Joey Ray Hawkins, a 1990s world longboard champion and Huntington Beach surf legend, was recently arrested on suspicion of being under the influence of methamphetamine while sitting in his car with a loaded 9 mm handgun near the city’s youth shelter, officials said.

Hawkins, 39, who won the ASP world longboard championship in France in 1992, pleaded not guilty Monday to two felony charges of possessing methamphetamine while armed and of possessing the drug.

“He is very well known – one of the few world champions in Huntington Beach,” John Lyman, a Surf City local since the 1960s, said after hearing about the arrest. “He never really took his surfing championship and did anything with it …He just kind of faded into the scene.”

read more at ocregister.com

There is a new buzz in the landscaping world — residential gardens that incorporate beautiful plants that thrive in our local climate and limit the necessity for irrigation and maintenance. The Surfrider Foundation and landscaping expert Douglas Kent have taken this concept a step further to include simple design ideas that will dramatically reduce runoff from properties that pollute creeks and beaches in a new manual available now for novice and expert gardeners: Ocean Friendly Gardens: A How-To Gardening Guide to Help Restore a Healthy Coast and Ocean.

Taking cues from the Surfrider Foundation’s “Ocean Friendly Gardens” program, the book describes how green-thumbs can help restore our precious oceans by applying simple practices to their gardening and landscaping routines including CPR – conserving the use of water, fertilizers and pesticides, increasing permeability so the landscape or garden holds more water, and developing water retention areas.

“With a growing trend of creating beautiful gardens that used native plants and other ‘climate-adapted’ vegetation, we wanted to show people how they could also help reduce water pollution,” said Chad Nelsen, Surfrider Foundation’s Environmental Director. “The result is a fantastic program

The Surfrider Foundation’s “Ocean Friendly Gardens” program developed from members’ personal contributions to their gardens and landscapes in an effort to restore and protect our oceans, waves and beaches. The results were unique and beautiful residential gardens that attracted the admiration and curiosity of the community.

Ocean Friendly Gardens: A How-To Gardening Guide to Help Restore a Healthy Coast and Ocean is available now at Amazon.com

David Mailman, in his third year as President of the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) Europe, just got back from the Rip Curl Pro Search in Portugal where he spent a couple of weeks along with the world’s best surfers as official announcer.

Also known as one of the ASP events’ main beach and web announcers, President Mailman sat down with ASP media to discuss about next year’s official changes that will give the sport a new boost in its evolution.

Apart from being the President of one of the seven ASP regions in the world (along with South America, North America, Hawaii, Japan, Australasia and Africa), Mailman has spent more than a decade around professional surfing events witnessing the evolution of the sport through different positions including four years as a marketing director for Quiksilver Europe.

Find out what Mailman a.k.a the Voice has to say about the changes that will occur in 2010 for the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) in Europe…

read the interview at surfeuropemag