The Nipomo City Council should be more worried about gangs from L.A. that have invaded than someone from L.A who wants to bring relief to the infirm through a pot dispensary. Living on the Central Coast for the last 30 years has shown me Santa Maria and Nipomo are crime magnets, period—marijuana dispensary or not.
Opinion
Posted inOpinion
What if we took an interest in our own communities?
San Luis Obispo
The devastation in Haiti is horrific. Our country and many other nations have come to the rescue. My only question is who is coming to the rescue for our local poverty-stricken areas of Oceano, Santa Maria, San Luis Obispo, and other communities? We have corporate jets from our area sending nurses and supplies to areas […]
Posted inOpinion
Don’t drill, conserve
Santa Lucia Chapter of the Sierra Club, director
Stop the presses: Oil has been leaking out of fissures in the ocean floor (“Resume drilling,” Feb. 4) for thousands of years! The drill-baby-drill fan club loves to cite the stats for oil seeps (250 barrels a day in the Santa Barbara Channel! An Exxon Valdez every six months in the Gulf of Mexico!), based, […]
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If money were not an issue, would you buy an electric car?
Kevin Young Student “I think I would. I prefer to draw sports cars to driving them.” Vincent Guzman Construction worker “No because nothing beats classic cars—gotta have the power.” Jazmine Thompson Actor “Yes, I would definitely do alternative energy but would not be an electric car.” Chris Bouget Student “Yes, but not for environmental issues, […]
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Decent people will change the station some day
Santa Maria
As I sit and watch the images of the humanitarian horror unfold in Haiti, I am simply amazed at the response of the ugly voice emerging from the giant megaphone that is Rush Limbaugh. As the people of the globe literally rush to save the hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of suffering humans from […]
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Resume drilling
San Luis Obispo
There was a time when I would have agreed with many concerns about offshore oil drilling and collection, but that was long ago. The attacks of 9/11 require re-evaluating the subject. I once worked for commercial fishermen who had their gear run over by seismic survey boats, who could not fish due to displacement, and […]
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Arguments against a dispensary make no sense
Paso Robles
I don’t understand the arguments against a local medical marijuana dispensary. Allow me to paraphrase what I hear: “It’s not that I deny medical marijuana’s validity; it’s that I don’t want it sold in my town,” or “I understand it’s real medicine but I think a storefront will breed crime.” How is that any different […]
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Breathing is not an option
Grover Beach
Lately I’ve been reading comments by uninformed offroaders claiming that the particulate problem downwind of the off-highway vehicles is not caused by their activities on the dunes, but that it’s a natural occurrence of sand that would become airborne anyway, any time the wind blows. Apparently they are unaware of the biology of these dunes, […]
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What’s your fondest memory of shop class?
Jonathan Zaragoza student “I don’t really have one—I just remember screwing up a lot. I did make a wooden key, though.” Bubby Baby barber “I remember breaking down an engine and putting it back piece by piece.” Robert Mabry machine technician instructor “I remember once I was teaching a class, and one of the students […]
Posted inOpinion
Incarceration doesn’t prevent crime
It’s time to rethink the system and give people a way to become responsible
What is California’s most important resource? Human beings, of course. Yet each year, the revolving door of the criminal justice system sends thousands of nonviolent young men and women to prison, principally based on the continuing inane belief that we are making our streets “safer” and that we can lower our crime rates through incarceration. […]
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Check out the South County class warfare
Oceano
While the gentrified, upper-middle-class residents of San Luis Obispo are arranging to ban loud parties and smoking on the sidewalks, and those of Pismo Beach have already banned smoking on its beach, the residents of Oceano Beach are forced to tolerate the hideous noise and ghastly pollution brought on by the Off Road “Recreational” State […]
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Off-roading opponents are reaching with this one
Santa Maria
Regarding Nell Langford’s letter on the particulates at the Oceano Dunes OHV Park (“Stand against health-threatening particulates,” Jan. 21): Come on, Nell, you’re certainly reaching on this one. Do you mean the exhaust from the off-road vehicles, or do you mean the sand that is kicked up out there? Regarding the pollutants coming from the […]
