Santa Cruz Mountains residents who want to see Sutter Health’s urgent care location in Scotts Valley remain open now have their federal representative actively on their side. Congresswoman Anna G. Eshoo on June 25 wrote a letter demanding the health care giant reverse course on its decision to shift its Scotts Valley Drive location from an urgent care facility to a primary and pediatric care center.
Eshoo, whose 18th Congressional District represents the northern reaches of Santa Cruz County, Los Gatos and swaths of the Silicon Valley, said she was not notified of the decision.
“I learned about this decision from my constituents, not Sutter Health,” Eshoo wrote to Sarah Krevans, the company’s president and CEO. “My office followed up with your staff to ask about this change and was informed you would be closing the only urgent care department in this part of Santa Cruz County in order to expand your primary and pediatric care departments.”
When contacted by the Press Banner, a Sutter Health spokesperson said the company plans to make the transition on Aug. 30, and that it will continue to provide “time-sensitive care at the Scotts Valley Center by offering same day appointments, Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.”
“For night and weekend needs, patients and families have several nearby urgent and walk-in care options from which to choose, including the expanded services available at Westside Urgent Care, located just six miles from the Scotts Valley Center,” the spokesperson said.
The move will allow the company to add on to the six employees practicing in Scotts Valley while expanding primary and pediatric care, according to the spokesperson.
But Eshoo said the move will create yet another hardship for hundreds of families that are still dealing with the ramifications of the CZU Lightning Complex fire that ravaged nearly 1,000 homes in the area served by the facility.
“Many of my constituents in this special community are seniors and disabled, and many don’t own cars,” she wrote. “While it might not seem very far away, it is an hour or more by car if you consider the congested beach traffic through this area and the current state of public transit impacted by the CZU Fire.”
Eshoo included senators Dianne Feinstein and Alex Padilla, State Senator John Laird, Assemblyman Mark Stone, Santa Cruz County Supervisor Bruce McPherson and the entire Scotts Valley City Council in the letter.
“On behalf of my constituents, I’m asking you to reexamine this decision and find a way forward to retain urgent care access in this part of Santa Cruz County,” she wrote.
A federal judge on Tuesday lifted a preliminary injunction preventing the city of Santa Cruz from removing hundreds of homeless people from San Lorenzo Park, where they have been living since July 2020.
But the order by U.S. District Court Northern District Magistrate Judge Susan van Keulen came with the understanding that the city has no immediate plans to evict the residents from the area, also known as the Benchlands.
Attorney Anthony Prince, General Counsel for the California Homeless Union which represents the residents, says that the city had already removed 75 people from the Benchlands when the injunction was put into place on Dec. 30, 2020. That order, he said, kept the residents where they had access to a safe living space and a variety of services.
“We saved lives,” he said. “We persevered.”
“Nowhere else in California or, to our knowledge, anywhere in the country during the pandemic did the homeless win such a decisive, lifesaving, long-running legal victory,” he added.
In attempting to close the camp and move residents elsewhere, the city has cited numerous problems there, including vandalism, fire safety and criminal activity.
Since it was established in July 2020, however, the city has provided trash service and hygiene resources to the residents.
Homeless Union President Alicia Kuhl says that the ruling was expected.
“Because we aren’t under direct threat of eviction, it didn’t make sense to keep it in place,” she said.
Still, the homeless advocates accomplished the objectives they intended with their advocacy, she added.
“We knew the injunction could not last forever, but we succeeded in stopping the city from destroying the encampment at the height of the pandemic,” she said. “This is our victory because we know we saved lives.”
Kuhl pointed out that evicting the residents would violate CDC guidelines that say providing safe, stable living spaces is the best way to slow the spread of Covid-19 among the homeless population.
In May, the Santa Cruz City Council approved an ordinance that restricts camping in most parts of the city, but requires the establishment of 150 “safe sleeping sites” before the rules can take effect.
The man who allegedly fatally shot Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Sgt. Damon Gutzwiller in Ben Lomond last year during a violent crime spree waived his preliminary hearing Monday in Santa Cruz County Superior Court.
The move means Steven Carrillo, who appeared in the courtroom of Judge Paul Burdick clad in red jail garb, sporting a beard and a black eye, can proceed directly to trial.
Burdick set Oct. 4 for an arraignment to set a trial date. Burdick also ordered Carrillo to remain in custody by the federal marshal with no bail. He is being held at the Santa Rita Jail in Alameda County.
Carrillo was in court Monday because Santa Cruz County District Attorney Jeff Rosell had filed an amended complaint of an additional attempted murder enhancement.
Carrillo, aided by his defense team of Mark Briscoe and Larry Biggam, pleaded not guilty to the additional charge.
Assistant District Attorney Johanna Schonfield and Chief Deputy District Attorney Tara George joined Rossell on the prosecution team.
On June 6, 2020, Sheriff’s deputies were dispatched to a report of a man acting suspiciously on a turnout near Jamison Creek Road about five miles north of Boulder Creek with bomb-making materials inside a van. Deputies followed Carrillo, a sergeant in the U.S. Air Force, to his home in nearby Ben Lomond where he allegedly ambushed Gutzwiller and another deputy with an AR-15 rifle as they approached his home. Carrillo, according to police reports, also ignited at least one bomb, injuring another deputy and a California Highway Patrol officer and triggering a massive law response from multiple counties.
Additionally, Carrillo and an accomplice, Robert Justus, allegedly fatally shot a federal security officer and injured another in Oakland on May 29. Justus surrendered five days later.
Along with the murder charges in both fatal shootings, Carrillo, 33, faces several weapons charges, numerous counts of attempted murder, carjacking, robbery, assault and special allegations.
“There are numerous charges,” Rosell said outside of court Monday. “Since he is facing federal charges, the ‘feds’ are the ones that are housing him now. This is an extremely strong case.”
When asked about the possibility of the death penalty, Rosell said, “We have left every option open—everything is one the table—as far as penalty, enhancement or charges.”
Burdick is currently working with the prosecution and the defense team on trying to have the trial take place in Dublin, Calif.
BANFF CENTRE MOUNTAIN FILM VIRTUAL FESTIVAL All the programs! If you’ve been too busy getting after it outdoors, or just haven’t made the time yet, now’s your chance to catch all our Virtual World Tour Programs. Join us online for a mixed program of award winners from the 2020, 2019 and 2018 Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book Festivals. Catch up on missed films or relive some of the best that Banff has to offer. For more information and tickets, visit riotheatre.com or call 831-423-8209. Wednesday, June 30-Tuesday, July 6.
GREATER PURPOSE COMEDY NIGHT Every Friday night at Greater Purpose Brewing it’s the Greater Purpose Comedy Show hosted by DNA and Chree Powell, this show features the best of California comedy. The show is 90 minutes long; doors at 7pm, show at 7:30pm. Admission is $10 and we strongly suggest buying your tickets on Eventbrite in advance at eventbrite.com/e/greater-purpose-comedy-tickets-156589496399. Show is for ages 16+. Friday, July 2, 7-9pm. East Cliff Brewing Co., 21517 E Cliff Drive, Santa Cruz.
SALSA SUELTA FREE ZOOM SESSION Keep in shape! Weekly online session in Cuban-style Salsa Suelta for experienced beginners and up. May include mambo, chachacha, Afro-Cuban rumba, orisha, son montuno. No partner required, ages 14 and older. Contact to get the link; visit salsagente.com. Thursday, July 1, 7pm.
WESTSIDE MARKETPLACE FOURTH OF JULY Time for the Westside Marketplace! First Sundays at the Wrigley Building! We will be featuring local art, handmade and vintage shopping, plus food trucks, pop-ups and live music by Papiba & Friends—all outdoors. Free admission plus free and easy parking, what more can you ask for? Friendly leashed pups are welcome! For more details visit scmmakersmarket.com or foodtrucksagogo.com and keep an eye on our social media! Sunday, July 4, 11am-5pm. The Old Wrigley Building, 2801 Mission St., Santa Cruz.
COMMUNITY
AB 626 TO LEGALIZE HOME COOKING IN SANTA CRUZ A public forum to discuss Bill AB626 and how legalizing Microenterprise Home Cooking Operations are providing safe and healthy food systems for communities across California. Join us in person at the Live Oak Grange in Santa Cruz (or through Zoom) for our panel and public discussion about AB 626 and how it is changing the way communities think about food. We will be diving into how the bill addresses the flexibility we need in our regional food systems for the safe and legal selling of food. Wednesday, June 30, 7pm. Live Oak Grange, 1700 19th St., Santa Cruz.
FAMILY SANGHA MONTHLY MEDITATION Come help create a family meditation cooperative community! Parents will meet in the main room for about 40 minutes of silent meditation, followed by 10-15 minutes of discussion about life and mindful parenting. Kids will be in a separate volunteer-led room, playing and exploring mindfulness through games and stories. Parents may need to help with the kids for a portion of the hour, depending on volunteer turnout. All ages of children are welcome. Please bring toys to share. Quiet babies are welcome in the parents’ room. Donations (dana) are encouraged; there is no fee for the event. Sunday, July 4, 10:30am-noon. Insight Santa Cruz, 740 Front St. #240, Santa Cruz.
GREY BEARS BROWN BAG LINE If you are able-bodied and love to work fast, this is for you! Grey Bears could use more help with their brown bag production line on Thursday and Friday mornings. As a token of our thanks, we make you breakfast and give you a bag of food if wanted. Be at the warehouse with a mask and gloves at 7am, and we will put you to work until at least 9am! Call ahead if you would like to know more: 831-479-1055, greybears.org. Thursday, July 1, 7am. California Grey Bears, 2710 Chanticleer Ave., Santa Cruz.
HOUSING MATTERS’ BUILDING WITH PURPOSE LAUNCH PARTY Join Housing Matters’ to celebrate the launch of Building with Purpose: a capital campaign supporting the construction of a 120-unit permanent supportive housing project in Santa Cruz County. This building will be the end of homelessness for 120 of our most vulnerable neighbors, and we are going to celebrate! To learn more, visit our website at buildingwithpurpose.org. Wednesday, June 30, 5:30-6:30pm.
ENTRE NOSOTRAS GRUPO DE APOYO Entre Nosotras support group for Spanish-speaking women with a cancer diagnosis. Meets twice monthly. Registration required: Call Entre Nosotras at 831-761-3973. Friday, July 2, 6pm.
OVEREATERS ANONYMOUS All our OA meetings have switched to being online due to sheltering in place. Please call 831-429-7906 for meeting information. Do you have a problem with food? Drop into a free, friendly Overeaters Anonymous 12-Step meeting. All are welcome! Thursday, July 1, 1-2pm.
WOMENCARE ARM-IN-ARM WomenCARE ARM-IN-ARM Cancer support group for women with advanced, recurrent, or metastatic cancer. Meets every Monday at WomenCARE’s office. Currently on Zoom. Registration required, call WomenCARE at 831-457-2273. All services are free. For more information visit womencaresantacruz.org. Monday, July 5, 12:30pm.
WOMENCARE MEDITATION GROUP WomenCARE’s meditation group for women with a cancer diagnosis meets the first and third Friday of each month from 11am-noon. For more information and location please call 831-457-2273. Monday, July 5, 11am-noon.
WOMENCARE TUESDAY SUPPORT GROUP WomenCARE Tuesday Cancer support group for women newly diagnosed and through their treatment. Meets every Tuesday currently on Zoom. Registration required, call WomenCARE 831-457-2273. Tuesday, July 6, 12:30-2pm.
WOMENCARE: LAUGHTER YOGA Laughter yoga for women with a cancer diagnosis. Meets every Wednesday, currently via Zoom. Registration required, call WomenCARE at 831-457-2273. Wednesday, June 30, 3:30-4:30pm. WomenCARE, 2901 Park Ave., Suite A1, Soquel.
OUTDOOR
CASFS FARMSTAND Organic vegetables, fruit, herbs and flowers are sold weekly at the CASFS Farmstand, starting June 15 and continuing through Nov. 23. Proceeds support experiential education programs at the UCSC Center for Agroecology & Sustainable Food Systems. Wednesday, June 30, Noon-6pm. Friday, July 2, Noon-6pm. Cowell Ranch Historic Hay Barn, Ranch View Road, Santa Cruz.
FREE TUESDAY AT UCSC ARBORETUM Community Day at the UCSC Arboretum, free admission on the first Tuesday of every month. Come explore the biodiversity of our gardens, great birdwatching or simply come relax on a bench in the shade. Tuesday, July 6, 9am. UCSC Arboretum & Botanic Garden, 1156 High St., Santa Cruz.
NEW BRIGHTON LITTLE RANGERS Any and all three to six-year-olds are invited to play games, listen to stories and songs, and learn about nature! Smiles, laughter, and good times abound at this program, and it’s a fantastic way to begin your morning in the park. We will meet at the campground Ramada. For more information, call 831-685-6444. Spaces are limited and early pre-registration is recommended. Attendees are required to self-screen for Covid-19 symptoms when pre-registering. Masks and social distancing are also required at all programs. To register, visit santacruzstateparks.as.me/schedule.php. Friday, July 2, 11-11:30am, Saturday, July 3, 11-11:30am. New Brighton Beach, 1500 Park Ave., Capitola.
SUNSET BEACH BOWLS Experience the tranquility, peace and calmness as the ocean waves harmonize with the sound of Crystal Bowls raising your vibration and energy levels. Every Tuesday one hour before sunset at Moran Lake Beach. Call 831-333-6736 for more details. Tuesday, July 6, 7:15-8:15pm. Moran Lake Park & Beach, East Cliff Drive, Santa Cruz.
YOU PICK ROSES We are growing over 300 roses, deeply fragrant, lush and in every color, and we want to share them with you! Get out of the house and enjoy cutting a bucket of roses for your own pleasure or to share with family and friends. Once you have made a purchase, you will be sent a calendar link to pick a time for your reservation and directions to our farm in Watsonville. Visit birdsongorchards.com/store/you-pick-roses for more information. Friday, July 2, 11am. Sunday, July 4, 11am.
The history of the Chateau Liberté in the Santa Cruz Mountains is both fabled and secret. Before white settlers ever came to the area, Ohlone natives lived on the land, making use of its two natural springs. Later, Jack London is rumored to have written his 1903 breakout novel Call of the Wild in one of the now destroyed cabins on the 72-acre property—a nearby street is still called Call of the Wild Road to this day. But its place in modern history is inextricably linked to the 1960s and ’70s, when it was not only a premier rock venue, but also a hot spot for Bay Area hippies, freaks and bikers.
The Hells Angels were often the unofficial security for shows that would go all night, featuring bands like the Doobie Brothers, Hot Tuna, Papa John Creach, Bob Weir’s Kingfish and local acts such as Snail, Timbercreek, Oganookie and countless more. Janis Joplin unsuccessfully tried to purchase the property. Jerry Garcia and Moby Grape’s Alexander Lee “Skip” Spence both lived there at different times. There are endless stories involving the two pools on the property, one of which had the infamous, rolling-paper ZigZag man logo painted on the bottom. Sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll flowed freely, and anyone who ever went seems to have a story to tell about it.
Many of those stories have been chronicled in the documentary The Chateau Liberté, which premieres July 10 at the Rio Theatre. It’s the work of local filmmaker William McKay, whose passion for this project has stretched over more than a decade.
“The beautiful part about this Chateau story is there are hundreds of accounts that all say the same thing,” says McKay. “It was a fucking rowdy place!”
In 2009, McKay began actively researching the Chateau, but its history was poorly documented. A couple years later, it was mentioned in the 2012 documentary The Doobie Brothers: Let The Music Play by director and producer Barry Ehrmann. But the reference was just a minute-and-a-half blip at the beginning of the film where the band talked about shooting their debut album’s cover on the Chateau porch.
“It was actually a very cool place for a band to start,” Doobie Brothers singer and guitarist Tom Johnston says in Let The Music Play. “You were accepted no matter what, so it was good from the morale standpoint.”
McKay reached out to Ehrmann and said someone should make a documentary about the Liberté. However, Ehrmann wasn’t up for takin’ it to the streets.
“He said, ‘No man, it’s nothing but a local story,’” McKay says, adding Ehrmann did give him some polaroid scans of the Doobies playing there. “Well, I’ve proved him wrong.”
“At the beginning it almost felt like this place didn’t exist,” says producer Ryan Zweng, who is also McKay’s godson, of the Chateau.
Zweng helped McKay gather any material they could find, often cross-referencing sources like Hunter S. Thompson’s Hell’s Angels and Gypsy Joker To A Hells Angel, the memoir by ex-Santa Cruz Hells Angels Chapter President Phil Cross, who is also featured in The Chateau Liberté. He also assisted McKay in creating a Facebook group where anyone with pictures or rainbow faded memories could share.
“This whole thing is really a miracle of Facebook,” says Zweng. “It turned into a deluge of material.”
By 2017, they had enough material to ramp up production of the documentary. McKay says it wasn’t a question of if he should make the film, but how.
“Here I was in the middle of a divorce, bankruptcy and the bank taking my house,” he explains. “And I’m making a movie for free.”
That year was also when archivist and historian Amy Long became involved in the project. At that time she was the curator for the New Museum Los Gatos (NUMU).
“I always wanted to find the story that someone didn’t know,” says Long. “I saw something on social media [about the Chateau] and once I started digging I realized, ‘We have to tell this story.’”
After connecting over the Chateau’s strange and sordid tale, Long and McKay teamed up with its current property owner, George Rabe, for a “Reunion of the Rats”—the affectionate, self-given name of people who lived at or frequented the Liberté—event at the NUMU on Aug. 3, 2017.
Rabe has done a lot of work to restore the property, and now its history is finally being immortalized in film. The untold stories captured by McKay range from funny to bizarre to tragic, but they all distill the essence of a time and place that was one of a kind.
“It was a passion project for everyone in the film,” McKay says. “Everyone wanted this story to be told as a time capsule of what West Coast American culture was like, and that’s what we got here.”
‘The Chateau Liberté’ will premiere on Saturday, July 10 at 8pm at the Rio Theatre, 1205 Soquel Ave. in Santa Cruz. Tickets are $20; email go**********@gm***.com for advance tickets. Remaining tickets, if any, will be available day of show at the Rio.
Since the killing of George Floyd, there has been a national outcry for alternatives to police for nonviolent emergency calls modeled after Eugene, Oregon’s nationally acclaimed CAHOOTS MCIS—Mobile Crisis in the Streets—program. Working both on the street and in-home, serving wealthy and poor equally, teams of a highly trained medic and social worker skillfully address nonviolent calls related to houselessness, substance abuse, suicide prevention, and interpersonal conflicts. Services provided include crisis de-escalation, medical evaluation and non-emergency treatment, conflict mediation, welfare checks, and transportation to other services. Bypassing jail cells, emergency rooms, and ambulance runs saves cities and counties millions while minimizing personal trauma.
For well over a year, our Santa Cruz community has been stridently advocating to implement a CAHOOTS-model public safety program in Santa Cruz County, and a local petition demanding a CAHOOTS model for Santa Cruz has been signed by over 600 community members.
For several years, formal reports, studies, and public statements have spotlighted the glaring need to reform our Santa Cruz public safety system, while both Chief Mills and Chief Honda have made statements expressing dismay at being forced to service mental illness and homelessness calls.
In 2020, the Santa Cruz County Grand Jury Report on Homelessness recommended establishing a county-wide program modeled after CAHOOTS, citing that such a program “would be beneficial to those receiving its services, as well as the County’s law enforcement and medical personnel.”
The Feds have been quick to respond to the public demand for a non-law enforcement alternative for crisis calls, with federal funding set in motion in March when President Biden signed the $1.9 trillion American Response Plan Act known as the Covid Relief Bill, designating $1 billion over the next 10 years for states to develop CAHOOTS stye programs. Beginning in 2022, communities with such programs will be eligible to be reimbursed by Medicaid for up to 85% of their service costs!
County budget hearings are in progress, and nearly 19% of the County’s proposed budget is designated for public safety, with $87 million—more than half the allotment—going to the Santa Cruz County Sheriff-Coroner’s Office. The proposed budgets reflect a $2 million increase in funds for the sheriff’s department, as well as the loudly opposed $1.3 million increase for Watsonville Police—funds that could more than cover the @ $1.5 million to implement a cost-saving county-wide CAHOOTS pilot program.
Let’s add Santa Cruz County to the growing list of California communities currently implementing the CAHOOTS model! Santa Cruz can and should take advantage of this opportunity to join the national movement to re-design public safety in anticipation of 2022 federal funds. Tell your supervisor and council member to allot $3 million of public safety funding to implement 2 24/7 mobile vans for a year-long CAHOOTS pilot program, reducing costs and trauma. And sign and share the Re-imagining Public Safety petition http://tinyurl.com/y387pmmh.
Sheila Carrillo | Santa Cruz
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I know a lot of baseball fans in Santa Cruz will remember Pedro Gomez, the illustrious sportswriter who got his start at the Mercury News and covered the A’s for years before going national as a baseball reporter for ESPN. In the world of sports reporting, he’s a legend, having covered 25 World Series and found fame covering the A’s “Bash Brothers” era and Barry Bonds’ pursuit of the home-run record. But Steve Kettmann’s cover story this week shows an entirely different side of Gomez, and better explains why so many around the beloved media figure were devastated when he passed away in February at age 58. It wasn’t just his stature as one of the greatest in his field, it was also the way he touched those around him on a personal level. It’s words like “warm,” “direct” and “open” that keep coming up to describe him—which explains why Kettmann sees him as sort of a beacon of hope for bringing a much-needed “human element” back to baseball.
Kettmann will be on KSQD’s reporter-roundtable show Cruz News and Views tomorrow (3-4pm, 90.7FM, ksqd.org) talking about his cover story.
Also, you might have seen GT’s latest magazine, the new edition of Explore Santa Cruz, around town. It’s a guide for visitors and locals to Santa Cruz’s attractions, dining, shopping and more, and it’s on stands now. Check it out!
Even with the need to show vaccination status (which will make entry slower) I will be planning to start going to shows (in fact I’ve hit a couple in the last month). When the Freight, Kuumbwa and SFJazz reopen I will definitely be there.
— Tom Frey
What’s the point of reopening any surviving live music venues if the same protocols still exist? Personally, I will not be attending any live music events until we return to business as usual.
— Roy Jordan
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GOOD IDEA
A NEW PURPOSE
Housing Matters last week announced its new “Building With Purpose” campaign, a plan to build 120 units of permanent supportive housing for people experiencing chronic homelessness in Santa Cruz County. The five-story residential complex will be located on the Housing Matters campus at 115 Coral Street, and construction will begin in 2022. For details about the project’s virtual launch party and a series of webinars on it, go to buildingwithpurpose.org.
GOOD WORK
POWER OF ‘THERAPY’
UCSC student Haoran Chang was selected as one of 15 finalists for the 2021 GSA BAFTA Student Awards. Judges from Global Student Accommodation and the British Academy of Film and Television Arts considered hundreds of submissions from 34 countries, with entries including narrative film, animation, documentary and more. Finalists included students from the U.S., China, South Africa, Norway, Denmark, and the U.K. Chang’s film Fair Sai Re Pi (Fire Therapy) was selected in the newly created Immersive category.
For more than 20 years, my friend Pedro Gomez and I had been talking about how we would be in our seventies and still be laughing over the same old stories from our time on the road together as Oakland A’s beat writers in the ‘90s. Now I can’t stop thinking about how when I’m in my seventies, I’ll still be hearing Pedro’s voice in my ear, scolding me or laughing at me or reminding me of something important, decades after his death in February.
To his close friends, who were many, Pedro was “the exclamation point on every sentence,” as ESPN investigative reporter T.J. Quinn put it to me; a buddy whose electric enthusiasm for life powered all of us and deepened the colors of our existence. To Major League Baseball, he was one of the great reporters of his generation, beloved and respected, a writer who started out covering ball for the San Jose Mercury News and ended up a fixture on national TV and a crucial bridge to bring Latin American ballplayers’ stories and personalities alive for all fans of the game. When Bruce Bochy was manager of the Giants, and we published his A Bookof Walks, he told me he thought “Pete” (as he called him) had more respect in the game than any other media figure.
Pedro’s death on Super Bowl Sunday from sudden cardiac arrest unleashed an outpouring of tributes. I’ve been thinking since then about how often we look to others to make us better, to inspire us or to pull us along by their example. When death takes them, we’re in a fog of shock at the realization of how vital a cog that friendship was, of how needy we all really are, deep down.
Three months after Pedro’s death, I was driving my wife and two young daughters to SFO for a flight to Germany to visit my wife’s family, trying to fend off feeling bereft at their coming absence. I watched with idle fascination as a shiny new sports car ducked from lane to lane on 101, sniffing around the asses of other cars like a beast in heat, and finally surged through an opening and shot off at 30 miles an hour over the speed limit.
“A lot of Miami in his game,” I could suddenly hear Pedro’s voice in my ear. “Very Miami,” he would add, shaking his head, his voice full of commiseration and realism.
I had to smile, so palpable was Pedro’s presence. I’d thought with time I might stop hearing his voice in my ear so much, but the opposite was true, even after I put in three months of intense work assigning, gathering and editing 62 personal essays for a 440-page book, Remember Who You Are: What Pedro Gomez Showed Us About Baseball and Life. I didn’t do the book to try to work through anything, I did it because Pedro deserved nothing less and I wasn’t going to miss a chance to encourage people to learn from his example.
ESPN’s Pedro Gomez interviews Alex Rios during the World Baseball Classic at AT&T Park on March 17, 2013 in San Francisco, California. PHOTO: BRAD MANGIN
As I wrote in a memorial talk I gave at home plate of an Arizona spring-training stadium six days after Pedro’s death: “If you were true to the moment, if you were alert and alive to the pulsing human connection that made Pedro’s life so incredibly rich and vital, who had time to give a shit about any sense of insecurity or self-limitation? Just go with it, man.”
Hall of Fame manager Tony La Russa wrote in his essay about the incredible week of reporting Pedro had in 1992 when the Oakland A’s traded Jose Canseco, who had been a sophomore at Coral Park High in Miami when Pedro was a senior, bringing to an end the team’s “Bash Brothers” era with its three straight World Series appearances and 1989 earthquake-Series championship. Pedro could have used his connection to Jose to bury the A’s, but was scrupulously fair in his reporting.
“He was able to strike a very tricky balance, where he covered the story, whatever the story was, but always with an understanding of the people he was talking to or reporting on,” La Russa writes in his essay. “He pushed, that was his job, but he never pushed too far because he wasn’t happy with what you were saying. When you give respect the way Pedro did, you get respect back.”
Pedro and Sandi Gomez with their children Sierra, Dante and Rio. PHOTO: COURTESY SANDI GOMEZ
Bay Area baseball fans may recall the shock of lucidity that came after the Home Run Hitting Contest before baseball’s 2013 All-Star Game. The winner was a Cuban then with the A’s, Yoenis Céspedes, a guy with an NBA power forward body, as Pedro put it to me at the time.
Céspedes, just two summers removed from his dramatic speed-boat escape from Cuba, spoke little English, and for an instant a feeling of vague dread loomed as he stood ready to go live with the ESPN reporter next to him before an audience of more than 6.8 million. This, surely, would be another dull interview, the demands of entertainment robbing a man of his dignity.
Instead, Pedro turned that encounter into crackling theater that will long be reviewed where broadcast media is studied. He asked Céspedes a question in English, and then with the rhythm of a dancer, slipped in a quick, fluid burst of Spanish to give Céspedes the gist of the question, listened to Céspedes reply in Spanish, and—again, with a speed and smoothness that he somehow made look easy—smiled and gave Céspedes’ answer in English, then continued the interview. For anyone who knows their baseball history, who knows how the great and dignified Robert Clemente, for example, was treated as a rube and a dunce for not speaking English, this was a titanic step forward, actual social progress seen unfolding in real time.
Cleveland Indians manager Terry Francona writes of Pedro in his essay“His Eyes Lit Up,”“When he would interview Latin stars, like at the Home Run Derby, and go back and forth seamlessly from language to language, it just humanized everybody. And it was really cool.”
ESPN writer Alden Gonzalez, in his essay “He Carved a Path for Me,” writes about being inspired to try to be the next Pedro Gomez: “I remember how awed I was watching Pedro conduct an interview while translating for Yoenis Céspedes on live television after he won the 2013 Home Run Derby, how connected I felt hearing someone speak with that distinctive Cuban flair that routinely filled my childhood home,” he wrote. “And it wasn’t until after Pedro’s death that I learned how much vitriol that triggered.”
Remember Who You Are (available now as an e-book, and at Bookshop Santa Cruz and online on July 13) would never have been possible if not for so many people all chipping in to help, above all picture editor Brad Mangin and copy editor Kurt Aguilar. They loved and admired Pedro, and saw this as a chance to remember someone who made everyone feel special. The pictures Brad gathered for the book, 185 in all (including many of Brad’s own), give the words an added immediacy and impact.
It was odd, reaching out to various writers I knew Pedro loved to ask them to contribute essays. Here’s how longtime Red Sox writer Sean McAdam described getting the call.
“Steve Kettmann was doling out assignments, like some substitute teacher in middle school attempting to herd a classroom full of restless students into some form of order. ‘I’m going to have Jack Curry do something with music,’ he said, running though his checklist,” he writes. “What would Kettmann pick for me? My mind raced: What single topic connected me inextricably with Pedro?”
That turned out to be the movie Animal House, a Pedro favorite.
“Our last communication came via text, about two weeks before he suddenly passed,” McAdam writes. “And yes, it was about You-Know-What. In a series of rapid-fire exchanges, we set about to cast Animal House—The Sequel, with inspiration drawn exclusively from members of the Trump Administration. He had the trigger-happy Douglas Neidermeyer played by Michael Flynn and tragic kiln-explosion victim Fawn Liebowitz in charge of funding for the arts. I, on the other hand, imagined an impeachment speech being delivered on the floor of the Senate, detailing behavior ‘so profound and disgusting that decorum prohibits me from listing them here’—just as Neidermeyer had done in attempting to get Delta House thrown off campus.”
That was Pedro, as the book explores again and again, finding a way to connect in real time to his friends. Curry, a former New York Times sportswriter, checks in with the longest essay in the book, 3,600 words about the love of ‘80s music he shared with Pedro, who would send him clips of concerts he attended, often in bunches, as the concert was happening.
ESPN’s Pedro Gomez interviews American League All-Stars David Ortiz and Miguel Cabrera during the 2010 State Farm Home Run Derby at Angel Stadium of Anaheim on July 12, 2010 in Anaheim, California. PHOTO: MICHAEL ZAGARIS
“Regardless of whether it had been one week or six months since I’d heard from Pedro, his texts were always as warm and welcoming, as if we’d seen each other a few hours earlier,” Curry writes. “During a steamy day in August, my mind mired in the baseball world, Pedro texted me the following: ‘Berlin, OMD and the B-52’s tonight.’” The videos were on their way.
Pedro leaned so hard into being a great friend, it rubbed off. If you were a friend of Pedro’s, and saw the way he treated all his friends like best friends, it fired you up to be a better friend—not only to Pedro, but to everyone you knew.
If I am cruising through a little Dead, and hit a nice China-Rider, I always think of my friend Pete Danko when I hear “Well the sun’s gonna shine on my back door someday.” Pete and I fell in love with writing together as Berkeley undergraduates. That feeling we had when we splashed the top of the Daily Cal sports page with the headline “BEARS FALL IN COOL COLORADO RAIN,” pulling a line from the song, that was a sweet rush that will forever stay with us. Inspired by Pedro’s example, I recently reached out to Pete yet again to tell him how forever that all is with me.
Twice this baseball season, I’ve reached out to major-league managers going through a tough losing streak, telling them I know Pedro would have just the right thing to say to help them keep their perspective. It all comes down to starting and ending with caring about your connection to other people. For those who have heard about the so-called Moneyball revolution in baseball, which grew out of a book about the A’s, it might be surprising that former A’s general manager Sandy Alderson thinks—as Pedro did—that the whole thing has gotten out of hand.
“I always felt that Pedro was less interested in the game than he was in the people who were engaged in it for a living,” Alderson writes in his essay in the book. “That focus on the human element is something that baseball has lost in the last few years. Analytics have prioritized the physical measurement of a player over the heart of that player or his value as a teammate. As one who was early to recognize value in new ways to assess player performance, my perspective is that the game has gone too far in the direction of efficiency and probability. We need to reconfirm the human element that is so vital in any sport and consider changes that will bring back that aspect of the game.”
The human element isn’t in eclipse only in baseball, of course. The kind of warm and direct personal openness that Pedro embodied has become increasingly rare. He was a man who listened and listened well, with all his attention, and all his heart, and more than anything, I hope that Remember Who You Are can inspire people to follow that example.
Of all the essays, all the different voices murmuring at me through these months, the words I most often hear in my ears come from the former Texas Rangers manager Ron Washington, now an Atlanta Braves coach. Wash is generally considered one of the best teachers of the game in baseball, if not the best. “To become a great coach you have to listen,” he writes in his essay. “I can’t teach you what I know unless I know what you don’t know. The only way I can find that out is to allow you to speak. As a teacher, your pupils have to be a part of what you’re trying to give to them. You’ll never get anywhere if you go in with an attitude of ‘I know everything’ or ‘You either get it or you don’t.’ It’s easy to coach up somebody when you know what you’ve got to coach them on, but it’s tough to coach up somebody when you haven’t let them show you who they are.”
Pedro always let people show him who they were. I’ve thought back again and again in recent weeks to a call we had two years ago, when I’d been suddenly presented with an opportunity to hop on a flight to Tel Aviv to head into Gaza for a potential book project. It would be my second time in Gaza, it wasn’t clear I could even get through the Israeli checkpoint, and I’d be leaving my wife and young daughters on short notice. Pedro heard all of that. He also knew what I was going to decide. “It’s who we are,” he said.
BOOK RELEASE EVENTS
Steve Kettmann, Sarina Morales and Mark Kriedler will participate in a free virtual event for ‘Remember Who You Are: What Pedro Gomez Showed Us About Baseball and Life’ presented by Bookshop Santa Cruz on July 13 at 6pm. Register at bookshopsantacruz.com. A release party will be held on July 17 at 2pm at the Wellstone Center in the Redwoods, 858 Amigo Road, Soquel, 831-566-8927. The event is free, snacks will be provided, and contributors from the book will be on hand to sign it. More information about the book is at thegomezrules.com.
It doesn’t take a statistics degree to spot the geographic schism in Santa Cruz County.
The population is disproportionately whiter and high-earning in the northern end of the county than it is to the south, with a dividing line somewhere around Highway 1’s San Andreas Road exit, where the cost of living begins to get slightly more affordable. For working families, these informal boundaries can be a matter of life and death, as evidenced by California’s environmental screening tool, which shows Watsonville’s higher rates of asthma, unsafe housing and poor water quality. We saw similar phenomena in the disparity in health outcomes amid the Covid-19 pandemic, which hit South County much harder than it did other regions.
There’s a word for this trend of geographic isolation: segregation.
It isn’t getting any better, either—in fact, new research shows that the problem has only gotten worse over the past three decades. Like most areas across the nation, the Santa Cruz-Watsonville metropolitan region saw segregation increase from 1990-2019, according to UC Berkeley’s newly released findings from the Roots of Structural Racism Project, which came out last week. Not only that, but Santa Cruz-Watsonville saw the 16th-highest increase in segregation out of 209 regions studied over that span. Generally speaking, redlining and other exclusionary 20th-century American housing policies laid the groundwork for such divides and exacerbated them.
In Santa Cruz County, it isn’t only race or socio-economic status that divides us.
A comprehensive new report—Santa Cruz County 2021 State of the Workforce—shows a variety of stark disparities between the northern and southern reaches of the county. Among them are differences in educational achievement—with North County having much higher rates of high school and college diplomas—and also in age. South County residents are overall much younger than those in North County.
Such population differences can make it difficult for local officials to govern and plan, says researcher Josh Williams, who led the work on the new workforce report.
“You have different economic profiles as you try to develop countywide policies, and what’s relevant in the north may not be relevant to the south, and vice versa. But it’s not totally unique to Santa Cruz,” says Williams, who’s based in San Diego County. “The Central Coast really has this issue. If you go from Santa Barbara up to Santa Cruz, it’s a beautiful area. It has a high quality of life, but it also has a high cost of living. They have all these affluent people who live there, but two of their biggest industries are tourism and agriculture. Those industries are generally low-paying. So you have these large employers that are low-paying in counties that are expensive. It creates a lot of challenges for the working poor.”
IN SICKNESS AND HEALTH
If Santa Cruz County’s wage disparities were bad before the spring of 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic only made them worse.
Unemployment skyrocketed after the pandemic hit in March of last year, remaining high for months—particularly among lower-paying careers. According to findings referenced in the State of the Workforce, local low-wage workers saw their earnings drop 34% and middle-income workers saw them drop 23%, while higher-income workers saw a drop of merely 6%.
Claudia Sanchez, a case manager for Families in Transition, remembers seeing the pandemic upend the lives of the families that she and her coworkers help. The terror caused by job losses and uncertainty is ongoing, she adds.
“The stress is a lot higher because of high unemployment and reduced wages,” Sanchez says. “Many parents needed to stay home and make decisions about what to do about their kids with schools and daycares closed. Many did get Covid and that cut their wages further. And then there was the stress of trying to keep their kids fed and pay the rent and keep their ends met.”
The combined industry cluster of tourism, recreation and hospitality already had the county’s lowest average earnings. Those jobs saw the greatest decline in employment—58%—between February of last year and February of this year, the report states.
A somewhat similar dynamic rocked local small businesses, which had a very hard time navigating the disruptions. Larger and wealthier corporations had an easier time reorganizing their operations and skating by, Williams tells GT.
Going forward, Williams says it would be too simplistic to say that the outlook for Santa Cruz County is either good or bad.
“I don’t think there’s a forecast that says it’s generally optimistic, it’s generally pessimistic. Economies don’t work like that,” says Williams, the president and founder of BW Research Partnership. “The forecasts are not up or down. They’re mixed. And it depends on what industry you’re in and how they’re being impacted.”
The Santa Cruz County Workforce Development Board hired BW Research to create the State of the Workforce report last year. The Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors will hold a study session on the analysis, key findings and recommendations on Tuesday, Aug. 24. The county hopes to produce a similar report again next year.
Emily Ham took over as the Santa Cruz County Business Council’s new executive director about a month ago, and she says that now is the perfect time for an analysis jam-packed with so many insights.
“Everybody’s taking the pulse right now to see where the chips have fallen, where the economy is headed. Everyone is trying to wrap their heads around that then prepare for our new reality,” Ham says.
Ham herself has spent the past few weeks reaching out to Business Council members and local businesses to see where they are. Many of their complaints, she says, have been familiar ones. In addition to the stress of navigating an unprecedented health crisis, entrepreneurs tell her that transportation and high housing costs continue to pose challenges.
Transportation and housing were not featured prominently in this year’s report. Williams notes that last year’s shelter-in-place and work-from-home orders lightened up traffic on freeways and local roads, although it’s picking up again now.
What happens next on transportation and housing is unclear. The report argues that the future of remote work presents both challenges and opportunities.
On the one hand, remote work could keep cars off the road, and it also creates the potential for an expanded non-local workforce—as Santa Cruz County businesses could hire workers who don’t actually have to live in the notoriously expensive region.
However, the county’s high quality of life could also draw in new residents who have jobs elsewhere and want nothing more than to live a little closer to the beach.
REC ROOM
The State of the Workforce makes five recommendations for how the county might move forward.
The top recommendation is for new measures to make it easier for employees to return to work, including through subsidized child care, new public health measures and the introduction of hiring bonuses. The other four focus on strengthening job training and collaboration across industries. Their scope extends beyond the county to education leaders and to the business community. But Workforce Development Board Director Andy Stone says many of the recommendations are in line with directions that the county’s already been taking.
The county already set aside $1.2 million in federal American Rescue Plan Act funding for expanding broadband access, supporting local apprenticeship programs and support for woman- and minority-owned businesses. Stone says some of the potential decisions around the size of more ambitious projects—like hiring bonuses and childcare—will be up to the Board of Supervisors. The county is working toward supporting local child care businesses, although spokesperson Jason Hoppin says there are no specifics to announce just yet.
While low wages are typical in the industries of agriculture and tourism, Williams says he’s hopeful that those sectors could retool. Basically, by embracing new technologies, there should be opportunities for such businesses to become more efficient and productive, while boosting wages, he explains.
In general, Ham says she’s optimistic about Santa Cruz County’s economy.
The city and county of Santa Cruz are building more housing, and there will be many opportunities to collaborate on big solutions.
“It’s such a great community to work with,” Ham says, “and everyone’s so willing to share knowledge and work together across different industries.”
ARIES (March 21-April 19): Columnist Linda Weltner says there’s a dual purpose to cleaning your home, rearranging the furniture, adding new art to the walls and doting on your potted plants. Taking good care of your environment is a primary way of taking good care of yourself. She writes, “The home upon which we have lavished so much attention is the embodiment of our own self love.” I invite you to make that your inspirational meditation for the next two weeks.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20): “For peace of mind, I will lie about any thing at any time,” said author Amy Hempel. Hmmmm. I’m the opposite. To cultivate peace of mind, I try to speak and live the truth as much as I can. Lying makes me nervous. It also seems to make me dumber. It forces me to keep close track of my fibs so I can be sure to stick to my same deceitful story when the subject comes up later. What about you, Taurus? For your peace of mind, do you prefer to rely on dishonesty or honesty? I’m hoping that for the next four weeks, you will favor the latter. Cultivating judicious candor will heal you and boost your intelligence.
GEMINI (May 21-June 20): In her essay about education, “Don’t Overthink It,” philosopher Agnes Callard reminds us, “No matter how much we increase our investment at the front end—perfecting our minds with thinking classes, long ruminations, novel-reading and moral algebra—we cannot spare ourselves the agony of learning by doing.” That will be a key theme for you in the next four weeks, dear Gemini. You will need to make abundant use of empiricism: pursuing knowledge through direct experience, using your powers of observation and a willingness to experiment.
CANCER (June 21-July 22): Philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche said that when our rational minds are working at their best, they inspire us to cultivate our most interesting and enlivening passions. They also de-emphasize and suppress any energy-draining passions that might have a hold on us. I’m hoping you will take full advantage of this in the coming weeks, Cancerian. You will generate good fortune and sweet breakthroughs as you highlight desires that uplift you and downgrade desires that diminish you.
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): Leo author Wendell Berry suggests, “It may be that when we no longer know what to do, we have come to our real work and when we no longer know which way to go, we have begun our real journey.” Although there’s wisdom in that formulation, I don’t think it’s true a majority of the time. Far more often we are fed by the strong, clear intuitions that emerge from our secret depths—from the sacred gut feelings that give us accurate guidance about what to do and where to go. But I do suspect that right now may be one of those phases when Berry’s notion is true for you, Leo. What do you think?
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): In 1750, more than 250 years after Columbus first visited the New World, Native Americans were still a majority of the continent’s population. But between 1776 and now, the United States government stole 1.5 billion acres of land from its original owners—25 times the size of the United Kingdom. Here’s another sad fact: Between 1778 and 1871, America’s federal administrations signed over 500 treaties with indigenous tribes—and broke every one of them. The possibility that these sins will eventually be remedied is very small. I bring them up only to serve as possible metaphors for your personal life. Is there anything you have unfairly gained from others? Is there anything others have unfairly gained from you? The next six months will be prime time to seek atonement and correction.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Libran Zen teacher Thich Nhat Hanh advises you and me and everyone else to “seek the spiritual in every ordinary thing that you do every day.” You have to work at it a bit, he says; you must have it as your firm intention. But it’s not really hard to do. “Sweeping the floor, watering the vegetables, and washing the dishes become holy and sacred if mindfulness is there,” he adds. I think you Libras will have a special knack for this fun activity in the coming weeks. (Thich Nhat Hanh wrote a series of “Mindfulness Essentials” books that includes How to Eat, How to Walk, How to Relax and How to Connect. I invite you to come up with your own such instructions.)
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): My unexpected interpretation of the current astrological omens suggests that you will be wise to go naked as much as possible in the coming weeks. Being skyclad, as the pagans say, will be healing for you. You will awaken dormant feelings that will help you see the world with enhanced understanding. The love that you experience for yourself will soften one of your hard edges, and increase your appreciation for all the magic that your life is blessed with. One important caveat: Of course, don’t impose your nakedness on anyone who doesn’t want to witness it.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): If you analyzed the best-selling songs as measured by Billboard magazine, you’d think we were in the midst of a dangerous decline in population. The vast majority of those popular tunes feature lyrics with reproductive themes. It’s as if there’s some abject fear that humans aren’t going to make enough babies, and need to be constantly cajoled and incited to engage in love-making. But I don’t think you Sagittarians, whatever your sexual preference, will need any of that nagging in the coming days. Your Eros Quotient should be higher than it has been in a while.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Pulitzer Prize-winning author Donna Tartt, born under the sign of Capricorn, writes, “Beauty is rarely soft or consolatory. Quite the contrary. Genuine beauty is always quite alarming.” In my view, that’s an unwarranted generalization. It may sometimes be true, but is often not. Genuine beauty may also be elegant, lyrical, inspiring, healing and ennobling. Having said that, I will speculate that the beauty you encounter in the near future may indeed be disruptive or jolting, but mostly because it has the potential to remind you of what you’re missing—and motivate you to go after what you’ve been missing.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): On July 21, 1969, Aquarian astronaut Buzz Aldrin was the second human to walk on the moon. It happened during a spectacular astrological aspect, when transiting Jupiter and Uranus in Libra were trine to Aldrin’s natal Sun in Aquarius. But after this heroic event, following his return to earth, he found it hard to get his bearings again. He took a job as a car salesman, but had no talent for it. In six months, he didn’t sell a single car. Later, however, he found satisfaction as an advocate for space exploration, and he developed technology to make future trips to Mars more efficient. I hope that if you are now involved in any activity that resembles Aldrin’s stint as a car salesman—that is, a task you’re not skilled at and don’t like—you will spend the coming weeks making plans to escape to more engaging pursuits.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Astronomers say the Big Bang birthed the universe 13.8 billion years ago. But a star 190 light years away from Earth contradicts that theory. Its age seems to be 14.5 billion years, older than the universe itself. Its scientific name is HD 140283, but it’s informally referred to as Methuselah, named after the Biblical character who lived till age 969. Sometimes, like now, you remind me of that star. You seem to be an impossibly old soul—like you’ve been around so many thousands of lifetimes that, you, too, predate the Big Bang. But guess what: It’s time to take a break from that aspect of your destiny. In the next two weeks, you have cosmic permission to explore the mysteries of playful innocence. Be young and blithe and curious. Treasure your inner child.
Congresswoman Anna G. Eshoo demanded Sutter reverse course on its decision to shift Scotts Valley location from urgent care to primary and pediatric care.
A federal judge on Tuesday lifted a preliminary injunction preventing the city of Santa Cruz from removing hundreds of homeless people from San Lorenzo Park, where they have been living since July 2020.
But the order by U.S. District Court Northern District Magistrate Judge Susan van Keulen came with the understanding that the city has no immediate plans to evict...
The man who allegedly fatally shot Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Sgt. Damon Gutzwiller in Ben Lomond last year during a violent crime spree waived his preliminary hearing Monday