Los Altos Rotary Club Home of the Annual Rotary Fine Art Show April 21, 2011

Pres. DENNIS YOUNG called the meeting to order promptly at 12:15 PM. Arriving Rotarians had been created by KENDRA GJERSETH, MARLIS MCALLISTER, BILL BALSON, and JUDY OTT.
 
MARGE SENTOUS provided the thought for the day; a quote from John Kennedy about gratitude. “You must always remember that the highest form of thanks is not to utter the words but to live by them.”
 
BONNIE BURDETT and KURT HUEG led us in the song for the day, “California, here I come.”
 
VP MONA ARMISTEAD stepped up to introduce visiting Rotarians, but we did not have any this week. Many Rotarians introduced guests. STUART BOWEN introduced his mother.  PAUL NYBERG introduced Sharon Infante.  ALLEN VARNI introduced Rae Udall who operates the school in Haiti that we are supporting with our red badge project.  JEAN MORDO introduced his wife, Barbara.  ABBY AHRENS introduced her daughter, and a friend (also Abbie) a local contractor. STEVE BIANCHI introduced his wife, Debbie, GARY MAGGART introduced his wife, Sandy, and DAVE SMITH introduced a guest of the club.
 
MONA announced that our speaker next week will be Dr. Natala from NASA, speaking about the Kepler discoveries.  (See below for more information.)
 

ANNOUNCEMENTS
 
Pres. DENNIS passed out the flyer for the district celebration that will be taking place May 6,7, and 8 in San Jose at the Marriott. There will be a special breakfast for new members to Rotary. There will also be the Rotary talent show on Saturday night. PEN, JOHN SYLVESTER and his band will be one of the 13 acts at the talent show.
 
DAN O'DONNELL announced that he was passing around the clipboard to sign up for delivery of dinner to the Rotacare Clinic in Mountain View.
 
JEAN MORDO announced that there were two nominees for the openings on the Board of Directors at LAREF. The two nominees are JERRY MOISON and JEANNE MACVICAR. MEL KAHN wanted to ask a question, but he was drowned out by the enthusiastic support for the nominees.

JEAN also announced that the Club was sponsoring a raffle to raise funds for the project in Haiti. Fantastic prizes had been generously donated by All Horizons Travel (ROY JONES), and the tickets are available for five dollars each. JEAN asked each member to take a book of tickets to sell to friends and business associates. The drawing will be held at the Fine Art show in May.
 
MARY PROCHNOW announced that on Monday evening April 25 at 7 p.m. there will be a fundraising dinner at Chili's in Palo Alto, with the proceeds supporting the Los Altos Community Foundation.
 
BAIDRA MURPHY sent out thanks for all the support that the club provided for the picnic for the visiting group from Russia. In particular, she pointed out the outstanding work by the Red Badgers.
 
MATT CABOT outlined all the work that is done to put together the Rotator each week with writers, photographers, and editors. MATT pointed out that we need more people to volunteer to be writers for the Rotator. Please contact Matt if you want an opportunity to serve LARC in a very special way.
 
SAM PESNER announced that we need one more Chairperson for the fine arts show, to supervise the collection of trash during the show.
 
STEVE POMEROY announced he had completed the assignment of jobs for the Fine Art Show, and everyone should double check their assignment.  But we still have a few jobs open. STEVE asked all members to consult the schedule for the few remaining open slots, and contact him if they can help out to fill one of those slots.
 
STEVE SHEPHERD announced that our annual club golf tournament will take place on June 3. Steve announced that the sign-ups will be handled exclusively by circulating the clipboard, because STEVE doesn't really understand what a computer is. STEVE also mentioned that he's going to need a lot of help because almost no one has signed up for his committee, except .... (insert names of 75% of the members of the club).
 
KAREN FOX had three announcements. First, she thanked everyone for the work done during the week that we were hosting the group from Russia.

KAREN also announced that on June 12, the Community Services Agency will have a garden party from 4-7 PM.

Finally KAREN announced that there are postcards available to send out to friends and associates to alert them to the date and time of the Fine Art Show. President DENNIS reminded us that the postcards are critical this year, but because due to the street repair work that will be underway in May, there will be no Pet Parade this year to provide a lead-in for the first day of the Art Show.
 
PAUL SCHUTZ thanked everyone who volunteered to be a greeter for the meetings, and he let us know that a another clipboard was circulating for people to sign up to be greeters for the upcoming months.
 
Pres. DENNIS made an announcement on behalf of our social director, JOHN SYLVESTER. On April 29, the social event is scheduled at Borel Bank. Dennis let us know that Borel is hosting this particular event, so the attendees do not need to bring anything for this event.
 
 

TEN-MINUTE TALK
 
Red badger CRYSTA KRAMES provided a 10-minute talk about her background and activities. Crysta grew up in Texas, in a family that was steeped in Republican politics. She discovered she was a small-town girl with progressive views. Eventually, she would move to Mountain View, and then to Los Altos. When her children were starting school, she moved to University Avenue in Los Altos, and became active in the Covington, and Bullis schools.

She then became involved with the Los Altos Community Foundation as well as Green Los Altos. During her work with all of the school and community foundations, she was constantly running into people who were in our Rotary Club. This convinced her that our club was a good place to meet like-minded people.

In the past, Crysta taught English in Taiwan and was a case manager for wards of the state in Chicago. After she married, she moved to California and Mountain View. She is excited to be part of our Rotary Club because it's a place where many people with differing political views can work together to do good for the community.

From an email from KAREN FOX, thanking all those responsible for making the Russian delegation visit a success:

From Karen Fox, 4/21/11
 
For the ROTATOR:
 
The six Russians came to Los Altos under an Open World/Rotary International leadership program spent April 8-16 learning about how American colleges and universities create and maintain relationships with their alumni.  The group also viewed the Computer History Museum, the Los Altos History Museum and History House, Mission Santa Clara, and attended a Mingus Big Band jazz concert at Stanford.  One of their biggest impressions, noted many times, was the way in which people in our community “give back” by being actively engaged in helping others and the community at large.  Several said they hoped they could take this spirit back to Yekaterinburg.  They departed before dawn on Saturday, April 16, and we wish this outstanding group of young Russians much success in applying their new knowledge and insights.
 
Bolshoe Spacibo (a big Thank You) to all those who made our Club’s “Russia Week” so successful:
 
·        The Red Badge Club who threw a great Welcome BBQ on Sunday, April 9, and to Val Carpenter, Tracie Murray, and Baidra Murphy who contributed time, food, and talents, and to all Los Altos Rotarians who came to enjoy the event
·        Chuck Lindner, who organized homestays
·        Julie Rose, who provided information for pre-arrival grant documents
·        Bill Balson, Sam Harding, and Frank Verlot, who hosted delegates
·        Roy Lave, who explained community foundations and how the Los Altos Community Foundation operates
·        Kurt Hueg who arranged the great program at Foothill College the first day
·        Paul Nyberg, who invited the delegates to the Town Crier office
·        John Hammerschmidt and Judy Ott, who hosted dinner parties on Tuesday night
·        Bob Adams, who took two delegates out to the ballgame and taught a third delegate the basics of golf
·        Frank Verlot, who was the Problem-Solver-in-Chief all week, and who patiently helped our visitors to find clothing, toy soldiers, toys, wine, and other items at local stores
·        Dan Holden, who prepared a presentation to explain how American high school students apply to college
·        John McAlister, who gave Baskin Robbins gift certificate for sundaes for the delegates
·        Barbara Small, who prepared last week’s thought for the day—in Russian
·        Jeanne MacVicar, who went along with the “What Do You Know…about Los Altos?” fining game last week
·        Larry Chu, who organized an outstanding farewell banquet last Friday night
·        Roy and Maureen Jones who came to the farewell banquet along with all the host families and delegates
·        President Dennis who cheerfully attended all the hospitality events, despite the run-up to Tax Day
·        Lonnie Gary, who handled the financial reporting for the grant
 

FINES FOR THE DAY
 
This week's fine master SAM HARDING, stepped up and immediately congratulated the club, because half the membership has already joined the President’s Club. SAM announced that it was his goal to get the rest of us into the club today.
 

• SAM called on MARLIS MCALLISTER, who announced that her son had been nominated as the outstanding sophomore at Redlands University for community service, and she joined the President’s Club.
• CRES MCFALL announced that all six of his brothers had gathered at their family reunion in Texas and CRES paid $30.
• TED SORENSEN announced that his son had found one of those rare jobs at law firm in Portland, so Ted paid $30.
• KEN SCHWEIFLER announced that he was just happy that his three children were enjoying Easter and that was a good enough reason to join the President’s Club.
• SAM called on ROY JONES, who thanked JEAN MORDO for all of the nice publicity and ROY paid $35 to join the President’s Club.
• SAM'S next victim was JOHN BOGART, who announced his 71st birthday and paid $80 to immediately join the Presidents Club.
• SAM called on JUDY OTT and asked if she could provide an “uplifting story” for the Easter season. Judy's story was one word; “Bras.” SAM then got himself in trouble by asking JUDY what her number was. Let's move on to the point that Judy paid a $40 fine.
• JOE LOCONTE announced his 46th birthday and paid $20.
• SAM'S next victim was ESTHER NG, who was happy to pay $60 to join the President’s Club, so that she could announce that on May 18 her office is sponsoring a workshop for maximizing brain health, and everyone is invited to attend this free workshop.
• SAM even went after new member RAE HOLT, who announced that he had been living in Los Altos only a year, but he was taken in by all of the lovely trees throughout town. RAE paid $40 to join the President’s Club.
• BARBARA SMALL announced that her son, only 13, had just begun flying lessons and paid $20.
• DAVE BERONIO announced that his son had just taken DAVE's four-year-old grandson flying and the grandson was extremely excited and would probably start his own flying lessons soon. DAVE paid $20.

 
THIS WEEK’S SPEAKER
 
JEANNE MACVICAR introduced this week’s speaker, Carol Rodoni from Bamboo Consulting, who had just a very few things to say. Ms. Rodoni is a very experienced real estate professional, having worked at Fox and Carskaden and Alain Pinel. She puts out a monthly newsletter about the state of the Bay Area real estate market.
 
Ms. Rodoni pointed out that the current state of the real estate market is always dependent on the state of the economy, and not just the local economy but also the national and international economy. Luckily for us, the South Bay Area is an oasis in the desert of hard times for real estate.
 
Ms. Rodoni mentioned that the national economy is technically out of a recession, but the recovery is slow. Big businesses are doing okay, but small and medium-size businesses, which generate 65% of the jobs, have been struggling and not hiring new people.

Since the beginning of the recession, consumers have become more value conscious and conservatives in spending. The stock market is doing better, having recovered 60% of its losses. Much of the recovery is due to the large companies that do business internationally. She pointed out that the Federal Reserve under Mr. Bernanke, had initiated a number of government stimulus programs, including buying mortgages buying T-bills, cash for clunkers etc.

Ms. Ms. Rodoni was a bit worried that the Fed will begin pulling back, to watch out for inflation. She is certain that mortgage rates are going up and up quite a bit in the near future. She noted that the big issue in the national economy is what to do about the deficit, but feels that politicians will follow their natural inclination, and try to put it off to after 2012.
 
The state economy is struggling much more. The state faces a $26 billion deficit. Ms. Ms. Rodoni feels that Gov. Brown will manage to get something done but isn't sure how much, (after all he's 72 he's not going to run again, and he doesn't really care about offending people). Ms. Ms. Rodoni feels there are going to be lots of cuts around the state a lot of lots of pain coming at the state level. This can certainly have an impact on the state real estate market.
 
Ms. Rodoni pointed out that international economic issues also have a local impact. Japan has lost 30% of its power since the Tsunami. This is hampering the supply line to the technology companies in Silicon Valley. Japan has also been the second largest buyer of U.S .debt, and Japan can now no longer afford to spend at the same level. The European Union is struggling. It's consists of 16 countries, but they are very different. The two or three major countries, such as France and Germany are propping up the failing economies in the PIGS, (Portugal Ireland Greece Spain), and the people in Germany and France are starting to hold back.  Italy is running into trouble also, because it's the biggest investor (and he biggest loser) in Libya, as a result of the war.
 
Like just about everyone else, Ms. Rodoni confessed that she doesn't really understand the Middle East and American policy in general doesn't seem to understand it. These countries are moving into a huge crisis, because many of the countries are authoritarian dictatorships or monarchies, sitting on top of a large population that is mainly uneducated and poor. Most of these countries have growing numbers of young people, who are currently 30% unemployed. Ms. Rodoni says to keep an eye on Saudi Arabia and what evolves in that country.

She is fairly confident that oil will probably stay about where it is, $110 per barrel, and not jump up further. However, she pointed out that a jump up to $125 per barrel would have a staggering impact on the US economy.
 
Ms. Rodoni then turned to the specifics of the Bay Area real estate market. She noted that a large number of current sales are foreclosures and short sales. The good news is that 27% of current sales are all cash. Many buyers are moving into the lower end of the market, in the $160,000-$180,000 range, with all cash purchases. Prices are stabilizing, but mortgage interest rates are going up. We are seeing a great influx of international buyers into the Northern California market. Silicon Valley remains a an oasis, because of the creative energies in the large number of companies located here, such as Facebook, Google, Twitter, and Zynga. 

She believes we are also going through a major economic revolution due to the ubiquity of smart phones. It is portable and cheap. 85% of the world has mobile phones. New companies are growing up that are “matchmakers.” providing goods and services over the smart phone networks. The Internet, the pipeline for these matchmaking transactions, is free. For example, Apple makes huge profits selling iTunes over the Internet.  Walmart currently processes 800,000 credit card transactions a day, and pays fees on all of them. New companies are moving into this realm and developing “pay by smart phone,” and creating new business opportunities.

Zynga is a game company for smart phones, which gives away the games for free over the internet, and the subscribers pay for the parts in the game to play the game. Once again the pipeline for all of these new transactions, the Internet is free, inviting many companies to develop new business products. Ms. Rodoni pointed out that this translates into very strong real estate sales in our area. She sees many of these companies going public, with more millionaires, mega millionaires and billionaires coming out of the woodwork. She sees the prospects for real estate appreciation in this area to be very strong.
 
Ms. Rodoni undoubtedly had a great deal of additional information to give us, but since it had progressed to 1:32 PM, President DENNIS had to chime the meeting to an end.

THIS THURSDAY'S PROGRAM: Kepler's Discoveries

Dr. Natalie Batalha is currently Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy at San Jose State University. She has been affiliated with NASA Ames Research Center since 2000 where she conducts research on extra-solar planet detection.

She is the Principal Investigator of the Vulcan planet search project. The Vulcan team runs and operates a robotic telescope atop Mt. Hamilton at Lick Observatory. Its objective is to identify giant planets orbiting other sun-like stars. She also works as a support scientist for the Kepler mission. Kepler is a NASA Discovery mission whose objective is to identify and characterize earth-like planets orbiting sun-like stars.

Dr. Batalha received her Bachelor's degree in Physics from the University of California, Berkeley and her Ph.D. in Astrophysics from the University of California, Santa Cruz.