Community

In an effort to combine Silicon Valley’s growing need for skilled tech workers and the unique ability for local libraries to provide classes in a safe learning environment, County Supervisor Mike Wasserman is spearheading the effort to offer free youth coding programs throughout the Santa Clara County Library District’s seven community libraries.

Morgan Hill-based South Valley Dance Arts will present live performances of the holiday classic “The Nutcracker” over the next two weekends.Audiences will be treated to Tchaikovsky’s original score, intricate scenery and vibrant theatrical staging that will combine to create one of “the most visually stunning productions of ‘The Nutcracker,’” according to the show’s producers. Youth and adult students of SVDA will make up the cast.Performances will take place at the Sobrato High School auditorium, located at 401 Burnett Ave. Three shows are scheduled for the weekend of Dec. 2-3, and for Dec. 9-10.SVDA is a non-competitive dance arts studio and performing company that uses a “holistic and modest approach” to the instruction of various dance forms. The group offers classes for men, women, boys and girls, in classical ballet, contemporary dance, Ukrainian Folk Dance, Pilates and musical theater. Classes are available for students age 3 and up.Tickets for “The Nutcracker” and more information about SVDA are available on the group’s website, southvalleydance.com. Tickets can also be purchased at BookSmart, 1295 East Dunne Ave., Suite 120.

County officials have set up a series of community meetings to help in their push to designate Santa Clara County as a National Heritage Area.

Responding to community concerns about potential changes in federal deportation policies with a change in administration in Washington, D.C., the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors President Dave Cortese and Supervisor Cindy Chavez are promoting a plan to keep residents informed about their rights and provide legal representation to those who may need it.

Standing at the open door and getting ready to jump out of an airplane at 13,000 feet above the ground, San Jose Skydiving Center owner Andrew Simmons can feel the body of his tandem jumper tense up.Simmons, a 35-year-old skydiver with more than 5,000 jumps over eight years on his resume, loves to share his extreme-sport passion with just about anybody willing to take the leap of faith with him or one of his employees.“It’s loud. The wind is hitting you. You can’t communicate with your instructor,” said Simmons of the first few seconds after jumping out of the aircraft. “I can feel the tension in people’s bodies when I push them out of the plane. It’s a rigid 5-10 seconds and then you can feel them take their first breath and feel them relax into it.”Then, the parachute opens up and together the skydivers “cruise like a bird” soaring through the sky and enjoy their serene surroundings with views to Santa Cruz, Monterey and Moss Landing to the North Bay and even the Sierra Nevada Mountains on a clear day.“It’s pretty intense. Words just don’t do it justice. It’s like describing a sunset; until you see it you don’t really know,” said the well-traveled Wichita, Kansas native who skydived around the globe before settling into his new business out of South County Airport in San Martin nine months ago.On his best day, Simmons participates and leads 56 expert sport jumps and 20 tandem jumps, totaling 96 bodies falling out of the sky, he said. The adventurer and entrepreneur has two airplanes, six full-time employees and five part-time workers that offer up the thrill of a lifetime seven days a week at up to 13,000 feet.“It’s great. I jump out of an airplane to put bread on the table,” Simmons said. “It’s a labor of passion. I couldn’t imagine doing anything else. It’s the hardest and most rewarding job I’ve ever done.”For Simmons, it started like any other 20-something year old thrill seeker who got the bug to jump out of a plane.“Within six months of my first skydive, I sold my house and all my cars and set out to the West Coast in 2009,” said Simmons, who completed 46 jumps in Kansas. “I packed everything in the back of my Nissan pickup, including my motorcycle and a tent.”Simmons spent three months in Arizona, but “couldn’t take the heat,” before venturing to Southern California, where he worked and built up his experience for three years in Lake Elsinore. He earned his Accelerated Freefall (AFF) rating, giving him a license to teach skydiving, and also got his tandem instructor rating that “allows you to attach people to you and skydive,” Simmons explained. Instructors must have a minimum of three years in the sport with 500 skydives before being able to get certified.After learning the ropes of the skydiving business working at a seasonal operation in New York, Simmons got the idea that maybe he could start his own operation. He first spent six months backpacking in Southeast Asia and then another year in Hawaii before returning to Southern California. Simmons, who had visited the Bay Area in his many travels, then started to research locations where he could start his new business.“I wanted to come to a place that was willing to work with me. (South County Airport) has a basic idea of how they wanted the skydiving operation to work. They even had a skydiving application online,” said Simmons on how he landed in San Martin. He submitted business proposals to about six other airports.“They all said, ‘Nope, we don’t want skydiving here.’ But Santa Clara said how can we make this work together,” Simmons continued. “They were more welcoming than other places.”Simmons explained that Santa Clara County had one of the strictest—and most expensive—insurance policy requirements he had come across, but it was worth it.“I was worried that the aviation community wasn’t gonna like skydiving here, but that wasn’t the case at all,” Simmons said. “The aviation community received us surprisingly well.”Director of County Airports Eric Peterson echoed Simmons’ sentiments of having a “positive relationship” with one of San Martin’s newest aeronautical business owners.“There are a couple of little things that we’ve chatted about and he’s always receptive if there’s some minor change for efficiency or safety,” said Peterson, who has seen airport activity increase with the welcoming of skydiving as well as the Gavilan College aviation program on the grounds.Now off and running since Feb. 9, customers can book reservations online at sanjoseskydivingcenter.com. No experience is necessary—just an appointment. Upon arrival, customers fill out paperwork, watch an instructional video, meet with their instructor, put gear on, more brief instruction and “your instructor takes care of everything,” Simmons said. At San Jose Skydiving Center, all instructors have at least 2,000 jumps with the most seasoned at 11,000.“You spend about 15 minutes with your instructor and then hop in the airplane and climb up,” Simmons explained.It takes about 20 minutes to get up to 13,000 feet. After jumping out, there is about a one minute free fall, the parachute opens up and then it’s a four to seven minute descent to the landing zone at South County Airport.“The instructor takes care of the landing,” Simmons said. “You land on the ground and become the world’s newest skydiver.”

Live Oak High School students Saul Ruiz, Ariana Berman and Justin Chang, pictured to the left, arrange Thanksgiving care packages for local families at the school's kitchen on the East Main Avenue campus Nov. 21. The students are members of Live Oak’s Future Business Leaders of America club, which organizes the annual holiday food drive for needy families. On Nov. 21, the students organized all the donated items they had received into individual boxes for each recipient family. On Nov. 23, members of the San Martin Lions Club will deliver the boxes to the families.

Two Morgan Hill Girl Scouts troops had a unique opportunity to host some of their counterparts from Indonesia for a Thanksgiving dinner, gift exchange, games, singing and dancing.The festivities took place the evening of Nov. 17 at the east Morgan Hill home of Barbara Conly, troop leader for Girl Scouts Troop 60009. They were joined by Girl Scouts Troop 62224, also based in Morgan Hill.They were visited by both a girl scout troop and a boy scout troop from Indonesia who won the island nation’s East Java Scouts Challenge. The winning prize for this challenge was a visit to the U.S., where they spent a week taking in a variety of sights and experiences in the Bay Area.At Conly’s home, the two groups of scouts strived to break their cultural and language barriers by singing, eating and dancing. The meal consisted of traditional American Thanksgiving fare as well as native Indonesian foods. The group even performed a “mannequin challenge” together.“It’s lovely to have the children sit down and have a dinner, and sing and play,” Conly said. “Our Girl Scouts are future leaders. It’s wonderful to get the opportunity to be good hosts and embrace other cultures.”Karen Ann Crane, the organizer of the annual Fourth of July Morgan Hill Patriotic Sing, led the group of children—numbering well over 50—in the singing of well-known American children’s songs. Ari Sufiati, a Morgan Hill resident and the U.S. organizer of the East Java scouts’ visit, led the Indonesian children in some of their culture’s songs.“Through this competition, we give (the scouts) a significant multicultural life experience and exposure that is not taught in the classroom to reach their dreams,” Sufiati, a former scout whose daughter is now a Morgan Hill Girl Scout, wrote in an email. “For the kids, this trip to the United States is the most unforgettable learning experience to see how other people with different culture, language, religions and all the attributes live and interact with each other.”During their stay in the Bay Area, the scouts visited numerous sites in San Francisco, including Pier 39, the Exploratorium museum, the Golden Gate Bridge, Lombard Street and the NASA Ames Research Center. Before they left Nov. 21, they also planned to tour Britton Middle School in Morgan Hill, visit Yosemite Valley, learn about “country living” in the small mountain town of Murphys, tour a local fire station and visit Gilroy Gardens. Trips to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, Natural Bridges State Park and Google were also on the itinerary.They ate at Denny’s and In n Out, where the classic American cuisine was met with mixed reaction among the children.The competition in East Java, a province of Indonesia, was sponsored in part by the newspaper Java Pos, the largest publication in the province. The newspaper sent multiple representatives to travel with the scouts as they toured the Bay Area.With the help of a translator from Jawa Pos, East Java Boy Scout Dimas Dwi Wibowo, 10, said Nov. 17 his favorite part of the trip thus far was the airplane ride to the states. Many of the East Java children had never traveled by aircraft before.He added he enjoyed a cruise under the Golden Gate Bridge, and he appreciates that American drivers seem to “respect the rules” on the roads.East Java Girl Scout Yasa Hilda An Faza, 12, said in Javanese that the trip will provide “wonderful memories.” She said the weather was too cold for her preferences, but she enjoyed seeing world-famous sites in San Francisco before they got to Morgan Hill Nov. 17.After dinner, the East Java scouts performed a “welcome dance,” which included a mix of traditional and contemporary chanting. The American Girl Scouts offered them friendship bracelets and patches decorated with the slogan “Friends Around the World.”Morgan Hill Girl Scout Molly Paul said she was impressed by the Indonesian children’s “dance moves.”“The dances were unexpected,” added Morgan Hill Girl Scout Elizabeth Conly. “It was fun to experience.”

Friends and family of Tara Romero joined the community in raising about $5,000 to pay for a statue of the slain 14-year-old, who died in a 2011 drive-by shooting in southwest Morgan Hill.At a Nov. 19 fundraising event organized by Joey Romero, Tara Romero’s brother, several musicians performed while volunteers sold raffle tickets for San Jose Sharks tickets, local restaurant gift cards and other prizes. The fundraiser took place at GVA Café, at the intersection of Second Street and Monterey Road in downtown Morgan Hill.Joey Romero, an artist himself, displayed several of his paintings on the walls of the café.He said they raised almost $5,000 during the evening, which will all go toward a six-foot bronze sculpture depicting Tara Romero’s likeness. When complete, the sculpture will be placed on the City of Morgan Hill’s Civic Center campus on Peak Avenue.In December 2015, the city council approved that location for the sculpture to serve as a permanent reminder of the impact of violence, urging youth and other passersby to commit to a peaceful environment.Fundraising at the Nov. 19 event was bolstered by several large cash donations, including one from GVA Café owner Renee Carrillo.Tara Romero was a freshman at Sobrato High School when she was gunned down in a drive-by shooting Nov. 4, 2011 at the corner of Cosmo and Del Monte avenues. Five young men drove slowly by the intersection when at least one of the occupants opened fire on Romero and a group of her teen friends, who were standing in the area waiting for a ride home.Romero was pronounced dead at the scene. Three of her friends—also her classmates at Sobrato High School—were injured by the gunfire.The occupants of the vehicle were arrested shortly after the shooting; four of them have been to trial on murder and attempted murder charges. Three were convicted earlier this year, and one was found not guilty. The fifth suspect is awaiting trial.According to police reports and testimony at the trial, the suspects were associated with the Norteno street gang and perpetrated the shooting for gang-related purposes. The victims were not associated with gang activity, and were mistakenly targeted by the shooters, according to trial testimony.

More than 100 students will take part in St. Catherine of Alexandria Catholic School’s latest production of “Annie” with performances beginning this weekend.

Local residents, including veterans and their families, thanked and honored those who have fought and died while serving in the military at the annual downtown Morgan Hill Veterans Day ceremony Nov. 11.