The following year the fires were back bigger than ever before. This time half the city of 100,000 people were in danger with half of Malibu CA over the hill cut off. Many lost their homes and few lost their lives unable to get out of the canyons in time. The fire moved so fast there was little time to escape. This year the fire was believed to be arson related, although no one was ever caught. That year there were other fires all burning simultaneously around Northern and Southern CA and parts of Northern Nevada.

That is when The Car Wash Guys, our company decided that they would get involved. Although many of us live in very green areas, where fires have a tough time getting started, once they do get going they generate their own wind and heat and little stands in their way. The most important strategy is to catch them early. Of the nearly 20,000 brush fires annually in the Western States in the Forest Regions, few ever get out of control, but the ones that do we all remember. By uniting the entire community and working together we can decrease the number of fires intentionally started and a better response to those that are started by negligence or by Mother Nature such as lightening. We must work hard to preserve our area and make our community one of the best places in the World, a person could ever hope to live. We have a great community and we intend to guard against the loss from fire. We want our community to be the greatest in our state and our citizens, friends and families to know that we are all looking out for them and they are looking out for us. No longer will the temptation exist for an unethical situation to occur from an arsonist. Arsonists will know that our town is a no fly zone and that it is not only a police car, fire department vehicle or the USDA Forest Service truck that they need to be concerned with. They will be caught if they attempt anything by the first person who sees them. The Schwann’s delivery truck, the school bus driver, an electrician, a plumber, a real estate agent, anyone and everybody will be observing while driving around in their normal course of business. With this same group of people we too wish to interact with Mother Nature to keep the natural forest fires to a minimum. We intend to protect our families, homes and beautiful serene area from devastation that can be prevented or quickly contained.

You may wish to consider setting up a neighborhood arson watch in your area as part of community effort. If you are interested in learning more, we have written a free online 21-page E-book, which is available at:

http://www.lancewinslow.org/arsonwatch.pdf

Perhaps you might look through it and see if this is a potential solution for your community during this next fire season?

“Lance Winslow” – Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; www.WorldThinkTank.net/. Lance is an online writer in retirement.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Lance_Winslow

I remember those days.

Parents of my generation can look back upon the summer ritual of flagging down the ice cream man as a fond memory. A quarter bought a red, white and blue Bomb Pop. Ice cold to the touch, you tore the wrapper off, tossed it to the street, squealed in delight when your tongue momentarily stuck to icy goodness and smiled brightly as your lips turned a bright red or blue.

Mom or dad may have watched from a distance as you made your purchase. Most likely they didn’t bother. They had nothing to fear. In those days everyone trusted the ice cream man.

Times change.

Struggling in an age of paranoia, parents today will march right out to the truck, make the purchase, eye the ice cream man with suspicion and keep their kids out of reach. Public perception of the ice cream man has turned sour. Perception is reality and every ice cream man is a potential pedophile. One need only look at the battered truck, peeling labels and smoke belching from an exhaust pipe.

Times change, indeed.

Recently, Tennessee lawmakers decided to study background checks for ice cream truck drivers over the summer. According to an article at CommercialAppeal.com there is need “to work out matters such as who should pay for the background checks, who should conduct them and penalties for violations.”

Any employee of any company should go through a comprehensive background check that includes the following:

* Social Security Number Trace

* County Criminal Records Search

* Motor Vehicle Records Search

* Nationwide Background Check

* Sex Offender Registry check, both statewide and national

The same should hold true if the truck is operated as an independent contractor. Anyone that interacts with children in a potentially unsupervised way MUST be background checked. The legislature in Tennessee, or any state, should mandate a thorough background check as a part of the licensing process.

A thorough criminal background check as part of pre-employment screening or even post-hire screening is a low cost endeavor when compared to the incalculable human cost that could occur.

Thomas Kenney is a web writer based in Southern California. His primary interests are creating safe environments for at-risk populations and works through his company, PreScreen Solutions, to achieve that.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Thomas_Kenney

You can’t hold an RC monster truck rally without an obstacle course of some kind, can you? Why not make a complete project out of your neighborhood monster truck show?

First draw your layout on paper so you know the exact dimensions and look of your finished course. Select an area for the course, and mark it off with flags or string so you know where the boundaries are.

Bring in the radio control excavators. Remove the sod, and haul it away in the dump trucks. Dig the dirt from your course area to form the shape where you’ll place the jumping hills, mud bogs, and target vehicles for the monster trucks to attack. Using the loaders pile the dirt just to the side of your layout so it’s handy. You’ll use that dirt to make your dirt mounds for truck jumping and climbing.

Using the loaders and graders level the area roughly. You won’t want a perfectly smooth surface for this event.

Now it’s time to detail each feature (where each hill goes, the location of the mud bogs, and the position of the vehicles your monster trucks will crush and jump. Use the graders, excavators, and loaders for this operation.

Excavate the dirt to form a pit for the mud bog. Later you’ll fill this with water and make the mud with loose dirt carried back to it with the loaders.

Have the loader operators haul dirt to the hill sites, and start your piles. Fire up the RC crane, and build your hills to your desired height.

The final step here (not necessarily last on your list) is transporting and positioning the vehicles with the loaders.

Upon completion of your remote control monster truck obstacle course you’re ready to hold your big rally.

Let the neighborhood kids know when the big event will happen. Put signs in your yard to inform everyone. Invite all the monster truck owners you know, and challenge them to radio control competitions on your course.

Schedule an all-day neighborhood event with pitch-in cookout and remote control fun. It’s a great way to meet new friends and refresh old friendships.

And the kids will have a fun day too.

Joseph Jackson provides information for learning and pleasure to help improve his reader’s quality of life.

He also searches for, and makes available, products that improve the enjoyment of his playtime activities.

For more stuff on radio control construction equipment visit Joe’s remote control construction website.

Visit radio control trucks for a selection of RC trucks for kids of all ages.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Joseph_Jackson

Design a backyard layout for remote control monster trucks that doesn’t require you to smash cars and other vehicles. Build a layout of “mountains,” and rock piles for RC trucks to climb.

For this radio control project invite local remote control construction and monster truck enthusiasts to help you beginning with creation of the layout blueprints, all the way through planning, and staging, the big event.

Consider the different scale models, and their climbing capabilities, when you start your initial design. Talk with the RC monster truck hobbyists about how steep a grade their different vehicles can negotiate. Include enough hills in your blueprints to schedule hill-climbing activities for every size truck.

Do the same for the rock piles you create. Using rocks sized according to what each different scale of truck can conquer, figure the number of piles you need to have climbing action for every size truck.

Once your blueprints are complete invite the remote control construction equipment operators in to build your RC project.

Since this is a rough terrain layout you won’t need any leveling efforts. Use the excavators to fill the radio control dump trucks with dirt, and haul the dirt to the “mountain” sites.

Start building the hills using the RC front loaders. Once the hill is too high for the loaders to reach the top employ the cranes, and finish the job of depositing the dirt until you reach the desired height. Pack the dirt tight, and scrape the side of your mountain to achieve the steepness level grade you’re blueprint requires. The excavators will perform most of this grade-shaping task.

Using the cranes load the rocks into the dump trucks, and haul them to their pile locations. With the front loaders and cranes build each rock pile to the difficulty level designed for each scale model remote control.

Now you’re ready to schedule that RC rock and hill-climbing event.

Decide on a date for the monster truck climb, and send out invitations to the local RC clubs. Include a menu of the radio control activities you’ll hold, the scale of the models you designed each activity for, and invite them to bring their monster trucks, and participate in the festivities.

Make sure you invite the neighborhood kids. They won’t want to miss this remote control monster truck fun.

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