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Community Voices
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
You can help protect our ocean — here’s how
Thirty years ago, Dan Haifley helped change the California coast from the driver’s seat of his 1972 Ford Pinto. As the only staff member of Save Our Shores, he drove up and down the coast urging communities to prevent oil companies from offshore drilling. Those presentations helped create a bulwark against drilling among coastal towns and were the first steps in the establishment of the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. But there is still much to do — and he has ideas on how you can get started volunteering and making a difference.
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Progressivism and real policy solutions: Santa Cruz has neither and here’s why
Cyndi Dawson wanted to stay out of the “mud pit that is Santa Cruz electoral politics,” but recent Lookout op-eds about local progressives have, she writes, pushed her to offer context and facts. Here, she explains the history of the progressive movement and why Santa Cruz is not really “the leftmost city” it purports to be. Outside money, particularly from real estate interests, has an outsized influence on politics here, she says. She blames our elected officials for not doing enough to solve our most pressing issues of housing and equity.
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Letter to the editor: Ryan Coonerty is wrong about citizen ballot measures N, M, D and O
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Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Our farmworkers are being sexually assaulted and poisoned on the job. Why aren’t we helping them?
Thousands of female farmworkers are regularly being assaulted, groped and raped in Santa Cruz County fields, without consequence, argues Ann Aurelia López, executive director of the Center for Farmworker Families. The women regularly call López for help, but fear job loss, deportation and shame if they make formal complaints, she says. Farmworker families also are regularly exposed to toxic pesticides that poison them and cause cancer and birth defects in their children. López is frustrated that their dire plight rarely makes headlines in Santa Cruz County. She wants that to change.
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Letter to the editor: Coonerty’s suggestions drip with irony
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Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Hey Santa Cruz, let’s take a break from writing political measures and jump into each others’ bathtubs
Recent ballot measures have pitted neighbor against Santa Cruz neighbor with totally unnecessary political vitriol and expense, former mayor and outgoing county supervisor Ryan Coonerty writes. It’s no fun to take a metaphorical bath with people you disagree with, but it’s an absolutely necessary, perspective-broadening step that leads to greater understanding on all sides.
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Happy Thanksgiving, Santa Cruz. What are you grateful for? I’ve got Nancy Pelosi and pasta palooza on my list
If you are hankering for turkey and pumpkin pie, steer clear of Lookout columnist Claudia Sternbach’s house. She and her 8-year-old grandson, Dodger, won’t be sitting around dishing up gravy. They’ll be on the beach eating cheese puffs and apples from Bella’s orchard, building sandcastles and talking about gratitude. At the top of Sternbach’s list? Nancy Pelosi, pies from a freezer, her grandson’s giggles, airplanes, Lookout and you.
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Phil Rodriguez is unfit as a school board trustee in the Soquel Union Elementary School district
Phil Rodriguez was unfairly reelected to the Soquel Union Elementary School district board, argues Chris Amsden, a parent of four kids who attended district schools. Rodriguez neglected to tell Lookout and voters he had resigned his seat. That led his challenger, Justin Maffia, to believe he was running in an uncontested race. Amsden believes Rodriguez is not fit to serve and not a good model for children.
Posted inOpinion from Community Voices
Letter to the editor: Progressives vs. centrists? Let’s all agree that city councilmembers need higher pay
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