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Speakers
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 Rod Diridon High Speed Rail Update Since 1995, Rod Diridon, Sr., has been executive director of the Mineta Transportation Institute (MTI). He is known as the “father” of modern transit service in Silicon Valley and has chaired more than 100 international, national, state and local programs, most related to transit and the environment.
Mr. Diridon was appointed in 2001 and 2005 by Governors Davis and Schwarzenegger, respectively, to the California High Speed Rail Authority Board. He helped found the American Public Transportation Association’s (APTA) High Speed and Intercity Rail Committee and National High Speed Rail Corridors´Coalition. He served as president of the national Council of University Transportation Centers and was recently elected chair of the US High Speed Rail Association’s Board.
His political career began in 1971 as the youngest person ever elected to the Saratoga City Council. He retired in 1995 because of term limits after completing six terms as chair of both the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors and the Transit Board. He is the only person to have chaired the San Francisco Bay Area´s (119 cities, 27 transit agencies, and 9 counties) three regional governments: the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, the Bay Area Air Quality Management District, and the Association of Bay Area Governments. He chaired nine successful rail system development project boards. The region’s main train station was renamed the “San Jose Diridon Station” upon his retirement from public office. After receiving a BS in accounting and MSBA in statistics in 1963 from San Jose State University, he served two combat tours as a naval officer in Vietnam. In 1968 he founded the Decision Research Institute which was sold in 1977 after his election.
Mr. Diridon has two successful children, Rod Jr. and Mary Margaret, and four grandchildren. He is married to Dr. Gloria Duffy, former US Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense and now president and CEO of the Commonwealth Club of California.
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"Two Club Members Provide Insight Into Their Lives"
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The "Personals" will be given by Leslee Hamilton and Carl Salas.
 Leslee Hamilton
Lesslee is executive director of Guadalupe River Park Conservancy. She earned a degree in business economics from UC Santa Barbara and served in the Peace Corps in Paraguay, where she worked in a rural cooperative and provided support and training to other Peace Corps volunteers. Leslee’s employment history includes extensive experience in transportation and environmental policy issues and political campaigns. She currently serves as a member of San Jose’s Parks & Recreation Commission and was a member of the Envision 2040 General Plan Task Force and the Diridon Station Good Neighbor Committee.  Carl Salas Carl graduated, with honors, from Virginia Tech in 1974 with a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering and a minor in Nuclear Engineering. He was recruited by General Electric’s nuclear division in San Jose and relocated from Blacksburg, Virginia to San Jose, in August of 1974. While working at G.E., Carl was awarded the Program Mangers award for his work at the G.E. Power Plant in Waterford Connecticut. In 1978, Carl met Dan O’Brien and co-founded Salas O’Brien Engineers. Since founding Salas O’Brien Engineers, Carl has been a significant force behind the company’s growth from three employees in downtown San Jose to five locations in California with over 80 employees. During this time, he also leveraged his expertise to develop and present a nation-wide series of seminars regarding Energy Auditing, Energy Management Systems, Ozone Depletion, and Distributed Power Generation. In 2007 he went on to develop a 2-day seminar entitled: Fundamentals of Sustainable Development and Carbon Reduction; and has taught this course nation-wide, for the past 4 years. Carl and his wife, Marianne, also co-authored a book entitled: Guide to Refrigeration CFC’s. It was published by the Fairmont Press in 1992. Carl is also a past, national president of the Association of Energy Engineers, and has been the National Awards chairperson since 2000.
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The Rotary Club of San Jose presents . . .
The Spring Evening Barbecue
Wednesday, June 5, 2013 at the San Jose History Park
$50.00 per person
5:00 pm Hospitality Bar and deluxe hors d’oeuvres
6:30 pm Dinner New York Strip Steak, Chicken, salad, sides and dessert
Park inside History San Jose (Enter from Phelan)
North Gate Will Be Closed (By the Gordon House)
Members, spouses, and guests are invited.
Motor Vehicle Enthusiasts will have cars on display.
If you are interested in bringing your classic car, or know someone who has a classic car please contact Victor Reid.
Please RSVP to Teresa McCarthy @ teresam@sjrotary.org by May 31, 2013
Any cancellations after Monday, June 3 will be billed $25 per person
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"The Future of Political Reform After Citizen's United"
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 Ann Ravel, chair of California's Fair Political Practices Commission, hopes to reinvigorate her agency and make it the nation's most aggressive public watchdog of campaigns, candidates and consultants, she told Calbuzz in a recent interview. With the backdrop of the Kinde Durkee scandal making clear the need for greater oversight of politics in California, Ravel said the time is right to revamp the policies, practices and procedures of the FPPC. 'Public trust in government is at an all-time low,' she told us. 'Our goal is to make information about who is paying for campaigns available in an immediate, accessible and organized way that is useful for voters in understanding and demystifying the political process.
Ann Ravel is the Chair of the California Fair Political Practices Commission, appointed by Governor Brown in March of 2011. Prior to her appointment she served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Torts and Consumer Litigation in the Civil Division of the United States Department of Justice. Most of her career was as an attorney in the Santa Clara County Counsel's Office, ultimately serving as the appointed County Counsel from 1998 until 2009. As County Counsel, she represented the County and its elected officials, provided advice on the Political Reform Act, and initiated groundbreaking programs in Elder Abuse Litigation, Educational Rights, and Consumer Litigation on behalf of the County and the community. Ravel has served as an elected Governor on the Board of Governors of the State Bar of California, as a member of the Judicial Council of the State of California, and as the Chair of the Commission on Judicial Nominees Evaluation. In 2007 she was named by the State Bar of California as the Public Attorney of the Year for her contributions to public service.
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"A Candid Conversation with a Silicon Valley Billionaire"
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 Carl E. Berg. Mr. Berg has been actively engaged in the ownership, development and management of R&D/office real estate and venture capital investment in Silicon Valley for over 45 years. From 1997 thru 2012 Mr. Berg was the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Mission West Properties, Inc., a public real estate investment trust 75% owner by Berg family members with Microsoft & Apple as major tenants. Mr. Berg was the first investor in Integrated Devices Technology and Sun Micro Systems and has been an investor in over 100 other technology companies including Amdahl, NetLogic, Savi Technology, On Command Video, QED and MoSys. During the last 6 years, Mr. Berg’s interest has become the pharmaceutical industry, where he has joined the Board of Edison Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a startup drug company in children’s diseases. Berg was a Founder and is a Director of Berg Pharma where they hope to create a revolutionary new approach to drug development with Berg Biosystems Interrogative Biology® drug discovery platform and its utility in the identification of novel targets in cancer, diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular and neurological diseases. Mr. Berg holds a B.A. in Corporation Finance from the University of New Mexico.
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"Leigh Weimer's Aspiring Artist Fellowship Program"
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The first annual Leigh Weimers Emerging Artists Awards will be presented in a program including performances and displays of the recipients art.
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"Summer Fruits and Vegetables"
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 Phil Cosentino is a member of the celebrated Cosentino family, managers of supermarkets.
The four Cosentino brothers who took over management after the retirement of their father, divided supermarket responsibilities, and
Phil's responsibility was always produce -- which explains why
Cosentino's Market is so well known for its fruits and vegetables. For
years before his own retirement, Phil would tumble out of bed at 2am
and drive the Cosentino truck to the markets in San Francisco and
Oakland.
He can be heard on weekdays on Radio Station KLIV, where he talks about
current crops, shamelessly promotes California produce (over that from
other states) and gives frequent voice to his theory that consumers are
too concerned about the cosmetics of produce, rather than their taste.
This will not be Phil Cosentino's first visit to Rotary. Over the
years, he has presented several programs -- programs that consist of
his talking about fruits and vegetables both common and rare -- with a
bonus at the end of each of his presentations. You'll enjoy the bonus
as well as the talk.
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 Jeff Thomas is currently the Bay Area Sales Manager for Pyro Spectaculars North, Inc., one of the largest fireworks display production companies in the world. Jeff has been working as a full time salesman for PyroSpec since 1990. Since that time he has been responsible for some of the largest fireworks display in the San Francisco Bay Area. These have included the Golden Gate Bridge 75th Anniversary Celebration, all of the San Jose America's festival fireworks, all of the Fourth of July and New Year's fireworks displays for the City of San Francisco, all of the Oakland A's, San Francisco Giants-and-San Jose Giants fireworks displays, and he helped with logistics on the KFOG KaBoom displays. Jeff's responsibilities include fireworks selection, fireworks siting and staging, securing the necessary permits, show design and all of the activities associated with putting on major and minor commercial-grade fireworks displays. He has also supported PyroSpec productions in Hong Kong, Shanghia and Germany.
Jeff brings with him a wealth of unique knowledge associated with fireworks. The things you don't see behind the scenes of a display are quite interesting and technology dependent ( like the computer firing systems used to launch the fireworks into the sky). Jeff will bring with him some visual aids to describe how aerial display shells work and the different types of ignition options available. Jeff will also discuss some of the challenges that his industry struggles with post 9/11 and the increasing levels of government regulation.
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"Water and the Future Prosperity of Silicon Valley"
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"California Republican Party. "Does the GOP have a future in California?"
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 SENATOR JIM BRULTE (Ret.), Chairman, California Republican Party On March 3, 2013, Jim Brulte was elected Chairman of the California GOP. He brings to that position almost 25 years of fulltime experience in politics and government. He served in the State Assembly and State Senate and was the only freshman ever elected leader of his party in BOTH houses of the legislature. Prior to the election of Governor Schwarzenegger, was described as “arguably the most powerful elected Republican in California.” He was recently named one of the 100 most powerful people in Southern California by The Los Angeles Times Magazine and one of the top 20 “most powerful political players in California” by Capitol Weekly, which wrote that “over the last 15 years, there has been no more enduring force in California Republican politics than Jim Brulte.” Brulte has also served on the Board of Visitors of the United States Naval Academy appointed by George W. Bush and on the California Performance Review Commission appointed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.
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"California State Parks System"
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"Two Club Members Provide Insight Into Their Lives"
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"Overview of California's Education System"
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