A new audit slams the University of California system for favoring foreign and out of state students because they pay higher tuitions, Mayor Harvey Hall shows more class and no, Trader Joe's is not shutting down

* ... UC SYSTEM: A new report sharply criticized the University of California system for favoring foreign and out of state students over California residents simply because they pay more in tuition.

This probably shouldn't come as any surprise, but the audit was the harshest criticism yet for the UC system that has long been under attack for admitting more out of state students as a way to balance its budget. It recommended, among other things, a cap on foreign and out of state students as well as stricter entrance requirements. How many outstanding, high achieving California students do you know who have been forced to out out of state simply because the UC System needs more money?

 * ... HARVEY HALL: Among the reasons I will miss Harvey Hall as mayor is the way he welcomes, embraces and appreciates all voices in our community. Among those voices is the local Sikh community, which is significant and growing, and which will hold its annual parade and celebration later this month. Hall is now appearing on public affairs spots on local television promoting the event, and we can only hope his successor is equally as welcoming to all diverse elements who share this place we call home.

 * ... APRIL FOOLS: What was the Yahoo! news site thinking by allowing someone to post an April Fools story saying Trader Joe's was shutting all of its 500 stores across the country? The story, posted Thursday the day before April 1, went viral on social media before it was exposed for just what it was, a premature bad joke.

 * ... SPOTTED ON TWITTER: "I think the only way I’ll ever be motivated to go to the gym is if I’m in prison."

 * ... OVERHEARD: "The only thing worse than smokers are the smokers who dump their ashtrays into a parking lot."

 * ... SHARP SHOOTER: Frontier High school junior Remington DeWitt has done it again, earning yet another accolade in the sport of skeet shooting. DeWitt, daughter of Stuart and Kourtney DeWitt, has been named to the Zone 7 All Area Ladies team that will compete in the regional shoot next month in Phoenix. Not bad for a 16 year old.

 * ... MEMORIES: John Strand from Lake Isabella says you might a Bakersfield old-timer "if you remember Marge Stiles (Styles?).  She was the weather lady at KERO-TV when studios were in the El Tejon Hotel downtown. Even though her monochrome graphics consisted of a grease marker and some Plexiglas, and there were no weather satellites, her forecasts were surprisingly accurate."

Here's one for the books: Who remembers the Great Kern County Mouse War of 1926? And another oil town in Texas has the lowest unemployment rate in the country

* … MOUSE WAR: John Pryor sent me a note tipping me off to the great Kern County "mouse war" of 1926. It's such an odd story I simply must share it. Turns out Kern County had experienced several years of drought and by 1926 the Buena Vista Lake was dry. Two men then planted 11,000 acres of barley and maize in the dry lake bed, which proved to be an ideal breeding ground for mice. Then, it began to rain and the water level started rising, sending mice scurrying for higher ground. Pryor said more than 50,000 mice were killed in one day by the use of poisoned barley. On Taft

Highway, thousands of mice were ground to deal under car wheels. A man was then hired to poison the mice and - according to legend - some 44 million mice were killed. Sea gulls, ravens and hawks then moved in and the "war" was over. And that, as they say, is the rest of the story.

* … OIL TOWNS: I read with interest a story the other day saying that the U.S. metro area with the lowest unemployment rate is a shale oil boomtown: Midland, Texas. Midland's jobless rate is just 2.9 percent and the city is one of the fastest growing metro areas in the nation thanks to Permian Basin Shale. Kern County, of course, is also experiencing a boom in oil production yet our unemployment rate is well north of 10 percent.

 * … SERVICE: Memo to Damon Culbertson, general manager of Subaru of Bakersfield: not only is your product first class, but your service representative Amanda David is a gem.

 * … PAINTER: And speaking of white glove service, I ran into my favorite house painter Rich Johnson the other day. There are a lot of good painters in town, but few are as meticulous - not to mention just plain nice and cheerful - as Rich. Johnson Painting can be reached at (661) 706-1077.

 * … KENNY BARNES: The 32nd annual Ken Barnes Open Skeet Championship is coming up this weekend out at the Kern County Gun Club. This is an excellent chance to catch some of the top All-American shooters from across the country. The tournament is named in honor of Bakersfield's own Ken Barnes, known as the "father of the 400 X 400." For the uninitiated, that means he hit all 400 targets without so much as one miss. The tournament runs Friday through Sunday.

 * … MEMORIES: I was at Chalet Basque this weekend when a reader asked me a question I couldn't answer. He wanted to know the name of a small cafe that occupied the space where Tam O'Shanter now sits. He thought it was "Touey's" but he wasn't sure of the spelling. Ideas?

Downtown Bakersfield boasts new eateries including the new upscale steak house The Mark, and local kids bust the clays in skeet tournaments

* ... EATS: I wandered into the new downtown steak house called The Mark this week and I have one word for it: spectacular. It's located in the old Goose Loonies building on 19th Street just around the corner from the Fox Theater and the Padre Hotel, and though its sign is not yet up, the renovated building with a handsome outdoor patio are easy to find. The eatery features wide distressed wood floors and long dark bar that remind me of some old place on Union Square in San Francisco or a rusty speakeasy in the swank Palermo neighborhood of Buenos Aires. The owners, two podiatrists, tell me the grand opening will come later, but this is a place to stop by if you are in the mood for something new and exciting. Meanwhile just a block down the street Dr. Nick Hansa says business is brisk at his Chef's Choice Noodle Bar, a clean and welcoming Thai restaurant with a friendly buzz and terrific food. Chef's Choice opened in April of last year and has now gotten into the catering business as well. If you are one of those who live in the Southwest or Northwest and haven't ventured downtown recently, you are missing some terrific eateries. (file photos of Chef's Choice Noodle Bar)

* ... SKEET: Bakersfield has a long tradition of producing world champion skeet shooters, and the Buoni children continued that legacy at the Junior World Skeet Shoot in Stockton this past weekend. Dominic Buoni, a graduate of Bakersfield Christian High School who now attends Lindenwood University on a skeet scholarship, was crowned Collegiate .410 bore champion and Collegiate high overall runner up by busting 397 out of 400 targets. Meanwhile his little sister, Jenna, took home high overall Junior Lady Runner-up third and Junior Lady .410 champ. Congratulations to these kids. (Dominic, center, shown with his skeet squad)

*  ... SPOTTED: Donald Taylor spotted actor Ned Beatty at Noriega's last week enjoying lunch. "He looked fit and was very gracious to all. Semper Fi," Taylor said. (file photo of Ned Beatty)

 * ... OVERHEARD: A resident of La Cresta is sharing the story of a neighbor who stumbled upon a homeless encampment at the rear of his property near Garces Memorial High School. "It looked like someone had been living there for months," she said.


* ... LANE SPLITTING: What is your feeling about motorcyclists who split lanes in traffic? Kerry McGill said he generally has no problem with it unless it is done at reckless, high speeds. "Several years ago while returning from Irvine I was in the car pool lane doing 10 miles an hour when a motorcycle passed me doing 65 mph and hit my passenger side mirror. He ended up crashing, breaking both legs. A motorcyclist behind him stopped and said he could not believe how reckless that guy was. How many times, I wonder, have we drivers been startled by those lane splitting in stopped or almost stopped traffic. I think it should be illegal, and I have a motorcycle license."

* .... EARTHQUAKE: Here's one last memory of the 1952 earthquake, a note from Linda Meadows Polston who was just three and a half years old but recalls it vividly.  Her parents had been awakened by a loud roar and ran into their back yard where her father held her tightly. "My grandma Perry was saying loudly, 'I hear the trumpets of the Lord.' She kept repeating it ... my grandma was convinced that the Lord's kingdom was coming and right now! It's amazing how a traumatic incident sticks in one's mind with clarity, even for a small child." (photo courtesy of BakersfieldNow.com)

 * ... LEGION: The good folks over at the American Legion Post 26 have opened a thrift shop on the southeast corner of 21st and H streets. It is staffed by volunteers and customers pay what they can afford. All this to support local veterans, a cause worth supporting. The store is open from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Cash deals make up 31 percent of all home sales in California, and remembering Railroad Avenue School

 * ... CASH DEALS: Not that it's entirely surprising, but now comes word that cash transactions are accounting for an increasing number of home sales. The reason? Tight credit has made it difficult for even the most qualified buyers to get loans. And, it may also be a sign that wealthy investors believe prices are at or near the bottom. This is all according to a story in the Los Angeles Times which says a record 30.9 percent of all the homes sold in California in January were cash deals. Local Realtors tell me they are seeing the same trend here as investors start to grab up property now going at near all-time low prices.

 * ... BIRTHDAY: Sending out special birthday wishes to Evelyn Johnson, the beloved office manager for the Rotary Club of Bakersfield (the downtown club ). When Evelyn started with the club back in 1955 the office was in the old El Tejon Hotel, which stood where the downtown Bank of America tower is today. "The Rotary office later moved to the lobby of the old hotel, and that was fun," she said.  "We faced 17th Street and were next door to the barber shop." Evelyn is the "heart" of the downtown club and has worked closely with every president over the past 56 years. Here's to you, E.

 * ... HOT SHOTS: There's a big skeet tournament this weekend out at the Kern County Gun Club, but the real attraction will be some of the best young shooters in the nation. Lindenwood University, a small liberal arts school in St. Charles, Missouri, fields perhaps the best collegiate skeet squad in the nation. And two of those Lindenwood shooters hail from Bakersfield: Dominic Buoni and Elizabeth Keys. Dominic graduated from Bakersfield Christian High School and is a freshman at Lindenwood while Elizabeth, a Ridgeview High graduate, is a sophomore. These kids earned college scholarships through skeet shooting and are walking ambassadors for the shotgun sports and the Second Amendment. The tournament runs Friday, Saturday and Sunday. (Elizabeth Key shown shooting below)

 * ... BLOOMFIELD'S: Gary Crabtree is a local appraiser and one of the leading experts on the Bakersfield housing market. And he also knows enough about Bakersfield history to correct an earlier post on the location of Bloomfield's drive in. "It was at the northeast corner of Niles and Baker across from Washington Jr. High. How do I know? I asked my mom who is 93. She was living with my great aunt on Niles Street (two doors down from where Chief Justice Earl Warren lived) and she would walk to Bloomfield's for sodas and milkshakes. She met my dad at Bloomfield's one evening where he was soda jerking at the time and they were married a short time later. I was born in 1938 so I think this was circa 1936 or so."

 * ... JERRY'S WORLD: Local resident Jerry Kirkland shared  his memories of growing up as a "park rat" around Beale Park in the late 1940s and early 1950s. He's written a fascinating history of this time period and has allowed me to periodically use excerpts. Today, he talks about Emerson Junior High, which opened its doors in 1876. "It was called Railroad Avenue School because it faced Railroad Avenue which later would be renamed Truxtun Avenue. The first Railroad Avenue School was a wood frame structure that was burned to the ground by arsonists shortly after it opened. A $12,000 refurbishing program was begun in 1901, this time using brick for the construction of 12 new classrooms. It was renamed Emerson School in 1904 and was, at that time, an elementary school. Later it became a junior high school and would remain in service until 1952 when it was damaged beyond repair by the earthquake."

 * ... BAKERSFIELDISM: You know you're a "dalian" (from Oildale) if you "remember as a fourth grader walking to Beardsley School, picking grass along Robert's Lane and feeding it to the cows through the fence at the Teakwood Dairy. Those were the days." Thanks to Vicki Kyker-Jameson for this little jewel.

Bakersfield among top five "risky cities" for foreclosures and more on those burglaries across town

 

* ... RISKY CITIES: Bakersfield made another list of dubious distinction this week by being included among the nation's  "riskiest cities for homeowners." This latest bit of bad news came via Forbes.com (read the entire piece here) which compiled a list of the top cities where homeowners are facing foreclosure. In those top ten cities, an average of 7 percent of all loans are at least 90 days delinquent, "considerably more than the 4.4 percent average delinquency rate across the county's 100 biggest metros." Bakersfield was the fifth riskiest city with 8.55 percent of all loans at least 90 days overdue. The top four were Las Vegas, Riverside, Stockton and Modesto. Meanwhile, this comes as we learn from RealtyTrac that the number of U.S. homes taken back by banks through foreclosure hit a record high in the second quarter, up 38 percent from the same period last year.


 * ... BURGLARIES: My post earlier this week about a rash of burglaries downtown triggered several responses via Facebook and private emails. One friend who was vacationing said her investment rental downtown was broken into this week, and another reader who lives off White Lane in the Southwest said there had been a number of burglaries and thefts in her neighborhood. These crimes are so numerous that it's unreasonable to expect the police to follow up and investigate each one, so it's up to us to protect ourselves-through neighborhood watch groups, alarms and keeping an eye out for each other.


 * ...  BAD FORM: Is it too much to expect folks clean up after themselves? A friend who participates in a morning workout "boot camp" at Yokuts Park says the place is a mess, particularly down by the river where it's littered with old soda cans and bottles, fast food wrappers and even used diapers. That's right, used diapers. And two days ago I'm driving behind a faded older van when a passenger casually tosses a soda cup out the window. Good grief.

* ... GOOD NEWS: Nice to know that not every business is suffering in this economy. Over at the relatively new Bakersfield Veterinary Hospital, owner Dr. Paul Ulrich said his business is up year over year and he is thinking about adding two new vets to his six-doctor staff. "We're doing terrific," he told me. "It's a different experience because we're a large practice but we're doing quite well." The clinic, located near the corner of Harris and Gosford roads, looks like a small hospital and is open 24 hours a day. It is equipped with kennels, services for small and large pets and even has a 'pet library.' Last year, it won a prestigious award for its design.

 * ... SKEET ACES: The shotgun sports like skeet, trap and sporting clays are clearly niche sports, but locally they have attracted an impressive group of shooters. The California State Teams were announced recently and the Kern County Gun Club was well represented. Brian Foley, a sophomore at Lindenwood University in Missouri, made the Open First Team and the Ladies First Team had three youngsters from Bakersfield: sisters Rachel and Emily Shuford and Elizabeth Key. A third Shuford sister, Brooke, made the Ladies Second Team. Other local kids making teams included siblings Jenna, Dominic, Darin and Josh Bouni. A slew of others from Bakersfield were honored, including Ben Wagoner, Cherie Miles, Wayne Cagle and Wes Reece. (Shown below are Emily Shuford, Brian Foley, Brooke Shuford and Rachel Shuford)

 * ... BAKERSFIELDISM: From reader Patsy Sadler: "You know you're a Bakersfield old timer if you remember when the Union Avenue Plunge bus would pick you up in your neighborhood and take you all day for 25 cents."

UC Santa Barbara sweethearts and the Women and Girl's Fund goes prospecting

  

* ... UCSB SWEETHEARTS: Loved the email I received from Helen Troudy, who wondered if she and husband Chester (named after Chester Avenue, but that's another story) were the oldest living local graduates of  UC Santa Barbara in Bakersfield. In her words: "I graduated in l947 and my husband graduated in l950 as a returning veteran of WWII. It is where we met and were married at the beginning of his sophomore year. At that time the campus was located on the Riviera above the Mission in SB, and the Industrial Arts Dept. (my husband's major) was located across town on the Mesa. This caused many trips back and forth to attend classes on both campuses. I was a student in Spring l945 when SB was chartered by UC, and we had a huge celebration, including a torch light parade in the pouring rain. I worked on the campus during the time my husband was a student, and it was at that time that negotiations were underway to acquire the Marine Base at Goleta for a new campus. We came to Bakersfield in l973 when my husband accepted the position of Superintendent of Panama School District replacing Wayne Van Horn. I wonder if we are the oldest alumni in Bakersfield? We are 84 and 87 and have been married for 62 years." Wow. Who can beat that?

 
 * ... GIRL'S FUND: I dropped by the "Prospect Lounge" at the Padre Hotel the other night to attend a meeting of the Women and Girl's Fund, a group that does an awful lot of  good for young women in our community. The fund was created  in 2005 by Judi McCarthy, the current chair of the Kern Community Foundation, and now boasts an endowment north of $400,000. Judi and Girls' Fund chair Mary Bynum were "prospecting" for more supporters and announced the fund will give away $20,000 this year, focusing on physical, sexual and domestic safety. Among those attending were Jane Haupt, former Bakersfield mayor Mary K. Shell, Laura Wolfe, Ray and Joan Dezember, Ken and Teri Jones, Jack and Mary Lou Thompson, Judith Chase and Ted Tilbury, Jeanette Richardson, Danielle Kilpatrick, Bettina Belter, Lori Mariani and daughter-in-law Tanya Mariani, Laurie Bustamante, John and Sheila Lake, local Realtor Mary Christenson, Lyndia Krausgrill and Sylvia Cattani, among others.

 * ... SKEET SCHOLARSHIP: Congratulations to Dominic Buoni, a17-year-old senior at Bakersfield Christian  High School, who just landed a scholarship to shoot skeet at Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Mo. Dominic is the third Bakersfield youngster to head to Lindenwood to shoot skeet, joining All-American Brian Foley and Elizabeth Key, both Ridgeview High School graduates who are now Lindenwood freshman. The sheer number of high achieving youngsters in the shotgun sports from Bakersfield is impressive, and for some it's paying the cost of college. Dominic is the son of Frank and Lori Buoni and he has three shooting siblings, Darin, Joshua and little sister Jenna.

 * ... HOME EXPO: If you are thinking about buying or selling your home, you should attending the Home Buyer and Seller Expo Saturday at the downtown Bakersfield Marriott. There will be 40-plus vendors there, including folks from Castle and Cooke, Towery Homes, Michael Flooring, Coldwell Bank Preferred Realtors, Prudential Tobias Realtors and so many more. And one of the best things: it is absolutely free. The expo will run from 1 p.m. t 4 p.m.. Make sure to check it out.

 * ...  BAKERSFIELDISMS: You know you're from Bakersfield when "You know what an '08er' is and where the 'Dale is."

Housing prices still heading south and four from Bakersfield named All-American in skeet shooting

* .. HOUSING BLUES: The long feared "double dip" in housing prices is now taking hold in as many as one in five major housing markets. That's the word from Zillow, the national real estate sales and data provider. Our own market here in Bakersfield remains slow, and local Realtors tell me there isn't a lot of inventory on the market. We are still working through thousands of foreclosures, and there are more to come. Zillow identified the top five cities to find a "bargain" for a house because of depressed prices. They are Naples, Fla., Cape Cod, Mass., Charleston, S.C., Merced, CA. (one house that sold for $337,000 five years ago just sold for $80,000) and Chicago. (read the Zillow and ABC report here) Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal referred to the pending flood of new foreclosures as "shadow inventory" and said there were enough homes expected to hit the market to last about 10 months based on average sales rates. It said the worst hit areas are California (naturally), Arizona, Florida and Nevada.

 * ... TRAVELING HOPWOODS: Reader Dale Hopwood wrote to remind me that Bakersfield was known as "Quakersfield" after the 1952 earthquake that devastated our once historic downtown. But he really wanted to talk about his children, some of whom moved away but came back home to live and work. His son, Ken Hopwood, is a North High graduate who was living in the Southland but moved back to work as a software engineer for Prosoft. Ken 's wife, Becky Coats, is working with the reading class at Endeavour Elementary. Meanwhile daughter Dana Villicano is teaching science at Fruitvale Junior High and another son, George Hopwood, is working at UC Santa Barbara in the special projects office. Finally, the last of the traveling Hopwoods is his daughter Sara Holm, a geologist living in the mountains of northern New Mexico.

 * ... SKEET HONORS: Kudos to four Bakersfield skeet shooters who have been named to the 2010 All-American Teams by the National Skeet Shooting Association. This is really unusual to have so many from one club make the All-American squads, and it's a credit to the programs and facilities at the Kern County Gun Club located near the Lake Buena Vista Recreation Area. Ben Wagoner, the 45-year-old owner of Air Control Services heating and air conditioning, was named to the Rookie First Team while Brian Foley was named to both the Open Honorable Mention team and the Junior First Team. Foley graduated from Ridgeview High and is now a freshman at Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Mo. Also named All-Americans were sisters Emily and Rachel Shuford, a senior and sophomore at Bakersfield High respectively. Rachel made the Sub-Junior First Team and Emily the Junior Honorable Mention Team. 

 (Above picture left to right Emily Shuford, Brian Foley, Brooke Shuford and Rachel Shuford. Lower picture is Ben Wagoner with Brian Foley)


 * ... B-TOWN JUST FINE: Reader Dave Collins, who works at the local collection agency Commercial Trade, dropped me a nice personal note and ended it by saying "... by the way, I think 'Bako' is just fine along with B-town and Bake-in-the-field." Add him to the list who think 'Bako' is not an insult.


* ... BAKERSFIELDISMS: You know you are from Bakersfield when ...  "You know a swamp cooler is not a happy hour drink" and "You know Trouts and we're not talking about the fish."

Short takes around town: Another financial institution on the ropes and Fred Drew is out at the Kern Community Foundation

  

* ... AND THE DOMINOES BEGIN TO FALL: The news that Kern Schools Federal Credit Union is on the ropes is further evidence of the depth of this recession. The credit union has lost over $54 million since the beginning of last year, a figure that makes the losses at the now shuttered San Joaquin Bank look absolutely paltry. And now we learn the credit union, like the bank, has been put on notice that it must dramatically increase its liquidity or face the consequences. Unlike commercial banks like San Joaquin, which got into trouble on soured development loans, the credit union issues are more consumer based - bad auto loans, delinquent personal loans and the like - and reflect the depths of the recession in Kern County, where our jobless rate is hovering around 14 percent. Another just stunning aspect of all this is the fact that at least one Kern Schools board member, Jim Fillbrandt, told The Californian he was unaware of the demands and written agreement with the National Credit Union Administration until Monday when outgoing CEO Vince Rojas mentioned  it. How and why the board would be left in the dark (if indeed it was) are questions that need to be answered. Looks like Rojas got out just at the right time, handing over the reins to Steve Renock, who previously worked at a credit union in Orange County. Here's hoping Renock is well versed in crisis management, because that's the job he's inherited.

 * .... DREW OUT AT FOUNDATION: I learned today that Fred Drew is out as CEO of the Kern Community Foundation. Drew has only been on the job since January. The press release from the Foundation was short and to the point and offered no explanation. But obviously things didn't work out between Drew and the Foundation Board of Directors. Judi McCarthy, the Foundation board chair, issued a press release saying only that Drew and the Board of Directors reached "mutual agreement" that he would leave effective October 31. In the meantime, retired CEO Noel Daniells "has been engaged by the Board to offer continued guidance and assistance" and McCarthy will serve as acting executive until a new CEO is in place. An appreciation dinner was just held for Noel last month at Stockdale Country Club. Looks like he'll stick around longer to help in the transition.

 * ... INDUSTRIAL REAL ESTATE REBOUND?: We all know about the funk that residential real estate is in, but what about the commercial and industrial side? I follow the blog of Wayne Kress, a principal over at CB Richard Ellis Bakersfield,  and learned that things are indeed slow but may be showing signs of a rebound. (check out his posting here). Kress said we have recovered a bit from the "lowly performance" of the first and second quarters. Some of the numbers and percentages here are staggering. From his blog:

 "Sales volume is down 30% over 2008 and a whopping 91% over 2007.  Average prices have actually increased over each of the last two years (+11% in 2008 and +7% in 2009), but this is a little deceiving, as the average building size has also declined in each of those years (by 43% in 2008 and by another 53% in 2009).  There is generally an inverse relationship between unit pricing and size:  the smaller the building, the higher the unit price.  This holds here."

* ... HOT SHOT WINS THE WORLD: Kudos to Bakersfield's Brian Foley, the college freshman who just won the World Championships in skeet shooting. Brian did it by not missing a single target in the 410 bore competition at the World Skeet Shooting Championships in San Antonio, Texas, and then beating perhaps the world's best shooter,  Todd Bender of Atlanta, in a shootoff. Brian graduated from Ridgeview High and is a freshman at Lindenwood University, a private college of about 13,000 students in St. Charles, Mo. He's the son of Tim and Kim Foley of Bakersfield.

Trying to keep up with an eighth grader

One of my passions is the relatively obscure sport of competitive skeet shooting. It's a difficult game that takes a lot of practice, honing the game out at the Kern County Gun Club near Lake Buena Vista. But no matter how good you get, there's always someone better, and this weekend it was an eighth grader at Tevis Jr. High who served me a dose of humble pie. I shot (what I thought) was an impressive 98 X 100 in my class only to be bested by Rachel Shuford, a sweet Tevis kid with braces and a deadly aim who posted a 99 (pictured). Actually Rachel is not the only Shuford girl who has beaten me. Her older sister, BHS junior Emily, regularly outshoots me at skeet and in fact Emily beat everyone this weekend at the Black Gold Skeet tournament by claiming 20-gauge gun champ. Emily posted her very first 100 straight targets, meaning she ran the field without missing. Emily, Rachel and older sister Brooke (she's a BHS swimmer) all shoot and are class acts who make our city proud.