Wal-Mart Ballot 2009

A large coalition of groups working to keep Wal-Mart from coming to Ventura have gathered more than enough signatures (more than 10% of the registered voters) to put an initiative on the ballot in the 2009 election. Residents will vote on a ban of grocery stores over 90,000 square feet that is specifically aimed at keeping a Wal-Mart out of their town. The petition drive went so well that organizers are asking people to stop collecting signatures because they do not want to go over the 15% threshold which would force an expensive special election.

"We were told a special election could be as much as $400,000 and we thought, Whoa, that's not good government,'" said Ed Lacey, a local attorney and spokesman for Livable Ventura, one of half a dozen citizen and union groups backing the measure. "We don't want to put the city and taxpayers in that spot."

...

"We don't want Ventura to have less (city) services because we forced a special election," supporter Das Williams said...

(for details on this item, click the posting title "Wal-Mart Ballot 2009")

Social Host Law

[ Excerpt from: "Social host law approved by council," by Eric Lindberg, DAILY SOUND, July 23, 2008 ]


A crackdown on party hosts who provide alcohol to minors will take effect in 30 days after Santa Barbara city leaders unanimously approved a social host ordinance [on 7/22/2008]... The legislation allows police to determine the person responsible for a party where underage drinking occurs and send a report to the city attorney to levy civil fines.

“It’s not a burden on us,” said Lt. David Whitham of the Santa Barbara Police Department. “It’s actually something that we’ve needed for a long time.”
Officers currently are prevented from entering a residence and handing out citations for underage drinking, since minor-in-possession violations can only be cited on public property...

For a first offense, a $1,000 fine will be levied. For continued offenses, that fine jumps to $2,000. Roberta Payan, coordinator of the Alcohol and Drug Abuse Prevention Teen Coalition (ADAP), said offenders will have the option of participating in an educational program to waive the first fine and reduce fines for additional offenses by $1,000.

In response to concerns from a resident, she said the ordinance is clear that the person responsible for the party — not necessarily the landlord or property owner — will be held accountable...

The push for a social host ordinance in Santa Barbara started in February 2007 when youth involved with ADAP held focus groups with local teens on the issue.
Payan said trends found during local surveys matched nationwide findings, citing statistics showing that 40 percent of underage drinkers get their alcohol for free from adults...

City leaders praised local teens involved in formulating the social host ordinance, calling their efforts admirable.

“The youth asked for this,” Councilmember Das Williams said, adding, “This is something that not all of their peers will probably think is the best thing in the world.” ...

Nava 2 Jordan

[ Excerpt from: "Das Steps Aside for Jordan," SANTA BARBARA INDEPENDENT, July 17, 2008, By Nick Welsh" ]

Santa Barbara City Councilmember Das Williams confirmed rumors that he’s all but endorsed environmental activist Susan Jordan in her quest to succeed her husband Pedro Nava as Santa Barbara’s representative in the California State Assembly. Nava will be term-limited out of the assembly in 2010..."



( Hanna-Beth Jackson, Das and Susan Jordan, May 2007 )


Das is term-limited to January 2011 .

Nick continued:

"Williams said his own personal ambitions will have to take a back seat to the 'greater good of the community,' praising Jordan’s environmental credentials and statewide connections. Jordan played a key role in the defeat of a liquified natural gas plant proposed off the coast of Ventura last year, despite strong support for the plant by the Bush White House and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger..."

CVR Project

[ Excerpt from: "Council majority seeks middle ground on CVR project," by Eric Lindberg, DAILY SOUND, July 15, 2008 ]

With community members sharply divided on a proposal to replace an aging gas station on Coast Village Road with eight condos and commercial space, a majority of the Santa Barbara City Council sought a happy medium to divergent viewpoints.

On a 4-3 vote, leaders upheld earlier approvals of the project but sent it along to the city’s design board to work on reducing its bulky appearance...

Since initially presented in 2004, the proposal to destroy a gas station at the corner of Coast Village and Olive Mill roads in order to build a 17,270 square-foot, mixed-use building has provoked fervent criticism from some and unrestrained praise from others.

Its location is commonly heralded as the gateway to Montecito...

A portion of public speakers joined that chorus, citing concerns about its bulk and height, compatibility with neighboring residences, potential traffic impacts and strain on water resources...

Height remained a critical issue for some city leaders, including Councilmember Iya Falcone, who cast a dissenting vote along with Mayor Marty Blum and Councilmember Dale Francisco.

While split on the merits of a third story, the council appeared largely in consensus on another issue — a requested modification on the northern edge of the building to allow a two-story section to protrude into the required setback...

City planner Peter Lawson... said rezoning a 50-foot segment of land along the northern edge of the project site currently designated as residential would merely fit with the city’s General Plan and present commercial use of the property...

While unanimously approving the rezone, the council majority deferred a decision on how exactly to solve the issue of neighborhood compatibility, instead directing the ABR to place an emphasis on resolving the project’s impact on the Olive Mill Road neighborhood.

Falcone and Mayor Blum said the possibility that the building might remain at three stories prevented them from giving it a nod of approval.

“It is just a little bit too big for that corner,” the mayor said. “It’s bulky. I’m struggling with that third story.”

Francisco, however, took issue with another condition of approval backed strongly by Councilmembers Schneider, Das Williams and Grant House.

While the city has yet to finalize changes to its inclusionary housing ordinance — which in essence requires developers to provide affordable units or pay into a city housing fund — Williams asked that the project be held to those standards by paying $17,000 per unit toward the development of affordable housing stock.

Representatives of developer John Price quickly agreed to such a proposition, but Francisco met the concept with great hesitation...

Nonetheless, with a majority vote, the project is off to the city’s design board for more tinkering on its apparent bulkiness and neighborhood compatibility. If the ABR grants preliminary approval to the project, that decision can be appealed back to the council for further discussion.

Impact of Fossil Fuels

[ Excerpt from: "U.S. mayors denounce oilsands," by Mike De Souza, Canwest News Service, June 23, 2008 ]

Mayors from the U.S.'s largest cities... called for a crackdown on fuels that could cause catastrophic global warming.

In a resolution adopted in Miami at the U.S. Conference of Mayors annual meeting, municipal leaders called for new national guidelines to track the life-cycle impact of different types of fossil fuels. They also urged their member cities to stop using unconventional sources of energy with a large carbon footprint such as liquid coal or oil shale for their own municipal operations.



(Syncrude's Mildred Lake plant north of Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada, is the largest oilsands crude oil production facility in the world. Photograph by: Chris Schwarz/Edmonton Journal)


"The production of tarsands oil from Canada emits approximately three times the carbon dioxide pollution per barrel as does conventional oil production and significantly damages Canada's Boreal forest ecosystem - the world's largest carbon storehouse," said the resolution.

Jennifer Hosterman, mayor of Pleasanton, Calif., said the mayors wanted to send a message that cities are taking action to stop the concentration of greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere from reaching dangerous levels that could seriously disrupt the living systems on earth...

The resolution coincided with the launch of a website on Monday from Canadian oilsands producers (www.canadasoilsands.ca) to beef up their environmental and social image.

The motion was co-sponsored by mayors from a dozen cities, including San Francisco, Austin, Texas, and Des Moines, Iowa...

.. Das Williams, a member of the city council from Santa Barbara, California, said that politicians should invest in conservation efforts and alternatives instead of promoting Western Canada's oilsands as a solution to energy security in North America.

"I think that both the people of Canada and the people of the United States are going to have to face some tough choices in the coming years of whether they expand domestic supplies or whether they conserve and invest in alternatives," said Williams, whose city is committed to becoming fossil free by 2020. "When you realize that you're addicted to something that isn't healthy for your civilization, that doesn't mean that you can quit overnight necessarily. But it does mean that what you have to do is focus on reducing your dependence."