What’s the advantage of being labeled a disadvantaged unincorporated community? You might get a new fire station, but if you’re looking for water or sewer service, you might be out of luck. And if you desperately need flood control help, well, bonne chance!
While the county is required to catalog infrastructure deficiencies in certain unincorporated areas—and is also required to catalog funding sources that could potentially help address said deficiencies—the state doesn’t actually require them to be fixed.
And, according to the state-required update to the disadvantaged unincorporated communities list, Santa Barbara County has basically followed the letter of the law and done no more, no less. Meanwhile, unincorporated areas that aren’t necessarily “disadvantaged” are struggling with basic infrastructure as well.
County 4th District Supervisor Bob Nelson brought up Rolling Hills, which apparently went without potable water for six months in 2021! But median household income in the area is more than $62,938 per year, so the county isn’t required to acknowledge the community’s lack of infrastructure.
I guess you can’t see what you don’t catalog? And even if you can see it, you can pretend you don’t? Is that what’s happening at Santa Barbara County Animal Services?
An Animal Services employee told the Sun that the department isn’t necessarily being transparent about some of the issues it’s facing, including staff burnout and stress due to workloads caused by both a staffing shortage and its kennels reaching capacity.
The number of residents who dropped unwanted pets off at Animal Services in the run-up to the holidays maxed out its capacity—bringing with it an opportunity for others in the community to step up, which they did. The county put out a call to action, and by the next day 33 animals had new forever homes!
Nice! Teamwork!
“People in the community came, they fostered, and adopted.” Animal Services Director Sarah Aguilar said.
There’s more good news on the horizon, potentially. Animal services has had 1,000 more volunteer hours this year than last and could soon be hiring an additional six staffers.
However, the employee who spoke to the Sun anonymously said the overcrowding in recent weeks led to a giardia outbreak.
“If your numbers are too high than what you can realistically handle, you are going to have disease outbreak,” the employee said.
True. Hopefully the run on surrendering animals to the county is over—and people will be adopting more pets as surprise holiday gifts (there are 64 dogs, 33 cats, seven rabbits, two parrots, and a lizard available in North County).
You know what else is a great surprise holiday gift? A certified election. At least if you won. After weeks of waiting, we now know for certain: Jim Mosby doesn’t get to have another shot at screwing up the Lompoc City Council budget or bringing his laborious drama to the public!
Jenelle Osborne will continue as mayor in her cool, calm, and collected way of being—behavior that I can get behind, regardless of political ideology or affiliations.
The Canary is craving collaboration. Send tips to canary@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Dec 15-22, 2022.