Pyle Criticized, Praised for Actions

Tulare - City Manager Darrel Pyle has received sharp criticism from two City Council members and high praise from two others for the way he prepared for a potential transfer of overseas money into an account for use by Tulare Motor Sports Complex developers.

The transfer of the money into a Tulare Redevelopment Agency trust account, which Pyle said city staff suggested to the private lender in a conference call last month, did not take place. The lending company wanted to consider other ways to get $120 million to developer Bud Long and his partners, city officials said.

Councilmen David Macedo and Wayne Ross said their criticism of how Pyle handled the situation had nothing to do with their opposition to the racetrack, but with what Ross termed process, procedure and ultimate liability.

“We have to look at these things, whether we love the project or not,” he said.

Mayor Craig Vejvoda and Vice Mayor Phil Vandegrift heaped praise upon Pyle and Bob Nance, the city's economic and redevelopment director, for their efforts.
“I commend you for working above and beyond the call of duty and trying to create jobs in this town,” Vejvoda said at the March 16 City Council meeting, where the matter was discussed for more than 30 minutes.

A frustrated Vandegrift thanked the Redevelopment Agency for “helping us try to diversify our economy” and asked City Attorney Steve Kabot what vote would the council have to take to “allow our staff to work as a cohesive unit” and carry out the council majority's direction.

“I don't think there's any vote you could put out there and take … to give carte blanch to move forward,” Kabot said, explaining that moving forward involved multiple steps and issues and, as they arise, staff will have to go through proper process and forum.

“Some will need to come back to you; some won't need to,” he said. Kabot is not advising the council on racetrack issues.

Councilman Richard Ortega was quiet through most of the discussion but at one point suggested to Ross that his view on how city staff handled the matter might be “a little bit slanted” because he is opposed to the project.

Ross vigorously disagreed and suggested in an interview later that if his vision was skewed because of his stance, then maybe those who strongly support the project are not seeing clearly either.

News Report

Macedo and Ross said they first learned about the potential Redevelopment Agency involvement in a transaction related to the racetrack in the Tulare Voice on March 4, a week after a special redevelopment meeting had been called and then canceled on the same day.

“That's not the best public policy I know of,” said Ross, who had indicated prior to the council meeting that he was upset because Pyle did not brief the council about the matter at its March 2 meeting, which occurred after the Feb. 24 meeting and before the March 4 Tulare Voice edition.

“I hate reading those kinds of things in the paper and if Darrel thinks that it is not that important to enlighten the council on … we can take care of that in a different venue,” Macedo said.

He said he had people calling him about the matter and he was unable to provide them with information.

Vejvoda asked Pyle to in the future “give a heads up to the entire council” if there is going to be a public discussion in which the racetrack project will be a potential topic.

“That's only fair,” Macedo said.

Ross said that's what he has been asking for more than a year.

“It's not a Brown Act violation if he [Pyle] calls you, you, you, you and you – as long as he doesn't discuss what was discussed with the mayor, vice mayor, Councilman Macedo or whatever,” he said.

Walk Out

When the council and redevelopment agency met in a joint meeting on March 10, Nance gave a report on what had transpired regarding the racetrack financing.

Ross was absent and Macedo left the room, contending he would not participate in a violation of the Brown Act. While he contended the item should have been on the agenda, Nance and Pyle said no violation had occurred because the wording on the agenda allowed for discussion of other items of mutual interest in addition to those listed.

“I think they purposely wanted to discuss it without being on the agenda,” Macedo said later.

After the council's closed session last week and about 10 minutes prior to its open session, Macedo sat alone on the council dais. When asked why he was not inside with other council members, he told the Tulare Voice the session had ended.

“They're eating, but I'm just not going to be part of it,” he said. “With everything that's going on, I think we need to be more open than ever before.”

He explained he was referring to the on-going criticism the Tulare County Board of Supervisors has received after the Tulare Advance-Register/Visalia Times-Delta published a series of articles about lunch meetings that appear to violate the Brown Act – the state's open meeting law.

After several references to the Brown Act were made during last week's council meeting, Pyle said he and his staff understand the Brown Act and are sensitive to anything that even resembles a violation.

“We take it very seriously when people make the statement that the Brown Act has been violated, especially when it is believed due to staff error or manipulation of the system,” he said, adding the city pays attorneys “lots of money” to make sure it complies with the law.

Why Not Council?

Macedo and Ross asked why the matter was brought to the City Council, instead of the Redevelopment Agency, especially since it is clear the council majority would have granted the request to set up the account.

Pyle and Nance have said timing was one issue. The redevelopment board was meeting prior to the next regular council meeting and acting as soon as possible would potentially speed up the ability to receive loan proceeds.

Another reason was the agency, as well as the city, has experience in being the local oversight banker for trust accounts and is also charged with economic development.
Ross and Macedo raised issues about the city or agency's liability if a trust account was established for the project.

Special Counsel Tim Sabo, who is advising the city on the racetrack project, said he would take several steps to make sure the city was not at risk.

In addition to consulting a banking attorney, he would also have a bankruptcy attorney take a look at any agreement prepared, Sabo said.

The kind of option that was being considered, he explained, is called conduit financing, which is something cities and redevelopment agencies do all the time, especially when tax-exempt loans are involved. It is also used when Community Facility Districts are established.

While the city or agency has to be the borrower in those cases, they have no obligation to repay bonds, he said.

Swiss Bank

In an interview a few days after the council meeting, Vandegrift said he sat in on last month's conference call, which Pyle told the council involved the lender, himself, Nance, Sabo and members of the TMSC development team.

“According to the lender, the money is sitting in a Swiss bank for an eight-month clearinghouse process,” he said.

The reason for the lengthy delay before the transfer can be made is because “Homeland Security apparently scrutinizes all money coming in … mainly because they don't want it falling into the hands of terrorist,” Vandegrift said.

“What I heard [in the conference call] was they were encouraging staff to seek representatives on the state and federal level to help verify the humanitarian need for this project,” he said.

The questions was raised by either Pyle or Nance about whether a local government, such as the city of Tulare, could substantiate the job creation benefits to the community, the vice mayor said.

Pyle said that over the course of the conversation, staff asked if the TMSC portion, which is part of a larger pool of projects, could be broken out to speed up its delivery, which he said “appeared to be at least a viable alternative to consider.”

It was then that the staff brought up the possibility of using a trust account, similar to what is used by the city to make first-time home buyer loans to allow loan proceeds to flow directly into the city or Redevelopment Agency, Pyle said.

This could further assure “proceeds would be available to cover the costs associated with the environmental impact report,” he said, referring to the $1.24 million cost the city incurred in preparing the document but which has yet to be reimbursed by the developer.

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Farmers of the Year
The Airosos: Like Father, Like Son

Tulare - Talk to the people who have known Joe and Joey Airoso for years and you are easily convinced the Noon Kiwanis Club knew what it was doing when it named the two Farmers of the Year.

This is the first time the service club has presented the award to a father and son team and the Airosos have set the bar high, not only for their farming efforts, a secondary consideration for the award, but also for their community involvement.
“It's humbling,” Joe Airoso said, adding he is especially honored to join the list of past recipients who are people “we've admired and got advice from and emulated.”
Their colleagues in the industry said they belong on that list.

“They are so well deserving,” said Lori Cardoza, a local dairy owner and farmer.
Cardoza recalled how Joe would “never miss an FFA show or event” when his children were in school and she praised his son Joey, who she said has taken on “a tremendous leadership role” in representing the dairy industry and has given generously of his time and talents.

Joey serves on the agriculture advisory boards for both the high school district and College of the Sequoias and “his leadership is invaluable,” she said.

Dave Caetano, Agricultural Department Chair for the Tulare Joint Union High School District, agreed.

He has known the family for 30 years and said the award recipients are consistent supporters of the district farm and FFA programs.

“Joey helps us out quite a bit,” Caetano said. “He works with our dairy cattle judging kids. He also is instrumental with the heifer sale they have in May, so kids have an outlet to buy heifers to show.”

Since the death of Max Corbett, who ran the high school district's dairy, Joey Airoso and Joey Fernandez have taken on the leadership role in making improvements to assure the program continues, he said.

The Airosos are “well deserving” of the award, dairyman Joey Fernandes said. “I've known them both most of my life and I would consider Joe a mentor to me and Joey a good friend,” Fernandes said. “They're farmers dedicated to what they do.”

The two share a true love for the Holstein cow, paying attention not only to milk production but to breeding practices as well, he said.

Ad Campaign

On the day the Tulare Voice visited one of their dairies, a representative from the California Milk Advisory Board stopped by to show Joe and Joey Airoso a series of television ads the board will debut in May, featuring long-time dairy families, including their own.

Airoso Dairy is a partnership involving Joe and Diane Airoso, Joey and Laurie Airoso and their son Joseph, who is the fifth generation to farm in the Central Valley.

Their selection for the ad campaign makes sense, because the Airoso family's farming roots extend back 98 years to when Joe's grandfather came to the Valley from the Azores with his seven children (his grandmother had died).

His father, Charles, was 17 years old at the time, and the family farmed for 15 years in the area where the Corcoran prison is today, milking 180 cows by hand, Joe said.

In 1927 his grandfather moved back to the Azores and his five sons scattered, Joe said, adding his dad “jumped around three places” until he ended up in 1938 southwest of Tulare at Avenue 184 and Road 64, which is the site today of one of the family's two dairies.

Joe, who was born in 1938, was the oldest of Charles and Julia Airoso's four children and in 1961 he and his brothers became partners in the farming and dairy operations.

His father died in 1963 and five years later he bought his brothers' portion of the dairy and they and his mother continued the farming operations until he bought them out in 1976, Joe Airoso said. That year he also bought the dairy facility he had been leasing.

The property the Airosos own on Road 96, a mile south of Avenue 120, was purchased in 1980 and the family grew cotton for many years before applying to build the modern dairy that has been in operation for nearly four years.

Permission to build the dairy came only after a lengthy court battle with the state, which was trying to halt construction of new dairies in the area. “It was seven years from the day we applied for the permit to the day we opened up the dairy,” Joe said.

Herd Improvement

Their persistence no doubt was rooted in their love of the business.

“I've always kind of liked the cows, even from the time I was little,” Joey said.
The family's decision in the 1960s, when he was still in 4-H, to raise registered Holsteins, which produce the most volume of milk, and the genetics aspect of the business have kept him interested, he added.

Asked why he has stayed in the business, Joe said it “sure wasn't for the money. I was just born into it and love the animals and planting crops.” Like his son, he also said he “enjoys the challenge of improving the herd.”

Airoso Dairy milks 2,300 cows three times a day at its two sites and has placed in the top 10 Tulare County herds for production for many years. The farm also includes 2,280 head of support stock and breeding bulls and the farming operation consists of about 1,700 acres of land upon which alfalfa, wheat, oats and corn silage are grown. The dairy and farm employ 28 people.

Community Service

In addition to supporting youth and adult sport teams for 40 years, Joe Airoso coached youth basketball and baseball in the 1960s and 70s, was a 4-H leader for two clubs and has helped FFA judging teams.

He is still “hands-on” with 4-H and FFA members, willing to help his nine grandchildren and their friends anyway he can, he said. He also assists COS judging teams.

“Helping youth is the most rewarding thing you can do,” he said.

Over the years, he also has served as chairman of the Springer-Heifer Committee at the Tulare County Fair, president of the Tulare County Dairy Herd Improvement Association, vice president of the California Holstein Dairy Association, president of the Fatima Celebration, board member for St. Aloysius School and member of the DCCA (now Land O'Lakes) finance board.

He is a member of St. Aloysius Church and a lifetime member of the Knights of Columbus.

In addition to Joey, he and his wife, Diane, are parents to Frankie Airoso, Julie Locke and the late Charles Airoso.

Joey Airoso has served on the high school farm's advisory council for more than a decade and is a member of the COS Agriculture Advisory Committee and the California Junior Ag Advisory Board.

He and his dad allow FFA dairy judging teams to come out to the dairy to practice. And as his father did, Joey has traveled to Oklahoma, Nevada and Nebraska to judge FFA shows and has judged adult teams at state fairs.

His commitment to the dairy industry is reflected in his service to many associations and boards.

He has served on the Tulare Dairy Herd Improvement Association board for 18 years and is a past president. He also is a past president of the California Holstein Association and the Southern San Joaquin Holstein Club. He serves on the Farm Credit West and Western United Dairyman boards and is a Land O'Lakes delegate.

In addition to their son Joseph, 22, he and his wife, Laurie, are parents to daughter, Amanda, a Sacramento-area teacher.

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Students Encouraged to Dream ‘Ivy’

Tulare - This weekend nine Tulare high school students will embark on a week-long journey to explore college options well beyond California's borders.

To be more specific the seven – five from Tulare Union and one each from Tulare Western and Mission Oak – will travel to the East Coast to visit Ivy League colleges.

Cleo Carrasco, a Tulare guidance counselor, will travel with them, as she did with six Tulare Union students who went last year as part of the Ivy League Project, which Parlier teacher Martin Mares has led for nearly 18 years.

“I try to get kids dreaming outside of the box,” Carrasco said, explaining why she encourages students to take a look at the Ivy League schools, even if they don't join her and Mares on the trip.

Her efforts this year already have led Tulare Union senior Jacob Gomez – who did not go on last spring's tour – to apply to Cornell University, which has accepted him and offered to pay tuition and board. Travel expenses are not covered.

The Ithaca, N.Y., university also paid part of the cost for him and his parents to visit Cornell in November and participate in Diversity Week activities. Carrasco went with them.

Aware that Gomez wants to study veterinary medicine and that Cornell has a noted agricultural program, Carrasco had taken him in September to Mission Oak High School, where Dr. Larry Stoneburner, owner of K-TIP radio in Porterville and co-chair of the North Central Valley chapter of the Cornell Alumni Admissions Ambassador Network, was to meet with students.

“They were trying to get kids from the West Coast to attend Cornell,” Gomez said. “They only get six to 12 students a year. They definitely wanted California representation. I didn't even know about Cornell – had no idea they had an ag school.”

He probably was not alone in that respect, because he was the only student to show up for the meeting with Stoneburner.

Carrasco said students, even if they know about the Ivy League schools, oftentimes have trouble imagining themselves attending one.

“I think the hardest part is getting the kids to believe in themselves,” she said.

When they go on the Ivy League tour, she said, they put things in perspective. “They hear kids says, 'I had a 3.5 [GPA). I didn't think I could make it but I am.'”

To participate in the Ivy League Project, students have to have a 3.75 GPA to go on the trip.

“If they go below 3.75, they go on probation,” Mares, the project founder and coordinator, said. “We have expectations. We expect the kids to excel.”

Most of the students in the program have GPAs in the range of 4.0 to 4.5, he said. “These are kids that love to learn.”

Mares said he began the program at the urging of journalist Ruben Navarette, a nationally syndicated columnist with the Washington Post Writers Group and a member of the San Diego Tribune's editorial board. Navarette grew up in Sanger, not far from Parlier, and later graduated from Harvard.

“For a long time our community has had a poor reputation and people think our kids can't do things and go places,” Mares said, reporting that the project, in its 18th year, has seen 112 of its students accepted at Ivy League schools.

“I think it's changed the expectations of other kids,” Mares said. “They've seen kids who live in the same neighborhoods and attend the same churches go to these schools. It's raised expectations and raised the bar of awareness for kids.”

Tulare Union's Gomez, whose ultimate goal is to become a large animal veterinarian specializing in dairy animals, said he is still waiting to hear if the University of California, Davis, has accepted him.

If it has, he said he will “really have to put more thought” into his final decision.

Cornell has a fast-track program in which he could finish his undergrad and graduate studies in six years instead of seven, he said. “It would save time and money.”

Gomez, son of Darin and Rosemary Gomez, also has been named a Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Scholar, which he can apply to his graduate studies, he said.

Prep School?

Tulare Union sophomore Carlos Aguilera, who is enrolled in the Ivy League Project, learned last week he has been accepted at The Lawrenceville School, an East Coast prep school he learned about through the program.

“I heard it was one of the top high schools in the nation,” Aguilera said. “They have the classes that would challenge me. Teachers are real close to students.”

He has a 4.33 GPA and wants to become a civil engineer and next week's tour will give him the opportunity to see The Lawrenceville School for the first time. It is in Lawrenceville, N.J., about five miles from Princeton.

Aguilera said he won't be making any decisions about the school until he hears how much financial aid he will get.

“I understand that if I don't get a full ride, there would be no need to go, because it's expensive and my parents don't have that kind of money,” he said.

How do parents feel about their children looking at Ivy League schools?

“My mother has been very supportive,” said Maria Barrera, a Tulare Union junior. “She said 'be a role model to your sisters. It's very important.'”

Barrera, who wants to study bio-chemistry or “green chemistry,” said she will be the first in her family to attend college and wants to take a close look at Colby, a college in Maine, which is considered a small Ivy League school.

“I would like to go to a school that is small and not so big,” she said.

Gerard Arroyo, a Tulare Union senior who wants to study to study medicine, said his parents want him to further his education. “It doesn't matter where it is,” he said.
He said he applied to Carroll College and Rocky Mountain College, both in Montana, after taking a college match survey in his history class. He is taking the Ivy League trip to check out graduate schools.

More Than a Trip

Students in this year's Ivy League Project will visit Harvard, Yale, Princeton, M.I.T., Colby College, University of Pennsylvania, Columbia, Dartmouth, Georgetown, Wesleyan, Brown and Wellesley College.

But the project is more than a trip for students. Mares said it is an 18-month leadership seminar, which meets twice a month and gives students an opportunity to learn team work, how to network and to listen to guest speakers.

“We teach them about being cordial and respectful and following through with thank you notes, Mares said.

Students say the program has been valuable and nudged them out of their comfort zone.

“I was really, really shy in front of people,” Barrera said. “I'm more comfortable around people now.”

They are taught communication skills and encouraged to make and use business cards, among other things.

The application process for the program is almost as rigorous as applying for college. Students must write three essays, obtain two recommendations and sit for an interview before they are accepted.

“The kids are all doing their own fund raising and we've done a couple of group fundraisers,” Carrasco said, adding she wants to thank the community for its support of the students.

The application process for students who want to go on next spring's tour will begin May 1, she added. Interested Tulare students can contact her at Tulare Union.

Other students going on next week's tour are: senior Vanessa Carrasco, junior Ignacio Romero, junior Blake Colson and sophomore Laura Gutierrez, all from Tulare Union; junior Cinthya Alvarez, Mission Oak; and sophomore Marissa Moraza, Tulare Western.

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Hospital Low-Bid Almost $400,000 Below Previous

Tulare - Harris Construction again offered the lowest price in a second round of bidding on the Tulare Regional Medical Center expansion project and hospital directors are expected to issue a letter of intent this week to award a contract to the Fresno-based company.

The good news is two-fold. The company's bid came in at $34.45 million – almost $400,000 below its initial bid – and the medical center received no protest from any of the other two bidders.

Project manager Mike McGuire reports Seals/Biehle was the next lowest bidder at $34.9 million, a huge drop from its original $41 million bid.

McCarthy Building Company, which filed a protest after the first round of bidding, was the highest bidder at $35.58 million, also less than its previous bid of $37.15 million.

Kitchell Contractors, which had bid $35.76 million in March, did not re-bid the project after the Tulare Local HealthCare District board unanimous rejected all bids on March 4 in the wake of McCarthy's request.

The bids for the expansion came in considerably lower than the $50 million estimate, good news since the overall project estimate of $120 million was $35 million more than the $85 million bond approved by voters in 2005.

McGuire said Harris' subcontractors are almost all located between Fresno and Bakersfield, which is expected to be a boost for the local building industry.

Once the hospital board issues the notice of intent, Harris will have 15 days within which to obtain the necessary bonds and sign the contract and 60 days within which to provide a work schedule for the first 60 days, he said.

The 115,000-square-foot expansion will include a new emergency room and a helipad.

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