After years of planning, the Santa Barbara County Public Works Department broke ground on March 30 on the Tepusquet Bridge project. The long-awaited bridge will connect the Tepusquet Canyon community to the rest of the county, improve public safety services, and increase potential tourism to local wineries. “This is a $4.2 million shot to the […]
Construction begins on Tepusquet Bridge project
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Chamber recognizes strawberry industry
The Santa Maria Chamber of Commerce is holding its 19th annual Strawberry Industry Recognition Dinner on April 8 at the Santa Maria Fairpark to promote and honor strawberry industry workers. Two strawberry growers, one cooler or processing company, one sales association, and one supervisor or manager will be honored at the event, which begins at […]
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Workshop tackles Form 990
Trent Bendetti, a certified public accountant and proprietor of the accounting firm Bendetti Associates, will present a Form 990 workshop on March 31 at the Santa Maria Public Library. New features on the tax form include changes to reporting on governance and management practices, executive compensation, endowments, conflict of interest policy, and whistle-blower policy. The […]
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Get the 411 on the I-9
Employers with questions about the new rule changes to the I-9—the Employee Eligibility Verification Form—are encouraged to visit a Santa Maria United Staffing Associates meeting on the topic on April 22. USA staffers in the know will hold a pair of hour-long workshops that day—from 7:30 to 8:30 a.m. and from 3:30 p.m. to 4:30 […]
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Domestic abuse agency names interim director
Domestic Violence Solutions for Santa Barbara County recently announced Richard Kavetz as its new interim director. “Domestic violence is on the on the rise during these stressful times, when our organization has suffered from government cuts. We are determined to continue to offer shelter and counseling to the families in our five facilities in the […]
Posted inMusic, Arts & Culture
Hey! Ho! Let’s go!
Before I was a husband and a father, I was an impressionable boy attending Cal Poly. Like most impressionable boys, my main task was trying to impress girls. I tried all sorts of schemes: surfing (never very good), growing my hair long (never washed it), and getting my nose pierced (never again). Surprisingly, girls weren’t […]
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Ontiveros students take reading to a new level
Students at Ontiveros Elementary School in Santa Maria recently took first place in the sixth annual Comcast Fifth Grade Reading Challenge. Earlier this year, Comcast challenged fifth grade classes throughout the Santa Maria area to improve their literacy levels by reading the most books in a one-month period. The contest was open to all […]
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It’s never too early to learn
High quality child care can be found in local neighborhoods, according to members of the Santa Barbara County Child Care Planning Council and First 5 of Santa Barbara County. To share that message with local families, the Child Care Planning Council and First 5 recently launched a website, qualitychildcaresb.org, that lists high quality child-care providers […]
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Arts Briefs
Vintners’ Festival poster art unveiled Local artist and muralist Angie Hamlin was selected to have her artwork featured for the 2009 Santa Barbara County Vintners’ Festival. The painting, titled Purisima Road Vineyard, is featured on the annual poster for the event. The Vintners’ Festival takes place from 1 to 4 p.m. on April 18 at […]
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Twisted metal
Allan Hancock College’s welding shop boasts cold metal tables, concrete floors, intimidating equipment, and scraps of steel. Even a brief visit is enough to reveal: Welding is a dirty job. It’s not a getting-paint-on-your-fingers or getting-clay-on-your-hands kind of dirty, but a blue-collar, middle-class America dirty found in a Bon Jovi or Bruce Springsteen song. Hancock’s […]
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A story in need of telling
During the Vietnam era, cities across America gave their sons to the war effort. Guadalupe, a small town of only 2,500 citizens in 1970, gave an extraordinary amount for a city of its size. The significance of that contribution changed the town and its residents forever. For decades, Guadalupe’s veterans kept their pain inside, suffering […]
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Girls bring the pain
Maggie Suarez dances around the ring, bobbing and weaving as she delivers a series of left jabs and right hooks to the firm padding of her coach’s mitts. She wipes the sweat from her brow, takes a sip from a water bottle, and does it all over again. Four days a week, she’s in the […]