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Gallery gets new name, image Gallery 255 owner Sandra McCullough welcomes guests to the gallery's grand opening celebration on Feb. 5, 2010 in Ventura. Performing next to her is artist/musician Xavier Montes. Formerly known as The Seabreeze Gallery, Gallery 255 is open from noon to 5 p.m. Thursday through Saturday at 255 S. Laurel St. For more information, call 805.861.0624 or click here Photo by Carlos J. Licea/Amigos805 Click on image to see entire set of photos of event
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Elizabeth Alvarez |
True tales of an accidental housing advocate — Elizabeth Alvarez created free education classes for the Area Housing Authority of the County of Ventura that are offered throughout Ventura County. She is a writer, educator and a passionate advocate on behalf of the consumer in the mortgage industry. Read more at consumermortgageadvocate.org |
Recent Updates |
· You support eliminating the residential development land use designations north of Hueneme Road. Residential development presents significant threats to wetland species. The land should remain designated "open space" to continue to buffer the Ormond Beach wetland area from urban impacts. If you cannot attend the hearing, please email the City Council members: Mayor Tom Holden: drtomholden@aol.com Mayor Pro Tem Andres Herrera: andres.herrera@ci.oxnard.ca.us Council Member Dr. Irene Pinkard: irene.pinkard@ci.oxnard.ca.us Council Member Bryan MacDonald: bryan.macdonald@ci.oxnard.ca.us Let them know that you care about the future of our city! For more information contact: |
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'Mixteco-Speakers in California' subject of panel presentation Feb. 8 in Ventura
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Santa Paula Art Museum ready for Feb. 14 grand opening |
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Community dances for a good cause to benefit Future Leaders of America's programs |
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A party with a purpose: Coverage of Susan Jordan campaign gathering
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Former Ventura County publisher earns industry award |
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Wells Fargo donates $50,000
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Supervisor Zaragoza installed as chair of Air Pollution Control District |
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Mexican Consulate opens "Ventanilla de Salud" |
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Los Empresarios announce
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Remembering the Dream |
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Santa Barbara community gathers for immigration |
Click here for full-size video of immigration reform rally in Santa Barbara |
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Galeria de Placencia
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Epoca Nueva in Santa Paula celebrates world's diversity |
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Click here for full-size video of Mercedes Gomez Benet harp recital |
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Supervisor Zaragaza gets media profile Supervisor Zaragoz steps out |
Click here for full-size video of Ignacio Carmona being honored by Board of Supervisors |
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Click here for full-size video of Hispanic Chamber Toy & Canned Food Drive |
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Click here for full-size video of (R)EVOLUTION calendar reception |
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Mexican harpist entertains, educates audience |
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Groups partner to aid Mercy Ministries |
A video slideshow from the Oxnard Student Digital Film Festival and Student Film Workshop presented Oct. 16, 17 in downtown Oxnard and Oxnard College Group photo of Film Festival |
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Amigos805.com Link Partner Mazanillo Sun — November 2009 edition Three for one — Art invasion at the beach By Mariana Llamas-Cendon |
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Frank X. Moraga:
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El Concilio to honor community leaders Feb. 4, 2010 Educators, law enforcement personnel and groups that assist women farm workers and Mixteco immigrants are among the individuals and organizations selected to receive a Latino Leadership Award from El Concilio del Condado de Ventura this year. The awards will be presented at El Concilio’s 21st annual awards ceremony on Saturday, March 20 in Oxnard. Sponsorships are still being accepted for the event. “Service Above All” is the theme for this year’s dinner. Honorees include Barbara Marquez-O’Neill, Steven M. Ramirez II, Damien A. Peña, Veronica Valadez, Organización en California de Lideres Campesinas, Inc., the Mixteco/Indigena Community Organizing Project (MICOP) and the Financial Empowerment Partnership of Ventura County. The Building Bridges Award will be presented to the Leaders in Education Awareness Program (LEAP) from California State University, Channel Islands. Oxnard Assistant Police Chief Scott Whitney will receive the President’s Award. Barbara Marquez-O’Neill has been a human rights advocate and community organizer for more than 40 years. She authored an issue paper for the Ventura County Human Services Agency, “Moving from ‘No Se Puede’ to ‘Sí Se Puede’: A Message of Hope for Violence Prevention in the Oxnard Area,” which contributed to the development of the Oxnard Safety Blue Print Plan. Marquez-O’Neill is a consultant on youth development and violence prevention for the City of Oxnard and the County of Ventura Probation and Human Services agencies. She is a member of the Ventura County Perinatal Substance Abuse Task Force, FIRST 5 of Ventura County and the Ventura County Child Death and Domestic Violence Death Review Team. She also is a commissioner for the Community Commission of Ventura County. Steven M Ramirez II, a senior police officer for the City of Oxnard, has a long history of community service. As a member of the Commission on Community Relations, he has volunteered more than 20 hours per month during the past two years to community-based activities and projects. For the past three years, he has volunteered as a community representative for the City of Oxnard Multi-Cultural Festival and has served as a facilitator for the Oxnard College Youth Leadership Conference. He has been a youth mentor for the Oxnard PRYDE Program, which works in collaboration with City Impact, the Oxnard Elementary School District and the Oxnard Police Department to mentor at-risk youth. He has also granted a “Ramirez Family Memorial Scholarship” to graduating high school seniors and deserving adults who are continuing their education. Damien A. Peña, a native of Oxnard, has made it his mission to affect Latinos in Ventura County by empowering underrepresented students to pursue higher education. He served for nine years as the senior director of academic programs at California Lutheran University. In October 2007, he became the director of Access, Orientation and Transition Programs at California State University, Channel Islands. He was promoted to serve as interim Dean of Students, becoming the first Latino to serve in that role at the university. In June 2009, he was awarded the Division of Student Affairs’ Pillar of Excellence Award. Most recently, he served as a key initiator for the university’s application to become a Hispanic-serving institution. He is currently pursuing a doctorate in higher education leadership at CLU. |
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Veronica Valadez, an educator and community advocate, was raised in Santa Maria, California, by Mexican immigrant farm-worker parents. Influenced by her mother to achieve her dreams, Valadez graduated from UCSB with academic honors. The mother of two is currently working on her master’s degree in Chicano studies at California State University, Northridge. She is the founder and owner of Under the Sun Gallery at the Bell Arts Factory and also teaches and performs traditional Mexica/Azteca dance. Organizacion en California de Lideres Campesinas Inc. is based in Oxnard, but has chapters throughout California. The group was founded in 1992 to promote the development of women leaders in the farm-worker community so they can become agents of social, economic and political change and promote human rights of farm-worker women. The group seeks to raise awareness on a variety of issues facing women, from violence in the home to bad working conditions, reproductive justice and other social issues including sexual harassment and assaults in the workplace. Mixteco/Indigena Community Organizing Project (MICOP) was founded in 2001 to address the concerns of indigenous farm workers from the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca. More than 20,000 Mixtecs live and work in Ventura County, and many speak primarily Mixteco and Zapoteco. MICOP holds monthly meetings at Las Islas Medical Group, serves hot meals and hosts educational presentations in Spanish and Mixteco on prenatal care, pesticide exposure, nutrition and domestic violence. MICOP also maintains a “Necessities of Life” program which helps distribute clothing, diapers, blankets and others items to families in need. The Financial Empowerment Partnership of Ventura County consists of the Business and Employment Services Department of the Ventura County Human Services Agency, the Cabrillo Economic Development Corp. and the Internal Revenue Service. Formed in 2005, the partnership increases awareness of and access to the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) program. The group supports multiple "Earn It! Keep It! Save It!" Volunteer Income Tax Assistance Program (VITA) sites in Ventura County, which offers free tax filing assistance to low-income tax filers. From January through April 2009, 21 volunteer tax preparers filed 523 returns at VITA sites, generating $732,163 in total refunds, including $357,839 in EITC. Assistant Police Chief Scott Whitney was raised in Oxnard and earned his bachelor’s degree in business administration/finance from the University of Oregon. He also received a master’s degree in public administration from California State University, Northridge. He has been with the Oxnard Police Department for 19 years, and has served as director of the Oxnard PRYDE Project for at-risk youth. He is a board member of the Oxnard chapter of Parents of Murdered Children, assisting parents in coping with the loss of a loved one due to acts of violence. He is also chair of the department’s Cultural Proficiency training program. The CSU Channel Islands Leaders in Education Awareness Program (LEAP) consists of student volunteers who host a campus visit program called “Pathways to College” for kindergarten to 8th-grade students every Friday during the academic year. The four-hour program includes a “How to get to college” presentation. During a three-month period, LEAP students provided presentations to more than 760 students in 13 schools in Ventura County. Many of the LEAP student volunteers are first-generation college-bound, low-income and underrepresented students. The awards dinner will be held at the Oxnard Performing Arts Center, 800 Hobson Way. Seat reservations are still being accepted. Individual tickets are $125. Sponsorships — $2,000 for corporate, $1,500 for a table of eight — are also still being accepted. For more information, contact Tania I. Corona, director of operations at 805.486.9777 ext 273 or via email at ticorona@elconcilioventura.org |
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Mariana Llamas-Cendon:
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Omar D'Leon is a Nicaraguan-born artist who fled from his country during the Sandinista era to settle down in Ventura County, where he is exhibiting some of his most recent and some never-before-seen artworks. Jan. 28, 2010 Reality and magic aren’t necessarily staunch enemies. Both, as Colombian writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Dutch graphic artist M.C. Escher have proven several times, can share a single space and time in which they not only blend to perfection but also don’t disturb their own realms. This artistic concurrence, better known as “Magic Realism” — a term coined by German art critic Franz Roh during the 1920s — is defined in Wikipedia.com as the introduction of fantastic or illogical objects or scenarios in a very real or common setting that makes them look ordinary, and can be found in almost every artistic expression from literature to film. Painting couldn’t escape from the “Magic Realism” spell as Nicaraguan-born artist and 27-year Ventura County resident Omar D’Leon exhibits “The Magical Realism of the Americas: The Art of Master Painter Omar D’Leon,” which is showing until Feb. 28 at the Museum of Ventura County. D’Leon is a well-known Latin American artist who “In 1970 founded Museo-Galeria 904 in Managua, but Nicaragua’s massive earthquake of 1972 destroyed much of the museum, and many of D’Leon’s paintings were lost or looted,” a museum’s press release points out. “Today his pieces are in the collections of the Museum of Latin American Contemporary Art in Washington, D.C., the Ponce Museum of Art in Puerto Rico, the Chicago Art Institute, the Cuevas Museum in Mexico City, and the Museum of Latin American Art in Long Beach, California, among other collections. In 1982 one of his paintings was reproduced in the form of a stamp for UNICEF.” Although bright and numerous colors are predominant in D’Leon’s work, fruits, women and tropical elements also can be found as a remembrance of his motherland, according to a story published by the Nicaraguan newspaper La Prensa. “He is known for his light-reflecting colors and surface textures, created by crosshatch scoring through oil and wax sometimes more then 20 layers deep,” the museum’s press release states. Anna Bermudez, curator of the Museum of Ventura County, said she is found of the color usage and the themes displayed in D’Leon’s paintings, in particular a piece named “Puberty.” She added that one thing she really enjoys about looking at D’Leon’s paintings is finding unusual elements in a quick glance since they are masterly fused with other very ordinary objects. For more information about the exhibit, visit www.venturamuseum.org |
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Carlos J. Licea:
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Commentary: How do you spell ripoff? Jan. 22, 2010 Coming up on my periodic visit to my doctor, I realized that I had missed my previous appointment and that my prescriptions for my life-saving meds had run out. I save some of my hard-earned cash by buying supposedly cheaper meds from my insurance company’s pharmacy and get my medication delivered every 90 days from its central location in Winter Park, Fla. |
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