By Cathy Mounce, Register Staff Writer The Daily Register Wed Feb 19, 2014, 09:09 AM CST

Gainesville The Gainesville Independent School Board (GISD) convened Monday for the February meeting at which Robert E. Lee Intermediate teacher Ashley Jones was named GISD teacher of the month.

Jones was nominated by Lee principle Dee Dosher who said that Jones innovative approach in teaching English second language students (ESL) has shown a positive increase in fourth grade reading from 8.45 percent to 43.48 percent during the last six weeks.

In other GISD news, Heartland Park & Recreations Mike Hill reported to the board regarding the continuing efforts by the contractor to complete the new baseball field at the high school.

Hill said that the weather has again caused some unforeseen delays but that he anticipates everything ready to go in two weeks.

Gainesville will have a great facility that will serve the community for many years, Hill said.

Two 30 x 40 foot concrete pads on the north side on the concession stand and one on the south side are being poured this week, light poles are being placed, dugout roofs are being finished and the grass sod is being placed in the outfield, he continued. Infield red clay will be added to the infield and bases will be set soon.

Hill said that the sod would need two weeks to root and the players should be kept off it during that time.

This means a completion date of March 3 now, said GISD board president Will Presson. We are looking forward to the completion of this project.

Hill also said that the new bus barn pad is done and once inspected it would be 20 days to construct the new bus building that will be located off Radio Road in Gainesville.

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Jones named GISD teacher of the month

Houston, Texas (PRWEB) February 17, 2014

Fresh Patchmaker of the real-grass, disposable dog pottyoffers some helpful advice about taking care of a dog or puppy Valentine gift. Now that February 14 has passed, the real work begins in helping a Valentine pet successfully adjust to a new home. Unfortunately, pets that are gifts may be returned to shelters and pet stores if this transition process doesnt go smoothly.

The Fresh Patch Company notes that the safety of a new pet needs to be the first concern. Valentines day can leave behind a trail of things that, if eaten or chewed by a dog, can result in harm or death. These include chocolate, other sweets, alcohol, petals of some flowers, thorny rose stems, gift paper, ribbons, and ties. New owners are well-advised to dog-proof their homes, just as parents do for a child. In addition to the dangerous things left from Valentines day, there are year-round hazards, such as loose wires on the floor, which can be easily chewed by dogs. A good way to avoid problems is for owners to put their eyes at dog level and then walk through their homes looking for potential safety hazards, especially for mischievous puppies.

House-training a new Valentine pet, or any new pet, can be a special challenge. According to the Fresh Patch Company, a large percentage of their customers are new dog owners who want to train their pets on real grassnot on synthetic products such as pee pads and fake grass. A Company spokesperson says that dogs will make a natural connection between the real grass in Fresh Patch and the real grass outside the home. That association will make house-training easier. The Company points out that Fresh Patch is made with dirt-free hydroponic grass, which is super absorbent and lighter in weight than regular sod. Most customers who try Fresh Patch for house-training purposes continue their convenient delivery service after the training period ends. The reason is that they can avoid walking their dogs early in the morning, late at night, or in bad weather. In many parts of the country, this winter has been particularly hard on dogs and their owners, says a Fresh Patch Company spokesperson. Fresh Patch is a convenient way to cope with a dogs bathroom needs in snow, ice, and freezing cold, as well as other times when dog walking is not safe or possible.

To learn more about the Fresh Patch company, visit http://www.freshpatch.com.

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Fresh Patch Shares Tips on Caring for Valentine-Gift Dogs and Puppies

FARGO, N.D. Wildlife officials said Friday that a $35 million federal program to conserve wetlands and grasslands in the five-state Prairie Pothole Region is an effort to find new ways to protect native prairie with less money from the government.

The Department of Agriculture's Environmental Quality Incentives Program includes conservation grants, carbon credits and technical assistance for farmers, ranchers and others who volunteer to participate. The federal program targets native prairie considered to be at high risk of conversion to cropland.

"We are at a critical time," Agriculture Undersecretary Robert Bonnie said Friday in announcing the program. "There is significant pressure on grasslands in the Great Plains and we have to be more targeted with the conservation we do."

Prairie potholes are shallow depressions that are wetlands and are commonly found in North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa and Montana. The region provides important breeding and nesting habitat for more than 60 percent of the nation's migratory waterfowl. The Dakotas are especially hotbeds for pheasant and duck hunting.

Bonnie said the native grasses in the region provide vital water storage to reduce regional flooding and improve water quality. He said there's also potential to store carbon in soils, which reduces the level of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere.

Eric Lindstrom, government affairs representative for Ducks Unlimited in Bismarck, said a pilot program with similar incentives was held in North Dakota last year. It protected about 24,000 acres of land at a cost of about $3 million.

"Basically we're working to keep the grass sod-side up by offering a new series of incentives," Lindstrom said.

High commodity prices in recent years, along with new varieties of crops such as corn and soybeans that allow planting in less receptive soils, have cut into interest in the Conservation Reserve Program, Bonnie said. The program allows landowners to take marginal cropland out of production for 10 to 15 years.

Many of those contracts are about to expire. In addition, the number of acres in rural CRP land will be ratcheted down from a cap of about 32 million acres in the previous farm bill to 24 million in 2017, as a cost savings measure.

"There are some new programs in the farm bill we think will enhance our efforts here. It gives us a few more tools in the toolbox," Bonnie said. "We want to roll this out now as folks are thinking about operations for the next year."

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Program Provides $35 Million to Help Conservation

DENHAM SPRINGS, LA (WAFB) -

Amanda Toups made her way around her muddy yard Monday afternoon in the newly constructed Quail Creek neighborhood near Denham Springs.

Toups says she received a picture from her husband last Friday showing a Ward 2 Water excavator on her front lawn. Toups says workers told her husband they had to dig up her yard to install water lines for the new house across the street. A big dirt mound was left behind and Toups wanted answers.

"I started to contact Ward 2 and said when are you going to come out and fix this and they said we just have to let nature run its course refusing to give any kind of help," said Toups.

Toups is not alone. There is another yard down the street with a mound of mud left behind. Toups says she continued to call and was eventually referred to Ward 2's head foreman who she says refused to do anything but fill the hole with dirt because the company had right of way.

"I was shocked, mad, upset," said Toups. "It's just not fair that they can come on your personal property do whatever they want, never notify you and not even leave a note on the door explaining what happened."

The damage to Toup's yard is beyond the six foot right away which is why she believes Ward 2 Water should be responsible.

In a phone call, Ward 2 Water Manager Preston Killcrease explained normal procedure is to fill in holes with removed dirt and spread it evenly. Killcrease also vowed to make sure Toups was satisfied.

"We will do anything to please the customer," added Killcrease. "Anything it takes I'm all for it."

Killcrease also requested that we give Toups his cell phone number and after a quick call with him Toups said she was feeling optimistic.

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Livingston Parish resident says water company damaged lawn

SANTA CLARA -- At 80 percent complete, Levi's Stadium is approaching the cosmetic-touches stage, some seven months until the 49ers' official home opener in what's expected to be a Week 2 matchup on "Sunday Night Football."

"We're right about where we expected to be," project executive Jack Hill said Wednesday as he ushered select media on a stadium tour.

Most of the heavy lifting appears done, and now it's as if they're putting lipstick on, well, a newly discovered supermodel.

Six months remain before the stadium hosts its first event: an Aug. 2 soccer game between the San Jose Earthquakes and Seattle Sounders FC.

The 49ers will play two exhibition games there in August before a probable two-week break ahead of its regular-season unveiling. (The NFL schedule typically is released in April.)

Two years after the stadium's groundbreaking, sod will be placed down in April, a strand of Bermuda called "Bandera" that's supposedly "shade tolerant" and able to "rebound quickly." The grass is being grown two hours east in Livingston, which is some 10 miles away from quarterback Colin Kaepernick's childhood home of Turlock.

Also in April, the final seats are expected to be installed, and team and stadium staff will begin moving into offices inside the stadium, which is a mere 13 feet from the 49ers' long-time training facility.

Here are other notes gleaned from the two-hour tour:

That behind-enemy-lines entrance conceivably could happen just for pregame warmups when the teams follow hallways adjacent to elite clubs so fans can see them. Both teams likely will come out through tunnels at opposing corners of the stadium, however, in pregame introductions, team president Paraag Marathe added.

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49ers' new Levi's Stadium making progress

The Los Angeles County district attorney's office is looking into whether thousands of dollars in taxpayer money was misspent on improvements to Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas' home last year, an office spokeswoman said Tuesday.

Newly released records show that a contractor charged the county $6,239 to perform work during a project to install a security system that included replacing interior walls in Ridley-Thomas' converted garage and trenching the property for an electrical upgrade.

The supervisor reimbursed the county $3,759 on Oct. 29 for an air conditioner and heater, a flat-screen television and a refrigerator the crews placed in the garage. Of that amount, $960 was for labor costs for installing the air conditioner and heater, according to the records.

The documents, which The Times obtained from the county under the California Public Records Act, provide the most complete picture yet of the scope and cost of the work in September and October at the supervisor's Leimert Park home.

District attorney's office spokeswoman Jean Guccione said the office's review grew out of a complaint that prosecutors received last month. She declined to elaborate. The Times first reported on the work performed at Ridley-Thomas' home in mid-January.

County supervisors are entitled to home security systems provided by the government, but not to unrelated improvements to their property at taxpayers' expense. Ridley-Thomas has insisted that the work at his home was completely proper and that he reimbursed the county for any items not related to the security system.

The total cost to taxpayers for the job was $10,038, according to Assistant County Counsel Judy Whitehurst.

The records show that the county contractor was given the task of removing wall paneling and drywall from the supervisor's detached garage and installing about 640 square feet of new drywall. The project included adding new baseboards as well as painting all new woodwork. Outside the garage, the contractor was to dig a trench through lawn and concrete from the home's electrical panel to the garage, the records say. The work was to entail planting up to 1,000 square feet of Bermuda grass sod. The records did not detail how much of the work was done.

The documents describe the project as a "security measure." The county redacted from the records descriptions of an additional $436 in work by the contractor, apparently because it was related to the security system. The name of the contractor was also withheld.

John Thompson, the county project manager who oversaw the work, previously told The Times that the trench was dug to bury conduit as part of electrical upgrades to make more power available to the garage.

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D.A. probes work on Ridley-Thomas' garage

A Lifetime Lawn is a healthy lawn. Its an environmentally-friendly investment in the beauty of your home and neighborhood. A Lifetime Lawn is soothing and welcoming.

Lifetime Lawns are grown with Zoysia, Bermuda, or Centipede grasses - all vigorous turfgrasses. They are established by sod, and in the case of Zenith Zoysia and TifBlair Centipede, by sod or seed. Once established, they will last a lifetime, requiring minimal maintenance for a healthy and beautiful appearance.

With 5 farms and 11 outlet stores in Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina, Super-Sod can provide you with unmatched availability and selection of grasses. We have three Atlanta sod outlet locations and locations in the major southeastern cities such as Jacksonville, Florida; Perry and Valdosta, Georgia; Charlotte, Greensboro, Hendersonville, and Raleigh, North Carolina; and Columbia, South Carolina. We ship throughtout Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and North Florida. Visit our Outlet Locator for maps and details.

We supply sod and seed for installations both large and small: from delivering tractor-trailer loads of TifGrand Bermuda turfgrass to golf courses, sports fields, and large construction sites, to loading a DIY homeowners pick-up truck with their needed square footage of Zenith Zoysia at a Super-Sod Outlet, to shipping a 1 lb. bag of TifBlair Centipede seed from our on-line seed store.

We are constantly improving our sod farming and landscaping practices (for instance with our Soil3 organic compost). Likewise with our service to and products for our customers. Here's a video on our new automated sod harvesters that harvest superior rolls of sod for both landscapers and homeowners.

It is important that you select the right Lifetime Lawn, the one that is best suited for your use, lifestyle, aesthetic sense, climate, and budget.Super-Sod grows all the warm-season and cool-season turfgrasses adapted to the Southeast. We are pleased to assist you in making the best selection.

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Turfgrass, Sod, Zoysia, Bermuda, Centipede, Sales, Atlanta ...

Lloy Ball (left) won a gold medal in 2008 with the U.S. volleyball team. Sharon Wichman-Jones (right) won gold and bronze medals in swimming in 1968.

FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WANE) As the Winter Games get underway in Sochi, Russia, two gold medalists in northeast Indiana share their thoughts and memories of the Olympics.

Lloy Ball has gone to four Olympics with the U.S. volleyball team and they took home the gold in 2008. As people from around the world now gather in Sochi, complaints about accommodations have been common.

Ican tell you first-hand , its never great. Its never the Hilton when you go to the Olympics, Ball said.

He said it also isnt uncommon for some facilities to be not quite finished.

When we walked into Olympic Village in Athens, they were still rolling out the sod. The grass wasnt all in yet. Our bathrooms were not done. We had to share a shower for a week until they got it ready, Ball said.

Ball also lived and played in Russia for six years. He was happy to see Sochi get the games.

This is a chance for Russia to showcase being able to hold a big event, he said. Ishook Mr. Putins hand and he wouldnt put the Olympics in Sochi if he didnt think he could protect our athletes and his own athletes.

Heighten security and growing safety concerns have been making headlines leading up to the games.

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Northeast Indiana gold medalists react to Sochi

Del Mar's new turf course is expected to help lure a future Breeders' Cup.

DEL MAR If you think putting in a new turf course at a race track is as simple as watching grass grow, well, you dont know worms about turf.

For an understanding of how involved it is to put in a new grass course for 1,200-pound race horses at Del Mar, know this: It all started Oct. 1, 2012 when sprigs of Greg Norman 1 (GN1) Bermuda grass were planted on a sandy, 12-acre plot in Coachella Valley.

Now February, 2014, that grass is mature and more than ready to be cut, rolled and transported to where the new and improved turf will meet the surf at Del Mar. For nearly a year and a half, the Pacific Sod Company has followed a stringent growing and maintenance plan developed by Del Mar to grow the new turf course.

Thats almost a year and a half of growing, which is unheard of (for a project like Del Mars), said Leif Dickinson, turf and landscape superintendent at Del Mar. It was costly to do, and we dont have NFL money here. But what we have is turf that is as strong as we can make it. That was the key. Grow strong turf and grow it for as long as possible. Its in very good shape. Its ready to go.

Dickinson said the original plan to roll out Del Mars new grass was delayed by more than a month because of soft ground discovered along the backstretch. The plan called for the turf to be put in by early January. The old turf course was installed in 1959-60 for the 1960 summer meeting. It had 53 meetings run on it before it was dug out last fall. It had hidden challenges.

A lot of areas had to be dug out, said Dickinson, who installed Santa Anitas present downhill turf course in 1996. We found soft spots that were difficult to compact. Were at sea level or below here. If you dig down too far, the way it was described to me, its kind of like a cookie on top of a milkshake. If you break through the cookie, theres nothing left below but milkshake. Weve had to re-form the cookie in some areas that needed it. It had to be re-compacted and sealed.

Dickinson said the target date for installing the new grass and sod has been pushed back to Feb. 21 or thereabouts. He said even if the turf doesnt go in until early March, the course will be ready for the Del Mar summer meeting that goes from mid-July to September.

With our climate, well be OK with the latter part of February or even the first part of March (for placing the new turf), Dickinson said. Thats when things actually start to grow here anyway. Its not a deal breaker. Were just anxious to get it down.

When Del Mar opens in July, its tracks will sport vastly different looks and its turf will be treated very differently. The turf course will be wider, making it more attractive for a future Breeders Cup because the turf course will handle 14 horses instead of the 12 in previous years. Del Mar remains in ramped up discussions with Breeders Cup officials who want to bring the games national championships, two days of Grade I racing in early November, to Del Mar, possibly as early as next year and certainly by 2016.

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Del Mar: Where new turf will meet the surf

Feb 3: California drought: Biggest rainfall of 2014 soaks Bay Area Jan 31: California drought: State Water Project will deliver no water this summer Gov. Brown says flush less as California struggles with drought Drought shakes off winter for perilous early spring Jan 30: Obama pledges support amid California drought California wine industry reports robust 2013, but worries loom about drought Drizzle brings hope to thirsty California but does nothing to deter drought Jan 29: Bay Area wakes up to drizzle as light rain appears for first time in more than a month Zone 7 Water Agency seeks 20 percent voluntary water reduction from customers Jan 28: California drought: 17 communities could run out of water within 60 to 120 days, state says Jan 27: Water oak trees if needed, but not too much Rain expected this week won't put dent in the drought, forecasters say Gold prospectors take advantage of California drought California drought: Bay Area water districts start asking urban residents to conserve Jan 26: After decades of payments, EBMUD may finally use its emergency water supply Jan 25: California drought: Past dry periods have lasted more than 200 years, scientists say Jan 23: Around Dublin: Do your part now to get ahead of drought Jan 22: Drought: California is a red state, if you're talking weather Jan 21: California drought: Tips for conserving water Jan 18: Snow makers rescue big Sierra resorts as drought bakes smaller ones Jan 17: Governor Jerry Brown declares drought: Social media reaction Document: Gov. Jerry Brown's declaration of drought emergency Brown declares California drought emergency California drought: Three more months of dry weather likely, National Weather Service announces Jan 16: Drought declared a natural disaster in California, 10 other states Jan 14: Drought imperils California salmon, steelhead California drought: What's causing it? Jan 10: Despite California drought, chances for water bond are evaporating Jan 8: Timm Herdt: Learning to adapt to droughts Jan 3: Barnidge: California droughts aren't nearly as scary as they used to be Dec 29: California drought deepens as another year's rains stay away

When Susan Stompe of Novato finishes a load of laundry, she flips a switch and the leftover water is pumped to a drip system that irrigates her garden of multiflora, tea, climbing and miniature roses, wasting not a drop.

Stompe isn't the only Marin resident who has come up with innovative ways to save water that go beyond ordinary devices such as low-flow toilets. As drought engulfs Marin and water rationing looms, there's much to learn from Stompe and others like her.

While people in the county are conservation-minded anyway, an unprecedented drought has made saving water even more important. Water rationing requiring a 25 percent cut will be imposed on most Marin residents April 1, unless the heavens open in the interim, Krishna Kumar, head of the Marin Municipal Water District, said last week.

Stompe, who is on the Marin Conservation League board of directors and well-known for her environmental activities, didn't need an outside mandate to start saving water. She and her husband Brian have had their washing machine system in place for two years now.

"The other thing we do is to take baths instead of showers, and we water our trees with the bath water," Stompe said. "We have a tube that comes out of our upstairs and goes down to the back yard." Lightly used water like bath water is also known as "graywater."

Stompe's setup was simple and easy to create, she said.

"It's not out of the reach of most people. It's low-tech and not expensive," Stompe said. "The tube attaches to a brick that is in an old sock, so it doesn't scratch the tub," Stompe said.

The brick holds the tube underwater, and Stompe and her husband use a hand pump to get the water flowing into the tube.

"We measured to see how long the tube would have to be, then went to the hardware store and got the tube and a pump. Just a couple of pumps and the water gets going, and you set the pump aside to let the siphon do its thing. The entire setup cost less than $100," Stompe said.

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North Bay homeowners slash water usage through creative conservation