- A former student and graduate of Canyon High was killed in a car crash in Escondido “while racing another on Interstate 15,” according to the Signal. TMS says Derek Milsap, 22, was racing his Nissan 370Z against a Titan truck when he lost control and crashed into a light pole. He’s the second Canyon High graduate to die in a car crash in the last two weeks. Story not online yet.
- Meanwhile, Deputies and other first responders will host an “Every 15 Minutes” programs at Canyon High to display and talk about the consequences of drunk or reckless driving KHTSCVTV
- Another recap of the City Council meeting focusing on the appointments conflict SIGNAL
- A seat is open on the best commission of them all, the Planning Commission. Get your application in by February 8, Petz, I don’t want any excuses this time CITY BRIEFS
- The SCV Young Republicans, the group that caused a stir when it endorsed a rival to Scott Wilk during the COC Board race, will host a City Council candidate’s forum next week at the Santa Clarita Republican headquarters WRB
- The city says it does not have employees enforcing helmet laws at the skate park because the law classifies BMX bike riding and skateboarding as hazardous recreational activities, but it does everything it can “to encourage kids to wear protective gear.” All this following the recent accident at the skate park involving a boy who was not wearing a helmet SIGNAL
- College of the Canyons is undergoing a review of its election processes, particularly whether it ought to remain at-large or create voting districts within the Santa Clarita Community College District to ensure that minorities and neighborhoods have adequate representation. Some agencies in California have faced lawsuits for having at-large elections. Should the City engage in the same process to ensure its elections are fair? SIGNAL
- A 21 year old man who worked as a safety inspector for some agency was arrested this week for allegedly building an improvised explosive device. Not much more detail than that other than the fact that authorities arrested him in the dead of night at his home SIGNAL
- Ugh: 70mph Santa Ana winds could hit SCV by this Friday LA TIMES
- What’s next in Real Estate? The LAPD is cracking down on LA Realtors who use remotely piloted drones to photograph houses. Creepy LA TIMES
- Et tu Brutus? The Hill says staffers and even lawmakers are upset and angry that someone leaked the names of three Congressmen -including our Buck McKeon- who received favorable mortgage loans from Countrywide. Fellow California Republican Darrell Issa -whose committee brought to light the mortage details- thought he’d only ensare Democrats in his probe, but all three are Republicans. THE HILL
- Speaking of McKeon, he apparently accused President Obama of being from another planet in a video released in reaction to the State of the Union speech. SCVTV
- And one more from McKeon/Obama: turns out President Obama’s idea to penalize colleges who can’t keep tuition costs down originated in Buck McKeon’s Education and Workforce Committee in 2003, according to INSIDE HIGHER ED
- John Boston’s TIME RANGER for this week
- LTE Writer says he likes Buck McKeon’s personal touch; he wrote the Congressman asking him to make sure babies born to illegal immigrants don’t get citizenship and McKeon’s response “made me feel that he understood my concern.” LTE
- Republican confidence collapses in the pages of the WSJ no less: “Let’s just say right now what voters will be saying in November, once Barack Obama has been re-elected: Republicans deserve to lose.” WSJ
Search SCVTalk.com
Official SCVTalk.com Time
You can set your watch to it. Courtesy of TimeandDate.com SCVTalkers ForumRegistration
LA Blogs We read
SCV Blogs We Read
Categories
- Advocacy
- Business
- Catholic Guilt
- City Hall
- College of the Canyons
- Complaint Dept.
- Crime
- Daily Brief
- Development
- Economy
- Education
- Elections
- Environment
- History
- Humor
- Media
- Misc.
- News
- Opinion
- Politics
- PSA
- Real Estate
- Recreation
- SCV Good Eats
- SCV Religion
- SCV.Tech
- Shameless Newhall Boosterism
- Sports
- Traffic
- Transportation
- Weather
- Website Matters
- Where in the SCV
- Wordless Wednesdays
- WOWS
Who's Online
78 visitors online now53 guests, 25 bots, 0 membersPowered by Visitor Maps
Loading ...
Earlier in the week I committed to post the link to Anna Frutos-Sanchez’s presentation on the SCE Smart Connect/Meter program. Her presentation can be viewed at http://youtu.be/xAFz5YKB5QA .
Links to other presentations provided that night, including CEMEX History/Status and a Chloride update, can be found at http://www.canyoncountryadvisor.com.
I found the response by Gail Ortiz on City staffing at the skate\bike park nonsensical.
Like it was noted yesterday, the city is not staffing the Skate Board Park because they do not believe they have any liability.
When Gail say’s “they are doing all they can do” it really translates to “they are doing all they want to do”, which is posting a few signs and turning their back on the problem.
I think our community deserves better than that.
Agreed. And wasting Sheriff’s time when a Parks and Rec staffer could handle enforcement seems to be a no brainer.
And the registered Repub again says the gub’mint should provide us all with personal minders to keep us safe. Luckily, I am now immune from inconsistent logic generating the headaches it once did.
LOL. Someone want to catch Tim before he falls off his barstool.
Are you willing to pay for the resulting liability?
Yes. Maybe our guys should talk with Todd’s friend in Santa Monica.
By not staffing the park, they are not liable. It’s the same at skate parks across the state.
I read it several times too. It struck me at first as a tautology but then I realized that was wrong.
“Because of the laws, we do not have city employees at the park enforcing the rules,” said city spokeswoman Gail Ortiz. “We do everything we can to encourage kids to wear the protective gear.”
If you just read it quickly, it seems to say that the law precludes the city from putting staff there to enforce helmet/safety laws. But that’s not true at all; the law doesn’t prevent the City from doing that; the city elects not to put people on site.
Exactly. Watch, it will take a real tragedy to change their position.
Yeah, they’ve had other problems with the skate park. Better to just close it down.
I would not go that far.
Having a Skateboard Park gives our young adults a place to practice other than city streets. I thought it was meant to provide a safer environment for those choosing to participate and I support maintaining that environment.
Of course, there is an implied and accepted risk in all Sports activities, but that should not be interpreted as allowing the owner of a Sports Facility to throw up their hands and just ignore what goes on.
Responsible management of the facilities is the responsibility of the facility owner and operator. Plus, the City does that in every other Sports Activity it has a hand in. Take Adult Softball for example, the City specifies which bats can be used and prohibits the use of metal cleats. Both rules were enacted because of safety concerns.
The city manages it’s other sports facilities and activities, the skateboard park should be no different. Why, because that is the responsible thing to do and is in the best interest of our community.
Softball is a game for sissies!
But the law imposes liability if the City supervises the activity.
Wrong. The law does not impose liability, it shields the city from certain liabilities.
There is a big difference.
Not really.
Hey Jeff, I saw this article in the Times yesterday noting an ordinance passed by the County requiring bicycle parking and wider sidewalks, among other things, in new developments. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-county-obesity-20120125,0,4174815.story
Buck, Buck, Buck…
As for City responsibility, I agree that the City can’t be responsible for the actions of individuals. The minute they do this, there will be an outcry in personal freedoms and then someone will sue because the City didn’t choose the right kind of helmet. Cities are always under the looming spectre of lawsuits. That’s why we pay taxes so they can carry insurance and have lawyers of their own.
Yesterday, on my way to work I saw people walking on the curb next to Valencia Blvd., while 50mph cars were whizzing by because these individuals were too lazy to climb the ramp to the provided walkway that meanders through the hillside across from COC. If people are too stupid to put space between themselves and a moving vehicle, what’s the city to do? But a lawsuit will certainly come anyway.
California statute limits the liability of a city that operates a skatepark, provided the skatepark is not supervised and a fee for admission is not charged. If a skatepark is supervised or if an admission fee is charged, the immunity provisions do not apply. Cities would not operate skateparks if they had to assume the liability associated with a person being injured while participating in a clearly hazardous activity.
Skateparks are very dangerous whether a helmet is worn, but particularly so when one is not. It is the responsibility of parents, not the government, to ensure children wear appropriate protective gear in order to prevent injury or death.
That is interesting. If that is the case, Gail should have just been more honest and not said something like “the City does everything it can” but rather have either been silent regarding that aspect or indicated that liability laws restrict the City from supervising the park. Don’t try to pretend to be doing something when your not really doing much of anything.
That makes the question; what is more important, a few dollars or our youth? I know what the city’s has been and I know what my decision would be.
It’s the parent’s job, plain and simple.
Silly CC next thing you know you’ll be blaming parents instead of teachers for bad student behavior
Do a google search on how much we already pay on our Youth. It’s more than a few dollars. I think it is time to fill a few pot-holes and mend a few bridges. You know, for the kids.
It seems no one has more political clout in this city than the Skateboard Caucus. You could open up a shop in Newhall that gave away buckets of art, culture and job growth and not have it as good as an SCV skater.
Are you referring to this?:
http://santaclaritacitybriefs.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/screen-shot.jpg
Pools are dangerous, too. Should the city, then, not charge for entry, nor staff lifeguards?
That kind of reasoning just doesn’t make sense to me — if the city builds and owns and allows use of a skate park (or pool), morally they should assume some responsibility in monitoring the park.
Maybe SCV should take safety lessons from Burbank (was that the city, Todd?).
It is not that they are dangerous activities. It is that skateboarding is considered “hazardous recreational activities.” This was mentioned in the article and has been discussed many times ever since the park was opened (if not before).
Likewise, my backyard pool is considered a hazard, and, as such, I am required, by law, to have a gate surrounding my pool, and I make the personal decision for a supervising adult to be present whenever people are swimming in my pool.
It is just an incongruous thought that the city should build a community park which has inherent dangers, and then leave it unsupervised. Liability or not, the current status appears irresponsible.
Is you pool open to the public? You are comparing apples to oranges.
Not apples to oranges. The property owner should assume basic safety mechanisms in the use of his/her property, whether public or private. I really don’t understand how an argument can be made otherwise.
And though my pool is not open to the public, I do run pool parties for my kids, every two weeks, throughout the summer, and have a dozen or two kids on my property, and make pool rules very clear to the swimmers, and supervision requirements very clear to the adults. I, myself, am a former lifeguard, and am vigilant in supervising swimmers, in addition to the additional parental supervision.
I’ve been thinking more about this, and have changed my mind. I do understand an argument for not staffing the skate park, though I would make a different choice.
In the end, it’s true, parents are responsible for supervising their kids and teens. I would just not concede to building a park with inherent risks without placing tangible safeguards.
Lori:
You are as red as a Twizzler so your assertion makes sense, but I still get a kick out of all the small gub’mint Repubs who will come on her seven days a week and promote the expansion of the nanny state.
Maybe I’m not as red as you think — I was a registered Repubican for most of my voting life, and voted for Bush II, both times, and voted against Clinton, both times.
My current “red” status comes after years of trying to reconcile my faith with politics, in spite of the pervasive (and assumed) Chrsitian conservative status quo.
Burbank and Santa Monica, are the two that I’m aware of.
http://www.ci.burbank.ca.us/index.aspx?page=833
http://www01.smgov.net/comm_progs/skatepark/
Todd
Thanks. This is valuable information.
These two facilities appear to be managed far better than ours with liability wavers used to limit the municipality’s exposure.
I hope the city is reading the blog today. There is a lesson here.
I just read California Health Code 115800 and Government Code 831.7 which defines hazardous recreational activity.
First 115800 states that Government Code 831.7 does not apply to individuals under 12 and Section 831.7 does not shield governmental agencies from claims of negligence do to design or maintenance of the facility.
Burbank and Santa Monica’s approach is sounding better all the time.
Both of these skateparks charge an admission fee and thus the California statutes do not apply that would waive them of liability.
That is why they are staffed.
Santa Clarita does not charge a fee.
Not necessarily. I suggest you read Government code 831.7.
That just says that the city is on the hook if they don’t maintain the park and someone gets hurt due to that disrepair. Totally different issue.
Mike
Look at para c and c.2 which states between the 2 para. “Does not limit liability …… where permission …… was granted for a specific fee”
I should have also included, paraphrasing C.2: A specific fee does not include a General Admission or Parking Fee. Indicating a difference between types of fees and showing that different liability criteria is applied.
So, it looks like the catagory of fee charged would cause or not cause the liabilty waiver to be in place. That is irrespective of Burbank and Santa Monica requiring a liability waiver to be signed by participants or in the case of minors, their parents.
My child has used the skate park. I stayed there with him the entire time and made sure he had all the right protective gear on. Even if it were staffed, I am not sure I would expect the city to supervise my kid and all the others there.
Right. And when I take my kids to the aquatic center, I, also, remain vigilant, and do not assume that the lifeguards are responsible for the safety of my kids.
But the presence of lifeguards gives me peace of mind, knowing that there are several extra pairs of eyes supervising what is often a very crowded pool.
They didn’t even want Petz on the library advisory board, why would they put him on the Planning Commission ?
Because you’re a good and decent man and I vouch for you?
Leverage your Joe Messina support somehow.
I don’t think Joe has a lot of heft at City Hall. Also, during the nomination of the quisling Library Advisory Board some people I know at City Hall said some things about Petz that were mean and unjustified.
If a remember right this is Kellar’s seat to pick (I believe he nominated Kennedy) so look for a Dave Gauny appointment to really get the the Repub cat fight going!
I doubt David Gauny would be interested in a Planning Commission appointment since last time I spoke with him he told me he was relocating to Santa Barbara.
They must have forgotten that Petz teamed up with the library to bring two national awards for Astronomy Day to the Valencia library from the Astro League.
But they really did not care.
Been meaning to ask… what’s the best Astronomy app for the iPad?
Funny because Buck believes he is from another planet called Kolob and when he dies he will rule over his own planet with all his wives.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3BqLZ8UoZk
What a shock. Al Ferdman and Lori Rivas saying “it’s the city’s fault” and “the city is doing it wrong.” I’m sure if Al goes to the next council meeting and drones on for 3 minutes about how the city should be running the skatepark that the city council will fall in line behind him. Or, more likely, they’ll never change it just to spite a ridiculous old man.
Thanks Remy
Say hi to your coworkers. Now I know I must be on the right track. It is noticeable, whenever you run out of logic and facts, the name calling starts.
As a ridiculous old man myself (just ask my children) I come to the unconditional defense of Alan Ferdman!
Thanks Tim
Spoken like a true city employee. Those that don’t fall into line with the city’s mandate should be ignored, if anything just for spite.