Where It All Began...

Thought many of you would be interested in two videos of Santa Barbara in 1969, plus a time capsule of environmental reporting as it existed at the time-- this series predates PBS and much of the environmental movement...and was the first eco TV series in the US.

"This program examines the controversial 1969 off-shore oil leak near Santa Barbara and demonstrates how the blame belongs not only to the oil companies, but to government, scientific, and civic parties as well."

Video 1 | Video 2

Indy, LA Times, Flickr and Local Photo Streams of Tea Fire Posted Overnight

There's an LA Times Photo stream here -- (LA Times/Michael Robinson Chavez link on the picture above).

Here's an amazing set of photos on Flickr -- even better here -- from locals. There are some more at City 2.0. Of course, there are also great photos at The Indy.

Direct Relief International is offering emergency assistance and City Administrator Jim Armstrong has called a state of emergency for the city. here's the Office of Emergency Services website at the County.

Levy Foreclosure Marks End of an Era?

Saint Barbara over at The Santa Barbara Housing Bubble blog did a good piece on the construction at State and Mason where La Entrada aka "Levytown" would have been. Later in the post, she mentions that the Levy's have gone into foreclosure on their Hope Ranch home which is for sale at $9.8 million. Before you begin to feel somewhat sorry for Levy, who bought this rather large home from uber-attorney Barry Cappello for only $3.4 million in 1999, Saint Barbara speculates that the foreclosure beneficiaries are members of his own family.

One has to wonder if this is a sign of things to come but on a rather grand scale....how many other people do we know that have lived and spent beyond their means? On the other hand, Levy had a dream, went for it and gave it all he had -- not many of us have the courage to do that, whether or not we agree with the developed outcome.

Saint Barbara and the Housing Bubble

There's been a lot of discussion this week on this blog on the pending mortage collapse, home prices and surprisingly -- whether any of us have a right to live here and own a home. We've seen comments that have surprised me (like the assertion that a county or city job is lucrative) and a passion that only comes from either protecting your property rights and home value or staring at your pay stub every week and wondering how you could ever own a home in this town.

I want to give a shout to Saint Barbara over at Santa Barbara Housing Bubble -- a blog I've been reading for the last couple of weeks. She covers interesting tidbits about the real estate market. This week's post shows how Avery labels were used in a recent advertising circular to chase the market down.

Over the next six months, we will likely be seeing more home owners "chasing the market down". Are you ready? What does it mean to be ready anyway?

Downtown Homicide

Here's a series of stories from KEYT on the downtown homicide yesterday which killed a 15-year old from Santa Barbara Junior High. Unconfirmed word on the street is that there was another incident o the Westside near Foodland today.

Earlier readers wondered aloud whether doing a post on this would cause me to be hitting "delete" all night. An emotional subject for sure, let's try to keep it clean.

Name that Basketball Team!

A reader suggested the following as a topic:

After a week of very heavy subjects, how about a lighter note—namely, naming the B-Ball team Coach Curt Pickering is bringing to town. Why not let your readers blog their little hearts out on the best name for the team—surely someone will suggest the McCaws, the Journalists, perhaps the Abused—how about the Smug, the Homeless or, my favorites, The Condos or The Developers…

Housing Series: Rental Costs

A comment yesterday said that there are plenty of one bedroom apartments for under $1,000. Are there really?

Realizing that this is half of many people's monthly income -- why is this okay? Is it because property owners assume there will be at least two people living there? Why should housing costs be 50% of income when books like Rich Dad, Poor Dad say it should be 30%. Definitely an oversimplication -- but what do you have to say about it?

Housing Series: Prop 13 Reform

We need to break this subject up a bit as there has been so much discussion.....so, PROP 13 Reform. One of our readers says he pays $11,200 versus his neighbor with a similar house who pays $2,500 in property taxes...is it good public policy to provide incentives for people to stay in one house for many years or should all property taxes be based on more current appraisals? If so, who is going to do all that work? and better yet, who is paying for it?

Home is Where You Park It.

Our friends at EdHat provided a link to a story on Santa Barbara's "mobile homeless" which made ABC national news recently after a national study showed that 3/4 of a million people are homeless in our country. If you don't mind the ads, the story has a video to go with it which shows the "parking lot shuffle" at a local parking lot at 7 AM.

I've seen a few people on BlogaBarbara take on the homeless like they should just move somewhere else. The truth is that people are being priced out of homes all over the country -- it's just happening here on a bigger scale. It's a regional, state and national problem that can't just be solved by sending someone to Bakersfield.

Lately, I've been wondering whether our insistence on owning a home is misguided...what's so great about it when you have property taxes, upkeep and $4,000 mortage payments? Did real estate's success in the 80s and 90s send us down the wrong path? Perhaps debt elimination and good old fashioned investment is more appropriate today...

Alternative Links to Local News

An email has been forwarded recetnly which provides alternative links to news for those that are no longer subscribing to the News-Press -- it's a good list of websites with news. I'm unclear who originated it, but appreciate them for putting all of these together. Of course, if you are a News-Press subsciber you can get past the "paywall" of their website, but with just a few reporters now you might as well get your AP and McClatchy news stories straight from the wires.

I am sure there are more and please feel free to include them in comments. If someone wanted to take on a great project and had the time, this would make a great shared bookmark page for del.icio.us.

SOUTH COAST
Edhat - http://edhat.com
Coastal View - http://www.coastalview.com/
Daily Nexus - http://www.dailynexus.com/
Montecito Journal - http://www.montecitojournal.net/
Santa Barbara Daily Sound - http://www.santabarbarafree.com/
Santa Barbara Daily Sound Forum - http://forum.santabarbarafree.com/
Santa Barbara Independent - http://www.independent.com/
KCSB (UCSB Radio – FM 91.9) - http://www.kcsb.org/
Pacific Coast Business Times - http://www.pacbiztimes.com/
Goleta Valley Voice - (no paywall!) http://www.goletavalleyvoice.com
Coastal Woman - http://www.coastalwoman.com

NORTH COUNTY
Lompoc Record - http://www.lompocrecord.com/
Santa Maria Times - http://www.santamariatimes.com/
Santa Ynez Valley News - http://www.syvnews.com/
Santa Maria Sun - http://www.santamariasun.com
Latino Today - http://www.latinotoday.net

TV
KCOY TV (Channel 12) - http://www.kcoy.com/
KEYT Local TV News (Channel 3) - http://www.keyt.com/news/local
KSBY TV (Channel 6) - http://www.ksby.com/

SPANISH:
El Tiempo - http://www.periodicoeltiempo.com

TRADE/BUSINESS
Santa Barbara Winemakers - http://www.sbwinemakers.com

BLOGS
BlogaBarbara - http://blogabarbara.blogspot.com/
Craig Smith’s Blog - http://www.west.net/~smith/blog/index.shtml
The Independent - http://www.independent.com/opinion/santa_barbara_media_blog/
Goleta Observer - http://www.goletaobserver.blogspot.com/
Sound Off Santa Maria - http://www.soundoffsantamaria.blogs.com
Santa Barbara's Blog -http://www.santabarbarasblog.com
Santa Barbara Sheriff's Blog -- http://santabarbarasheriffblog.blogspot.com