aug. 29, with on-site shopping, virtual author events, online classes and limited-edition merchandise.

The event, which got its start as California Bookstore Day, was launched by local writer and editor Samantha Schoech in 2014 to put a spotlight on books and reading. The event has grown every year in scope and participation. In 2019, 580 independent book stores nationwide participated. Here is what’s happening at the following local bookstores: Books Inc. Author Sasha Laurens will talk about her fantasy debut novel, “A Wicked Magic,” 1 p.m., via Zoom; producer and writer Sarah Faith Alterman will share her darkly funny and poignant memoir,” Let’s Never Talk About This Again” at 3 p.m., via Zoom; and editors Jerry Thomspson and Owen Hill will talk about the latest installment in the award-winning Akashic Noir anthology series,

“Berkeley Noir” at 5 p.m., via Zoom. Books Inc. will be open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.

For more information or to register, go to booksinc.net.

Kepler’s Books Kepler’s will be open for dropby service in the plaza from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. For online events and other activities, go to keplers.com.

Linden Tree Children’s Books Linden Tree will be open from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. (maximum of eight shoppers at a time). For online events and other activities, go to Lindentreebooks.com.

Indie audiobooks Book enthusiasts can purchase audiobooks directly through their local independent bookstores through Libro.fm. The audiobook service allows customers to designate a portion of their audiobook purchase to an independent bookstore of their choice. In celebration of Independent Bookstore Day, Libro.fm is offering a free audiobook credit. Q

Upfront

Police (continued from page 7)

protect the safety of the public and/or police officers.” During the July 22 hearing, Assistant Police Chief Andrew Binder suggested that this would be “a reasonable policy” and that the department already trains officers to exhaust all other options.

“We want the officer’s mindset to be that their first option is to deescalate,” Bender said. “As a natural flow, they would exhaust all that is feasible before using deadly force.”

Despite its general alignment with the commission’s view, the department is proposing language that would give officers more latitude.

Under the department’s proposed language, officers would be required to “evaluate each situation in light of the particular circumstances in each case and use other available resources and techniques when reasonably safe and feasible to do so.”

The department also proposes allowing officers to use deadly force when they “reasonably believe” that its use is necessary.

In other areas, the Police Department and the Human Relations Commission are largely in agreement. Both believe that the department’s existing policies on reporting of force and on issuing warnings before shooting are already consistent with 8 Can’t Wait.

Tanaka (continued from page 7)

The complaint claims that Tanaka “has knowingly committed clear violations of law by both receiving illegal monetary contributions and making illegal expenditures from his 2016 campaign committee account months before filing a new 501 Form as legally required.”

The complaint claims that the recent violations, combined with his failure in 2017 to disclose numerous contributions from developers (he agreed to pay $733 in fines), demonstrate “persistent attempts to shield the sources and amounts of his campaign contributions from public scrutiny by voters in this current election.”

The complaint also points to Tanaka’s expenditures in the early months of 2020 as evidence that he was using the contributions to his 2016 campaign to ramp up his reelection effort. Campaign finance documents show that he had spent $2,277 between Jan. 1 and June 30 of this year, with expenditures including ballot fees and fees to Google and NationBuilder, which specializes in campaign software.

Fires (continued from page 5)

line, the county Fire Department is preparing and planning to issue evacuation orders through the EOC if needed.

The Bay Area Air Quality Management District has issued Spare the Air alerts through Sunday, Aug. 23, because of smoke from wildfires throughout the region that has created unhealthy air pollution.

Both have also concluded that the department’s policy on de-escalation should be expanded to include specific examples of de-escalation techniques.

According to a report from the Community Services Department, the revised policy will have “clear explanations and guidance for officer actions related to de-escalation tactics to improve decision making, reduce situational intensity, and provide opportunities for outcomes with greater voluntary compliance.”

The council’s discussion of revising Palo Alto Police Department policies to better comply with the 8 Can’t Wait platform is part of its broader conversation on police reform. In late May, Mayor Adrian Fine formed ad hoc committees on police operations, accountability in the Police Department, diversity and alternative service models. Each committee is scheduled to make its first report on Monday night.

While the council’s actions are, by and large, a response to the national movement in favor of police reforms, Palo Alto is also facing its own accusations of police brutality stemming from arrests at Buena Vista Mobile Home Park in February 2018 and near Happy Donuts in July 2019. The city has already paid a settlement of $572,000 to Gustavo Alvarez relating to the Buena Vista arrest, which has also

prompted the Santa Clara County District Attorney to launch an investigation into retired Sgt. Wayne Benitez, who was the supervisor during the arrest and who can be seen on home surveillance footage slamming Alvarez into the hood of a car.

The city is also facing a federal lawsuit over the arrest of Julio Arevalo, who suffered a facial injury when he was flipped to the ground by a Palo Alto officer near Happy Donuts.

Neither Alvarez nor Arevalo was charged with any crimes relating to incidents that led to their arrests.

Palo Alto is also already on track to adopt other reforms, some of which are required by state law.

This includes the collection of demographic data on police stops, including race, age and gender of the person being stopped, the reason for the stop and actions taken during the stop. The Racial and Identity Profiling Act, also known as AB 953, requires law enforcement agencies with fewer than 334 officers to collect this data for police stops beginning Jan. 1, 2022.

The department plans to start collecting the demographic data one year before state law requires it, according to a memo from police Capt. April Wagner. Q Staff Writer Gennady Sheyner can be emailed at gsheyner@ paweekly.com.

These expenditures were incurred well before he filed the paperwork for his reelection campaign.

The 2020 expenditures represent a significant increase in campaign spending for Tanaka, according to his filed statements. In 2018 and 2019, his expenditures for each six-month reporting period ranged from $207.57 to $321.97. In the six months prior to the New Year’s Eve contributions, Tanaka’s campaign had spent $301.15, his filings show.

The only other six-month period in which his campaign had reported significant spending was in the second half of 2017, when its $1,243.70 in expenditures included the $733 fine from the state.

“The one-month accumulation of over $25,000, between December 31, 2019 and January 31, 2020, by Mr. Tanaka’s 2016 campaign committee with no nexus to ongoing office-holding expenses, and including expenses such as the voter database that directly correlate to campaign activities clearly implies changes in recipient committee information,” the complaint states.

This week, Tanaka disputed the accusations and denied any wrongdoing. State law, he noted,

allows campaigns of elected officials to continue to receive contributions after a successful election. The expenditures that his campaign made before July were not associated with his reelection effort but with his regular activities as a council member. This includes his regularly held office hours, during which he broadcasts on Facebook Live.

“That’s what we were spending funds on, constituent outreach,” Tanaka told this news organization.

When asked about the New Year’s Eve contributions, which were made more than six months before he declared his intention to run again, Tanaka said the donations reflected the desire of community members to see him seek another four years on the council.

“There’s a lot of people who support me and a lot of people who wanted to encourage me to run,” Tanaka said. “I think people wanted to see me continue to serve on the council. There was enough support for me that convinced me to do that.” Q Staff Writer Gennady Sheyner can be emailed at gsheyner@ paweekly.com.

Burning wood, manufactured fire logs or other solid fuel is banned both indoors and outdoors on days when the alerts are in effect, according to the air district. Bay Area residents are recommended to stay inside if possible with windows and doors closed until smoke levels subside.

The Peninsula, Santa Clara Valley and Livermore Valley are expected to be mostly heavily

affected by the smoke pollution, according to the air district.

People can find out when a Spare the Air alert is in effect by visiting sparetheair.org, calling 800-HELPAIR (4357-247), or connecting with Spare the Air on Facebook, Twitter or YouTube. Q Bay City News Service contributed to this report.

Staff Writer Sue Dremann can be emailed at sdremann@ paweekly.com.

News Digest Bicyclist dies in collision A 61-year-old bicyclist was struck and killed by a driver early Friday morning on University Avenue in East Palo Alto, police Cmdr. Jeff Liu said Tuesday.

The bicyclist, Eric Clemons of Menlo Park, was struck by a car traveling west on University Avenue and Adams Drive at around 4:30 a.m. Responding paramedics rendered aid but Clemos died at the scene, Liu said.

The driver, a 31-year-old man, stayed at the scene and cooperated with the initial investigation. The cause of the collision and specific details are still under investigation, Liu said.

Adams Drive is the entrance to the Menlo Business Park, an office complex that is near the well-traveled area of University Avenue, Bayfront Expressway and the Dumbarton Bridge. Q —Sue Dremann

Palantir relocates its headquarters Palantir Technologies Inc. hasn’t yet publicly announced it, but the software company has moved its headquarters out of Palo Alto to Denver, Colorado.

The $20 billion, data-analysis company has come under scrutiny and multiple protests in Palo Alto for allegedly tracking immigrants for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and counterintelligence agencies, among other data it collects.

Palantir lists Denver as its headquarters on its website and on social media pages. A source familiar with the company told the Weekly on Thursday that the information on the website is accurate. The company will still have a presence in Palo Alto and expects that some employees will transfer to Denver, but the number is not yet known and would happen sometime later.

Multiple local and national media outlets reported the news on Wednesday.

Palantir has been scaling back its footprint over the past few years.

CEO Alex Karp has made it clear that he isn’t happy with Palo Alto’s political landscape.

In a May interview, he told Axios that he was considering moving to Colorado due to the “increasing intolerance and monoculture of Silicon Valley.”

Palantir has 1,400 employees worldwide with an estimated 350 to 400 in Palo Alto.

Palantir’s tenure in Palo Alto has at times been rocky. The company faced multiple protests outside its headquarters at 100 Hamilton Ave. for its data relationship with ICE. In 2016, the company faced a U.S. Department of Labor lawsuit for alleged discrimination against Asian job applicants. The company also riled neighbors in the city that same year when it took over a Cubberley Community Center soccer field for its annual employee party.

Palantir also made community contributions while based in Palo Alto. The company launched a computer-coding after-school program for low-income youth in 2015 through the Palo Alto Unified School District. Q —Sue Dremann

Man rescues boy from Boronda Lake It was Aug. 5, a cloudy Wednesday evening. Daniel Frisk was on the phone, walking away from Boronda Lake after a calm, hourlong hike at Foothills Park, when he heard a large splash.

“Something went off in my head thinking that someone might have fallen in,” Frisk said in an interview with the Weekly.

That’s when he heard a child’s cry coming from the water by the footbridge: “I need help, I need help!”

In a moment he described as a flash, Frisk went into “autopilot” to pull the child out of the murky lake by holding on to the railing of the bridge with one hand and reaching out to the boy with his other.

Frisk didn’t see the boy enter the water, but thought the child may have fallen in while riding his bicycle ahead of his parents, near the landing at one end of the bridge, where there’s no guard rail.

“It was kind of funny because the boy’s first reaction after I pulled him out was: ‘Oh, but my bike is still in there,’” Frisk said.

After the rescue, there were no hugs or handshakes due to the pandemic protocol of social distancing — just a moment of shared shock, gratitude and relief with the boy’s parents, who were nearby with three of their other children when the boy went into the water.

For Frisk, the experience was a particularly cathartic one, with tinges of dÈj‡ vu. Years ago, when he was 4 years old, Frisk said, he too once fell into a lake and was saved by a stranger.

“I was 4, and I don’t even remember who it was, but I’ve been carrying that with me ever since,” Frisk said.

After pulling the boy out of the water, Frisk said he hoped that through telling this story, he could express how grateful he was to the man who rescued him years ago.

“I’d love to say thanks to the man who saved me,” he said. Q —Lloyd Lee www.PaloAltoOnline.com • Palo Alto Weekly • August 21, 2020 • Page 29

Upfront

Ravenswood (continued from page 8)

union has endorsed both of them.

She said the K-8 district, now under a new superintendent, has made progress in improving communication and transparency. But she wants to see improvement in other areas, including teacher retention, equity and environmental sustainability.

If elected, she said she’d prioritize increasing teacher pay to reduce turnover. At Belle Haven, she said she once heard a student tell a new teacher, “Why do I have to remember your name? You won’t be here next year anyway.”

“Teachers in Ravenswood do a serious amount of work outside their contract hours, and we’re one of the lowest compensated districts in the area still,” she said. Increased stability among teachers also helps build relationships and connections with students and families, she said.

One of Ravenswood’s most pressing issues is years of sharply declining enrollment and a corresponding decline in state funding. Alexander said she would push for bringing more students into Ravenswood by communicating about the improvements the district has made in recent years, from makerspaces at all of the schools to a dual-immersion program.

“Too many Ravenswood students are attending the Tinsley program, which I am adamantly against, and too many of our students are choosing to go to charter schools or to private schools in the area,” she said. “We need every single Ravenswood student to start attending Ravenswood schools again.”

Whoever is elected to the board in November will be doing so at

a time of great uncertainty for schools in the age of COVID-19, with local districts starting the school year completely online and no sure timeline for when they will be able to reopen.

Alexander said the board must stay on top of maintaining connections between students, families and teachers as well as addressing inequities in students’ home environments, from technology to simply having a quiet space to learn.

“I think the most important thing is to make sure that the kids continue to learn, that we don’t end up with a year and half of summer slide because our students especially can’t afford that,” she said. “It has to be coming from the top down how to make sure that our students continue to learn.”

Jenny Varghese Bloom Jenny Varghese Bloom, a college admissions counselor at Insight Education, said she wanted to run for school board because she offers “another experienced and dynamic voice.” It’s also a personal choice: Her daughter is a Ravenswood kindergartener and her son attends the district’s preschool.

“East Palo Alto is our community and our children have always been in care and education here.

I believe that my perspective and ability to connect with others will complement the existing board,” she wrote in an email.

Varghese Bloom, who grew up in Texas, has worked as a college student mentor, community college assistant instructor, legal assistant and college counselor. She holds a bachelor’s degree in human development family sciences with a focus on child development from the University of Texas at Austin and a

Public Agenda A preview of Palo Alto government meetings next week CITY COUNCIL ... The council plans to discuss revisions to Palo Alto Police Department policies to make them more compatible with the 8 Can’t Wait campaign; and provide direction on the city’s race and equity initiative. The virtual meeting will begin at 5 p.m. on Monday, Aug. 24. Those wishing to participate by Zoom can do so by dialing 669-900-6833 and using Meeting ID: 362 027 238.

BOARD OF EDUCATION ... The school board will discuss school safety measures, hiring trends during the school closures, support systems for students in distance learning and reopening plans, among other items. The virtual meeting will begin at 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Aug. 25. The meeting will be broadcast on Cable TV Channel 28 and midpenmedia.org. Those wishing to participate by Zoom can do so by going to pausd.zoom.us/j/97888498129 or dialing 669-900-6833 and using Meeting ID: 949 9734 6242.

PARKS AND RECREATION COMMISSION ... The commission plans to hear an update on green stormwater infrastructure and discuss the Ramos Park improvement project. The virtual meeting will begin at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Aug. 25. Those wishing to participate by Zoom can do so by dialing 669-900-6833 and using Meeting ID: 951 4917 7161.

PLANNING AND TRANSPORTATION COMMISSION ... The commission will discuss Castilleja School’s proposal to rebuild its campus, construct an underground garage and obtain a new Conditional Use Permit that would allow it to increase enrollment to 540 students. The virtual meetings will begin at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, Aug. 26. Those wishing to participate by Zoom can do so by dialing 669-900-6833 and using Meeting ID: 962 7264 8373.

BOARD POLICY REVIEW COMMITTEE ... The board’s policy review committee will tentatively discuss policies on sexual harassment, Tile IX, infectious diseases, physical education/activity and individualized education programs (IEPs). The virtual meeting will begin at 8:30 a.m. on Friday, Aug. 28. The Zoom link was not available by press deadline.

Page 30 • August 21, 2020 • Palo Alto Weekly • www.PaloAltoOnline.com

master’s degree in early childhood education from Loyola Marymount University.

At Insight Education, she helps high schoolers and their parents navigate the college admissions process.

“I bring to the table my experience across an expanse of fields within education, which can inform and help discern best practices moving forward,” she said.

Varghese Bloom said her priorities, if elected to the school board, include focusing on better preparing Ravenswood students for high school — an area she knows well through her work as a college counselor — and listening to input from parents, students and teachers.

The greatest challenge facing the K-8 district, from her perspective, is financial.

“I know that it has been a building season for the board with reassessing budgets and making sure that resources are allocated well to fund schools and teachers. I think that is something that will continue to be a challenge in Ravenswood,” she said.

With two schools closing in the fall and students at the merged campuses starting the new year remotely, building “a sense of community and support” among families will also be crucial to focus on this year, she added. She wants the district to continue hosting virtual town halls at least once a month to keep parents informed and connected.

Zeb Feldman Zeb Feldman said he wants to bring his expertise as a labor contract negotiator to the Ravenswood City School District. He currently represents managers, administrators and supervisors who belong to the Santa Clara County Employees Management Association Operating Engineers Local 3.

He said he was approached by friends, mentors and “local politicians” to run for a seat on the school board.

“Professionally and personally I’m accustomed to stitching together diverse coalitions and finding a common cause. There’s been some acrimony and controversy in Ravenswood recently. I’m really looking to bring some professionalism, budget research and expertise and contact negotiations understanding” to the board, he said in an interview.

Feldman, who has lived in East Palo Alto for 11 years, attended public schools in Menlo Park and graduated from Menlo-Atherton High School. Looking back, he said he’s struck by the funding disparities between a Basic Aid district like Menlo Park and Ravenswood, which relies heavily on state funding rather than local property taxes.

He said he wants to look into obtaining a “Basic Aid equivalent designation” for Ravenswood and offered that as an example of why he thinks people asked him to run for office: “They’ve seen me bring a fresh view and creative solutions to previously intractable problems.”

One of the biggest challenges facing Ravenswood, he said, is hiring and retaining quality employees,

including both teachers and staff such as janitors, guidance counselors and bus drivers.

“I think we can only do that by being more competitive in terms of our pay compensation and of course that means we have to have the economics to back that up,” he said, suggesting that the district tap local “patrons” such as Facebook, Google and Stanford University to help bridge funding gaps. He also sees opportunities to collaborate with more affluent neighboring districts on fundraising.

“I’m really looking for innovative ways to keep our property taxes more localized and to partner with fundraisers,” he said.

Feldman described himself as an expert in public proceedings — wellversed in California’s open-meeting law, the Brown Act, and Robert’s Rules of Order, a set of parliamentary rules for meeting conduct — as well as in reading budgets, negotiating contracts and navigating management-labor relations.

“I think that is a needed perspective,” he said. “I’m really just hoping to bring technical expertise on those items to the table and then understand the needs and desires of the community and the students as well as staff.”

Marielena Gaona Mendoza Marielena Gaona Mendoza, first elected in 2016, said the district has improved under new leadership “but we are not there yet.”

“I want to continue to advocate for a better education for our students so parents are not forced to take their children to other school districts, charters or private schools in order to have access to excellent education and a safe learning environment,” she said.

Gaona Mendoza works as a special education teacher in the Redwood City School District. She has served during a tumultuous time in Ravenswood, including a budget deficit, the forced resignation of Hernandez-Goff, the departure of other top administrators, the closing of two elementary schools and the eventual permanent hiring of Superintendent Gina Sudaria.

Gaona Mendoza said she was most proud of increasing accessibility as a board member and a “strong commitment to the values of transparency and fiscal responsibility in government and listening to community concerns which resulted in the departure of (the) previous superintendent.”

Gaona Mendoza cast the sole dissenting vote against renewing Hernandez-Goff’s contract in 2018, and the next year voted to place her on paid leave.

Gaona Mendoza said she also advocated for special education students, including changing the way they were being restrained in classrooms, and worked to address safety issues at Ravenswood’s new comprehensive middle school, including hiring more custodians, yard duty personnel and an extra vice principal to respond to student fights, the pulling of fire alarms and students who skipped classes.

Gaona Mendoza’s top campaign priorities include equity and the digital divide, including mandating technology training for teachers and offering technology help to parents to increase students’ success with distance learning.

“Most of our parents hold one or two jobs in order to make (ends) met and have no time or the means to provide support or supervision to their children during at-home learning. Therefore, we need to provide them with technology training and provide a safe and supportive place where students can be supervised and get support with their school assignment. This is a must if we want to narrow the academic achievement (gap),” Gaona Mendoza said.

Gaona Mendoza was the top vote-getter in 2016, winning 36.3% of the vote.

Julian Alberto Garcia Julian Garcia, a graduate and former employee of the Ravenswood City School District, is making a second bid for a seat on the school board. He ran in 2016 on a slate with parent Nicole Sbragia. His campaign slogan was “leading from the grassroots,” an alternative to the then-status quo of leadership in Ravenswood.

Garcia said he decided to run again “because I wanted to continue the work that I had begun back in 2018. Although I didn’t have success at winning the election, I was able to meet many community members, whose words encouraged me to keep going.”

He also feels the board would benefit from a member with personal experience as a student and employee.

Under new leadership, he sees Ravenswood as “headed in the right way.”

If elected, he said his top priority would be closing the digital divide in Ravenswood, which has been exacerbated by the shutdown, including by partnering with local organizations such as StreetCode Academy and Computers for Everyone.

Mele K. Latu Growing up in East Palo Alto and Redwood City, Mele K. Latu said she “always knew that I wanted to help people, I just didn’t know how or in what capacity.”

Her bid for school board is an extension of that early desire, she said.

Latu attended Clifford School in Redwood City and graduated from Menlo-Atherton High School in 2009. After attending college in Miami, she traveled abroad for a year and then returned to work in East Palo Alto. For four years, she worked for One East Palo Alto on the nonprofit’s behavior health advisory group ambassador team, which advocates for and supports mental health in the community including through a project that worked to provide culturally competent crisis support to middle school students who experience trauma as a result of violent crime in East Palo Alto.

In that role, she worked directly

Upfront with students at Ronald McNair Academy, Cesar Chavez Academy and the Ravenswood Middle School.

Latu, who is Pacific Islander, said students often told her, “It’s rare that we see someone from East Palo Alto that works here and doesn’t work as a security guard or a janitor.”

“They felt like there was a connection,” she said. “For them to see someone who looks like them, who talks like them, who lives down the street from them to be able to do what I’ve been able to do was inspiring to them.”

Latu now works as a community collaboration manager for the Emerson Collective, the social change organization founded by Laurene Powell Jobs. She works at the organization’s Bloomhouse site in East Palo Alto, which is “part of the long-term vision for Emerson Collective to partner with the local community in creating the future of the East Palo Alto waterfront,” its website reads. (Bloomhouse is physically closed due to the coronavirus shutdown but still providing

virtual services.)

If elected to the school board, Latu said she would focus on creating “togetherness” in a district that’s gone through leadership transitions, financial upheaval and is threatened by outside forces of gentrification and housing affordability. She pointed to her “network and rapport within the community” as a source for building stronger relationships in the district.

Similarly, she said she’s committed to being an accessible official who prioritizes communication.

She said the district should be developing a COVID-19 version of its long-term strategic plan.

“What is education going to look like post-COVID and how are we going to be able to maneuver that?

It’s not just about planning for this year but the following year and the year after that,” she said.

Latu also advocated for adding more East Palo Alto history — including how the city was incorporated and its deep-rooted legacy of activism and community engagement — to Ravenswood curriculum to combat negative stereotypes of

the community. This kind of curriculum would “show our young people that East Palo Alto is more than the stigma” often affiliated with the city, she said.

Joel Rivera Joel Rivera became a U.S. citizen so he could run for a seat on the Ravenswood school board this fall.

Rivera immigrated to the United States from Mexico as a young child, was raised in San Francisco and moved in 2000 to East Palo Alto, his wife’s hometown. He wanted to run in the 2016 school board but was a U.S. resident, not yet a citizen, at the time, so he couldn’t. This year, he became a U.S. citizen.

Rivera has worked for 20 years in the construction industry, including as a foreman, assistant superintendent and superintendent. He currently works as a labor manager for Nibbi Brothers General Contractors in San Francisco.

He said he was motivated to run by watching the amount of time and effort his wife, Jesusita Rivera,

a fifth-grade teacher at Costaño Elementary School, puts into her job outside of school hours and requirements. He recalled watching her stay up late one night to write grants to fund a field trip, wondering why there weren’t established systems in place to address a funding need that in many districts would be a given.

“It brought me back to my construction background. When we have needs, we go to people who specialize in (them). We won’t bog down folks that are better skilled at certain areas,” he said. “It frustrated me. That’s not fair.”

Rivera’s two children attend the Menlo Park City School District through the Voluntary Transfer Program, also known as the Tinsley program.

“Some of the sad truths of our neighborhoods is that our kids grow up a little too fast, a lot too fast sometimes,” he said of their decision to not send their children to Ravenswood schools.

Rivera said he wants to fight the very trend his own children are a part of: the increasing number of students who live in East Palo Alto

or east Menlo Park but don’t attend district schools there.

If elected, he said he would focus on increasing engagement among working parents so that it’s the “default, not an exception.”

“It’s not the norm in our area for parents to participate on a regular basis. They can’t — long hours, two jobs, multiple people working and a lot of them are intimidated by the language barrier,” Rivera said.

“That’s one of my goals — to have it feel regular, comfortable.”

Rivera, as both a parent and the spouse of a teacher, witnessed firsthand the challenges of distance learning when schools closed in the spring. For his children, it was a state of “survival,” he said.

But when it comes to reopening schools, health and safety should come first, he said.

“We’re asking for really negative results if we try to have kids go back before it’s safe to do so, even with the challenges of remote teaching,” he said. Q Staff Writer Elena Kadvany can be emailed at ekadvany@ paweekly.com.

RECOGNIZING LOCAL HEROES LOCAL HERO

Maria Martinez Maria exemplifies the best in community service to the residents at Buena Vista Mobile Park. She partners with PAUSD, donors, and volunteers to ensure children get school lunches and families receive canned foods, fresh vegetables and fruit.

Maria promotes community health during this pandemic.

Submitted by: Amado Padilla

LOCAL HERO

Valerie Campos Amid COVID-19 restrictions, Valerie Campos, director of adult services at the Vista Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired, pivoted to mobility classes via telephone and talks on Zoom. As a Vista client/board member, I’m inspired by a can-do spirit that touches the most vulnerable among us.

Submitted by: Joan Desmond

Have a local hero you want to recognize? Spread the joy and support our journalism efforts by giving him/her a shout-out in the Palo Alto Weekly. Submit entries at PaloAltoOnline.com/local_hero/

www.PaloAltoOnline.com • Palo Alto Weekly • August 21, 2020 • Page 31

Page 32 • August 21, 2020 • Palo Alto Weekly • www.PaloAltoOnline.com

www.PaloAltoOnline.com • Palo Alto Weekly • August 21, 2020 • Page 33

Upfront

Post office (continued from page 5)

until further notice.”

Letter carrier Vu Tran, James Free, CEO of the Campbell Veterans Memorial Foundation, and Lisa Ratner, vice president of Palo Alto League of Women Voters, joined Eshoo at the Aug. 18 press conference.

“I depend on the post office for my medication from the Veterans Administration,” Free said.

The Postal Service recently made headlines Anna Eshoo after President Trump’s appointed postmaster general, Louis DeJoy — who is a known megadonor to the Republican Party and the president’s campaign — began to introduce changes to the national Postal Service, including eliminating overtime for employees and removing mail-sorting machines from facilities across the country, which workers have told the media has caused delivery delays in some areas.

These changes have raised concerns that the Trump administration is attempting to cripple the agency ahead of the election as the president makes exaggerated claims of voter fraud from mail-in ballots, as seen in a May 28 tweet.

In another tweet on July 30, he suggested that the nation delay the election because of the alleged potential for mail-in voter fraud and also recently told Fox Business that he doesn’t agree that the Postal Service should receive billions in funding to handle mail-in ballots during the November election.

“It’s an election theft in progress,” Eshoo said at the conference, also suggesting that DeJoy is trying to dismantle an agency he was appointed to lead in mid-June.

On Sunday, Eshoo submitted a letter to California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, calling for a criminal investigation of DeJoy to see if the postmaster general violated any state laws that protect constituents’ right to vote by mail.

Becerra announced on Twitter Tuesday morning that the state is suing Trump for his “attacks on the USPS,” making this the 96th lawsuit against the president.

Just as the conference ended, DeJoy released a statement that said to “avoid even the appearance of any impact on election mail,” he will halt any changes to the Postal Service “until after the election is concluded.” He pledged that “retail hours at post offices will not change; mail processing equipment and blue collection boxes will remain where they are; no mail processing facilities will be closed; and we reassert that overtime has, and will continue to be, approved as needed.”

However, some, including Sen.

Across 1 Drains, as energy 5 R&B singer Cantrell 8 Cause counterpart 14 Jog like a horse 15 Presidential monogram during the 1960s 16 “Starlight Express” director Nunn 17 Gigantic bird with a stone passenger cabin 19 Item with an image-chiseling bird 20 Suffix for McCarthy 21 With a tilde, “year”; without, something nastier 22 Darkness and obscurity 23 Musical item using a pointy-beaked bird 28 Eye color location 29 Birds on a ranch Down Under 30 Word after tight or rear 33 “Ad ___ per aspera” (Kansas state motto) 35 PBS kids’ show that taught Ubby-Dubby 36 Fortune 500 member, most likely 37 Signaling item, when the bird’s tail is pulled 39 Motorist’s signal, when the bird is squeezed 42 Parisian street 43 Annoying “Sesame Street” muppet 45 “Biography” network 46 “Abso-friggin-lutely!”

47 Mother of all, in Greek mythology 48 Other, to Osvaldo 49 Garden tool, when the bird’s legs are squeezed 53 “The Heat ___” 55 Dig in 56 Pension plan alternative 57 Writing implement using a bird’s beak 59 Talking bird flying back and forth between stone boxes 61 Cover for a platter 62 “Little piggy,” really 63 “___ but known ...”

Elizabeth Warren, D-Massachusetts, have said that DeJoy’s statement does nothing to address the changes that were already made or the ongoing concerns about his possible conflict of interest.

DeJoy is expected to testify before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on Friday, Aug. 21.

Santa Clara County prepares As concerns about the Postal Service heat up in Washington and local residents have already voiced complaints about unexpected delays in delivery, Santa Clara County Registrar of Voters’ Shannon Bushey has sought to assure voters that her office has procedures in place so that all ballots will be counted, just as in years past.

Under a new law signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in June, all registered voters in California for the first time will be sent mail-in ballots to ensure safety during the pandemic. But Santa Clara County already has experience with that method, having implemented it during the March primary under the county’s Voter’s Choice Act, Bushey said.

Mail-in ballots will be sent to registered voters by Bushey’s office on Oct. 5 and will include a prepaid envelope so the voter can send it back. For people who do not wish to risk sending their ballot through the Postal Service, the county

will deploy about 90 drop boxes throughout the county. Ballots put into drop boxes will be picked up by staff from the Registrar of Voters, not the Postal Service, and brought back to be counted.

“Like the mailbox, it’s secure,” Bushey said during an Aug. 14 Facebook Live event about the election.

Voters also will be able to drop off their completed ballots in person at one of about 100 vote centers, which will open on Oct. 31 for four days, up to and including Nov. 3, Election Day, Bushey said. People also can come to vote in person at a vote center if they’ve misplaced their mailed ballots, need language assistance or require accessibility accommodations.

In the past, mail-in ballots had to be postmarked by Election Day and received by the Registrar of Voters within three days in order to be counted. This year, while the postmark must still be by Election Day, the office is allowing ballots 17 days to arrive by mail.

“That may help if there’s any issues or delays in the Post Office delivering ballots to us, which we haven’t seen,” Bushey said.

Another measure of assurance for voters: The Secretary of State has set up a system by which a voter can track their ballot’s whereabouts — when it’s been mailed to the voter, when it’s been received by the Registrar’s office and when it’s been counted. Voters can sign up by providing their name, birth

date and ZIP code at california.ballottrax.net/voter.

Bushey said that another change in November’s election is the expansion of a program called Remote Accessible Vote by Mail to all voters. Previously limited to military and overseas voters and those with disabilities, the system lets people access their ballots online through a secure connection and then voters can complete the ballot, print it out and mail it in or drop it off.

Bushey urged people not to be discouraged from voting in the election due to the pandemic or fears about the Postal Service’s reliability.

“I want you all to think about how important voting is. People have marched for this. We have fought for this. People have died for the right to vote. So ... no matter what has been going on in the world — before with wars, and now we’re in a pandemic — we still need to exercise our constitutional right,” Bushey said. “We need to vote.” Q Editorial Assistant Lloyd Lee can be emailed at llee@paweekly. com. Editor Jocelyn Dong can be emailed at jdong@paweekly.com.

About the cover: Palo Alto’s downtown post office was in the spotlight this week as local and federal officials warned that proposed cuts by the U.S. Postal Service could impact the November election. Photo by Magali Gauthier. Design by Douglas Young.

“For the Birds” — multi-tasking for the “modern Stone Age family.” [#34, Feb. 2002]. by Matt Jones

Answers on page 14.

64 Tousles, like a puppy 65 AMA members 66 Corrida cheers Down 1 It’s made to step on 2 Obey Viagra?

3 San Francisco and New Orleans, for two 4 Frequent NASCAR sponsor 5 Uses an iron, maybe 6 Quick stretch in the alphabet song 7 Article written by Voltaire?

8 List-ending abbr.

9 Web design option that’s obsolete 10 Thighbone 11 “The Greatest Story ___ Told”

Page 34 • August 21, 2020 • Palo Alto Weekly • www.PaloAltoOnline.com

Answers on page 14.

12 Stopper for the bubbly 13 Singing syllable 18 Cowboy’s rope 24 Hockey great Bobby and family 25 Summer sign 26 Service station owned by BP 27 Arizona City, today 30 Cost-friendly 31 Bookish type 32 Cooked to perfection 33 Off-kilter 34 Elisabeth of “Leaving Las Vegas” 35 Woody Allen “regular guy in famous situations” movie 38 Old paint additive 40 Ostrich or kiwi, e.g.

This week’s SUDOKU

www.sudoku.name

41 “First Do No ___” (Meryl Streep TV film) 44 Sallie ___ (student loan provider) 47 Site of a 1949 European “Convention” 48 Takes to the soapbox 49 Wishes 50 Carreras, Domingo, or Pavarotti 51 Etch away 52 Harold of “Ghostbusters” 53 “To Live and Die ___” 54 Twist, as statistics 57 AOL or MSN, e.g., once ...

58 ... and where to find them 59 “___ be my pleasure!”

60 Sorority letter © 2002, 2020 Matt Jones

Redwood City | $1,299,000 Located in the desirable Woodside Plaza neighborhood, this home offers two bedrooms, one bath and an attached one-car garage.

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Carmel Valley | $899,000 Spectacular million-dollar views & sunsets from approx 20 acre, 3,136 SF, 4 bd, 3.5 ba at end of private road.

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Redwood City | Price Upon Request Close to downtown, charming 2br/1ba features open floorplan w/hardwood floors, fireplace & large backyard.

Rick Smith 831.277.6039 rick.smith@camoves.com CalRE #00844450

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Amelia Middel 650.704.3064 CalRE #01103989 Miriam Porras 408.644.5041 CalRE #02002039

ColdwellBankerHomes.com

guiding you home since 1906

The property information herein is derived from various sources that may include, but not be limited to, county records and the Multiple Listing Service, and it may include approximations. Although the information is believed to be accurate, it is not warranted and you should not rely upon it without personal verification. Real estate agents affiliated with Coldwell Banker Realty and Coldwell Banker Devonshire are independent contractor sales associates, not employees. ©2020 Coldwell Banker. All Rights Reserved. Coldwell Banker and the Coldwell Banker logos are trademarks of Coldwell Banker Real Estate LLC. The Coldwell Banker System is comprised of company owned offices which are owned by a subsidiary of Realogy Brokerage Group LLC and franchised offices which are independently owned and operated. The Coldwell Banker System fully supports the principles of the Fair Housing Act and the Equal Opportunity Act. ®

www.PaloAltoOnline.com • Palo Alto Weekly • August 21, 2020 • Page 35

Palo Alto | $2,098,000 www.595Matadero.com for more information. Rare opportunity! over 10,000 sf flat lot with a darling 3-bedroom home in a tranquil and serene setting of sought-after Barron Park neighborhood of Palo Alto. This property is the ultimate blank canvas offering many options to customize--move in and enjoy; remodel & expand plus an ADU; or a fantastic location to maximize the lot potential and build your dream home.

Julie Lau 650.208.2287 jlau@cbnorcal.com CalRE #01052924

Mountain View | $2,098,000 Meticulously maintained beautiful duplex home located on a quiet street near Downtown Mountain View & Google.

Menlo Park | $1,695,000 Ready to sell and get on with your plans? This beauty Sold quickly in the pandemic.

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Noemi Ruelas 650.917.4303 noemi.ruelas@cbnorcal.com CalRE #01819934

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Palo Alto | $1,500,000 Rarely available 2br/2.5ba unit w/private front patio & oriental garden in the Colorado Place complex.

Redwood City | $1,398,888 Amazing triplex with 2 units offering 1 bd 1 ba, while 3rd has 2 bd 1 ba.

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Terrie Masuda 650.400.2918 tmasuda@cbnorcal.com CalRE #00951976

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ColdwellBankerHomes.com

guiding you home since 1906

The property information herein is derived from various sources that may include, but not be limited to, county records and the Multiple Listing Service, and it may include approximations. Although the information is believed to be accurate, it is not warranted and you should not rely upon it without personal verification. Real estate agents affiliated with Coldwell Banker Realty and Coldwell Banker Devonshire are independent contractor sales associates, not employees. ©2020 Coldwell Banker. All Rights Reserved. Coldwell Banker and the Coldwell Banker logos are trademarks of Coldwell Banker Real Estate LLC. The Coldwell Banker System is comprised of company owned offices which are owned by a subsidiary of Realogy Brokerage Group LLC and franchised offices which are independently owned and operated. The Coldwell Banker System fully supports the principles of the Fair Housing Act and the Equal Opportunity Act. ®

Page 36 • August 21, 2020 • Palo Alto Weekly • www.PaloAltoOnline.com