El Niño is officially here whether you like it or not, and according to weather scientists, we’re supposed to get lots of rain. This is good, because California needs water, and bad, because it could be potentially devastating. Despite the outcome, it’s good to be prepared, or at least know the options. Enter Chuck Winkle. […]
DAVID MINSKY
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Too much CrossFit? What can happen if you overdo it?
There’s exercise and then there’s CrossFit. Both get you in shape, but the latter is more akin to high-intensity training like you experience if you’re training to be an Olympic athlete. There’s no denying the enthusiasm for the intense level of fitness offered by CrossFit. It’s a strength-and-conditioning exercise system that consists of a medley […]
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Barely above water: A third of households in Santa Barbara County struggle to meet basic needs
At Allan Hancock College on a Friday afternoon, a 24-year-old woman named Elizabeth Pampa finished cleaning and arranging tables and chairs into a neat pattern. She and her coworker were preparing the conference room for its next meeting. Between this job and another one at a church in Orcutt, Pampa earns about $800 per month […]
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Santa Barbara County bans medical marijuana cultivation with some exceptions
There’s good news and bad news regarding the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisor’s ban on medical marijuana cultivation on Jan. 19. Bad news first. The new ordinance, which passed unanimously, bans any new cultivation of medical marijuana on unincorporated county land. However, according to Supervising Planner for Long Range Planning Allen Bell, existing cultivators […]
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Three homicides in Santa Maria in less than 7 hours
“I thought this side of the town was the safest,” 52-year-old Annette Blanco said. Blanco was inside of her relative’s home during the evening of Jan. 25 when she thought she heard fireworks, but was too afraid to look outside. They were actually gunshots. Responding to a report of gunshots at 9:45 p.m., police officers […]
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Spotlight on: Stars Pharmacy
Not a week had gone by since the grand opening of Stars Pharmacy when owner Sami Boraie walked into the building on a Thursday morning to broken glass littering the floor. According to officers from the Guadalupe Police Department investigating the scene, two men with clearly identifiable tattoos were captured on closed-circuit television smashing the […]
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Violence on the street: Family of double homicide victims deny any gang association
Out of all the electrical poles that line Oakley Street in Santa Maria, there is one near the corner of Main Street that is different from the rest. Several candles, bundles of red roses, white balloons with messages written on them, and half-empty bottles of Miller Lite are strewn at its base, along with rosaries […]
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Local militia madness: Historian says militias once had a home on the Central Coast
As Ammon Bundy and a band of armed protesters occupy an empty federal building on Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in eastern Oregon, the term “militia” has been getting tossed around. Bundy is the son of Cliven Bundy, the Nevada rancher who instigated at standoff with federal authorities in April 2014 in protest of unpaid […]
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Spotlight on: Monarch Wealth Strategies
Aaron J. Clark, president
Talk to any financial planner out there and most—if not all—will agree that it’s never too early to start saving money. Certified financial planner Aaron Clark agrees. How you go about doing that is all up to you, and people like Clark are there to help. Clark is a certified financial planner (CFP) for Monarch […]
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‘Godzilla’ El Nino begins wreaking havoc, but won’t cure the drought
It wasn’t unexpected, but it’s finally here and there’s been no shortage of fiascos in the first week of the global weather phenomenon that is El Niño. Predicted by weather scientists for the past year, El Niño is a band of warm ocean water that develops over the eastern/central portion of the Pacific Equator. […]
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SpaceX Falcon 9 to launch from Vandenberg AFB
Vandenberg Air Force Base (VAFB) is ushering in 2016 with a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch scheduled for Jan. 17. It’ll be the base’s first launch of the year. The Falcon 9 rocket will be used to haul a satellite into space that’ll monitor global sea surface heights and how tropical cyclones intensify, according to 30th […]
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Santa Barbara County wine has a $1.7 billion economic impact
The movie Sideways may have helped put Santa Barbara County on the map as a wine destination, but if there was a way to quantify the impact county wineries have on the state economy, a recent report may be able to shed some light on the subject. All total, the 191 wineries in the county […]
