Happy Tuesday, everyone,
Hope you’re all off to a good start to the last week of the year. It’s going to be mostly sunny today with highs in the low-60s — a nice, bright day before some more rain heads into the county.
JUMP TO … Latest News | Opinion | Events | Job Board | Puzzles
Our Newsmakers 2025 series is back with Wallace Baine, who spoke with local activists that worked with the progressive movement Indivisible about their busy year of protest and advocacy.
Lily Belli spoke with a newsmaker of her own, catching up with Sasha Pavy of Verve Coffee Roasters, who emerged as a leader in the downtown Santa Cruz café’s push to unionize. Now, she’s been elected to represent the café in contract negotiations that are likely to continue through 2026.
I spoke with a couple of meteorologists about last week’s storms, who both said it’s hard to say if the incredible low-90s miles per hour winds were a record, or even entirely accurate. But they agreed that the winds were very intense as another weather system makes its way to the county later tonight.
Hillary Ojeda looked into black tar balls that appeared on Manresa State Beach over the weekend, raising concerns among some visitors and prompting a local to remove the material from the shoreline. However, officials say this is probably a natural phenomenon, caused by oil seepage that winter storms pushed north.
Now, let’s get to the headlines…
Newsmakers 2025: A year of grassroots protest at Indivisible
Margaret and Roya Ghodsi, a mother-daughter duo from Capitola, are emblematic of a growing number of local residents not active in politics before 2025 who began to participate in protests after Donald Trump’s second inauguration.
‘I can be a leader’: The barista who helped unionize Verve says the experience changed how she saw herself
Sasha Pavy, a shy 24-year-old UCSC graduate, emerged as an unlikely leader of a successful 2024 unionization drive at three Verve Coffee Roasters cafés, rallying coworkers around higher wages, consistent hours and respect from management. After workers unanimously voted to unionize in October, Pavy was elected to represent the downtown Santa Cruz café in contract negotiations expected to continue through 2026.
DAILY DIGEST
That’s all for today. Sign up here for breaking news alerts via email and text, and for all of our other newsletters. You can also find Lookout on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Threads and/or Bluesky.
Get all of our award-winning local coverage, with breaking news notifications, games and plenty of other features right on your smartphone by downloading the Lookout Santa Cruz app from the Apple App Store or Google Play Store.
Our content isn’t possible without community support, so if you’re not already, please consider becoming a Lookout member.
Have a good Tuesday and I’ll see you again tomorrow morning!
Max Chun