On Thursday, March 22 they “appreciated” the Ventura Breeze. Representing the Breeze were Publisher Sheldon Brown and Senior Account Executive Breezy Gledhill. “Come enjoy and honor our local contributing hometown newspaper. This paper gives so much to all of Ventura’s seniors and citizens” stated their invitation to residents and family members.
The MC for the breakfast was Director of Marketing Samantha Crisp who chose, along with residents to honor the Breeze.
The application deadline for $1.5 million in assistance from the United Way Thomas Fire and Flood Fund for those impacted by the recent disasters has been extended to April 30.
The application for individual hardship assistance is available now at vcunitedway.org in English and Spanish. The United Way Thomas Fire and Flood Fund will support residents in expenses related to housing, livelihood/income and habitability of their homes.
Applicants can submit a completed form to one of the partnering agencies listed at vcunitedway.org to speak with a case manager. Victims should gather any documentation to substantiate needs, such as rental agreements, campground rental fees, costs replace trade tools (could be prices from online or physical stores) or insurance invoices.
Eligible applicants are Ventura County residents, and household income limits are determined by family size of 120% AMI or less.
The United Way Thomas Fire and Flood Fund has grown to more than $4 million. The next phase in disbursements will center on long-term recovery. To contribute, visit unitedwaythomasfirefund.org.
Since 1945, United Way of Ventura County has advanced the common good by creating opportunities for a better life for all. Our focus is on education, income and health, because these are the building blocks for a good quality of life. We support local services and programs that are more than just ‘stop gap’ measures, but rather solutions that help create lasting change. We invite everyone to be part of the change by giving, advocating and volunteering. When we work together in common purpose, we LIVE UNITED. For more information about United Way of Ventura County, visit www.vcunitedway.org.
Phil Taggart, Ethan Messecar and Annabelle Augustine, representing the ECTV student producers proudly show off their 3 WAVE awards.
Congratulations to the El Camino High School ECTV Crew for winning a series of WAVE Awards at the Alliance for Community Media Western States Regional Conference in Sacramento. Annabelle Augustine and Ethan Messecar represented the ECTV crew at the event along with Phil Taggart, director and mentor of the CAPS Media/El Camino High School media program. ECTV won first place awards in three categories: Informational Talk Show, Youth Division, for ECTV: Spocabulary, Halloween and Digital Citizenship; Informational Lifestyle, Youth Division, for ECTV: California Islands; and Informational Culture, Youth Division, for ECTV: Travel & Photography.
The ECTV program is a collaboration with Ventura Unified School District, El Camino High School, VC Innovates and CAPS Media. As a career pathways education program, students receive hands-on instruction to master video cameras, audio, lighting, studio production and postproduction editing. In addition, the ECTV members develop Digital Storytelling skills including conceptualizing, storyboarding, writing, producing, on-camera reporting, interviewing, directing, and production management.
Mentored by Taggart and unitizing the extensive production facilities at the CAPS Media Center, the El Camino students create magazine-style programs on topics of interest and concern to themselves including drug abuse, discrimination, gun control and more. The ECTV programs air on CAPS Media television and are archived and stream at capsmedia.org.
The Thomas Fire Stories Project has begun and is a major success. The extensive undertaking is a collaboration with Ventura City Fire and Police, Ventura County Fire, Sheriff, and Office of Emergency Response and the Museum of Ventura County. The year-long, comprehensive project includes an ongoing series of television and radio archival recordings with those whose lives were dramatically changed the night of December 4th.
Members of the public, fire fighters and first responders and others are sharing remarkable first-person stories at recording sessions throughout the county. Selected stories will air and stream on CAPS radio (KPPQ 104.1 FM) and on CAPS Media television, stream on capsmedia.org, and may be included in the comprehensive Thomas Fire documentary. All of the recordings will be included in the historic archival project at the Museum of Ventura County.
During the past few weeks Thomas Fire audio recording sessions took place at the Ojai Valley Museum and Ojai Library and they continue on Saturday, March 31 from 11am-4pm at the CAPS Media Center; on Monday, April 2nd at the EP Foster Library from 5-7pm, and on Saturday April 14th at the Avenue Library from 10am-2pm. More audio recording sessions will continue at the Ventura County Agriculture Museum in Santa Paula on Sunday April 22nd from 11am-3pm and at the Museum of Ventura County on May 20th from 11am-3pm.
Everyone with a story to tell is invited to participate. The audio recording process is simple and enjoyable and typically lasts 10-15 minutes. CAPS Media staff and volunteers help the storytellers share their experience in their own words. The result is unscripted, unrehearsed, engaging and compelling first person stories. If you have a Thomas Fire Story to share or know someone who has a great story to tell, drop by and record the experience. Visit capsmedia.org to find a convenient day and time to record your story and add it to the museum’s historic archive.
If you have photos or video to contribute to the archive, go to capsmedia.org for instructions on how to contribute photos, video and other media. If you have a story to share, email [email protected] or call the CAPS Media Center at 658.0500.
Chef Jose Andres returned to Ventura.
by Jennifer Tipton
Due to the recent heavy rains, many were required once again to evacuate their homes and on March 21st Chef Jose Andres of World Central Kitchen returned to Ventura. Our very own Chef Jason Collis said, “Chef Andres said he wouldn’t stop until the last person in need is fed in Ventura and he meant it!”
The numbers of evacuees grew slowly with thirty on March 22nd and increased to forty on the 23rd however, with numbers this low there was no need to mobilize the Mission Kitchen. Chef Collis stated, “looks like we will go unscathed with this storm which is great news for all of us in Ventura!” When news got out that Chef Collis and World Central Kitchen were once again at evacuation centers providing meals, many of our Ventura neighbors wasted no time offering to help out.
Chef Andres thanked Collis by saying, “On behalf of World Central Kitchen, thank you for the amazing job you are doing for the people of Ventura. You are amazing people, you are the heroes, and we love you”.
Storm water runoff can transport physical hazards into the ocean. Photo by Richard Lieberman
As part of the Ventura County Ocean Water Quality Monitoring Program, the Environmental Health Division is providing the following precautionary information for the public. Rainfall that is significant enough to result in runoff can flow into storm drains, channels, creeks, and rivers that empty onto the beaches of Ventura County. In general, 0.2 inches (2 tenths of an inch) of rainfall may be enough to create significant runoff conditions.
There is a potential for storm water runoff to carry disease causing bacteria to the beaches and into the ocean water. In addition, storm water runoff can transport physical hazards such as partially submerged tree limbs and logs into the ocean that could result in serious physical injury. Contact with this runoff water will result in an increased risk to human health and should be avoided for at least 72 hours after all rainfall activity has ended.
As a result of the recent and predicted rainfall, the public is advised to avoid body contact with all storm water runoff and ocean water at all Ventura County beaches. Any items that may have come in contact with runoff or ocean water should also be avoided. If contact occurs, wash thoroughly with soap and water.
Any shellfish on or from Ventura County beaches may have also been exposed to this contamination and should not be eaten.
This advisory will remain in effect for 72 hours (3 days) after all rainfall has ended.
Bacteriological sample results for specific beaches are also available on the Environmental Health Division hotline (recorded information), 805/662-6555, and on the Division’s Web page at:
http://vcrma.org/envhealth/technical-services/ocean/index.html
You can also view any current beach advisories and learn about the State ocean water quality standards on the VC Safe Beaches app, available for Android and Apple devices.
Dana is one of the staff who received $1,000.00.
At the YMCA Campaign Report Night on Feb. 23, four employees who lost their home from the Thomas Fire received $1000 from the Ventura Family YMCA. The $4000 was donated from San Francisco YMCA’s emergency relief fund.
Every year, the San Francisco Y donates to a fund to support YMCAs that have experienced disasters or have other dire needs. “When the Director of Human Resources heard about the fires in the Ventura and Santa Barbara Counties, he gathered the team together and they determined, right away, that they wanted to support the work that Ventura YMCA was doing to help those impacted by the fire,” said Margo Byrne, Chief Operations Officer of the Channel Islands YMCA.
The Ventura Y has elected to keep the names of the four employees anonymous. At the report night, one of the employees shared her story about how the YMCA helped her during the Thomas Fire. The Y staff member explained that they didn’t take anything when they initially evacuated with her four children. “We were up to the left of Ventura High School so we weren’t that concerned.”
When her neighbors started evacuating, she and her family left to her father’s house. When they arrived, she asked her father to take her back to the house to pick up a few items. They returned to find her whole street on fire, and they left with nothing.
The morning after her house had burned down, Amy Bailey Jurewicz, Executive Director for the Ventura Family YMCA, was the first to check on her. The employee stated, “I can tell you without a shadow of a doubt if the Y had not offered the childcare that they did, I would not have made it through this.”
At the end of the night, Amber Stevens, Associate Executive Director at the Ventura Family YMCA, stated, “We have amazing staff here. It’s nice to be able to say we can help when we hear our staff is in trouble.” The Y also paid all of their employees for hours while the facility was closed during the fires.
Information about the Ventura Family YMCA, visit http://www.ciymca.org/Ventura or call 642.2131.
Ventura High School students Daniela Aranda and Sierra Conboy) were awarded “Senior to Senior Legacy Scholarship” in 2016.
When the owners of Cypress Place Senior Living decided to create a scholarship fund for local high school students wanting to pursue a college degree, the Cypress Place Senior Living “Senior to Senior Legacy Scholarship” was created.
By awarding two $2500 scholarships to local high school seniors, residents at Cypress Place are attempting to pass on opportunities for young people in the community, according to Steve Spira, executive director at Cypress Place.
Applicants need to have a verified 3.2 or higher GPA and to have applied for fall 2018 admission to a college or university with the intention of obtaining a degree. Applicants are also asked to submit an essay about their reason for pursuing higher education along with a personal account of how a senior or seniors has affected their life, including specific examples of intergenerational experiences of the applicant.
Residents on the Resident Scholarship Committee at Cypress Place will read the essays, then hold oral interviews with the semi-finalists to determine the two award winners.
The scholarships are open to senior students at Ventura High School, Buena High School, Foothill Technology High School, El Camino High School, and St. Bonaventure High School. The deadline for submitting a completed application packet is Friday, April 20, at 5:00pm. Qualified applicants will be invited to a mandatory oral interview on May 11. The presentation of the two scholarships will be held Thursday, May 31, at 5:30p.m. at Cypress Place Senior Living. The recipients must be available to attend the presentation event to receive an award.
For more information or to receive an application packet please contact Pam Staniland, Director of Sales and Marketing at Cypress Place Senior Living 656-9500 x 201,or via email at [email protected].
Cypress Place Senior Living is at 1200/1220 Cypress Point Lane. To learn more about Cypress Place Senior Living of Ventura, visit their web site at www.cypressplaceseniorliving.com.
When the Ventura Elks Lodge’s 30th annual County Ventura St. Patrick’s Day Parade makes its march up Main St., it will feature a new green pig.
As Ventura history can report, Shamhock – the giant inflatable green pig who’d been a mainstay of the parade for 26 of its 29 years – collapsed last year along the parade route, right in front of the judges’ viewing stand.
To parade committee chairman Tim O’Neil, who’d “fathered” the pig back in the 1980s, it was a devastating loss. “He died right there in front of me,” said O’Neil, who announces the parade every year.
Now, the parade committee is thrilled to announce that, using the dead pig’s “DNA” (i.e. fabric) along with copious photos, they’ve been able to create a new exact identical pig, who will debut at this year’s parade!
The resilient pig plays right into the “Ventura Strong” theme of the milestone parade, which will begin at 10 a.m. Saturday, March 17, at the San Buenaventura Mission on Main St., and will proceed along Main to Ash Street.
The true heroes of the “Ventura Strong” movement are the parade’s grand marshals: the incredible first responders who worked tirelessly to suppress the raging Thomas Fire and to help its victims.
To honor them, the parade committee encourages all spectators to bring homemade signs thanking the first responders for their remarkable efforts and courage. We really want them to feel the love.
Also joining the parade this year will be Irish Belles Cameryn Boggio-Shean of Ventura High and Jonyssa Carrillo of El Camino High. For the first time in the eight-year history of its Irish Belle program, the parade committee has selected two winners to share the honor. Both Cameryn and Jonyssa are seniors at their Ventura high schools.
Presented each year by the Elks Club’s Ventura Lodge No. 1430, the popular St. Patrick’s Day parade draws thousands of spectators, and dozens of entries.
The judges who will select winning entries this year are Nicole Ipach of California State University, Channel Islands; Ventura Unified School District Superintendent David Creswell; parade committee member James Lockwood, Sue Georgino of Georgino Development and the Elks Club’s Connie Stahl.
Dozens of sponsors support the annual parade, including many who have given generously every year for decades.
Do you have a story to share?
CAPS Media is recording Thomas Fire Stories with the public, fire fighters, first responders and others who want to share their story. The extensive documentary project is a collaboration with Ventura City Fire and Police, Ventura County Fire, Sheriff, Office of Emergency Response and the Museum of Ventura County. The year-long, comprehensive project includes an ongoing series of television and radio archival interviews and recordings with first responders, individuals and families whose lives were dramatically changed the night of December 4th.
Recordings of Thomas Fire Stories are being scheduled at locations throughout the county including the Museum of Ventura County, EP Foster Library, the Ojai Museum, the Agriculture Museum in Santa Paula and CAPS Media Center in Ventura. The public is invited and encouraged to share their story. Each recording will be conducted by CAPS Media producers and is expected to last 15-20 minutes. Selected stories will air on CAPS Television and CAPS Radio KPPQ 104.1 FM, and will stream on capsmedia.org. Visit capsmedia.org to find a convenient day and time to record your story and add it to the museum’s historic archive.
If you have photos or video to contribute to the legacy, CAPS Media has set up a simple process for the public to share recordings of the Thomas Fire for the historic project. Go to the CAPS Media website homepage (capsmedia.org) and click on the Read More arrow on the lower right corner of the Thomas Fires Stories image. The page presents more details on the project and step-by-step instructions on how to contribute photos, video and other media.
If you have a story to share, send an email to [email protected] or call the CAPS Media Center at 805.658.0500.
Season 3 of Mayor for a Moment is in full swing. The program is a collaboration with the City of Ventura, the Ventura Unified School District and CAPS Media. Each month an outstanding 5th grader is selected by the individual elementary schools. The “young mayor” is invited to gavel the start of a City Council meeting and present an essay on a leadership topic to the council and community. CAPS Media produces a profile on each young mayor that is shown at the council meeting and at the VUSD board meeting. Honorees thus far this school year are Braydon Rocco (Portola), Olivia Blomquist (Poinsettia), Allison Cabeza (Citrus Glen) and Isabella Coleman (Sunset). Congratulations to all the young mayors.
CAPS Media’s mission is to create an engaged and informed community through participation in electronic media. Join our community of enthusiastic engaged member/producers. To find out more come to orientation on the first Thursday of every month and learn how to become a member of CAPS. Member classes include HD videography/camera class held on the 2nd Thursday, Final Cut postproduction editing class on the 3rd Thursday, and CAPS Radio (KPPQ, FM 104.1) two-part classes this month on the 5th week. In every training session Member/Producers receive hands-on instruction in videography, video editing, radio production and more. All classes begin at 6pm at the CAPS Media Center, 65 Day Road. Once trained, member/producers may check out CAPS Media’s video cameras, tripods, audio gear and other production equipment to record their story and then book postproduction editing suites to craft the story they want to tell. Go to capsmedia.org for information or call 658-0500.
Eric Harrison, President & CEO of United Way of Ventura County was a recent guest on the radio show Face of Ventura on FM station KPPQLP hosted by Publisher Brown.
Disaster victims can apply for the next phase of relief funding through the United Way Thomas Fire and Flood Fund, which has grown to more than $3.7 million. Through April 30, United Way of Ventura County (UWVC) will be releasing as much as $1.5 million from the fund for individual hardship assistance.
Until March 15, application forms for victims will be available at vcunitedway.org or 211ventura.org. Applicants can also call 2-1-1 or text “ThomasFire” to 898-211 to find out more. Local partnering agencies will assess each applicant’s needs and eligibility.
“The outpouring of support has been incredible, and we’re so proud to be able to get these funds out to help residents who have lost so much,” said Eric Harrison, President & CEO of United Way of Ventura County. “We have a long way to go to rebuild our community, but nobody is in it alone. Whether you lost a home, income, or have been impacted in another way, I encourage you to give 2-1-1 a call and learn more about the resources that are being extended.”
Eligible applicants for individual hardship assistance must be Ventura County residents.. Eligibility will be based on household income limits, determined by family size of 120% AMI or less. Funds will support residents in expenses related to housing, livelihood/income and habitability of their homes.
The United Way Thomas Fire and Flood Fund recently grew thanks to a $100,000 gift from AT&T and $150,000 from Bank of America. To provide immediate assistance in December from the fund, $500 prepaid credit cards went out to up to 1,000 residents whose homes were destroyed by the Thomas Fire.
United Way of Ventura County and United Way of Santa Barbara County formed a strategic partnership vital in helping the community recover from the Thomas Fire. The fund was later expanded to also assist flood victims and $500,000 was given for assistance in Santa Barbara County.
Further information and to donate:
Online at www.unitedwaythomasfirefund.org
By texting UWVC to 41444
By phone or mail: call 485-6288 or checks may be sent to the United Way office at 702 County Square Drive, Suite 100, Ventura, CA 93003. Please write “Thomas Fire Fund” in the memo.
