The Weekly Newspaper of El Segundo Herald Publications - El Segundo, Torrance, Manhattan Beach, Hawthorne, Lawndale, & Inglewood Community Newspapers Since 1911 - (310) 322-1830 - Vol. 104, No. 36 - September 3, 2015 Inside This Issue Certified & Licensed Professionals.....................14 Classifieds............................4 Crossword/Sudoku.............4 Film Review..........................4 Legals............................ 12,13 Pets......................................11 Police Reports.....................3 Real Estate.....................7-10 Sports....................................5 Weekend Forecast 120 Years of Water Treatment A bird’s-eye view of the Hyperion Plant in El Segundo. The plant has been in operation since 1894, although it has been extensively renovated many times, the first time in 1950. Photo by Peter Thornton, jp.thornton58@gmail.com. • Friday Partly Cloudy 76˚/65˚ Saturday Sunny 78˚/64˚ Sunday Sunny 80˚/65˚ Council Looks to Balance Budget While Fulfilling Department Requests By Brian Simon The El Segundo City Council moved one step closer to adopting a balanced budget for the 2015/16 fiscal year after Monday night’s strategic planning session—the second such meeting this summer. By using $841,000 in excess reserve balance monies and reducing the annual transfer into the Economic Uncertainty A Day in the Life of a Museum Educator By Nancy Peters Finding passion in a career is not necessarily an easy task. Some know, from an early age, being a member of a police or fire department or being a nurse or doctor or teacher is all they want to be. Many don’t know what they want to be when they grow up, even into adulthood. Chelsea Hogan took a few years to realize her life’s passion. Born in Syracuse, she grew up in Ithaca, a college town where her mother was a professor. Her father was an architect and art lover. Floundering after high school but resistant to more school, her mother urged attending Ithaca College. Her father counseled--at least one art history class should be mandatory for every college student. Chelsea found so much truth in her father’s advice. “I took that art history course and Bam! There I was delving into art, realizing how much I could learn from it. I had not been a lover of school, until then,” she related. “I followed my Bachelor’s degree in art history with a Master’s program at George Washington University (GWU) in D.C., which actually offers a Master’s in Museum Education. I was off and running. “I could combine my camp counselor jobs working with children and my love of art history into a career. It did take three years to jump into that next phase of schooling though. So, I worked in a local coffee shop. Former professors would come in, ask me what was next, but I would just pour See Museum Educator, page 3 account by $250,000, the Council was able to accommodate various (though not all) department head funding requests for the coming year. Though two additional moves would have freed up dollars to pay for all the remaining department requests, the Council declined options to eliminate an additional $200,000 transfer to the Equipment Replacement Fund (normally $1.5 million a year and will now be $1.7 million) and to keep reserves at 18 percent rather than move up to 19 percent. The group felt the City is already too far behind in replacing equipment and was committed to a previous decision to incrementally push reserves back up to the 20 percent level maintained in the past after those had dropped to just 17 percent a few years ago. Though he was fine to apply the excess reserve balance to the new budget, Mayor Pro Tem Carl Jacobson did not wish to reduce the Economic Uncertainty transfer (which will be $500,000 instead of $750,000) and thus did not side with the rest of his colleagues on the vote. Barring any changes between now and final budget adoption at the end of the month, the El Segundo Police Department will be able to add two new officers ($217,367) and promote a Sergeant ($38,100). Chief Mitch Tavera had also hoped to get approval for a third officer plus another $100,000 for document imaging/scanning to improve efficiency and so that a room currently used for paper storage can revert back to being a jail cell. The Council nearly okayed the $100,000 item, but then pulled it off the table when the initial projected budget showed a $206,000 deficit. The Council granted the Information Technology Division requests for a new staff person ($115,000) to oversee 2015/16 projects such as laserfiche expansion and website revamps. Another $50,000 will help modernize systems (e.g. phones, servers) that haven’t been updated in over five years. A full-scale IT strategic plan is due in November and will identify future projects. The Fire Department will be able to order one new fire engine and a rescue ambulance from monies already budgeted. However, lack of available funding put on hold Fire Chief Kevin Smith’s desire for another $531,800 to purchase a second engine and $267,000 for an additional ambulance. Under a prepayment arrangement, the City would save $25,000 per engine with an additional multi-unit discount of $10,000 if it purchases two at the same time. The current fire engines are two years past their 20-year recommended shelf lives and Smith reported $118,000 in repair costs for just one of them since 2009. Staff looked into the costs of leasing See City Council, page 14
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