Update: The March 26 event at Bookshop Santa Cruz has been postponed until further notice.
From the moment you meet chef Toriano Gordon, his confidence and passion for food culture are palpable. If you haven’t yet had the pleasure, his new cookbook, “Vegan Mob, Vegan BBQ & Soul Food,” offers a colorful glimpse into his culinary world.
“Vegan Mob” has already made the list of Top 100 Vegan Cookbooks of All Time on the website, VegNews while Food and Wine lauded it as one of the best cookbooks to hit the shelves this spring.
If lip-smacking dishes like Ragin’ Cajun Fried Shrimp, Smakarony, Fried Okra andVegan Mob Gumbo and sound worth the trip, on March 26 you can catch up with this charismatic chef and author at Bookshop Santa Cruz for a free book talk, signing and recipe tasting.
Yes, the food sounds tantalizing, but equally important to Chef Toriano is the culinary experience deeply rooted in family and tradition. Blending together fragments of the past, various family influences, and so much more, Gordon’s is the story of a rapper who changed his life. His debut cookbook draws inspiration from his upbringing in the vibrant communities of San Francisco and Oakland.
Toriano says “people think of soul food as one thing but there are a lot of different interpretations that fall under the umbrella of soul food.” Since his early days as a rapper, a career he began at 12, he’s been sampling different versions of soul food wherever he goes.
Yet healthy living wasn’t always a part of it.
The rapper lifestyle, the partying, the instability, eventually began taking a toll on his health. That all changed In 2017, with the documentary What the Health Gordon says after seeing the film, he discovered a more spiritual way of eating.
“I was always intrigued because it was different, a more conscious way of eating that also took some discipline. It worked with who I was and wanted to be, I was tired of not feeling well.”
One by one he began reworking all of his favorite dishes into vegan versions without compromising flavor.
While working as an Uber driver, he began listening to books like The Secret by Rhonda Bryne and Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. He decided he would open a food truck and in the meantime use his job as an Uber driver to help reach his goal.
Each ride became an opportunity for free promotion, offering passengers a 10% discount on their first order. He gained hundreds of followers on his social media accounts that way.
“I put it out to the universe, looking to give people a healthier alternative. We grew up eating food that could kill us, I can make food just as good that can heal us” Gordon says. From there things happened fast. In 2019 he started Vegan Mob out of the trunk of his car, began doing pop ups, and working the farmers market two days a week.
With the help of a restaurant business mentor, he opened Vegan Mob in October 2019.
Wildly popular on Instagram, Vegan Mob turned cash positive quickly. People came for the food, the energy, the authenticity and because it was different–drawing as many as 60% non-vegan customers and opening two locations.
Join Chef Toriano Gordon at Bookshop Santa Cruz on Tuesday, March 26th, at 7pm.
TEDxSantaCruz is back for its first in-person event since 2019, taking over Cabrillo College’s Crocker Theatre with a stacked lineup of speakers this coming April 13.
The theme is “Rising Together,” and celebrates the greater Santa Cruz County community’s collective strength and seeks to provide new ideas and solutions to build resilience as a local and global community, according to a press release.
“Rising Together” addresses challenges such as poverty, racism, global climate change, food insecurity and divisiveness, according to Consuelo Alba, one of the key producers of the event. Alba is best known as the founder of the Watsonville Film Festival. The emphasis of the event will be on the need for “massive collaboration” to solve these challenges.
Throughout the day of the event, talks will be given in English with Spanish translation, in order to include as many community members as possible.
TED is a nonprofit organization founded in 1984 that puts on conferences, called TEDx, where short talks are delivered by leaders in their field. These include scientists, philosophers, philanthropists, musicians, business leaders and religious leaders.
TEDxSantaCruz began 2011 as an independently-organized iteration of TEDx, and has hosted a total of 106 speakers in the area.
For this year’s installment, 30 speakers will take the stage who were selected out of a pool of 130 applications by a 10-person committee made up of local leaders. These include Nada Miljkovic of the University of California Santa Cruz, and Elana Solon and Jenny Kurzweil of Community Foundation Santa Cruz County.
“We were beyond impressed by the overall quality of the applications, the innovative thinking in our community, both in terms of building social movements and developing technology. The applications we received were by and large a showcase of how people in this community are powerful forces for good,” said Miljkovic.
The criteria for selecting the finalists included the quality of each talk’s content, how it provided new perspectives on a topic and relevance to both local concerns and global issues. The ability for the proposed talk to inspire calls to action was also weighed.
Here are some of the speakers and topics:
Kara Meyberg Guzman — Local News: Telling Our Story Through the Lens of Listening
MariaElena De La Garza — What Did You Call Me? Reclaiming Our Power Through Language
Kat Armstrong & Jorge Guillen — Someone Like Me: Drag Matters
Nicole Beck — Rainwater Not Wastewater
The Community Foundation of Santa Cruz County is the presenting sponsor for the event. Other sponsors include: Rise Together Fund for Racial Equity at the Community Foundation, Driscoll’s, UCSC’s The Humanities Institute/Office of the Chancellor/Baskin School of Engineering, Lookout Santa Cruz, Watsonville Film Festival, Cabrillo College and Santa Cruz Community Credit Union.
TEDxSanta Cruz: Rising Together will be held Saturday April 13 at Cabrillo College’s Crocker Theatre from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Joseph Clements, the former singer for the punk band Fury 66, has dedicated himself to teaching mindfulness meditationto the most at-risk populations in Santa Cruz. Leading groups in rehab, and lock-up, Clements has become the teacher that he never had. Not one to want to ever “get stuck in the muck” of his personal story, Clement’s tale is fraught with the perils of addiction. It’s a cautionary tale with a constantly evolving happy ending.
“I think so many people feel ‘lesser than.’ What do you do with that information when you believe it is true,” asks Clements. “I think the root of it is, not feeling like you belong to anything or anyone. It’s a survival instinct of our species to want to belong to a bigger group for safety. It’s how we survived. If we belonged, and there was a Saber-toothed tiger, we had each other’s back. If you don’t get that at an early age in your household or immediate environment, you feel less than. And then you carry that out into society,” says Clements.
He’s had many success stories, including writer, music seller and bar keep Mat Weir.
“I’ve been a part of the Santa Cruz Meditation Group from the ground up,” says Weir. “Not only does it provide me a solitary place to explore the true nature of my thoughts, emotions and actions, it provides me with a weekly community of like-minded friends.
“Through one of his own teachings, or one from his diverse guest speakers, every session I’ve been to has provided me personal insight and a greater sense of connection. While you’ll hear him use terms like Dharma or Sangha, Joe likes to lovingly describe the group as Buddh-ish not Buddhist, keeping the door open and welcoming to anyone who wants to walk in.
“The diversity of the group helps make it so special. Young and old, non-binary, queer, bipoc , tattooed, punks, hippies and normies all congregate together for 90 minutes of connection, peace and insight. Being ‘hella meditated’ is the new hardcore. ”
“Love says I am everything. Wisdom says I am nothing. Somewhere in between the two, my life flows.” – Nisargadatta Maharaj
Sit. Feel. Heal. Bagel.
Clements, from the top: “I was born in Dominican Hospital. My parents are Valley kids, who grew up in Boulder Creek,” says Clements, the uber-chill, rock father, meditation facilitator.
With clear, lucid, weary, eyes, and a healthy glow, Clements has an intense ability to listen – which isn’t easy to do. We are at The Bagelry on Cedar Street, at noon, during the school week. The world is in motion around us, but the vibe at our outdoor table is peaceful. It feels like I’ve been placed in the Cone of Silence. Clements begins with his origin story.
“When I was born my dad was 17 and my mom was 18,” Clements says. “I was a product of some wild shit. When I was 1, my grandparents lived right next to the Venetian in Capitola. And we lived there for a year.” But it was on 26th Avenue that Clements, and his young parents, finally settled. “I grew up there, and never left. I’m 53, and was born in 1970,” Clements adds, for the record.
Clements’ father was a commercial fisherman and during the off-season, would work the fish counter on the Wharf. His mom worked in a frozen food packaging plant. They were teenagers, trying to make a living, while raising three young children, two blocks from the ocean.
One thing Clements definitely recalls is the parties at his home on 26th Ave. Zeppelin, Skynyrd and Sabbath blasted all night long. “When things would get rowdy in the house, I’d get as close as I could to the mesh-covered speakers and feel them vibrate around me in the air, and rumble the floor beneath me,” says Clements.
Through music, the young Clements was able to feel like he was still part of the party, but separate enough to feel safe. “Music, from the beginning, has always reminded me of community and ease. Especially when it’s loud and played just a little aggressive.
“The surf/skate culture that I grew up in had a clear line between East Side and West Side. I was an East Sider and I wouldn’t come down to the West Side –especially, not to surf. We would go to Derby Skate Park (the oldest public skate park in North America) to skate. When it came to punk shows, we had a hub called Club Culture,” says Clements.
HELLA MEDITATED Joseph Clements and the musicians who follow him prove
you can rock just as hard without hard drugs. Photo: Guerin Myall
Opened in 1984, the notorious club was centered at 418 Front St. Club Culture was the vibrant vision of Richard Walker, who had changed the goal lines for where music was heading in Santa Cruz with his band Public Enemies (later called Child Prostitutes). It was an all-age venue and a beacon, like a giant screaming hand, to every misplaced youth in the county.
“My first punk show there was like, ’86 with Faction, JFA and Caustic Notions, or something like that,” says Clements. “It was bonkers. We did a bunch of acid with a friend, drank a 40 ozer and went to the show. I just thought the whole time, ‘What the hell is this.’”
What separated Santa Cruz from other scenes in America, was the cutting edge lifestyle. “I went between surfing and skating, but I stuck with skateboarding a little bit more,” he says. For the young Clements, it was easier just to grab his deck and hit the street.
During Clements formative years, Santa Cruz was already known worldwide as a haven for surfers – a destination point for those who would rather be in the ocean. In 1986, when Clements was 16, the Santa Cruz Surfing Museum at Steamer Lane, opened. The museum was dedicated to “All youths whose lives, through fear of misadventure, are terminated before realizing their true potential.”
It was not only the waves that could end a young life, but also, the drugs, alcohol and gang-like mentality.
“There was a localism in this town, and this pride, that kept people from being well-rounded and open-minded. The vibe of surfers, while I was growing up, was kind of angry,” he says. As the popularity of our surf town grew, things became very territorial.
You can almost see the confrontations that ensued in the mind’s eye. Words yelled out. Fists thrown. Probably more than fists. A melee of surfboards and beer. This ain’t Gidget.
Breath. Here. Now.
But I’m in the here and now and safe, still at the Bagelry. The commotion has settled down around us– the high schoolers have left. Clements is very careful in talking about how things are different today. “It’s not that way anymore. And I don’t want to stereotype or pigeonhole anybody, but the localism kept people from growing. I was caught up in it. I had a deep need to fit in– which became problematic, in a lot of ways. Ultimately it becomes about ego and identity.”
Without a tight family structure to plug into, or any scene that was uplifting and supportive, Clements turned to vices that were wickedly easy to obtain.
Drugs were around every park bench. Education about substance abuse was still dripping slowly out of Reagans, “Just Say No,” hypocritical agenda. With little adult supervision, Clements’ mom did the best she could. One thing, led to another. “I started smoking weed when I was 12, and this is difficult to talk about, because my kid is 12,” says Clements.
I can tell the story is about to shift. I’m glad the high school kids have left. Or maybe they should have stayed. Maybe this is the exact kind of story that a young Clements could have stood to hear. Or perhaps, this is the time-traveler moment, where Clements admits that he figured out a way to hijack the slipstream to become the voice that he needed to hear the most.
“By the time I got to my 20s, I was done,” says Clements. “I was strung out on heroin and all kinds of other shit. I was living out of my car and it was a bad scene. I was trying to get clean and sober. The last time I tried to detox, and got out of rehab, I went to the West Side where there was a 12-Step Fellowship. And, I stayed. Because I was living on the West Side, none of my friends saw me on the street. I found a really cool group of young people, also in recovery, who were into punk and skateboarding and it was pretty cool.”
Clements keep going to meetings and hanging out with like-minded sober people. And then, the devilish mistress, music, entranced him.
“Music really saved me in the early days, and then destroyed me, in the same way,” Clements admits.
“I never felt like I was a part of anything,” says Clements. “I always felt lesser than. Then my ego would come in with the surfer dude/punker attitude of, ‘I’m better than you.’ I was either lesser than you, or better than you. But most of the time, it was lesser. Even in the punk and skateboarder realm, I never thought I was good enough.”
KNOW PEACE Strip away all the pretenses and find peace. Photo: Daniel Jahangard
Finally sober, Clements launched his career in music. After his first performance singing with his band Schlep, up in the Santa Cruz Mountains, Clements felt peace, ease, connection and validation. Chasing the performance high became his new drug of choice. In the summer of ’93, Clements was contacted by Russ Rankin from the band Good Riddance, he was looking for a singer, and Fury 66 was born.
There’s an entire book that should be written about Fury 66. The rise and the descent of the band, is a wild, enthralling, furious ride. But to the point, even “fame” didn’t fill the pit in Clements’ soul.
Fury 66 was gone and without the gusto and validation of being onstage, the “I’m not good enough” army returned en masse. That early psychic trauma had never really been healed. At best, it had been bandaged.
Clements was still working in the music industry at Sessions Records, happily married to the love of his life, and had just built his own dream recording studio, Compound Records. But the unresolved nagging doubt of not fitting in, led Clements back down a desperate, dire, spiral into the void.
For Clements, it was the discovery of mindful meditation that gave him direction, a path forward, and a language that resonated at a cellular level. In the cyclical nature of Santa Cruz magic, it was the old friend who went with Clements to Club Culture, who himself found sobriety, and invited him to a weekend workshop at the Esalen Institute in Big Sur. Clements took meditation, “one breath a time,” and found that it steered away his attention from anger, stress and frustration.
“I learned to sit in the fire of fear, watch the anger wash away the sadness of my tears, and found freedom in the ashes of my suffering.” – Joseph Clements
When Clements talks about his journey, it’s easy to see the same scenario being played out with millions of people. We all know, or are, the sensitive kid who had to hide their sensitivity, because, it’s scary to be sensitive. Everyone knows someone, or is, that person who turned to drugs and alcohol to create that thick skin, that keeps one from feeling anything.
“I’ve known Joe since the 1980s,” says Clifford Dinsmore, the lead singer of Bl’ast!. “We lived in a neighborhood we called The Devil’s Triangle. It was a constant orbit of debauchery. The entire scene was in contrast to the hippie vibe that Santa Cruz was known for, until that point. We were a very close-knit community.
The sharing was seriously missed during the pandemic.
“This is my sangha, my community, and when I step through the door on a Thursday night, it is my sanctuary,” says Heather Duffy, an instructor with the Santa Cruz Poetry Project. “During the pandemic I had a home routine but I missed sitting with other meditators, and I wanted that sense of showing up for both myself and for others. It’s a simple and powerful practice, and I love the chance to slow down and breathe. I don’t have to do anything for just a little while, I can just be, and I don’t need to be perfect. My mind will do what it does. Whatever is going on with me is held with such gentleness and kindness, no judgment or solving.”
For Clements, the journey is a constant challenge.
“I’m still continuing my own inner journey and teaching people the mindfulness meditation and emotional understanding tools that helped me get to where I am today,” says Clements. Currently working with incarcerated youth, and other people who suffer from addiction, he wants to help anyone that “wants to be free from the tyranny of self.” Clements continues his self-exploration, while helping as many others as he possibly can through things like The Santa Cruz Meditation Group at 7pm every Thursday night at the Veterans Hall.
“When the resentment kind of lifted, for me, is when I began to have empathy for my parents. They were teenagers raising a baby. They were doing the best they could,” says Clements.
When you talk about forgiveness, the hardest forgiveness is the forgiveness of ourselves. “It’s almost like I’m re-parenting myself. There’s that little kid that’s still in there. So I’m showing up for that little kid asking for forgiveness – forgiveness for me, for turning my back on him. I got to meet that wounded part with wisdom and compassion. And that, actually, was where the healing began.”
To find out more about Joe Clements and where to attend a meditation class, retreat, personal coaching, or podcast, go to josephclements.comAlso, checkout Clements new band HOTLUNG on May 4th at The Blue Lagoon
Live Oak School District (LOSD) Superintendent Daisy Morales announced her resignation in an email to staff and parents last Friday afternoon. She will stay on until June 30, 2024, the end of her current term.
“Upon reflecting on my time here, I acknowledge my imperfections. Errors were made, with the most recent being an avoidable negative budget certification that led to unnecessary stress and hardship for many. I apologize for this,” said Morales in her email.
The resignation came after calls from LOSD parents for her to step down after district administration revealed a budget crisis and subsequent plans to layoff teachers and staff last month.
Morales was hired as LOSD superintendent for the 2021-22 school year. Before this position, she worked as Assistant Superintendent of Business Services for the Salinas City Elementary School District.
Morales’ contract allows for the board to end her contract “without cause” —her current contract would have expired on 6/30/2026. The salary for the position was $228,900 for the 2022-23 school year and Morales is entitled to 12 months of severance pay.
“That is a significant expense to a district so it is disappointing that there was not a way forward,” said LOSD board member Jeremy Ray.
Morales and the board agreed that it was time for her to go, according to Ray.
At a March 13 district board meeting, it came to light that the district’s financial situation was worsened by errors in the December budget. The Santa Cruz County Office of Education (COE) subsequently decertified the budget. In retrospect this “negative certification” was not deserved, according to the COE.
Layoffs would still have happened by March 15 despite the budget error, Ray said, but the district would not have been threatened by insolvency and a state takeover.
The board will be looking into all layoff notices that were sent because “it was forced in a way that was unnecessary which also led to potentially a larger number of positions being cut,” Ray said.
The COE’s decertification forced the LOSD Board to pass a Fiscal Stabilization Plan on March 6. This was a mistake, according to Ray. The decertification was triggered by the district’s estimate that their reserves would fall below the 3% mandated by the state.
Damage Control
Chief Budget Officer Hanswool Kim was fired from LOSD on March 12 after a meeting with Morales. According to Kim, Morales said, “it’s not a good fit.”
Kim called for the board to reconsider Morales’ contract at the meeting, before her resignation was announced.
“To have it presented like we messed up, while we were trying to clear it up and fix the solution that doesn’t feel right,” said Kim. “I gave her the benefit of the doubt. I trusted her and her strategy.”
According to Kim, his numbers aren’t wrong. Sara Perez, who is overseeing the budget now, was using them at the March 13 meeting, he said.
Perez, a consultant for the COE and ex-budget chief at LOSD, started looking at the budget weeks ago as “a second set of eyes” at Morales’ behest, according to Perez.
Perez trained ex-Budget Chief Officer Alison Warner, who left the district in 2023 after working on the June 2023 budget. Then Kim was hired in November 2023.
The problem in the December budget comes from how the general fund was used instead of dipping into “restricted funds,” put aside for particular expenditures like school books, or specific-programs. These “pockets of money” were budgeted unnecessarily but not spent, according to Perez.
The LOSD budget office is crunching the numbers to determine how much extra money the district has, according to Perez.
Jeremy Ray still has questions about the budget.
“It is a concern. I want to understand exactly how this happened and why,” said Ray. He has not heard of any fiscal or financial impropriety.
These days, Nathan Willett values the autonomy he and his band, Cold War Kids, have gained over a career that now stretches 20 years and spans 10 albums.
That sense of freedom has shown up in tangible ways, first on the band’s “New Age Norms” trilogy of releases and now on a self-titled album released in October. Cold War Kids embarked on these projects after their contract with Capitol Records expired and the band in 2018 released a greatest hits collection, “This Will All Blow Over In Time,” and a live album, “Audience.”
In a sense, those two releases marked the end of a chapter in the Cold War Kids story, and Willett, in a late-January phone interview, said he wanted to cast aside some of the usual considerations that come with making new music.
The format itself for “New Age Norms” was a bit of a rebellious statement. Each eight-song installment was a little long to be marketed as an EP, but a bit short of being a full album and was recorded with a different producer. The first installment arrived in November 2019, followed by “New Age Norms 2” in August of 2020 and the final chapter in September 2021.
“I think it represented a sort of, a lot of things,” Willett said of ‘New Age Norms. “I think it represented a certain type of freedom and a certain type of like totally not really caring about how it’s all going to land. For me a lot of it is breaking the constraint of the album or the single and just kind of being somewhere in between and being sort of in a way maximal, a maximalism in ways it was this huge exercise in writing and production and trying things and spreading our wings and working with different people, working in different ways, finding different sounds, asking us what can a Cold War Kids song be like?
“I think it came at a time also when we had this sort of contractually obligated best-of collection we had to put out and the we did our live record, which both ended up being great, but it was just so much backward looking that I wanted to just open the floodgates of like, I just want to write a lot,” he said. “And yeah, I really needed it. It was a really healthy thing.”
The three “New Age Norms” releases were well received, with some critics praising Cold War Kids for broadening their musical horizons, while delivering hook-filled songs that retained the band’s signature mix of alt-rock with shadings of R&B and blues, yet also being a bit more concise and a little less chaotic than early hits like “Hang Me Up To Dry” or “Something Is Not Right With Me.”
The self-titled album is back to a more conventional format of 12 songs, but it also reflects Willett’s willingness to challenge himself and continue being open to new collaborations and creative approaches. He worked with several new producer/songwriters, including Militarie Gun’s Max Epstein, Casey Lagos (Kesha, Wrabel), Ethan Gruska (Phoebe Bridgers, Weezer), Jenn Decliveo (Miley Cyrus, Hozier) and Malay (Frank Ocean, Lorde). And he continued to explore the question of what can a new Cold War Kids song be like these days.
One notable shift came with the lyrics, which found Willett getting more introspective and personal, although not in the spill-my-guts style that’s popular these days. Musically, “Cold War Kids” offers a compelling mix of rockers (the catchy “Double Life”), upbeat soul-inflected pop (“Blame,” “Run Away With Me”) bouncy alt-pop (“Empty Inside”) and rich balladry (“Another Name” and “Starring Role.”)
Much of the musical growth Cold War Kids have made and will make in the future can be traced back to a fundamental change that happened ahead of the group’s third album, 2011’s “Mine Is Yours.” Up to then the band had been a democracy, with the four original members (singer/keyboardist/guitarist Willett, guitarist Jonnie Russell, bassist Matt Maust and drummer Matt Aveiro) seeking to contribute equally to the songwriting.
Willett and his bandmates realized democracy wasn’t working, communicating was tricky and the songs themselves sometimes suffered. The better approach was to have one songwriter steering the ship, and Willett took on that role.
The band’s lineup has evolved since, with Willett, Maust, David Quon (guitar), Matthew Schwartz (keyboards, guitar, percussion) and Joe Plummer (drums) intact since 2016, while Willett has remained the songwriter and leader in Cold War Kids.
He’s still, however, learning how to navigate the process of writing, bringing songs to his bandmates and keeping things moving forward right through recording so the songs become the best they can be.
“On one level, it would be easy to think ‘Yes, now I get to do exactly what I want. I don’t have to jump through all of these hoops, going back channel or try to have petty conversations just to take a step forward,” Willett said. “Then on the other hand, it’s a little bit be careful what you wish for. You really have to pay the cost to be the boss. You really have to work so much harder and do so much more and really you have to investigate
your soul so much more.”
That learning process continued on the self-titled album as Willett took the necessary time to live with the songs to identify any flaws and find the right tweaks. He also decided that it’s OK to be firm about an idea and insist on carrying it through to its fruition, something that doesn’t come naturally to Willett.
“I have to not always be apologizing for pushing it further, for knowing what I need and (not worry) because it inconveniences someone or because it totally flips out what somebody this thing was going to be,” Willett said.
“My personality is generally I want to please people and I want things to go well and to have a good time,” Willett said. “I think you don’t really get that when you’re in my position. And I think this record is a lot was me trying to step into some of that, some of the sort of ‘No, I need to set myself up to get it right, not to just have the best time and work with the people I like and have a blast and have a great time. But it’s the music (that matters) at the end of the day. It’s all that remains of that work.”
With the self-titled album released and Willett and his bandmates feeling proud of their work, new songs will be a large presence in the band’s current live shows. Willett appreciates the band’s fans, but he said playing the new songs will help ensure he’s enjoying the show Cold War Kids present each night.
“Always kind of the ambition is to want to lean heavily on the new (songs),” Willett said. “And this one we’re really doing it because the hard part is always really rehearsing them a lot so that you can work as many in, knowing that people don’t want to necessarily hear 12 or however many new songs. But we’re playing a bunch. We’re actually probably playing seven every night off of the new record. I’m really excited about that. I feel like more than ever, I kind of need it for my own sake.”
A new cannabis dispensary is set to take over the site of the former Emily’s Bakery after the Santa Cruz Planning Commission approved the project on March 7. The vote was 5-2 in favor with commissioners Michael Polhamus and John McKelvey voting “no.”
Many Wo/Men’s Alliance for Medical Marijuana (WAMM) members came out to support Valerie Corral who spoke in favor of The Hook Outlet, the dispensary that will take-over supplying WAMM members. The Hook hopes to provide medical marijuana to 200 WAMM members at this location, according to co-founder of The Hook, Bryce Berryessa.
The Santa Cruz City School District voiced its opposition to the dispensary with a case that boiled down to the site’s proximity to Santa Cruz High. Superintendent Kristin Munro, Santa Cruz High Principal Michelle Poirier and Mission Hill Principal Derek Kendall spoke out against the permit. They requested that the Commission move the zoning-requirement from 600 feet to 2000 feet away from schools.
The dispensary is only 850 feet away from Santa Cruz High. Zoning code currently requires a buffer of 600 feet.
Poirier said that marijuana had become a huge issue at the school. Drug violations were up 50% in 2022-23 and students told her that it is easy to get a scannable fake-ID.
“A student can very quickly conduct a business negotiation, quickly obtain [weed], and make it back to campus very quickly without it needing to become an alarm because they are late to their third period class,” said Poirier.
The dispensary had offered to only sell to 19-year-olds and up, but Poirier said that fake-IDs make that regulation obsolete. Medical dispensaries can sell to people aged 18 and up, while others are restricted to 21 and over.
Many parents and staff of Santa Cruz City Schools said having a dispensary on such a prominent corner would amount to “exposure marketing.”
But the school’s arguments failed to persuade the Commission.
‘I am also unconvinced by arguments against this site’
–Julie Conway
“I am also unconvinced by arguments against this site. [The argument being] ‘exposure normalizes.’ I think it is too late for that,” said Chair Julie Conway. “There are a lot of reasons to be concerned about kids with cannabis but nothing I’ve heard leads me to believe that this location will exacerbate or lead to more kids getting their hands on cannabis.”
Pro-dispensary advocates say that there is a huge black market of cannabis. Members of the weed-consuming community joked that children could never afford dispensary prices.
Per a 2017 Santa Cruz City ordinance, there are only five dispensaries allowed in Santa Cruz City. Each dispensary cannot be within 600 feet of schools or parks, leaving only a few areas where they can legally open, according to city staff.
There are dispensaries in the Harvey West area, on Fair Street, and along Ocean Street, making a few blocks along Mission Street one of the few remaining areas zoned for dispensaries not already occupied by a cannabis-store, according to Berryessa.
Commissioner Polhamus, who teaches at Santa Cruz High, said he was concerned about the potency of the weed and the location of the store because of its effects on learning. He proposed an amendment to the approval that would ban cannabis products with over 40% THC at the dispensary.
It was not added to the approval.
Instead the Commissioners agreed that the city has a well-thought-out zoning ordinance and to change it now would be unfair to the applicant.
“I see how much moving around they [the students] do on their electric bikes. The notion that to go to 1200 feet would change anything is crazy. They can go anywhere they want to go very fast. And there are lots of them,” said Commissioner Matthew Thompson.
Berryessa, who lives in the neighborhood, said that he is a parent of kids at Mission Hill Middle School and he understands parent’s concerns.
“I do not fault you for being here because we are parents doing what we can, to do the best for our kids,” said Berryessa.
Berryessa said that he expects there to be an appeal to the Santa Cruz City Council.
When Vanessa Quiroz-Carter and Maria Orozco were sworn in late last year as Watsonville’s Mayor and Vice-Mayor, it was only the second time in the city’s history two women have held the roles.
The first was in 2019, when Rebecca Garcia and Trina Coffman-Gomez sat in the seats.
In fact, women being placed into high office is a relatively recent development in Watsonville, with Ann Soldo becoming the city’s first female mayor in 1983, more than 100 years after Watsonville was incorporated.
For International Women’s Month, Good Times sat down with Quiroz-Carter and Orozco to talk about their roles, and the importance of having women leaders.
In decades past it would have been unthinkable for women to hold leadership roles, and vestiges of that outdated thinking still remain in some places.
Quiroz-Carter says that both her youth, and the fact that she is Latina surprises some people. But others, she says, draw inspiration from it.
“People tell me that it gives them hope for the future,” she says. “That they can see their daughters or their sisters or their wives, people that they know being in positions of power.”
Orozco agrees.
“When we look at historically the City of Watsonville, it’s rare when you’ve seen two women of color representing the city,” she says. “And when you see it it’s shocking, but it’s also very powerful.”
Orozco says she always keeps in mind that she is serving as a role model.
“So there is a burden we carry,” she says. “That responsibility in making sure we are representing our community in the best possible way.”
Quiroz-Carter says she still sees traces of a patriarchal system.
“I’ve definitely been in meetings where I’m overlooked,” she says. “They will bypass me to shake the hand of the man.”
This thinking changes, she says, with more women getting elected and appointed.
“That’s why it’s important for people to see more women leaders,” she says.
Both Quiroz-Carter and Orozco agree that women generally have different leadership styles than their male counterparts.
“We’re logical, we have strong leadership skills,” Orozco says. “But we also have that humanity in the way we lead. And I think that we’re willing to even change our minds sometimes when we sit down in conversation with people who may not agree with us.”
Quiroz-Carter adds, “And women are collaborative.”
But these differences can be both a detriment and a benefit, Quiroz-Carter says.
“Sometimes those leadership styles aren’t—because they’re not within this masculine frame—it’s not taken as seriously,” she says. “So I feel like as a woman you have to sometimes work so much harder to fit into someone’s idea of what a leader is, even if you don’t fit that mold.”
At the same time, both say that they have had many male mentors. Orozco says she has learned to weather the slings and arrows that come with her position.
“One thing I appreciate from the male perspective is that ability to teach you to have a tough skin,” she says. “And to look past being ignored at times and just keep paving the way.”
Quiroz-Carter says that her success comes despite being raised in a patriarchal family where the men come first and women are expected to get married and have children.
“I always felt I was in the shadows of my male cousins, because they were the ones that were expected to be the leaders,” she says.
Orozco came from a similar background. She describes herself as the, “trouble-maker of the family.”
“I had to push the agenda, and I think that’s where my leadership comes in. I’m not going to take no for an answer just because you say no,” she says. “I’m going to open doors for myself. And I want you to listen to me. I want you to see me, because I have something to say. And I think that’s beautiful.”
When asked for her advice for young girls who are learning to make their way in the world, Quiroz-Carter said they should, “open your own doors. Make your own opportunity.”
“That’s really what you have to do,” she says. “And trust what you’re good at and continue doing it.”
Also, she adds, “Failure is part of success.”
“You have to fail in order to succeed,” she says. “You have to try things. You have to go where other people have not gone before, even if it’s scary.
Orozco adds, “get comfortable with being uncomfortable, because that’s when you know you’re growing.”
“In any decision you have to make, and any opportunity you take, make sure you hold your integrity tight, and keep your values intact,” she says. I don’t think you should ever have the need to negotiate your values.”
The Live Oak School District Board (LOSD) approved laying off at least 16 workers Fiscal Stabilization Plan with contentious layoffs needed to save the District from insolvency on March 6.
If the state does not certify the plan, the District could still end up insolvent.
The layoffs approved with the stabilization plan are a school psychologist, an administrative secretary, four family liaisons, four reading and math aides, seven elementary school teachers, among other positions.
The total savings of the budget will amount to $6 million over the next two school years. Next year the plan proposes $2.3 million in personnel-savings alone.
The Green Acres Principal was saved after Board Member Paul Garcia brought forward an adapted Plan A, which cut half-time financial analyst and education services positions in the District office instead.
Teachers and parents still told the Board that the plans weren’t doing enough to save the teachers.
“When we talk about percentages we should be looking at a percentage of the total budget with the children versus in an office,” said Ocean Alternative teacher Deb Bell.
Another parent expressed frustration about how the Board can’t answer questions because of the Brown Act.
“Then get the state law changed,” said Ray.
Then life lab instructor Emily Claridge came up.
Claridge told the Board it was “unethical and pathetic” to approve the cuts. Ray responded, “I resign.” He stormed out.
Before re-entering the building to applause from teachers and parents later in the meeting, Ray said, “I am not resigning, at least not right now.”
Claridge later apologized to Ray.
Board Member Felicita Rasul reminded the audience that she serves on the Board as public service. No one else wanted the job when she was appointed in 2021. She joined the Board to help everyone have the great experience she had in the District as a parent.
“A lot of things that were mentioned in the vote of no confidence we are discussing and looking at but it is a personnel issue. It is personal,” said Rasul. “I hope that you can trust that we are all decent and kind people that are just trying to take care of the business of this District.”
After Ray’s return, Pomrantz of LOETA thanked the Board and she agreed to work together.
Ray said they must decide in the next several months if Green Acres Elementary will close before they spend the funds for the $44 million facility bond measure, which leads in the early election results.
The saga will continue at least into June when the LOSD Board will approve a final budget for 2024-25.
There is now a petition on change.org titled, “The Children of Live Oak Deserve a Quality Education,” which calls on the Santa Cruz County Board of Education to investigate Dr. Morales. It has 613 signatures as of March 8.
Board Member Felicita Rasul says that the issue of Dr. Morales’ employment will come up at the next meeting in closed-session. The Board is currently working on how best to report what they discuss, according to Rasul.
Nick Ibarra, Director of Communications for the Santa Cruz Office of Education, said in an email: “Our office’s role is currently limited to this ongoing fiscal review and support process. COE’s provide oversight to districts only under very specific circumstances, as outlined in state ed. code, which generally relates to finance and appeals of certain board decisions.”
Scammers have been taking advantage of PG&E customers in the last year and are continuing to do so into 2024. Santa Cruz County residents are some of the most victimized by the culprits, according to a release by the public utility.
Customers were fleeced for nearly $900,000 in 2023 alone, with 43,000 cases reported to PG&E from throughout the state.The scammers impersonated PG&E employees and processed fraudulent payments. The average victim was robbed of $785.
Santa Cruz residents were the second-most swindled group with 192 reported scams in 2023. Watsonville residents reported 75 incidents. PG&E said that this was an all-time high for scams. However, many go unreported.
The frauds have continued in high numbers into 2024, with customers reporting over 2,500 attempts in the month of January, and the scammers made off with $67,000 from customer payments.
The scammers are employing sophisticated techniques, including creating authentic-looking 800 numbers which appear on a phone’s display screen.
PG&E is now partnering with the Federal Trade Commission to curb fraud attempts.
Matt Foley, scam investigator for PG&E, said any threats of immediate disruption of service are a red flag.
“Scammers will attempt to create a sense of urgency by threatening immediate disconnection of your utility services if you don’t make immediate payment,” Foley said.
He stressed that anyone asking for financial information over the phone, or asking for payment via prepaid debit cards or money transfer services like Zelle is not a PG&E representative.
Fraudsters will often look for times when customers may be distracted or stressed and are constantly contacting utility customers asking for immediate payment to avoid service disconnection. They also target vulnerable populations like seniors and low-income households.
Here are signs of a potential scam:
Threat to disconnect: Scammers may aggressively demand immediate payment for an alleged past due bill.
Request for immediate payment: Scammers may instruct the customer to purchase a prepaid card then call them back supposedly to make a bill payment.
Request for prepaid card: When the customer calls back, the caller asks the customer for the prepaid card’s number, which grants the scammer instant access to the card’s funds.
Refund or rebate offers: Scammers may say that your utility company overbilled you and owes you a refund, or that you are entitled to a rebate.
If you think you are being scammed, contact PG&E at 1-833-500-SCAM. The Federal Trade Commission’s website is also a good source of information about how to protect personal information. If customers ever feel that they are in physical danger, they should call 911.
Yes, I know it’s a centuries-old American (USA) tradition but ‘pizza pie’ is redundant because pizza means pie in Italian. Looking forward to your next order of a cappuccino coffee with steamed milk.
David Bolam
SPEND LOCALLY
I just had Sunpower put solar panels on the roof of my home. so glad i did. PGE needs to be broken up and brought under control. the PUC is simply a hand puppet of PGE.
I am now returning to our Capitola Macys again. i do not want to see it go under. before my former partner had his massive stroke, he worked in Macys in women’s shoes. He enjoyed the job.
While I appreciate Amazon, I do not need to give Bezos another yacht. So, Brad, THIS ELECTED official is NOT in favor of closing Macys, Kohls or Target. By the way, they bring taxes, jobs and income to our community college. Remember that next time you order from Amazon. That money goes to Bezos, not your community.
Steve Trujiillo
WEED STORE IS LEGAL
If the dispensary is following our ordinance as approved by voters, then this appears to be a witch hunt and a misuse of limited authority by this Superintendent. 🤔
It’s amazing that after years of legalization, we are wasting any public resources or the planning commission’s time on a zoning law that has been in place since 2010. If the Superintendent wants to change the ordinance, then she needs to use the same channels as every other citizen and put up a ballot initiative to make her desired changes.
She should have zero authority to direct our city staff, or planning commission to stop a business from opening when city staff is quoted saying this business “meets all the objective standards laid out in the City Zoning Code.”
This is actually going to a commission vote tomorrow? How about we fill some of our pot holes instead of wasting city resources like this.
CoreyJK
NOT NEAR A SCHOOL
I cannot personally attend the meeting, but would if I could. I am in 100% agreement that all permits should be denied because of its proximity to the high school and then some.
The last thing Santa Cruz needs is another dispensary. Teenagers and young adults are experiencing the devastating results that cannabis use has on their mental health. Our community is taking the brunt of having to pay enormous tax dollars to support the cost of hospitalization and ongoing care of those suffering the effects of inhaling and ingesting higher and higher levels of THC. Doctors are diagnosing case after case of the correlation between cannabis with high THC levels and psychosis.
If we only knew of the mental horrors cannabis has on developing brains, it never would have become legal. If there is any group trying to get this legalization banned, please let me know. The old propaganda of no harm, no addiction, it’s medicinal, etc needs a second look.
If lip-smacking dishes like Ragin’ Cajun Fried Shrimp, Smakarony, Fried Okra and Vegan Mob Gumbo and sound worth the trip, on March 26you can catch up with this charismatic chef and author at Bookshop Santa Cruz
TEDxSantaCruz is back for its first in-person event since 2019, taking over Cabrillo College’s Crocker Theatre with a stacked lineup of speakers this coming April 13.
The theme is “Rising Together,” and celebrates the greater Santa Cruz County community’s collective strength and seeks to provide new ideas and solutions to build resilience as a local and global community, according to...
hese days, Nathan Willett values the autonomy he and his band, Cold War Kids, have gained over a career that now stretches 20 years and spans 10 albums.
A new cannabis dispensary is set to take over the site of the former Emily’s Bakery after the Santa Cruz Planning Commission approved the project on March 7. The vote was 5-2 in favor with commissioners Michael Polhamus and John McKelvey voting “no.”
Many Wo/Men’s Alliance for Medical Marijuana (WAMM) members came out to support Valerie Corral who spoke in...
