Blueprint Planners’ Toolkit to be discussed at next Valley Futures Forum

The next Valley Futures Forum will focus on the San Joaquin Valley Blueprint Planners’ Toolkit, an online resource developed specifically to address strategic planning for long-range growth of Valley cities and counties.  The Forum will be held on Thursday, October 18, 5 – 6:30 p.m. in Forum 102 on the East Campus of Modesto Junior College. The Forum is free and open to the public.

The Toolkit was developed several years ago as part of the implementation of the San Joaquin Valley Blueprint Planning Process. The Toolkit provides a comprehensive resource for Valley planners, community members, and decision-makers, and it includes tools to address planning challenges, and facilitate change by incorporating Blueprint principles and concepts into local plans, policies, ordinances, and processes. Used over time, the tools can promote patterns of growth and development that preserve open space and farmland, maintain resources for future generations, enhance distinct communities, and provide more travel choices.

The presenter will be Ted Holzem, Senior Project Manager with Mintier Harnish, who served as the principal design and content manager for the Planners’ Toolkit and is the current Toolkit administrator. Ted will provide guidance on how to use the Toolkit’s collective ideas, resources and planning tools and instigate change in community planning.

Ted has been a planner in both the public and private sectors since 2001. He specializes in land use planning, public policy, planning law, public outreach and meeting facilitation, and management of multi-disciplinary consulting teams. He has managed many types of planning projects, such as regional plans, general plans, specific plans, climate action plans, and municipal services reviews.

Ted has worked with a diverse array of clients, from rural agricultural counties and small rural communities to large urban cities. A native of Tulare County, he has focused on planning projects throughout the San Joaquin Valley for over a decade. Ted is also a specialist in climate change and sustainability policy, which he has addressed in planning documents and as a panelist at local, state, and national conferences.

You are invited to attend this informative presentation on October 18!

Connecting Californians for Reform summit offered at the Great Valley Center via Skype

The American Leadership Forum and Reviving California invite you to the 4th Annual Community Summit - Connecting Californians for Reform.  Join regional leaders, community members, students, journalist and elected officials across the state on Friday, October 5, from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. in on of seven locations statewide that are hosting the Summit simultaneously via Skype.

In Modesto, participants will gather in the Community Room at the Great Valley Center, 201 Needham Street, to hear topic experts discuss specific ballot measures and how their outcomes will affect democracy in California. Presentations will be followed by interactive small group dialogues with the opportunity to share highlights between venues. Dejeune Shelton, Senior Fellow with the Great Valley Chapter of the American Leadership Forum, will moderate the Modesto session.
“This is the second year we’ve incorporated Skype technology to connect disparate regions around the state,” said Anu Natarajan, Program Director for Reviving California. “Microsoft’s acquisition of Skype in the past year has enabled us to not only harness Skype technology, but also Microsoft’s evolving technology platforms for civic engagement.”

Featured Summit presenters include:

• Betty Yee, Board member, California Board of Equalization
• Joe Mathews, Contributing Writer, LA Times; Editor, Zócalo Public Square; Senior Fellow, New American Foundation; Co-author, California Crackup: How Reform Broke the Golden State and How We Can Fix It
• Yolie Flores, President & CEO, Communities for Teaching Excellence & former board member of the Los Angeles Unified School District
• Mike Genest, Chairman, Capitol Matrix Consulting & former Director,
• California Department of Finance
• Bob Brownstein, Policy Director, Working Partnerships USA & ALF Senior Fellow
• Michele Siqueiros, Executive Director, Campaign for College Opportunity

The Summit is free and open to the public. Although there is no charge, space is limited, so participants must pre-register. To register for the Modesto location, contact Linda Hoile at the Great Valley Center, 209-522-5103 ext. 140 or email linda@greatvalley.org. Check-in is at 8:30 a.m. and the program starts promptly at 9 a.m.

This year’s event features a social media sharing section in which the public is encouraged to use the Twitter hashtag #CALReform to Tweet questions and comments prior to the Summit. Day-of participants will be asked to do the same, in addition to sharing photos and highlights via twitter.com/revivingca and facebook.com/revivingca. For more information go to www.alfsv.org

Reviving California is a project of the Common Good Collaborative, powered by American Leadership Forum – Silicon Valley. Since 2008, Reviving California has played an active role in the state’s fiscal and governance reform efforts by focusing on educating and engaging the diverse population of Silicon Valley. The goal is to replace political rhetoric with authentic conversations, move beyond the blame game, reward integrity in the political process and create the conditions for individuals, networks and communities to engage in democracy. For more information, visit www.alfsv.org/revivingca

Summit Partners include the three American Leadership Forum chapters - Silicon Valley, Mountain Valley (Sacramento region) and Great Valley (Merced, Stanislaus and San Joaquin counties); Coro Center for Civic Leadership-San Francisco and University of San Francisco; Leo T. McCarthy Center for Public Service and the Common Good; Inland Empire Economic Partnership; San Diego Foundation and UC San Diego, and Southern California Leadership Network.

ALF’s “Hillside Garden Party” fundraiser set for October 6

The American Leadership Forum – Great Valley Chapter invites you to the 2012 Hillside Garden Party – an evening of captivating conversation, wonderful wines and brews, and delectable delights by Greens Catering. The fundraiser will be held from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, October 6, and individual tickets are on sale for $75. It will be held at the same venue as last year’s party, in a beautiful, countryside garden setting in Modesto.

The focus of this year’s event is to raise scholarship funds for leaders of non-profits and smaller organizations who do not have the means to participate in ALF without financial support. Scholarship funds raised last year are currently supporting several participants in the ALF-Great Valley Chapter’s Class III, which began this year-long transformational leadership development program in June.

Multi-level sponsorship opportunities are also available, from $500 for a “Supporting” sponsorship” which includes admission of ten guests, up to a “Uniting” sponsorship for $10,000 that includes admission for 20 guests.

Purchase your tickets or sponsorship today and help us unite and strengthen our valley’s leaders to address our region’s challenges and serve the public good.

Click here to download information on sponsorships and purchasing tickets. For more information contact Kathy Halsey at kathy@greatvalley.org or (209) 522-5103, ext. 109.

Class III begins transformational leadership development journey

The challenges facing the San Joaquin Valley are daunting. We struggle with high rates of unemployment, housing foreclosures, obesity and asthma, as well as low average household income and low educational attainment levels. The rapid population expansion of the last decade has placed increasing pressures on transportation, air quality and water resources. We must address these challenges and many others to effect a positive outcome for our communities.

Solving these complex problems, however, is further complicated by diverse ways of thinking and approaches to dealing with issues. Our culture, how and where we are raised, and our life experiences all effect how we think and solve problems. Unfortunately, these differences many times get in the way of collaborative problem solving. The need for inclusive, effective and cooperative leadership between government, business, education and non-profit community leaders has never been greater.

To address these needs the Great Valley Center joined with community leaders in 2008 to begin the American Leadership Forum (ALF) Great Valley Chapter, understanding that ALF recognizes, respects and embraces these differences and uses them to promote collaborative problem solving within and among communities.

The chapter seeks to build a diverse network of leaders in San Joaquin, Stanislaus and Merced Counties who are equipped and motivated to address our area’s pressing issues.

Over the course of a year, ALF Fellows come together for an intense, national-caliber training on how to solve problems and work together to tackle challenges facing our communities and region. Most participants say it is life-changing and the single best program for developing and refining their leadership skills.

A key factor in class selection is representation from a broad spectrum of organizations, backgrounds and cultures – involving a cross section of leaders who might not ordinarily interact. This builds understanding and valuing of diversity and creates bridges of relationship and trust within the network of leadership.

How does our region benefit?

Led by ALF national facilitators Kevin McCarthy and Kristen Jacobsen, the 22 leaders selected as Fellows for Class III began their year-long, leadership development journey in June. During their training they will establish relationships built on trust and cooperation; be armed with new skills in dialogue, systems thinking and community leadership for taking on complex issues; learn to appreciate diverse views, and identify resources to turn dialogue into action.

The ALF program strives to motivate “servant leaders” to a lifetime of active public engagement and to become catalysts for positive community change. In addition to their leadership positions on the job, the Senior Fellows serve as board members and as volunteers in a variety of community organizations – spreading their new insights and skills out to their communities.


The transformation that Fellows report taking place within them during the program eventually translates in to transformational change for our region.

Great Valley Center and UC Merced release new environmental indicators report

Report reveals some progress in the Central Valley, though many environmental challenges remain

The Central Valley environment is getting healthier, but not fast enough. Its air quality is still among the worst in the nation, according to a report released today.

The Great Valley Center and the Sierra Nevada Research Institute at the University of California, Merced, jointly produced "The State ofthe Great CentralValley: Assessing the Region Via Indicators – The Environment2006-2011.” The report tracks a variety of environmental indicators within the Central Valley and shows mixed results.

The good news is there has been a reduction in the level of a number of key air quality indicators, a recharge of watersheds to near normal levels, a slowing in the loss of prime agricultural land to urbanization and an increased restoration of wetland habitats.

The Central Valley's depressed economy has dramatically slowed the use of prime land for new homes and commercial space. It has also given local and regional governments time to prepare and begin using blueprints to improve urban housing density and transportation choices.

However, the Central Valley has many red flags when it comes to the environment.

The number of days ozone levels were above state and federal air quality standards has increased overall since 2005, and almost all counties in the region are not meeting the one-hour and eight-hour air quality standards for many days each year. The percentage of the Valley’s population at risk for respiratory problems because of poor air quality outpaces other California regions.

The level of nitrates in drinking water has increased because farmers are using nitrogen-based fertilizers and planting nitrogen-fixing cover crops. Poor soil drainage has caused damage to fragile ecosystems. A great deal of energy is being used to move waste materials to landfills, presenting an opportunity for more recycling. Many counties have not reduced their waste production or energy consumption. In some cases, the numbers have increased beyond the proportional rise in population.

Gathering the data for this year’s report was challenging because of state and local budget cuts that limited the collection of information and the monitoring of air, water, species diversity, habitat conservation and resource management. Among the five recommendations for future action: Increase data gathering and improve sharing information, and support renewable energy sources for sustainable growth.

The report tracks environmental indicators as they relate to carbon monoxide, ozone and particulate matter; water quality and levels in our watersheds; pesticide use, soil drainage and land use; species of concern, fish, birds and wetland habitats; and waste production and energy consumption. The data sets, which underlie and correlate with many of the other assessments of regional well-being, are grouped in sections describing air, water, land use, species and habitat, and resources and energy.

Included in the report are profiles of half a dozen successful efforts to conserve and build capacity for the future.

“We included stories of environmental best practices to show that there are organizations and individuals working hard to make a positive impact in our Valley,” Great Valley Center Executive Director Dejeuné Shelton said. “Some of these successful programs could serve as models for similar environmental initiatives in other areas of our Valley.”

A highlight of the report is a public policy essay by UC Merced engineering Professor Roger Bales, director of the Sierra Nevada Research Institute, on the need for a sustainable water supply to meet the growing needs of the expanding Central Valley population with the additional stresses of climate change.

"The State of the Great Central Valley: The Environment (Third Edition)" is part of an ongoing regional initiative of the Great Valley Center (GVC) to track conditions in one of California’s fastest growing regions: the 19-county Great Central Valley. The data presented in the report were gathered by the Sierra Nevada Research Institute, and present a snapshot of information providing tools for measuring the community well-being of the Valley. This third edition revisits indicators introduced by the GVC in 2001 and revised in 2005, and includes several new ones. Past reports can be viewed on the GVC'sIndicators Report Series website.

“No More Silence” child abuse prevention video debuts in Merced

If your child suffers sexual abuse, it is more likely than not that someone your family knows has committed the abuse. A new DVD “No More Silence,” produced by the Great Valley Center in partnership with Merced County Office of Education/Early Care and Education Department, addresses important facts that parents and guardians should know to help protect children from abuse.

The English version of the video is posted to the Great Valley Center website and the Spanish version will be uploaded in the coming weeks.

Local child care providers were the first to view the video on June 5 during a session of the Early Care and Education Training Institute in Merced. GVC secured funding to produce the video as part of a year-long child abuse prevention program funded by the Department of Health and Human Services Administration for Children and Families. GVC also hopes to provide training in some migrant education classrooms in Merced County this summer as part of the program.

“People want to believe that if they keep their kids away from ‘strangers’ that they will not suffer sexual abuse but the sobering fact is that is not true,” said Jami Westervelt, Senior Director of Programs and Operations at Great Valley Center. “It is important that parents know that and that there are resources for help.”

In addition to facts and abuse resources, the video also features vignettes showing parents what actual conversations with children might look like around the sensitive subject. Parents of older children have the option to replay the vignettes and view them with their children as they feel appropriate.

Great Valley Center produced Spanish and English versions of the video, using both female and male actors to portray parents and children. The actors in the example conversations also represent a variety of ethnic backgrounds to enable families to relate to those portrayed in the video.

In planning the collaborative project, GVC met with local agencies including MCOE, Merced County Human Services Agency and Valley Crisis Center to develop program content and all provided video development assistance. The partnership with MCOE was vital to the video, with the staff contributing heavily to the production, including MCOE Caring Kids Program Manager/Behavior Support Specialist Monica Adrian who led script development and narrated the video. The MCOE Merced Educational Television program (METV) produced the video.

Green Communities intern hired as a program coordinator

Caldean “Dean” Biscocho is proof that an internship can help you land a job.  Selected as an intern for the Green Communities program in November, he has been gathering and analyzing greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) data for the City of Tracy over the past five months.  In June, Dean was hired by Great Valley Center as a full time program coordinator within the Green Communities program. 

He now assists interns and local governments in collecting and analyzing GHG data, preparing final reports for agencies.  These reports provide a carbon emission baseline for local governments, helping in their efforts to reduce emissions and improving energy efficiency.

Dean graduated from University of California, Davis in 2011 with a degree in Civil Engineering and a minor in Construction Management.  He worked as an undergraduate research assistant for the UC Davis Institute of Transportation Studies, focusing on California environmental policy.  He was deeply involved in the campus civil engineering community, becoming club president of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) UC Davis Branch. 

“As president of ASCE, I oversaw the administrative responsibilities of the club.  This helped me develop as a professional,” reports Dean.  “We were responsible for the project competitions for our civil engineering students, with the top two regional teams advancing to the national competition. It was an exceptional experience.” 

Dean also served as an intern for the Development and Engineering Services Department of the City of Tracy, where he learned about the Green Communities program sponsored by Pacific Gas and Electric Company. After he expressed an interest, PG&E connected him with the Great Valley Center, where he was eventually selected as an intern.

Dean intends to work further into the civil and environmental engineering arenas, hoping to obtain a Master’s degree in Civil Engineering.

“The people who work in the environmental sciences and engineering community have a worldly mindset that I aspire to,” Dean explains. “I enjoy the learning involved with reanalyzing how we live as Californians and Americans.  The Great Valley Center radiates the mentality of giving back to the community in a sustainable way.  This provides motivation for people like me, who grew up here, to stay here and contribute to the valley.”

Dean speaks Tagalog and visits family in the Philippines. He also has roots in the Central Valley, and currently resides with his family in Tracy.  Part of a musical family, Dean plays piano and dabbles in music composition.

When asked what advice he would give to college or graduate students considering an internship experience, Dean responds, “Go for it, but take it as seriously as possible.  It will only be as rewarding as you make it.”

The Great Valley Center welcomes Caldean “Dean” Biscocho to the staff team!