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BODY ELECTRIC ELECTS NEW BOARD MEMBERS!

Six new board members joined Body ElectricÊ in November, and we are pleased to introduce them to you:

Deana Blackwood, a Business Technician for Verizon, has been volunteering for Body Electric since March 2002. Deana has also volunteered for the Fund for Santa Barbara and the Environmental Defense Center.

Judy Delkeskamp has also been volunteering for Body Electric since March. She is a Medical Representative for Roche Laboratories with an MPH in Community Health.

Colette Hadley is involved with a number of nonprofit organizations in Santa Barbara as a volunteer, including CASA and Cal-SOAP. She works for the Scholarship Foundation of Santa Barbara, as the Director of Student Aid.

Julie Harris is a board member of the Santa Barbara Discovery Museum and a full-time mom of two young boys.

Erin Kelley is the new Chair of the Adventure Club committee, and has volunteered for Body Electric for the past ten months. She is a graphic designer with the City of Santa Barbara.

Pam Tanase, a full-time mom of two young children, recently retired from her career coaching women's water polo. After nine years with the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps athletic program, she had coached at UCSB for the past two years.

KATHLEEN'S JOURNAL

Part one in a series, the following is an excerpt of the journal of Kathleen Horton, a woman with a typical list of many competing priorities: job, spouse, children and personal time among them.

With our journal series we bring you the challenges and accomplishments of an average woman: someone who, like all of us, balances a life full of work, play, friends, family and occasional struggle.

We hope you find inspiration in their daily endeavors, and perhaps decide to try something new and challenging yourself!

A brief personal history is a past life filled with tennis, bicycling, running, bodysurfing and long distance outrigger canoe paddling.

Currently, I'm a 45-year-old mother of two children, six and two. My husband is a very busy self-employed building designer and we have two goofy dogs who would appreciate a good walk every day, or even every hour.

Before I was married and with kids, I never expected to go without regular exercise and the fun that went along with it but it happened. I'm through making excuses and want to kick it up a notch! Here goes my first installment...

November 1: Tommy is at preschool while Madeline is at school. I popped into work for an hour then took the dogs for a half-hour walk around the neighborhood. After the time change last weekend our family evening walk has disappeared. We miss the fresh air after dinner.

November 2: Aaagh, shin splints! I should have stretched after the dog walk yesterday! Have to remember that I'm not a limber teenager anymore. Thank goodness I made it to the pool early this morning for a ten-minute swim. I'm aiming for a half hour by Christmas. Swimming is wonderful for my body and spirit.

November 4: Madeline had her first swimming lesson since spring. It works out great because I can swim in the lane next to her lesson simultaneously. She enjoys seeing me there and I love seeing her enthusiasm for the water. She is looking forward to learning how to surf but she needs more experience in the ocean.

November 5: I've been enjoying biking around Goleta with Tommy in his bike seat. He loves it, especially when we follow garbage trucks. I'm not sure how long I can carry his 32 pounds but it is a great workout.

November 6: We all rode our bikes to school today - Madeline made it up the hill without stopping. I'm looking forward to family biking trips to the beach by spring. We plan to get a tagalong bike attachment for Madeline.

November 8: Rain second day in a row. Got the kids out for walks with umbrellas. We still got wet but it felt great to get fresh air.

November 11: No school for Madeline today - we went to three different parks to play with cousins and friends. I was tired chasing after Tommy all day.

November 13: Another swimming lesson day - love it! Also took the dogs down to the beach for a good sand walk at Haskell's Beach.

November 18: We are all sick this week . . .I'm just laying low.

November 24: Thanksgiving vacation coming up. I'm looking forward to beach play, surfing, and time with family without the normal daily schedule. Went for a bike ride today without Tommy - felt like I was flying without his chunky body behind me!

November 29: Had a blast today out in the water with my surfboard, my best friend, my brother and old high school classmates. I almost stood up today! While drying off we all decided to make this an annual event. My lap swimming paid off - I wasn't too sore the next morning!

December 3: I'm looking for workout alternatives to the YMCA. Rode the bike with Tommy to check out Gold's Gym. It's a ten-minute bike ride from home - very appealing to be able to bike, plus weight train, try out Pilates, yoga. Only downside is no pool. The hours are very accommodating, too. Would be great to get Eric exercising regularly.

December 8: Boy, today was just like old times. Met up with an old roommate for breakfast in Santa Ynez. We ate and talked, then enjoyed a beautiful walk. I had brought the dogs, who loved the car ride and walk. The kids played with cousins while Dad worked. I wish it could work out so easily everyday!

THE MASTERS MESS: SHOULD AUGUSTA ADMIT WOMEN?

Since 1934, The Masters Golf Tournament has been an annual tradition at Augusta National Golf Club, a showcase for the world's top male golfers. Will the 2003 tournament be a showcase for women's issues instead?

This story surfaced in June 2002, when a letter regarding the all-male policy of the Augusta National club was released to the media. Martha Burk, chair of the National Council of Women's Organizations (NCWO), wrote the letter to Hootie Johnson, chairman of Augusta National, asking the club to admit a female member before hosting the next Masters Tournament in April 2003.

Johnson responded with a three-page statement in which he said the club would not be pressured "at the point of a bayonet" into admitting a woman to the club. Johnson's comments heightened the tension between the two sides and prompted Burk to pursue her campaign against Augusta National.

Burk has targeted club members, the companies that sponsor The Masters, and the PGA Tour and its sponsors in an effort to get them to pressure Augusta National to admit women. She also asked that CBS drop its broadcast of The Masters. CBS refused.

Burk is not afraid to take on the status quo. As a young mother in Texas, she offered to coach her son's baseball team when no one else volunteered. "Then men started coming out of the woodwork," Burk recalled. "It was like, 'My God, we can't have a woman coach.' So I've always been an activist."

Burk is increasing the pressure by waging a letter-writing campaign targeting high-profile Augusta National members. So far, retired CBS chairman Thomas Wyman has announced his resignation, as has U.S. Treasury Secretary Nominee John W. Snow. But why is Burk targeting Augusta National?

"Because it's the home of The Masters, it is highly symbolic," stated Burk. "It reminds women of the glass ceiling and unequal pay and all the reasons women are running second in America."

As a private club, Augusta National has no legal obligation to admit women. The crux of the issue is whether as host of The Masters each April, the club becomes a place of public accommodation. Burk says it is a moral issue, not a legal one. The response heard most often from Burk's critics is that Augusta National isn't the same as the Masters.

During Hootie Johnson's interview with the Associated Press, he never referred to Burk by name, instead saying, "this woman" or "that woman."

"This woman portrays us as being discriminatory and being bigots. And we're not," Johnson said, defending his legal right to decide its members. "We're a private club. And private organizations are good. The Boy Scouts, the Girl Scouts, Junior League, sororities, fraternities Ñ are these immoral?

Regarding criticism that Augusta National was forced to finally admit a non-white male member in 1990, Johnson said there is no connection between racial and gender discrimination.

"Do you know of any constitutional lawyer that's ever said they were the same? Do you know any civil rights activists that said it was the same? It's not relevant," he said. "Nobody accepts them as being the same."

Women are welcome at the 69-year-old Augusta National as guests of members, and women play about 1,000 rounds per year there.

Johnson also said that playing host to the Masters does not make the private club a public entity. "That's one week. Fifty-one weeks of the year, we are a private club," Johnson said. "And we do something good for one week, for the sporting world, and we're going to be penalized?"

Recently, LPGA Tour commissioner Ty Votaw urged Augusta National to admit a female member, saying its obligation to golf outweighs its rights as a private club.

The LPGA is not involved with The Masters, but Votaw stated, "We represent not just women, but the game. Augusta's exclusionary practices with respect to women speak volumes. The message it sends is that women cannot be the face of golf. And that's wrong."

A recent AP Poll found that Americans are almost evenly divided. 46 percent of survey respondents said Augusta National has a right to have an all-male membership, while the same percentage said the club should have female members. Women were slightly more inclined than men to say the club should admit female members.

Whatever your opinion, the issue has become much more than a fight to admit one woman to a stodgy old men's club.

Wyman, now a former member of Augusta National, told CNN, "My hope and expectation are that the many corporate leaders, whose own lives and enterprises have long since passed this diversity issue and treated it properly . . . will now surface and the good old boys club will join the 21st century."

By Colette Hadley, Body Electric Board Member

NATIONAL GIRLS AND WOMEN IN SPORTS DAY APPROACHING

"Succeed in Sports, Lead in Life"

17th Annual National Girls and Women in Sports Day - February 5, 2003

NGWSD calls attention to the positive influence of sports participation, and advances the struggle for equality and access for women in sports.

The day has been celebrated annually since 1987, sparked by the death of Olympic volleyball player Flo Hyman, who died of a heart attack due to Marfan Syndrome, while competing in Japan.

NGWSD is sponsored nationally by Girls Incorporated, Girl Scouts of the USA, National Association for Girls and Women in Sport, Women's Sports Foundation, and the YWCA of the U.S.A.

See the our flyer for ways you can join Body Electric in celebrating women and girls in sports during February!