The school board meets tomorrow night in Malibu …
… the PCB remediation at Juan Cabrillo is finished.
A small business bites the dust at Point Dume.
And power poles around you are still unsafe … 33 percent flunk the test.
We’ll have a special report.
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This is Malibu’s only local daily news.
It’s the Wednesday edition … from Radio Malibu …. 97 point 5 K B U.
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A small business is going out of business at Point Dume.
Cafe Organcito’s last day is today.
Employees announced the coffee shop’s closure on social media yesterday.
The shop had opened at Point Dume Village several years ago.
The attached bookstore … Bank of Books … closed a year ago.
The closure leaves two coffee shops still open at the small shopping center.
The independently-owned Lilly’s Cafe is a few steps away.
And the Starbucks outlet in Pavillon’s is at the other end of the shopping center.
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Here’s the storm damage update ….
Caltrans was able to open Decker Canyon Road overnight.
But it was scheduled to close again this morning . and stay closed through Friday night.
Crews will need the roadway closed for the next three days to knock loose rocks
East of Malibu …
Topanga Canyon Boulevard remains closed … just north of P C H.
Yesterday … Caltrans said good progress was being made on hauling away the hillsides and cliff rocks that fell on the lower part of the canyon road last week.
Union Engineering Company of Ventura yesterday hauled away 36 loads of debris from the work zone.
Today they expect to haul away that many loads … or more.
Two and a half miles up the canyon … grading a slope next to the road is almost finished.
A Caltrans geologist will inspect the steep hillside to determine whether additional grading is needed.
Then the crews will place geo fabric for erosion protection and hydro seed.
At a cliff three and a half miles up from P C H … most of the loose boulders and exposed tree roots were removed Monday.
Yesterday the contractor was using air bags to pry loose and then remove loose boulders.
Heavy machinery is in use in the roadway and further assessments of the stability of slopes must be completed before the road can be opened for the public.
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The Santa Monica Malibu school board meets tomorrow evening at 5-30 at Malibu City Hall.
On the agenda … the achievement gap.
School leaders will talk about why some students do very well in the local schools … and others so dismally.
Pam Kazee … the district’s special education director … will make a presentation.
That’s early in the agenda … at 5:30 tomorrow at Malibu City Hall.
As the meeting goes on … the school board will look at the Cabrillo Elementary School reconstruction project … which is substantially finished.
The project was required to get rid of windows and foors that were built in the 1960s … when PCB was a common building ingredient.
The PCB remediation at Juan Cabrillo is finished.
The school’s windows and doors have been replaced … every surface has been repainted or refloored … a virtual new school has been built inside the old buildings.
The project was supposed to cost just under 900 thousand dollars.
Another hundred thousand dollars was required to address unforeseen paint and other potential dangerous material abatement issues and state-mandated architectural changes,
The Cabrillo project is nearly finished
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You are listening to the latest news from Radio Malibu … 97.5 K B U. ((( time ))))
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There are 2 thousand 8 hundred and 48 power poles in Malibu that do not meet state safety standards.
That’s of one month ago … even after Southern California Edison replaced 15-hundred 47 poles in a crash replacement program ordered after a pole fell over and ignited a firestorm in Malibu Canyon in 2007.
A document marked “confidential – public disclosure restricted” has been obtained by K B U U News in the files at the California Public Utilities Commission.
It’s a Status Report for Malibu … prepared by Southern California Edison as a result of a legal settlement it agreed to several years ago.
In that agreement …. Edison paid 20 million dollars to the state for having covered up the condition of the overloaded and termite ridden pole that fell in Malibu Canyon, causing the fire.
It also agreed to spend 17 million dollars to evaluate the 9 thousand or so poles in the Malibu area … and replace the ones that fail to meet state safety factor regulations.
The company was supposed to file bimonthly reports on this effort … and the state was supposed to put them up on their internet site.
Despite frequent requests … those reports were marked “confidential – public disclosure restricted.”
And the state has refused to release all of the reports … plus the state analysis of the Edison work … which was ordered by the Public Utilities Commission.
KBU station manager Hans Laetz … who was a party to the formal state investigation … has been trying to get these so-called public documents for months.
The study says that … as of the end of November … 28 percent of the wooden poles in Malibu are so bent that they violate state safety factor regulations.
One point 5 percent are buckling …. and 3-point-4 percent have bad guy wires.
The promised 17 million dollar fund to replace poles … was supposed to come from shareholders of Edison International … not ratepayers.
All of that money was supposed to be spent on poles in the Malibu area .. along major highways.
The confidential document says only about 40 percent of that has been spent … despite the 2 thousand 8 hundred and 48 power poles in Malibu that are failing safety factor standards.
The company says it is holding on to 9 million dollars to pay its share of a different project.
Verizon and two other cellphone companies … in a separate settlement …. are supposed to replace all of the poles in Malibu Canyon.
That project is years behind schedule.
It is not clear if Edison is allowed to hold on to the 9 million dollars in Malibu repair fund money … to shift to the separate … malibu Canyon project.
Bottom line … nearly 30 percent of the power poles in Malibu are not safe … according to state safety factor standards and an Edison study.
The company has replaced only 16 hundred of the 44 hundred substandard poles in Malibu … and has basically run out of money for the rest.
There is the regular Edison pole replacement effort … but that will take years to get to all the bad poles in
KBUU has been asking Edison for their reaction to all this for a week.
No reply.
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Traffic …
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Weather for the Malibu ….
Patchy fog this morning and much cooler than predicted.
It will be (((( just 61 )))) degrees for a high today on the beach … (((( 65 )))) inland.
Winds will be gentle. Winds off the ocean will be ((( 10 )))) miles per hour this afternoon.
Sunset tonight is at (((( 5:24 )))).
After that … expect it to be ((( more patchy fog late )))) tonight … a low of (((( 51 )))) on the beach … down to (((( 41 )))) in the canyons.
Tomorrow should be (((( cooler and cloudy. )))).
Right now … it’s (((( 50 )))) at Trancas.
(((( 55 )))) in upper Malibu Canyon.
And it’s (((( 51 ))) at Civic center Los Angeles.
In the ocean … it’s (((( 54 )))) degrees in the water at Zuma Beach.
The lifeguards say the waves today are (((( 2-4 )))) feet high ….
(((( New West swell building in. Offshore AM wind ))))
Those are (((( fair )))) surfing conditions …. according to the lifeguards.
((((( High tide is at 11:53 AM.
Low tide is at 6:27 PM ))))
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Our KBU Newswire is posted at midmorning at the Malibu Times dot com.
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