As previously reported, Lydia Stewart, a 12-year-old entrepreneur and 7th grader from Antioch, is the proud owner of Lydia’s Soap. She has successfully secured a spot as one of the 10 finalists in the upcoming Contra Costa Youth Shark Tank Competition. To gear up for the February 6, 2024, event, Lydia is seeking support from her community.
The public is invited to Lydia’s practice event, organized by Antioch resident Dominique King, this Saturday, Feb. 3 at 3:30 p.m. inside TnT Smoothie and Juice Bar, 208 G Street in historic, downtown Rivertown, where attendees can enjoy refreshments, snacks, and explore various youth-run businesses as vendors.
“Let’s come together on a Saturday to celebrate and uplift our young entrepreneurs!” King said.
Shoot for the stars and dribble into a world of excitement! Join our Junior Warriors Co-Ed Basketball League – where teamwork, skill-building, and fun collide! League open to youth in grades K-8th. Sign up now and let the balling adventure begin.
Plus, 7 other items including Wilson’s gas station moratorium, repealing city cruising ban due to new state law; presentations on homeless services, Community Response Team
By Allen D. Payton
During a special meeting Tuesday night, Jan. 30, 2024, the Antioch City Council will receive three presentations including one on Unhoused Resident Services and discuss eight items requested by council members including a possible ballot measure for infrastructure and/or programs under agenda Item 5. requested by Mayor Lamar Hernandez-Thorpe, and a moratorium on new gas stations, proposed by Mayor Pro Tem and District 4 Councilwoman Monica Wilson.
The meeting will begin at 6:30 p.m. and be held at the Nick Rodriguez Center, 213 F Street in Rivertown.
The other two presentations will be on the City’s Youth Services Network and on the California Violence Intervention and Prevention (CALVIP), the City’s Community Response Team and raising awareness against domestic violence.
On the gas station moratorium discussion under agenda Item. 10, city staff offers basic options that the Council could consider including: a temporary moratorium on approval of new gas stations or a ban on new gas stations. In addition, the City could consider a ban on the expansion of new pumps at existing gas stations.
The other six items requested by council members for discussion and possible placement on a future council meeting agenda for votes include the following items:
4. Discussion on the Antioch Alert System requested by District 2 Councilman Mike Barbanica.
6. The Contra Costa County A3 Miles Hall Crisis Call Center requested by District 1 Councilwoman Tamisha Torres-Walker.
According to the staff report, A3 is the county’s approach to providing behavioral health crisis services to anyone, anywhere, at anytime in the county. Annual Measure X sales tax revenue supports the center, mobile response teams and connection to follow-up care for those in crisis. A3 has grown from a pilot project in 2021 to now operating 24/7. Currently, A3 responds to about 200 calls and dispatches 30 mobile teams per week. They helped over 2,900 callers in 2022 and expect that number to grow to more than 4,500 people this year.
7. Hiring incentives for city employees requested by Hernandez-Thorpe.
8. Permits for landlords renting to family members requested by Barbanica.
9. Discussion on the City’s official poet laureate program requested by Torres-Walker.
11. Repealing the City’s ban on cruising. According to the brief description of the agenda item, staff is recommending that the City Council direct staff to prepare an ordinance to repeal the City’s local ban on cruising, set forth in Section 4-5.1009 of the Antioch Municipal Code (AMC), which is now preempted by State law effective January 1, 2024.
Cruising Now Legal in California
According to the city staff report by City Attorney Thomas L. Smith, “On October 13, 2023, Governor Newsom signed into law AB 436, which amends Section 21100 by removing subdivision (k) “Regulating cruising” from the traffic matters that local agencies may regulate. Effective January 1, 2024, cruising bans adopted by cities are no longer authorized under State law. Therefore, cruising is a legal activity within the State of California. Existing City bans are now preempted by State law.”
State Senator Steve Glazer was absent for the vote but State Assemblyman Tim Grayson, who is running for Glazer’s seat, voted for the bill.
Community Response Team Report Details
According to the Community Response Team report, since Oct. 2022, they have responded to 1,600 Dispatch calls of which they had 51 accompanied the Antioch Police Department, 573 Welfare Checks and 293 for Mental Health Related Services. In addition, most of the calls were made during the hours of 6am-11pm, with 12pm-5pm being the peak hours of conducted services.
No votes will be made during the meeting just direction to staff. See complete meeting agenda.
Front row: Brianna Davenport (8 yr. old girl), Isaac Ramirez (10 yr. old boy), Isaac Torres (9 yr. old boy), Cristiano Pham (8 yr. old boy), Ruby duPont (11 yr. old girl) Second row: Jorge Aragon (14 yr. old boy), Lex Magpoc (12 yr. old boy), Matthew Gallego (13 yr. old boy), Gabriella Matar (12 yr. old girl), Thalia Pham (13 yr. old girl) Back row: Knights of Columbus Antioch Council #3265. Photo by Knights of Columbus.
Qualify for District competition
By Wayne Steffen
Ten boys and girls ages 8 to 14 were named local champions of the 2024 Knights of Columbus Free Throw Championship and have earned the right to compete at the district level. Antioch Council #3265 sponsored the local competition at Most Holy Rosary parish center.
The champions are:
Age Boys Girls
8 Cristiano Pham Brianna Davenport
9 Isaac Torres
10 Isaac Ramirez
11 Ruby du Pont
12 Lex Magpoc Gabriella Matar
13 Matthew Gallego Thalia Pham
14 Jorge Aragon
Each of these winners will compete in the district competition to be held on February 10 with an eye toward moving on to county, state national, and international levels.
Council #3265 in Antioch, CA is one of 17,000 Knights of Columbus councils that make up the world’s largest Catholic fraternal service organization. Founded in 1882 to assist working-class and immigrant Catholics in the United States, today the approximately two million members of the Knights put their faith into action through a broad range of charitable causes locally, nationally, and internationally with financial contributions and hands-on service.
Information meeting Jan. 24; application deadline Feb. 2
Contra Costa County Fair Queen serves as a role model for young women in our community.
The pageant is seeking young women who are intelligent, articulate, charming, talented, sincere and healthy (in mind and body) with warm outgoing personalities.
The winner and her court will reign for one year.
Closing date for Application is Friday, February 2nd, 2024.
Contestants must be between the ages of 17 – 21 years old, on the day of the pageant (May 16th, 2024). Contestant must be female, single, have never been married nor is planning to be married until after her reign, and have never given birth to a child.
Pageant Information Meeting:
Wednesday, January 24th at 6pm, to assist and answer any questions regarding the pageant,
completing the application form and the required activities.
Visit www.contracostafair.com for Contra Costa County Fair updates on shows, exhibits, entertainers, fair-time sponsors, fair maps, promotions, ticket sales and more!
Princeton University senior and Dozier-Libbey Medical High School of Antioch graduate Carlos Cortez, 2023 Projects for Peace grant recipient.Photo by Gwen McNamara.
It takes a village: Carlos Cortez – Class of ’24 – and the people of Zináparo bring music and soccer to their youth
By Lou Chen, Trenton Arts at Princeton Program Manager
The 2020Dozier-Libbey Medical High School graduate’s family is from Zináparo, a small rural village in Michoácan, Mexico, where few people have ever heard of Princeton University.
The son of Carlos and Eréndira Cortez is a senior at Princeton University, where few people have ever heard of Zináparo.
But Carlos, the student, had an idea to bring these two worlds together. Last year, with the funding he won as Princeton’s 2023 Projects for Peace award recipient, he started a music and soccer summer camp for Zináparo youth.
Now everyone in Zináparo knows Princeton. And Princeton is just getting to know Zináparo.
Carlos Cortez (back right) and his soccer team. Photo by Lou Chen.
An Idea
Even though Carlos was born and raised in Antioch, California, he considers his real hometown to be Zináparo, where most of his extended family still lives. Twice every year, he travels to Zináparo to enjoy the balmy summers and festive winters, hiking in the nearby mountains and participating in the annual peregrinación (religious pilgrimage).
Accepted into Princeton as a Questbridge scholar, Carlos chose to major in neuroscience and committed to the pre-med track, supplementing his coursework with research and tutoring jobs. Despite his busy schedule, he felt restless. His thoughts constantly returned to Zináparo.
Carlos in Zináparo’s town square. Photo by Lou Chen.
“My dream was to become a doctor and open a pediatric clinic in Zináparo,” he says. “But I realized that it would be many years before I could accomplish this. I didn’t want to wait that long. I wanted a chance to do something now.”
That chance soon arrived. During his junior year, he heard about the Pace Center for Civic Engagement’s Projects for Peace initiative, which provides Princeton undergraduates with a $10,000 award to implement a service project anywhere in the world. With his family’s encouragement, he proposed a music and soccer summer camp for children in Zináparo.
“Growing up in California, music and soccer were very important for me in making community,” he says. “I wanted the kids in Zináparo to have the same experience.”
In the spring of 2023, he won the award.
According to a preview article about his project, “He saw his project as an opportunity to not only influence the youth of his town, but to have positive reverberations for the entire community and surrounding communities as well.
He summarizes this hope as he looks forward to this summer by saying, ‘just like a musical note can travel through both time and space when it is played, I am hopeful of learning how my project’s ideals and goals are going to have transgenerational effects on the future generations of Zináparo and ultimately transcend beyond the borders of my hometown,’ he shared before the project began.”
Carlos and his music students. Photo by Adrián Pimentel.
A Village
As any entrepreneur will tell you, the road from idea to execution is a winding one. “Right before arriving in Zináparo, I was feeling that the process would be easy,” Carlos says. “But when I landed in Zináparo, I started to realize that it was going to be a long journey with a lot of challenges.”
The first challenge was recruiting children for the camp, which Carlos had titled, “Musical Notes: A Composition for Peace.” Even though Carlos was a frequent visitor to Zináparo, he remained an unfamiliar face to many people. It didn’t matter that Princeton was supporting the camp; none of the children knew what Princeton even was.
He began by visiting the local high school where his aunt Noemí taught history and ethics, going from classroom to classroom and telling students about his new program. He later found out that one of the students called up Noemí, a widely respected community leader in Zináparo, and told her that someone from Princeton University wanted to start a summer camp. “Do you know about this?” the student asked. “Can we trust him?”
“Of course, you can,” Noemí replied. “He’s my nephew!”
Carlos purchases a bass in Paracho. Photo by Adrián Pimentel.
Another challenge was procuring instruments. Almost 40 kids wanted to learn guitar, violin, or bass—but none of them had their own instrument. One hot summer day, Carlos, his younger sister Natalia, his mother, his uncle Adrián, and his grandfather Guillermo piled into the family van and drove two hours to Paracho, a small town in Michoácan that specializes in making instruments. (Paracho inspired the setting of the Oscar-winning animated film Coco.)
Once in Paracho, they purchased several instruments from a local luthier. Somehow, they crammed one bass, five guitars, and seven violins into a van that already contained five people. “I was pressed up against the side of the van,” says Carlos. “It was definitely an experience.” They made several return trips to Paracho for more instruments, and on one occasion, the aforementioned luthier drove a second bass all the way to Zináparo by himself.
Carlos was surprised by how enthusiastically the Zináparo community rallied around the camp. Countless people pitched in: the neighbor who let them use his house for rehearsals; the business owner who let them use his shop for a private recital; and Carlos’ 10-year-old student Hector and Hector’s mother Luz, who cleaned up after every rehearsal. “Without everyone’s help, this project would not have been possible,” says Carlos.
The camp exceeded even Carlos’ wildest expectations. Every Monday through Thursday for two and a half months, almost 100 children aged four to 17 participated in one or more classes: soccer, choir, guitar, and violin/bass. Carlos coached the soccer team and hired teachers for the other subjects. “I wanted teachers who were passionate about working with kids,” says Carlos. “I didn’t want them to treat this as just another way to make money.”
On the last day of camp, his soccer team surprised him with a loud round of applause. One student cried out, “Carlos for president!” Carlos promised to buy them jerseys out of his own money if they continued to practice soccer.
Carlos and his soccer team. Photo by Adrián Pimentel.
Continue they did. Even though Carlos had to return to Princeton for his senior year, he was determined to keep the camp going. He found two people to coach the soccer team on a volunteer basis; they had recently moved to Zináparo and had long dreamed of coaching their own team. He used his leftover Projects for Peace funding to pay for weekly choral and instrumental lessons for his students until December and let them keep their instruments. Noemí took his place as the point person for the program.
For Carlos, the experience was a blessing. “I just wanted to change the future of even one of the kids,” he says. “I’m seeing that difference already.”
A Debut
On January 7, Carlos woke up with butterflies in his stomach. Today was the debut of Musical Notes: A Composition for Peace. Since the summer, the choir and orchestra (consisting of guitar, violin, and bass) had been rehearsing weekly for a big concert in the Zináparo town square. The entire community had been invited, and Carlos’ extended family in California had flown out to watch.
Carlos’ soccer team wears their new Princeton-themed jerseys. Photo by Lou Chen.
First, Carlos stopped by the soccer field to observe a match between his team and a team from a neighboring town. He had kept his promise: His team was wearing brand-new orange and black jerseys. Natalia had designed the jerseys, including the iconic image of a Princeton tiger glaring through claw marks.
“In one of our first games, we played against a team from a much wealthier town,” says Carlos. “I could tell how discouraged my students were to see how much nicer [the opposing team’s] field was. I got them jerseys because I wanted them to feel proud to be on this team. I wanted them to feel like they were a part of something bigger…like they had the support of Princeton University.” The new jerseys seemed to do the trick: After putting them on, his team won the next game.
After the match, Carlos and his parents walked to the town square to set up for the performance. The owner of the local funeral home, whose daughter was in the choir, had donated 150 chairs for the audience—and had even purchased new ones so that there would be enough.
The audience seated (and standing) in the town square. Photo by Lou Chen.
Carlos was worried that not enough people were going to show up to fill the seats. But as people started entering the town square, he realized that he had the opposite problem: He didn’t have enough seats. His family raced to the rehearsal space, grabbed as many chairs as they could, carried them back, and set them up with only minutes to spare. The new chairs were quickly occupied, and latecomers had to stand. At least 350 people were in the audience.
As Natalia helped tune the guitars, she noticed a student looking forlorn. She asked him what was wrong, and he quietly asked if this was the last day of the program. “Of course not,” Natalia assured him. He smiled.
The choir performs “Noche de paz.” Photo by Lou Chen.
The choir opened the concert with six Christmas carols. During “Noche de paz” (Silent Night), they cradled candles in their hands, their faces glowing as if lit from within. For their final song, “Ven a Cantar” (Sing with Us), they rolled up their sleeves, revealing bracelets made of jingle bells. As they clapped their hands, the ringing of bells filled the crisp winter air.
The orchestra was up next, performing two songs that featured a 15-year-old choral student named Andrea. Her voice, initially hesitant and wavering, gradually grew in power. The guitarists kept the orchestra together with their steady strumming, and the violinists trained their eyes on the conductor, determined not to miss their tremolo entrance. In the very back, a student plucked away at the bass that Carlos had brought back from Paracho.
José delivers his speech. Photo by Lou Chen.
After the orchestra finished, Noemí invited Hector and Luz to the stage and thanked them for keeping the rehearsal space clean. She presented them with gifts and embraced a clearly overcome Luz. The crowd cheered.
Next to speak was Carlos’ student José, who at 17 years old was the oldest member of the program. “I want to give a special thank you to Carlos for giving me and the children of this town the opportunity to learn music,” he said. “I hope this continues…Zináparo needs these programs.”
Carlos walked onstage to deliver the concluding remarks. “Thank you to my grandparents for giving me a love of Zináparo,” he said, choking back tears. “I know I wasn’t born here, but this is my home.”
As Carlos left the stage, he was mobbed by students, parents, complete strangers—all of whom wanted to take a picture with him. Grown men were crying and little kids were beaming. “Before this camp, the children of Zináparo didn’t have anything like this,” said Eréndira. “But now, they do.”
Carlos hopes that the camp will take place every summer, with weekly programming throughout the rest of the year. He hopes that someday his music students will be paid to perform or even to teach. (This is already happening: José has been invited by his guitar teacher to perform in a mariachi band, and Carlos wants him to teach for the camp.) He hopes to solicit donations from Zináparo residents who have immigrated to the United States, and to potentially seek funding from the Mexican government.
Musical Notes: A Composition for Peace. Photo by Lou Chen.
These are all big dreams. It’s a lot for one Princeton student—and soon-to-be-alum—to take on alone.
But Carlos knows he isn’t alone. “I feel honored to have so many different communities believe in the project,” he says. “It ensures the life of the project, because there are so many people invested in wanting to see the kids succeed.”
To learn more about Musical Notes: A Composition for Peace, follow them on Instagram. Their full debut performance can be viewed on YouTube.
Lydia Stewart of Antioch will be competing in the Shark Tank finals on Feb. 6th. Photo: LydiasSoaps.com
Students ages 11-17 selected from over 300 applicants
Finalist pitch event February 6th at Lafayette library will determine $1,000 winner
MORAGA, CALIFORNIA –Ten students in Contra Costa County have been selected as finalists for the first Contra Costa Shark Tank Youth Competition (www.contracostasharktank.org).
The competition, open to all Contra Costa County students in grades Kindergarten through 12th grade, is a fun way to promote youth entrepreneurship. When young people succeed as entrepreneurs, they improve their own lives while also contributing to the economic development of their local communities.
Antioch 7th-grader Lydia Stewart is one of the finalists and owns Lydia’s Soap. According to her business website, Lydia’s “soaps are good for sensitive skin and fun for bath time. Try my rub a dub soap for kids who love to play hard. Each hand wash gets you closer to a fun toy inside.”
“My parents bought me a soap making kit and I loved making soaps,” she shared. “My mom decided it would be a great way to learn economics. I have fun making great soaps and I get to share them with all my friends. I learn how to keep a budget and run a business, but most of all I get to spend time with my mom. Mom is my manager, teacher and employee. We make a great team.”
High school junior Maya Hammerman, the competition founder and one of the judges said, “The best way to learn about entrepreneurship is by starting a business. My journey as an entrepreneur started in elementary school. I created the competition to inspire kids in Contra Costa County to start or grow any type of business from traditional ones such as lemonade stands, to innovative new products or services that they create.”
The ten finalists listed below were selected by members of the Campolindo High School Entrepreneurship Club from over 300 applicants.
SportzCity, Hunter Smith (5th Grade, Burton Valley Elementary, Lafayette)
Experimental Kids, Archit Kundu (5th Grade, Bella Vista Elementary, San Ramon)
Lydia’s Soap, Lydia Stewart (7th Grade, Homeschool, Antioch)
Workout Wizard, Fatimah Hussain (12th Grade, Dougherty Valley High, San Ramon)
Winners will receive $1,000 for first place, $500 for second place, and $250 for third place. Sponsors for the competition include Chevron, Visa, PG&E, Lafayette Chamber of Commerce, and Campolindo Parents Club. Winners will be chosen by a panel of five judges at the Finalist Pitch Event at the Lafayette library on Tuesday February 6, 2024 at 7pm. For ticket information visit www.contracostasharktank.org
Celebrating Antioch’s Citizens, Businesses, Non-Profit and Youth of the Year; deadline Feb. 9
By Antioch Chamber of Commerce
At 6 pm on Friday March 22, 2024, the Antioch Chamber of Commerce will host our annual awards Gala. The Chamber is pleased to open nominations for 2023 in the following categories:
-Youth of the Year
– Non-profit of the Year
– Citizen of the Year – Most Impact
– Citizen of the Year – Lifetime Achievement
– Small Business of the Year
– Large Business of the Year
Nomination forms must be completed and received by the Antioch Chamber of Commerce no later than 5p on Friday, February 9, 2023.
Please return forms to the Antioch Chamber of Commerce office at
