Jeff Pelline's Sierra Foothills Report

The University of Southern California will announce Wednesday its largest donation ever, a $200-million gift from alumnus David Dornsife, the chairman of Herrick Corp., a Stockton-based steel fabricating company, the L.A. Times is reporting.

“The Dornsifes’ donation will go to USC’s College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, the university’s biggest academic unit, without restrictions on how it should be spent. It is expected to support faculty hiring, research and fellowships and be especially useful for the humanities and social sciences, which receive less funding than the sciences from federal and private sources.

“As a single donation, it beats USC’s previous record of $175 million from ‘Star Wars’ creator George Lucas, given in 2006 to build a new home for the university’s film school, which he attended.”

The rest of the article is here.

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The memorial for naturalist John Olmsted, who died on Tuesday, is Sunday, March 13 at 2 p.m. at St. Joseph’s Center in Grass Valley.

“John loved St. Joes,” said resident Mark Johnson.

Here are some memories of John that were posted on this blog:

John was my friend. A good friend, who always accepted me for who I am, even when I wasn’t my best. Likely because he himself knew he was so challenging, in that he asked so much of those around him, he also was unerringly forgiving of the humanity in each one of us. He asked a lot, but he gave everything. — Shawn Garvey

An amazing man and such a legacy he provided for the world. God bless John on his next big journey. —Steve Enos

Gone, gone, gone beyond, gone utterly beyond, Enlightenment hail! — John Vodonick

RIP, John. We are richer for your having been here. — Gail Allinson

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“The California Preservation Foundation has been working with the Nevada City community to save the school and courthouse from the chopping block,” according to this article.

“The foundation has written letters to the committee, attended school board meetings, and even presented feasibility information to the Administrative Office of the Courts last December.

“‘We really want to bring attention to the cultural assets of the area,’ says Jennifer Gates, field services director at the foundation, which held its annual conference in Nevada City in May 2010. ‘Usually we hold the conference in San Diego or Hollywood or some big city. But we chose instead to go further afield and bring our membership there to bring awareness to what happens in smaller communities like this.’

“The San Francisco-based nonprofit is partly funded by the National Trust’s Partners in the Field program.”

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The Stonehouse Hospitality Academy in Nevada County could be revived by a local nonprofit, a county director Alison Lehman said Tuesday.

The nonprofit is expected to vote on the plan later this week, Alison said during Tuesday’s supervisor’s meeting.

The Academy, which provides job training for the hospitality industry, is faced with permanent closure as a result of the Private Industry Council shutting down, as previously reported.

The Private Industry Council could be forced to file for Chapter 7 bankruptcy, Stewart Knox, an official with NoRTEC, the Northern California Employment Network, said at Tuesday’s supervisor’s meeting.

PIC’s financial problems began in the fall, though it had been cutting costs, Knox added. The challenges to groups such as PIC and NoRTEC have been exacerbated by the pending loss of federal funding from HR 1, he said.

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No sooner does tea party advocate Barry Pruett exit the blogosphere, than the tea party shows up in force to grandstand about the ongoing County vs. AtPac lawsuit at Tuesday’s county board meeting.

This has been a favorite topic of Barry’s when he was a blogger, painting the county and clerk-recorder who beat him in a negative light. Trouble is, the case hasn’t been concluded yet, so it’s premature to cast stones — expect for political hay.

I watched on my computer as the tea party showed up at the meeting in their trademark red shirts to protest the legal defense for the suit. Stan Meckler read a statement.

Then the board unanimously agreed to increase the contract budget to defend the suit by $100,000 for a maximum amount of $350,000, as expected. (The money already had been budgeted).

There was tension on both sides.

You can expect to see more political grandstanding by the tea party — and the resulting tension — as I’ve written before.

It’s their MO, and the GOP moderates here let them run amuck without standing up to them. Now you live with the consequences.

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Naturalist John Olmsted has died after a long battle with cancer. He was 73.

“Greetings All, Windsong has one less breath here this sunny Tuesday morning,” wrote Linda Lamb under “John’s Ascension.” “Our Gentle Giant ascended peacefully at 6:30 a.m. Feeling very honored to be here sharing LoveLight and support with John.”

John had signed up with Hospice again on Monday, according to a website in his honor. “He is much more comfortable thanks to Hospice,” Linda had written on Monday. “Sitting with John today, jumper cabling Universal Life Source energy with him, a vision of John in a field of Spring flowers with children laughing and playing appeared. John Muir showed up with a smile and a twinkle in his eyes saying, “meet ya at the top of the hill”. Off they all merrily went.”

In 2009 Nevada County Land Trust awarded John Olmsted the William Nickerl Award for Conservation Leadership. John has been a longtime friend and supporter of the Land Trust and many, many other conservation organizations.

To watch a trailer from MY FATHER, WHO ART IN NATURE by his son Alden click here. “This is my dad. He’s a rambler,” it begins.

I had written previously about John here and here.

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“An audit released Monday criticizes California redevelopment agencies for lacking performance measures that track how well they are fighting blight and creating jobs,” according to BusinessWeek.

“The review by the state controller’s office also showed great differences in how cities define blight. Palm Desert, for example, used redevelopment money to renovate greens and bunkers at a 4 1/2-star golf resort. Near San Diego, Coronado’s redevelopment area covers every privately owned parcel in the city, including multimillion dollar beachfront homes.

“As part of his plan to close California’s budget deficit, Gov. Jerry Brown wants to eliminate the state’s more than 400 redevelopment agencies to send more local tax money to schools, police, fire and other local services. Local governments are defending the agencies and say Brown’s plan is illegal.”

The rest of the article is here.

I’ve written previously about this issue here.

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The Union editor/publisher is starting to sound a lot like me! LOL.

Back on Feb. 11, I observed “Jerry Brown flies for peanuts on Southwest.” I wrote: ” It sends a message — but also gets you close to your constituents.”

Now, lo and behold, the editor/publisher of The Union writes that he admires Jerry Brown’s frugal touch, such as booking a flight on Southwest.

“His message? Sacrifices will be painful and necessary and he’s not saying one thing and doing another,” Jeff Ackerman writes in a political flip flop that won John Kerry fame. (“You have more waffles than a house of pancakes.”)

That’s a switch from the past, when he was excoriated — justly so — for denouncing Brown’s support for removing lead from toys. “I bring this up just in case you wonder why we used to refer to Jerry Brown as ‘Moonbeam.’ It seems he still has that ‘glow’ about him,’ the column said.

A reader responded: “Lead exposure is no laughing matter.”

What’s going on here? Perhaps a realization that his readership is “purple” politically, not red. The county has changed a lot from his cub reporter days.

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The latest local voter statistics for our county show 24,067 registered Republicans vs. 20,249 registered Democrats — a difference of just 3,818 voters.

There also and 12,090 decline to state voters — the ones who swing the elections.

But here’s another interesting point: There are 1,948 registered with the American Independent party, 1,102 registered with the Green party, 495 registered with the Libertarian party, 128 registered with the Peace and Freedom party and 161 other. All told, that adds up to 3,834 — more than the difference between registered GOP and Democrats.

All told, the figures confirm what I’ve said all along: We are a “purple” county politically. Our demographics also are aging and declining.

Our county posted the second-largest turnout statewide behind Sierra County. We can expect big turnouts in this year’s and next year’s elections — for local supervisors in 2011, for example — as well as for 2012. Stay tuned for some tight, expensive (and mud slinging) elections.

The voter statistics are here: voterstats

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