Valley Voice Newspaper

Booth Ranches Buys Porterville Citrus Operation

Porterville - Booth Ranches, based in Orange Cove, has purchased Goodell Packing of Porterville, says company owner Loren Booth. “We’ve purchased their 1,000 acres of orange groves in Tulare and Kern counties as well as their packing operation in Porterville,” says Ms. Booth who doubles as the firm’s general manager.

The news will mean one fewer Sunkist packer. Booth will instead be packing and marketing all the fruit themselves. “We tried to continue to pack the Goodell fruit through Sunkist but they turned us down,” she says, since it was not agreeable to have one owner pack some fruit through Sunkist and some other fruit independently. Sunkist confirmed the news.

Booth says general manager of the Porterville packing house, Mitch Butler, will continue to run the packing house for the company. Ms. Booth says her first look at the new crop coming in October is that it could be just a hair larger in fruit size—generally good news for the market.

Booth Ranches is already the third largest citrus grower in the state with ranches in both Kern, Tulare and in Maricopa with nearly 6,000 acres of citrus (now 7,000) along with some 3,000 acres in other uses including cattle. Founded in 1957 by Loren’s father, Otis Booth, the company is celebrating its 50^th year in business. Most recently, the company reopened a closed packing facility in Orange Cove in 2003. Last year, the company began to do all of its own marketing and sales for the first time.

Sunkist, once the dominant packer in California citrus, continues to see stronger competition from larger independents like Paramount, Sun Pacific, Booth and Grimmway Farms.

Tulare County Assessment Roll Jumps $3 Billion
Double-Digit Gain in All Eight Cities

Tulare County - Tulare County Assessor Greg Hardcastle released his preliminary roll values for 2007-08 earlier this summer and it showed property values increased by double digits in all Tulare County cities and in the county as a whole by 12.75%. Farmersville led the way with a 24% increase and Lindsay followed close behind at 21.83% increase over the assessment the year before.

The large cities had impressive gains as well, led by Porterville up 18.93%, Tulare 18.23% and Visalia up 16.89%.

Gains by other cities were Dinuba at 15.16%, Exeter at 11.16% and Woodlake at 11.56%.

Countywide, the value of all property in the county jumped from $22.9 billion in 2006-07 to $25.8 billion in 2007-08 nearly a $3 billion increase.

The county’s property values have increased almost $6 billion since 2005-06 year when they hit $20 billion for the first time. That year, Exeter led the way with a 14.91% increase and the county as a whole was up 9.97%.

Pumping up the values throughout the county in the latest year was a big jump in land values typically higher by percentage than the increase in improvements on the land. Farmersville property values jumped nearly 40%, Lindsay up 39% and Tulare up nearly 30%. Dinuba land values jumped 38% the report says. In Dinuba land values went from $172 million in 2006-07 to $238 million in 2007-08.

Still, improvements made up a majority of the $3 billion increase in values countywide shows the report with this category jumping $1.7 billion in a year.

The higher assessment will mean more revenue for both the county and cities and special districts. Tulare City Manager Darrel Pyle was elated at the value increase noting that “this is the second year our city has enjoyed a double digit gain in values.” The city has had a major retail building boom in place for the past few years that shows no sign in abating.

Visalia remains the county’s highest value city with property values assessed at $8.77 billion, up from $7.5 billion the year before. The boost was led by new improvements (buildings) totaling more than $700 million of that increase as commercial construction has now taken the lead over new residential activity, says the city’s building department.

The gain in value for the county is already translating into a better budget picture for the county who has agreed to for out double-digit increases in pay for law enforcement needed to keep the county safe. All cities use property tax funds to bolster public safety. Although cities, redevelopment districts, county fire and our library system all get a small share, most of the money however goes back to the state for schools.

A closer look at the increases both inside all the urban areas of the county vs. outside those areas in the rural part of the county shows a clear difference with values inside the incorporated cities jumping 17% vs. just 5.6% outside the cities. The report says countywide land values jumped 16% in 2007-08, part of the boom in real estate that has swept California in the past few years but has clearly slowed more recently. If the housing boom raised values by double digits in the past, the bust in housing will likely slow the trend.

Great Lakes Aviation Expected to Serve Visalia

by Steve Pastis

Visalia - A decision from the Department of Transportation (DOT) about which air carrier will serve Visalia and Merced is expected by end of month and if rules are followed, Great Lakes Aviation, the choice of the Visalia City Council, will be selected. This will occur despite the vote by the Merced City Council that selected Vision Airlines.

“It’s a package deal, so unless really goes awry, they’ll end up with Great Lakes,” said Mario Cifuentez, manager of Visalia Airport. “Vision proposes service to Long Beach and North Las Vegas, neither of which is a large or medium hub airport. The Essential Air Service statutes require that an airline provide service to a large or medium hub airport.

“In this case, the city has said, ‘No, we want Great Lakes. We’re not willing to waive our right to a large or medium hub airport.’ So the DOT cannot impose service to a non-hub airport on us because we are not willing to give up that statutory right we were granted by Essential Air Service rules,” he said.

The Department of Transportation, based in Washington, D.C., manages and runs the Essential Air Service program, which has been serving smaller airports, such as Visalia and Merced, for almost 30 years.

“In 1978, when the airlines were deregulated, as a condition of deregulation, they established the Essential Air Service program,” explained Cifuentes. “What the regulations stated is that any airport that was served by an air carrier at the time of deregulation will be guaranteed air service through subsidies in the future, with some caveats. There are regulations and subsidy limits.”

Mesa, which is a part of Air Midwest, has been serving Visalia Airport under the EAS program, but apparently not very well.

“We cannot continue with Air Midwest or Mesa,” Cifuentes said. “They cancelled 27% of the flights in August due to maintenance and crew issues. My understanding is that’s actually a relatively low number compared to their system nationally. In some cities in the Midwest and the East, they have actually cancelled 50 and 60% of their flights.

“Mesa, on behalf of Air Midwest, has filed to withdraw from 17 essential air service communities in the last few months,” he said. “It’s no secret that they are trying to get out of the essential air service market and they’re trying to get out of the 19-seat market. Since they can’t sell it, and they’ve tried to sell that arm, they figure they can focus on a small area and focus five or six of their aircraft and sell off the rest. I think that’s what their attempt was here on the West Coast.

“However, they’ve hurt the markets that they’re in so bad, due to their poor on-time performance and their completion ratio, that many of the communities, including ourselves have no desire to continue the relationship,” he said. “They requested to pull out, however, they put in another bid to continue servicing that was almost double, in terms of subsidy requests.”

According to Cifuentes, Mesa pulled out of the Visalia market and others, stating that they were losing money, which happens in the airline industry. Airlines in the EAS program will ask for bigger DOT subsidies and cite rising fuel costs or changing market dynamics.

“Typically, the airline would come to us and say, ‘We’re really losing money. Costs have gone crazy. We’re going to file, but know that we have no intention of leaving. We just want to trigger the subsidy,’” Cifuentes said.

“Now it is almost unheard of for a carrier to file midstream, in the middle of their two-year contract, and then put in just because they want more money,” he continued. “Quite frankly, I believe, it scares the DOT because you’ve got 107 EAS communities. What if every carrier were to say, ‘We want more money. Let’s file and put in doubling the amount’? There’s just not that much money in the program. That’s essentially what Mesa did.”

After filing to pull out of Visalia and Merced, Mesa put in a bid for these cities again. Their bid is $3.2 million more than their competitors, however, and Cifuentes said, “Their performance has been so poor and we see nothing that indicates that they are going to be able improve their performance.”

This leaves a two-horse race between Great Lakes and Vision.

“Vision obviously has the advantage in terms of aircraft,” Cifuentes said. “They fly the 30-passenger Dornier 328. It’s gorgeous aircraft—almost a stand-up cabin, overhead bins, that sort of thing.

“However, they were proposing service to Long Beach and to North Las Vegas,” he continued. “Passengers would have to fly in there and get their own ground transportation to the Strip or to hotels, or they would provide free shuttle service over to McCarran (International Airport). The drawback to that is once you get to McCarran, you’d have to go through screening again and carry your own bags. Our passengers have said, ‘We don’t want to do that again.’”

But passengers in Merced like what Vision offers because their air transportation needs are different than those of passengers in Visalia.

“When you look at the L.A. area, part of the problem that Vision ran into is you have Merced-Visalia, and they’re two separate markets in terms of wanting service to the L.A. basin,” Cifuentes said. “For us, so many local people travel to L.A., they’ll just drive it. It’s two-and-a-half or three hours. You aren’t going to spend $250 round-trip to do that. Whereas Merced’s two hours further away. It’s much more appealing for the people up there to want L.A. service via air.”

Merced had very high numbers when Scenic was there, according to Cifuentes.

“They saw a lot of tourism,” he said. “A lot of people coming in and going to Yosemite, that sort of thing.”

Meanwhile, he explained the numbers in Visalia have reflected a higher percentage of people connecting to other flights in Las Vegas.

“We have a higher number of business travelers, ” he said. “They have primarily a leisure market in Merced. We have 30% of our passengers continuing on while 20% of their passengers do.”

For an EAS market, Visalia has been doing pretty well over the past few years, according to Cifuentes.

“Each of the last three years, we have doubled the number of passengers we’re serving and we were on pace to double them again this year until Mesa filed to pull out and the numbers started to steadily decline,” he said.

Mesa is required to continue serving Visalia on a 30-day continuing basis until a new carrier takes over. Cifuentes expects the new carrier to start in November.

Supervisor Connie Conway Announces
Candidacy for State Assembly

by Steve Pastis

Tulare County - Tulare County Supervisor Connie Conway announced her candidacy for the 34^th Assembly District at a campaign kickoff rally in Visalia on September 14^th. She joins Rebecca “Becky” Maze and Bob Smith (who will both be profiled in upcoming issues) as a candidate for the Republican nomination.

The Republican nomination will be decided with the June 3, 2008 ballot. The general election will be held on November 4, 2008. The 34^th Assembly District extends to the Colorado River and includes Visalia, Tulare, and parts of Kern, San Bernardino and Inyo counties.

In her campaign literature, Conway prominently uses the word conservative to describe herself.

“I think it’s important to have a conservative,” she explained. “I’m sure everyone has their own description of what that means. One of the reasons that I included that in my press release is I would like to see the working relationship between the state legislature changed to be more conservative. By that I mean I would like to see the legislature in the state of California wake up and remember that they represent the same people that local government represents.

“If you live inside of a city, you live inside of a county, you live inside the state of California,” she continued. “It’s frequent that the state legislature will set forth a program or a mandate, push that on down to local government and say, ‘Oh, by the way, we’re not paying for it.’

“The folks in Sacramento seem to think that it’s okay to push those programs down to the local level and let us worry about it and let us figure out how to do it,” she said. “I have a theory on local government and it’s not partisan—we’re all conservative. We have to be. We don’t have any money. I would just like to see the legislature remember who they represent so when you, for example, as a taxpayer, believe you’re paying your taxes to pay for roads and for police and for fire service and yet you find out, well, wait a minute, maybe we’re not putting as much into that as we’d like to because we have to fund a state-mandated program over here that’s forced upon us by law but we’re not funded to pay for it.”

In addition to having served on the Tulare County Board of Supervisors for almost seven years, Conway was appointed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to the California Partnership for the San Joaquin Valley, an organization he created two years ago to promote economic development and the quality of life in the Central Valley. She is also on the Board of Directors of the National Association of Counties, for which she also chairs the membership committee.

Conway believes that her political strengths include “experience and the ability to get things done on a state level. I know how to translate what I’m hearing from my constituents into opportunity for them, which translates into opportunity for the whole district that I represent.

“I think that I have the ability and the energy and the presence of mind to represent this district in all of its entirety and give it everything that I have,” she said. “I’m very dedicated to the work that I do. It’s very important and it’s very special to me. Should I be elected, I will work night and day for those that I serve.”

Conway started her political career 17 years ago in Tulare. She explained how and why she decided to enter politics.

“I had an opportunity to serve on a redevelopment agency board of directors for the City of Tulare, which is an appointed position,” she said. “I participated in Leadership Visalia, as it was called then—now it’s called Sequoia Regional Leadership—back in 1990. That really gets you thinking on a wider scope than just your neighborhood. You take a look at the community and maybe even look further than that.

“But I would probably have to say the real inspiration came from my father (John Conway),” she said. “I hold the seat now on the Board of Supervisors that he formerly held. He retired from the phone company after 35 years at a relatively young age and was elected to serve on the Board of Supervisors in 1980. We lost him in 1991 to cancer in the middle of his third term. Ten years later, actually, is when I made the decision to run for the board.

Conway received a degree in physical education from Fresno State and taught high school P.E. for at Tulare Western High School. She left teaching to raise her two sons.

“But I wasn’t very good at sitting home full time so I did some volunteer work,” she said. “When I went back into the work force, it was a lot of sales and marketing.”

She worked for a couple of hospitals, a medical equipment company and as an advertising director for The Advance-Register. For the six years before her first election as supervisor, she was the district manager for Corvel Corporation, a workers compensation/disability management corporation.

Conway was asked what she believes is the most important issue facing the state of California.

“If I had to just pick one, in the state of California, it’s the urban-rural interface,” she replied. “I think that can explain a lot of the things that we talk about. That’s your water issue that you’re talking about. I believe it can extend clear over to health care, which we all talk about. It’s interesting how things overlap. I was appointed by the Governor to serve on the pension benefits commission and health care tends to dominate our meetings.

“Everything tends to overlap,” she continued. “The urban-rural interface folds over into every aspect of our lives. You can include health care in that because urban areas and rural areas have different challenges when it comes to health care. Your transportation issues, those are certainly urban and rural, and that mixes together, whether you’re talking highway or whether you’re talking transportation systems. It’s just basically the growth. In California, like maybe other areas, we were prepared to deal with X amount of people and now we have a lot more than we are able to deal with. So in every aspect of our life, I thing we’re dealing with that.”

She was asked for her opinions about other issues, including immigration reform.

“Immigration is a touchy issue,” she said. “We’ve had lots of years to work on it and solve it but no one seems to want to. We have federal laws that basically everybody interprets their own way or doesn’t even bother with. I think that’s troublesome. It’s really a federal issue, which is not to skirt the issue, but I think it’s a federal issue out there, and they evidently refuse to address it. I sure would like to see everybody working together a little bit harder on that issue to come to some kind of conclusion. I think it really factions people and I don’t think it’s healthy in any way to just let things go and let everybody do their own thing.”

Conway was asked what she would do about the shortage of health care professionals in the South Central Valley.

“This is a topic of much discussion for us within the California Partnership,” she responded. “Some of the ways we have looked at it is increasing access to the educational programs that will create more healthcare professionals. But one of the ideas that I think would be important and, should I be successful in the election, is something that I would want to take a look at, is a healthcare enterprise zone, if you will, because I think we are particularly challenged with this in this area. I think that qualifies us for a different kind of benefit arrangement than others.

“We have a difficult time attracting physicians, nurses and nurse practitioners to this area because of our high rate of poverty here in the Valley and low rates of reimbursement,” she continued. “I think that for a medical professional to come to the Central Valley, it’s just a difficult place to have a practice, not even from a financial aspect, but from every aspect, anyway you look at it. You have a tremendous patient base because we are so needy here. If you manage to get a physician, he’s got a client base of 2,000 patients that need to see him immediately upon putting his shingle out.

“A health enterprise zone is something that I am getting some input on to see how that might be created and if that is something that could be done by legislation,” she said.

She was asked how that differs from a government subsidy.

“It wouldn’t be about subsidies for a health enterprise zone,” she said. “It might change the reimbursement scale. It might change our ability to attract providers to the area. Looking at a partnership with UC Merced—they’re trying very hard to become a medical school. We’re already looking at some telemedicine with them. In my mind, a health enterprise zone would not change the regulations, but perhaps free you to work within existing statutes to call attention to the area that we serve—to just take a different look at it and make sure that we’re using our ability, all the things that are aligned for us in the most focused way.”

If elected, Conway would begin her first term in the state assembly in December 2008, the same month that her term as supervisor ends.

“This is not a safe election for me,” she said. “Other people, when they run, for example, for the assembly, they do it midterm in their supervisor’s term. If I had run midterm, should you not be acceptable for one, you still have the other. I am very serious about this, so much so that I am walking away from the Board of Supervisors for the opportunity to run for the assembly. I cannot run for both offices concurrently so I had to make a choice. I gave this a lot of thought and consideration.”

L.A. Based Company Would Hire 200 at Kings Industrial Park

Hanford - Carmi Flavors and Fragrances has opened an escrow on some 16.5 acres of industrial property owned by the City of Hanford. The site, east of 11^th and north of Energy, is on land the city purchased from Pirelli Tire when it left Hanford some years ago.

Carmi, a Commerce, California-based company with eight plants and offices in North America, supplies ingredients to the baking and food processing industry, fragrance to the candle industry and unique food products, says Hanford economic development manager Barbara McCurdy Marty. “The company is anxious to get going.”

“They have big plans but will be at about 200 jobs when the business gets going,” she says.

Owner of the company, Elliot Carmi, says “the people up in Hanford have been great” and appreciates help from economic development officials from the state is finding the location in Hanford.

“We hope to break ground in about a year. There is a lot to do but we are simply out of room here,” says Carmi whose company does about $20 million in sales. “We’re ready to expand and grow the business.”

Carmi says the new building will likely be between 50,000 to 100,000 square feet and hopes will “start with 50 jobs and end up at 1,000.” Most of those jobs would be in food processing.

Their Commerce site is just 40,000 square feet.

Carmi says they plan to make product they don’t have room for in Commerce at the new plant including a line of gelato type frozen dessert made of soy— Soyloto. The company plans to buy fruit flavors locally he says. The firm already provides flavors to Real Fresh in Visalia.

The company makes essential oil, citrus concentration, fruit flavors, dairy flavors, butter substitutes among others, offering a selection of some 500 flavors to select from.

Owned by Elliot Carmi, the company is in its 28^th year of operation.

Carmi says the firm has discontinued the use of a butter substitute produce used on popcorn recently after news came out that the material is hazardous to one’s health. “The product will be gone by the end of the year,” he says. Already they are no longer using the product—diacetyl—used on microwave popcorn, he says. The state surveyed 29 food flavoring plants and found some workers with lung problems including one from Carmi.

Mitigation Land Bank for Allensworth Area
Needs Additional Study

by Miles Shuper

Allensworth - Tulare County Supervisors want a more detailed plan for a proposed mitigation land bank which would restrict development and protect lands around

Allensworth State Park near Earlimart. Basically, mitigation banks preserve wetlands, natural areas as well as endangered species from development.

Supervisors asked county staff Tuesday to come back in three weeks with revisions of a hastily drafted mitigation bank plan. The plan was ordered last week in a move to help direct mitigation land designations to specific areas in the county, including land around Allensworth.

Supervisor Connie Conway, whose district includes Allensworth State Park, a key location in black history in California, last week pushed for quick county action in the wake of the purchase by the California Department of Parks and Recreation of property use rights from Visalian Sam Etchegaray. The deal is for $3.5 million. Etchegaray had planned to build two large dairies about one-and-one-half miles from the edge of Allensworth Park. Earlier this year, Supervisors granted Etchegaray permission for the huge dairies after a long permitting process. Threatened by legal action, including state legislation, and the offer by the state to purchase the land use rights for the property, Etchegaray can still farm the land but cannot construct the dairies or raise or house livestock.

Supervisor Conway feels the mitigation bank for land around Allensworth will create an additional buffer in addition to easing concerns about potential animal feeding operations in the surrounding area. She also expressed her concern over the county’s ability to decide where mitigated land should be located. She and others cited a case in which Kern County land owners purchased mitigated land in Tulare County which wasn’t all in the same general area. There are no laws prohibiting one county’s mitigated land to “offset” restricted land use in another.

Several Tulare County officials in the past have voiced concern that Tulare County could become “the land mitigation bank” of California.

At Tuesday’s board session, Conway cited her concern over some confusion or misunderstanding over what she had hoped to accomplish with the proposed rules drafted by county staff.

The additional three weeks to study and refine the proposal was endorsed by other Supervisors. Phil Cox was the most direct, stating, “I don’t see it as so urgent that I have to rush through this with my eyes wide shut.”

Supervisor Steve Worthley agreed saying the county needs to find out what projects might be affected if rules for land use were imposed on the property near the Allensworth area. He said a more complete study and formulation of the rules would allow the county “to do it right.”

Cox and Worthley also cited concern that too much land use protection could end up blocking development in the area. “I doubt that is what Allensworth wants,” Cox said.

The board’s action Tuesday was applauded by a small group of area residents and supporters who strongly opposed the dairy projects and pushed for legislation to protect the environment around the state park.

Beverly Blake, representing Allensworth Pals, a community support group, said the group was pleased to see the county being aggressive in protecting the areas. She added that the group wants to work closely with the county from the beginning on the issue of a mitigation bank.

Although not specifically in the Allensworth State Park site, land near Earlimart was cited along with others for potential mitigated bank protection in a study commissioned by the Tulare County Association of Governments several years ago. That study indicated the land could serve as a protected area for several endangered species including the blunt-nosed lizard and the San Joaquin kit fox.

Etchegaray’s plans to build the two huge dairies started more than eight years ago but the issue of their potential impact on Allensworth State Park gained momentum when plans came to the Tulare County Planning Commission which held several hearings before eventually going to Supervisors without a recommendation.

That sparked an outcry from black leaders from throughout the state and beyond who showed up at board hearings protesting the project. They cited the potential for groundwater contamination, odors, flies and potential disease, despite studies and restrictions on the project.

Those protests worked their way to Sacramento where legislation, Assembly Bill 576, authored by Assembly Member Wilmer Carter (D-Rialto), proposed creation of a 2.5 mile buffer zone adjacent to the park.

The legislation, supported by the Legislative Black Caucus and others, has passed key votes but was left hanging when lawmakers closed out their session. If AB 576 is passed, there is a question whether Gov. Schwarzenegger will sign it.

Tulare County and various groups and individuals oppose the bill which they say usurps a county’s right to decide land use issues.

Downtown Visalians Part Ways with
Executive Director Jan Minami

by Steve Pastis

Visalia - "I chose to resign,” said Jan Minami, about why her service as executive director of Downtown Visalians ended on September 13^th. A meeting that afternoon at the Downtown Visalians office on Church Street was held at the request of the group’s President Vernon Barr and Vice President Clare Whitlatch. When the meeting was over, so was Minami’s almost two-year tenure with Downtown Visalians.

“There was a difference of opinion over the direction of the organization,” Minami said. “The executive board of Downtown Visalians and I do not agree on the future of the organization.”

Minami believes that the Downtown Strategic Plan, which incorporated input from various groups interested in the future of Downtown Visalia, will probably continue because “the contract with the consultant is not complete.”

“The Strategic Plan involves both Downtown Visalians and PBID,” said Barr. “What we received from the consultant is a draft of the plan. Both boards need to review it. We may adopt it as drafted or we may adopt it with changes, or we may not adopt it. The decision hasn’t been made yet.”

Barr was asked if the departure of Minami would affect the plan.

“The only way it may possibly affect it is the timing of the implementation of the plan,” he replied. “There are some things we can’t move ahead with without an executive director.”

Minami said that the board would also have to make a decision on another program developed during her term, Friday Nights Downtown, which attracted visitors to the downtown area by providing free outdoor music concerts on Main Street.

Minami wouldn’t comment on the future of the VAM Festival, however. Immediately following the July event, she told the Voice, “We would have liked it to be a huge financial success, but it didn’t meet that level.”

Although she and others considered the event a success because of the numbers of people who attended and for the amount of publicity the city received, the Voice has heard from members of Downtown Visalians who were concerned about the price tag for the event, although the numbers they cited varied.

“I think that everybody liked the event,” Barr said. “We just have to figure out a different way to fund it. That’s going to be the challenge. The consensus is that we’d like to move forward and do it again.”

Barr questioned whether a VAM Festival could be put together in time for next summer, however.

Neither Minami nor Barr would provide the Voice with any additional information that would shed light on the reasons that her tenure at Downtown Visalians ended, nor would they confirm or deny that the financial results of VAM influenced anyone’s decision. Barr explained that what happened “involves some personal issues” and because of that would not comment further.

Barr did offer some information that he felt was important to include in this article, however.

“The financial condition of Downtown Visalians is strong, despite any loss that we may have incurred with VAM,” he said. “We’re not in jeopardy financially. I want to make that clear.”

What's New

Federal Reserve cut the fed fund rate to banks this week by an aggressive half point in a move to bolster the economy. The vote was unanimous to cut the rate from 5.25% to 4.75%. Visalia banker Tom Beene says the move “should help with the big gorilla in the room being the home building and home buying industries and help drive down mortgage rates.” Besides the rate cut “the Fed made a strong statement that will likely continue to reduce rates for the next six months,” providing assurance that the Fed will “do whatever it takes” to insure the economy doesn’t get worse, he believes. Banks prime rate will drop for the first time in 18 months. Realtor Bill Jordan says “Lowering the rate by one-half percent is a positive step, I believe. Although the move will not affect mortgage rates directly, it will have an impact on borrowing rates. The move today is just what we need. Usually when the Fed lowers the rate the economy as a whole picks up. Today’s action is positive for real estate. It’s one more step in our recovery.”

Three schools, Goshen, Ivanhoe and Washington, will be recognized at the next board meeting of the Visalia Unified School District. “Those are the three schools that this year officially met the criteria to come out from under the Federal Accountability Program because of the consecutive years of improved student achievement at those schools,” VUSD Superintendent Stan Carrizosa told the Voice. He credited a combination of reasons for this success. “Primarily, it’s aligning their curriculum, making sure that they are teaching exactly the core content standards and bringing variety to their instructional delivery, what we call ‘differentiating their instruction’ slightly varying the instruction for the different needs and different levels of the kids in their class and then just really high expectations, really hard work and very talented teachers.”

Kings River Conservation District (KRDC) is evaluating a site west of Kingsburg for a natural gas fired power plant. The site, adjacent the Selma Kingsburg Fowler (SKF) sanitation district on Conejo, would use reclaimed water on the site to cool the plant. KRDC is comparing the location to one it had previously preferred near Parlier. But the Parlier site has run into some controversy. KRDC officials say decision on whether to file a land application for the new site will be made in the next few weeks. The plant would supply the base load of the new San Joaquin Valley Power Authority that includes municipalities in the Central Valley, including the counties of Tulare and Kings.

Eyes will be on Sacramento in the next few weeks to see if a compromise between Democrats and Republicans can take place on the construction of reservoirs and conveyance canals related to the Delta that could mean voters could get a state bond to vote on next February. Governor Schwarzenegger, who favors the idea, called the legislature back in session in recent days. “If they can come up with a compromise, maybe there is still hope,” says Visalia engineer Dennis Keller. A judge’s ruling will shut down about one third of the water supply from the Delta, adding pressure on legislature to come up with a “fix” for the problem in the midst of drought conditions. Demos had generally been reluctant to support more storage but the judge’s ruling threatens a wide variety of water deals as well as underground storage of transferred water, says Tim Quinn who heads a state water organization. This week, Senate Leader Don Perata (D-Oakland) indicated he might change his position. In this water crisis, the Bay Area is feeling the pain along with the rest of the state and water rationing plans have begun.

Visalia city council approved that big industrial park annexation 5-to-0 this week that includes for the first a $2000 per acre ag land mitigation fee for converting farmland to urban uses. The $320,000 in this case will be put in a city fund likely for Scenic Corridor purchase. Whether this becomes a precedent is an issue that will come to the council likely after the November election when they will consider a proposal to do this in all annexations in Visalia.

Fresno-based Dynaco Food Concepts, franchiser of Perkos and Cool Hand Luke’s, has a new restaurant concept, Huckleberry’s, offering southern style foods. The first Huckleberry’s is in Pismo but a site in Exeter is planned as well on Visalia Rd. in the center where the new Starbucks is.

Sacramento based A-1 Doors will make doors in Visalia leasing 20,000 square feet from Diversified Development off Plaza Dr.

Gottschalks announced they would buy back some two million shares of its stock in the next year to help boost its sagging stock price currently at $4.5 compared to $15 earlier this spring.

Visalia council announced they would close the alley in the 500 to 600 block of S. Bridge and S. Santa Fe to help boost the neighborhood and discourage gang activity. Council was shocked to hear how many calls for service at the several apartment complexes one over 200. City will focus on the responsibility of property owners to keep up their place. “No wonder people in the Washington School district are frustrated,” said council member Greg Collins. Police may cite properties as public nuisances. Staff says one former out-of-town landlord now lives on site which has improved the situation.

Bears are hungrier than usual this year since the drought has cut into the high country berries available typically to bears and sent them down to lower elevations. A few days ago, a female bear in Sequoia Kings Canyon was euthanized after she bit a sleeping hiker. Park rangers remind people not to feed the bears.

New draft of FEMA floodplain maps is being circulated at Visalia City Hall. The draft, not yet ready for public viewing, offers some relief for local land owners because of the construction of larger Kaweah Dam. However, the draft considers much of the levee system to offer no protection using new rules. The upshot, some people who are in a floodplain now are out and some who weren’t in the floodplain before are in, says city engineer Andy Benelli. It could be many months before the public draft is available.

City council heard a report on two alternative routes for a day lighted section of Mill Creek to head east into Downtown Visalia. They agreed to continue a study led by engineer Dick Moss to discover the “block-by-block cost” to resurface the creek. Even though the cost could be high, a decision could set in place land-use plans along the route and give the city a chance to apply for the many grant funds available for such projects, building the project in sections if needed. One possibility considered at the meeting is the building of a temporary package treatment plant that would allow the use of reclaimed water to run in the creek year round as they do in San Luis Obispo.

Speaking of creek restoration, look for construction of a trail and landscaping along Packwood Creek on both sides of Mooney west to the new police precinct center as soon as the county authorizes purchase of land along the creek. Brian Kempf will lead the effort to green up this part of Visalia, one of the town’s busiest retail areas. Work should be complete over the next year.

City of Visalia police department is ordering 16 new police cars and police chief Bob Carden told council this week they will be so-called “flex-fuel” vehicles able to run on e-85 ethanol. Carden says the department will look into having an e-85 pump in town. The first valley e-85 pump will be opened in Tulare later this year. Council congratulated the department for buying the Fords locally.

U.S. Census reported California leads the nation in the number of people who speak a language other than English at home at 42.5%. L.A. leads the nation at 53.4% in this category. Tulare County is not far behind at a bit over 46% based on 2006 numbers.

A new Jack in the Box restaurant in Farmersville is currently under construction at Farmersville and Walnut. The new fast food outlet is being built within easy walking distance of Farmersville High School, which fortunately has a new state-of-the-art gymnasium on its campus. Behind the future restaurant, a Jack in the Box corporate franchise office is also under construction.

Serrano Furniture with multiple locations in the valley, has purchased a 40,000 square foot warehouse at 851 Bardsley in Tulare, says broker Mike Porte of Grubb and Ellis. The building is just west of the former Ruiz Foods plant in Tulare.

This week, the Department of Health Services is conducting a survey of Kaweah Delta’s new dialysis center to evaluate its services, staffing, technologies, policies and procedures before allowing it to open to the public. “We expect by the end of the week to get a green light to open the center,” said Lindsay K. Mann, CEO of the Kaweah Delta Health Care District. Meanwhile, there is currently a large hole in the middle of Kaweah Delta’s cogeneration plant. The location will be the site of the foundation for a new turbine cogeneration system that will provide heating and cooling and save $1.5 million a year in energy costs, according to Mann. More importantly, however, the new system will keep the hospital running even during brownouts in the city, allowing Kaweah Delta to maintain its life sustaining systems.

Cool Temps and Apples
NOAA Says Half U.S. in Drought

Visalia - Cool weather has come to Tulare County by mid-September after a nearly month-long heat spell reminded everyone of the summer of 2006, at least for a few days. But fall is in the air as we can tell at the Visalia Farmers Market where the Apple Lady is once again selling her several varieties of locally grown apples from the foothills.

NOAA announced last week that the U.S. experienced a prolonged heat wave that set 200 one-day temp records in the central and southern U.S. It was the warmest summer in the continental U.S., says the federal agency. Severe drought is being experienced in the West which had a near-record low rainfall last season. NOAA said half the U.S. is suffering drought conditions. Unfortunately, their sister agency, the Climate Prediction Center, is forecasting a warm and dry winter for the southwest. This week we could see some thundershowers, forecasters say.

Jennifer Conn Shirk to be Sworn in as Superior Court Judge

By Steve Pastis

Visalia - Jennifer Conn Shirk, who was appointed to the Superior Court bench last month, will officially be sworn in as a Superior Court Judge on September 20^th along with Kathryn T. Montejano, who was appointed in July. The 4 p.m. ceremony will be held at the Tulare County Courthouse in Visalia.

Shirk, who graduated with a political science degree from UC Berkeley before graduating from University of San Diego Law School, started as a communications major at the College of the Sequoias. Her intention was to become a newspaper reporter.

“Then I got involved in student government and I was student body president of COS,” she said. “My dad was an attorney so I decided to do what I was interested in and what I should be interested in.”

In the time between her studies at Berkeley and San Diego, Shirk went into the hotel business, working at the front desk of the Marriott in Berkeley. She was soon appointed to manager.

“I needed to make some money so that I would be able to go to law school,” she said.

Shirk established a law practice on Court Street in Visalia. On and off over the last 18 years, she has had a contract with the county to practice juvenile law, defending children in criminal cases when the public defender’s office has had a conflict. The primary part of her practice, however, has been family law—handling divorces, child custody and child support matters.

The appointments of Shirk and Montejano to the Superior Court bench are a result of Senate Bill 56 which called for the appointment of 50 judges in the state this year, two of them in Tulare County.

“It’s actually a really long appointment process,” she said. “I submitted my application in July of last year. Nothing really happened until late February. I got a call from the JNE (Judicial Nominations and Evaluations) Commission saying that I was going to be interviewed.”

The commission wanted a list of the attorneys that she had worked for or with, and a list of the judges that she appeared before, as well as names of the attorneys on the opposite side of her recent cases. She was finally interviewed by the commission in April.

“In early June, I got a call from the governor’s appointment secretary inviting me for an interview and I was interviewed by her on June 25^th,” she said.

She was asked if she knew how many people applied for the two positions.

“You never really know how many people apply,” she said. “You hear how many people have interviews and, I believe, from Tulare County, seven people were interviewed for the two positions. I think there were probably 20 names altogether that were considered.”

Shirk, who is raising two sons, Adam, 9, and Sam, 8, said that she has no career ambitions beyond this appointment.

“I’m 49 and I’d like to sit on the bench for 20 years,” she said. “By then I’ll probably be old enough to garden and travel.”

Shirk explained that she always wanted to be a lawyer.

“If you look at the little things I wrote when I was in second and third grade, I was always going to be a lawyer,” she said. “I was never quite sure at what point I was going to head in that direction and if I was going to do things in the meantime. But this is exactly where I wanted to be— if you asked me 40 years ago—to be an attorney and a judge.”

Since her appointment, Shirk has been busy wrapping up cases for her clients. Greg Gillette, an attorney from Porterville, will take over her practice.

“Mr. Gillette is going to keep my secretary, which was actually the biggest worry for me,” she said. “I didn’t want to leave her out in the cold.”

Shirk’s father, Kenneth Conn, was appointed as a judge by Governor Jerry Brown. Conn will conduct the swearing in of his daughter, the first father-daughter combo in the state, Shirk believes. Since her new robe has not yet arrived, she will wear her father’s judicial robe at the ceremony.

“I think we both share a love of the law,” she said. “My father is well respected. He set the standard for honesty and integrity and hard work in Tulare County. He was a judge for over 20 years.”

Shirk then commented on the publicity that has followed her appointment.

“That’s the hardest thing about all of this.” She said. “My kids found out how old I am and my father found out I was a Republican.”

County Rings Up $914 Million Budget

By Miles Shuper

Tulare County - A continuation of growth in property tax assessments, higher federal and state funding and monies from the Measure R half-cent sales tax has put Tulare County in an economically sound position again.

Last week during budget hearings, Tulare County Supervisors gave their stamp of approval to a $914 million budget for fiscal 2007-08, an increase of 6.3 percent over the previous financial schedule.

For the last couple of years, Tulare County has rebounded from 2004 when the county was forced to cut and trim to make economic ends meet.

In his presentation to Supervisors, Mike Spata, assistant county administrative officer for finance, said diligent planning to not fund positions and programs which might not be able to be financially supported in the long run was a key factor. That along with the increase in revenues has put the county in position for “a very good budget year.”

The general fund rose to $622,990,630, up from $573,481,345 and the county’s operating fund rose a little more than $6 million to $197,600,405.

Brighter economic status for the county also is linked to an increase of nearly $3 billion in assessed valuation, a jump to $25.8 billion from the $22.9 billion last tax year, according to Greg Hardcastle, county assessor. Since 2005-06, the county has seen a $6 billion rise in assessed values.

Earlier this year, the true strength of the county economic status was reflected when Fitch, a Wall Street bond rating company, upgraded the county’s certificates of participation from A to A-Plus. Fitch reported that Tulare County’s “credit strengths include stable financial performance and satisfactory reserves, healthy assessed valuation gains, and stable economic underpinnings.”

County officials have been quick to point to the shift to a county-operated fire department is working well financially, as they expected. The start up cost for the new department was estimated at about $12.5 million but actual costs were $11.9 million.

Tulare County is among the first in the state to break away from contracting fire suppression and prevention services with CalFire, formerly the California Department of Forestry. The split came after more than 80 years as the county determined it wanted to free itself from state-mandated salary and operating costs. The new Tulare County Fire Department became operational July 1.

Other highlights of the new county spending schedule include:

· An increase in the contingency funds by $500,000 to $4.5 million. Those funds are set aside for emergencies or unexpected costs.

· A gain of 18.5 county positions, most of them in the public safety departments. This increase follows last year’s restoration of 50 positions in the public defender, district attorney, sheriffs and probation departments.

· General revenues increased about $11 million.

· The public safety agencies were enhanced by a total of 415 million, and the office of Emergency Services and Animal Control had funding increasing totaling $200,000.

· Measure R funds totaled $5 million. Measure R is the one-half cent sales tax increase approved last November by county voters with funds going to road construction and repairs and public transportation. It is estimated to bring in $680 over 30 years.

· Funds from the Williamson Act, totaling $3.4 million, were left intact despite an on-going attempt on the state level to halt reimbursements to county. Land in Williamson Act preserves is taxed at lower levels and the state reimburses county for the lost property taxes.

Tribal Travel Center on Hwy 190

Success Lake - The Tule River Tribe continues its efforts at economic diversification with a new travel center opening soon on Highway 190 east of Porterville. The Eagle Feather Trading Post is located near Success Lake on property the tribe once hoped to site a hotel and casino. The project includes a service station which will be open to the public and used to fuel tribal vehicles including Eagle Mountain Casino buses. A convenience store, Subway sandwich shop, and RV sanitary dump station are among other features of the travel center. Photo courtesy Southern Sierra Messenger.

Downtown Visalia Strategic Plan Unveiled

By Steve Pastis

Visalia - The Downtown Visalia Alliance Strategic Plan was released on September 6^th. This preliminary report followed a series of roundtable discussions and interviews with more than 75 property owners, business owners and city officials. Also incorporated into the report was a stakeholder mail survey from 65 business and property owners, a review of past studies and plans, and a review of the Downtown Visalia Alliance organizational structure including work programs, budgets and operating practices.

The results of the June surveys, which took the ideas and opinions of 10 community stakeholders groups, including merchants, restaurant owners, service business owners, professionals, and people from hotels, the Visalia Convention Center, Transit, the Visalia Chamber of Commerce and Quad Knopf, were also a key component of the research.

“All the people who had input in the sessions are people who care about downtown Visalia,” said Jan Minami, who as executive secretary of Downtown Visalians coordinated much of the project. “The surveys that were done were done with our memberships, our property and business owners. So that information was distilled by the consultant to come up with these 16 important pieces. The meetings in September ranked those pieces.”

The top five priorities for the stakeholders were: improved parking management and resources, creating a downtown gathering place, diversifying retail and restaurant options, encouraging development and creating a vision for downtown. The top five priorities for the board were the same as the top five composite, but not in the same order.

“The top five are going to have the most detailed action plan steps,” Minami said. “Those are going to be the things that the boards work on. Obviously some of the projects are long-term projects, but the initial steps will begin sooner than some of the others.

“I think one of the first steps is going to be looking at the budgets of the two boards to evaluate how those priorities fit in,” she said. “There are some things that may have a budget category that’s a broader budget category that has not been allocated. Parking for instance. The parking funds in PBID have not been designated for specific parking uses yet. There are a couple of things here that relate to parking so they may guide the PBID Parking Task Force as to how they might spend those funds.

“I think the thing that is most important to remember is that all of these things are important,” she added. “All of these are things people consider to be of value. It’s just the matter of the order where we spend our time and money”

This preliminary report, which was done by Progressive Urban Management Associates, a Denver-based consulting firm, also includes a wide range of ideas from Visalians about how to bring more people into the downtown area, such as strengthening the city’s historic preservation efforts, developing a comprehensive marketing and events plan, improving parking management, and expanding the Downtown Farmers Market by developing it along Main Street and making it into a regular event for the community.

The final report will include the implementation process and action steps of what to accomplish in three months, 18 months and five years, explained Minami.

“This guides our work for the next five years so it’s very important that all the board members contemplate their decision carefully,” she said. “The best case scenario would be that this reverberates so well that it can easily be passed and the implementation steps are in place. But that may not happen. There may be some further work with the consultants to craft this strategic plan into something that can be something that is universally accepted by the board.”

The day after discussing the report with the Voice, Minami was no longer executive director of Downtown Visalians. Vernon Barr, the organization’s president, said that the boards of both Downtown Visalians and PBID would study the recommendations of the report and decide the best way to proceed.

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