New Parking Meters (and Higher Rates), West LA College’s New Building and CCHS Art Students Earn “Gold Keys.”

1. Culver City’s Public Works Department is scheduled to upgrade the existing parking meters in the Downtown area to accept credit cards starting today. Once installed, they will be programmed with the changes to parking meter operations in the Downtown area approved by the City Council on January 23, 2012.  These changes include raising parking meter rates from $1.00/hr. to $1.50/hr. and extending the hours/days of operation to include 8 am-11 pm, everyday (including Sunday). 

2. West Los Angeles College has officially opened its brand new, four-story location for social science, liberal arts and other classes. The $19 million, 47,989 square foot structure provides modern “smart classrooms” that allow instructors to better integrate technology with teaching and learning. The building is certified “Gold” under the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standard. A community open house is tentatively scheduled for May 19. Details on the event will be posted shortly at www.WLAC.edu/BusinessCommunity.

3. Culver City High School art students from the CCHS Academy of Visual and Performing Arts (AVPA) have been recognized for their exceptional talent in the visual arts via the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards  - a nation-wide arts competition open to all high school students. Edna Vogel Amezcua, Michelle Bac, Camille Clair and Ahin Ju have earned “Gold Key” awards, the highest level of achievement, for their individual work in visual art. They will now compete in the Scholastic Arts & Writing Awards national adjudication in New York City for further scholarship consideration.  

Scholastic Art and Writing Competition also recognize students for literary excellence by The California Writing Awards from The California Writing Project, California Writes! and the California Association of Teachers of English. 11th grade AVPA art student, Kelly Yeo was awarded two Gold Keys for her poetry collections, one of which is an American Voices nominee, the highest regional award.   Kate Johannesen has also won a "Gold Key" for her poetry. Both move on to the national competition.

4. The City’s Parks and Recreation Department has been busy helping beautify the city. Its most recent contributions to the greening of Culver City include installing new drinking fountains at Vets Park as part of the City’s Prop A Grant obligation; installing three new PAR exercise equipment pieces at Fox Hills Park; installing new roofing at the new booster pump enclosure and the existing auxiliary pump station at Culver City Park; repairing playground equipment at Lindberg Park and performing ball diamond irrigation and field maintenance at the Little League fields and various park sites.

5. Culver City resident and Azusa Pacific University student Esther R. Winslow made the academic Dean's List at APU. Winslow is a nursing major and is honored for a fall semester 2011 academic standing of a 3.5 or better grade-point average, alongside 1750 other students at APU.

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