The Canary

COVID-19 really did turn politicking into a spectator sport, complete with rabid fans who direct their indiscriminate, inappropriate, and often inarticulate anger at everyone if the game plays out in a way they don’t like.  Only it’s not a game. And in the case of the Santa Ynez Valley Union High School District, the losers […]

Solvang Mayor Mark Infanti finally caved.  Although he didn’t specify why he switched sides on Pride Bannergate 2023, he did indicate that he was feeling the pressure from the state, federal, and international levels. The pressure on Solvang seemed to continually rise in the weeks following the upheaval over a relatively benign proposal to hang […]

At least one official in the Santa Ynez Valley has had it with the area’s political shenanigans.  The Santa Ynez Valley Union High School principal is quitting after one year on the job. Why? It’s definitely you, not him. Michael Niehoff said he tried to make learning the forefront of his job, but the people […]

Our favorite “Danish capital of America” is still trying to figure out how best to represent its identity as a diminutive Denmark here on the Central Coast while also trying to hear and act on requests from its residents to represent their identities and values. To many, those are not different things. In February, the […]

I’m getting kind of tired of writing about all the homophobia in the Santa Ynez Valley.  But it seems to be the topic du jour. Now, Santa Ynez Valley Union High School is getting in on all the action. As the principal put it, the school was “unintentionally pulled into an issue that has divided […]

This little bird ruffled some feathers last week. Sweet! Write to us. Tell us how you really feel, so we can share it with our readers!  The Sun also received some angry responses to the first installment in a two-part series on the Solvang City Council’s decision on a proposal to put Pride flag banners […]

Solvang is so far up its own ass about what “Danish” means that it can’t understand the evolution of the European country that it spends marketing money to emulate. I guess Solvang likes to live in the past—like almost 100 years ago, past: pre-1933 Denmark.  You know? Back before it was legal to be a […]

Are residents right to be worried about a plan to update the valves on an oil pipeline that was so badly corroded it burst in 2015, spilling more than 120,000 gallons of crude oil along the Gaviota coastline? If you ask the company that proposed the project, it’s just a matter of bringing the coastal […]

California’s No. 1 inland oil polluter—aka Greka Oil & Gas, aka HVI Cat Canyon, aka owned by Randeep Grewal—is now on the hook for $65 million for more than 12 oil spills between 2005 and 2010.  Oil spills, as in plural, as in multiple spills taking place over and over and over again on the […]

Are you sick of hearing about snow yet? I hope not, because I’m not sick of talking about it yet. It snowed in Santa Barbara County!  And not just on the peaks either. Highway 154 closed and Caltrans had to break out the snow plows. New Cuyama was blanketed in the white stuff. This February […]

Modernity isn’t a word anyone would associate with Solvang, and the city’s Design Review Committee would like to keep it that way.  The committee, which was revamped a few years ago to allow for more wiggle room when it comes to new building design concepts in the city, was nonplussed with the audacity of a […]