30 Apr 2020
MWD News
Montecito Water District’s Board of Directors held its regular monthly meeting this week as scheduled. The agenda included updates on the status of a Water Supply Agreement with the City of Santa Barbara and the Rate Study. “These projects remain on schedule to be completed and ready for Board consideration in June,” said General Manager […]
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Viva Oliva Moves Downtown
Specialty olive oil and artisan food emporium Viva Oliva has closed up shop on Coast Village Road, leasing a larger space in downtown Santa Barbara, at 927 State Street, across from the Apple Store. Owners Amanda and Sven Dybdahl say they have enjoyed being part of the Montecito community since taking ownership of the shop […]
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Ca’ Dario Opens on Coast Village Road
Despite the inability to fully open and seat and serve diners, Dario Furlati, owner of the Ca’ Dario restaurants, has softly opened his newest location on Coast Village Road, offering dinner for takeout. “It’s been a long time coming, and I’m happy I can finally open the doors,” he told us earlier this week, behind […]
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Montecito Planning Commission Hears San Ysidro Roundabout
Last week, the Montecito Planning Commission heard from County Planning & Development and Public Works staff regarding the proposed roundabout at San Ysidro Road and North Jameson Lane. It was the first time the project was in front of the MPC, after receiving positive comments at two prior Montecito Board of Architectural Review (MBAR) meetings. […]
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Itching to Re-Open
“We’re itching to get open and…” said Kyle Irwin, “Welcome everybody back!” business partner Susie Bechtel chimed in, finishing her business partner’s sentence. The duo opened their highly anticipated Field + Fort design shop and café in Summerland just this past November to great acclaim – only to shutter the doors some four months later, […]
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Awakened Futures Summit
Tristan Harrison, founder of the Center for Humane Technology; Nichol Bradford, CEO and founder of the Willow Group and co-founder of Transformative Technology Lab; Liana Sananda Gillooly, development officer, MAPS; and Jamie Wheal, co-author of global bestseller Stealing Fire and co-founder of the Flow Genome Project are among a dozen thought-leaders, researchers, academics and entrepreneurs […]
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Write Your Way to Connection
Jenny Boyar’s Sunday Writing Series at Yoga Soup – which takes place the first Sunday of the month May-July, stems from the premise that writing can turn things that feel intangible and difficult into something tangible while also allowing us to invite others into our experience, something especially valuable in moments of isolation. The primary […]
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Sheltering in Love Workshop
Barbara Rose Sherman – a Yoga Alliance E-RYT-500 Certified Instructor who is also a UCLA Trained Mindfulness Facilitator (TMF) and UCLA Mindfulness Awareness Practices affiliated instructor as well as a Certified Meditation Teacher (CMT) – invites everyone to join her online to nourish and nurture yourself during the coronavirus crisis. Sherman will lead a restorative […]
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Other Offerings Out of Ojai
Gay and Kathlyn Hendricks’ Ojai-based Foundation for Conscious Living has created a number of new resources for meeting the coronavirus crisis on the home page of the organization’s website, where visitors are able to connect with its Restoring Resourcefulness faculty for coaching and education about how to shift from fear to create wellbeing and creative […]
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Krishnamurti Foundation’s May Gathering Zooms Online
Can the Mind Be Quiet? That’s the timeless and perhaps uber-timely theme in the novel coronavirus era for Krishnamurti Foundation America’s annual May Gathering, which in our “old normal” times would draw hundreds of higher-consciousness seekers to the KFA’s bucolic grounds in Ojai, reminiscent of the days when the Indian philosopher Jiddu Krishnamurti himself would […]
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MJ’s Guide to Local Online Shopping
When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Go Shopping – Remotely In these tough times, it’s important to support local businesses while also practicing social distancing. To that end, when the COVID-19 pandemic first hit California and changed life as we know it, the Montecito Journal changed its local events listing page to a Grab […]
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When it Comes to Maintaining the Sewers, the Sanitary District’s Work Never Stops
Earlier this year, before the COVID-19 emergency, I took a tour of the Montecito Sanitary District’s waste treatment facility, where the town’s collective fecal matter is slowly bio-engineered into top-notch soil fertilizer that ends up on the shelves of our local gardening emporiums (see “Montecito’s Most Unusual Harvest,” Montecito Journal, February 12). Part of my […]
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Santa Barbara Coalition for Responsible Cannabis Sues Santa Barbara County
You might recognize the Santa Barbara Coalition for Responsible Cannabis from various letters to the editor and reader-submitted editorials that have run in the Montecito Journal, Carpinteria’s Coastal View News, and other local newspapers in Santa Barbara county. Although the group claims not to oppose cannabis per se, its members have consistently decried what they […]
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Foggers for County First Responders
Much has been made lately in news articles about the effort to provide masks and other emergency preparedness gear to first responders in Santa Barbara. But not all such gear is wearable. To wit: One805, a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting first responders, emergency preparedness and response, has just announced the purchase of 45 electric […]
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Santa Barbara Zoo Hosts “Drive By, Wave Hi” Donation Parade
Ever since March 17, the Santa Barbara Zoo has been off limits to the public. That’s not surprising, given California’s stay-at-home restrictions, but it’s a disaster for the Zoo, its employees, and animals. In fact, the 57-year-old institution is facing the most dire financial crisis in its history. For that reason, on Saturday, April 25, […]
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Fire Chief Kevin Taylor Talks COVID-19 and Crazy Weather
When I first met Montecito Fire Chief Kevin Taylor last year, I remember asking him what the biggest challenge was facing his department. “The weather,” he told me, quickly adding that the sheer unpredictability of Montecito’s weather threats, be they fire or rain, made his job uniquely worrisome. This week, I caught up with Taylor […]
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MUS Parade
On Wednesday, April 22, hundreds of Montecito Union School students, Montecito residents, and members of the community came outside their homes and businesses to wave to dozens of MUS teachers and administrators, who drove their cars in a “parade” throughout Montecito. “Our teachers and staff miss seeing the students’ faces on a daily basis, and […]
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Life and Business Interrupted – by COVID and Other Unusual Circumstances
I am pleased to share joint authorship today with my good friend, Attorney Jan Larson. Coincidentally, she and her husband, Rock Rockenbach, soon will be moving back to Montecito. Jan and I both represent policy holders against insurance companies. In this article, we discuss how first party property insurance policies should be examined to determine […]
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A Grand Reopening?
Years from now we may look back on the Santa Barbara City Council meeting of April 21 as a time capsule of how prepared or not we were during the economic collapse of the 2020 Coronavirus Pandemic. In that meeting, City Administrator Paul Casey introduced his new hire Economic Development Manager Jason Harris to the […]
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Clink for a Cause: Couple Selling Unique Wine Glasses to Aid Restaurants
Sarah Boggs likes to reminisce about living out her formative years in New Orleans. “People were constantly outside, constantly enjoying neighbors and friends, constantly going to festivals,” she recalls. “And they were always drinking!” Her move to Santa Barbara provided much of the same: an outdoor-driven lifestyle and plenty of good wine to drink. “We’re […]
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