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THURSDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2014
Volume 13 Issue 290
Santa Monica Daily Press
AIRPORT DEBATE SEE PAGE 4
We have you covered
Revised water cuts coming
THE WATER WISE ISSUE
Collaborative care at UCLA Breast Center
BY DAVID MARK SIMPSON Daily Press Staff Writer
CITY HALL One of these days, City Hall is going to implement some strict water cuts. In August, City Council approved a plan to cap water usage in Santa Monica. It was scheduled to go into effect right about now. Those restrictions turned out to be difficult to implement, according to city officials. On Tuesday, city officials will come back to council with restrictions that will be easier to track and tougher on businesses. They plan to implement penalties by March of 2015. California is in the midst of one of the worst droughts in its history. Back in July, statewide water restrictions went into effect. Under Santa Monica’s new plan, all residents will be given a bi-monthly threshold. If they go over that threshold, they’ll be measured against their 2013 waster usage baseline. If they go over the threshold and fail to reduce usage by 20 percent against their 2013 baseline, they’ll be charged a drought fee. In a Stage 2 water shortage (that’s where we’re at right now) all single-family customers will get a threshold of at least 22 hundred-cubic-feet (HCF) of water every two months. One HCF equals 748 gallons. If a family used 44 HCF of water in April and May of 2013, they’ll have to use 35 HCF or less in 2015 to avoid penalties. If they use 22 HCF
Courtesy Photo
TEAM EFFORT: Breast cancer patient Nicole von Riesen meets with Dr. Amy Kusske. Kusske, co-director, UCLA Breast Center, Santa Monica, is the surgeon who performed von Riesen’s mastectomy.
BY KELSEY FOWLER Daily Press Staff Writer
MID CITY Nicole von Riesen, 43, didn’t want to wait a month for her MRI. She didn’t even really want to wait another hour. At the end of May, von Riesen went in for a regular mammogram. Then another. Then a biopsy. After that, the doctors scheduled a MRI - for June, maybe July. “My heart sank,” she said.
Von Riesen decided to reach out to the UCLA Breast Center Santa Monica. They got her in the next week, she said. “Everyone pulled together and that was basically a lifesaver,” she said. Von Riesen had been diagnosed with breast cancer, and would spend the next few months working with a team of doctors to undergo surgery, breast reconstruction and chemotherapy. SEE CANCER PAGE 12
Student attendance improving districtwide BY DAVID MARK SIMPSON Daily Press Staff Writer
SMMUSD HDQRTRS Attendance improved drastically in the Matthew Hall matt@smdp.com DROUGHT TOLERANT: The City wants residents and businesses to decrease water use. Examples of drought friendly plants can be found at the demonstration garden at 3200 Airport Ave.
SEE WATER PAGE 11
district last year but Ed Board members still want to see more kids in class. One in five kids missed less than two days of school last year, according to Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District officials. In the year prior, 2012-13, that number was closer to one in 10. And while 5.6 percent of the students in the district were absent for 10 percent of the last school year,
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% OFF ANYTHING,
that number was also cut in half from the year before. District officials say that the implementation of a new attendance tracking system, Attention2Attendance, is a large part of that success. Parents get letters home after their students have three, six, and nine unexcused absences or after seven and 14 excused absences. At the secondary level, parents get a phone call when their kid misses a single class period. SEE SCHOOL PAGE 12
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