Current News You Can Use

6 th Speech to Networking Toastmasters, 6/24/2013 Good morning, Toastmasters and Honored Guests: I come dressed for work, with a batch of tools to show you, tools that every homeowner would find very handy to have around, regardless of whether or not you do your own gardening, or hire help.  If you hire help that has tools, it is very handy for the help to have extra tools available on occasion.  More important, if you know what you need to have done, and have the tools to do it, you can hire workers without truck or tools for as little as $10 per hour , rather than $15 for those who have tools, and teach them how to garden right from the start.  As a garden coach I can help you figure out exactly what you need to have done, and you can tell your helpers exactly how to do it, or have me explain it for you. I’ll start with a little gem that everyone should own, a battery powered surface sweeper .  It’s light, easy, and so quiet you don’t even need ear...

5 th Speech to Networking Toastmasters, 6/3/2013 Good morning, Toastmasters and Honored Guests: Grants Pass’ top stated goal has long been, “to be a city that looks safe and is safe.”   What’s wrong with that goal? I’ll tell you what’s wrong; that it’s only a goal.   That our city has been taking no real steps to attain it. What makes a city look safe?   I submit that it is cleanliness and order: clean streets, well kept properties; no litter; no graffiti.   Order is intimidating to the disorderly and lawless, comforting to the orderly and law abiding. Weeds, litter and filthy pavements, on the other hand, are encouraging to low life and disturbing to respectable folks.   Disorderly property is worse than bad advertising; it is downright dangerous.   That’s why we have property nuisance codes. In 1982, James Q. Wilson wrote an article for Atlantic Monthly about the disorder that encourages crime.   He called it, “BrokenWindows.” ...