A local man says there’s a shameful historical reference wrapped up in the city of Santa Maria and the Santa Maria Joint Union High School District’s (SMJUHSD) logos and is advocating for the emblems to be changed.
Earlier this month, Orcutt resident Scott Fina sent separate public comment letters to the Santa Maria City Council and the SMJUHSD board concerning the ship that’s depicted in both logos.
Fina says that Santa Maria’s seal depicts Christopher Columbus’ largest ship, called the Santa Maria.
“I thought it’d be worth the City Council and the school board to have a discussion about it, and to see if that logo is still relevant and if it’s appropriate,” Fina told the Sun.
With many Santa Maria residents being of indiginous heritage, Fina wrote in his March 4 letter to the city, the logo’s apparent reference to one of Columbus’ ships that bore the same name as the city “can currently be seen as an affront to members of our community.”
Fina’s letter urges the council members to “consider the historical accounts of the activities of Christopher Columbus and his treatment of indigenous peoples in the Americas.”
City Public Information Manager Mark van de Kamp told the Sun that while the city’s name origin is not connected to Columbus, the 50-year-old logo did draw inspiration from the controversial colonizer’s ship.
The city got its current name in 1882 when a local settler suggested naming it after a piece of property in the area already called Santa Maria, van de Kamp said in an email. The property owners had named their land in honor of their arrival to the region on the Feast Day of Mary—meaning the city’s name origins are not connected to the famous ship.
The city seal, however, was adopted by the City Council nearly a century later in 1971, and does appear to refer to Columbus’ ship. Van de Kamp shared the council’s 50-year-old statement on the logo’s adoption with the Sun.
“We believe that in today’s world, it is imperative for our city to have an easily recognizable trademark,” the statement from 1971 said. “Taking the familiar motif of the ship, Santa Maria, which is already associated with the name of our city, the design simplifies and sharpens the detail by placing the ship against the sun’s rays, which creates a radiance that draws the eye to the mark and at the same time implies optimism and pride.”
Van de Kamp said that while Fina can express his concerns over the city seal during public comment, the item is not currently agendized and as such cannot be discussed or voted on by the City Council.
SMJUHSD’s logo also depicts a ship, though the district did not confirm before press time what its origins are. Fina has his suspicions, which he expressed in his separate March 8 letter to the district school board.
“I believe the logo of the SMJUHSD has the same connotation,” Fina wrote. “I had assumed that the SMJUHSD adopted its logo following the example of the city of Santa Maria.”
However, according to Fina’s account of a conversation with district Public Information Officer Kenny Klein, “it was adopted as far back as the 1960s or possibly earlier,” before the city’s 1971 seal.
“So it would seem that the city of Santa Maria may have followed the example of the SMJUHSD,” Fina concluded.
Klein told the Sun in an emailed statement, “This will be an important topic of discussion with our board of education in the near future.”
At a March 9 board meeting, after Fina’s written public comment was read into the record, board member Dr. Carol Karamitsos said, “I would like to propose that we bring that item forward, regarding our district’s logo, and as well I would add, the opportunity for each of the sites to look at their own mascots and see if they still find them relevant.”
This article appears in Mar 18-25, 2021.