Cover Story
Solvang’s denial of Pride banners goes against Denmark’s progressive LGBTQ-plus policies, advocates say
Editor’s note: This is the first installment of a two-part series on the conversations surrounding a proposal to hang Pride banners and paint a crosswalk with rainbow colors in Solvang during Pride Month in June. The second part, “Solvang residents say Pride banners promote politics and exclusivity, while LGBTQ-plus community members say they promote acceptance…
NEW FLICKS: All The Beauty And The Bloodshed
NEW FLICKS: ALL THE BEAUTY AND THE BLOODSHED Where’s it playing? HBO Max What’s it rated? Not Rated Novelist Toni Morrison said, “The best art is political, and you ought to be able to make it unquestionably political and irrevocably beautiful at the same time.” I think Academy Award-winning filmmaker Laura Poitras (Citizenfour) and her…
NEW FLICKS: Boston Strangler
NEW FLICKS: BOSTON STRANGLER Where’s it playing? Hulu What’s it rated? R Perpetually overlooked female journalist Loretta McLaughlin (Kiera Knightly) has a story on her hands. Usually given lifestyle pieces and appliance reviews, she can’t seem to get any traction. But when women start turning up strangled, Loretta and her fellow reporter, Jean Cole (Carrie…
Extrapolations’ is sprawling, dark look into the future of a climate changed Earth
EXTRAPOLATIONS (2023) Where’s it playing? Apple TV Plus What’s it rated? TV-MA What’s it worth? Full price (Anna Starkey) What’s it worth? Full price (Glen Starkey) Creator Scott Z. Burns (Contagion, Side Effects) helms this new anthology drama series that peers into our future to explore what life on our climate-changed planet will be like.…
County cannabis tax revenue $10 million less than projected
Santa Barbara County collected $3.1 million in cannabis cultivation and retail taxes through the second fiscal quarter, $10.5 million less than the original projections of $23 million. “There’s been a decline in gross sales receipts, there has been a significant drop in wholesale pricing, and there’s a severe supply glut—there’s too much product in California…
Lompoc prioritizes funding body cameras for city police
More than 300 Lompoc residents participated in a recent survey to help city officials weigh future budget priorities. Results were collected between Jan. 10 and Feb. 10, and members of the Lompoc City Council discussed them during a special budget workshop on March 16. One of the survey questions included a list of potential areas…
Political Watch: March 23, 2023
• U.S. Reps. Salud Carbajal (D-Santa Barbara) and Jimmy Panetta (D-Santa Cruz) joined 24 members of the California congressional delegation in calling for a delay of the March 16 deadline for families impacted by January’s severe storms to apply for federal aid, according to a March 15 statement from Carbajal’s office. Amid multiple new storms…
Point-in-Time Count shows slight decrease in homelessness
For the first time in more than three years, Santa Barbara County’s Point-in-Time Count results showed a decrease in the number of people experiencing homelessness. “We’re hopeful that all the efforts and the county and Continuum of Care and homeless service providers is really beginning to make a difference in people’s lives, but we’re hoping…
Orcutt community members pitch in to help local donut shop owner hospitalized with cancer
Orcutt resident Patricia Sly-Feighner said Houth Hak, the owner of Orcutt’s Golden Donut, always went out of her way to make people feel special. “She’s just always so happy, you just knew she would smile at you. She would help carry your stuff out to your car; she was a ray of sunshine,” Sly-Feighner said.…
Policy prattlers
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…
Santa Maria: Stop the gobble-gobble
The citizens of Orcutt are fed up with the actions of Santa Maria as they attempt to annex the Richards Ranch property into the city. It is located next to Highway 135 and Union Valley Parkway. The Parkway already has significant traffic. If approved, traffic will increase by 20,780 trips per day creating more unwanted…
Lompoc’s fire crews are well trained, but the city needs to fund a more robust department to ensure public safety
On Saturday evening, March 11, a very large fire occurred at the north end of Lompoc between Walmart and the airport. The property, known as the “Campbell Coolers,” is a very large vegetable processing facility. There are several football field-sized piles of construction material, pallets, and boxes stored on the property. It was one of…
Ryan Carroll’s papercut pieces pop with color in Santa Maria
Just like the Donovan song implies, to catch the wind was no easy task for local artist Ryan Carroll while completing a piece centered on Morro Rock. “I was trying to capture that Morro Bay is very windy,” Carroll said with a laugh. As a papercut artist, Carroll enjoys re-creating imagery from reference photos and…
Flying Goat Cellars showcases landscapes by Carol Talley
On Friday, March 24, Flying Goat Cellars in Lompoc will hold an opening reception for its latest art showcase—a solo exhibition of paintings by local artist Carol Talley. The reception is scheduled to start at 4 p.m. The exhibit is titled Luminous Landscapes, and features a collection of Talley’s “abstracted landscapes” that evoke feelings of…
Three local high schools team up for student production of ‘Chicago’ in Santa Maria
A new student-led production of Chicago will premiere at the Pioneer Valley High School Performing Arts Center in Santa Maria on Thursday, March 23, at 7 p.m. Additional performances will be held on March 24, 25, 30, and 31 and April 1, at 7 p.m. each evening. This iteration of the popular musical, set during…
Camins 2 Dreams winemakers open new tasting room in Lompoc
As two local vintners were recently putting the finishing touches on their new tasting room, the building shook for a moment. “I just finished hanging all the stuff. I think that was the day before we opened,” said Lompoc-based vintner Mireia Taribó, who recalled the reverberating boom of a missile fired from Vandenberg Space Force…
