The first round of the first-ever work-from-home NFL draft came and went April 23. It was a deep class for defensive backs so I’m not too surprised my number wasn’t called. Plus, at my age, I’d probably pull a muscle trying to intercept my phone.
Now that I think about it, Day Two won’t be any more convenient for me.
At 12:30 p.m. April 24, I’ll be interviewing Santa Barbara County Second District Supervisor Gregg Hart about our community’s response to and recovery from the coronavirus crisis. The exclusive Zoom webcast will livestream on Noozhawk’s homepage and our Facebook page, and will be available later on our YouTube channel.
Topics on deck include the fiasco that is the U.S. Penitentiary in Lompoc, how we’re going to get back to business and whether the county will be a hindrance or a help, ongoing health impacts and expectations, the county’s budget outlook, and a bunch of questions I’ve been getting from Noozhawk readers.
We’ll be covering a lot of ground in the 30-minute conversation, but it’s not too late to ask a question of your own. Click here to pose your question through our Noozhawk Asks platform. I’m not making any promises, but I’ll try to get to it.
Gregg’s a longtime friend of mine and, while we don’t always agree on politics and policies, I have enormous respect for him. What I like most is his willingness to listen and engage. It’s a trait we need more of in our public discourse, and it’s serving us well during his suddenly tumultuous tenure as chairman of the Board of Supervisors.
This Noozhawk Talks webcast is a follow up to the widely watched April 13 interview I did with local public policy expert Brian Goebel, whose columns on Noozhawk have drawn national attention for the accuracy of his predictive modeling of California Department of Public Health data in the COVID-19 crisis.
Unlike last time, I’ll have some help “in studio” at Noozhawk World HQ so, hopefully, there will be fewer technical difficulties. For that reason alone, you should watch.
The Noozhawk Talks webcasts, however, are among the innovations we’re exploring to keep you even more connected to the vital news and information our professional journalists have been covering — nearly 24/7 since the pandemic struck Santa Barbara County.
As you can imagine, support from our readers is critically important to our mission. In a fast-moving disaster like this, your donations enable us to be nimble in our reporting, further strengthening and advancing our work.
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In last week’s Best of Bill column, I inveighed against the notion that our economy can not be properly reopened until there has been more demonstrative success in controlling the coronavirus. That is a false choice and, from the get-go, I have said that we must work on the two issues — the most monumental challenges of our time — together. Immediately.
Let me assure you that local business is indeed working on a very detailed action plan, which will be announced in the next few days. I don’t mean to be cryptic, but let’s just say my column is ahead of its time.
Which is ironic since the whole point of this column is to look back at the past week, and what you were reading most. During that seven-day period, according to our Google Analytics, Noozhawk’s readership totaled 132,531 of you.
What follows is my take on those Top 5 most-read stories. As a reminder, this is my opinion column and not a news story.
1. Fire Destroys Small Commercial Building at Santa Barbara Harbor
A fire inside a Santa Barbara Harbor convenience store sent smoke billowing along much of the waterfront the morning of April 21. No one was injured in the blaze, but the small shop was destroyed.
According to Santa Barbara fire Battalion Chief Robert Mercado, crews were dispatched about 8 a.m. to the Boat Launch Mini Market, at 305 W. Cabrillo Blvd. off the main harbor parking lot. The building is adjacent to the Santa Barbara Sailing Center, west of Sea Landing and the public boat launch.
Mercado said firefighters arrived to find flames and smoke pouring from the single-story building. He added that Harbor Patrol personnel already were on the scene, battling the blaze with help from a fire boat.
Damage was estimated at $150,000, and Mercado told our Tom Bolton that the place appeared to be “a total loss.”
The store was not open at the time, and no injuries were reported.
The cause of the fire is under investigation.
Across the parking lot and the street, a shed behind Sambo’s Restaurant, at 216 W. Cabrillo Blvd., and the Hotel Milo went up in flames early on the morning of April 19. That fire is being investigated as a possible arson case.
The shed fire actually was the No. 4 story of the week, but I’m adding it here because of the proximity and timing.
For the tight-knit harbor community, the mini market fire was more than a little unnerving. Last September, the ill-fated Conception launched from nearby Sea Landing for a Labor Day weekend scuba-diving trip to Santa Cruz Island.
In the middle of the night Sept. 2, the vessel caught fire and sank while anchored just off the island, killing all 34 people trapped in the below-deck sleeping area. Five crew members up on deck were able to escape.
Authorities say the fire was likely caused by a lithium ion battery charging station on the boat, and that the Conception’s owners had failed to implement proper safety procedures and training.
2. Santa Barbara Unified School District Quietly Proposes Grade Change Option for Spring Semester
In just about every school district in the country, administrators and trustees are mulling changes in the way teachers grade student performance during the unprecedented coronavirus pandemic and classroom shutdown.
Leave it to the Santa Barbara Unified School District to make it needlessly complicated.
The 14,000-student district had assembled a grading policy committee of more than two dozen people to weigh options and gather input from faculty, students and parents. Led by Shawn Carey, assistant superintendent of secondary schools, and Fran Wageneck, the district’s assistant superintendent, the committee also counted high school principals and counselors in its ranks.
As our Josh Molina first reported on April 20, the committee recommended a simple credit/no-credit grading system to blunt the achievement gap caused by persistent technology challenges, lack of home computers and WiFi access, and inconsistent support materials needed for remote learning.
“The pandemic has exposed and amplified the underlying challenges faced by some of our students, and the committee recommends a credit/no-credit grading system to avoid furthering the student achievement divide caused by conditions beyond the control of a student,” the committee stated.
At an April 23 special meeting of the school board, however, SBUSD trustees voted 5-0 to go their own way and allow high school students the option of taking a credit/no-credit grade for the spring semester or keeping their grades as of March 13, the day the district abruptly ended the school year.
School board president Laura Capps said the choice option made the most sense for the largest number of students.
“I do believe there is no perfect solution here,” she said. “But this one that we have come up upon now provides the right kind of balance for me to feel good that we are putting students first in this and acknowledging their ability to make some choices, even as challenging as this time is.”
Junior high school students only get the credit/no-credit option, while elementary school students just get feedback from teachers but no grades
3. Real Estate Community, Property Managers Hit Hard by COVID-19
As it is in most California coastal communities, residential real estate is Santa Barbara’s national pastime. Locals closely follow the market’s ups and downs, either fascinated or flabbergasted by the prices.
So, of course the all-pervasive coronavirus and its #FOMO devilry had to make its presence felt. Real estate professionals say pending sales have plummeted a staggering 65 percent while residential listings are down 30 percent.
“We are seeing buyers and sellers who have lost their income putting homebuying on hold,” Staci Caplan, president of the Santa Barbara Association of Realtors and a Noozhawk real estate columnist, told our Josh Molina.
Although California has now designated real estate as an “essential service,” many agents already have replaced their Sunday open house listings with social distancing-friendly virtual open houses, photos, digital signatures and Zoom meetings.
Property management can’t win for losing, meanwhile, with municipal governments — and up — imposing a hodgepodge of anti-eviction rules to assist renters.
“There is the quandary of if the tenant doesn’t pay rent, then how does the property owner pay their mortgage, especially since the rollout of the unemployment programs and Small Business Administration loans are not being fully implemented yet,” Caplan remarked.
“It’s tough for everyone in the rental market right now.”
My friend, Renee Grubb, owner of Village Properties, says many of her clients have taken their properties off-market while buyers are just not that interested in looking anyway.
“The number of withdrawals is declining as time goes on,” she acknowledged. “We are not seeing substantial declines in prices.”
But don’t worry if you’re using your house as your retirement plan like I am: Keller Williams Realty broker Gay Milligan predicted that home sale prices probably won’t be as affected because the inventory remains so scarce.
4. Santa Maria Valley Woman Undergoes Treatment That Shows Promise for Coronavirus Patients
A couple of weeks ago, our Janene Scully reported on some coronavirus good news/bad news.
The good news was that Santa Maria Valley resident Louis Meza survived his bout with COVID-19, although it was touch and almost no-go there for a while. Meza, a 47-year-old chef at The Hitching Post in Casmalia, was one of Santa Barbara County’s first confirmed cases of the malady.
The bad news was that his 43-year-old wife, Melissa, also came down with the virus — and was admitted to Marian Regional Medical Center in Santa Maria on the same day her husband was released.
Melissa, who works for the Mechanics Bank operations center in Santa Maria, has been hospitalized for the past three weeks.
“She’s doing a lot better,” Meza told Janene last week, adding that his wife has opened her eyes and has been responding to medical staff who talk to her remotely via a tablet.
“She’s still in a fight,” he said. “She’s going to have a lot of recovering.”
Just days before, Melissa was transported to a Santa Monica hospital to undergo extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO), a specialized treatment that has shown promising results for patients with COVID-19.
Somewhat akin to a heart-lung bypass machine used in open-heart surgery, the device pumps and oxygenates a patient’s blood outside the body, allowing the heart and lungs to rest.
“Our Easter miracle,” Meza said. “A bed opened up, a machine opened up and they had transportation ready in two hours.”
The couple, who just marked their 24th wedding anniversary, is grateful for the outpouring of support.
“I want to thank everybody for the prayers, and please continue to pray for her,” Meza said.
A GoFundMe account has been established to assist the family with their medical expenses, and has raised more than $31,000 to date. Click here to make an online donation.
5. 3.3-Magnitude Earthquake Strikes with a Jolt Near Carpinteria
I was just about to go upstairs to bed early on April 19 when I sensed a faint shock wave behind me, followed immediately by a sharp thud along the eastern wall of my house in Montecito.
Sure enough, a few minutes later, my QuakeFeed app reported that a magnitude 3.3 earthquake had been recorded in the Santa Ynez Mountains 7½ miles northeast of Carpinteria.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the quake struck at 1:34 a.m. at a depth of just over a half-mile below the earth’s surface.
There were no reports of damage or injuries, but readers sure kept the story alive for several days afterward.
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• • •
Last Year on Noozhawk
What was our most-read story this time last year? 1 Dead, 5 Seriously Injured in Head-On Collision in Carpinteria.
• • •
Bill Macfadyen’s Story of the Week
I have friends from San Clemente, and always thought that city was smarter than this: San Clemente Filled Its Skatepark with Sand, So Dirt Bikers Showed Up.
• • •
Best of Bill’s Instagram
My Instagram feed was good this past week, but @sadiethealaskanmalamute’s was better.
• • •
Watch It
This is doggone funny but, yeah, I noticed the road-tripping passenger isn’t wearing a seatbelt. Talk to the paw, not me. HT to my friends, Bill and Will Borgers.
(The Dodo video)
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— Bill Macfadyen is Noozhawk’s founder and publisher. Contact him at wmacfadyen@noozhawk.com, follow him on Twitter: @noozhawk and Instagram: @bill.macfadyen, or click here to read previous columns. The opinions expressed are his own.
