With opening night quickly approaching, actors, dancers, set designers and the directors are beginning feel the pressure, as well getting energized as this winter’s show finally begins to take shape. Christmas in New York promises to be the perfect holiday treat, with numbers that take the audience along from downtown to Central Park, Brooklyn and even Queens and Broadway!
Archives for 2015
Mysterious Harbor interview committee formed
Fourteen applications for the vacant Harbor Master position have been received so far. The Town has established a so-called ‘Interview Committee’ which will be responsible for the interview and hiring recommendation. However, no one seems to know who is sitting on the committee. The Mirror accosted councilman Frank Wendell on the sidewalk, and he stated that he had no idea there even was a committee until just a few days earlier. Wendell also noted that he did not know who was on the committee, but said he would contact the Mayor to find out. Wendell eventually responded to the Mirror on Saturday the 28th, stating that he contacted the Mayor, and that Proto also had no idea who was on the committee, only that Town Manager Manuel had formed it.
Sources tell that Mirror that they also have no idea who is on the committee, but that Joan Natali is probably on it, since she is on every other committee in Cape Charles. The interview committee did attend a webinar Friday on proper interviewing techniques.
Blithering Idiots: Town puts Dolphin in Trash
Last week, Town staff attended a webinar hosted by Virginia Municipal League (VML) on Transportation and Mobility, as well as a supervisor training webinar hosted by Virginia Municipal League Insurance Program (VMLIP) on termination, furlough, reduction in force (RIF), and layoff practices, and to round off a hectic work week, they participated in a social media webinar.
Note: The Virginia Municipal League Insurance Program is the entity that funded the Town’s hiring of two high priced law firms to fight a citizens group that challenged the selling of the old school to a developer for $10. The VML also holds classes which instruct town’s how to deal (not) with citizen Freedom of Information requests. Anyone who has ever FOIA’d the town to try and pry information out of them realizes that those classes are having a chilling effect on our local democracy.
While Bob Panek’s protégé, Town Manager Brent Manuel was engaging in these frivoulous activities, the Cape Charles dolphin spent the holidays languishing in the town trash pile:
La Mer Design: Here to help tell your story
Our town of Cape Charles is quietly becoming a town of unique shops, but being a fan of design, one of our favorites is La Mer Design, tucked neatly away in a gorgeous space at 215 Mason. With the holiday season in full swing, owners Nicolle Isaacs Smith and Tammye Delk Van Clief took a few moments to talk design and influence with the Cape Charles Mirror.
Mirror: Where did you get the idea to start La Mer?
Nicole: The idea for La Mer came out of two friends that liked spending time together, which was at the first house, which was kind of a design think tank for us. Two best friends wanting to do something together.
Mirror: You have such a great shop, it has its own feel, its own aesthetic. What is the design influence for La Mer?
Nicole: Our design philosophy is really about juxtapositioning, mixing the old with the new, contemporary with a vintage look, with a little of our flair adding to it; We like the mixing of mid-century and traditional. Our main goal is to create something that is authentic and real.
Mirror: As far as clientele, who would you consider to be the main ones, do you do design for people’s homes, or is it more people coming into the shop to pick things out?
Nicole: We do design in people’s houses – we can do it from the ground up, or we can do it right from their homes as it sits. We can design and work with what you have. Our main thing is telling your story, revealing who you are through what you have. It’s not like you have to come in and buy a lot of expensive things, we can work with what you have. Our main goal is revealing the story of the client. The important thing is that you have things that you really love, and they will always go together. It is important that your home, that it tells your story, reveals who you are.
Mirror: What is your goal for the future? Where do you see the company going?
Nicole: For the next season, we would like to have more design that goes beyond the retail. We love the retail part of the business, but one thing we would like to do, as far as telling our story…we sometimes feel that people sometimes think we are expensive, or too expensive, and that really is not the case. I’m very down to earth, and I would love for people to see us in a little bit different way, then just this expensive retail store. We are really here to help you, to help reveal your story, even if you just need some help decorating for an event, or the holidays. We’d like to be seen as more approachable on the design side. On the retail side, we are going to hone in on the vendors that work best for us, as far as what we are trying to do. We’d like to offer very authentic things, that…we really want to be able to help the people of the community. That’s why we started La Mer, that’s what it’s all about.
Riverside hosts Grocery Shopping with Diabetes classes
Festive Friday a Huge Success: Next Event Dec 4th
This Black Friday, the sidewalks were filled with shoppers, and the outside tables of the Cape Charles Coffee house were at capacity. In the evening, music filled the air, and many folks were out enjoying the beautiful night air as shops stayed open to 8:00. The Palace showed the film White Christmas, which was a perfect way to send off our first Festive Friday. This first event was an unqualified success, and there are three more Festive Friday’s on the way. Next Friday, December 4th, Peg Volk’s Corn Funk Review will take the Strawberry Street Stage from 5:00 to 8:00, shops will again be open late, and the film at the Palace will be ‘Elf’.
Upland dredge site filling up fast
Science and Philosophy Seminar: End-of-Life Care Planning
Dudley Rochester will lead the seminar and present a step-by-step pathway that shows those who are nearing the ends of their lives how to think about such planning; he will provide a handout detailing the steps.
Rochester is a retired pulmonologist, most recently with the University of Virginia medical faculty.
Science and Philosophy Seminar is an informally organized group that meets more or less regularly to explore and discuss a wide array of topics, ranging from philosophical speculation to scientific research. All Seminars are open to the public. Admission is free.
Can Buckminster Fuller Winner teach us a new way to farm?
“You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” – Buckminster Fuller
Greenwave, a nonprofit that’s developing the world’s first ecologically sustainable ocean farms, has won this year’s Buckminster Fuller Challenge – the premiere award for socially responsible design.
GreenWave’s goal is to restore ocean ecosystems, while providing jobs by turning fisherman into “restorative ocean farmers.” GreenWave’s “vertical underwater garden” shifts the practice of monoculture aquaculture to multi-species 3D ocean farms – vibrant ecosystems that also produce higher yields. The infrastructure is simple: seaweed, scallops and mussels grow on floating ropes, stacked above oyster and clam cages below. From these crops, ocean farmers can produce food, fertilizers, animal feeds, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, biofuels and much more. The farms filter pollutants out of water, sequester carbon, support biodiversity, and are thus designed to restore rather than deplete our ecosystems.
A single acre filters millions of gallons of ocean water every day, creates homes for hundreds of wild marine and bird species and absorbs the overabundance of nitrogen and carbon (with kelp sequestering 5x more carbon than land based-plants) that are killing billions of organisms. The design requires zero-inputs-there is no need for fresh water.
Greenwave describes the benefits:
- More Biodiversity, Higher Yields: By using the entire food column, the “farm” provides habitat for hundreds of marine and bird species, and create natural reef systems. It can grow 20 tons of sea vegetables and 500,000 shellfish on each acre per year.
- Zero Inputs: Since there is no need for fresh water, fertilizer, or pesticides, restorative ocean farming is the most sustainable form of food production on the planet.
Nitrogen pollution causes algae blooms that lower oxygen levels as they decompose, causing dead zones. Greenwave’s farms sequester nitrogen, preventing algae blooms.
- Food Security: As a food crop, seaweed is rich in nutrients such as protein, calcium, and vitamin-C. Studies demonstrate that a network of seaweed farms the size of Washington State could produce all of the dietary protein needs of the human population.
Kelp absorbs 5 times the carbon as land-based plants and the farms create storm barriers that mitigate the impacts of storms.
- Energy Security: a network of farms totaling an area half the size of Maine could grow enough biofuel to replace all the oil used in the US, according to the Department of Energy.
Greenwave’s approach gives us a scalable, integrated model that coastal fishing communities around the world can adopt with modest infrastructure costs and begin to build towards a long-term resilient future,” says Elizabeth Thom
County responds to allegations of racial bias
The County, particularly the Board of Supervisors and Administrator Katie Nunez have been the recipients of a good bit of criticism of late over perceived racial bias in the proposed zoning. In the below letter, Katie Nunez provides the County’s response to many of the allegations:
To the Editor:
In his letter Mr. Kellam expresses his opinion about how he wishes his real estate to be zoned and why. He also makes allegations such as that the proposed zoning map includes what he calls “spot zoning” and constitutes a “taking” of value from his property. None of those remarks is in any sense unusual in rezoning situations. Mr. Kellam’s wishes and opinions with respect to the zoning of his property should be offered to the Board of Supervisors and taken into consideration by them. (As a matter of fact, Mr. Kellam’s assertion that the proposed rezoning would prohibit “the sale of crops” is categorically false.)
Unfortunately, though, Mr. Kellam’s letter also includes defamatory allegations about the Board of Supervisors and, inferentially, its staff which are profoundly, dangerously and unjustly divisive of and corrosive to the relations between the citizens of Northampton County who are of different races. Mr. Kellam goes so far as to allege that “the sitting Board is engaged in a war on the minority population.” It is hard to imagine a more baseless and irresponsible accusation; an accusation which follows the similarly despicable and racially inflammatory remarks made by Mr. Ken Dufty at the public hearing on November 2, 201 5, regarding the proposed zoning ordinance.
I advise the readers of this letter that I was present at virtually every meeting at which the County’s staff worked on the proposed rezoning. No one ever even remarked on the race of any owner of property and, indeed, in the giant majority of cases no one was even consciously aware of the name, much less the race, of the property owners. I have never seen the slightest sign that any of the staff members who worked on this project has any animus toward anyone based on race or anything else.
As to the Board of Supervisors, their meetings are matters of public record with all remarks being audio recorded and minutes being maintained. While there has been enthusiastic disagreement among members of the Board about some provisions of the proposed ordinance, not a single member of the Board has ever suggested that any change be made based on racial considerations nor has any member ever suggested that any of his colleagues might be so motivated. I personally attended virtually every single executive session attended by the Board of Supervisors and I unambiguously and without reservation report that the substance of the proposed rezoning was never discussed and, if it ever came up in some peripheral sense, no member of the Board of Supervisors ever exhibited even the slightest indication that he was motivated in any way by racial considerations or was even mindful of the race of any interested party.
It is natural that a general rezoning of the real estate in the County would give rise to passions among some or even many people. But it is worthy of note that over a process which has extended for most of two years (the first public hearing was held in March of 2014), Ken Dufty’s noxious statement on November 2, 2015, was the first time anyone suggested that there was some racial dimension to the proposed rezoning. It cannot be a coincidence that that theme was unleashed at exactly the time when it became apparent that the Board may well vote on the proposed map and ordinance. The fomenting of racial animus to gain some perceived advantage on a public policy question is a truly nasty tactic engaged in with reckless disregard for the welfare of Northampton County. Mr. Dufty and Mr. Kellam should be ashamed of themselves.
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