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By Cheri Rae

Good neighbor Mike grew up right down the street and still lives in his family home. He remembers residents from times gone by, and virtually everything that has happened in this neighborhood for about a half-century.

When Mike was recently diagnosed with a rare cancer, he put out a plea on the neighborhood e-mail list: could we pitch in and drive him to his radiation treatments?

For weeks and weeks and weeks, an assortment of neighbors—and even a couple who don’t even live in the neighborhood anymore—have stepped up to drive him to his daily morning appointment across town. Sometimes it takes an hour, sometimes two. Sometimes he needs to run an errand afterward, sometimes not. It’s the least we can do to help him cope with his situation.

This particular morning, while Mike was receiving his treatment, the waiting room filled up with a lovely group of individuals, all waiting their turn. We got to talking and sharing stories.

One woman in a wheelchair had a brightly colored purse draped over the side. She proudly showed it off, and said it was her chemo bag; her daughter made it for her. She spoke of her fondness for scrapbooking and hummingbirds. She is facing another round of radiation treatment due to a recurrence of cancer—this time in her lungs.
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By Cheri Rae

The Council Member sat up in her seat on the dais, pursed her lips and looked down her nose at the assembled citizens in the council chambers and stated in her characteristically imperious tone, “You have to wonder about the ethics of people who would bring an ethicist to speak on their behalf.”

As so often happens in Santa Barbara’s small-town politics, the politician attacked the individual and avoided the issue.

In this case, citizens had paid their money, done their research and appeared in front of City Council in order to appeal several troubling aspects of a mega-project that had sailed through every aspect of the approval process, even when serious ethical questions arose about everything from hidden health effects to a questionable Historic Structures Report.

The aspect that the ethicist addressed was the fact that the City had allowed a consultant—in this case, a historian—to prepare the Historic Structures Report on St. Francis Hospital on behalf of Cottage Hospital’s project, without disclosing to the Historic Landmarks Commission, or anyone else, that the historian’s spouse was a teaching physician at Cottage Hospital.

The appearance of a conflict of interest to members of the public could not be denied.

As one member of the public memorably stated in a public meeting when Cottage officials tried to shut him up, “If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck…” Many in the room laughed, realizing we’d been had. But this is no laughing matter.

Not when City officials are so willing to bend and stretch the rules and ignore common sense. And common decency.

In this case, when the information about the relationship between the consultant and the project was brought to the attention of Senior Planning staff members, the City Attorney and members of the HLC, citizens—including myself—were treated like we had yelled “Fire” in a crowded movie theatre—or worse. Senior Planning members couldn’t run fast enough into the David Gebhard Room to lecture the HLC members that they could not consider that bit of information, that it had no relevance, and that it was inappropriate for it to be brought forth. Even though some HLC members were clearly upset about the revelation and wanted to know more.

Although the City Attorney never official responded to the written query, when I questioned him in public, he muttered that it was a “political” not a legal issue, and hurried away.

That Historic Structures Report became a point of contention for years, with the City continually insisting there was no conflict of interest, up to and including the evening of the appeal when we were haughtily lectured during the appeal for bringing it into the public forum.

In several years of researching and reporting about city issues, I’ve learned stomach-turning details; read official documents demonstrating contempt for the process and the people; and learned how official policies and procedures have been skirted, ignored and circumvented in a systematic process that allows certain applicants and individuals extraordinary leeway in obtaining their “approvals.” I’ve witnessed how staff members cover up and move around to avoid accountability, and how senior staff gets away with avoiding responsibility.

When undeniable facts were brought to the attention of the highest levels of city administration, there was far more interest in keeping the issues quiet than finding out the truth—and the member of the public is called a “troublemaker who just wants to embarrass the city.”

Far too many local public officials—elected and appointed—have repeatedly shown that who you are matters more than what you are proposing. Laws on the books don’t matter; regular policies and procedures can be overlooked; and the determination to push a project or protect an applicant overrides everything else.

If the won’t obey the law will they heed a Code of Ethics?

God only knows. But it’s worth a try.

Having a public discussion about ethics is a step in the right direction to restoring the soul of this city, and maybe even its conscience. If it goes nowhere, God help us.

By Cheri Rae

Santa Barbara High School alumnus and standout athlete Ron Shelton (Class of ’63) grew up idolizing fellow Don and eventual Hall of Famer Eddie Mathews (Class of ’49). Shelton, who went on to play minor league baseball and to direct some of the best sports movies ever—including “Bull Durham”—wrote these immortal words, “I believe in the church of baseball.”

If baseball is a church, its incense is the scent of freshly mown grass; its opening hymn is The Star-Spangled Banner; its altar is home plate, and its homily always begins, Play Ball!” The congregants gather on bleachers and gaze out reverently at the tableaux laid out before them: the impeccably kept green playing field and accented with bright white lining the basepaths, defining the batters’ box and circling the spot for the on-deck batter.

It’s where some prayers are answered, others cruelly ignored; the place where hope stays alive, year after year as the players change jerseys and move on, but the team continues to play the game.

Yesterday was Major League Baseball’s Opening Day once more. For baseball fans across the country, it’s the happiest day of the year, the moment that makes spring worth waiting for.

Here in Santa Barbara, baseball’s Opening Day began a few weeks ago: with the PONY and Little League schedules now in full swing. And the local high-school teams, practicing since the school year began, are now playing games that count.

And those games count far more than the final score. As a “baseball mom” for nearly a decade, I’ve come to appreciate America’s game—and the many unsung heroes who make it possible for our kids to play it on local diamonds in our community: Continue Reading →

By Cheri Rae

While a whole host of experts blame video games, movies, and music for the appalling violence and frequent massacres that occur in our country, they might take another look in places they never imagined.

Like at the shoes their kids are wearing.

A few months ago, as I often do, I accompanied my son to the Van’s shoe store on State Street. Van’s is a brand I have known since my own youth, since the company started its unique waffle-soled deck and skate shoes in Orange County, where I grew up.

So I’ve always had a positive feeling about the brand, and have purchased many pair of Van’s for him over the years.

I bought him a pair of black suede shoes that looked pretty much like every other pair of low-top skate shoes on display; the popular “Half-Cab” design I’ve bought in many different colors because they fit well, last a reasonable length of time, and look pretty good on this kid who has always been hard on his shoes.

He’s worn this particular pair for a while, and I never paid any attention to them. Never dreamed I needed to. Not until he left them in the kitchen over the weekend and I noticed the inside of the shoe: A bright red label stitched inside caught my eye. It says, “Kill ‘Em All.”

A little investigation revealed the model is a collaborative effort between Van’s and the heavy metal band Metallica, in honor of its 30th anniversary of its debut album of the same name. This is a line of shoes that Van’s now sells in its stores, distributes across the country in all kinds of shops, and markets heavily to teens on its website.

On closer look at the shoes, the manufacturer has engraved the following on the rubber soles, a lyric from the group’s song “Motorbreath,”  “Those people who tell you not to take chances…they are all missing on what life’s about.”

Just added to this commemorative line of shoes that debuted last fall is a bolder, brighter bunch that reproduces the look of the album—a graphic depiction of a hand holding a hammer and blood that appears to splash onto the shoes. And other models read “Kill Em All” emblazoned right across the top of the shoe. And on the bottom of it, the red streaks look like the wearer has stepped in a pool of blood.

And parents—unwittingly or not—are likely footing the bill for these things.

This one is not too happy about it.

In the couple of decades I’ve been a parent, I’ve become attuned to the mass-marketing of inappropriate and violent imagery in items designed for kids. I once even returned a wallet that had an Iron Cross on it—to the disappointment of my then-very young son, who had never even heard of the Nazi symbol.

We have lots of talks at home about video games; discussions about current events; conversations about lyrics and music videos; and debates about the “fun” of an afternoon with the airsoft rifle or at the paintball park with a big group a friends—and their dads. I’ve done my best to be on top of this stuff, but really, never, ever anticipated I would have to police a pair of shoes.

And I can’t imagine what parents would ever want their kids to wear anything that appears blood-spattered, or that reads “Kill ‘Em All.” And with zero-tolerance policies about everything these days, I can’t imagine any kid being allowed to wear them to school.

There’s something afoot in this opportunistic glorification of violence for the young ones among us—right down to the soles of their shoes. It smells like money made at any price, and I think it stinks.

By Cheri Rae

A few weeks ago, I wrote the sad story of a how a thief brazenly entered our property, broke into our garage and stole away the brand-new bicycle that my teen-age son had purchased for his neighborhood friend for Christmas—a present for a kid who had had his own bike ripped off and couldn’t afford a new one.

Today the good news is that the bike is back in the hands of its rightful owner.

Note #1 to bicycle thieves: Santa Barbara is a small town with lots of networks, and news travels fast.  One of my neighbors from three blocks away excitedly reported a possible sighting of the bike downtown on Friday.

Note #2 to bicycle thieves: If you’re dumb enough to put your very distinctive ill-gotten gain in a public place, and not even invest in a proper lock, well, karma might just catch up with you.

The rest of the story: When my sharp-eyed son gave up on the Super Bowl and went downtown to see a movie, he spotted the black fixie with the purple rims and handlebars that he recently bought with money from his savings account. It was locked up in the alley near Dargan’s—chained to a light post.

He called home. Dad met him. Mom called the cops.

Just before all hell broke loose when the train hit the man on the tracks, three of Santa Barbara’s finest—described as “so totally chill” by my boy—arrived in the alley near Dargan’s and scoped out the situation.

They were sympathetic, but couldn’t break the lock without some sort of proof of purchase. The guys at Velo Pro, where the bike was purchased, could produce duplicates, but not until the next morning. My exasperated husband facetiously suggested he simply wait there with a tire iron in hand, until the thief returned. The police took him seriously, and in no uncertain terms, warned him off that line of thinking. (For the record, I think he meant bicycle tire irons…)

The officers gave him 15 minutes to locate the paperwork before they had to leave; he returned home and frantically, fruitlessly searched for the receipt.  Momentarily—since no one was going to wait for the thief to return to the scene—it seemed that once again the thief would get to ride away in the dark on a stolen bike.

That stolen bike. The one with the heartwarming backstory, the one that was so freely given before it was so cruelly taken—uh, no, not gonna happen twice.

Blame it on my Sicilian heritage, but the idea of the guy taking that bike a second time made my blood boil. I got an idea about how to keep the bike in place for the 12 more hours we needed to keep it out of the hands of the guy who had snatched it away.

Karma in the form of Kryptonite.

For once, something was right where it belonged. I handed the Kryptonite bicycle cable lock to my husband and told him to head back downtown and put it on the bike. He laughed with delight, returned to the scene of the bike and locked it with a real bike lock—the kind of lock that kind of bike deserves—securing it until the paperwork could be produced.

We hoped and prayed the Kryptonite would live up to its name and reputation, that the guy wouldn’t strip the bike’s parts, and that morning would break our way.

The sun shone brightly Monday morning on the spot where the bike remained. But sometime during what seemed like a very long night, someone had cut through the flimsy chain, and a few links still lay and only the Kryptonite still held it in place. My husband unlocked the bike and triumphantly brought it home.

A close examination revealed the speedometer had been removed; the handlebar tape messed up and in need of replacement; the seat was lowered for a shorter rider, and the fixed gear back wheel had been turned around so that the thief could ride it as a one speed instead one fixed gear. He had to find another way home Sunday night.

Note #1 to bike owners:  Beware: this guy probably on the lookout for another nice bike to snatch away from its rightful owner and claim for his very own.

Note to #2 bike owners: Keep records of your bike’s purchase in a secure place. Note the serial number and keep the paperwork in a safe place so you can produce it if you need to. And, as I’ve learned recently, short of buying a pricey GPS for your bike, hide a slip of paper in the seat post with your own contact information in it—something that can easily prove your ownership.

A Note to this bike thief: We have lost far too much to the likes of you. We hope you get caught the next time you steal one—and get charged and convicted not only for theft, but for breaking and entering, too. (A Specialized mountain bike was stolen at the same time; that one is still missing, and reported to the police.) Meanwhile, it’s very satisfying to think of what your reaction was when you saw “your” bicycle locked up and out of your grasp. We hope you had a very long walk home to contemplate changing direction from the dead-end path you’re on now.

By Cheri Rae

It’s bad enough that the thief boldly walked onto our property, crossing fences and opening gates where not invited. The shiny object, coveted an claimed, was not out in the open—easy to pick off and ride away.

No, the bicycle was carefully put away in the front of the garage. It took a certain determination to maneuver around the boxes, tools, and cleaning supplies to reach them, a brand-new fixie, a gift that arrived at Christmas time.

This is not the first time my son has had something ripped off from the back yard—he learned at a pretty young age about predators who would run off with skateboards and bikes left unlocked and unguarded. So he’s learned to close gates and put his possessions out of sight.

But this is surely the worst time. For that fixie bike has a story, it was the best gift, the best moment of the recent holiday season.

That fixie bike didn’t belong to my son. It wasn’t a gift he received; it was one he gave, full of holiday spirit.

It was the biggest purchase he’s made in his 16 years. He took money out of his bank account to purchase that sleek new fixie for a neighborhood friend of his whose family wasn’t able to buy him a bike. They couldn’t manage to replace his last bike, the one that was stolen from his own backyard.

I don’t know who was more thrilled with that new bike on Christmas morning—the boy who bought it or the one who received it. And boy, did they have fun riding together, until they both came down with bad colds and couldn’t ride for about a week.

Feeling better, they planned a weekend ride—which keeps them healthy, balanced and in good spirit. But when they went out to the garage, the bike was gone.

Irony Number One: Our neighbor had stored his new fixie in our garage for safekeeping, thinking it a safer place than his backyard, with no garage.

Irony Number Two: Our neighborhood meeting last week featured our assigned Beat Coordinator from the Santa Barbara Police Department who spoke on the issues of neighborhood safety—after elevated local concern about recent thefts. Just a few months ago, I hosted one of these police reassurance meetings in my own living room, but I missed this one in order to help my son study for his finals.

He’s been studying hard and learned his lessons well—but this part of his education doesn’t come from school: getting your stuff stolen in Santa Barbara is a regular occurrence—and there doesn’t seem to be much of anything anyone can do. Based on previous experience, the police are helpless to protect us from this predatory way of life.

So once again, our family that has enough, but not a lot, has to figure out how to recoup the losses—not just the things, but the sense of safety, the sense of security, the sense of confidence that if you work hard you can get ahead.

Someone else took those dreams and rode away on them. Shame on the thief who took that brand-new fixie—the gray one with the distinctive purple rims—away
from a couple of good kids who deserved the joy that bike brought, not this cruel and crushing blow.

The thief hurt them, but he couldn’t steal away the spirit of two kids trying to figure out ways to earn another one. And that willingness to pick up the pieces and get to work can’t be taken away, even by the darkest soul.

After the recent tragedy, here’s a timely post from the View Vault by Cheri Rae

I hate guns.
I hate their potential for destruction of any form of life. I hate the way they have become objects of worship for far too many individuals who use the Second Amendment to justify private ownership of assault weapons meant only to mow down masses of people whose soft, warm bodies are no match for the hard, cold ammunition that pierces them so easily.

I grew up in a home with handguns and rifles; I watched my father admire them, clean them and store them under lock and key. I listened to him tell me about how one bullet would explode on impact, another would spin—each more lethal than the other. He taught me how to shoot a handgun, and target shoot with a rifle; I got a black eye caused by kickback from the scope the first time I tried the high-powered weapon.

The things terrified me. Even when he triumphantly brought home a rifle that he’d won at a management club meeting when he was an aerospace engineer. And especially when he walked around the house late at night with a loaded gun, certain that he’d heard a potential intruder outside. Sometimes I woke up to the sight of him standing by my bedroom window, aiming the gun outside.

I was once held at gunpoint, in a bar where I had gone to settle my nerves after my father’s open heart surgery. The robber held the gun against my back while he demanded money from the cash register and the other customers—and finally collected enough that he fled the scene without bothering to shoot me. I literally shook for an hour afterward.

A former colleague with a promising academic career, a loving family and a great deal of success as an award-winning writer impulsively committed suicide in his car with a handgun during a bout of depression. He was at the airport on his way to a conference. If only he had gotten on the plane instead of grabbing the gun…

I hate guns for what they do to people—for giving them access to unbelievable power so far beyond their own physical strength, so easily unleashed, with consequences that reverberate forever. And for the lives ruined again and again and again in the never-ending story of innocent victims mowed down in one unimaginable massacre after another in our country’s grim determination to allow guns and horrifyingly lethal ammunition in the hands of anyone and everyone who wants one, or even a hundred or more.

A couple of years back the police raided the house two doors down from my own—where the guy who lived there had stockpiled a couple of hundred rifles, along with an array of ammo, loose gunpowder and even some old grenades. He had enough firepower stacked in dressers, hoarded in drawers and hidden in the walls of that little bungalow to blow the whole block up.

And when I wrote about the harrowing experience in a column in the Daily Sound, I received several hateful letters and comments about how the guy had the right to own the entire arsenal with no questions asked—even though he was overmedicated and not in his right mind, as evidenced by increasingly bizarre and frightening behavior.

We can remember guns in the hands of assassins who brought down the best and the brightest America has ever seen; we can look at poor Jim Brady and Gabby Giffords—even their horrific injuries can’t bring legislators to do anything to stand up and re-instate the assault weapons ban. The carnage continues: right here at the Goleta Post Office, at Columbine, Virginia Tech, and so many more. Now at a movie theatre in Colorado, in a place with the lovely name of Aurora—the dawn.

Clearly, the Founding Fathers—who dealt with muskets, not assault weapons—never had any notion of the kind of lethal killing machines now so readily available. And they never imagined a disease or the pressures of our contemporary life that would obliterate the humanity of a person’s brilliant mind completely and turn that person into a monster.

That’s not the well-armed militia they envisioned.

I hope and pray that Aurora is the one where it finally dawns on us that these guns, their ammo, and access to them is completely out of control—and we have to do more to protect our right to life without guns in the hands of madmen.

By Cheri Rae

It may be festive holiday time, but it’s a sad time in Santa Barbara, with the recent loss of two fine men—Robert Maxim and Peter Sklar—within just a couple weeks of each other. Both had valiantly fought the same fight against brain cancer, and both left behind so much for us to remember about their lives well lived.

Robert Maxim is also known locally as The Man Who Saved Santa Claus, and Peter Sklar as the Man Who Started Edhat. Both were optimistic visionaries who stepped up, stepped out and made this world a better place.

Several years ago—even before edhat was founded—I had an idea for a guidebook to the schools of Santa Barbara. A friend suggested I meet with a friend of his who had an idea about building communities online—it turned out to be Peter Sklar. We met for coffee and it was like two worlds colliding: I was stuck in the world of hand-held paper, and Peter envisioned this vibrant online community filled with the contributions of citizens for mutual benefit.

Peter Sklar

As a professional writer and publisher, I didn’t get how the work could be monetized, and wasn’t accustomed to writing for free (this was a long time ago). But to Peter, the availability of the content to everyone was payment in itself. We didn’t really speak the same language, but realized we could learn from each other.

In many conversations over coffee over many years, we discussed this lingering question about payment; the concept of citizen journalism and what is the difference between opinion and news. We talked about the challenges of raising teenagers and shared sometimes painful stories about tough times. He even asked me for help getting the work of one of his sons published in book form. He was so proud of his boys, Nick and Zack. And I frequently ran into Peter and his wife Sue when we were out exploring some offbeat part of Santa Barbara life.

He memorably stepped into the community several years ago, organizing an informational evening about emergency preparedness at the Faulkner Library. Lots of public officials in attendance who spoke about multiple communications difficulties encountered. The clearest message that came across that night was, as my neighbor whispered, “Without edhat, we’re screwed.”

And it’s been proven time and time again that edhat is the go-to site in an emergency like a fire or bad weather; for details about, a crazy car chase through town or even just those everyday happenings that make Santa Barbara such a special place. It’s been brought closer through the visionary efforts of Peter Sklar who created a genre wholly out of his own genius and the positive belief in the integrity of the community he both led and reflected so very well.

And Robert Maxim shared that upbeat vision and interest celebrating and contributing to the best of Santa Barbara—from his work with the Santa Barbara Men’s Garden Club to serving as President of the Pearl Chase Society, and participating in the Solstice Parade, with elaborate facepaint and costume.

A decade ago, when he realized that Santa Barbara’s roadside Santa faced certain destruction, Robert was determined to find him a new home. He worked the media and finally found a new spot for him—in a hardscrabble neighborhood in Oxnard, where he stands today, still waving at passersby on the 101. But that was just the beginning of Santa’s new life. Thanks to the friendship Robert struck up with Mike Barber, there’s now an annual toy drive and scholarship fund for underprivileged children, the Santa to the Sea half-marathon (run last weekend and dedicated to Robert) and an inspiring community park all built around the relocated Santa.

Robert Maxim

When I wrote about his work last year in the Pearl Chase Society newsletter, Robert was characteristically appreciative, and sharing the credit with so many others.  Just a couple months ago, he expressed his thanks for the article again, and said, “You know, I think Santa is in a better place now.”

As his brother noted at his memorial service last week—in a church lined with festive Santa hats—Robert always greeted him the same way, “I live in Santa Barbara; I live in Paradise.”

Sending hope and a prayer that these two Santa Barbara luminaries, Robert Maxim and Peter Sklar, find each other and share their talent in Paradise—for surely, that’s where they both are now, figuring out ways to bring the community together and make it a better place.

By Cheri Rae

It’s often a matter of timing.

October 1 was the date of the first community forum for the candidates vying for seats on our school board. It was also the first day of Learning Disabilities Month.

Three of the candidates presented themselves as knowledgeable and concerned about multiple issues, including the ever-present budget issues and the achievement gap, along with references to learning disabilities and special education. One clearly did not.

Unfortunately for that candidate, Lou Segal, it was just before the 10-minute break when he went off about the funding requirements of special ed students and those IEPs. (Note: An IEP is short for Individualized Education Plan, which documents the services and accommodations the student needs in order to be included in school—often as simple as more time on tests, sometimes much more.) His implication was that those students take from others, and it hung in the air, as the topic of conversation throughout the break, particularly among the audience members who have children who receive special education services.

As the mother of one of those students, I leaned over and told my colleague seated next to me, “I guess he doesn’t care much about kids with dyslexia.”

Actually, I was astonished to hear a candidate for school board sound uninformed and insensitive about special education, which has been a source of so much contention for so long. And now—thanks largely to the efforts of some of the parents in the audience, along with committed leadership from Superintendent David Cash and his administrative team, and the oversight of the current school board—we’re finally making some progress for the 12 percent of our students identified with special needs.

This is no time to move backwards with a school board member who needs so much education in the fundamentals.

After the forum, he was confronted by one mother who told him she was “pissed off” by his comments. He admitted he doesn’t know much about IEPs or anything at all about FCMAT (the Fiscal Crisis Management Assistance Team—the special study done to analyze and improve Special Education, which has been a district focus since 2009). There was a lot of eye-rolling and several knowing glances exchanged, but everyone was too polite to point out the obvious lack of qualification for this race.

I commend Mr. Segal for getting off the sidelines and into the race. It takes a lot of time and effort to run for any office. And he’s clearly done a lot of research on the subject of school reform. But in order to serve the whole community, a school board member needs to master a wider range of subject matter and complete a lot more homework. All that research and critical thinking—and focusing so much blame on the unions—just doesn’t add up to get a passing grade—or a seat on the school board.

NOTE: For those who would like to see all the candidates in action, the forum will be broadcast several times before the election on TVSB, channel 71. http://www.tvsantabarbara.perfectmind.com/