Date: Monday, Oct. 18, 2010
Time: 6:30pm - 8:30pm
Place: Galpin Ford - 2nd floor meeting room
15555 Roscoe Blvd (at the 405)
Parking: Free parking in the Galpin Lot on the West side of Orion
Please do not park in the customer service areas.
Agenda
6:30pm - 7:00pm
Networking
Introductions
7:00pm- 7:30pm
Reports by Valley VOTE Committees
( ~5 minutes for each including Q&A)
Housing Vic Viereck
Land Use Pauline Tallent
LAWA Denny Schneider
Transportation Bart Reed
Boeckmann Event Joe Vitti
7:30pm - 8:00pm Brian Bauer
Brian Bauer is the Executive Director of Granada Hills Charter High School. Brian began his career at Granada as the school’s Principal in 2000. While principal, Mr. Bauer led the faculty and community through the politically charged process to become a fiscally independent conversion charter school. Nearly every employee – teacher, classified and administrator -- as well as almost 2000 parents signed Granada’s petition for independence. When Granada was granted independent charter status in 2003, Mr. Bauer was appointed Executive Director. Granada Hills Charter is the largest charter school in the nation.
As Executive Director, Mr. Bauer is responsible for the school’s instructional, operational, and financial programs that involve almost 4200 students, over 180 teachers and 150 classified employees, and nearly $35 million in revenue. He oversees all of the school’s significant business and operational services, including payroll, general ledger, cafeteria, building and grounds, and human resources, all of which are handled in-house.
Since becoming a charter school in 2003, Granada Hills Charter’s Academic Performance Index has soared over 100 points to 874, the highest of any public comprehensive high school in Los Angeles. This is the fifth consecutive year the school has scored over 800, the goal for all high schools in the state. Equally as impressive as meeting its school-wide target, the school met its target in every state-determined subgroup. In fact, the Socioeconomically Disadvantaged, Students with Disabilities, and English Learners subgroups had the greatest gains with 55-, 62-, and 52-point jumps, respectively. Other subgroups with impressive 2010 gains were Hispanic students with a 29-point increase, Asian and White students with a 27-point gain each, and the two-or-more races student subgroup with a 25-point jump. With a graduation rate of 99%, an in-seat attendance rate of 98%, and a student wait list of almost 2500, GHCHS is a top school of choice in Los Angeles.
Mr. Bauer began his teaching career in LAUSD in 1991. He served as Assistant Principal at Locke and Franklin High Schools. Brian has worked as a leadership coach with six charter school leaders through the California Charter School Association and has advised the Mayor’s Partnership School Organization. Brian has served on the California State Board's Advisory Commission on Charter Schools (ACCS) since 2008 and currently serves as the ACCS chair. He has been President (since its founding in 2004) of the Special Education Improvement Authority for Los Angeles, a Joint Power Authority that includes the leading conversion and startup charter schools/organizations advocating higher quality special education options within the LAUSD.
He received his BA from Yale, a Masters from CSUDH and UCLA, and is still writing his PhD dissertation at UCLA. Between his teaching and administrative assignments, Mr. Bauer spent two years in Colombia, South America as a Fulbright Scholar, and during the 2007 summer, was on a special educational leadership project in Brazil under the auspices of the U.S. State Department and the Fulbright Association.
Mr. Bauer serves as a trustee on several education, community service, and family philanthropic Boards. He presently resides in Los Angeles.
We are very pleased to have Brian take time out of his busy schedule to bring us to date on his plans for the new Valley Region High School # 4
currently under construction in Granada Hills close to the intersection of Devonshire and Balboa Blvds.
8:00pm -8:30pm Joel Fox
Joel Fox operates Joel Fox Consulting, a public affairs/political consulting firm. He also currently serves as President of the Small Business Action Committee, founded in 2003 to battle for small business on important political issues. Prior to starting his own firm in January 1999, Fox worked for the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association for 19 years, serving as the association's President from 1986 to 1998. Joel is also a member of the Valley VOTE Board.
Mr. Fox is a co-publisher and editor and chief of the website, Fox and Hounds Daily (www.foxandhounddaily.com), which offers commentary and news on California business and politics. He has authored hundreds of opinion articles which have been published in the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Los Angeles Times and many other leading newspapers across the country. Joel's book "The Legend of Proposition 13" was published in May 2003 and his first novel "Lincoln's Hand," a mystery, was published in 2010.
In 2004, he was proponent of the workers' compensation reform initiative embraced by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, which played a major role in leading to legislative compromise on workers' comp reform. Joel served as a commissioner on the California Performance Review Commission (2004) appointed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger; and the Assembly Speaker's Commission on the California Initiative Process (2000-2001) appointed by Speaker Bob Hertzberg. Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa appointed Fox a commissioner on the California Assembly Speaker's Commission on State and Local Finance (1999-2000). He has also served on numerous commissions appointed by former Governor Pete Wilson and Supervisor Mike Antonovich asked him to join the L.A. County Blue Ribbon Budget Task Force in 1996.
Joel served as a Senior Research Associate at the Rose Institute of State and Local Government at Claremont McKenna College; was on the Advisory Council of the Public Policy Institute of California; and is a member of the Board of Advisors at the Initiative and Referendum Institute at the University of Southern California. He is an adjunct professor at the Graduate School of Public Policy, Pepperdine University.
Fox was a Senior Policy Consultant for the Schwarzenegger for Governor campaign during the historic Recall election of 2003; Policy Director for Richard Riordan for Governor in 2001-2; and a state cochairman for John McCain for President in 2000.
We are very pleased to have Joel take time out of his very hectic schedule to bring us up to date on what is happening in Sacramento and provide us his insight on the key issues in the upcoming November election.
Questions from the audience, as time permits, will follow each speaker's remarks.
The public and press are invited to the meeting.
The next regular monthly meeting of Valley VOTE will be on Monday, November 15 , 2010 at Galpin Ford.
Valley VOTE Mission Statement Valley VOTE, a diverse coalition of San Fernando Valley residents, businesspeople, educators, community activists, and organizations, is committed to exploring and fostering the implementation of programs that empower the people of the San Fernando Valley and the City of Los Angeles, to improve local governance, education and public participation on policy matters.
Please forward this Email to interested individuals and organizations. If you would like to be removed from our distribution list please send an Email to javittisr@cs.com