I don’t know much about below-ground critters, I’m more of a winged creature expert, but it seems to me that Groundhog Day wasn’t Feb. 2. It was Feb. 18, during a Lompoc City Council meeting where elected officials had to grapple once again with homeless encampments in the Santa Ynez Riverbed.
It wasn’t so long ago that the city spent half a million dollars to clear 60 to 80 people and millions of pounds of waste out of the riverbed. Gosh. Remember when?
The city coughed up all of that money, and then it didn’t have any more dollars or personnel to patrol the riverbed and ensure that it stayed encampment free. And, now—no surprises here—about 20 homeless individuals are once again calling the riverbed home. And Lompoc, which essentially did nothing to ensure its $500,000 investment wasn’t wasted, is wondering why it would have to pay to play all over again!
Councilmember Dirk “The Renegade” Starbuck was pissed that Santa Barbara County isn’t helping. After all, it’s land owned by Lompoc that has yet to be annexed to the city. So, obviously it’s a county issue! Wait a minute. I’m confused. If Lompoc owns it, but it’s technically within the county, who’s responsible?!
Starbuck seems convinced that it’s a county issue. In fact, he thinks a joyride along the river bottom is just the ticket!
“Let’s just go down there and ride a motorcycle,” Starbuck said during the Feb. 18 meeting. “The Sheriff’s [Office] will respond if your kid is down there on a quad. They will send out four quads of their own and find your kid. Somehow they can’t look left or right when down there.”
So, Starbuck seems to be saying, send your kids down there on motorcycles and the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office will go get them! Yeehaw!
Wait. How is this going to fix that whole encampment issue that bothers the city so much?
Meanwhile Councilmember Jim “Ride the Free Market” Mosby believes the city could just send a bunch of process servers into the riverbed to evict the homeless. Aren’t those the people who chase soon-to-be divorcees down and hand them papers? With no proper training or experience dealing with that population, I’m sure nothing bad could happen and the city certainly wouldn’t be liable for any associated safety-type issues because it’s county land!
Right? No? Oh. Shoot.
Pastor Brian Halterman, who manages the Bridge Homeless Shelter, seemed to be the voice of reason at the meeting. The city, he said, needs to figure out what it wants: to come up with solutions to homelessness or clean up the riverbed for environmental reasons.
It should definitely do both. The riverbed will have encampments as long as individuals feel like there’s nowhere else to go. It’s a humanitarian issue that affects the environment—and will continue to do so over and over again. Renegade Starbuck and Free Market Mosby need to get their priorities figured out—all this “fiscal responsibility” rhetoric they preach but fail to practice keeps showing up to bite them in the booty.
The canary is channeling an inner groundhog this week. Send comments to canary@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Mar 5-12, 2020.