A real estate investment firm has acquired the 292-unit Lofts at NoHo Commons from J.H. Snyder Co. for about $92 million. Snyder officials said they had not put the residential portion of the project, which opened its doors late last year, on the market for sale, but were persuaded to divest it when the buyer, Redwood Partners Inc., presented itself. “Redwood made an attractive proposal and we decided to take it because it allowed us to proceed immediately with phase three,” said Cliff Goldstein, senior partner at the L.A.-based development company. Goldstein declined to confirm the purchase price. But brokers familiar with the transaction said the purchase price reflected the timing of the sale as well as the upside potential of the apartment units at the property. “Their lease rate per foot is the highest for any new construction in the Valley,” said Gregory S. Harris, president of The Harris Group of Marcus & Millichap. “They’re at least 10 percent to 15 percent higher.” Although some of the area’s streets are still deserted, many investment property brokers believe that North Hollywood real estate values will continue to escalate as the area continues to gentrify. The buyer, Newport Beach-based Redwood, is a firm that includes the former head of acquisitions for BlackRock Realty, a real estate investment company that has been particularly active in the Los Angeles area, recently acquiring Sunset + Vine, a mixed-use project in Hollywood. Officials at Redwood did not return phone calls seeking comment for this story. The opening of The Lofts at NoHo Commons last November marked the completion of the first phase of the mixed-use project. In recent weeks, the project’s first retail tenant and its anchor, Hows Market, opened its doors. The balance of the tenants that will occupy the 60,000 square feet of commercial space in the second phase are set to open in the next two months. They include: Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, California Pizza Kitchen’s CPK ASAP, Cold Stone Creamery, T-Mobile, Daphne’s Greek Caf & #233;, Wells Fargo Bank, Booster Juice and Panda Express. As currently designed, the third phase, located on a three-acre adjacent parcel, will include a seven-screen Laemmle Theatres complex, 100,000 square feet of office space and about 130 condominium units. Phil’s Diner, a North Hollywood restaurant in an old railroad car dating back to the 1950s, has been sold to a new owner and will be relocated and refurbished at the NoHo Commons as well. Goldstein noted that some of the plans for the third phase are still under discussion. Groundbreaking is currently slated for January. “What we’ve done is taken some of the profit from there and invested it in the next phase,” said Goldstein of the residential complex sale. Although the NoHo neighborhood has yet to live up to the promise of an upscale enclave for singles and families that will lead a new generation of Valleyites who opt for public transportation in lieu of the automobile, investment interest is going a long way to reinforcing those expectations. The Hows Market unit that just opened includes some cutting-edge features that the owners designed specifically for the clientele they expect to move into the neighborhood. Hows officials traveled throughout Northern California gathering ideas for the new store, said Mark Oerum, one of the four Hows partners who oversees store operations, and, among other features, came up with the idea of including a wine bar in the new store. The store is the only one in the Hows group that holds wine tastings, and the wine selection available at the North Hollywood unit is far more extensive than that of the other stores in the chain. “One of the things we’re always intrigued with is if we could educate people in wine,” Oerum said. “We saw it in Northern California, but not in supermarkets there. We thought, why can’t we blend it? Here’s an area that’s growing, with the NoHo arts element and it’s got a lot of street traffic.” The wine bar will also give the market the opportunity to launch other special events like guest vintners speaking about wine. “We’re envisioning sushi and sake night,” Oerum said. “It’s kind of a blank slate right now. We’re very happy and excited that we can do it.”

Business in the Valley isn’t just where or what we think it is. A horseback survey (that means I asked four friends) shows that most of us think of the Valley business community as a barbell-shaped entity: two large round weights at Universal City and Warner Center, connected by a bar known as Ventura Boulevard. If you’re in need of a lawyer, an accountant or a medical professional, there’s probably some truth to that view. But the richness of Our Valley is that a kaleidoscope of businesses survive and thrive across our North-of-Mulholland region and most of the people who work therein don’t take elevators up several floors to oak-paneled offices. Those of us who do work in offices know the truth of poet Robert Frost’s view: “The brain is a wonderful organ; it starts working the moment you get up in the morning and does not stop until you get into the office.” Much of the best “work” in the Valley doesn’t take place in offices as evidenced by Bobrick Washroom Equipment, one of the few remaining Valley-based companies founded more than a century ago. In 1906, George Augustus Bobrick, a manufacturer of waxes and ammonias, conceived the idea of the first liquid soap dispenser and obtained a patent for it in 1908. He later developed a soap dispenser for Pullman railway passenger cars and a soap dispensing giant was born. The company has since morphed into the world’s leading designer and manufacturer of washroom equipment and supplies. They celebrated their 60th anniversary in 1966 by moving into a new 32,000-square-foot headquarters building on Hart Street in North Hollywood, where the firm continues to be flush with success. In May, 2005, then-Mayor Hahn selected Bobrick’s North Hollywood headquarters as the location for signing Los Angeles’ business tax reform ordinance. And just when we feared the Valley would be taken over by an endless string of chain restaurants, hotels and coffee shops we discovered thriving businesses based on individuality and craftsmanship. Take Silver King. Designers of almost everything in silver you could imagine, Silver King was founded in 1977 by Miguel and Maria Davalos, a couple who immigrated from Mexico. Silver King is one of the many small shops located along Devonshire Street in Chatsworth, where the Old West still echoes. Three of their four children Marcia, Malila and Miguel Jr. have turned the silversmith shop into a family affair, with Miguel Jr. creating new artistic designs. Among their more fascinating creations is a belt buckle they made for Governor Schwarzenegger. Not to be outdone, Antonio Villaraigosa had the Davalos family create a buckle for him, which modestly proclaims in raised silver letters: “Los Angeles Mayor.” Other celebrities who have found their way to the unprepossessing north-end-of-the-Valley shop are Tom Selleck, Dwight Yoakam and Jennifer Tilly. Miguel Jr. will be demonstrating the age-old art of silversmithing at the upcoming free SummerFest 2007, which will be held at the historic Chatsworth Train Depot on June 9. And since we’re at the north end of Our Valley When you think of Ted Diggins, only one word comes to mind: “grizzled.” A wiry man who won’t see 60 again, Diggins is one of the Valley’s last farriers (that’s “horseshoer” to city slickers like me and probably you). Raised in West Virginia, Diggins grew up with horses. He started shoeing at 14 and has spent his whole life around equines except for the years he served in the military in Japan, Korea and Vietnam. Diggins has been living and shoeing in Chatsworth for 32 of the 45 years he’s been practicing his craft. He says he loves this area for its spirituality and its connection with the Native American cultures. He talks about standing on Devonshire Street, looking up at Pregnant Indian Mountain and thinking about those who lived in this region hundreds of years ago. Diggins reflects on his many years as a Man of the West: “I live every day as an adventure; the key things for success in my business are integrity, knowledge and a sense of caring for horses. Every horse I shoe, I shoe as if it’s my own,” he said. “I love having my own business,” Diggins said. “I’m the Employee of the Month every month.” “Diversity” has become one of the top ten politically correct words that pepper our 21st century nomenclature. Perhaps we should keep in mind that diversity is not just a word that refers to ethnic, racial and religious groups, but to where we live and work and what we do as well. Our Valley contains slightly more than 50,000 businesses with a workforce of 825,000 people. It includes people who make bathroom supplies, etch silver and shoe horses. Ain’t that grand? “There’s no labor a man can do that’s undignified, if he does it right.” Bill Cosby Martin Cooper is Chairman of Cooper Beavers, Inc., marketing and communications. He is the Immediate Past Chairman of VICA, Past President of the Public Relations Society of America-Los Angeles Chapter, and of the Encino Chamber of Commerce, and is Vice President of the Los Angeles Quality and Productivity Commission. He can be reached at mcooper@cooper beavers.com.

How is the commercial real estate market doing? It depends on whom you ask. Developers and property owners can look forward to strong demand, increasing property values, higher rental rates and a healthy dose of available funding. But those operating businesses are likely to face a corresponding shortage of choices and increasingly higher prices. That was the message delivered at the recent 2007 San Fernando Valley Economic Summit presented by California State University Northridge and the Economic Alliance of the San Fernando Valley. With most economists predicting a strong economy for the Valley, vacancy rates for all types of properties are expected to remain in the single-digit range across Southern California, but even more so for much of the Valley region. Current vacancy rates in the 2 percent range will allow the Valley’s neighborhood retail centers to increase rents about 4.8 percent by year end, according to a Marcus & Millichap forecast report delivered at the summit by Jonathan Weiss, one of the firm’s managing directors. “Retail demand continues to be one of the strongest in the country,” Weiss told the audience. But with a decided lack of new office or industrial construction, those sectors too should continue to experience very low vacancy rates and increased rents. Douglas Emmett’s Trillium property in Warner Center, which a year ago had very high vacancy rates due to the exit of several major tenants, is now 96 percent leased, said Gina Guarino, senior leasing agent for the company who spoke at a summit panel on office and industrial real estate. “That’s a 50 percent jump from last year,” Guarino said. “We’re expected to be over $3 a foot by December in Warner Center, so you’ll be seeing rents rise a lot.” A recent trend to convert industrial properties for residential use in Warner Center appears to be abating, but the damage in terms of reduced availability of already scarce industrial properties, may already be done, said the summit panelists. “We have a 2.8 percent vacancy in industrial space,” said John DeGrinis, senior vice president at brokerage company Colliers International. DeGrinis noted that Santa Clarita, once the alternative for Valley industrial companies that required more space, is now built out, as is the western end of the Valley extending to the Oxnard plain. “One of the things that concerns me is how are these companies going to grow going forward,” DeGrinis said. “We have a lack of alternate locations for the Valley.” But while business owners who want to expand may be in for tough times, the climate for property owners could not be better. Although new construction is expected to lead to a 3.7 percent increase in apartment vacancies in the Valley, a rising demand for apartments will continue to give property owners the flexibility to raise rents considerably, Weiss said. Asking apartment rents in the Valley region are expected to increase 6.8 percent this year to an average of $1,369 per month, according to the Marcus & Millichap forecast. Weiss noted that projections for employment growth will continue to feed apartment demand. But perhaps more important, he said, is the growing gap between the cost of home ownership and the cost to rent. “The average gap between owning a home and renting is about $3,000,” Weiss said. “That’s a significant gap.” Strong leasing activity also means that prices to acquire properties will remain at the very high levels experienced over the past few years. Cap rates, a figure used to evaluate the value of income producing properties, have remained in the 5 percent range for several years, an indicator of very high prices. And those who expected higher interest rates and other factors would bring those prices down are likely to be in for disappointment, Weiss said. “People thought it was a false cap rate,” Weiss said. “But it’s balanced out and (the mid- to high- 5 percent range) is where it will remain.” With no letup in the increasing value of properties in sight, lenders are actively pursuing real estate deals, according to the panelists at a session on debt and equity for real estate. Lenders on the panel noted that they are still actively seeking deals, although underwriting standards for some have tightened somewhat as a result of the problems in the subprime mortgage market. The current slowdown in the residential market is also affecting interest in lending for condominiums and condominium conversions, some of the panelists said. “The subprime meltdown has affected everyone with regard to who’s out there buying bonds,” said Derek Layne, first vice president for Countrywide commercial real estate and one of the session’s panelists.

Fire in the server room! Your multi-location business is headquartered in a 3-story building in the Valley. You’re the CEO and on Sunday morning you receive bad news. An electrical fire that began in your headquarters server room took its toll, destroying everything on that floor. You just lost all your critical digital business information (spreadsheets, accounting records, customer histories, documents and contracts) and you also lost your ability to process revenue-generating transactions because your eCommerce Web site and e-mail relied on the servers in the building. Oh, you lost most of your paper records, also. Sound far-fetched? It’s not. Your business could truly be at a standstill. Each of your employees, customers and vendors rely on digital connections to your headquarters in order to transact your business. The adage of “when the computers are down, everyone seems to have nothing to do” has been proven. Worse yet, your IT staff informed you that your business system’s backup tapes were kept in a safe down the hall from the server room, but the safe did not survive the fire. Now what? This is an example of a simple, local “disaster”; one that may not be recoverable. Its pales in comparison to the challenges faced during more comprehensive regional disasters like earthquake, storms, environmental damage and others which leave public resources and communications in total disarray. Then there are disasters such as when an ex-employee steals confidential or trade secret data, or someone you don’t even know hacks into your accounting system and causes great harm. Now, ask yourself: what kind of disasters can hit your company? If you’ve not addressed this in your business, you should before you become victim of an otherwise remediable disaster. It is your fiduciary duty, among other more practical reasons. If practicality were not enough, just recognize that regulations such as Sarbanes-Oxley and others now include business continuity in their scope. Get started Businesses should create, maintain and regularly test a Disaster Recovery Plan (or “DRP”, also referred to as a Business Continuity Plan) for mitigating the losses of operations, information and systems illustrated above. It is not a “one size fits all” process rather, each business must consider the kind of disaster(s) it believes it should prepare for and the actions required to recover from them. DRP’s should address information systems, human resources, sales, administration, manufacturing, procurement, operations and commerce-based logistics. The process is laborious and requires collaboration among owners and staff. Considerations should include, among others, an assessment of what assets digital and otherwise need protection, how operations will physically commence again, where operations will be commenced, on what systems and with what equipment and other hard assets. Also, the simple concept of how employees will communicate among themselves immediately after a disaster is often overlooked. Finally, keep the DRP current, updating it as your make changes to operations, systems and staffing and test its effectiveness frequently. Perhaps you think this may not apply to your small business. Not so. Smaller and mid-size businesses can tackle the DRP process less formally; however, like larger businesses, the process requires complete buy-in from the executive and ownership level. Mitigating the risk We can’t escape the need to do business digitally. DRP’s must emphasize IT in their scope, such that electronic data-oriented operations can resume without material impact on the profitability of the underlying business. Using the fire example above, let’s consider a few simple steps that could have comprised the IT portion of the missing DRP: – Maintain a backup procedure that requires off-site storage of backup media with both current and archival data. Data would have been available after the fire, if this was employed. – Have ready a mirrored Web site setup for those instances when headquarter-based Web servers are lost or out of service temporarily. E-commerce transactions could have continued after the fire, in such a case. – Configure an off-site server and data infrastructure capable of hosting and transacting most of your business information in the event of loss of the main server infrastructure. This concept is often termed a “hot” or “warm” site. Business data and transactions could have been live immediately after the fire, with little effort. – Establish an externally-managed call routing system that would forward critical calls to staff and phones not affected by the fire. DRP’s are critical in today’s business climate and businesses that invest time and effort in their creation, maintenance and testing will be well-rewarded in the event of disaster. Robert P. Green, CPA, CITP, is the managing director of INSYNC Consulting Group Inc., which is now in its third decade of providing objective IT advisory services and computer forensics services to its clients. He can be reached at 818.784.8600 ext. 650, or [email protected].

This is one in a series of articles exploring the issues of business retention and recruitment in the greater Valley area. As part of the series, the Business Journal is posing questions to L.A. City Council members for the Valley about how they are improving the business climate. Whatever you think about City Councilman for the Seventh District, Richard Alarc & #243;n, this much seems true: he sure is ambitious. A former schoolteacher and assistant to late L.A. Mayor Tom Bradley, Alarc & #243;n over the past decade has been on a dizzying number of city and state ballots, sometimes barely winning one seat before announcing his candidacy for the next. He was a city councilman representing the northeast Valley from 1993 to 1998; a state senator from 1998 to 2006; a candidate for Los Angeles mayor in 2005; a state assemblyman for a brief period in 2006; and finally back to a seat on the Los Angeles City Council this year. During all of those elections, critics have portrayed Alarc & #243;n as a career politician with blind ambition, anxious to move up the political ladder by running for any office available to him. But in an interview with the Business Journal a month after moving back into City Hall, Alarc & #243;n said that image is the result of years of tough elections and mudslinging. He says he’s committed to the Valley and has already worked to bring business to the area, authoring a motion that directs the Community Redevelopment Agency to ink a master plan for the area to stimulate growth. He says it’s the foundation he hopes to build upon this term. Q: What does the CRA motion hope to accomplish? A: To discern what corridors are our best opportunities for us; things that will transition our community from a disenfranchised community to something that will add to the quality of life. One of the goals is to upgrade the average wage. So we have a long-term view. There are some incredible opportunities. I estimate it’s a $1 million study. Q: You’re regarded as one of the city council members who is not as friendly to business interests A: Well, that’s a bogus assessment. That’s a ridiculous assessment. That’s based on some pretty rough political campaigns and it totally ignores that under my stewardship there was more economic development in the north San Fernando Valley than anywhere, with the exception of Woodland Hills. We revamped the General Motors plant. We brought in the first Wal-Mart to the city of Los Angeles. We rebuilt Panorama Town Center. We created an enterprise zone. Frankly, I think there are some racial factors. Yes, I am anti-war. Yes, I am pro-environment. But I’m also pro- strong economic development. And I think there’s a way to balance those issues. The facts are clear. It’s ridiculous that people try to still undercut those accomplishments. Q: Because that image is politically motivated? A: There’s no doubt about it. These are people who can’t see beyond my environmental credentials, can’t see beyond my civil rights credentials, can’t see beyond my support for diversity. They won’t look at the facts. Q: How do you keep manufacturing jobs in this part of the Valley? A: Well, it depends on what you’re talking about. If it’s low-end manufacturing jobs: go. Go wherever you want. It serves no useful purpose to have people making minimum wage. What that means in my district is rental properties that aren’t managed properly and blight. I don’t know many people that would want these jobs. We want high-paying jobs. Q: What are you currently doing to improve the business climate? A: I’m looking at low-interest loans for businesses. I’m looking at fa & #231;ade improvement programs. If it were just one business improving its fa & #231;ade, it wouldn’t have much impact. But if we can create a program where nine out of 10 businesses in the San Fernando Road corridor improve their facades, then we can build some real, positive consistency along the corridor. Secondly, we have to seize the opportunities that present themselves. Sometimes, it takes calling up a company and talking with them. And sometimes you have to cajole, sometime you have to fight, sometimes you have to embarrass. But sometimes you have to show them that it’s a better bottom line for them. Q: So how can the city council work together to shed this image that L.A. is unfriendly to business? A: Well, the fact of the matter is, the gross economic product produced by the city of Los Angeles is competitive with anywhere else in the nation. So while there are problems and believe me I have been frustrated with the planning process, the slow inspection process, and the lag in city services but the numbers demonstrate that the Los Angeles economy is strong. I think if you go into any community, you’ll hear things about the difficulty in development. The primary reason it’s difficult to develop in the city of Los Angeles is not because a bunch of politicians all get together and figure out ways to block business, it’s because we’re over-saturated. We have an overpopulated area and limited housing, which drives the value of the land way up. If you want to get good land prices, go to Lake Erie. But if you want to live in the sunniest state in the nation, if you want to live where workers are bountiful, then come to L.A. And that’s why people continue to come. That’s not to say that there are sectors of business that are disadvantaged by the way Los Angeles operates. Q: Like what? A: Well, corporate. We’ve lost a lot of corporate operations that would be nice to have. I would like to see more corporate operations in Los Angeles. But it doesn’t mean that all businesses are flocking out of Los Angeles. There’s a reason why California’s economy is No. 5 in the world and Los Angeles is a huge part of that. At this stage in my career, I don’t have to patronize anybody. I’m happy to help and I think there are great opportunities. But if people want to get bogged down in political rhetoric, then I gloss over. Q: Do you think L.A. has so much bureaucracy because it’s so big? A: Well that’s a huge question I’ve been trying to figure out since I became a councilman. I think some of it is that the bureaucracy squashed itself. It’s not like you can point the finger at someone occasionally you can and say, ‘that person is the problem.’ It’s the weight of the bureaucracy. The question is: How can we prioritize the most important projects and expedite them? I largely feel that is the role of the council members, to discern in their best judgment to go in there and get the best projects expedited. It’s a good news-bad news situation: there are so many people demanding opportunities for new business development that they can’t process it fast enough. So we have to pick and choose. But the other thing is getting the community to support the projects. With the General Motors plant that redevelopment of that site went through without a single opposition. I think it was because I created a community advisory committee put all the NIMBYs on it, the head of the homeowners association, the head of chambers of commerce, some neighborhood watch folks put them in a room and said, ‘work with the developer.’ They came up with a plan that was amenable to them and nobody protested. You work with the community and you bring tremendous benefits. A lot of developers make the mistake of thinking of the people in the community as their enemy. The community is your customer, you should have a good relationship. But I don’t mean to sound like I’m a defender of the bureaucracy, because I’ve had to scold them just as much as anybody. But they’re not the monsters that people portray them to be. Q: I’ve talked to a lot of businesses that left the Valley because of Los Angeles bureaucracy. You’re painting a picture that it’s not that bad. So why are these businesses leaving? A: I don’t know if I agree. All the economic reports that I have show that L.A.’s economy is vibrant and more and more businesses are attracted here. In terms of micro-enterprise and entrepreneurship, there are more people creating businesses in Los Angeles than pretty much any place in the nation. So I don’t buy your rhetoric. If you’re talking about businesses that have the ability and resources to move to Nevada, where they don’t pay taxes, how we going to compete? We’re not going to compete with a state like Nevada that is begging so much for business that they’re not going to charge taxes. I’m not into that rhetoric. I know what I have to do in my district. Q: Do you think Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is doing enough to bring business in? A: I think he’s doing a great job. I think he’s the antithesis of the previous mayor (James Hahn) in terms of activism. He’s not shy about creating a dynamic office that gets involved with everything and that sends a positive message about Los Angeles. And when you do that, you’re going to have mistakes. But I would rather have seven victories out of 10. Q: How would you like this district to look 20 years from now? A: Wow. I have so many things. I would like to see higher-end jobs and affordable housing that makes sense. Corridors much more transit-friendly as opposed to auto driven. I’d like to see more homeowners and a theater in Sylmar. I think we can do it.

The revised state budget proposed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger contains $52 million for career technical education programs to better prepare high school and community college students to enter the workforce. Such programs are important because they create interest in jobs that are important to the economy and show the relevance of core academic courses. The proposed funds would expand career tech courses and programs; build stronger partnerships with the business sector; plan and implement curriculum for emerging industries; expand internship opportunities; and streamline credentialing for teachers. Formerly known as vocational education, career technical education pairs core curricula of reading, writing and arithmetic with areas such engineering, health sciences, agriculture and marketing. In today’s job world, it is no longer as black and white as “go to college or go to work” as it was a generation or two ago. “It is education on steroids,” said Kenn Phillips, director of education and workforce investment of the Economic Alliance of the San Fernando Valley. “You need both to be successful.” In the revised budget, Schwarzenegger added $32 million to an existing $20 million from a 2005 career technical education bill sponsored by state Sen. Jack Scott. A pending bill sponsored by Scott streamlines the credentialing process for teaching high school-level career technical education courses. In the rush to prepare students for college, it has been forgotten that vocational skills fill a need in the economy and are a means to self-fulfillment, said Scott, whose district includes Glendale, Burbank and a small part of the east San Fernando Valley. Involvement by the business community can include serving on advisory committees to make sure that curricula are up to date; making equipment donations to schools; and hiring graduates of the programs. “Those are the practical ways to show there is a tie between industry and education,” Scott said. The Economic Alliance is working on a pilot program with the School of Engineering and Design at James Monroe High School in North Hills in which students receive credit for taking classes at Los Angeles Valley College. More importantly, Phillips said, the students get an idea of what a career in engineering is like so they can decide if it is something they want to pursue. A key to career tech courses is showing the relevance of math and science classes in a work environment, Phillips said. Valley high school students taking part in the FIRST robotics competition need to know about Cartesian scales as well as how to weld, Phillips said. “That is a [CTE-type class] that is relevant to what they need to learn to develop the robot,” Phillips said. Providing programs that are interesting to students who are not on the college track is critical to slowing down the statewide drop-out rate, currently approaching 30 percent, Scott said. There is a natural tendency to find a class like geometry dull, for example, but put that same student into a construction program and suddenly they see the practical application of geometry on the job, Scott said.

If the workers at the just-opened Hows Market in North Hollywood seem especially helpful, thank Los Angeles Valley College. As part of an agreement related to the status of the area as a community redevelopment zone, Hows utilized the school to help recruit and train the workers at the store. The school prescreened a pool of candidates and then provided two weeks of customer service training. In all, about 45 of the store’s 100 workers were hired from the program. Most were entry level, but the program also yielded a floral manager and four meat and seafood employees, said Mark Oerum, one of the four partners at Hows. “The results coming out of that were just incredible,” said Oerum, noting that the customer training was handled by a professional trainer with a business background. L.A. Valley College partners with a number of city agencies and private employers to provide worker training. Some of its programs include recruiting and job training for the county’s Metropolitan Transit Authority and Superior Super Warehouse Stores, which worked with the college on a 75-hour customer training course last year. Late last year, Valley College was awarded a $1.5 million grant from the U.S. labor department to train youth from 150 area high schools for jobs. Shelly Garcia

Burbank During the week, Mike Zugsmith works in the commercial real estate brokerage sector as the chairman of NAI Capital. But during his free time, he trades his suit and tie for a baseball cap and sports shirt and assumes his alter ego, “Iron Mike.” Along with his wife, Rachel, and two pro baseball players, Zugsmith started On Deck, a baseball training entity that has been attracting sports enthusiasts from all over the region who are interested in building up their strength and improving their sports game. At the Burbank facility, sports enthusiasts have access to the San Fernando Valley’s only “fast twitch” gym as well as indoor public batting cages, Iron Mike and softball pitching machines, a 60-foot pitching lane, a community room with Internet access and instruction from professional baseball players. The idea for On Deck was born after Zugsmith befriended Glen Raasch, a former player with the Chicago Cubs and Seattle Mariners, and Daris Toussaint, a former player with the San Francisco Giants. Zugsmith met the men after his son, now 18, expressed interest in playing Little League baseball when he was in elementary school. “When he became very interested in baseball, we decided to get him professional coaching to see how good he could be,” Zugsmith said. Subsequently, Zugsmith took him to West Coast Baseball School in the northeast San Fernando Valley, owned by Raasch and Toussaint, to help him improve his catching and hitting skills. After forming the venture with Zugsmith, Raasch and Toussaint moved their school to an existing 14,000-square-foot building in Burbank in late October. They now provide instruction through On Deck. The pro-athletes, Zugsmith said, expressed interest in offering services to clients that other sports facilities don’t offer. “They really felt, ‘We know how to do this better,'” said Zugsmith. “Better” includes computerized fast twitch gym equipment that custom tailors an athlete’s workout regimen, adjusting 16,000 times a second, and analyzes a user’s musculature for strengths and weaknesses. According to Zugsmith, the equipment helps athletes who require explosive power to maximize their ability to throw and is used at rehabilitative centers. Professional and top athletes, such as runner Carl Lewis and 19 World Record holders, have been trained using the machines. The facility’s Iron Mike pitching machines use real balls instead of plastic ones and contain arms that throw fast balls to emulate real-world experience. “We’re really trying to create a real game experience for people at On Deck,” Zugsmith said. SAN FERNANDO VALLEY Canoga Park Parade: Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa will serve as the grand marshal of the 19th Annual Canoga Park Memorial Day “Hometown Heroes” Parade on May 28. The parade, which is being held to honor local men and women serving in the Armed Forces, is hosted by the Canoga Park/West Hills Chamber of Commerce. The parade route will start at Owensmouth Avenue and Sherman Way and will move east to De Soto. The parade will then make a right turn on De Soto, turn right on Vanowen and will end at the corner of Owensmouth and Vanowen. The Canoga Park Memorial Day Parade has been held since the 1940s. Event chairman Jack Dawson predicts this year’s event will draw more than 50,000 spectators. Glendale Health: Glendale Adventist Medical Center has received the American Stroke Association’s Get With the Guidelines Stroke Initial Performance Achievement Award. The American Stroke Association commended the hospital’s commitment to providing a higher standard of stroke care according to national standards and recommendations. GAMC has developed a comprehensive system for rapid diagnosis and treatment of stroke patients who are admitted to its emergency room. The system includes 24-hour access to brain imaging scans, staffing of neurologists to conduct patient evaluations and the use of clot-busting medication. Northridge Culture: Antonia Garcia-Orozco, a Chicano studies professor at California State University, Northridge, received a prestigious internship to study at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C., this summer. Garcia-Orozco will be working with the Latin Music Initiative, which is part of the Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, in conjunction with the Latino Center. “I am reconstructing how Mexican women and Chicanas have created agency for themselves through a musical genre that historically has been male dominated,” said Garcia-Orozco. The Smithsonian program grants 40-45 internships each year. Pacoima New Neighbors: Grand opening ceremonies for the Pacoima Federal Development Credit Union, the first of its kind in the area, took place during the week of May 14. Among the officials who attended the May 17 ribbon cutting were Los Angeles City Councilman Richard Alarcon, whose district includes the Pacoima area. Over the weekend of May 19 the credit union held a block party complete with mariachi and other performances, food and events for children. The festivities marked the opening of the credit union headquarters. The credit union had been operating out of its Lakeview Terrace branch since it launched in February, 2006, and will continue to service customers from that branch as well. “To date we have 460 members and $2.4 million in assets,” said Roberto Barragan, Pacoima Federal Development Credit Union chairman and CEO and president of the Valley Economic Development Center, which spearheaded the credit union. “And NCUA just approved us to begin making SBA small business loans. Not only are we the only credit union in the Northeast San Fernando Valley, we are now the first SBA lender to operate in this community.” Panorama City School Days: The fruits of some of WWCOT’s recent labors can be seen in Panorama City with the opening of Panorama High School, the newest of Los Angeles Unified School District’s facilities. Architectural firm WWCOT designed the $71.8 million facility including a portion of the school which will also be open to the public. The school offers public use of its community room, library auditorium and gymnasium as well as the swimming pool during after-school and summer hours. To be certain that the school met the needs of the community, WWCOT and LAUSD held bilingual meetings with the community during the planning stages. Sylmar Veins: QPC Laser Inc. shipped its 2,000th high-brightness semiconductor laser used for varicose vein treatment. The lasers are custom designed to deliver a highly-focused beam into the vein through a narrow optical fiber. QPC has shipped the lasers since 2005. Universal City Named: Vivid Entertainment Co-Chairman Steven Hirsch was named to Time magazine’s “Alt-100” list. Hirsch was No. 58 on the list that also included former Vice President Al Gore in the top spot; Paris Hilton; and Jesus Christ. The “Alt 100” appeared in the magazine’s May 1 in conjunction with the “Time 100” listing men and women whose power, talent and moral example is transforming the world. Woodland Hills Signs: Last week the installation of some 20 signs to designate the neighborhood of Woodland Hills began going up around town. City officials gathered to unveil the first sign, at Ventura Boulevard and Don Pio Street. The signage will be placed from Valley Circle Boulevard to Corbin Avenue in the first phase. CONEJO VALLEY Camarillo Batteries: Zinc Matrix Power, Inc. President and CEO Ross Dueber will speak on the benefits of silver-zinc rechargeable battery technology at the 2007 Battery Power Conference in Denver. Dueber’s presentation focuses on how rechargeable batteries from Zinc Matrix have a longer runtime over lithium-ion batteries; are safer because they do not use chemistry that is flammable or toxic; and key components making up the batteries can be recycled and reused. “It’s never been more important to provide safe and reliable portable energy solutions that pose no threat to consumers or the environment,” Dueber said. Westlake Village Sporty: Sports Authority opened its newest store at The Promenade at Westlake on May 19. The store carries gear, apparel and other products for football, softball, basketball, baseball, hockey lacrosse, running, cycling, skating, golf and tennis. Sports Authority operates 424 stores in 45 states. The Promenade at Westlake was developed in 1996 by Caruso Affiliated. Finalists: Loi Nguyen, founder and vice president of technology for Inphi Corp., an electronic components manufacturer, was among the finalists for the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award. Also named as a finalist is Philip Asherian, CEO of ESI Enterprises in Woodland Hills, a firm providing consulting, information technology outsourcing and network design, installation and support. The finalists were chosen from over 100 nominations received by an independent judging panel composed of area business, academic and civic leaders. The winners will be announced June 26. SIMI VALLEY Kudos: Simi Valley Hospital received a 2007 Gold Achievement Award from the American Heart Association’s Start! Fit-Friendly Companies recognition program for its commitment to providing a healthy work environment. Simi Valley Hospital was one of only three companies to receive the award. during the current award period. To qualify for the honor, the hospital had to demonstrate it is meeting a number of criteria, such as offering physical activity support for employees, increasing healthy eating options at work and promoting a culture of wellness. AHA representatives will present the Gold Achievement Award to SVH at the Ventura County Heart Walk on Sept 8. SVH is sponsoring the walk. SVH’s implementation of the new Walk This Weigh employee fitness program was the main reason the hospital received the honor. The program promotes employee wellness through walking and smart diet choices. ANTELOPE VALLEY Lancaster Information: The City of Lancaster won two top honors for public information from the California Association of Public Information Officials. Lancaster Communications Manager Anne Aldrich was presented with the honors to the city for its monthly newsletter and for its new website, cityoflancaster.org. The Outlook, published quarterly and distributed to all Lancaster residents, keeps the public informed about city news. In 2007, the publication was expanded with a smaller Outlook Lite newsletter sent to residents in the months the Outlook is not published. The new city website was launched in October and was designed with multiple elements to encourage two-way communications with residents. Excellence: Antelope Valley Hospital’s Women, Infants and Children program won the Best Practice Recognition Award and an Excellence in Program Evaluation Award at the California WIC Association Conference on May 7. The Women, Infants and Children Program is a federally funded, nationwide program that helps ensure good nutrition for pregnant and breastfeeding women, infants and children under 5. AVH sponsors the program for the Antelope Valley region. To receive the award, AVH underwent a four-day evaluation process, which takes place every two years. The AVH WIC program was also commended for keeping participants in the program from pregnancy through postpartum care. Scholarships: The Antelope Valley Hospital Auxiliary and Antelope Valley Hospital have awarded $15,000 in scholarships to high school students in the Antelope Valley who are pursuing health care careers Fifteen students have been selected to receive $1,000 each. The recipients were chosen from among hundreds of applicants and were awarded the scholarships based on panel interviews and scholastic achievement. To qualify, applicants were required to have a 3.5 grade-point average or higher and have plans to pursue a career in a health-related field. The scholarship program is a partnership between AVH, which contributed $5,000, and the AVH auxiliary, which contributed $10,000. (PHOTO) SANTA CLARITA VALLEY Santa Clarita Honors: The city of Santa Clarita received two honors from the Los Angeles section of the American Planning Association and will be recognized at a ceremony at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Cathedral Plaza on June 12. The city’s Downtown Newhall Specific Plan won first place in this year’s Los Angeles area APA awards, and the Sign Compliance Program received a merit award. The Downtown Newhall Specific Plan was awarded a first-place Planning Excellence Award for best practice. Because the Downtown Newhall Specific Plan took first place, the city will now be competing at the state level. The plan is a form-based code that is designed to invigorate downtown Newhall. It calls for mixed-use development that allows commercial and residential developments to co-exist on the same parcel of land. The city’s Sign Compliance Program received a merit award for planning excellence in implementation for a large jurisdiction in the final phase of the sign compliance program. The program was started to improve the appearance of the community and reduce competitive streetscape signage clutter along the city’s roadway corridors. Excellence: The city of Santa Clarita’s transit maintenance facility received the 2007 Excellence in Transportation Award by Caltrans in the Transportation Related Facilities category. Caltrans received approximately 90 entries from across the state from various entities. The transit maintenance facility, which received a gold rating from the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Green Building Rating System in 2006, is a “green” building that allows the city to house, maintain and clean its bus fleet. It saves the city more than $1 million each year. The facility includes a bus maintenance building, an automated bus wash, diesel and compressed natural gas stations and parking to accommodate 110 buses and 163 cars. Recognition: The city of Santa Clarita recently received three awards during the California Association for Public Information Officer’s annual Excellence in Communications Awards Ceremony in Yosemite. The “Film Santa Clarita” spring and fall 2006 newsletters were awarded second place in the Community or Special Audience Newsletter category, and the city’s employee newsletter, “City Call,” received an honorable mention. The city’s 2006 DUI Awareness Campaign was awarded second place in the Public Safety Program or Campaign category. The campaign utilized a multi-media approach to demonstrate the perils of drinking and driving. Biking: Dozens of workers in Santa Clarita biked to work on May 17 during the city’s 4th Annual Bike to Work Day Challenge. The event coincided with a weeklong state awareness campaign calling for residents to cut down on pollution by biking to work. Santa Clarita businesses vie to get the most number of employees to bike to work during the competition. Small, medium and large businesses who won in their respective categories received free frozen yogurt from Golden Spoon-Valencia. The city teamed up with Metro, L.A. County Bicycle Coalition and Newhall Bicycle to host public pit stops for cyclists to catch their breath during their commutes. “By riding your bike to work, residents are helping to reduce traffic and pollution, improving your health by increasing cardiovascular activity and saving money on gas,” said Santa Clarita Mayor Marsha McLean.

United Airlines begins daily service next month between Palmdale and San Francisco in what may be the last chance to bring scheduled commercial air service to the Antelope Valley. What is different this time from when United last offered flights out of Palmdale in 1998 is a change in demographics and economics of the Antelope Valley, more congestion on freeways linking the valley with other, larger airports and an unprecedented commitment by Los Angeles World Airports to make it work. Funds from the airport agency, Los Angeles County and the City of Palmdale will be supplemented with a federal grant guaranteeing monthly revenue for United if it falls short of its projections. The airline, in turn, has made an 18-month commitment to stay at L.A./Palmdale Regional Airport. “This is a critical opportunity to establish air service and prove there is a market here,” said Mark Thorpe, air service marketing director with LAWA. Inside the terminal building on land LAWA leases from the U.S. Air Force, the check-in counters and metal detector are ready for passengers to arrive June 7 for flights to the Bay area. Outside is a free parking lot with ample spaces; where the silence is broken only by a brisk wind, the flapping of a bird’s wings or a jet fighter streaking across the azure sky. If all goes according to LAWA’s wishes, vehicles belonging to area residents, especially those employed at the major aerospace companies or the military, will fill that lot. For the key to the success of the air service lies in the corporate traveler on a tight schedule who is willing to trade a commute down to LAX or Bob Hope Airport in Burbank for a 70-minute flight to San Francisco and from there the rest of the country or the world. “We see this as an opportunity for residents and customers to take advantage of our global route network,” said United spokesman Jeff Kovick. Service to an airport with many connecting flights, such as San Francisco, is what sets this attempt at scheduled commercial air service apart from previous ones, said Palmdale Mayor James Ledford. The terminal’s most recent tenant, Scenic Airways, offered flights to North Las Vegas from late 2004 through March 2006. Other carriers have previously offered service to LAX and Phoenix. Data collected by LAWA shows a quantifiable time savings when flying out of Palmdale, Thorpe said, while data from travel agencies revealed that up to 30 percent of travelers from the Antelope Valley booked premium seats first class, business class or the costly walk-up fare. With four of the top five employers in the Antelope Valley related to aerospace or the military, the airport looks to attract those workers, especially since much of the work done at Lockheed Martin in the city limits, or at Edwards Air Force Base or China Lake in the desert, is of an experimental nature, requiring engineers and project managers. “There is a different mix of flyer coming out of those bases,” Thorpe said. In applying for a grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation, LAWA didn’t show a need from the aerospace and military, so most persuasive to the feds was the overall demographics of the Antelope Valley and its proximity to the Santa Clarita and northern San Fernando Valleys as a secondary area to attract customers, Thorpe said. The $900,000 awarded for the Palmdale service is among the highest given through a Small Community Air Service Development Grant. LAWA applied for the grant in 2003 and 2004 before it was finally successful in 2006. Bringing scheduled service to Palmdale helps meet the larger goal of regionalizing the airports of the greater Los Angeles area to more evenly distribute traffic, taking the burden off LAX. Bob Rodine, a Sherman Oaks consultant with clients in the aviation industry, called regionalization a thorny issue and said that, theoretically it makes sense to spread flights around to other airports. The marketplace for commercial air travel, however, is not spread out and many potential passengers are in an area of limited physical distribution, Rodine said. “When you get far beyond Crenshaw, moving east from the ocean, you have little demand for commercial air service,” Rodine said.

Some of the best salespeople I’ve ever hired have come to me when I was a patron dining at a restaurant. It’s my experience that waiters, waitresses, hosts and hostesses who work at restaurants are actually businesspeople who are dying to be discovered. High school baseball players are on the field every day hoping that a scout will notice them and draft them into the big leagues. Actors and actresses work in small playhouses hoping that they’ll be noticed and scouted by someone who’s recruiting for Broadway. Similarly, entrepreneurs have to be on the lookout for the best talent that they can find in the marketplace. Great sales talent and people who have the potential to be excellent customer service representatives or business developers are frequently found in restaurants. Although no rule of thumb is perfect, I’ve had great success scouting at restaurants. Consider the local Starbucks. Here’s a location where one can find a person who gets up every day and is working hard to meet the needs of the customers who walk through the door. These are the types of people you want for your business. Not only are they oriented toward serving customers, but you know that they’re in the business of creating a pleasurable experience for the patrons of their establishments. Typically, these people are motivated. If they’re waitresses or waiters, they’re already used to working on commission because the tips that they receive far exceed the base compensation that the restaurant pays them. They already understand the correlation between good service and good pay. That’s a lesson you don’t want to have to teach. You want to work with people who possess self-confidence and believe in themselves enough to be willing to take some risks in their compensation. You want people who are willing to bet on themselves and say, “If I can do a good job and deliver good service, then I’m going to make good money.” When you find these people, don’t be bashful. Give them your business card and invite them to give you a call. It’s always better, by the way, to offer your business card and ask them to call you, than for you to call them. My rule of thumb is that if someone takes the initiative to give me a call, they’re probably someone I would be willing to bet on. I’m a sucker for enthusiasm. I believe that anyone who’s enthusiastic, persistent and asks for a break is someone to whom I would be well-served to provide that break. So, as you are working hard every day to build your company or your career, make sure that you think of yourself as a talent scout looking for talent that can help you to build your business everywhere that you frequent. Often dubbed a “Growth Architect” by his clients, Joel G. Block advises companies on growth strategies by driving revenue and sales. Well known in the capital markets, Joel is a successful entrepreneur, speaker and advisor. Contact him at www.joelblock.com