The real battle is just beginning. Can the environment be saved or will it be destroyed in the name of profits?

We are seeing it unfold right here in our county, as local environmentalists struggle to save an endangered fish population from neglect and spending cuts.

“Why do we have to choose between environmental protections and economic development? If we continue to enact policies that are indifferent toward our water resources and climate change, what will be the real cost to our collective livelihood?” asks environmentalist Erin Brockovich in her book Superman’s Not Coming: Our National Water Crisis and What WE THE PEOPLE Can Do About It.

Drew Penner’s cover story spells out the debate clearly. On one hand you have idealistic stewards like Brockovich and even Bobby Kennedy Jr. and on the other you have President Donald Trump talking about how much he loves oil, gas and coal.

Penner takes us up the river, the San Lorenzo that is, looking at what preservationists are trying to do to restore it and keep it healthy. It’s something we should all care about, right here in our front yard.

In other must-read stories this issue, comedian Brad Williams, who plays in the Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium Sunday got his start by walking onto the stage at another comedian’s show.

Comedian and Good Times writer DNA writes in an inspiring tale: “Carlos Mencia was headlining. When Mencia told a joke about dwarves, the crowd around Williams, who was born with achondroplasia (a type of dwarfism), went silent. Mencia noticed and invited Williams onstage. ‘I was working at Disneyland, and I joked that ‘I was not one of the seven.’ And I got laughs,’Williams recalls.

“He was a natural, and Mencia, ridiculously quickly, invited the human dynamo onto the world stage.”

Author Caro De Robertis speaks at Bookshop Santa Cruz May 15 about the books So Many Stars: An Oral History of Trans, Nonbinary, Genderqueer, and Two-Spirit People of Color, which document transgender and Black experiences.

“Trans and genderqueer people have always existed throughout time and in every culture,” De Robertis says. “We have always been here, even if our voices have often been systematically silenced. These stories have not been acknowledged as part of our collective cultural inheritance, but they are here.”

Read on for many more arts, entertainment and food stories.

Thanks

Brad Kava | Editor

PHOTO CONTEST

CAR HOP A lifeguard on the Santa Cruz Wharf Photograph by Tatiana Lyukin

GOOD IDEA

U.S. Senator Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) joined his colleagues in blasting President Trump’s continued attacks on the freedom of the press, a fundamental First Amendment right guaranteed by the Constitution. Padilla joined a letter pressing Attorney General Pam Bondi on her decision to change Justice Department policies to make it easier for the Department to subpoena journalists to obtain confidential information about their sources and potentially harass journalists who write stories critical of the Trump Administration. He also cosponsored a resolution calling for the Executive Branch to respect the rights of journalists and demanding they be allowed to perform their duties “without fear of retaliation.”

GOOD WORK

For the first time in 33 years, the UCSC American Indian Resource Center and the Student Alliance of Native American and Indigenous Peoples will be hosting a free powwow at Kaiser Permanente Arena May 18. The Powwow brings together Native Americans from various tribes within California and Turtle Island (USA). This event is a celebration and honoring of cultural heritage on Uypi and Amah Mutsun lands. It includes dancing, singing, feasting, and  exchange of arts, crafts and traditions, fostering unity and cultural pride. 11am-6pm.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“God doesn’t need soldiers. He needs brothers.”

– Pope Leo XIV