March 05, 2004

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Palo Alto Online

News digest

District officials were happy to see Proposition 55, which provides money for school facilities, pass in Tuesday's election.

The proposition includes $2.25 billion for school modernization projects and also provides state money for schools that pass their own local bond measures for building projects.

The district has now garnered more than $30 million in state funding for school building projects, Golton said. These funds are in addition to the $143 million passed under the Building for Excellence bond in 1995.

School board member Mandy Lowell said the proposition's success indicates there's a clear need to fix some schools throughout the state.

"In terms of (Proposition) 55 passing, I think it's an affirmation that people recognize that even though it's going to cost them money they want adequate school facilities," she said. --Rachel Metz
Friends of the Palo Alto Library gets more space

`Now the books will have space to breathe. During its meeting Monday night, the Palo Alto City Council awarded the Friends of the Palo Alto Library two new rooms at Cubberley Community Center for the group's popular monthly book sales.

The library-supporting group has been cramped for space ever since they lost use of classrooms at Terman Middle School, when the school reopened last year. The new rooms will be in the K wing.

The council gave the friends a discounted rate for using the rooms, since they raise funds that help the city's libraries. The group will pay 57 cents per square foot a month, while the previous user of the room paid $1.68 per square foot. -- Bill D'Agostino
Palo Alto History Museum gets first crack at Roth Building

The Palo Alto History Museum got a critical go-ahead on Monday night, when the City Council allowed the museum to lease the historic Roth Building.

Palo Alto is one of the few cities in Santa Clara County not to have a place to celebrate its history.

The museum's founders will need to raise $5.5 million in the next two years to renovate the dilapidated 17,000 square foot building, located near downtown, on Homer Avenue. The group also needs to acquire permits and environmental approvals from the city. The building, the former home of the Palo Alto Medical Foundation, was built in 1932, designed by architect Birge Clark.

The city purchased the building in 2000 for $2 million, hoping a nonprofit would take it over. The history museum was the only nonprofit to apply for the building.

The group will only need to pay $1 a year for the 30-year lease. By not choosing to lease the building as office space, the city gave up an estimated $500,000 in annual rent. --Bill D'Agostino
Dead Sea is target for live science

Studying plants and animals surviving in very harsh conditions is Stanford's aim in collaborating in operating a new center for that purpose. But the location is a notable one: on the border between Israel and Jordan.

Groundbreaking for the Bridging the Rift Center will take place March 9 in a remote desert area on the Jordan-Israel border about 50 miles from the Dead Sea. Half of the center will be in each country.

The center, a collaboration between Stanford and Cornell universities, is an attempt to increase scientific collaboration between Arab and Israeli students.

Funding for the center comes from the Bridging the Rift Foundation, a New York-based nonprofit that includes Jordanians, Israelis and Americans. Faculty at the center will be from Stanford, Cornell and Israeli and Jordanian universities.

"The center is located in an extremely interesting environment," said Marcus Feldman, a Stanford geneticist who chaired the academic planning committee of the New York foundation. ""There are numerous organisms in the Dead Sea, the most saline body of water on Earth, and in the desert, one of the hottest places on the planet. How they are able to survive in such extreme conditions is of great interest to geneticists and other life scientists." --Don Kazak

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