Tears welled up in Gretchen Harrelson’s eyes as she watched 16-year-old Jenna Santana belt out an emotional rendition of “Rise Up” by Andra Day. A technology issue had caused Santana’s accompanying music to unexpectedly stop, but she continued on—singing acapella—despite the glaring musical halt. The audience, mostly made up of Santana’s classmates and teachers, gave […]
Local students participate in National School Walkout despite weapon scare
Posted inNews
Lompoc to public: Stop setting dumpsters on fire
What’s that smell? It’s burning garbage, according to a statement issued by Lompoc’s public information officer, Samantha Scroggin, on March 19. “Five dumpster fires have been reported across the city to emergency dispatch since 2:30 a.m. Monday morning,” she wrote later that afternoon in an email. Scroggin said the city’s police and fire departments were […]
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Guadalupe Union School District Superintendent Ed Cora announces resignation
The decision to leave Guadalupe Union School District wasn’t an easy one to make. “Any time you have strong relationships, it’s always hard,” Ed Cora, superintendent of the Guadalupe Union School District, said. “But then you think about new opportunities and the opportunity to make a difference for a larger group of students.” That possibility […]
Posted inNews
Five-year contract between Dignity Health and workers expected to protect jobs
Roughly 15,000 healthcare workers in California ratified a five-year contract on March 16 with Dignity Health, a nonprofit health care corporation that announced plans to merge with another nonprofit, Catholic Health Initiatives, in December 2017. The agreement, which will apply to 708 workers at Marian Medical and Marian Extended Care centers in Santa Maria, will […]
Posted inOpinion
Revisionism at work
I had to wonder why you went to such trouble to compose your article “Time of Tumult” (March 15). It has been told many times. It was revisionism at its worst. Apparently you were using the Chumash Indians as your shill to promote your anti-oil agenda. The mission system did not harm the Indians, politics […]
Posted inOpinion
Stop the sand trap
The sand trap at Oceano’s Pier Avenue ramp proposed by the settlement between State Parks and SLO County Air Pollution Control District (APCD) is going to make our beach and community even uglier and noisier than it already is. The ramp itself should not even be there. It is illegal. It has been illegal for […]
Posted inOpinion
Think twice on Measure T
The proponents of Measure T2018 say Santa Barbara County embarked on a yearlong process to review issues surrounding countywide marijuana grows. The two cities most impacted by the marijuana operators in our county, Carpinteria and Goleta, oppose the regulatory framework the county adopted to mitigate impacts from marijuana grows. Opposing Measure T isn’t about opposing […]
Posted inOpinion
More of the same in Lompoc
Six weeks after 57 percent of Lompoc voters passed Prop 64, city staff, including then City Manager Patrick Wiemiller, City Attorney Joe Pannone, and both the police chief and former fire chief initiated, drafted, or supported a city ordinance to ban adult-use recreational cannabis businesses in opposition to the voters directive. Ultimately, the Lompoc City […]
Posted inNews
Hidden history: The Chumash rebellion of 1824 illustrates the changing conversation surrounding life at California’s missions
View a slideshow from La Purisima Mission. The salmon-hued tower of Mission La Purisima looms over the pastoral grounds near Lompoc where generations of California fourth-graders field trip each year to learn about the state’s mission era and the people who called Purisima home centuries ago. But life at the mission wasn’t always so serene. […]
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Lompoc councilmember’s poop emoji bumper sticker brings up questions of ethics
A crude bumper sticker on the back of an elected official’s pickup truck in Lompoc sparked a dialogue in recent weeks about how representatives should conduct themselves in public. “I think it’s important to have in most any sort of elected body some sort of standards of conduct,” local columnist Ron Fink told the Sun. […]
Posted inMusic, Arts & Culture
Orcutt native Pryor Baird talks the blues, singing with soul, and making it on NBC’s ‘The Voice’
Pryor Baird had barely finished the opening verse of “I Don’t Need No Doctor” when the first judge on The Voice, Adam Levine, hit the button that flipped his chair around, meaning Baird had passed through the show’s “blind audition” phase. By the end of the song, all five judges had hit their buttons to […]
Posted inMusic, Arts & Culture
The Solvang Library’s poetry challenge seeks to awaken the inner poet in area youth
Whatever you do, don’t call it a contest. Local poet Steve Braff will politely correct anyone who makes that mistake. “It’s not a contest,” he said. “It is isn’t about who’s best or anything like that.” Braff is one of the co-organizers of the Solvang Library’s annual youth Poetry Challenge, which invites seventh and eighth […]