The Weekly Newspaper of El Segundo
Herald Publications - El Segundo, Hawthorne, Lawndale & Inglewood Community Newspapers Since 1911 - (310) 322-1830 - Vol. 111, No. 9 - March 3, 2022
Inside
This Issue
Certified & Licensed
Professionals.....................14
City Council..........................2
Classifieds............................4
Crossword/Sudoku.............4
Entertainment......................5
Legals............................11-13
Pets......................................14
Police Reports.....................5
Real Estate.....................7-10
Sports.................................3,6
Weekend
Forecast
El Segundo Girls Are Champions
Trevor Elder Brings His Passion
for Skateboarding to El Segundo
By Kiersten Vannest
“High fives and good vibes” is the motto
you may hear around the El Segundo skate
park. Every summer and often after school, a
group meets to skate, socialize, and learn. This
group is called Champ Camp! It was started
by South Bay local Trevor Elder and his love
for skateboarding.
As a child, Elder couldn’t get enough of
skateboarding. “[I skated] all through high
school and college, and I was a sponsored
skater when I was in eighth grade,” he says,
noting that after he began skating around fifth
grade, it became his passion. Going on to work
in a local skate shop in Hermosa Beach, Elder
was constantly determined to learn a new
trick or try a new ramp. “What drew me to
[skating] was the freedom and the creativity
Orly Israel: El Segundo’s
it offers… If you were to ask me when I
started skateboarding in fifth grade, I would
Listener and Connector
have said, ‘because I want to do tricks,’” he
laughs. Wanting to do tricks led him down a
By Duane Plank
path of a skateboarding lifestyle, where he
Most of us tend to talk, some of us
met new people, made lifelong friends, and
incessantly, about ourselves. But we
challenged himself.
typically spend much less time emphatically
Later on, Elder got a job working with the
listening and comprehending what
city of Torrance and coaching kids through
skateboarding. Through this experience, he
realized he had a passion for teaching. “I
wanted to pursue this kind of longer-term,
and also by chance, the skate park that we ran
the program out of sort of fell apart and was
eventually removed,” he says. After the skate
park was removed in 2010, Elder set out to
keep the activity camps going.
It started with a few summer beach camps,
learning activities in the water, and doing exercises
the other person might be sharing, right?
El Segundo’s Orly Israel, who was
raised in Pacific Palisades, attended Pali
High School, and matriculated to Syracuse
University to study Communications, is
flipping the script on that. The 27-year-old
Israel has embarked upon a program to
listen and explore the thoughts of others,
withholding judgment and allowing those so
inclined to freely riff their thoughts to him.
Israel has set-up up his “listening
table” in available spaces in swaths of
El Segundo, in other South Bay cities, and
the Westside. His table is draped with a
banner that trumpets: “Here to listen. No
judgment, no advice, no charge.”
Now I have never been to a psychiatrist
myself (some may say I should immediately
sign-up for sessions). Still, I am
guessing that the professional psychiatrists
out there may charge a pretty penny for
allowing one to spill their innermost
thoughts to them? No charge is incurred
from the time spent with Israel, though.
In our phone interview, Israel mentions
classes that he has taken that have sharpened
his listening skills, citing courses
from communication instructors whose
like dodgeball with other kids on the
sand. These got so popular that in 2012, Elder
founded his current company Champ Camp!
with his wife and kicked off a program that
has flourished and grown exponentially over
the years.
For the next few years, Elder took his time
learning the best ways to run these camps and
figuring out best practices and processes. With
the closure of the skate park in Torrance, Elder
sought to bring skating back into his camps.
Remembering where he used to skate as a kid,
he reached out cold to the city of El Segundo.
Quickly and without question, the parks and
recreation department and the city officials
granted him permission to use the skate park
See Trevor Elder, page 12 Trevor Elder, founder of and skateboarding coach for Champ Camp!
See Orly Israel, page 9
The El Segundo Eagles, the CIF Southern Section Division 3 champions, pose after their 2-0 win over top-seeded West Torrance. For story see Sports on page 3.
Friday
AM
Showers
61˚/50˚
Saturday
Partly Cloudy/
Wind
58˚/46˚
Sunday
Sunny
60˚/46˚