• Event Filled Saturday in Wildomar

Relay For Life is a 24 hour event where people walk to raise money in efforts to find a cure for cancer. In years past, the Wildomar teams have been at Canyon Hills Middle School, Elsinore High School and this year at Vista Murrieta High School on Clinton Keith Road, just east of the 215.

Bob and Margie Amos participate in the "Survivors Lap" which kicked off the event on Saturday morning. If you look closely, you can see a "spirit stick" being held by Bob (detail of the stick is seen in a photo below).

At the closing ceremonies, it was learned that more than $91,000 had been raised at the event. The original goal was set at $80,000.

There were several teams from Wildomar present. Here is a look at the Wildomar Walkers' station. In the foreground you can see top of the team's "spirit stick" which was topped with photos of Stan Smith and Doug Lech (not visible here), both of whom died from cancer during the past year.

There are many awards given out to the various teams for one accomplishment or another. The award for most laps went to a member of the Wildomar Walkers, Doug Ames. He logged 211 laps, which is more than 56 miles, while being on the track all 24 hours of the event.

Taken during one of Doug's first few laps.
Inset taken during one of the themed laps later in the day.

At the same time, there was the third annual ALS1 5K at Marna O'Brien park. Much as I tried to be in two places at once, I was unable to pull it off... so I'm borrowing some of Bridgette Moore's pics from the event to share here. ☺

A group shot of the winners from the various age group categories.

The amazing part about this event is that the promoter, a local family that has been touched by the disease (ALS), has really emerged as community leaders. 

Click this link to read more about Ken and Erin's motivation for this event, which was covered in a 2016 blog.

Both Ken and Erin Hartley have shown tremendous grit and willpower getting this event to come off so well for the last three years... and if organizing such a thing weren't enough of a task on its own, Erin just gave birth to the couple's fourth child in late March.

Somehow I managed to photobomb the group shot that features the Hartley family.

I got my request for the event stats in a bit late for the publication of this blog (numbers of runners, amount raised), but will put them in this spot once I receive them.

The Rotary Club of Wildomar helped raise funds for the charity by manning the beer garden.

Pictured from left to right: Ben Benoit, Jaimie Benoit, Dana DeJong, Joseph Morabito, Bridgette Moore, Andy Morris, Martin Haeberle (in the back), Erin Hartley, and Ken Hartley.

The last thing on the busy Saturday list was the kickoff of the Rooted in Nature Craft Brew Festival up at the visitors center at the Santa Rosa Plateau. 

A look at the taster glasses that have been designed for the event.

I've really been impressed with the amount of planning going into the event... it's not even scheduled for another year: May 18, 2019. 

It was first brought to my attention last year. It was mentioned in a blog dating back to August 2017. 

LINK to past blog.

The program cover (front and back) from the kickoff event.

It's going to be held at Marna O'Brien park, and the aim of the event, besides having a world class event in Wildomar, is to raise funds for the Santa Rosa Plateau Nature Education Foundation.

Click this link to visit their website to hear their mission 

The committed craft breweries include: 
         •  Garage Brewing Co
         •  Stone Brewing
         •  Coronado Brewing Co
         •  Karl Strauss Brewing Company
         •  Ballast Point
         •  Wiens Brewing Company
         •  Inland Wharf
         •  Aftershock
         •  Craft Brewing Company
         •  Ironfire Brewing Company
         •  8-Bit Brewing

The festival is scheduled to be from 3pm to 6pm (with a VIP early access set to start at 2pm). Entry fees haven't been established yet.

Ginger Greaves discussing the 2019 Rooted in Nature Craft Brew Festival.

For more information about the event, or if you'd like to be one of the sponsors, contact: 

Ginger Greaves at (909) 732-2209, ginger@SRPF.org

or

Herb Massinger (714) 264-0311, herb@naturebrewfest.org

Visit the website, ask some questions.

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"Everywhere I go I'm asked if I think the university stifles writers. My opinion is that they don't stifle enough of them."
– Flannery O'Connor (1925-1964)

Wildomar Rap would lay even money that Flannery would say ten times that about bloggers if she'd been aware of the concept during her lifetime.

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• Planning Commission Meeting May 2018

There were a couple of items on the agenda worth going over from the May 2018 Planning Commission meeting. I'll also upload all the videos since the installation of the the chamber's video equipment has hit molasses going uphill in Winter speed. 

When it comes to official video at city meetings, the latest rumor suggests that September is when live streaming will start.

Now, if we juxtapose that information against the oft projected release dates of the city's updated website (which was talked about for years before the trigger got pulled), the safe bet is that live streaming will commence some time in Trump's second term... but I digress. 

2.1 Zoning Ordinance Amendment
This item was to help streamline the process where already approved projects seek a time extension before beginning construction.

I've never understood why a company would invest the time and money into a project, to design it and get it all the way through the process, to just sit on it for years and years.

One suggestion is that it can work to their advantage when they're sitting in a CPA's office in April, but that shouldn't be the concern of the city.

A legitimate reason could be downturns in the economy. I get that. The project's funding fell out, and they need more time to find other backers. 

Makes sense... but if after years you still can't scrape together the funds to move forward, then you should feel the heat of the clock ticking, and either break ground or face starting the process over again.

This ordinance is to make the process easier, to save money for the city —in staff time necessary to prepare for such a meeting. Again, seems reasonable to me, but if you listen to the video, at about the 8:45 mark, you'll hear Wildomar Planning Director Matt Bassi say, "... as well as cost savings to the developers."

Sorry, but the developers are the ones that are requesting the city spend time on their projects, and in these cases, long after they were supposed to be built and occupied. If they want an extension of time, mandate that every staff hour be paid for by them. It shouldn't be costing the taxpayers one additional dollar. 
(if that's already the case, then the point is moot to begin with)

Click this banner to visit the campaign website.

3.2 Extension of Time #3 Planning Commission review and consideration of a 2-year Extension of Time SEC of Bundy Canyon Road and I-15 Freeway

This was an interesting item in so far as when it came time for the vote, no one put a motion forward. There was the longest pregnant pause in human history (literally 20 seconds of dead air) before the silence was broken when Commissioner Langworthy asked, "I just have a question, when was the first extension given for that?"

It almost looked like this might not get approved, then the representative for the developer, Karine Kofdarali, told the commission that they had personnel issues due to health issues and had to start part of the process over.

After her explanation, the commission quickly voted to approve the time extension. For the full item, see the video below.

3.1 Breslin Family General Plan Initiation Proposal

This item took about half an hour. There were three public speakers that spoke their objections, and then the commission weighed in with their objections.

The spokesman for the Breslin family came up and basically threatened that if they didn't go along with this plan, they'd be looking to put in a wrecking yard, boat storage place, or some other such establishment on that land. 
(check the 20:00 minute mark of the video to hear him suggest such things)

Since it's just a GPIP, (and I'm not going to put my Mario and Princess Peach cartoon in this time, but you can click this link if you really want to see it again ☺) which is a bizarre dance where the applicant pokes his toe in the water to see how warm it is, before jumping all in with a formal request for a General Plan Amendment... I'm not going to bother with too many details on something that will never come about.

In short, they wanted to change the General Plan from EDR (Estate Density residential) to MHDR (Medium High Density Residential), or from 1 unit/2 acres 5-8 units/acre.

I counted 26 clusters, which they said would have 6 units apiece... basic math tells us that is 156 units in that area, but that far exceeds the numbers allowed with a MHDR designation.

According to the agenda packet, the project seeks to put between 80 and 134 units on about 17 acres of land... where with the current General Plan, with 1 unit per 2 acres, would allow about 8 units.

I get it, if I were the landowner, I'd want to squeeze as many dollar signs out of each acre too. Thing is, that's why we became a city, so that we would be able to control "spot zoning" attempts like this.

Commission Comments
  •  Veronica Langworthy: Our general plan is Estate Density Residential [in that area]. To change it to a Medium High Density Residential doesn't really fit in with our general plan. Typically we make conformity issues, where the zoning is not in conformity with the general plan, but to make such a drastic change to our general plan is not what I see for Wildomar.
  •  Kim Strong: I agree [with Commissioner Langworthy] we have to stay true to the general plan. There's been times that we've had to stay true to the general plan when we've not necessarily agreed with it, but I think we have to in this case as well.
  •  Michele Thomas: I agree [with the first two comments]. I have big concerns with the traffic study [...] this would be very inconvenient, it's a lot of homes, if they're apartments those are young families generally, they're driving to school. It's not a safe access, there's no way they can walk to school from this location. It's not safe, there're no sidewalks. 
  •  John Lloyd: The houses that surround this property, they have been relying that that area being Estate Density, it goes to Rural Mountainous [Density] afterwards. To put in condominiums in an area that wasn't designed for it, where it doesn't fit, it's not a good fit to me. I don't see it as something that we really need. We don't have a shortage of apartments on the books, at all. [...] I appreciate the time you guys took for the proposal, the sketches and designs, but I couldn't support this. 

3.3 Capital Improvement Program for Fiscal Year 2018/19: Planning Commission’s Annual Review of the Public Works Department 2018/19 Capital Improvement Program for General Plan Consistency.

Newsworthy points: 

• Clinton Keith road widening is 100% designed. It's a $7.5M project with about $3.6M ready to spend. Still no start date predicted.
• Palomar widening, the designing is at the 65% complete mark. Looking to phase the project in over time.
• Bundy Canyon interchange. This is a long term project that involves years of planning, dealing with CalTrans.
• New traffic signals associated with Bundy Canyon Road widening. When that goes forward, so will the new signals. 
   •   Bundy Canyon Road @ Sellers Road
   •   Bundy Canyon Road @ Monte Vista Road
   •   Bundy Canyon Road @ Oak Circle Drive
   •   Bundy Canyon Road @ The Farm Road
• Flood control/drainage, please see the video for details on the various items (starting at about the 5:30 mark of the video).
• Parks, next parks workshop will include the newly acquired 11 acres just south of David A. Brown school. 

Let me be the first to suggest that this park be named after the man that made it possible... Charles Tunstall Park has a nice ring to it.

• Trails, the Grand Avenue Multi-Use Trail is complete and the lines on the road will be painted within the next week or two. The city is working on getting the east side of Murrieta Trail opened for public use. Currently only the west side access road is readily available.

It was discussed that Grand Avenue will be striped as a two lane road from Corydon to Clinton Keith, which will affect the current lane count near the stop sign at Sheila. 

By my count, there are currently as many as five lanes at the intersection of Sheila and Grand.

Below is a short video that has the other bits and pieces of the meeting, including public comments. I'd prefer to post videos in chronological order, but that's not what Wildomar Rap is supposed to do... that's the job of the city.

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"Why don't you write books people can read?"
– Nora Barnacle to her husband James Joyce

Wildomar Rap is asked something similar by Mrs. Wildomar Rap at least once a week.

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• Excessive Light Pollution?

I've had several people talk to me about the LED sign that is at Wildomar Square, suggesting that it's too bright at night. Or, that it's on after 10:00pm at all... which seems to be against the agreement (see below).

This photo was taken about 10:15pm, standing just north of Pie Nation.

In the photo above, it's clear that the LED sign is on, but it didn't change images the entire time it was being observed, and is clearly far dimmer than the Stater Bros sign.

Below is a graphic from a July 2016 blog about the planning commission meeting where this sign was first discussed.

This graphic says that there is a "Dark Period" from 10pm to 6am, but it also says that it can be at 200 NITs at night until sunrise. The question seems to come down to the definition of "off".

I went looking for the graph in the agenda from that night, but found the following instead.

The "dark" period is mentioned, and updated to reflect more stringent inclusive times.

Another shot of the LED sign about five minutes later than the first. You'll notice that the graphic with The Habit still hadn't changed. Whereas in daylight hours, they change about every five seconds.

This photo was taken from Catt Rd, near Avry Way, about 600-700 feet away.

My conclusion is that the LED sign at Wildomar Square was on past 10pm, but didn't rotate the images and was far dimmer than the standard shopping center light for Bear Creek Village Center (a term that NO ONE uses for the Stater Bros Center — EVER). 

One person told me that they could see the Wildomar Square sign change images, from more than a mile away. 

Since this sign didn't change while I was there, and it was quite dim in comparison... I'm guessing that for the above claim to be accurate, it must have occured before 9:30pm or something.

The question comes down to this, is the LED panel permitted to be on at past 10pm or not?  The table above says "Dark Period (off/on)"... which would suggest darkness (not just dimmer)

When I was growing up, the term "off" didn't mean "dim" or "low"... it meant OFF. 

Just ask my erstwhile stepmother, who could hear the slightest whisper from the otherside of a closed door, down the hall, and while otherwise engrossed in McMillan and Wife.

Link to July 2016 blog where this was first covered

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The human conscience, certainly the most elusive component in a person's makeup. It may slumber for years, and awake without warning.
– EG Marshall 

Wildomar Rap never sleeps, thus avoids being rousted in the first place.

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• Community Profile: Cleo Doran

One thing about social media, you get to meet people that you probably otherwise wouldn't have. ☺

I recently had a conversation with the vivacious Cleo Doran, four year resident of Wildomar, who has a couple of irons in the fire worthy of sharing.

She has two ventures going on right now, and both have opportunities for youth that are looking to a future in the entertainment field. 

The first is called Bella Noir Diamond Couture (BNDC), it's an acting/modeling workshop that runs for four hours (see flyer below). 

Real-time photoshoots with coaching an arm's length away.

The workshops are held at different locations in LA, Playa Vista, and Pasadena through CTRL Collective. She livestreams parts of the workshops to her facebook page so that the students can take a look at the videos later and seek to improve their techniques.

The photoshoots also have sponsors. A recent one was the local charitable organization, Operation Prom Girl.

Cleo Doran is just a bit to the left of center in the back row, Tanya Marie is on the right.

Not all of the models/modeling students are aiming for future fame. The classes appeal to varying levels of interest, with occasional students having medical limitations, eager to be in the workshops, as they seamlessly become part of the whole.

"This is a great experience for them, they can have some fun with it, it may be their only chance to model. We're always reaching out and making sure that everyone is going to do something fun with it. Some have acting parts, some will be on the runway"

- Cleo Doran

Getting concepts and ideas down on paper.

Practicing lines

Getting their parts down.

Pausing for a pic. An Atari shirt in 2018? Awesome! ☺

Classes are small, usually between seven to nine students per class. 

"That gives us the opportunity to really work with them"

- Cleo Doran

The executive producer, which is also her friend and business partner, Tanya Marie, is a mother of five that lives over the city line in Murrieta. Tanya has previously worked with MTV. 

The duo work "mom hours" while they balance their families and their dreams for a successful TV talk show.

Cleo and Tanya.

Among other places, Tanya has put on variously themed fashion shows in Vegas, Carlsbad, and Pechanga. One theme was James Bond, with participants ranging from seven through their forties.

On the runway during the James Bond-themed fashion show.

James Bond(s) and starlit.

Oh, I forgot to mention the other iron in the fire of theirs... The Industry: Live Legends & TV Stars. 

The show's logo.

A TV talk show, that sometimes feels like a red carpet show. It's been in production for a couple of months, with the air date slated to be sometime in August.

Tanya Marie, Richard Ryan and Jackie Nova from Art of Deception, Cleo Doran while filming their show.

It's all about movie stars —past and present and future—singers, actors dancers, writers, entrepreneurs, and the like. 

Posing with guests of the show. Some of the original soul train dancers, Diva Glamas, Ikettes, Ike Jr, and Sweet Randi Love.

I asked Cleo how she got the idea for the show, and she didn't hesitate to let me know that the idea was Tanya's, and that Tanya is also the executive producer. 

The episodes are shot with the one hour time slot in mind, with about 46 minutes of content per episode. Their hope is that it'll be picked up by a major network, but until then it'll be available through iLaunch.tv. That can be seen through ROKU and other similar devices.

On the set.

Cleo told me that she'll be reaching out to Elsinore High School, specifically to their videography and photography programs, to look for volunteers or interns to help on the show.

"I think that would be a great opportunity for these students who are planning on being in the industry, working with videos and recordings and photography and a chance to earn some service hours and [gain] experience. They get to come out and work with the actual equipment and learn how the shows are run."

- Cleo Doran

I want to thank Cleo for the pleasant chat and letting me share some of what she does, with the community.

Cleo Doran and Joseph Morabito at The Bean (a new coffee spot in Wildomar).

All images above are courtesy of Cleo Doran and Tanya Marie.

Contact links

Link to contest webpage
Link to contest FB page
Link to The Industry FB page

Link to Lady Doran Industry TV FB page
The Industry Instagram Link

emails
theindustrylivetv@gmail.com
ladydoran.industrylivetv@gmail.com 

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Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn't.
– Erica Jong

Wildomar Rap furnishes the answers you wish you didn't want to know.

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• City Council Meeting May 2018

The meeting was on the quick side tonight, and the council was running 40% light with Council Members Bridgette Moore and Tim Walker not in attendance.

There was a library update — with lots of things planned for the community this Summer, and Sycamore Academy invited the council to their Art Showcase event.

Other than being reminded that everyone's water bills will be going up in July (skip to the bottom of the blog for the video for the whole presentation below), and that Wildomar Crossings passed its last hurdle (video to entire presentation also below) it was basically Joseph Morabito night. (Yes, that's me).

During the public comments on non-agenda items, I announced that I'll be running for city council this year (video is right here). 

I live in District 3, which you can see in the map below. 

Click the map to visit the JosephMorabito4Wildomar.com.

I also spoke about the "greenbelt" that leads into Windsong Valley. It was an item on the agenda but put into the consent calendar since it's coming back next month as a regular item. 

I chose to speak about it tonight because I don't think that it's going to be dealing with the landscaping part as much as it is the lighting. If you live in Windsong Valley, it most likely will be affecting you. 

The thing with that tax, it no longer is covering the cost for the streetlights. We're still paying what the original owners were paying when the first Windsong home was built in the late '80s.

I don't mind the increase for the street lights, that makes sense, but I can't imagine what the deal is when it comes to that greenbelt. 

This was part of the consent calendar. The highlights are mine.

We are paying $100 per week for "administration" to take care of that "greenbelt". $5300 per year comes out of the taxes that over 1000 Windsong Valley homeowners pay into. That's about 25% of the entire tax collected.

Let's see a show of hands, who thinks the work done on the Cervera greenbelt is acceptable?

If you have thoughts, be sure to weigh in on it, and consider attending the next city council meeting too. If not, when you discover that your property tax bill went up under CSA 103, just remember you were told about it.

Watch the video to hear my concerns about it.

The only other substantive part of the agenda was Wildomar Crossings. Since I'm running for city council in District 3, I felt I should weigh in on it. 

This was featured in the blog covering the April planning commission meeting.

In short, I don't see how we can block a landowner from developing their land when it's in accordance with the city's established general plan. 

They happen to have three signed tenants, but other times, like the still mostly empty Subway building on Bundy Canyon, a developer doesn't know who the tenants will be.

There were some issues with the boxiness of the buildings, and it will be going back to the planning commission in June to get a workover. 

The entire agenda item is in the video below. Complete with the presentation, comments from the landowner, and only one from the North Ranch neighborhood in opposition, Gracie (she didn't leave a last name, but told us she used to be mayor of Pico Rivera). I loved her energy, take a look at the video to see what I'm talking about. 

Other than that, there wasn't much else to the meeting.

Oh wait, here's the video about the water bill increase. It's been being talked about for a long time, and it seems to happen every year, so pardon me while I don't elaborate on it. 

Yes, it's early in the year... but you don't have to click. ☺

Link to campaign Facebook page

Link to campaign Website

If you have questions or concerns, please email me.

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"The man who goes alone can start today; but he who travels with another must wait till that other is ready."
— Henry David Thoreau  

Wildomar Rap thinks HDT was referring to wives when he said "another".

This blog was produced for viewing on a desktop or a laptop. Though it's been optimized for smartphones, the formatting can look odd on a smartphone or if you get this delivered through email (such as missing video links). Link to proper format.