Local resident, actor and Shakespeare authority Justin Scalise brings Shakespeare’s work to Laura’s Library twice each month on the first and fourth Mondays.

“Shakespeare was made to be heard,” Scalise said. “There is a rhythm and a richness to the words he selected to use, some of which he made up himself. You lose much of the magic of Shakespeare if you read it silently. You really have to hear it.”

Scalise, who grew up in New Orleans and moved to Austin in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, has been holding the local Shakespeare Aloud reading groups since November. He generally attracts seven or eight participants and is already developing some regulars. Scalise said people of all ages come to the readings, and his groups often range from young children to retired adults.

“Shakespeare isn’t too far over the heads of children,” he said. “Most people in some way are attracted to the beauty of it. It’s not a foreign language. It’s English, 400-year-old English, but it’s English all the same. There is something familiar about it and yet still magical. He wrote so succinctly. Once you begin to wrap your mouth around those words, you begin to get a sense of his power.”

Scalise fell in love with Shakespeare in middle school. The poetry and the theatrical aspect of the stories drew him. And he fell for Shakespeare’s passion. It’s something that others seem to pick up from Scalise during his readings.

“Justin has an infectious enthusiasm for Shakespeare,” said Lisa Charbonnet, branch manager of Laura’s Library. “We’ve had people wander in to find a book on Monday evening and serendipitously discover Justin’s Shakespeare Aloud program. They’re glued for the rest of his session. Last week, we had a delightful professor who brought her two young daughters. They read with Justin for an hour and left with an armful of books by and about Shakespeare. Justin brings an actor’s sensibility to what otherwise might be dry words on a dry page.”

“One of the problems people have with Shakespeare is the way it is taught in school; it can be terribly boring when done wrong,” Scalise said. “And many times people go to see it performed by actors or directors who don’t really understand what the words mean. That can ruin it.”

Some people drop by for a Shakespeare reading at the library out of pure curiosity. Many have had a taste of Shakespeare in the past, Scalise said.

“When you are touched by Shakespeare, you want more,” he said.

The young actor makes sure his readings are packed with fun. After all, fun is the point, he said.

“We read it out loud and make sure everyone knows what’s being said,” he explained. “It’s a casual, friendly atmosphere. We sound things out, laugh at the jokes and listen for the rhythm.”

As the weather improves, Scalise hopes to take advantage of the library’s beautiful setting and take the readings outside.

“We go to the theater nowadays, and we conform to 19th-centruy rules,” he said. “We sit back rigidly in our seats and watch. Outside, you can bring a blanket, lie down and take a deep breath. People are more relaxed outside.”

Shakespeare was a genius with a rare gift, Scalise said. More than 400 years after they were written and first acted on stage, the messages in his plays still ring true today.

“Take Hamlet,” he said. “Those simple words – ‘To be or not to be.’ It’s about living your life or not living your life. He captured a fundamental element common to the human condition. What’s so wonderful is that that very basic human condition – that question we all face – hasn’t changed that much in four centuries.”

In October, Scalise plans a production of Hamlet in a local cemetery by torchlight. Join him for a reading of Hamlet at his next Shakespeare Aloud session at Laura’s Library on March 29 at 6 p.m. Laura’s Library is located at 9411 Bee Cave Road.

Sharman Reed has filed for Place 5 that is currently being filled by interim appointee James Kallison, who replaced Gail King when she resigned in August 2009; Dr. Colleen Jones filed opposite Place 6 incumbent Mike Monnig; and Place 7 incumbent Ellen Balthazar is unopposed for re-election.

Early voting runs from April 26-May 4 at Randalls, 3300 Bee Cave Road, from 7 a.m.-7 p.m. Monday-Saturday and Sunday from noon-6 p.m., or at any of the other early voting polling locations provided by Travis County.

The polling place on Election Day is Valley View Elementary School, 1201 Capital of Texas Highway.

Alderman Bill Hamilton was the lone candidate to file for the mayor’s race in Rollingwood after Mayor Dale Dingley opted not to seek re-election, and incumbent Mayor Dave Claunch was the only candidate in West Lake Hills.

However, city council elections in both municipalities will feature contested races.

West Lake Hills Place 2 incumbent Councilman Andrew Schwartz will face former council member Katherine Loayza, and former council member Jane Noble will face Jean Goehring in Place 4. Place 4 incumbent Councilwoman Cindy Probst announced before filing began that she would not seek re-election. Loayza had previously filed to run for Place 4 but withdrew and filed for Place 2 shortly before the deadline.

Rollingwood, which features an at-large City Council election in which the top two vote-getters win, will have four candidates facing off for two positions. They are incumbent Alderwoman Shanthi Jayakumar, Sara Hutson, Kelli Carlton and Barry Bone. Incumbent Alderman Brian Nalle opted not to seek re-election.

Hamilton said he is not under any supposition that running unopposed is a vote of confidence.

“All it means is that I wanted it more than anybody else,” Hamilton said. “But it’s not really a matter of wanting it. I’ve just lived in the community long enough; I know most of the people; I know a lot of the issues that make people think one way or the other.

“We’re only 1 square mile, 450 houses. We’re basically the size of a regular subdivision. The difference is we’re a government, and we’ve got to do our business as a governmental entity as opposed to a homeowners association. We’ve got to follow state and federal laws and our own ordinances. The good news is we’re in control of our own destiny.”

Hamilton said he is looking forward to working on key issues facing the city, which include completing the water project, street project, parks master plan, making fiscally sound decision and finding a way to complete improvements to the remaining segment of Bee Cave Road in the city without a turn lane.

Early voting in both cities runs from April 26-May 4 at Randalls, 3300 Bee Cave Road, from 7 a.m.-7 p.m. Monday-Saturday and Sunday from noon-6 p.m., or at any of the other early voting polling locations provided by Travis County.

West Lake Hills’ polling place on Election Day is Valley View Elementary School, 1201 Capital of Texas Highway. Rollingwood’s pol-ling place is at City Hall, 403 Nixon Drive.

Polls are open from 7 a.m.-7 p.m. on Election Day.

Two biologists from the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department will give a presentation on controlling animal populations in response to demands for an ordinance related to the feeding of deer and other animals. Additionally, the City Council will discuss an interlocal agreement with Travis County for street maintenance (paving); results of an RFQ for a utility rate analyst; and two budget amendments related to last year’s audit.

For more information, visit the city’s Web site at cityofrollingwood.com or call 327-1838.

Alderman Bill Hamilton was the lone candidate to file for the mayor’s race in Rollingwood after Mayor Dale Dingley opted not to seek re-election, and incumbent Mayor Dave Claunch was the only candidate in West Lake Hills.

However, city council elections in both municipalities will feature contested races.

West Lake Hills Place 2 incumbent Councilman Andrew Schwartz will face former council member Katherine Loayza, and former council member Jane Noble will face Jean Goehring in Place 4. Place 4 incumbent Councilwoman Cindy Probst announced before filing began that she would not seek re-election. Loayza had previously filed to run for Place 4 but withdrew and filed for Place 2 shortly before the deadline.

Rollingwood, which features an at-large City Council election in which the top two vote-getters win, will have four candidates facing off for two positions. They are incumbent Alderwoman Shanthi Jayakumar, Sara Hutson, Kelli Carlton and Barry Bone. Incumbent Alderman Brian Nalle opted not to seek re-election.

Early voting in both cities runs from April 26-May 4 at Randalls, 3300 Bee Cave Road, from 7 a.m.-7 p.m. Monday-Saturday and Sunday from noon -6 p.m., or at any of the other early voting polling locations provided by Travis County.

West Lake Hills’ polling place on Election Day is Valley View Elementary School, 1201 Capital of Texas Highway. Rollingwood’s polling place is at City Hall, 403 Nixon Drive.

Polls are open from 7 a.m.-7 p.m. on Election Day.

Three seats are up for grabs in the Eanes school board election and in both Rollingwood and West Lake Hills city council elections.

In West Lake Hills, seats currently held by Mayor Dave Claunch, Place 2 Councilman Andrew Schwartz and Place 4 Councilwoman Cindy Probst will be decided. As of late Tuesday, only Claunch and Schwartz have filed for re-election, and Jean Goehring and former council members Katherine Loayza and Jane Noble have filed for candidacy to Place 4. Place 4 incumbent  Cindy Probst has indicated that she will not seek re-election.

Mayor Dale Dingley and Alderman Brian Nalle and Alderwoman Shanthi Jayakumar are up for re-election in Rollingwood. Dingley announced that he will not seek re-election, and no other candidates had filed as of Tuesday afternoon.

Nalle and Jayakumar will face all comers in an at-large election in which the top two vote-getters win, and the mayors race is a traditional head-to-head election. The filing place and polling place on Election Day is at City Hall, 403 Nixon Drive.

The Eanes school board meets on the fourth Wednesday of each month. The Rollingwood City Council meets every third Wednesday of the month at 7 p.m., while West Lake Hills Council members meet every second and fourth Wednesday at 7 p.m.

Interested candidates have until Monday to file for the election at his or her respective city halls. For more information, call the Rollingwood City Hall at 327-1838 or West Lake Hills City Hall at 327-3628.

In both cities, council seats are for two-year terms.

The Election Day polling place for both the West Lake Hills and Eanes school board elections is Valley View Elementary School.

In the Eanes school board election, places up for grabs are Place 6, currently held by Mike Monnig, and Place 7, currently held by Ellen Balthazar. Both are for three-year terms. A concurrent special election will also be held to fill the Place 5 seat vacated by Gail King last August. The seat is currently bing held by interim appointee James Kallison.

Only the incumbents have filed candidacy as of Tuesday afternoon.

Candidates file for the election at the Eanes administration building, 601 Camp Craft Road.

The deadline to file for candidacy is also Monday.

Alderman John Hinton proposed a plan that would allow staff, commission and council members to put items on a Capital Improvement Plan as an unscheduled project, and it would ostensibly move through the matrix, becoming a one- to five-year project. At last week’s meeting, Hinton made a motion in an attempt to clarify it further, requesting that all Rollingwood Community Development Corporation expenditures more than $1,000 require council approval.

“It’s just slowly picking away at any of the empowerment of our boards and commissions,” Alderman Brian Nalle said. “They can propose something, which we can rightfully include or not include on this capital improvement plan. But even if the council allows an item to be budgeted and approves that project again, council can still stop that project.”

Hinton replied that he only intended to clarify the oversight already afforded to council under the law.

“An appointed board should be responsive to the elected officials,” he said. “The council that appointed them or a subsequent council that has been elected should have that authority. This is all this does.”

Alderman Bill Hamilton said that while the language might need some tweaking, the basis of the motion should find fruition, as the concept has always been a part of the way the RCDC and council worked together.

“Obviously I really agree that we need to closely scrutinize our expenditures but we need to have an efficient government as well,” Alderwoman Roxanne McKee said.

Council members decided to table any action on the motion pending further discussion.

In other action, the council filled out nearly all of the vacancies on the various boards and commissions. A full list of appointments is below:

• Planning Zoning Commission: Rick Fisher, reappointed to serve until Dec. 2011; Amie Rodnick, chair, reappointed to serve until Dec. 2011; Colin MacDougal, appointed to serve until Dec. 2011; and Reza Shirazi, appointed to serve until Dec. 2012

• Utility Commission: David Clark, reappointed to serve until Dec. 2011; and Larry Smith, appointed to serve until Dec. 2011

• Parks Commission: Kelli Carlton, chair, reappointed to serve until Dec. 2011; Tami Bone, reappointed to serve until Dec. 2011; Deb Bigham, appointed to serve until Dec. 2011.

• RCDC: Joe Basham, treasurer, reappointed to serve until Dec. 2011; Brian Rider, reappointed to serve until Dec. 2011; Susan Bryant, former utility commission chair, appointed to serve until Dec. 2011.

• Board of Adjustment: Michael Shcher, reappointed to serve until Dec. 2011; Susan Welker, reappointed to serve until Dec. 2011; Tony Corbett, moved from alternate to main position, to serve until Dec. 2010; and Tucker Lynch, becoming a first alternate, to serve until Dec. 2012

The Board of Adjustment still has three vacant positions.

Contributing Writer

The West Lake Hills City Council approved a majority of building identification signs the Eanes school district wants to put up to aid emergency responders trying to locate specific areas around Westlake High School, but disallowed several free-standing red and blue signs.

The rejected signs range from approximately 6-feet to more than 10-feet tall and planned within the right of way along Westbank Drive in front of the school.

Representatives from the school district’s maintenance and operations department requested the Council approve after-the-fact sign variances adjacent to and within the high school campus at the Council’s regularly scheduled meeting

The Council also disallowed 10-foot-tall, freestanding parking signs with nine varied color schemes and rejected 8-foot-wide plaques the district wanted to attach to the exterior of brick buildings. Those building signs were intended primarily to direct deliveries.

The reason for residential and building sign codes is “to preserve the natural state of the right of way,” West Lake Hills city administrator Robert Wood said.

The need for directional and identification aids arose from recommendations by local fire and police departments to provide clearer designations for building and area locations within the Westlake High School boundaries.

“First responders are the reason we started this whole project,” said David Hoedebeck, maintenance and operations coordinator for the school district. He said some of the signs would clearly identify the quickest route for emergency vehicles. Directional signs would also assist visitors to the school in finding their way around during athletic, band, performance and other events, said Les Reddin, director of maintenance and operations for the school district.

Reddin said the district had paid for all the signage before these requests for numerous variances were presented to the West Lake Hills City Council.

Although the signs improve safety on the high school campus, Councilman Spencer Stevens said there are simply too many of them.

Reddin agreed that the proposal may include too many signs and said he would review the quantity.

Other action by the council included approval to keep a lighted pole on the road just in front of the United Methodist Church in lieu of spotlights on the church’s sign at 1460 Redbud Trail. Realty Austin received unanimous approval to put up a 12-square-foot sign in front of the firm’s office at 901 Capital of Texas Highway.

After discussion in executive session, the council directed the city attorney to draft regulations to control development in the city’s extraterritorial jurisdiction regarding subdivisions, water quality, trees and landscaping. The council also asked staff to investigate the possibility of regulating on-site sewage facilities (septic systems) in the extra territorial jurisdiction.

Any weekend morning will find the place filled with Westbank early risers, as well as a few folks who drove all the way across town. It’s a good bet that Cassandra Usener will be there, wearing a huge smile and a blond ponytail poking out of her green Texas Honey Ham hat. They call her their customer service savant.

Usener has become the friendly face of Texas Honey Ham. She calls everybody “sweetie” and makes even the most unrepentant night person glad to be out and about on a weekend morning, basking in the glow of her happiness. Even people stumbling to the counter searching for coffee and a good reason to live naturally perk up despite themselves when Usener tosses a “sweetie” their way.

She’s been a part of the Texas Honey Ham charm for most of the five years the place has been serving sandwiches and selling ham and turkey by the pound.

“A customer once told me that this restaurant is like the Cheers of Westlake,” she said. “I think that’s a good way to put it. It’s a real neighborhood place. I like being a part of that. I get to eat good food and talk to good people. Truth be known, I get paid to play with my friends.”

Usener grew up in Dripping Springs and graduated from Lake Travis High School. She loves the Austin area – the trees, sports and the lake. Her contentment with her life spills over into her work.

Barton Creek residents Travis White and his wife, Sharon, have been coming to Texas Honey Ham regularly since the place opened. They like the good food, and they like seeing Usener’s face light up when she sees them.

“She always smiles,” he said. “No matter how bad things are, she makes us feel happy.”

Everyone who dons a Texas Honey Ham apron is noticeably friendly. Owners Trent Hunt, Kelley Weiss and Robert Siller say that’s the way they like it.

“When we started the place, we wanted it to be a happy, fun place,” Hunt said. “We’ve been careful. We don’t have a grumpy, mean person on staff.”

Hunt said the thing that makes Usener unique is that she really is as friendly and open as she seems.

“She’s just a rare, genuinely nice person who doesn’t put on a front,” he said.

“That sort of thing just kind of spills out on everyone else,” Weiss said.

The friendly nature of the staff seems to be drawing fans for Texas Honey Ham, along with the restaurant’s firm dedication to the perfection of the American sandwich and breakfast taco.

Mary Mignatti and her family have been driving to the restaurant from out of the area for two years now. That’s how good they think the breakfast is.

“And it’s quick, the kids can all find something they like, and we can make as big a mess as we like and it doesn’t even matter,” she said. “Everybody still is nice to us.”

Rachel Luu brought a foreign exchange student from Korea, Jieun Seung, who is living with her family for three weeks, for Sunday breakfast.

“The food is so good here,” Luu said. “We wanted Jieun to get the real Texas breakfast experience.”

Usener started working for Hunt straight out of high school when he was general manager of Rudy’s Country Store and Bar-B-Q on Loop 360.

She came with him when Hunt and Weiss opened the sandwich shop five years ago. She said Hunt, Weiss and Siller have become like family to her. So have her customers. She’s watched their children grow and listened to the things going on in their lives.

“They all have such interesting stories,” she said. “They always ask me how I’m doing, and they really want to know.”

Monday afternoon at 2:30, the shop is still busy. Usener takes the time to help Jane Chenevert, who dropped in to nervously scope out plans for a Tuesday luncheon. After 10 minutes of conversation with Usener, Chenevert relaxes. She beams as she heads out the door.

“I like her exuberance,” she whispered. “She reminds me of a close friend I have in Clear Lake.”

Usener looks a little sheepish.

“Everybody here is friendly,” she said. “It’s not just me.”

Clearly, her bosses think she’s special.

“She changes people’s day,” Weiss said. “Besides, we can never fire her. She knows too many secrets.”

A memorial service for long-time Forest Trail Elementary School teacher Joan Reeves will be held at the Westlake Hills Presbyterian Church Sunday at 3:30 p.m. Reeves died Thursday evening.

“In her twenty-two years at Forest Trail, Joan taught second and third grades and served as a team leader,” said Charles McCasland, Forest Trail principal. “She was on staff the day the doors opened at Forest Trail in 1984 until she retired in 2006. She will be remembered at our school for her kind and gentle spirit, her dry sense of humor and her ongoing dedication to the children of our community.”

Westlake Presbyterian Church is located at 7127 Bee Caves Road. In lieu of flowers and in recognition of Reeve’s lifelong dedication to children, the family requests that donations be made in her honor to Save the Children at www.savethechildren.org