Views from the Terrace

June, 2001


Newsletter of the College Terrace Residents' Association







CTRA Bylaws Adopted on May 19th

At the CTRA meeting on May 19th, the task force that had been working since February to review the bylaws of other Palo Alto neighborhood organizations and discuss options for College Terrace presented draft bylaws for consideration and a vote.
The minutes and the final version of the bylaws as amended at the meeting are available on the CTRA website (www.ctra.org). Residents without web access will find hard copies of these documents in the reference section of the College Terrace library.

Purpose of the CTRA

According to the new bylaws:
"The purpose of the College Terrace Residents' Association is to enable residents to work together to maintain and enhance the quality of life in College Terrace.
The CTRA shall conduct activities that further this goal, such as:


Candidates for first CTRA Board of Directors

By the Nominating Committee: Erika Enos (Columbia St.), Melissa Campbell (Princeton St.), Kay Culpepper (Amherst St.) and Louise Roche (Hanover St.)

For the last three weeks, members of the nominating committee have been soliciting input from residents, deliberating, and then recruiting suitable candidates for the first seven members to serve on the Board of Directors. Job descriptions are provided in the newly adopted bylaws, but those who are elected at our 6/26 meeting will have the special challenge of creating a new governing body, representative of our diverse neighborhood yet effective in achieving the purpose of the CTRA.

We on the nominating committee were especially sensitive to creating a balance among the seven candidates on our slate for the Board of Directors. We wanted old time residents & newcomers, upper & lower Terrace residents, homeowners & renters, people from busy streets & quiet streets, seasoned resident activists & novices.

We truly feel the volunteers who have agreed to run for the Board are a diverse group who will work together to achieve the purpose of the CTRA with the utmost ability & integrity.

What follows is a listing of the slate to be presented at the election meeting on 6/26. Brief biographical information follows.

Candidates for the Board of Directors of the CTRA for the remainder of 2001:
PRESIDENT:
     Kathy Durham

VICE PRESIDENT:
     Roswitha Remling

SECRETARY:
     Victoria Colligan

TREASURER:
     Paul Lomio

DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATIONS:
     Rob Ruether

COORDINATOR OF SOCIAL EVENTS:
     Maritza Frankfurt

GOVERNMENT / UNIVERSITY OBSERVERS:
     Karie Epstein, Paul Garrett and John Ciccarelli (sharing one position)

Nominations from the floor may also be made at the meeting.

Absentee ballots

Those eager to vote for our new Board of Directors, but unable to attend the important meeting on June 26, should call or email Nominating Committee members Melissa Campbell or Erika Enos to arrange for pick up and delivery of an absentee ballot.
Melissa: MelissC@pacbell.net or 858-1214 (up to 6/26)
Erika: erikaenos@hotmail.com or 493-6677 (prior to 6/22 only)

The Future of the Old Alza Site

By John Ciccarelli

At the 6/26 CTRA meeting, representatives of the Stanford Management Company have requested an opportunity to show the neighborhood their revised plans for the redevelopment of the Alza site at Hanover & California. This will be an excellent chance for us to give them feedback before they present to Palo Alto's Architecture Review Board (ARB) at 8:00 AM on Thur. July 19th.
College Terrace residents living near this site and leaders active on traffic and development issues reviewed an earlier version of these plans on May 15th, when architects presented a draft site plan with preliminary building footprints and elevations.
The plans respond to CTRA concerns about parking, noise, light and visual impacts to California Avenue by:

The proposed 2-story, 82,000 square foot building would have underground parking with the garage entrance behind the building, facing away from California Street. Most surface parking would be behind the building except for a 20-space "visitor and delivery" lot at the building's main entrance facing Hanover Street.
Stanford also responded to the idea presented in our March CTRA meeting regarding the creation of an internal "spine" service road - bisecting the research park "superblock" from Hanover to El Camino - by locating the major driveway on Hanover so that it could be converted to a street intersection in the future.
Finally, the architects presented a stepped-back alternative for the north side of the building, with a first-floor projection extending 20 feet further toward California. After some discussion, residents responded that they would prefer the 2-story building face, set back the full 100 feet.
Want more info? See you 6/26!

Brief Biographical Info for CTRA Officer Candidates

By Erika Enos

KATHY DURHAM has lived on Dartmouth St. with her husband and their 2 sons since 1984. She is a political scientist by training, but has been involved in traffic safety and development issues since 1987, when the Rains housing complex was built. She and neighbor Susan Rosenberg have hosted our Labor Day Picnics for 10+ years. Kathy has been active on the CTRA Traffic Calming Task Force and in the bylaws group. She also serves on citywide advisory committees on the shuttle and school commute safety. Currently she works in bike and traffic safety education in our schools.

ROSWITHA REMLING was born in Austria and came to California to study physics. She now works at Intel. She & her husband moved to Columbia St. in 1997. Roswitha got involved in PANDA (the city-sponsored disaster preparedness training program) earlier this year, and then joined the bylaws task force. She is also a part of the College Terrace Gardening Group. Roswitha has lived in many places but really values living in College Terrace, "our little town within a town".

VICTORIA COLLIGAN recently moved to California St. from Southern California along with her 3 children. She works at the Family & Children Services Agency, across El Camino. Being able to walk to work and many other places, Victoria feels, is a real benefit to living in the Terrace. She hopes College Terrace can remain a quiet, peaceful and diverse place to live.

PAUL LOMIO, along with his wife and daughter, has lived in the upper Terrace on College Ave. for 15 years. Paul works in Information Services at the Stanford Law School. He is on the Traffic Calming Task Force and a faithful deliverer of College Terrace flyers and newsletters. He founded "College Terrace Walks!", a walking group for residents. Paul says one of his proudest achievements is never having driven to JJ&F.

ROB RUETHER has lived on Stanford Ave. since 1985. He has long involvement with ham radio and the Internet, so he seems a natural for the Communications position. Rob is concerned about coordinating neighborhood information and services in emergency situations and increasing the connectedness of our neighborhood. He is looking forward to involvement on the Board.

MARITZA FRANKFURT moved to College Terrace in 1977, after attending Stanford University and meeting her husband John, a 2nd generation College Terrace resident. They now live on Columbia St. in the house John grew up in and subsequently remodeled for his wife and 3 children. Maritza has been active at Escondido School for 14 years and been the "Picnic Goddess" since neighborhood picnics were re-incarnated in the late 1980's.

KARIE EPSTEIN, who lives on Stanford Ave., moved to College Terrace in 1991, but her husband has lived in the Terrace since the early `80's. Karie is also on the Traffic Calming Task Force and is especially concerned about the impact of traffic on the quality of life in the Terrace. She is a member of the new multi-jurisdictional group convened by Stanford Univeristy to address existing traffic problems on Junipero Serra Boulevard and Stanford Avenue.

PAUL GARRETT has lived in Palo Alto since 1948. He and his wife moved to College Terrace in 1981 after he retired from Alza and they built their passive solar home on California Ave. in the lower Terrace. Paul is on the board of the Palo Alto Housing Corp., a non-profit agency that provides low-cost housing in Palo Alto. Paul feels this is "the best neighborhood in Palo Alto," and hopes to help improve it.

JOHN CICCARELLI has lived mostly in Palo Alto since 1986 and on Yale St. since 1998. John was Bicycle Program Manager at Stanford from 1995 until 1998, when he became an independent planning and engineering consultant focusing on livable streets, bicycling and walking.
He is part of the Traffic Calming Task Force, where he brings a professional perspective to CT transportation and land use matters.

Canopy in the Terrace

As the saying goes, "It takes five years to plant a tree. A morning to get it in the ground and five years to care for it." Canopy has launched a new Tree Care program to make sure Palo Alto's young street trees get the care they need to thrive. Learn how to water street trees, rebuild basins, fix or remove stakes, mulch or even weed -- no experience necessary!
The first Tree Care session will be held in College Terrace, Saturday, June 23, from 9 AM to noon. Please contact the Canopy office at 964-6110 or e-mail info@canopy.org to sign up.

Interest in CT Senior Activities Group?

Melissa Campbell is interested in organizing an informal group of College Terrace seniors like her dad, who could get together regularly for activities like chess, Scrabble, card games, slow walks, lunch, carpooling to Senior Center, etc, with a neighbor. Please call her at 858-1214 if you can help her get in touch with CT seniors with similar interests.

Summer Welcome Party for Common Ground

Common Ground will be moving to 555 College (the former church building across from JJ&F) sometime this summer. Plans are afoot to welcome them to our neighborhood with a block party! Watch for date!

Passing the Editorial Baton

This edition of Views from the Terrace was produced by a transition team, and the next one will be the responsibility of the soon-to-be-elected CTRA Communications Director and helpers. But we would like to acknowledge the outstanding work done by retiring editor Pria Graves, who has nurtured this newsletter since 1996.

Pria's parting words: "The first few issues of Views were a one-person effort, written, edited, copied, and even distributed by yours truly with help from my wonderful husband. More recent editions were written mostly by others, with my role being primarily as editor. . . .

"Views is not the first College Terrace newsletter - a few faded mimeographed editions from the 70's are archived in the main library - but for at least a decade no one felt the need to produce such a thing until the demolition of Big Blue revitalized the Association in 1996. These days, with all that's happening within and around our neighborhood, there's plenty to write about and a real need to keep all residents of the neighborhood informed. I expect that Views will continue to flourish. Thanks for all your support. It's been fun!"

Thanks, Pria!

Newsletter of the College Terrace Residents' Association
Printing costs for this newsletter were underwritten by an anonymous donor.

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