Free Republic

PLEASURE POINT -- The state Coastal Commission encourages California's seaside communities to embrace clean energy -- with a caveat. It has to look good. The regulatory agency has told a Santa Cruz County couple that a wind turbine planned for their new home in the Pleasure Point neighborhood is too tall. Suggesting it would add to the area's "visual clutter," the commission recommends the residents lower their proposed 35-foot-high, electricity-generating windmill, an idea the home's architect says is simply unworkable. "You can also put photovoltaic cells in a garage, but it's not going to do much for you," said Cove...

Dozens of student protesters who took over a UC Santa Cruz administrative building after a systemwide tuition increase were removed Sunday morning when police officers in riot gear ordered them to exit the building or face arrest. No arrests were made, and university officials said the operation concluded peacefully. But videos provided by some of the 70 or so protesters show a tense scene, with officers pushing their way through a wall of students chanting "We are peaceful, what about you?" to reach the entrance of Kerr Hall. Anthropology Professor Mark Anderson suffered minor injuries after he was squeezed off...

A California wildfire forced the evacuation of more than 2,000 people near the surfing town of Santa Cruz, emptying wineries and rustic homes on Friday. Billowing white smoke, punctuated by orange flames, covered rolling hills in television footage of the coastal mountain fire about 80 miles south of San Francisco.

The following video from a Santa Cruz, California city council meeting shows why some people really should avoid talking about economics. If you need a laugh this Friday morning, listening to the sage advice on display ought to do the trick:

As yet another exhibit in the ongoing argument against government education, I offer this video which was sent to me by one of my students. Two points. First, this partially explains why California is bankrupt. Second, you want to turn over your healthcare to the government that produced this girl’s worldview? It’s no wonder Obama won…

Brilliant Woman Solves All of California's Problems It's nice to see that Miss Teen South Carolina is trying to make a difference now that she's all grown up.

County retirement payouts are one more toll on budget By Kurtis Alexander 06/21/2009 SANTA CRUZ - As county leaders cut health and human services, furlough employees and reduce office hours to close a record budget shortfall, one more expense is weighing on the bottom line: hundreds of thousands of dollars paid to retirees for unused vacation and sick time. A Sentinel review of county payroll records shows during the past six months retiring employees cashed out nearly $900,000 in unused vacation, sick time and other leave. More than a third of that money went to four retirees, top managers who...

SANTA CRUZ -- More than 100 students and staff from UC Santa Cruz gathered at the foot of campus Tuesday to launch a hunger strike aimed at urging administrators to reverse course on budget cuts that opponents say disproportionately affect students of color.

SANTA CRUZ -- More than 100 students and staff from UC Santa Cruz gathered at the foot of campus Tuesday to launch a hunger strike aimed at urging administrators to reverse course on budget cuts that opponents say disproportionately affect students of color. About two dozen people, some attending the noon rally organized by the nascent Students of Color Collective, pledged not to take nourishment until a long list of demands is met. The demands include blocking cuts to the Community Studies and Latin American and Latino Studies departments, as well as hiring full-time directors for the American Indian Resource...

The last UC Santa Cruz treesitter surrendered to campus police Saturday, moments before a chainsaw-wielding crew began to level the redwood grove they had occupied for 402 days. “We knew they were getting ready for an extraction, so we had been preparing,” said Jennifer Charles, who had been the designated media contact for the protest. In the end, when “about 90 police in riot gear” and the commercial tree-cutters appeared Saturday morning, only one treesitter was left in the branches, Charles said. He came down of his own volition, to be promptly booked on charges of trespassing, disturbing the peace...

Santa Cruz -- The devices used in two firebombings targeting UC Santa Cruz biologists are similar to some used in the past by animal rights activists, investigators said Sunday. The bombs were so powerful they were like "Molotov cocktails on steroids," said Santa Cruz police Capt. Steve Clark.One struck the home of assistant biology Professor David Feldheim on Saturday morning, forcing him to flee with his family. The other exploded just a few minutes earlier, gutting a car parked outside the campus home of a second researcher.Later, Santa Cruz County sheriff's deputies went to the home of a third researcher...

SACRAMENTO, Calif. - A second day of hot weather and dry wind stoked new wildfires across Northern California on Wednesday, as firefighters battled blazes that have damaged at least 50 homes and threaten hundreds more. About 1,500 residents in the heavily forested hills north of Santa Cruz were told Wednesday afternoon to leave their homes as a quick-moving wildfire spread through the area. The 300-acre blaze broke out in the Bonny Doon area of Santa Cruz County just before 3 p.m. Wednesday, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said. Battalion Chief Paul Van Gerwen said the fire threatened...

A mountain lion attacking a small animal was spotted by students living near Gerhart Hall on the Bethany University campus in Scotts Valley Monday night, the second such sighting in as many days... Students reported seeing the cougar on both Sunday and Monday nights... Students are also being advised to avoid jogging or walking alone during the early morning hours or at dusk to avoid coming into contact with a mountain lion.

Firefighters are evacuating residents near a wildfire that is burning out of control this morning in the Santa Cruz Mountains. The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said the fire has burned about 500 acres. Sheriff's deputies from Santa Cruz and Santa Clara counties are in the process of evacuating residents living in a three-mile stretch near Mount Madonna Road, according to Chris Morgan, a fire prevention specialist. Morgan estimates there are at least 20 homes in the are being threatened by the fire. "Our main priority is evacuations, getting people out safely," Morgan said. "Then we can start...

SANTA CRUZ, Bolivia - Bolivia's largest state voted amid scattered violence Sunday on a measure seeking greater political and economic autonomy from the government of leftist President Evo Morales, who called the vote unconstitutional. As polls closed Sunday, exit surveys showed the autonomy referendum drawing as much as 85 percent support, though they were conducted by local news media sympathetic to the cause. No margin of error was available. Minor clashes across Santa Cruz state injured at least 25 people during the politically charged vote, which sought to separate the state's freewheeling capitalism and mixed-blood heritage from Morales' vision of...

Campus Locks Down For Pot-Smoking 'Holiday' Unofficial Marijuana 4/20 Holiday Raises Security Concerns POSTED: 6:35 pm EDT April 18, 2008 SANTA CRUZ, Calif. -- The University of California-Santa Cruz campus was in lockdown Friday night, but it's not in the traditional sense of the word. The university is anticipating thousands of students Sunday, gathering to mark the so-called "4/20" cannabis culture holiday, reported KSBW-TV in Monterey, Calif. Four-twenty is named for the day, which is Sunday's date, or the time of the day well known among regular marijuana users for smoking pot. It was once a student-only gathering to smoke...

BERKELEY -- Berkeley police detectives investigating a two-month string of animal rights-related vandalism targeting the homes of UC Berkeley scientists will begin probing possible connections to a spate of similar crimes in Santa Cruz, including last weekend's attempted home invasion of a local biomedical researcher. Sgt. Mary C. Kusmiss, a Berkeley Police Department spokeswoman, said detectives have not identified suspects in the rash of sidewalk chalking, brazen daylight trespassing and bullhorn-powered yelling incidents that have unfolded every Sunday afternoon since New Year's Day outside the homes of at least six Berkeley researchers who use cats, mice, rats and other animals...

SANTA CRUZ -- Santa Cruz backers of Cuba say they hope Fidel Castro's legacy of health care and education will live on in the wake of his retirement announcement Tuesday. Over the years, the left-leaning Santa Cruz area has had a unique interest in the island nation, with an ongoing Cuba Study Group for area residents and healthy support for the annual Pastors for Peace Caravan that takes humanitarian aid to the country. The perspective here is a bit different than what might be found in other parts of the United States. "We've been fed such a lie about socialism...

In the latest issue of City on a Hill Press, the student newspaper for the University of California at Santa Cruz (UCSC), reporter Marc Abizeid spins a bone-chilling tale of silenced professors and a Middle East studies field threatened by a shadowy network of "radical pro-Israel interest groups." At the helm of this nefarious conspiracy is of course Campus Watch, which Abizeid paints as a ruthless organization bent on censoring anyone who strays from the straight and narrow. The problem is none of it's true.Much like the disaffected academics he profiles in the ominously titled, "Silencing Debate on the Middle...

It's a story that virtually begs for the "only-in-Santa-Cruz" eye-roll treatment - another item in a wave of wackiness over the years that has painted the beach town, fairly or not, as nuttier than a bowl of granola. Only this time, it might actually be true - the "only-in-Santa-Cruz" part, at least. That's because two cherished progressive ideals - smoking bans and medicinal marijuana - have collided in a cloud of, well, smoke. The city last year banned smoking in two city parks, citing the threat to public health. The city also is on record in support of the local...

There's a job opening in Santa Cruz for the newly created position of global warming czar. The pay: $80,000 a year. The global warming coordinator will help prevent climate change, guide the city in transportation and land-use decisions and get the community involved in the effort. "We think this position will help address possible sea level rise, whether that's at our bluffs, at our beaches or maybe even in our downtown," city planning director Greg Larson said. The City Council approved the Planning Department position for one year. "The preponderance of scientific evidence globally and locally shows that global warming...

As the county housing market turns from a seller's to a buyer's affair, the growth of property taxes collected across Santa Cruz County went from 10.6 percent last fiscal year to an estimated 3 percent in the year that ended June 30, according to county Treasurer/Tax Collector Fred Keeley. In other words, the total amount of property taxes collected — about $382.4 million — grew by about $39 million between fiscal years 2004-05 and 2005-06, but only $12 million last year. While it's still a net gain, government leaders can no longer base spending on the rosy projections that came...

Human remains thought to be oldest ever found in Santa Cruz By Todd Guild Sentinel CorrespondentMay 12, 2007 SANTA CRUZ — For the Santa Cruz Water Department, most construction projects are uneventful, encountering nothing more than dirt, rocks and an occasional root. That was not the case when city workers installing a water pipe on the Westside unearthed the bodies of two Ohlone people — now believed to be the oldest human remains ever found in the city. Studies over the past six months date the bones back 5,000 years, when construction on the Great Pyramids in Egypt had just...

Santa Cruz, Calif. -- A gay student prevented from donating blood because of his sexual history has stirred debate among Santa Cruz school officials over whether to continue hosting campus blood drives. Ronnie Childers, 17, student body president at Harbor High School, said he volunteered at a blood drive at his school earlier this month for five hours and waited in line for three more before being turned away. "I was turned away because of my sexual contacts," Childers said. "The reasoning behind me not being able to give blood is ridiculous. ... It made me feel like an outcast."...

SANTA CRUZ, Calif. -- Steelhead trout season has lured fishermen to Santa Cruz County with hopes of landing one of the feisty fish to reel in. Sportsmen traveled hundreds of miles away to fishing holes up and down the San Lorenzo River this weekend, one of 33 spots around the state where catch-and-release fishing of the imperiled steelhead is allowed. The steelhead season began Dec. 1 and continues to March 7. "I caught a two-pounder -- the biggest in a long time, said Don Foskett. Torin Bryan, 29, who said he was a "corporate cubicle worker" from Mountain View, relished...

SANTA CRUZ, Bolivia - Protesters demanding greater autonomy from the central government clashed with backers of President Evo Morales on Friday, and officials said more than 20 people were injured before a planned giant protest march. Santa Cruz state Gov. Rubén Costas, who has backed the protests, reported the injuries occurred as pro- and anti-government groups threw rocks at one another in San Julián, a town about 70 miles northwest of Santa Cruz. Meanwhile, thousands of protesters decked in the green-and-white colors of Santa Cruz state hit the streets of this eastern lowland city Friday to demand greater autonomy from...

As We See It: Pelosi faces big challenge We can only hope Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi will live up to her promises to clean house in Congress and to steer a moderate and ethical course. For Democrats, this remains their best hope of capturing the White House in 2008 and retaining control of Congress. Pelosi's actions earlier this month, however, give pause. The San Franciscan first blundered when she attempted to vault Rep. John Murtha into the post of House majority leader, ahead of Rep. Steny Honer, who Pelosi dislikes. Honer was overwhelmingly elected by colleagues. Although Murtha has gained national...

Bolivia is on fire. The fiery democratic revolutionary babes of Santa Cruz are no more. Now, it’s angry citizens of The Media Luna - four provinces, led by Santa Cruz, fighting to the last man against the brutal expansionary communism of Evo Morales’ Bolivia. This is going well beyond peaceful demonstrations to the first stages of insurgency and maybe war. Revolutionary war. They are fighting tyranny. They’re fighting with axes, fists, and cudgels, in an action that began with a general strike Friday in four provinces against Morales’ effort to rewrite the constitution to maximize his own power. Attendence was...

DAVENPORT, Calif. - The state acquired five miles of beaches and rugged coastline in Santa Cruz County on Friday, bringing public ownership to one of the longest stretches of private beachfront property in Northern California. The state Public Works Board voted to accept 407 beachfront acres of Coast Dairies Ranch, which consists of 6,845 acres of redwood forests, artichoke fields and rolling hills northwest of Santa Cruz. The beaches, including Panther Beach, Bonny Doon Beach and Davenport Bluffs, will become part of a new state park that will be opened to the public and patrolled by rangers over the next...

About 25 revelers celebrated their freedom of speech and welcomed the Fourth of July on Monday night with the "2nd Annual Old Time American Flag Burn." Around a burn barrel at Seabright State Beach, organizer Brent Adams, 41, of Santa Cruz, declared flag burning not a protest, but a celebration of the Constitution's First Amendment. "It seemed like a good idea to burn some flags just because we can," added fellow organizer Sha Lar, 32, of Santa Cruz. The festivities were especially relevant after a constitutional amendment allowing Congress to ban flag desecration died in the Senate last week. That...

CARACAS, Venezuela The government of Venezuelan has donated 100-thousand dollars to a Santa Cruz-based non-profit organization dedicated to preventing violence among youths. Deputy Justice Minister Yuri Pimentel made the announcement during a meeting in Venezuela's capital with American singer and activist Harry Belafonte, who accepted the donation on behalf of the California Coalition of Barrios Unidos. The California Coalition of Barrios Unidos began as a community based peace movement in the violent streets of urban California in 1977.

Not every Bolivian likes to be under the thumb of Hugo Chavez’s minime, Evo Morales. Residents of the eastern province, Santa Cruz, which is full of industrious immigrants and enterprising native-indigenous Bolivians who’ve moved there, want instead to have autonomy. They hate communism and want freedom.

SAN FRANCISCO - A University of California chancellor died Saturday in an apparent suicide jump from a 43-story apartment building, authorities said. Denice Dee Denton, 46, the chancellor of the Santa Cruz campus, apparently jumped from an undisclosed section of the Paramount luxury apartment building around 8 a.m. and landed on a parking garage, police and university officials said. The Medical Examiner's office and a university spokesman confirmed her death, though the cause was still under investigation. "Those of us who worked closely with Denice valued her intelligence, humor, and commitment to the ideals of diversity and higher education," UC...

Denice Dee Denton, chancellor of the University of California-Santa Cruz, apparently jumped to her death Saturday morning from the 44th floor of a San Francisco building where she shared an apartment with her partner... The nationally recognized educator had been in the eye of controversy since she arrived at UC-Santa Cruz less than a year and a half ago. But Denton had been under fire almost since the day she was named to the Santa Cruz post in December 2004 at a salary of $275,000... The UC system did not initially reveal it had also hired Kalonji to a newly...

UC Santa Cruz Chancellor Denice Denton, apparently despondent over work and personal issues, died Saturday after she jumped from the roof of a 42-story San Francisco apartment building, police said. Denton's partner, Gretchen Kalonji, is listed as having an apartment in the building. Denton, a well-regarded engineer, had been named this spring in a series of articles examining UC management compensation. She had been criticized for an expensive university-funded renovation on her campus home, and for obtaining a UC administrative job for Kalonji. Denton, 46, died Saturday morning after jumping from the Paramount at Mission and Third streets, police said....

LA PAZ, Bolivia - Students attending a conflict resolution course in this politically tumultuous Andean nation got some unexpected extracurricular experience when Bolivia's leftist government accused the program's sponsor of being a front for U.S. spies.

Several Border Patrol agents were fired upon Wednesday evening in Nogales while responding to a call about a vehicle that was entering the country without going through a port of entry, an official said Thursday. Around 7 p.m. Border Patrol agents responded to a report of a silver Mercedes sport utility vehicle driving through the desert in Nogales, said Jesus Rodriguez, a spokesman for the agency's Tucson Sector. As the agents neared the SUV, they were fired upon, he said. One patrol vehicle took rounds to the windshield and the body. The agent in that vehicle fired back as did...

BISBEE — Congressman Jim Kolbe said he would be “closely watching” the Border Patrol’s management of traffic revision points in the area after the officer in charge of the agency’s Naco station said that a permanent checkpoint on Highway 90 would be reinstated. Kolbe has long opposed permanent Border Patrol revision points, which he says are predictable and ineffective. Instead, he advocates roving checkpoints and has inserted a provision into Border Patrol appropriations bills requiring the agency’s Tucson Sector to relocate checkpoints on a regular basis. “The law allows checkpoints, but they must be relocated at least once every seven...

After UC-Santa Cruz-Inspired Threats, Malkins Pack UpDays after receiving threatening emails and finding personal information plastered across the Internet by campus thugs, FOX News Channel contributor Michelle Malkin and her family are moving, according to the Santa Cruz Sentinel.Known to students and locals alike as "Uncle Charlie's Summer Camp" and "UCk SuCk", the latest incident proves yet another black eye for the long-troubled University of California- Santa Cruz campus.After Malkin published contact information from a publicly-distributed Students Against War press release, the violent anti-military group responded by disclosing private details, including her Maryland home address and phone number.In a story...

Administrative Message April 13, 2006To: UC Santa Cruz CommunityFrom: Denice D. Denton, Chancellor, and David S. Kliger, Campus Provost and Executive Vice ChancellorRe: Protest on April 11 On April 11, at the UC Santa Cruz Career Fair, a small group of individuals violated the principles they claimed to embrace – those of peaceful assembly and freedom of speech. In using threatening and aggressive tactics to prevent interested students from contacting military recruiters, these protesters infringed on the rights of others and acted with intimidation, intolerance and disrespect. Many did so with their faces covered, unwilling to take public responsibility for...

SANTA CRUZ — Vandals struck at least six sport utility vehicles Saturday night on the Westside, slashing tires and spray-painting politically charged messages such as "Oil equals blood" and "Guzzle" on the side of the vehicles, authorities said. One of the victims, Andrea Muzzi, who lives in a house at King Street and Berkshire Avenue, said she saw a group of 30 to 40 young men on bicycles ride away after using a knife to slash the four tires on her brand-new GMC Yukon, which was parked in front of her house. The incident happened about 10:30 p.m., she said....

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld should withhold federal funds from a California college given the failure of the college to ensure the safe presence of military recruiters on campus, the Secretary was advised by a public interest law firm in a letter released today. According to news reports, military recruiters were forced to flee yesterday from a University of California Santa Cruz job fair because of a raucous mob. Mountain States Legal Foundation advised Rumsfeld that the college’s actions violate the Solomon Amendment, which requires that colleges permit military recruiters on campus or lose all federal funds. UC Santa Cruz...

Four military recruiters hastily fled a job fair Tuesday morning at UC Santa Cruz after a raucous crowd of student protesters blocked an entrance to the building where the Army and National Guard had set up information tables. Members of Students Against War, who organized the counter-recruiting protest, loudly chanted "Don't come back. Don't come back" as the recruiters left the hilltop campus, escorted by several university police officers.

Four military recruiters hastily fled a job fair Tuesday morning at UC Santa Cruz after a raucous crowd of student protesters blocked an entrance to the building where the Army and National Guard had set up information tables. Members of Students Against War, who organized the counter-recruiting protest, loudly chanted "Don't come back. Don't come back" as the recruiters left the hilltop campus, escorted by several university police officers. ~snip

BOULDER CREEK - Serial killer Herbert William Mullin wants to come home to Santa Cruz County and find a wife. ``I just want to get back to living my life free,'' Mullin told the Board of Prison Terms on Wednesday. But the board denied his freedom bid and told the Mule Creek State Prison inmate to try again for parole in five years. Mullin was convicted in 1973 of 10 slayings in Santa Cruz County and one in Santa Clara County during a five-month killing spree in late 1972 and early 1973.

Why exactly should Bill O'Reilly travel to Darfur? The "answer" speaks volumes on just how petty and childish his left-wing critics have become. Going so far as to take up a cyber collection, they insist he could easily host his shows from Sudan to bring attention to the region's plight. Do these people really care about Sudan, the virtually obliterated peoples of Darfur, or human rights as a whole? Of course not. And don't take the Radio Equalizer's word for it, here's the real story (excerpted) from Editor & Publisher: ..................snip............................

February 7, 2006 Five Santa Cruz churches target of 'hate crime' By Cathy Smith sentinel staff writer SANTA CRUZ — Vandals struck five Santa Cruz churches, a Christian bookstore and the historic Santa Cruz Mission Adobe on Saturday night in what police are calling a hate crime. The vandals used a stencil to leave specially crafted messages and images about a half-foot across. One depicted a cross with an equal sign followed by a swastika. Church leaders said another stated "Abort Christ," a message one minister called "stunning and distressing." The targeted churches included Holy Cross, Messiah Lutheran, High Street...

Feinstein demands Rumsfeld explain UCSC spying U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-California, wants an explanation about reports of Pentagon spying at UC Santa Cruz as well as other surveillance of U.S. citizens. Feinstein wrote Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in a letter dated Tuesday asking him to explain the practices and authority of the Counter Intelligence Field Activity in collecting information in the course of its domestic investigations. In December, NBS news aired a string of reports based on Pentagon documents that listed 1,500 "suspicious" activities during a 10-month period. NBC interviewed experts who said the Pentagon had overstepped its bounds...

In a move that divided the city's famously left-leaning politicians, the Santa Cruz City Council on Tuesday voted to create a city department to distribute medicinal marijuana. If it eventually comes into being -- something that is doubtful at this point -- the Office of Compassionate Use would become the first such municipal office in the country. The vote marks the latest salvo by the council in a long-running battle over medicinal pot. Three years ago, the council allowed medicinal marijuana to be given away on the steps of City Hall as journalists from around the world recorded the moment.