Like Bob Dylan said, “The Times They Are A-Changin’.”

But they don’t have to. Just ask Santa Barbara’s venerable former Mayor Sheila Lodge.

“Santa Barbara has managed its growth in such a way that we have preserved what we all love about this community, so far, and there’s no reason not to continue, except there are fewer people like me,” Lodge told Noozhawk.

At 91, Lodge is as much of a city icon as the many spots around town that she has worked so hard to protect.

If Santa Barbara had a Mount Rushmore, Lodge might well be on it; her civic life extends more than three decades, bookended by terms on the city’s Planning Commission, with time on the City Council and as mayor in the middle. On Tuesday, she was appointed to another four-year term by a majority of the City Council.

After 33 years, Lodge has a lot to share. So, she wrote a book — not about her life, but about Santa Barbara’s.

An Uncommonplace American Town: Urban Planning History in Santa Barbara — A Personal View tells the story of early Santa Barbara and its history of battling development in an effort to preserve its small-town charm.

Among the most notable stories? A 1968 proposal, called El Mirasol, would have built two nine-story, 107-foot-tall condo towers at the site where Alice Keck Park Memorial Gardens currently stands. 

The Planning Commission at the time said the proposal was “out of character with the surrounding area and with the community as a whole.”

The developers ran five full-page ads in the daily newspaper “saying that the council would be responsible for whether or not the city would move forward or remain a ‘sleepy little village.’”

According to Lodge’s book, the developer threatened that if the condo towers were not approved, “200 cheap, mass-produced small apartments with only profit in mind” would be built there. 

The opponents were outspent. They ran small classified ads pushing back against the plan.

Even though the city’s ordinance limited the height of residential buildings to 45 feet, the council at the time granted a variance to allow 107-foot towers. 

However, three Santa Barbara residents had other plans.

Terry Davies, a research engineer, and Estelle Busch and Frances Yulo, “neighborhood housewives,” as Lodge’s book described them, found an attorney who would represent them for free. They filed a lawsuit, and a judge ruled that the city violated its own ordinance.

“That would have been horrendous,” Lodge said of the towers. “The town really would have changed. Housewives can make a big difference. It doesn’t matter if you have money and power in other ways.”

Lodge said Santa Barbara is special, and years of activism by everyday people have made that happen.

“Prince Harry and Megan Markle could have lived anywhere in the world they wished,” Lodge said. “They chose Montecito. It’s not technically in Santa Barbara, but it is part of this community. People come here, and the high-tech industry comes here, because of the quality of life here and what has been created here.”

Lodge grew up on a dairy farm in Arcadia. She was reared in a family that talked about politics and events at the dinner table, and she said she remembers conversations about topics such as the Spanish Civil War.

“My family was always interested in what was going on in the world around me,” she said. “It was dinner table conversation.”

She served on the city Planning Commission from 1973 to 1975, the City Council from 1975 to 1981 and as mayor from 1981 to 1993. She returned to public life in 2009, serving again on the Planning Commission.

Lodge was married to former Santa Barbara County Superior Court Judge Joseph Lodge, and they raised four daughters. Lodge’s husband’s died 12 years ago.

She said she has spent a lot of time tending her garden and growing fragrant roses at her home on Santa Barbara’s Riviera. Over the years, she also as volunteered at the Santa Barbara County Courthouse and the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden.

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Lodge said she mostly stays home, venturing out about once a week.

She decided a few years ago to embark on a research project to chronicle Santa Barbara’s history with development. 

Fellow planning commissioner Jay Higgins knew what she was working on, and asked her to give a talk at one of his planning seminars. She turned the research into a book that is available at local stores, including Chaucer’s Books in Santa Barbara and Tecolote Book Shop in Montecito.

Lodge said her goal is to wake people up. 

“What makes Santa Barbara special is its small-town feel — we don’t have to destroy that,” Lodge said. “When I was first on the council, I started saying we are in a catch-22 in Santa Barbara. The more we maintain what makes it so special and even enhance it, if we can, the more people will want to come and live here.”

She references the late Pearl Chase and others who contributed to Santa Barbara’s preservation. She writes:

“As I continued to do research, it became clear that if it had not been for certain individuals, Santa Barbara would be a very different place. It would not have the distinctive built environment for which it is famous if two civic activists, Pearl Chase, who gets much more credit than she deserves, and Bernhard Hoffmann, who gets far less credit than he deserves, had not worked hard to urge and guide Santa Barbara towards use of the Spanish Colonial Revival architectural style.”

She credits Bernhard and Irene Hoffmann, who arrived in Santa Barbara in 1919 with their diabetic daughter to be treated by William Sansum, the first doctor in the United States to develop insulin shots. 

“The Hoffmanns quickly became engaged in the community,” Lodge wrote. “He arranged to restore Casa de la Guerra, a large adobe home built from 1819 to 1837, with the two remaining de la Guerra family members still living in the house. He created El Paseo, a shopping courtyard, around it in 1921.”

The book also details the origins of the Architectural Board of Review, the Historic Landmarks Commission and the Planning Commission, with lots of names of yesteryear drizzled throughout.

The most compelling statement, however, might come at the beginning of the book. She reveals an anecdote of her interaction with a bookstore owner in 1982. In a book, she found a quote from a newspaper editorial.

“The old landmarks and most charming characteristics of Santa Barbara are disappearing before the march of improvement, and though our practical people cannot move the mountains, nor change the scenes, nor spoil the climate, they are doing all they can to despoil the quaint beauty of the place and make it just a commonplace American town,” the editorial states. 

The editorial was from 1874.

“I was astonished — 1874?” Lodge wrote. “Santa Barbara has a long history of civic activism around how it is developed, but I had no idea that this history went back so far. What is it about Santa Barbara that has made its residents so concerned about the development of the town? What has made Santa Barbara what it is?”

She told Noozhawk: “It’s a constant battle so the misguided ones in the community don’t have free rein.”

She answers it differently at the end of the book.

“Santa Barbara not only has a sense of place, it has had a sense of community,” Lodge wrote. “That is part of its magic. I urge all who care about Santa Barbara to be part of it. Get involved and stay involved.

“Understand, value and respect Santa Barbara’s history. It is in everyone’s interest — including those of the city’s ‘practical’ people — to help protect and enhance this special, still uncommonplace, American town.”

— Noozhawk staff writer Joshua Molina can be reached at jmolina@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.