Losing It on East Valley Lane

We built our house 20 years ago at the end of the most beautiful lane. It was called East Valley Lane. Now the addresses are East Valley Road.

It is, with the three houses above us, part of Ennisbrook, the gated development accessed from Sheffield Drive. It is part of Ennisbrook because the stables were located there for the polo ponies involved in the polo matches at Mr. Boeseke’s property. We have use of the clubhouse, tennis courts, and pool. The last four houses on the cul-de-sac are in this part of Ennisbrook. We have been paying dues for over 20 years.

In the January 9 “debris flow,” our entire lane was devastated. It looks like Syria. Honestly.

Our house at the end of the lane survived. We will be moving back in June 6 (we were not there and we would not have survived had we been there). 

The Homeowners Association of Ennisbrook has done absolutely nothing to remove the massive amounts of mud from our street. Nothing to remediate the massive mud that was deposited in the nature preserve next to us. This is property owned by Ennisbrook Owners Association. It is part of the “Common area” owned by the HOA of Ennisbrook. I am shocked to my core. Next to our driveway, there is an enormous pile of mud and debris covering half the street… three months after the disaster. 

It is in our contract with the HOA of Ennisbrook that they are responsible for our road and the nature preserve. They have erroneously stated that the “Land Trust owns the land” (it does not), and that the “Land Trust told us not to touch the Nature Preserve” (the head of the Land Trust, Chet Work, has told me face to face that is not true).

I can only say that if the mud, rocks, and debris were in the middle of the Ennisbrook portion that is behind the gates, it would have disappeared within days. 

The lovely forest with trails through it next to our property is also covered in mud, cars, debris, mattresses, toxic chemicals, batteries…

Ennisbrook owns it. They falsely say that the “Land Trust told them not to touch it”! Totally false… from the head of the Land Trust. Thank God for the volunteers in the “Bucket Brigade”; they have done an amazing job of probably saving the beautiful trees in the preserve. Hundreds of people have been working.

Another fact of note: most owners in Ennisbrook have in their homeowner’s insurance, coverage for “assessments by their HOA” of up to $100,000.

So, any assessment would probably be covered by most homeowners’ insurance policies. There are 100 homeowners in Ennisbrook. We are four.

One house was torn down. Another will be. Two will be left on our lane.

It is disgraceful. Just drive down the street, right next to Glen Oaks; you will not believe your eyes.

Penelope Bianchi
Montecito

(Editor’s note: We received this over the weekend and have not been able to contact the Ennisbrook Homeowner’s Association, so have no knowledge of their responsibility, but no doubt someone will contact us concerning this matter. Thank you for bringing it to our attention. – J.B.)

Loves Lieff

You ran an article month ago on Gretchen Lieff (Montecito Miscellany, MJ #24/12) and I failed to compliment her efforts to save Montecito’s trees. I should like to offer her a brava (female, Italian), at this time. She is an inspiration to us all.

Leon “Lee” Juskalian
Santa Barbara

Not So “Independent”

I am aghast registered Democrats are a plurality (39%) in “Little Mountain” (“Need for Leadership,” Bob Hazard‘s Guest Editorial, MJ #24/17)). A community of this kind of affluence and clout in western Pennsylvania would easily be (at least) 3-to-1 Republican. Were Mr. Hazard to research the voter registration for Hope Ranch (a wealthy enclave not nearly as infected with Hollywood influence), I’d wager he’d discover a Republican plurality, if not majority.

My theory on non-partisan voter registration (28% in Montecito) is this: people in a blue state, such as California, who register “non-partisan,” are closer to being Republican than Democrat, but don’t wish their friends to know they’re Republican, so they go non-partisan.

Just the reverse in red states: Independents lean Democrat but don’t wish to be attached to the Democrat label.

As for Montecito, I think the default position for its 28% Independents is that 60% of them will vote for the Republican candidate in state and federal elections. This would explain Republicans getting a small majority out of 93108 (the simple math in my model actually makes both parties 50%).

The deadline for your august publication would’ve been too late to catch the results of the Arizona Congressional Special Election on [April 24]. 

Isn’t it lovely to behold the spin the socialist mainstream media puts on another Democrat loss in a special election? 

Since Trump’s inauguration, Republicans have won six special Congressional elections and lost one. In addition, Democrats narrowly captured a U.S. Senate seat in Alabama. 

Leading up to each of these elections, the mainstream media said Trump’s supporters were abandoning the president in droves and will vote to give Democrats yet another seat. This fortune telling “worked” in two elections (out of eight), each one with an albatross around the Republican candidate’s neck, for starters. 

In Alabama, the young WASP male prosecutor who ran away from the national Democrat Party agenda narrowly defeated a Republican who came under an overwhelming personal slander attack at the last moment. 

In Pennsylvania’s 18th Congressional District, a white male, practicing Roman Catholic, former Marine and military attorney (like the Tom Cruise character in Rob Reiner’s fabulous film A Few Good Men), who attended Roman Catholic school right next to my home Presbyterian church in Mount Lebanon (the premier community in the 18th District), took on a crippled Republican Party, in the aftermath of a long-term pro-Life, pro-Family Republican incumbent who grossly violated his integrity and betrayed his supporters with a kiss-and-tell mistress, and forced to instantly resign. 

The 18th is an odd district. Its registration has always tilted a couple percentage points toward the Democrats – but probably 40% of those registered Democrats are Reagan Democrats. In federal elections, where the Democrats threw up a socialist candidate on the party line, these “Reaganites” rebelled and voted Republican. In truly local elections, they kept to their Democrat loyalties. Thus, the (now disgraced) Republican Congressman, and all Republican presidential candidates, won this district handily. 

The sordid details of this Congressman’s infidelity is not something voters are going to easily shrug off or forget. It would only take half the Reagan Democrats, and a few of the Protestant country club Republicans, to vote against an anemic, cookie-cutter Roman Catholic Trump Republican in the Special Election, to give the election to the Democrat. Even then, the Democrat won by a whopping 755 votes. This Democrat’s family has a long history in Allegheny County and statewide Pennsylvania Democrat politics. He’s not going to abandon the national Democrat caucus any more so than does (supposedly) pro-life, pro-family, anti-abortion Pennsylvania Senator Bob Casey. These people are accustomed to campaigning differently before the voters, and then catering, as they must, to the national party caucus.

In all the other elections won by a Trump Republican around the nation in special elections, the Democrats paraded one-size-fits-all secular socialist Democrats before the voters. The Republicans won all six. Yet, the mainstream media claims moral victory for the Democrats in each election they lost.

I’m going to stick with my prediction of a Republican House and a Republican Senate next January. A booming economy will negate much of the wall-to-wall anti-Trump wailing from the mainstream media. It will keep Trump’s “favorables” in the low 50s (that’s all he needs, according to the Jesse Helms way of political thinking). “My” Republican House majority may be a bit larger than “yours,” while “your” Senate Republican majority may be bigger than “mine.”

I’m surprised that with “Little Mountain” being 39% Democrat, Montecito Journal can remain so resolutely conservative, Republican, and capitalist in the face of what could be a lot of leftist push-back, especially against advertisers. The Montecito Journal is not socially conservative. Perhaps that’s the compromise you make in the presence of so many local liberals, and vice-versa from the local left.

David McCalmont
Santa Barbara

(Editor’s note: Well, you cover a lot of ground, Mr. McCalmont. Just to re-equip readers with some of your references, in last week’s issue I prognosticated that Republicans would probably hang on with a small (half a dozen or so) majority in the House of Representatives and a larger majority in the Senate, guessing Republicans would pick up four or more seats in November’s mid-term election. As for votes in Montecito, the village went for Hillary Clinton big time (something like 59% versus 37%), so Bob Hazard’s numbers seem accurate. Analyzing each race state by state and district by district, the most dangerous losses for Republicans could take place right here in California. If the top two vote-getters in the upcoming gubernatorial primary are both Democrats, that will likely suppress Republican votes statewide, which could catapult a number of Democratic candidates over their Republican rivals in some, mostly coastal, districts. Nationally, the outcome is less clear, but the outlook favors the Republican Party countrywide. It is still too early to make any solid predictions, but that’s the way things look to me right now. I’m also guessing Mr. Trump will do much better in 2020, but that really is a long way out! – J.B.)

Marijuana Not So Merry

The cultivation, sale, distribution of marijuana are federal crimes, subject to imprisonment, fine, and asset attachment . Marijuana is not an FDA-approved drug as to medical treatment, dosage, purity, and sale. It is a Federal Crime to produce, distribute, sell, and profit from a drug not approved by the FDA.

California Proposition 64 is unconstitutional per the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution. The 10th Amendment does not apply. It is not a state right to cultivate, sell, and distribute marijuana, for recreational or medical treatment purposes. All marijuana-related revenue from sales taxes and fees collected by state, county, and cites are subject to federal prosecution and attachment, as well as income from private marijuana dealers and businesses.

Marijuana is a proven gateway drug. A mind-altering drug and an impediment to critical thinking. It’s not a goodtime, benign, and harmless drug. It is drug with high potential for abuse and dependency, leading to stronger drugs. A fool’s drug, promoted by drug sale advocates, drug dealers, users, and stoners. And apparently, the Santa Barbara City Council and County supervisors, due to their dreams of large tax revenues to counter growing budget deficits and consequent police costs and governmental medical costs related to drug use.

Are they unaware of our local and the nation’s drug problems and the growing cost of addiction, suffering, deaths, and crimes related thereto? Ask the hospital Emergency Room and medical community, addiction treatment professionals, the police, the courts, and the dependent and addicted. Contact the federal attorney general and demand that federal law be enforced.

H.T. Bryan
Santa Barbara

Zionism Marches East

Perhaps demonstrating that television has more influence over the churched than churches do, since when would any Christian entity permit Jerusalem to be the administrative center of a secular country, thus bolstering secularism?

It seems the traditional Jerusalem of old day could be distinguished by religion. The modern Jerusalem’s faith-based identity is second in priority to modern Zionism and Its march east.

Matt McLaughlin
Santa Barbara

(Editor’s note: We’re just not sure how far “east” modern Zionism is headed, but Jerusalem has been connected to the Jewish people and the Jewish faith for, oh, at least 2,500 years, so we don’t find it particularly alarming that Israel has claimed Jerusalem as its capital city nor that the U.S. Government has acknowledged that. – J.B.)

A New Challenge

I call upon community members to be involved in the challenge the recent upheaval has presented to us. We must embrace, discuss, and provide input regarding the rebuilding and continued improvement of Montecito.

The Montecito Association (MA) provides a unique voice in this effort. Impacting that voice is a highly qualified team of volunteer professionals serving on the MA’s Land Use Committee (LUC). The LUC is at the forefront in evaluating and deciding whether to make recommendations regarding a wide variety of projects: large, small, very visible, or under the radar. I am grateful, as a Montecito Association board member, for the countless hours the LUC spends interacting with concerned residents and local government leaders. The LUC represents the MA at the monthly meetings of the Montecito Board of Architectural Review, the Montecito Planning Commission, and the Santa Barbara County Planning Commission. This dedicated work results in the LUC providing comprehensive reporting on a wide variety of Montecito projects to the entire MA board. Consequently, the MA board makes very informed, unbiased recommendations to Santa Barbara County decision-makers. 

I encourage community members to attend LUC meetings, which take place the 1st Tuesday of every month at the Community Hall in Montecito. Further review of the LUC agenda and a host of issues occurs at the MA board meetings on the second Tuesday of the month at the same location. Meeting agendas are available at montecitoassociation.org 

Please participate in these important decisions to be made. Please strengthen the voice of our beautiful community and all that the Montecito Association will do to represent you.

Michele Neely Saltoun
Montecito

(Ms Saltoun is a Montecito Association board member.)

Returning Home

Madame X knows she is in a world imagined by Kafka (“Warehousing Not Care”, MJ #24/12). As I enquire about how she has come to be where she is after her evacuation from Montecito during the fire, I find her life is being taken from her without her participation. She tells me, “They can’t do that!” 

Her present environment is bleak. She is becoming more filled with despair, as there has been no progress (or effort as far as I can tell) to get her back to the home she loves. There is no encouragement to physical exercise. There is no mental stimulation either, as Madame X is the only patient there who can carry on a conversation. She can be cranky with the staff and is aware of doing so. Who could blame her?

I recognize that she needs live-in help if she were to return home. She can afford it. Such care could be arranged if the desire was there.

Gerald Rounds
Santa Ynez

(Editor’s note: We too wish a speedy return to Montecito for Madame X. – J.B.)