Milpas on the Move column by Sharon Byrne

By Friday afternoon, we’ll know whether we’ve won a national competition for Neighborhood of the Year 2013.

Lorraine Cruz-Carpinter forwarded me the call for entries from Neighborhoods USA. Lorraine runs the city’s Looking Good program. She gets people to sign up as Adopt-a-Block captains to keep our blocks litter and graffiti-free. She also runs the city’s giant annual clean-ups. Thus she scales up to hundreds of volunteers working to keep our city clean, probably the highest return-on-investment employee in this city.

I realized the Milpas Community Association could be a good fit for the competition’s focus on social revitalization, given all the struggles we’d had, how we stayed unified on fixing the neighborhood, and how the entire community pulled together for the holiday lights and parade last year.

So I wrote up our story, and sent it off.

And I got a letter back.

Neighborhoods USA, headquartered in Minneapolis, put us in the top 5 finalists nationwide for Neighborhood of the Year 2013.

Not because everything is perfect – it’s not. We made the finals because Milpas is indeed revitalizing due to a strong community-based grassroots effort for the past 2+ years. There’s a new sense of connectedness and neighborliness, and neighborhood pride.

There’s a lot to be proud of in this neighborhood:

• The Egg McMuffin was invented at the Milpas McDonald’s.
• Milpas hosts many family-owned businesses that have been here for decades, with one in constant operation for 100 years.
• Franklin Neighborhood Center completed a stunning mural, under the leadership of Ricardo Venegas. This is also where the neighborhood came together for the first time at a contentious Franklin Advisory Committee meeting in August of 2010, and decided that we had something worth fighting for.
• Kids are playing softball again in the Cabrillo ballfield – a welcome sight in our former Ground Zero.
• We have great schools with amazing principals that care deeply about our kids.
• We have incredible restaurants. Super Rica was named one the top 25 Mexican restaurants nationally by Food and Leisure Magazine. Los Agaves, Your Place and The Habit consistently win Best of Santa Barbara. El Bajio won the trophy for the city’s best Menudo.
• Our community police officers hosted the first citywide Menudo competition, at Franklin Elementary. Our beat cops live in our neighborhood, and are invested in our community. We’re proof that community policing works.
• SBHS was named one of the top 10 most beautiful schools in the US, is the 3rd oldest in California, hosts the state’s longest-running school newspaper at nearly 100 years, and is home to the defending US champs in cheerleading! Go Dons!
• The Eyeglass Factory puts on Kids Health Day, and gives out free eyeglasses and exams to kids. We give away kids’ bikes at that event, thanks to John Dixon of Tri County Produce, hands-down the best produce market in this city.
• We started a Halloween Trick or Treat on Milpas, and the merchants really turn it up for the kids.
  We got our holiday streetlights back up, with huge community support, including Milpas businesses, the Sentinel, Franklin PTA, Casa de la Raza, Boys and Girls Club, and Casa Esperanza.
• We throw a holiday parade featuring youth and cars. This year is the parade’s 60th anniversary.
  Boys and Girls Club just won the city’s Spirit of Service Award for Clean Community. They always bring out masses of kids for the clean-ups, and teach them how to take ownership of their neighborhood.
• Casa De La Raza gave us a home for the holiday parade team, and welcomed us to throw a party to greet our beat cops to the neighborhood.
• Our Lady of Guadalupe, shepherded by Father Marin, cranks out the best tamales at Fiesta. The hall, historic home of Franklin Elementary School, has been a great place for us to work on some of our toughest issues.
• We have our own column!
• North Milpas now hosts The Shop for great coffee and food, owned by Eastside residents. Let’s hear it for another local business on the street! Ami (also an Eastside resident) of Jack’s Bistro holds down South Milpas, and always smiles a greeting when you walk in.

This really is an incredible neighborhood, when you step back and look at it.

All the marches, neighborhood clean-ups, meetings, meetings, and even more meetings, Planning Commission and City Council hearings, graffiti removal, neighborhood watch efforts, community policing, and holiday efforts…

Where else have you seen business owners, residents, community organizations, and schools work together with the city to make the area better?

All that effort applied for sheer love of our neighborhood has led us to this point.

To those that worked so hard for so long on this area, and gave so much, you already are winners. You already are the Neighborhood of the Year.

Way to go, Milpas-Eastside neighbors!

Or did.

Eric Larson quit smoking after 39 years and is back on the trail to good health.

What a pleasure–and surprise–to recently run into my longtime friend Eric Larson hiking in the Santa Barbara foothills. I DIDN’T ask, “What are YOU doing here?” But Eric must have known I was wondering how he hiked nearly three miles up San Roque Trail to a scenic vista point, because shortly after we greeted each other, he explained his new passion for hiking.

I got a nasty, lingering cold and cough in February,” he began. “I took that as an opportunity to stop smoking.”

“Just like that?” I asked.

“Just like that. I’d smoked for 39 years. First couple days were hard, but now I’m OK.”

I was shocked. We all know how hard it is to quit smoking. Especially after 39 years!

“Eric, that is awesome!”

Eric told me more of his story as we descended from Inspiration Point and hiked along San Roque Creek. It seems Eric, a book designer, did like to get out of the office and take a hike, and more than occasionally, during those many years when he was smoking. It was a challenge getting back to the trailhead to get a smoke; once in while he even succumbed to the urge and climbed up into some rocks to smoke a cigarette, understandably nervous about the potential fire danger in the highly flammable Southern California backcountry.

Now he literally and figuratively breathes easier on the trail. And the sage and fennel that perfumes the air along Santa Barbara’s front country trails in spring smells mighty good.

“You on any meds, anything to counter the urge to smoke?” I ask.

“Just this.” Eric drops a piece of candy in my hand and pops one in his mouth. “Hikers like them too.”

He laughs when I pucker up.

“Salty licorice?” I question, resisting the urge to spit it out.

“Salmiak, very popular in Finland and northern Europe,” Eric explains. “Ammonium chloride gives the licorice an astringent salty taste.”

An acquired taste to be sure. Maybe there are more hikers than I imagined trying to give up smoking and they find salmiak the perfect trail trail treat.

Never mind that, it’s great to see my friend smiling, arms swinging, lungs filling with fresh air.

“Eric, congratulations,” I say when we get back to the trailhead. “Not many people can quit smoking after 39 years and take off hiking.”

“One day at a time,” he says. “One hike at a time.”

John McKinney’s new books include HIKE Santa Barbara and HIKE for Health & Fitness, available at Chaucer’s and online from The Trailmaster Store, CLICK HERE.

WEV Founder, South Coast Author to be Honored
The Association of Women in Communications, Santa Barbara, will present its 2013 Women of Achievement Awards to Marsha Bailey, founder and CEO at Women’s Economic Ventures, and author Kathleen Sharp at a luncheon from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. June 5 at the Montecito Country Club, 920 Summit Road, Santa Barbara.

Admission to the luncheon is $45 for AWC-SB members and $60 for non-members. For more information on AWC, see www.awcsb.org.

Mistress of ceremonies will be KCLU radio station General Manager Mary Olson. An original poem crafted for the event by Perie Longo, AWC-SB poet laureate, will be read.

Bailey started Women’s Economic Ventures, or WEV, in Santa Barbara 22 years ago to help women and men start of accelerate their enterprises with training and financial loans. The nonprofit organization now also serves entrepreneurs in Ventura County.

South Coast-based author Sharp is the author of “Blood Medicine,” currently being developed into a feature film by New Regency, and “Mr. & Mrs. Hollywood” and is a former business writer at the Santa Barbara News-Press.

‘Film Night’ Cookbook Signing Set June 1
South Coast author and business coach Dr. Kyre Adept will take orders for her new cookbook, “Cooking for Film Night,” from 3 to 5 p.m. June 1 at the Tecolote Book Shop, 1470 East Valley Road, Montecito.

A 13-year Central Coast resident, Dr. Adept is the principal at the Art of Integration as well as the founder of the Church of Chocolate. She worked as a chef in a French restaurant in Cambridge, England.

“Although I started with savory dishes, cooking for film night also offers wonderful opportunities to bake sweet dishes that I dare not make just for myself, at home. I specialize in chocolate desserts, and find they are very well received by the group,” Dr. Adept said. “However, film night has also enabled me to brush up non-chocolate recipes such as Sour Cherry Cheesecake. Another factor has been to find dishes that reheat well, that retain their heat, taste just as good lukewarm, or that can receive their final finish in someone else’s kitchen.”

“As with potlucks, film night does not lend itself to delicacies of timing,” she said. “Recipes that end up in one dish, with sauce, tend to work best. To this end, I have a wonderful set of Le Creuset casseroles. (In case you are not familiar with Le Creuset, this is a French firm that manufactures first-class enameled cast-iron cookware in a range of colors.”

After years of using their casseroles in deep blue, she said, “I recently indulged in an entire set in light aqua – lovely! These heavy round and oval pans can be used on the stovetop and in the oven; they retain heat for half an hour or more, allowing one to carry a cooked dish to a friend’s house, and then serve it, still warm, to the assembled viewers.”

Finally, she said, “I had to find dishes that were flexible as to ingredients. One regular at film nights cannot eat onions, so at times I had to do without. Another is allergic to garlic (a much more serious problem), and one of the hosts doesn’t care for fish. I myself am allergic to crustaceans and bivalves, so although I offer fish from time to time, shellfish is out.”

Many people also find wheat and dairy products difficult to digest, she said, “And my cooking uses many ingenious substitutes for flour, cream, and cheese. In any case, I encourage you to make your own experiments with ingredients that suit your palate (and your diet).Like many people these days, I do better with lots of protein and vegetables, and minimal carbohydrates.”

Father Larry to Bless Granada Book Store
The Rev. Larry Gosselin will read from his new poetry book “Hidden Sweetness” at 5:30 p.m. May 23 at the Marquee Lounge, 1212 State St., followed by the blessing of the soon-to-open Granada Book Store at 1224 State St.

Store founders Emmett McDonough and Sharon Hoshida have partnered to make the opening of Granada Books a community event and an opportunity for an independent bookstore in downtown Santa Barbara in the heart of the arts district.

Granada Books and its nonprofit arm, Pomegranate Arts will host drinks and light snacks for the community at the Marquee, which will be the finale in a series of “First Edition” events before the book store officially opens June 20.

Walking tours from the Marquee to Granada Books will occur throughout the Thursday night event.

Father Larry is a Franciscan priest has become popular among parishioners of the Old Mission Santa Barbara and around the Central California Coast. Known for his spirit and tender care, Father Larry opens the hearts and minds of fellow seekers with his inspirational literary voice.

Weekly Column by Loretta Redd

Leave it to LA to try and outdo everyone in California.  This time, it’s not Rodeo Drive’s couturier and jewels, nor Hollywood’s glam and paparazzi taking the headlines.  It’s election spending.

By last Saturday, our neighbors to the south had set a less than enviable record of over $33 million on their race for a mayor.  We’re not talking the whole council…just the mayor.  Probably would have been cheaper to simply bride every registered voter with a check; especially since neither candidate seems to be very adept at garnering a lead in the polls.

Is Santa Barbara’s City Council so far behind?  Using rounded numbers of cash raised and expended in the last campaign for our tiny, tawny town, we have:

Randy Rowse  $83,000
Deborah Schwartz  $79,000 ($105,000 including in-kind)
Dale Francisco  $79,000
Cathy Murillo  $72,000  ($88,000 including in-kind)
Grant House (2009) $74,000
Bendy White (2009) $65,000 ($91,000 including in-kind)

“In-kind” expenditures include outside monies by groups whose gifts are known to the candidates.  Some of the auxiliary groups offer “independent expenditures.”  They may not have been in direct contact with the candidate or campaign director, but they still have to list the value of the gift and who receives them.

For example, if the Democratic Party produce a $3,000 mailer for three endorsed candidates, and informs them that they are doing so, the ‘gift’ is pro-rated, and both the candidate and campaign committee report a $1,000 contribution.  If the Democratic Party does not inform the candidate, but simply sends money or includes them on a slate mailer, it is considered an “independent expenditure” which the campaign committee must list, but the candidate isn’t required to do so.

The City of Santa Barbara has on-line campaign filing showing campaign expenditure and monies raised.  It isn’t easy to find the numbers; the City of Goleta actually does a better job, but with a little tenacity, the information is there.

Here’s a link to a filing from the Democratic Central Committee (see Schedule D) :

This year, our local City council election is projected to cost between $70-75,000 per candidate.  I think that is an absurd amount of money for a council seat where the City Administrator, Attorney  and Chief of Police pretty much run the place.  Especially since Santa Barbara is a Charter City where members have limited terms, non-district elections and thankfully, limited compensation.

Other cities and towns in California have decided to place either a voluntary cap on election expenditures or have written a limit into their municipal codes.  Even Beverly Hills has a voluntary spending limit of $80,000 (PDF) for council campaigns in a place where most people go to the polls in their Rolls Royce!

In Santa Cruz, the expenditure is limited to $0.35 per resident, or approximately $17,500 per candidate.  Landcaster decided back in 1996 to rewrite its municipal code (PDF), restricting campaign fundraising to not exceed $0.75 per resident.

Mountain View requires disclosure for any gift over $100 or campaign expenditure of more than $200.  When originally written about a decade ago, the fundraising limit was set at $15,000.  With a 3% per year increase, today that number has reached $21,388. Still relatively paltry, relative to Santa Barbara.

The reason for the limitation was simple according to a Mountain View official, “Candidates spend time trying to out-raise each other.  It just escalates.  Especially for first time candidates.  They feel like they owe something to their contributors, to show they believed in you for a reason.”

Finally, in Santa Rosa, where they limited the campaigns to $45,000 (PDF) in 2010, the City provides each qualified candidate with space on the City’s website for a 500 word statement, with links to other information or candidate positions.

In Santa Barbara, the City generously produces a ballot statement of 200 words from each candidate and covers the printing and mailing to all registered voters.  I believe they also allow a video statement, but that shouldn’t cost very much in this day of “face time” and digital recordings.

Some people complain that Santa Barbara City Council belongs to the “old guard,” that it is both expensive and difficult to become known to the voters.  Many say that the deck is stacked against youth and minorities.   Others believe certain committees, unions and other special interest groups play the role of “King maker” through slate mailers, signage, volunteers and direct contributions.

Candidate Spending Pledge

Is it time to voluntarily cap the candidate spending for the upcoming City Council and Mayoral races?  Could we attract a more diverse field of candidates with fresh ideas or a desire to serve to protect our town, if they didn’t have to refinance their car or literally beg for money, in order to run for office?

Will this year’s candidates be willing to sign a pledge to raise and expend no more than one dollar per registered voter, say $50,000, until a limit can be written into the City’s Ordinances?  Truth is, if we do that, we’ll get just as good a council – or better- than they will in LA for one hundred times that much.

Santa Barbara View is closing in on another milestone, 5,000 Facebook Friends! The Facebook page is incredibly active with additional comments, likes and custom content; so, if you’re not, be sure to follow the County’s fastest-growing social media page by clicking the like button below. And, to the person who becomes Friend number 5,000, Santa Barbara View will giveaway two tickets to Thursday’s Downtown Art & Wine Tour.

After a fun weekend getaway to the Sicilian Festival in San Diego’s Little Italy—where I unexpectedly ran into Santa Barbara French Festival founder Steve Hoegerman—it was a long trip home. Including a 2-hour layover in Santa Ana, it was a seven-hour trip on the train from San Diego to Santa Barbara on a Sunday afternoon into late evening. This alternative-transportation-using traveler was happy to be back home in Santa Barbara: tired, hungry, and in need of a restroom.

The familiar Santa Barbara train station seemed welcoming from the train, but on closer look, my spirits sank. Trash cans were overloaded with vile refuse; there were rodent bait stations everywhere; the lighted lobby was locked, and no travelers were allowed inside, because signs indicated it was being cleaned.

Is this any way to welcome the weary traveler?

Way back in 1907, when Pearl Chase was a student at Cal Berkeley, she returned home for a visit on the train.  When it stopped at the Victoria Street Station she stepped off and took in the scene. For the rest of her years she spoke of that transformative moment, because she was, as she stated, “ashamed at the dirt, dust and ugly buildings of my hometown. I resolved then and there to making Santa Barbara beautiful.”

Large Rat Trap

First impressions mean a lot. While we have made a lot of progress in this town, thanks to Miss Chase, and many citizens who have worked very hard over the years, that sense of civic pride and resolve in keeping Santa Barbara beautiful and welcoming seems to have been lost over time.

It certainly was missing at the train station on this Sunday night on May 19, 2013: the ugly and unwelcoming conditions gave me the same sense of shame Miss Chase experienced so long ago.

Cheri Rae’s book, Pearl Chase: First Lady of Santa Barbara will be released early this summer.

David Landecker, the former Santa Barbara City Councilman who was forced to resign from the Council after he was caught stealing from the Home Improvement Center, is back. Not only is Mr. Landecker back, but he is being endorsed by the Democratic Women of Santa Barbara County. According to the questionable endorsement…

David Landecker

“David Landecker was chosen for endorsement due to his broad and deep experience in the matters of most concern to the City of Santa Barbara and the Democratic Women. In addition to his successful careers as a lawyer and businessman, David has a wealth of expertise in city planning, environmental protection, financial and non-profit management, housing, health care and growth control. Among his diverse community activities, David has volunteered for more than twenty years as an attorney and board member for the Citizens Planning Association, and has recently retired as Executive Director from the Environmental Defense Center. David has a proven track record in standing strong on women’s issues. Of special interest to the Democratic Women was his work as CEO of the Santa Barbara Neighborhood Clinics where he spearheaded construction of the Eastside Medical and Dental Clinics and other major improvements, including creating two regional Health Program Centers to address issues of women’s and family health.”

David has a truly extensive knowledge of the history and complexity of the issues facing Santa Barbara, said Gail Teton-Landis. “He will be a strong force on the Council for implementing the new General Plan and solving the financial challenges that face the City.”