Letters To The Editor

The forest fires, floods, drought, and the extreme weather we are all living with just got some help from William Shatner, Jeff Bezos, and his billionaire buddies. The latest version of a rich guy buying a Ferrari is launching yourself into space for a 10-minute joy ride.  But what is the real cost of some […]

Imagine this scenario: A hospital is facing a surge of patients, and a new patient is in need of emergency care. However, as a result of a nationwide nursing shortage (exacerbated here in California due to a statewide mandate requiring nurses to be vaccinated) and the need for the hospital to meet certain staffing-to-patient ratio […]

In contempt of the California Coastal Commission’s (CCC) ruling of March 18, 2021, the Off Highway Vehicles Division (OHVD) of State Parks defies the law and opens the plover enclosure south of Oceano beach to vehicle activity.  It is not the only defiance. The OHVD also keeps allowing vehicles to drive on the wet sand […]

County Planning and Development staff reports supported the drilling of more than 750 new oil wells in Cat Canyon. They proved to be poorly drafted and replete with error. The proposed projects threatened the quality of our drinking water and the water used by growers. The Oct. 1 Huntington Beach oil pipeline accident has underscored […]

The county of Santa Barbara has forced ExxonMobil to propose trucking their oil until they are permitted to reopen their pipeline. The pipeline is the least expensive and safest means of transportation for the oil from Las Flores refinery.  We urge the county to grant their permission for ExxonMobil to proceed for these reasons. They […]

With a sense of helplessness, we watch events in Afghanistan unfold and wildfires rage in this great state. Meanwhile, the For the People Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act are strongly beckoning us to repeal the greatest threat to voting rights since Reconstruction. Hundreds of new voting restrictions are being enacted in […]

For a guy who likes to talk a big game about supporting the middle class and advocating for the job force, you sure threw nurses under the bus with your letter to the Health and Human Services asking to wipe out our staffing ratios. Nurses have been working the last 18 months with crushingly high-acuity […]

The Police Department held a public meeting at the Minami Center last Monday evening, Sept. 20. There are signs on both front doors saying that anyone who enters any public building must wear a mask. Everyone in attendance did wear a mask over their nose and mouth, except for Councilperson Etta Waterfield. She sat among […]

Santa Maria High School, and perhaps the city of Santa Maria, will be abandoning its image of Columbus’ flagship, the Santa Maria, as a logo. Duh! Whose idea was it in the first place to adopt that ship as the city’s, and school’s, logo in the first place? I can assure you, it was not […]

The COVID-19 pandemic rages on, and there are still tens of thousands who have yet to get vaccinated, even though the shots are free and readily available. There is no doubt this mindset is prolonging the pandemic. Back in the early ’50s, a polio epidemic swept through this country with a vengeance. I was in […]

When COVID-19 first blanketed our country in early 2020, we were indeed “all in this together.” But, after the development and wide dissemination of three effective vaccines against COVID, we all saw that cases declined. Well, that was until the rapid spread of the Delta variant among the unvaccinated. We now find ourselves in a […]

There’s something wrong with Joe Biden’s thinking. The United States became energy independent under President Trump for the first time in 75 years, and we no longer bought oil from foreign countries. Now Biden is crushing domestic oil and gas production while pressuring OPEC to boost their production so we can buy theirs. We do […]