LosGatosObserver.com

There may soon be a new charter school in Watsonville, the Escuela Xochitl Tonatiuh. The school, proposed by Teresa Robinson of Los Gatos, is planned for 85 students and would be intended to help middle-school students avoid getting involved in drugs and gang violence.

Last week, architect Cove Britton sued the county to restore a planning appeals board that was disbanded earlier this year after just a few meetings.

When UC’s Board of Regents met in UCLA yesterday to vote on a 32 percent fee hike for students, they gathered behind closed doors in a windowless room.

The Pajaro Valley Water Management Agency lost the chair of its board yesterday with the sudden resignation of Dennis Osmer. He later compared the role of chair to that of a circus ringmaster, and noted one boardmember, John G. Eiskamp, as being particularly troublesome.

A 2,000-gallon water leak on River Street brought traffic to a standstill yesterday at the intersection of Highway 1 and Highway 9.

Students at UCSC gathered yesterday with drums and bullhorns to protest the proposed new fee hike for students. With a decision by the UC Board of Regents looming today, tuition could be raised 32 percent—$2,500—over the next two years to help cover the system’s burgeoning deficit. As part of the protest, students blocked the campus gates for five hours yesterday to show their anger at the price hike.

There’s a new website in Santa Cruz where residents can do everything from pay their parking tickets to apply for city jobs and find the nearest public restroom downtown.

Some snippets of conversation from the recent Penny University meeting at the Calvary Episcopal Church.

Clothing designer Noa Levin shares her thoughts on what’s important, what’s really not, and how she realized a lifelong dream by coming to Santa Cruz.

When an Alabama superior court judge issued an order that Amanda Hodge’s two adopted children be returned immediately to her custody out of concern for their safety following a February, 2008 state-ordained forensic interview, the family court of Monterey County, where Hodge’s children were living with their adoptive father, declined to cooperate. Instead, the custody battle seemed only to swing further out of Hodge’s favor. She lost custody entirely, was granted supervised telephone calls only and has now not see her children in two years.

After disappointment one year ago, Alejo boosters finally got their day.

Two years ago Planet Cruz launched into orbit. Today it’s a standing-room-only party with fans at the ends of the earth. Comedian Richard Stockton explains how his spaceship landed here and why it’s parked—for now.  With slide show.

Watsonville’s city council selected Luis Alejo to serve as the city’s next mayor. Alejo, the son of migrant workers, was born and raised in Watsonville and is running for the the 28th District Assembly seat being vacated by Anna Caballero.

The exciting finale of our mini-documentary on the Aztecas. (Video after the jump.)

Santa Cruz is hoping to regulate medical marijuana dispensaries in the city, but that does not mean that it will be imposing new taxes on them, at least for now. In addition to state and federal taxes, the dispensaries currently pay a 9.5 cent sales tax to the city. It has been suggested that an additional tax be paid by the dispensaries, in part to limit the number of nonlocals who come to Santa Cruz to buy marijuana. According to some estimates, only 25 percent of the customers at the city’s two dispensaries live in the City of Santa Cruz. Another 50 percent live in the county, while 25 percent come from out-of-county.

During a recent visit to New York City to spend time with my sister and her family, I discovered firsthand the considerable advances in bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure of this bustling metropolis.

The SCPD has taken the initiative in the fight against crime.

Poverty is up; giving is down. That, in a nutshell, is the central theme of Second Harvest’s campaign to provide food for the needy this Thanksgiving.

It all began in the 1980s, when the Santa Cruz City Council began to speak out against immigration raids.

For some people, Friday night is a chance to get out and party. For many students at UCSC, particularly in the departments of Science and Engineering, it used to be a chance to get some work done at the library.

A debate is brewing in Santa Cruz County between supporters and opponents of a passenger rail line to run along the 32-mile Union Pacific line.

Peak wildfire season in Northern California ended at 8am today, and Calfire will begin the transition to its winter staffing in Santa Cruz and Santa Clara counties. The state’s burn suspension in the Bay Area will also end at that time. Wildfire season officially began on June 1.

“Which comic strip figured a character called Pig Pen?”

It’s quite a thing to watch a brilliant mind, a useful cache of important thoughts such as professional matters, personal hygiene and important to-dos, drunkenly stumble over trivial matters.

Jon Stewart opened Wednesday night’s show with a reference to UCSC’s latest job posting for an archivist for its Grateful Dead collection.

Santa Cruz City Council decided on Tuesday to hike the fees on some restaurants serving alcohol, depending on how much alcohol they sell and how late the restaurant is open.

Generally, the opening of a new Safeway is no big deal. But the company’s top brass turned up in Santa Cruz this week to check out the mammoth new Safeway at the Almar shopping center.

Local residents planning to attend a local swine flu vaccine clinic at Cabrillo College next Saturday should start making alternate plans.

The continuation of our mini-documentary on the Aztecas. (Video after the jump.)

Ten Questions with Chad Brill, brewmaster of Santa Cruz Mountain Brewing.

LANDSCAPES, they’re called—but the toneful, moody, electric pieces in Richard Mayhew: After the Rain, at the Museum of Art and History through Nov. 22, are not portraits of topography. In an interview in the intimate Art Forum gallery, on the museum’s top floor, the slender, elegant Mayhew discusses his vivid, animated works, which lifted my spirits the first time I saw them.

After several years of flat conditions, the O’Neill Cold Water Classic blew up big this year. Photographer Dina Scoppetone caught the highlights; view the slideshow here.

A local man in his twenties is in serious condition after being stabbed in a fight in Capitola yesterday afternoon.

Efrain Toledo Martinez, 54, of the Toledo Harkins Slough Ranch pleaded no contest to animal abuse and was sentenced to pay $868 to Animal Services.

Whether it’s the recent smoking ban in public spaces or the crackdown on panhandling, the Santa Cruz Chamber of Commerce says much credit should go to the community group Santa Cruz Neighbors, which supported the various new city ordinances intended to clean up the city.

Softening regulations on what kinds of businesses can occupy downtown buildings took little consideration by city leaders. From 2007 to 2009, vacant office space downtown tripled from about 60,000 square feet to more than 180,000 square feet. Vacant space equals dwindling sales and property taxes for city coffers, and at 2030 North Pacific, Santa Cruz city leaders have an especially high stake in seeing business begin to boom.

Retired professor Don Rothman makes the argument for why the UC fee hikes are detrimental to California, from harming diversity to creating a enclave of the privileged.

The County Sheriff’s Office will be asking the state for $275,000 to help it crack down on local marijuana growers and traffickers. The money would allow the Sheriff’s Department to add an officer to its narcotics team and cover the cost of a part-time prosecutor. Sheriff Phil Wowak added that the funding is especially crucial this year because of county budget cuts, which prevented him from hiring 20 new deputies.

The SCPD has released a sketch of a man suspected of attempting to kidnap a 23-year-old woman as she walked back from a bar to the restaurant where she worked.

It could be much worse, but a new report by the Surface Transportation Policy Partnership named Santa Cruz as California’s 23rd most dangerous metropolitan area for pedestrians.

Santa Cruz City Council met last night for a meeting devoted entirely to the issue of public safety, and decided to relaunch several programs that had been cut because of budget constraints.

Gina Castaneda stands along the sidelines inside the cavernous Soccer Central Indoor Sports arena in Watsonville, shouting to the teenage boys in the purple uniforms tumbling back and forth on the field. “Buena, buena, Jesus!” she yells. “Baja las manos!” With slide show and video.

Studies conducted in California and other locations support the use of marine reserves as a tool for managing fisheries and protecting marine habitats.

Sure, unemployment is soaring, but every so often a job pops up that anyone would want. UCSC just began advertising for one of those jobs: Grateful Dead Archivist. According to the posting, “The Archivist will be part of a dynamic, collegial, and highly motivated department dedicated to building, preserving, promoting, and providing maximum access both physically and virtually to one of the Library’s most exciting and unique collections, The Grateful Dead Archive.”

The faculty of UCSC receives the lowest salaries of any faculty in the University of California undergraduate network.

Violent crime certainly seems to be on the rise in Santa Cruz these days.

Thousands of tourists flock to Santa Cruz every day to visit the coast and take in the sights. But unless they know exactly where to look, they are likely to miss some of the lesser known attractions, like the Surfing Museum or the mansion that inspired Hitchcock’s film Psycho. Until now, of course.

Over 1,000 people lined up outside the Santa Cruz Health Center this Saturday to take advantage of the free H1N1 vaccine that was being offered there.

The United Methodist Church of Santa Cruz broke ground on a new church with a new vision this Saturday in Live Oak. The planned 20,000-square-foot building will be the first “green” church in the county.

Santa Cruz nightlife does offer a spark of relief in these post-apocalyptic times for smokers. There are several secret hovels every black-lung should know if he or she is going to survive in this brave new world, but discretion being the better part of pallor, this cloak-and-dagger guide is based on hidden clues. Read carefully and be rewarded with a bourbon and a Camel.

Local poet David Swanger shares his work in a series appearing the first week of each month.

Santa Cruz residents waiting to get the H1N1 vaccine will have another chance on Saturday at the Santa Cruz Health Center on Emeline Ave. The clinic has received 1,000 doses of the vaccine, and will be offering them to the public between 2pm and 8pm.

A federal judge, John Walter, ruled that the Santa Cruz-based online music distributor BlueBeat must immediately stop selling copyrighted music on its website.

When Santa Cruz City Council meets on Tuesday, it will vote to take a stand in the national debate surrounding illegal immigration.

Ten questions for Jordy Topf, starving artist and lead singer for the Vox Jaguars.

In the late 1940s and early 1950s, following the establishment of the state of Israel and heightened hostility toward Jews inside Iraq, some 120,000 Kurdish Jews were airlifted out of the mountainous area known as Kurdistan and relocated to Israel.

All across Santa Cruz, people are trying to understand the recent wave of violent crimes that culminated with the slaying of 16-year-old Tyler Tenorio.

The most comprehensive study of evolution ever was proposed this past April at a three-day meeting at UCSC.

To thirsty patrons, a bartender is a hero with a thousand faces: analyst, confessor, entertainer, clown, crush, captive audience, authority figure, giver of all good things, withholder of same, fount of wisdom or trivia—even friend, for all we know (and hope). When we walk in the door and perch on that barstool, we see someone with godlike powers to make us happy. Someone wise. Someone who’s got it all together. With slide show of photos by Dina Scoppettone.

Cyclists and environmentalists have been at loggerheads over a proposed new bike path through Arana Gulch. While environmentalists warn that a new path would cause irreparable damage to the threatened Santa Cruz Sunflower (tarplant), cyclists argue that a trail through the site would help them avoid congested streets along the city’s greenbelt.

Faced with growing public anger over the wave of violence that has swept over Santa Cruz recently, city leaders laid out a five-point plan to cut down gang activity and increase residents’ sense of security. The proposed program focuses on three approaches: technical, legislative, and educational.

Santa Cruz residents, The Santa Cruz City Council and Santa Cruz Police discuss preventative efforts in place and explore new options for cracking down on crime.

Michael Roberts makes his case for why adults should take back Halloween and make it their holiday.

For nine months in 1898, the lions of Tsavo held the British Empire at bay. They preyed on workers at a construction camp in Kenya, and prevented them from building the railroad.

A new contract was finally reached on Monday with 12,000 nurses at 32 Catholic Healthcare West hospitals, representing 32 hospitals in California and Nevada. 

Now that the Obama administration has announced that it will stop cracking down on medical marijuana—sellers and users—entrepreneurs across Santa Cruz want to get a piece of the action and open their own marijuana dispensaries.

With the murder of 16-year-old Tyler Tenorio looming over them, the Santa Cruz Police Department stepped up its anti-gang operations to avert any trouble on Halloween

Dozens of men and women paraded through Watsonville on Sunday, calling for an end to the violence that violence that has claimed 80 lives in the town over the past 16 years.

Despite fears of violence, thousands of costumed holiday revelers packed downtown Santa Cruz on Saturday night to celebrate Halloween. Captain Steve Clark of the SCPD said that the event was generally quiet, with very few arrests, though he added that this year more people than usual people chose to attend house parties instead.  With slide show.

Ten Questions for Community Restoration Program Director and proud Deadhead David True.

More cops, streetlights and security cameras are on tap in Santa Cruz following a rash of violence that saw a blatantly public shooting at Pacific and Laurel streets on Wednesday night.

On Wednesday, the Academic Senate of UCSC took a stand again the budgetary cuts imposed throughout the UC system.

With Santa Cruz residents already showing signs of stress because of increasing violence in the city, the SCPD has decided to hit the streets in force this Halloween.

Paulo Luna, a suspect in the fatal stabbing of Tyler Tenorio two weeks ago, is believed to have fled to Mexico.

THEY DON’T drink blood. They don’t wear fake fangs or black trench coats. They don’t read Anne Rice novels and they wouldn’t be caught dead watching Twilight. What they do is ride souped-up motorcycles at ridiculous speeds, party like rock stars and occasionally forget to wear clothes while doing either. They’re the Vampires. And they’re Santa Cruz’s most recognizable motorcycle club.

School trustees voted last night to allow Executive Chef Jamie Smith to begin preparing school lunches for Santa Cruz middle school students.

On Tuesday, 30 protesters interrupted a City Council meeting, waving signs and demanding that the city do something to address public safety.

County water officials have announced that they plan to loosen strict water rationing rules that have been in place since May.

“There’s no more swine flu vaccine in Santa Cruz and Watsonville until further notice.” That was the gist of a statement issued by the Santa Cruz County Health Services Agency on Wednesday.

Morton Marcus, whose outsize presence animated and at times dominated Santa Cruz County’s literary culture for most of the last 40 years, died peacefully at home after a long illness early in the morning of Oct. 28.  He was 73, and seemed both younger and older—younger because his attitude toward everything was one of boyish enthusiasm, and older because the amount of living he jammed into his years would have taken several lifetimes for anyone less charged with creative energy.

I never met Mardi Wormhoudt. In the late 1990s, when I was getting my start in journalism and relegated to the sandbox of features writing, I would hear her name uttered in the newsroom and wonder at the hallowed tone employed by my usually cynical hero-colleagues. In the same way children take cues from their parents, espousing essentially baseless opinions about frivolous aunts or shiftless uncles, I came to understand that Mardi Wormhoudt was one of the good politicians. I didn’t know why. I just accepted it.

The rape of an elderly woman last week and the murder of a local high school student by gang members seem to have people on edge. About 30 protesters interrupted a City Council meeting last night, waving signs and demanding that the city do something to address public safety.

Santa Cruz City Schools trustees will be voting tonight on whether to approve a new school lunch program. The proposed program will feature food prepared from scratch from locally grown produce. The decision will come earlier than planned because a transition period, during which lunches were provided by Revolution Foods of Oakland, was found to have been misbudgeted.

Deborah Berkson of Santa Cruz turned down the chance to drive her son to school in a brand new Prius. The winner of this year’s Drive for Schools fundraiser decided to take the cash prize—$25,000—instead. 

The electric car—quiet, fast and clean—has captured some media attention since the release of the sleek Tesla Roadster 18 months ago.  But it’s not a new idea. Some of the first cars ever built, going back to the 19th century, were battery-powered. And the contemporary push to break away from the internal combustion engine dates back more than 40 years.

LAST Saturday, on 350 Day, the International Day of Climate Action, which forward-thinking people everywhere celebrated with carbon-neutral acts of faith in a sunshine-powered future, I was awash in a sea of smelly detritus from the past, flailing around in musty tides of old shoes, T-shirts, plastic Christmas decorations, screws, Tupperware, plastic soap caddies, collectible figurines.

Paul Elerick explains why the Campaign for Sensible Transportation filed a lawsuit in Sacramento last week challenging the $22 million widening of Highway 1.

Looking back, James “Pops” Lee’s loved ones say they now read a lot more into things that, at the time they were happening, seemed like nothing special. Lee’s son Bob dwells on the first time he met Fenita Caldwell, a medical supplies saleswoman in her early 40s who lived down the street from his father on Dolphin Drive in Aptos. “She seemed like a sweet lady, professional, highly educated,” he says. “She said, ‘Oh, I love old people.’ I look back on that.”

With the 6oo-acre Loma Fire now contained, and residents returning to their homes, investigators are trying to figure out what actually caused the blaze.

Another alarming statistic about the kids of Santa Cruz: according to the Santa Cruz County Community Assessment Project, about one in five kids between the ages of 4 and 20 is overweight.

When you don’t want to hear the answer to a question, you probably shouldn’t ask it. That’s a lesson that the California Healthy Kids Survey should consider, now that it has released the finding of its new poll of 6,200 fifth, seventh, ninth, and eleventh graders.

Automobiles may be a convenient way of getting around, but they are one of the greatest sources of greenhouses gas emissions in the world today. That’s why a group of local climate activists decided to put the car—represented by a beat-up old Honda—on trial for all the problems it has caused.

Dozens of families have fled their homes to escape a 600-acre wildfire in Summit area of the Santa Cruz Mountains. Some 100 homes were lost in the same area in May of last year.

Perhaps best known for her high-key colors, historic murals and consummate plein air pastels, Ann Thiermann is a tireless connoisseur of other people’s artwork—especially of the vibrant variety of women’s artwork.

Ten questions for owner of T-Shirt Mafia Rudy Guzman.

As we careen toward a swampy future without ice caps or polar bears, some scientists have put their stake in carbon sequestration—essentially storing atmospheric carbon someplace where it cannot contribute to the greenhouse gas effect or to climate change.

Clothing was a big issue at the meeting on gang violence held at Santa Cruz High School Wednesday evening. The color shirts that students wear could potentially identify them as gang members, no less than something as basic as school colors.

UCSC has a long reputation as a hotbed of political activism, whether it is protests against the recent budget cuts or the students’ climate action rally planned for this Saturday. All of that will be brought together this weekend at the seventh annual Practical Activism Conference to be held on campus.

Thousands of cyclists will converge on Santa Cruz this May 18 as part of the 2010 Amgen Tour of California.

Zombies converge on Cooper St. Saturday to celebrate Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”.