Roses & raspberries

By: North County Times - Editorial | Sunday, February 22, 2004 9:30 PM PST ∞

A rose ---- the "Bon Voyage" award ---- to California Highway Patrol Officer Bob Schmeiser, who retired last week after 30 years with the CHP. The Oceanside-based motorcycle officer was honored by about 80 friends at a retirement lunch last week. He retired 32 years to the day after he married his wife, Beth, a Vista schoolteacher. And he just became a grandfather. We wish him the best as he putters around the house before he and his wife take a cruise to Belize.

A rose ---- the "Summer School" award ---- to Cal State San Marcos' Teacher Diversity Project Summer Institute, which expects to provide $1,000 scholarships to about 25 prospective teachers this summer as part of its effort to recruit a diverse pool of people for careers in education. Much of the money comes from the college's share of the state lottery program. We often are asked what happens with the lottery money ---- the lottery was sold as a way to send more dollars to education. Here's one place it goes.

A rose ---- the "Hearts of Oak" award to the environmental group Preserve Calavera, which relied on local volunteers to plant 50 oak saplings in Buena Vista Park on Saturday. The trees now growing around Agua Hedionda Creek will replace fallen ones, some of them centuries old, that have died recently. It's the third North County park that Preserve Calavera has helped revegetate recently. Trees and materials were donated by San Diego-based environmental consultants RECON and Home Depot. For information on Preserve Calavera, call (760) 724-3887.

A raspberry ---- the "How Insensitive" award ---- to University of Colorado football coach Gary Barnett, who presides over a program accused of using strippers, alcohol and prostitutes to attract athletes. Then last week after a former player, a young woman who kicked for the team, said she had been raped by a teammate at UC, Barnett had the monumental bad taste to call her a "terrible" player. That's hardly the issue, coach. We generally reserve roses and raspberries for local citizens, but Barnett's behavior deserves special mention. He is an example of everything that's wrong with college athletics. At least the university president had the good sense to suspend him.

A rose ---- the "Deadline" award ---- to Tom Chambers, a graduate of Palomar College's journalism department and editor of the new North County paper called 78, whose third edition is on the streets. The paper is named for the highway that connects the cities it considers its home ground. The paper already has been criticized, perhaps fairly, for its strained efforts to capture attention through articles whose taste and tone might stand a bit of improvement. But this is a rose, and we congratulate Chambers and his staff for going out and trying something different. Another rose for Wendy Nelson, the Palomar College journalism professor who taught most of the staff of 78.