Some Ellwood area residents are furious after learning a local gun shop is set to officially open its doors next month on Hollister Avenue next to a preschool and daycare facility. 

A few dozen Goleta community members gathered at a small park in the Santa Barbara Shores neighborhood on Monday to protest Goodland Guns’ upcoming move to 7443 Hollister Ave., next to the Here We Grow Early Learning Center. 

Community members raised safety concerns, discussed possible next steps and demanded transparency from the city of Goleta. Goodland Guns owner Dan Ashton and city councilmembers Stuart Kasdin and James Kyriaco were in attendance. 

“The city has failed us,” Ellwood resident Matt Twohey said during the meeting. 

Goodland Guns — previously located in Old Town Goleta — has signed a 25-year lease for the former 7/11 storefront, which had been vacant for years, Ashton told the group. 

Ashton had been looking for a new location for two years through a “difficult process with the city,” he said.

“This wasn’t my first choice to move to,” Ashton said. “This is just what actually worked with the city.”

The store plans to hold a soft opening in the coming weeks, with the official opening set for Sept. 5. It will be open on weekdays from 12:20 p.m. to 5:56 p.m.

Goodland Guns has operated in the Santa Barbara County area since 2013 and sells California-legal rifles, handguns, ammunition and pre-owned firearms. 

Ashton said he decided to move after the landlord doubled the rent on his previous space. 

He also reassured community members that the Goodland Guns sign wouldn’t have the word “guns” written on it. 

Ashton said he also tried to acquire the Here We Grow Early Learning Center location when it was available. 

“Every location that I have attempted has been denied. I have over 150 emails with the city of Goleta trying to find a location,” he said. 

The city did not flag the facility’s proximity to the gun shop as a potential issue, he said.

“They have a map. They can see what is going on in the neighboring community,” Ashton said. 

When community members learned that the shop was moving in next door to Here We Grow Early Learning Center, which opened in January, they created an online petition to protest Goodland Guns’ relocation. 

The petition hit 1,100 signatures as of Tuesday morning. 

“This isn’t just a matter of discomfort. It’s a potential safety hazard for the young children in our charge, and it places an emotional and operational burden on our entire community,” wrote Heather Robbins, owner of Here We Grow Early Learning Center.

Kasdin told the group of concerned community members on Monday that he was not aware that Goodland Guns was approved to relocate to that spot and only heard about it last week.

“It blindsided me,” he said. “There was no potential for anything proactive or any decision-making on our part.”

Community members on Monday took issue with the shop’s proximity to the early learning center and said the children can currently look into the gun shop’s parking lot from the play yard.

However, Ashton said that, under California law, people carrying guns in and out of the store will have to keep them in a locked container, and the store will have signage reminding patrons of the law.

Councilman Kyriaco added that Goodland Guns’ former location was near the Goleta Community Center and the Rainbow School. 

Rainbow School parents said the difference is that the school had a 400-foot buffer and the kids couldn’t reach through the fence and into the shop’s property. 

Under California law, people generally may not possess a firearm in a school zone, including the grounds of a public or private K-12 school and the area within 1,000 feet of those grounds, with some exceptions. 

Meeting organizer Catherine Mizrahi said she would like to see a city policy that would not allow the sale of firearms next to a preschool or daycare.

Community members also blamed the city for allowing the shop’s move next to Here We Grow Early Learning Center. 

“This was a failure. Staff should have let us know and given us a proactive kind of heads up on the situation,” Kasdin said.

Kasdin told the group that he is going to pass along community questions regarding zoning, process, land use, a buffer addition and a potential urgency ordinance to city staff and lawyers. 

No timeline is known for when the community might get answers to those questions, but Kasdin said he would get responses back to the community as soon as possible. 

Community members also discussed possible solutions, from moving the business to adding a different type of fence so the kids at the early learning facility can’t see the gun shop from the play yard. 

But Ashton said all the paperwork and licensing have been issued, and they are currently renovating the storefront and removing debris and vandalism from when it sat vacant.

“They are not going to let me out of the lease,” he said. 

Additionally, Ashton said he tried to open his storefront in an industrial zone but “got pushback” and is now subleasing that spot.

Community members also demanded better communication and transparency regarding proposed changes in Goleta.

“This needs to come to a resolution, and I think we have to sue the city for negligence in this process,” Dan Mizrahi, a meeting attendee, said.

“That is an option you have. You can sue away,” Kasdin responded.

The decades-long lease term also stirred up criticism from the community. 

“This decision was approved and affects the whole generation, if not two generations, of our community,” Tarrah Bouley said during the Monday meeting.

Ethan Bertrand, Goleta Unified School District Board member and District Director for Assemblymember Gregg Hart, was also in attendance on Hart’s behalf.

“He shares the concern of everyone gathered here that having a gun store next to a preschool is not an acceptable use. He will be working with the city to make sure all options are exhausted to keep everyone safe,” Bertrand said.

Some Here We Grow Early Learning Center parents, including Mizrahi, threatened to disenroll their children from the preschool and daycare facility if the gun shop opens its doors.

The facility’s Director, Crista Trujillo, told Noozhawk on Monday that hearing people want to disenroll is “heartbreaking.”

The facility also only recently learned about the gun shop moving in, she added.

“We understand he put money into this, and we are not trying to hurt his business at all either, but we are not going to have children to enroll,” Trujillo said.