Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here. To the editor: We are challenging the comments of outgoing Supervisor Ryan Coonerty and Lookout’s Nov. 22 article, “A progressive won the District 3 supervisor race after trailing for nearly two weeks. How?” Justin Cummings won. Period. We […]
Community Voices
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Need a quick stocking-stuffer? Nothing beats a book
Books often make the best gifts. Lookout columnist Claudia Sternbach offers some tips for new and classic reads, including a few that either take place in Santa Cruz or are written by local authors. All would make swell stocking-stuffers, she writes. Maybe even throw in a battery-operated book light for those stormy evenings when the power leaves us reading by candlelight.
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Letter to the editor: Teach history fairly, but keep the Cabrillo name
Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here. To the editor: I’ve been following the discussions in Lookout regarding the decision to rid Cabrillo College of the “Cabrillo” name. In trying to think of an analogy, an age-old idiom came to mind rather quickly, “cutting off […]
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Santa Cruz elections turned out well for pragmatic progressives
Mike Rotkin explains why he felt better coming out of Santa Cruz’s November 2022 elections than he did going into them. Most of the candidates he supported won, with the exception of Shebreh Kalantari-Johnson in the District 3 county supervisor race. But, he writes, he feels good about Justin Cummings as a leader and about his “evolving politics.”
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
The election is over: Let’s put differences behind us and work together
Shebreh Kalantari-Johnson narrowly lost the race for District 3 Santa Cruz County Supervisor and is still reeling from the negativity and personal attacks that characterized the November contest. But, she insists, it’s time to put the hurt behind and do the work she cares about most: making our community better. Here, she outlines some of what’s needed from our public servants as she prepares for another year on the Santa Cruz City Council.
Posted inInside Lookout
‘Save local news’ — or provide a lifeline to newspaper-owning hedge funds? Time to bury the Orwellian JCPA
Why is an anti-competitive, hedge fund-preserving bill even before Congress in the waning days of 2022? Providing tens of millions of dollars to financially driven chains that have accelerated the decline of the local media makes no sense.
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Healthy soil, healthy people, carbon storage … the reasons to ditch pesticides are endless
Pesticide application needs to stop in the Pajaro Valley. It’s not only harming people, it is also damaging our soil and preventing natural carbon emissions from occurring, argues Watsonville resident and former farmworker and teacher Woody Rehanek. Carbon storage in healthy organic soils, he writes, is a plausible, workable method of addressing climate change and could help Watsonville achieve zero emissions in the next decade.
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
A million dollars or a million otters? Should I take a big pay cut to help the planet?
Marisa Messina had a plumb job in Seattle’s tech industry after she graduated from Stanford University. Now, six years and a Stanford MBA later, she realizes her passion is environmentalism. She thinks she can use her skills to make a difference. But she’s shocked at the low salaries offered. She wonders what it means for our world when serving the planet is not financially sustainable.
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Letter to the editor: Santa Cruz City Council voting is inherently unfair; there’s an easy fix
Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here. To the editor: We see Cyndi Dawson’s recent op-ed as helpful, but it is also important to describe the “disproportional representation” in our city more exactly. In 2018 and 2020, only 46% of all citizens’ votes cast elected […]
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Let’s be real: Local government can’t fix everything, but Santa Cruz’s ‘laser focus’ on housing will benefit us all
Donna Meyers has spent four years on the Santa Cruz City Council and takes issue with a recent Lookout piece by Cyndi Dawson, chair of the city’s planning commission. Dawson misses the point of local government, Meyers writes. She also fails to take a long view or see that this council has raised close to $50 million to support affordable housing. Meyers thinks this council’s “laser focus” on affordable housing will be its legacy. Councilmembers are not “progressive,” “conservative,” Democrats or Republicans, she argues. Such labels are, she insists, counterproductive to the communal work of governing.