On Sunday, July 4, one of the busiest beach days of the year, L. A. County Beaches and Harbors workers flushed thousands of gallons of contaminated water out into the ocean, near the intersection of PCH and Chautauqua. The water came the ‘mystery pond,’ a 350-ft.-long by 85 ft.- wide body of water which was once just an open trench running from the end of the Rustic Creek water channel into the ocean at the base of Santa Monica Canyon. Beaches and Harbors Division Chief Wayne Schumacher told the Palisadian-Post that he supervised the operation himself ‘at around 8 or 9 a.m.’ He added that he was responding to a request from the L.A. County Lifeguard Division, which was concerned about the amount of water that had collected in the pond. While the lifeguard division often requests that the pond be drained when the water gets too high, ‘concerned that beachgoers, particularly children,’ might fall into the 15-foot-deep pond ‘and drown,’ Garth Canning, captain with the County Fire Department, Lifeguard Operations, told the Palisadian-Post that the actual request to bulldoze the sand bar between the pond and the ocean to let the water out on July 4 came from the L.A. County Health Department. ‘People aren’t supposed to be in that water,’ said Bernard Franklin, Chief of Recreation Health Programs. ‘That’s why we have ‘No Swimming’ signs posted there, which people sometimes ignore. They are routinely posted within 100 feet of all the city’s storm drains leading to the ocean. It’s a matter of public safety.’ Asked if his department had tested the quality of water in the pond before requesting its release, Franklin said ‘No.’ When the Post asked all three officials if they were aware that the water was contaminated, all three said they were not aware. Last week, after discovering that no tests had actually been done on the pond water by either the city or the county, the Post had a sample tested by Baykeeper, an independent watchdog organization which monitors and patrols the beaches in Santa Monica Bay. ‘The pond is definitely a ‘hot’ spot,’ said Angie Bera, after performing the test at the Baykeeper’s in-house laboratory. ‘This means it’s polluted, and there’s lots of bacteria.’ While Bera found there was low salinity in the 100 milliliter sample (which indicates there is a combination of both salt and fresh water in the pond), the total coliform count, which measures bacteria from all sources (plant/animal/human) came in at 24,192 (the California limit is 10,000); E.coli, which is a direct indicator of the fecal count, came in at 10,462 (400 is acceptable); and enterococci bacteria, which like E.coli helps determine the extent of the fecal contamination, was 3,255 (a count of 104 is the most desirable). The Post had the water tested after receiving persistent complaints from Santa Monica Canyon resident Gregg Willis, who in the last few weeks alone has seen the water in the pond flushed out to the ocean on several occasions. ‘Anyone can see that the pond, which is not even supposed to be there, is polluted,’ said Willis, who has lived across the street from the area for 18 years. ‘So I wanted to know why they kept bulldozing it out, but no one could give me a straight answer. It’s a cesspool, and while everyone agrees it’s a problem, no one seems to be doing anything about it. First of all, I want to know where all of the water is coming from. If the low-flow-diversion project (LFD), which cost over $1 million, is working as it should, there shouldn’t be any water at all.’ For years Will Rogers State Beach at Santa Monica Canyon regularly received an F rating from Heal The Bay. This summer it has had only A’s. ‘The improvement can be attributed directly to the city’s low-flow diversion project, which is now fully operational,’ said James Alamillo, who monitors the beach reports for the non-profit organization. Before the storm drain was completed last fall, the location was considered one of the worst polluters of the bay, with an estimated four million gallons of filthy water streaming down the channel and into the ocean during the dry-weather season (April through October). The LFD project was designed to divert water run-off to the Hyperion Treatment Plant in El Segundo, where it is filtered before being discharged into the ocean. The drain was installed under the Golden Bull restaurant parking lot. So why is there a pond? ‘There are two factors,’ Alamillo said. ‘One is high tide (bringing salt water into the pond), the other is an excess of water coming out of the channel. The dry-weather diversion cannot handle the excess flows from Rustic, Sullivan, and Mandeville canyons. The City of L.A. engineered and constructed the diversion to handle an average flow coming out of Santa Monica Canyon. However, as with most natural systems nothing is ever in a steady state. The flows from the channel are at times greater than the capacity of the diversion, and when that happens, the flow bypasses the concrete berm and flows directly into the old depression on the beach.’ He added, ‘Because a lot of this ponding water comes from stormwater, and because it doesn’t get flushed out by natural tides, it also often has unsafe levels of bacteria.’ When asked about the July 4 draining of the pond, Mark Gold, executive director of Heal the Bay, said: ‘It should never have happened. Flushing contaminated water into the ocean is unconscionable and negates everything we are trying to do here. People should not have been swimming in the ocean after they released that water. And they should have at least been told that the water had been flushed out.’ The solution to the problem, said Gold, is to pump out the storm-drain water coming down from the channel ‘and to fill in the pond with sand during the dry season.’ While Schumacher agrees that there is some engineering needed to deal with the overflow of water coming through the channel, he said completely filling in the pond with sand ‘is impossible. There needs to be an open trench from the channel to the ocean’ in case of flooding. ‘When was the last time you saw a major flood in the dry season?’ asked Gold. ‘It just doesn’t happen. Isn’t protecting swimmers more important than worrying about something that’s not going to happen?’ ‘I have not been told by anyone that the water is contaminated,’ Schumacher said. County crews bulldozed the pond again last Saturday, allowing polluted water to once again reach the ocean.

A proposed preferential parking district on the streets surrounding the business district and the Palisades Recreation Center will be discussed at the Community Council meeting on Thursday, July 22 at 7 p.m. in the Branch Library’s community room, 861 Alma Real. Emilie Baradi, a transportation engineer with the L.A. Department of Transportation, will speak about the proposal by residents whose on-street parking has been diminished by spillover from the Palisades business district and activities at the park. Last December, these residents requested applications for preferential parking for the following streets: * Carthage between Swarthmore and Via de la Paz. Residents are applying to be exempt from the existing two-hour parking from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday, plus no parking from 6 p.m. to 8 a.m., except by permit. * Radcliffe between Haverford and Bowdoin, two-hour parking 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday through Friday, except by permit. * Alma Real between Toyopa and Frontera, two-hour parking 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday through Saturday, except by permit. * Monument between Albright and Bestor, two-hour parking 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday, except by permit. If approved, the boundaries for the preferential parking district will extend at least two blocks beyond the areas that have requested it. Now that the proposed district has met DOT criteria, the DOT will seek input from Cindy Miscikowski’s City Council office and will solicit feedback from the community before approving the establishment of this district. ‘The Community Council meeting is prior to the public hearing,’ said Monique Ford, field deputy for Miscikowski’s West L.A. office. ‘The DOT would like to get a consensus from community leaders.’ Depending on the response, DOT may rectify issues or, if there is strong opposition, they may not go forward. Otherwise, a public hearing will be set, at which time affected businesses and residents of the district (within 300 feet) will have an opportunity for comment. Jack Allen, the Community Council’s advisor on governmental affairs, has sent a report on the preferential parking issue to council members, detailing his opposition. ‘Once it’s allowed, it spreads like chicken pox and neighbors can’t immunize themselves against it,’ he argues. ‘Sure, all those parkers who clog up their streets now will be gone but residents must purchase permits if any vehicles are to be parked on the street.’ ‘The first problem to be solved,’ Allen says, ‘is the critical shortage of parking in the Village and at the Palisades Recreation Center.’ Council chairman Norman Kulla told the Palisadian-Post: ‘Jack’s memo certainly persuaded me to be cautious about preferential parking approaches. It has untoward affects and can make things worse. We have a huge problem already with respect to lack of parking. ‘On the other hand, the homeowners who have people parking in front of their homes have genuine concerns.’

Gloria Martinez, former UCLA professor in the Educational Leadership Program and Malibu High School vice principal, has been selected the new principal at Palisades High School. Martinez will become the first principal in the independent charter school’s new leadership team, which will also include an executive director. The West Los Angeles resident was chosen from a final field of four candidates who were screened and interviewed by the school’s Board of Governors last month. Born and raised in Whittier, Martinez earned her doctorate from UCLA in education with a focus on the so-called achievement gap in public schools. She then taught at St. Bernard High School, a racially diverse co-educational school in Playa del Rey, before moving to Malibu High eight years ago. She taught Spanish for five years, then served as vice principal. According to outgoing Principal Mike Matthews, who is now assistant superintendent with the Santa Monica School District, Martinez achieved two notable successes as an administrator. ‘Gloria is a very follow-through person and gets things done,’ said Matthews. ‘Her best work came in solving a crisis Malibu was having in Special Education. We were not doing what we needed to do. Gloria made sure that every teacher understood what the needs were and deserves credit for bringing our school from being deficient to being a model. She is a leader in special education and all the teachers appreciated her support.’ ‘Gloria wrote her dissertation on the achievement gap, but she didn’t just leave it in the academic realm,’ Matthews continued. ‘She found ways to implement it on a practical level. She brought the AVID (Advance Via Individual Determination) program to the school. This program targets kids with potential but who aren’t going to be college-bound unless intervention happens. Malibu is now on the way to become a demonstration school.’ Martinez will concern herself with the academic and student life at 2,560-student PaliHi. Monday night, July 19, the Board of Governors will meet to determine the new leadership structure particularly the role of the executive director.

By ELAINE CHOI Palisadian-Post Intern Some of the fondest memories of childhood are those visits to the ice cream parlor when you watched through the glass as the server scooped out your favorite flavor, pressed it down into the cone, smiled and handed you this special treat. Palisadians have now been enjoying this tradition at the Baskin-Robbins store on Swarthmore for 50 years. With 31 ice cream flavors available from the nearly 1,000 choices that are continually rotated across the country, a customer can try a different flavor every day of the month. Of all those flavors, Mint Chocolate Chip and Jamoca Almond Fudge reign as the town’s favorites. Among the youth, flavors inspired by movies and holidays are the most popular, including the new Shrek flavors and rainbow sherbet. New flavors are constantly being invented and recreated such as the Donkey Gone Bananas Sundae, Fiona’s Fairytale (pink and purple swirled cotton-candy flavor), Puss in Boots Chocolate Mousse (white chocolate mousse, milk chocolate and chocolate ice creams loaded with chocolate chips and chocolate-covered pretzels), and Shrek’s Swirl (green-colored grape sherbet and purple-colored green apple sherbet loaded with popping candy). Baskin Robbins first opened here on March 31, 1954, nine years after the chain’s first store debuted in Glendale. There are now over 4,500 locations throughout the world, making it the largest chain of ice cream specialty stores. In the U.S. alone, more than 150 million ice cream cones are served every year. Chris Fracchiolla, a father of two and a Palisades resident since 1994, bought the store three years ago after a career in playwriting (notably ‘Tony ‘n’ Tina’s Wedding,’ co-created in 1988 with his wife, Nancy Cassaro). ‘I wanted something else in the community that was especially around kids because I work a lot with kids,’ said Fracchiolla, who is a Sunday school teacher and children’s nursery leader at United Methodist Church. ‘I heard the store was for sale and it just felt like the right thing for me and my family. We have always loved this community and the ‘small-town’ qualities. For us the store has always been a kind of ground zero for that good old-fashioned Palisades feeling.’ The dieting craze that is sweeping the country has had little impact on his sales because ‘people still love their ice cream,’ Fracchiolla said. Nor did the Haagen-Dazs store on Sunset have much effect; in fact, ever since Haagen-Dazs closed in February, there has been virtually no change in the number of ice cream cones or cakes sold at Baskin-Robbins. Another popular ice cream franchise, Cold Stone Creamery, which opened in 1988 in Tempe, Arizona, and has grown to 650 stores nationwide, has also had little local impact because the Baskin-Robbins store here has been the Palisades tradition for such a long time. ‘Our store has become a hangout for kids,’ Fracchiolla said. ‘There’s also a lot of Pacific Palisades loyalty, so people continue to keep coming here. He added, ‘We have a big business in cakes too, especially for birthdays and graduations.’ June was especially busy because of all the end-of-the-year school parties and graduations. More than 120 unique cake designs are available, with different sizes to suit any occasion or celebration. In 2000, Baskin-Robbins launched its freeze-frame cakes to turn any picture into a cake design using edible ink and paper. Well before going into the ice cream business, Fracchiolla and his wife Nancy wrote their off-Broadway play, ‘Tony ‘n’ Tina’s Wedding,’ which follows the nuptials of two working-class Italian New Yorkers and their wacky, diverse families. Among the bizarre events that take place, the father of the groom gets in a fist fight with the mother of the bride as the newlyweds take off together. The production ‘has played around the world as a cult classic for 15 years,’ the Hollywood Reporter noted a year ago. The Fracchiollas have two children, 8-year-old Alice and 10-year-old John, who attend Palisades Elementary. Nancy is still an actress (guest appearances in ‘Nip/Tuck’) and writer (co-credit on the screenplay for ‘The Devil and Daniel Webster’) while Chris has become more involved in volunteer work. He helps run two after-school programs, and has also been coaching a Palisades Pony Baseball team (the Baskin-Robbins Indians) while staying involved in Cub Scouts. To celebrate his store’s 50th anniversary and maintain its ‘good old-fashioned’ feeling, Fracchiolla has begun a history wall at the store. Anyone with copies of photographs or favorite recollections of the store are encouraged to bring them to Chris.