Beginning this week in The Courier, Andrea Dorey will begin writing a monthly column about issues affecting older adults.

Dorey, 65, brings to the task more than 20 years of experience as a medical writer for such companies as Syntex Research and Matrix Pharmaceutical Inc.

She has a degree in creative writing with an emphasis in technical writing from San José State University and two lifetime teaching credentials. She is a licensed vocational nurse.

She has taught a number of adult education classes in nonfiction and fiction writing as well as writing television and film scripts.

She honed her special interest in senior issues through her involvement with AARP, serving for two years as a chapter president. Her column will appear in the first issue of every month.


Circle the Date

The Cupertino Courier presents "A Time to Talk: A Cupertino Forum" on Saturday, Aug. 9, from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at St. Jude's Church, at the corner of Stelling and McClellan roads.

Shawn Spano, who has worked with the Cupertino community since he and the Public Dialogue Consortium initiated a process for discussing community issues in 1996, will facilitate the forum. Members of the community are invited to participate in a candid discussion about changing demographics in Cupertino.

According to Spano: "Through our earlier work in Cupertino, a process has been developed to create a comfortable environment for people to express themselves. Our goal in this forum is to take the dialogue to the next level."


Correction

In the Courier's June 23 issue we misstated the number of faculty and staff laid off by the De Anza-Foothill Community College District. In fact, the district wide total of individuals leaving the district because of layoffs is 26.

James made good choice with conflict resolution

Thank you for your editorial in the June 11th issue of the Courier. It surely is time for "heartfelt talk."

I believe we are often so careful in choosing words that we no longer know what we mean. How can another person know? If we are afraid to ask, we had better get over it or communication may dwindle and die.

I believe it's best to have a little "fire in the belly," in spite of discomfort at a City Council meeting.

I'm an old-timer and I welcome change. To quote my refrigerator magnet motto, "If nothing ever changed there would be no butterflies." No butterflies? I wouldn't like that!

Vice Mayor James has made a good choice in conflict resolution. Instead of apologizing for something she did not do, (a misinterpretation of her comments by others), she brought key people together and a reconfiguration of the donor recognition pattern is emerging. Nothing is lost.

In fact, it seems clear to me that the aquarium at the Library will be exciting, satisfying and appropriately beautiful. I envision our children saying, "Let's go look at the fish!" After all, the children have the biggest stake in the library game, don't they? Why not have them participate in the fundraising?

Perhaps follow-up interviews with the city leaders would serve to get past the "heats up again" feeling and set the record straight.

—Mavis Smith, Cupertino Block Leader


City messed up when it voted no funds for Fourth

I see the Cupertino Council voted to cancel the fireworks show this Fourth of July, in favor of using the $50,000 to keep the library open for a few extra hours on Sundays. What a travesty!

There are sufficient funds for events like Moon Day, Mother's Day at Memorial Park, the Unity Parade, Sun Day, and the Cherry Blossom Festival. There are sufficient funds to widen Stevens Canyon Road a few feet for a million plus, to build a bicycle/pedestrian crossing over I-280 for $6 million-plus and to install unnecessary and useless yield signs at three T-intersections near Regnart School.

However, the $50,000 earmarked for fireworks has been diverted to extended library hours. Did late cancellation cost the city any money?

I read a few weeks ago in the Courier the $50,000 was about one-fourth of the cost for a full year of Sundays at the library. So, what is the source of the rest of the money? City Council Members' personal donations? Not in this lifetime, most assuredly!

I am told the primary purpose of the Cupertino library is to provide free baby sitting services for the children of the entire city--free, year-round, with no parental participation. I'll bet that's really the agenda behind diversion of the fireworks money.

A similar shortage of funds arose during the mid-ninetys, but the volunteers raised the necessary funds to continue the traditional fireworks. Now, however, the City Council made the diversion too late for anyone to be able to plan the event.

It appears the City has funds for many projects and events which fit the mold for political correctness for the constituents, but it has no funds for the quintessential display to celebrate the founding of this great country and the liberties treasured so dearly by the long-time citizens, as well as the new arrivals.

The City Council, collectively as a group and individually as representatives of the people of Cupertino, ought to hang their heads in deep shame over this one. They really messed it up!

—Gordon Frolich, Cupertino