A narrow escape from the wharf, and what election maps show
Although the darting eyes of the national media have turned away from the Dec. 23 Santa Cruz Wharf collapse, much of that story remains to be told.
On Saturday morning, a crowd of residents, visitors and local dignitaries gathered to celebrate the wharf’s official reopening, less than two weeks after it was battered by powerful ocean swells. After the news cameras captured the celebratory mood, I caught up with Norm Daly, the 69-year-old city worker who was sent to sea when the wharf collapsed. Daly walked with a cane to support his still-injured left leg, his quiet, reflective mood contrasting with the excitement that surrounded him.
Daly had spent much of his 33-year city career on and around the wharf. Yet, Saturday was his first time returning since his rescue from the roaring waters of Monterey Bay made national headlines in the likes of The New York Times and NBC News. Standing atop the wharf over the weekend with a couple weeks’ worth of perspective, he told me he now recognizes how close he was to losing everything.
“Fate’s funny,” Daly said. “I’m just glad I’m still here, able to talk about it.”
Election season is often one of numbers, math and fractions. In the weeks following the official vote certification on Dec. 3, Lookout has been building a set of maps to help tell a more visual story of how the November election shook out. To calculate how locals voted is one thing, to see it offers something else entirely.
Using precinct data, I and my colleague Hailey Wang analyzed voter trends from November’s general election. What we found puts a fresh lens on the results.
Yes, Proposition 33, the statewide rent control proposal, failed in a big way county- and statewide. However, in Santa Cruz County’s two largest cities, Watsonville and Santa Cruz, most voters supported it. Kamala Harris easily won the county with more than 74% of the vote, but President-elect Donald Trump did better than any Republican candidate since 2004, winning some county precincts and coming close in others.
That’s just scratching the surface. See what else we learned.
OF NOTE
A major shakeup in Capitola politics: On Thursday, Mayor Yvette Brooks will step down from her role as Capitola’s political leader less than a month after rising to the seat. She leaves city hall for the C-suite, taking over as CEO of United Way of Santa Cruz County. The city council, which already includes two newcomers in Gerry Jensen and Melinda Orbach, will now decide whether to hold a special election or hand-pick an interim city councilmember to finish out the two years remaining on Brooks’ term. The now-four-member city council will also need to pick a new mayor among themselves. That meeting kicks off at 6 p.m. on Thursday.
Environmental analysis of Santa Cruz’s ambitious downtown plan: On Wednesday, the City of Santa Cruz is expected to publish the environmental impact report for its plan to expand downtown Santa Cruz into the South of Laurel neighborhood. The report, which has been in development since 2022, will offer the first in-depth analysis of how the downtown expansion will affect the environment, and whether there are any reasonable alternatives to the city council’s vision.
POINTS FOR PARTICIPATION
Aside from the Capitola City Council meeting mentioned above, all other major political bodies in Santa Cruz (city and county), Scotts Valley and Watsonville are off and will return next week.
ONE GREAT READ
How much does language shape our thinking?, by Manvir Singh for the New Yorker
In October, I had my first real brush with the politics of language when I visited Montreal, that Canadian gem, where the battle between French and English has persisted for decades. I heard countless stories about the Orwellian language police, who visit hotels and businesses unannounced to ensure the workers and signage lead with French lest they incur penalty.
Yet, when I spoke with Montrealers, few had any sort of allegiance to France or the country’s culture. It was wholly about preserving the language against the spreading force of English. I started to wonder, with skepticism, how different Montreal might actually be if English became more dominant. Many linguists argue the change could be foundational. Yet, as Manvir Singh points out in this New Yorker article from December, while language does affect thought and behavior, the fears that it bulldozes culture might be overblown.
“What if language is less like a yoke than like a wind, nudging us in various directions?” Singh writes. “… Linguistic patterns affect us. Yet, going by the best ethnographic and social-science research, his fear of brainwashing was overblown. If ways of speaking can alter ways of thinking, ways of thinking can alter ways of speaking as well. The dynamic interaction between the two is part of the ongoing story of how we try to make the world intelligible to us — and to make ourselves intelligible to one another. Talk about the human conversation.”