Posted inPolitics & Policy

Santa Cruz’s oversized vehicle ordinance goes into effect Monday. Will it help solve homelessness?

The City of Santa Cruz’s oversized vehicle ordinance goes into effect Monday after a lengthy road to approval. While safe parking services are available for those living in RVs and campers, spaces are often full, and some worry about the ability of their often old vehicles to withstand traveling to and from the designated parking areas.

Posted inOpinion from Community Voices

I am on a hunger strike in the Santa Cruz County jail: We want better conditions and more oversight 

Five men have been on a hunger strike at the Santa Cruz Main Jail since Nov. 8. They are asking for better conditions, more oversight, cheaper prices on commissary goods and assurance that mail they get from their lawyers remains private. The writer is a pre-trial detainee who has spent close to five years inside the jail. “We think the public should know what happens to people inside these walls,” Jason Cortez writes. “Many of us have been inside for years awaiting trial. We are not yet guilty of any crimes, yet we are treated abominably.”

Posted inOpinion from Community Voices

Here’s what they don’t tell you about the Housing for People ballot initiative

“Not a single leading affordable housing group in our area has indicated support for this initiative,” write longtime Santa Cruz housing advocates Diana Alfaro, Don Lane and Elizabeth Madrigal. “To put it bluntly, the Housing for People name is just a political deception – especially egregious at a time when we need genuine affordable housing efforts.

Posted inPolitics & Policy

Santa Cruz City Council delays vote on installing license plate readers over privacy concerns

The Santa Cruz Police Department asked the city council if it could lease automated license plate readers that would record each license plate that crosses the cameras’ lenses. Many residents and some organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union, urged caution, saying they don’t want anything resembling an Orwellian surveillance state in the community. Faced […]

Posted inPolitics & Policy

Islamophobic comments in local newspaper article about pro-Israel march spark public backlash

A group of pro-Palestinian supporters say they are planning a rally in front of the Santa Cruz offices of Good Times this week after the local newspaper published an article Saturday about a pro-Israel rally that included Islamophobic statements. The article, “Pro-Israel demonstrators rally on West Cliff,” was about a protest last Friday by about […]

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