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In his week’s Around Town column, Christine Blasey Ford writes a memoir, Andrew Luck gets back into the game, and Palo Alto eyes new dog parks.
FORTHCOMING BOOK … Christine Blasey Ford, the Palo Alto University professor who stepped forward to testify against Brett Kavanaugh when he was a nominee to the Supreme Court, will release a memoir, “One Way Back,” on March 19.
Five years ago this month, Blasey Ford identified herself to the Washington Post as the author of the confidential letter that accused Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her in the early 1980s, when they were both high school students in suburban Maryland. Ford provided the letter to U.S. Rep. Anna Eshoo, who gave it to Sen. Diane Feinstein, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which led the Kavanaugh nomination review.
“One Way Back,” recounts the months Blasey Ford had spent trying to get information about the alleged assault into the right hands without exposing herself and her family to dangerous backlash, according to a press release by the publisher, St. Martin’s Press. Drawing parallels to her life as a surfer, she describes the process of paddling out into the unknown, knowing there is only one way back to shore. The memoir will include new details about the lead-up to her testimony and the overwhelming aftermath, the press release stated.
Kavanaugh, who denied Blasey Ford’s and others’ allegations, was ultimately confirmed by two votes.
“I never thought of myself as a survivor, a whistleblower, or an activist before the events in 2018,” Blasey Ford stated in the book announcement.
“But now, what I and this book can offer is a call to all the other people who might not have chosen those roles for themselves but who choose to do what’s right. Sometimes you don’t speak out because you are a natural disrupter. You do it to cause a ripple that might one day become a wave.”
VIKINGS GET SOME LUCK … Former Indianapolis Colts and Stanford quarterback Andrew Luck, who famously walked out of the NFL four years ago, is now back on the field as part-time football coach at Palo Alto High School. He coaches the players twice a week and helps them out with workouts and drills, according to media reports.
The 34-year-old football star is currently pursuing a master’s degree in education at Stanford University, across the street from Paly. Luck, who played six NFL seasons and made the Pro Bowl four times in his career, has reportedly learnt the team’s playbook in record time. Vikings coach Dave DeGeronimo and the JV team, are excited to have Luck’s support.
“I got an email from Andrew Luck and thought one of my coaching buddies was pranking me, but he actually reached out to us and we’re very happy that he did,” DeGeronimo said in an NBC Bay Area interview on Sept. 19. “What’s really cool about Andrew is that he fits right in, right away. He’s a down to earth guy and really just wants to help develop student athletes. It was more him interviewing me than me interviewing him, obviously!”
Also helping the team out twice a week is Christoph Bono, former Vikings player who was the star quarterback of Palo Alto’s 2010 state championship team. “It’s really great to have both of them,” DeGeronimo said.
PET PROJECTS Palo Alto’s dog owners and their playful companions are in for a treat next year, when the city expands one existing dog park and opens a new one. The city plans to complete in 2024 the Mitchell Park dog park renovation, which will get an expanded area for large dogs and a smaller fenced area for smaller dogs. The project will increase the dog park from 0.56 acres to 0.82 acres, according to the city’s Public Works Department.
And later in the year, the city will open the new and improved Boulware Park, which will grow from 1.6 acres to 2.4 acres and which will include a dog park among its new amenities. Both south Palo Alto projects are part of a broader movement by the city to add more dog parks throughout the city. A recreation master plan that the City Council adopted in 2017 established a goal of at least six dedicated, fenced dog parks throughout the city. The following year, Palo Alto opened a new dog park at Peers Park, raising the new total to four (Mitchell, Hoover and Greer parks have the others). A new report from Daren Anderson, assistant director in the Community Services Department, suggests that the movement won’t stop any time soon.
In recent months, city staff, members of the Parks and Recreation Commission members and local dog owners have been exploring the feasibility of adding a dog park at Hopkins Park, an effort that raised concerns because of the park’s proximity to the San Francisquito Creek. Other areas in north Palo Alto that the group is considering for a fenced dog park include Johnson Park, El Camino Park and Rinconada Park.
Residents in the Barron Park neighborhood, meanwhile, have suggested dog parks in either Bol Park, Briones Park or Strawberry Hill, according to Anderson. While a future Barron Park dog park remains a possibility, Anderson’s report suggests that the city is more concerned about adding parks to north Palo Alto.
“The lack of dog parks on the north side of the city, together with the prevalence of people allowing dogs to run off-leash outside of designated dog parks in parks and on school property, underscores the need for more off-leash dog parks in the near term,” he wrote. The Parks and Recreation Commission will discuss the new dog parks at its Sept. 26 meeting.