Cover Story
Making room: Santa Maria allows accessory dwelling units for the first time
A few curious neighbors watched as carpenters pieced together the wooden skeleton of a 2,138-square-foot house on the corner of South Bradley Road in Santa Maria’s Sunrise Hills neighborhood on May 8. The finished product would one day include a spacious kitchen, lower and upper level living rooms, three bedrooms, two and a half bathrooms,…
Leonardo’s Ristorante and Pizzeria in Solvang is a perfect spot for a luxurious lunch
Tucked in the corner of the Nielsen’s shopping center in Solvang, it might be easy to miss Leonardo’s Ristorante and Pizzeria. It’s separated from the busy tourist-heavy streets of downtown Solvang and the shopping and dining districts of Los Olivos and Santa Ynez. But once inside, it’s clear the venue is playing on the same…
Artists Debby Fuller and Gabriel Bustamante feature art inspired by a wooden world at the Cypress Gallery
Artist and wood turner Gabriel Bustamante has no plans to put his work online. He politely brushes off questions about where one can see photographs of his exquisite wooden pieces, explaining the digital world just isn’t for him. “People keep telling me to get a website, but that’s not for me,” he explained. “For me,…
Photography of Dugan Aguilar, on display at DANA Adobe, chronicles California’s Native American population
Liz Aguilar has become comfortable talking about her husband and his visionary photography. She has been married to photographer Dugan Aguilar for 44 years, a fact that still makes her smile proudly and laugh as she describes his long history documenting native cultures in California. It’s something she has to do, since her husband, now…
Quire of Voyces features sacred music composed by women at St. Mark’s in Los Olivos
The classical music world has been dominated for decades, if not centuries, by the image of a lone, baton-wielding figure. And that figure is almost always white and almost always a man. As so many sectors of American cultural society have diversified, the classical music world has been a little slow on the uptake. But…
Spotlight on: Lompoc Valley Cannabis Association
A new association of business owners and activists in the the cannabis community say they want to help improve relations with skeptics and opponents of the plant in general. According to its founders, the Lompoc Valley Cannabis Association aims to be both a voice for a nascent industry and an intermediary between business owners, governments,…
Two Republican candidates hope to challenge incumbent Salud Carbajal for 24th Congressional District
Local Republicans are hopeful that they can unseat incumbent Rep. Salud Carbajal (D-Santa Barbara) at the ballot box come November, but first they need to choose the candidate they want to do it in the June 5 primary. Two candidates are duking it out for the Republican nomination—returning candidate for the 24th District and Santa…
NASA and Iridium, with help from SpaceX, complete launch
The first phase of a joint mission run by NASA and the German Research Centre for Geosciences—or GFZ—successfully detached from a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on May 22, releasing a pair of satellites that will now orbit the Earth for at least a half decade. The spacecraft launched just before 1 p.m. that day from…
Santa Barbara County District Attorney declares officer-involved shooting of armed robber justifiable homicide
An officer-involved shooting that led to the death of an armed bank robber in August 2017, was deemed a justifiable homicide by the Santa Barbara County District Attorney’s Office. Santa Barbara County District Attorney Joyce Dudley announced her conclusion in a statement released on May 21, which also stated that the determination followed an extensive…
Drag racer
There is a new phenomenon at my house. A new craze has taken over. All the women in my house—my wife, my daughter, and even our dog—began religiously watching a television show every Thursday night at 8 o’clock. It’s not a show like Game of Thrones with dragons, violence, and half-naked women, a show I…
Youth Arts Alive presents free summer arts classes
Youth Arts Alive, a free arts education program for Santa Maria youth, returns this summer to the Abel Maldonado Community Youth Center and Grogan Park from June 11 through July 12. For five weeks, Youth Arts Alive Alive will present 90-minute classes in theater, dance, music, and visual arts taught by local professionals. Classes include…
Wildling Museum hosts workshop for children
Artists Jill Littlewood and Pamela Zwehl-Burke will lead a workshop for children ages 6 and older on June 3 at the Wildling Museum of Art and Nature in Solvang. The class starts with a guided tour of the River’s Journey art exhibition now showing at the Wildling as well as a group conversation about the…
Get a whiff
It’s barely election season, and you can already smell the piles of platitudes pouring out of the mouths of hopeful politicians, much like the manure scent that wafts off North County’s crops. Ah, breathe in the BS! It doesn’t matter whether they’re Republican or Democrat—why do we hear the same tired words and phrases regurgitated…
Oil is OK
As three area oil companies prepare to submit their plans to upgrade oil production in the East Cat Canyon oilfield, a growing chorus of familiar voices has appeared in local media with dire predictions of future disasters should those projects gain approval. One writer, a principal architect of the failed Measure P anti-oil campaign, wrote…
Vote Betsy Schaffer for auditor-controller
Betsy Schaffer is the best choice for county auditor-controller. My name is Jim McClure, and I spent almost 30 years in the Navy as a supply corps officer and have an MBA from Stanford. After retiring as a captain in the Navy, I began a second 20-year career in county government, first as a division…
Hillary won
When will any journalist say that, while Hillary Clinton was being dragged through every investigation invented by Republicans in Congress and the media, the FBI, CIA, and NSA erred on the side of silence about Donald Trump’s conspiracy with the Russians? When will writers and TV personalities admit Bernie Sanders was never vetted and given…
Theft of $2 million from county is cause for concern
Lynn Hogan, a county employee since 1988, has pleaded guilty to embezzling more than $2 million from the county. Over the past nine years, an employee with a drug addiction outsmarted the Santa Barbara County Auditor-Controller’s Office. Their lax internal controls, antiquated financial systems, and incompetence led to theft that went on for nearly a…
Only one auditor-controller candidate is qualified
There are two candidates running for auditor-controller, and I have supervised both the candidates. After six years working in the office, one candidate left to become the treasury investment officer. That position is much more suited to her background and her degree in finance. You have to ask the question: How does investing over a…
AERA Energy’s efforts at greenwashing don’t fool cancer survivors
As someone who has watched her mother battle breast cancer twice, I am outraged by polluters that try to greenwash their image by donating to charities that fight the disease—all while using known carcinogens in their oil extraction methods. A $20,000 gift from AERA Energy last month to Mission Hope Cancer Center at Marian Regional…
Gabriela Rivas
After four years of varsity wrestling at Pioneer Valley High School, senior Gabriela Rivas plans to continue her career at Waldorf University in Forest City, Iowa, next fall. Rivas, who hopes to study education and English in college, earned several league honors throughout her time at Pioneer Valley, and helped her wrestling team win various…
Future Leaders of America call on district officials to align A-G and high school graduation requirements
Shortly after Dioceline Araujo moved from New Cuyama to Santa Maria during her freshman year of high school, a guest speaker visited one of her classes to discuss college. “‘Who here knows about A-G?’” Araujo said the speaker asked. As hands around the classroom shot up, Araujo sat still in confusion. “Like the alphabet?” Araujo…
Political Watch 5/24/18
• Gov. Jerry Brown issued an executive order on May 10 designed to address forest recovery and wildfire prevention, and support forest management. The order includes doubling land actively managed through vegetation thinning, launching new training and certification programs for controlled burns, boosting education and outreach to landowners about fire safety and prevention, streamlining permitting…
Santa Maria to increase food truck enforcement in June
Santa Maria city officials plan to crack down on food trucks and enforce regulations in June after receiving an influx of food truck-related complaints. Since the beginning of last month, Code Compliance Officer Joy Castaing said city officials have been “bombarded” with various community complaints and concerns regarding truck parking times, locations, and other impositions…
Former Santa Maria City Councilmember and county Supervisor Tom Urbanske passes at 88 years old
Former Santa Maria City Councilmember and 5th District County Supervisor Thomas “Tom” Urbanske passed away on May 17, leaving those in local government reflecting on the longtime teacher, advocate, and public servant’s legacy in Santa Maria and North County. Urbanske was 88 years old. “He really cared about people and he was a very good…
