High Gear February 22, 2017

Posted by Rosalie McCloud on Feb 23, 2017
 

 

Beautiful, bright sunshine and green everywhere.  We are blessed.   And, President Stan is back, looking perfectly innocent, no explanations.  That’s good enough, at least he’s back among us.
 
 
PLEDGE AND INVOCATION
Mary Murphy (British Expat) led the American Pledge of Allegiance.  The jolly (for some inexplicable reason) Mark Johnson delivered cheerful motivating words.   Mark remarked that it was good to see Tom Mohr among us, looking hale and hearty, too. 
 

Guests and Visiting Rotarians

Lisa Goldman, City of Burlingame City Manager and today’s speaker, introduced guest and co-presenter Public Works Director Syed Murtuza.  Marilyn Orr formally introduced guest Tom Mohr, and Barry Parker introduced the lovely Sophie Mahncke who has been living with Barry and Dawn during her exchange year. 
 
Sophie has visited in the past; now, it was time for a report.   Sophie is from Germany, having been raised in the town of Herdringen, population 3,900. Her dad is a jurist for an insurance company; mom is a deputy in the secretarial department of a hospital.  Her school was the Franz-Stock Gymnasium.  More recently she is a popular, typical student at Half Moon Bay High School.  Sophie says Rotary made it happen. Actually, we had nothing to do with the straight As, but we’ll accept credit anyway.
Fifteen years ago, Barry became acquainted with a fellow professional at Carr-McClellan who became Sophie’s father.  Sophie had always wanted to experience life in the United States, so Sophie was encouraged to reach out to Barry when she reached her teens, and a wonderful time is being had by all!
 
A question from the audience asked how Sophie became so proficient in English?  Sophie had always wanted to learn English and took English language, politics, and history – all in English!  That’s the way to do it!

Rotary Fun

Funmaster Fritz offered up co-funmaster Sean Williams for the Truth or Lie Game:
  1. Sean has visited six of the seven continents.  2. Sean has been skiing since age three.  3. Sean is a mountain-biker.
We guessed correctly that Sean has not visited six continents.  That’s one loss and one win for the good guys!  That would be the Rotary audience.

Announcements

Mike Heffernan reminded that we are off site next week on March 1.  We are fortunate to have an opportunity to lust after the gorgeous vehicles at the Candy Store.  Mike says we may come a little early to have a good look.
We are privileged to hear the comments of Tom McGrane, the ex-director of the Blackhawk Automotive Museum at Blackhawk.  He’s a British gent who will speak on car culture in America.
 
Oh Joy!!!!!  The rosters are here and ready after ‘lo these many years.  Kudos to Emily Matthews, Cheryl Fama, and Mary Murphy for compiling, editing, re-editing, updating, and finally supervising the printing of our roster.  We must admit, we look pretty fabulous.

Progam

President Stan introduced Burlingame City Manager Lisa Goldman; Lisa introduced Public Works Director Syed Murtuza, her co-presenter today.  The City is in the process of reaching out to various groups, non-profits, general population, to determine which City issues are of highest priority.
Sidewalks maintenance and repair was high on our group’s list.  Uneven sidewalks are a risk to all, but especially to folks in wheelchairs or those depending on canes. 
The issue of  whether the City and the homeowners  would share the cost of repair was raised; unknown, many factors in play.  It was suggested that a disclosure be prepared by the City outlining  allocation of financial responsibility for maintenance and repair, potential for liability.  Disclosure is critical  in making prospective buyers aware.
Half of the City’s budget goes to police and fire.  Lisa assured us that the City of Burlingame only issues tickets when such a ticket is deserved!  Traffic court was created for a reason, Lisa! 
We are the City of Trees; we love our trees!  Unfortunately, our trees make mischief on sidewalks, and there are 116 miles of sidewalks in Burlingame.  Any time it is proposed to remove our trees, there’s an issue!    Caltrans wanted a left-turn lane into Hillsborough from El Camino.  This proposal involved removing trees.  Uh oh, big problem.  The problem was solved temporarily with a pilot program prohibiting the left turn.  Stay tuned.
Our computer didn’t have enough goobers or plugs or something, so we didn’t get to see a video on the proposed raising of Caltrain over Broadway.  There was an architectural rendering of the project.  Unfortunately, there is no funding presently to complete it.   
Go to Burlingame.org , Public Works, to see the video of the  Broadway-101 Interchange grade separation,  to be completed by end of summer 2017.
Lisa mentioned that President Stan did not present  the bio he asked her to prepare.  Thanks a lot, President Stan. Glad you’re back anyway, so far. Thanks to  Lisa and Syed for a great update.  We were given forms to complete that will register our thoughts  and recommendations for inclusion in the study.
 
 
Next Week, March 1,  fabulous, historic cars at The Candy Store.  Presentation by Timothy P. McGrane, of Blackhawk Automotive Museum, Box lunch by Copenhagen.
March 8 – Bob Roberts, President-Elect of Mill Valley Rotary, speaks on the Rotary International Project in Puno, Peru
March 16 – THURSDAY, Poplar Grill, joint meeting with Rotary Club of San Mateo
 
Happy Birthday to Paul Neiberding February 22, and Rosemary Rayburn February 23!!!!