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From the Editor

Tuesday, 30 August 2011 15:24 Greg Archer Columns - Editors Note
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What makes a surf icon a surf icon? Even if he doesn’t want to be one? This week, you’re about to find out. In a compelling, and fascinating historic look back in time, writer Geoffrey Dunn explores the complex yet totally interesting man known as Miki Dora. Surf culture holds a significant amount of interest in these parts, even for those who don’t surf—this is Santa Cruz, after all. So, learn more about the inner workings of Dora, and how the surf mystique managed to ride its way into pop culture.
In News, the idea to erect an apartment building doesn’t often stir controversary, but when it’s on a Native American Ohlone Indian site, that’s another story. This week, GT talks to individuals who may be impacted should things roll ahead. Also in News, take note of all that is unfolding with the Santa Cruz County Community Coalition to Overcome Racism (SCCCCOR). A while ago, we reported on the unique local group, which received funding to move forward with its mission. How has it progressed? Read on ...
Be sure to check out Town Hall this week, too. On the roster: Supervisor Neal Coonerty.
This weekend also marks somewhat of an end to the summer months, with Labor Day and all. So, how has the summer treated you, and vice versa? Don’t ponder it too much because there’s plenty of diversions to be had, one of them being the 59th Annual Capitola Begonia Festival, which unfolds during Labor Day weekend in Capitola. All eyes will be on the Nautical Parade. Some of the float ideas that captured our attention: “Ballet at the Beach” by Begonias On The Bay (BOB); “Hoedown on the River” by Gayle's Bakery and Rosticceria; “Rock Around the Clock” by Riverview Rascals; and “Austin Powers Returns!” by  Windmill House. Turn to our Events and Calendar pages this week for more details on the celebrated fest.
Meanwhile ... enjoy these summer days—while they last.


Greg Archer | Editor-in-Chief
Letters to the Editor


Obama Daze
Have you seen the stocks? Ever since Obama's suicide bill was passed, the Stock Market has been crashing. Obama supporters are pulling their money out of the market, because they know that Obama's Ideas to fix the economy are not put out by a very smart group of leaders. Obama is not very smart. He doesn't manage the office like Bush did. Bush was masterful in getting us to follow him into his war and getting us to believe there were weapons of mass distruction. Obama just believes that his mere presance will change things and that is just really stupid.
David Brumfield
Aptos

Humanitarian Crisis?
Regarding your recent News story, the Showtilla that took Debra Ellis to Greece and back was nothing more than a publicity stunt. They were not bringing anything to Gaza that is not already shipped there through Israel. The International Red Cross has confirmed that there is no humanitarian crisis there. Six thousand tons of food, fuel, and other supplies enter Gaza every day through official channels. In fact, Israel offered to deliver any legitimate cargo from the flotilla, but they were rebuffed. If there really was any aid, it remained in Greece.
In the past five years, Hamas has fired over 10,000 rockets into Israeli communities. The blockade is a legal measure to prevent Hamas and other terrorist groups from importing weapons for their ongoing war against Israel. Under the Oslo Accords the Palestinians gave Israel the right to control the coast of Gaza. Under international law it has a right to enforce an embargo against the importation of war material. The pro-Hamas activists were in fact in violation of both international law for violating a legal blockade, and American law by giving aid to a terrorist organization.
Contrary to the statements of Ellis, Israel does not prevent aid to Gaza. In June a European convoy of Miles for Smiles 3 transferred 30 tons of medical supplies, ambulances, wheelchairs and other supplies without a fuss because their goal was to help people, not create incidents and publicity.
One only has to read the Charter of Hamas, the Islamic Resistance Movement, to understand the enemy that Israel faces.  Ellis says she did not act out of politics, but the whole operation was undertaken in cooperation with Hamas leaders. I would hope that most members of our community will work to promote peaceful co-existence instead of engaging in dangerous provocations which only strengthen the repressive regimes like Hamas. To learn more about this subject go to www.flotillafacts.com.
Gil Stein
Best Online Comments

On La Bahia’s Defeat ...
Always the talk of more jobs and better tourist opportunity. Frankly I'm glad not to see a huge conference center on our beach area. Once this happens then the precedent is set and projects that have been rejected in past years such as the Seacliff Beach conference center proposal are easier to pull off. Why not fix up the building and make it a historical restaurant. There is a beautiful example in Portland, Ore., fully done with gardens and a little movie theater. Pictures of the old building line the halls.
Santa Cruz can be creative without compromising integrity. Go with what we have. La Bahia is a lovely building and with some care and thought can be an asset—much more than a large conference center. Quit the whining about the loss of that and make something out of that space. You'll have plenty of people to enjoy it and jobs to fill if you quit using tunnel vision.
Robin Faith

Correction
In the 8/23 issue Andrew Purchin's name is spelled incorrectly. GT regrets the error.
Holiday Deadlines
Good Times offices will be closed Monday, Sept. 5 in observance of Labor Day.  Offices will reopen at 9 a.m., Tuesday, Sept. 6. The following deadlines will be in effect for the Thursday, Sept. 8 issue.
Display and Classified Display advertising deadlines are 5 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 1.
Classified advertising deadline is 10 a.m. Friday, Sept. 2.
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CYNDI

On the eve of Cyndi Lauper’s Mountain Winery gig, we dissect the woman, the icon, the creative beast. Plus: Her thoughts on the music industry, equal rights and those sparkling ‘Kinky Boots’ Few performers possess the kind of fierce, she-bopping tenacity Cyndi Lauper has become famous for. Equal parts free spirit, civil rights activist and Grammy-winner, Lauper is one of the few creative artists able to successfully marry her cutting-edge verve with a heart-of-gold panache. It certainly has helped fuel the remarkable career resurgence she has been experiencing lately.

 

Field to Vase

Open house provides opportunity for residents to meet their local flower growers Valentine’s Day is a high point of the year for those in the cut flower business. So when, one year in the late ’90s, the bouquet-riddled holiday failed to deliver for Kitayama Brothers Farms, the family behind the decades-old rose-growing business knew something was wrong.  “It was the writing on the wall,” recalls Stuart Kitayama, operations manager for the Watsonville-based company. “Those of us who had been hoping things would just get better finally said ‘it’s time to change.’”

 

The Price of Safety

The city's proposed budget addresses public safety needs The City of Santa Cruz’s pocketbook has come a long way since 2009, when an $8 million shortfall loomed. According to City Manager Martin Bernal, the proposed general fund budget for 2013-2014 is healthier than it has been since the beginning of The Great Recession in 2008. Armed with this returning stability, the proposal puts one of the community's top concerns—public safety—front and center.

 

Community Studies 2.0

After a controversial suspension, a new incarnation of the unique UC Santa Cruz major is reinstated The UC Santa Cruz community studies lounge is a great place to have a conversation.  Housed on the second floor of a faculty building in Oakes College, just down the hall from a whiteboard that reads “COMMUNITY STUDIES LIVES,” the room has a big round table, couches and chairs, and shelves stacked with past senior “capstone projects.”

 

North Pacific String Band

Jeff Wilson, who plays banjo for North Pacific String Band, loves being part of original music experiences. “What I like about the music we play is that it’s fairly unique and kind of hard to put your finger on,” Wilson says. “We’re not just trying to do bluegrass or country or folk. It’s a mixture of those things and we try to add in a lot of musicality to all of that.” Originality and musicality aren’t ideas which are limited to the band’s exploits either.

 

Peace in the Middle East

New dance-concert explores Palestinian-Israeli conflict Inspired by the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, local choreographer Karl Schaffer’s “Mosaic” is a dance-concert featuring Jewish Diaspora and Arab music from the women’s choral group Zambra, singer Fattah Abbou and a troupe of local dancers. In between rehearsals for the show, which runs June 21-22 at Motion Pacific, Schaffer shared the story behind its creation.

 

Muscle-Bound

Valiant cast battles loud, ugly action for the soul of 'Man of Steel' Early in Man of Steel, fourth-grader Clark, the boy who will be Superman, is cowering in a broom closet at school, eyes screwed shut, hands clapped over his ears. He can't control his super powers: his X-ray vision shows him the skulls and skeletons under everyone's flesh; unfiltered noise—dogs, traffic, heartbeats—assault him from all sides. Rushing to school, his mom kneels outside the door and asks what's wrong.

 

The Plug Bug & Corbin Dunn

Mechanic, programmer, acrobat, builder, tinkerer. Corbin Dunn's 1969 Volkswagen Beetle is a fully electric vehicle. It has an electric motor powered by 48 stacked squares of Lithium-ion battery cells under the hood in place of the 50 horsepower gas engine that it was built with. He calls it, affectionately, “the Plug Bug.” Dunn, who was born in Hawaii, raised in Corralitos, and now lives in a large, old A-frame house near the summit in the Santa Cruz Mountains, is a 35-year-old programmer for Apple in Cupertino, where he helped develop the iPhone and works on the framework for the Macintosh operating system. But his aptitude for intricate technical work is not limited to computers. Dunn is a tinkerer.

 

Making the Grade

The quest to identify sources of high levels of bacteria at Cowell Beach continues With straight As on Heal the Bay’s annual “beach report card” for 10 out of 13 Santa Cruz County beaches—Main Beach, Seabright, and even Cowell Beach at the Stairs, to name a few—it would seem that Santa Cruz boasts a high coastal GPA. But in recent years, one Santa Cruz beach just can’t seem to pass: Cowell Beach west of the Santa Cruz Municipal Wharf.

 

Flag Day, Father’s Day and Chiron

Another week of complex planetary energies falling to Earth. Mars interacts with Pluto (inconjunct), Uranus (sextile) and Chiron (square, challenge, ouch!). We won’t know how to comprise, we’ll want to be friends but our hurts will challenge that desire.
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Good Morning Maui

Goodness, righteousness, virtuousness and fairness are some of the four-score English words that attempt to describe the Hawaiian essence of pono, whose use in the state motto translates to “The life of the land is perpetuated in righteousness.”

 

The Power of Conversation

Local author Cecile Andrews emphasizes importance of community engagement in newest book Cecile Andrews, author of the new book “Living Room Revolution: A Handbook for Conversation, Community and the Common Good,” probably wouldn’t get along too well with Larry David’s character from HBO’s Curb Your Enthusiasm, known for hiding his face and avoiding communication with anyone he runs into on the street. Andrews is a longstanding part-time Santa Cruz (part-time Seattle) resident who says something that’s struck her about this town over the years is people's willingness to participate in a practice she’s dubbed the “Stop and Chat”—which is exactly what it sounds like.

 

Is Edward Snowden a patriot or a traitor?

He's a patriot. Anyone who stands up for the rights that we stand for as a country, that is real democracy. That would be in my book—somebody who is a patriot. Leah WeissSanta Cruz | Therapist

 

Best of Santa Cruz County

The 2013 Santa Cruz County Readers' Poll and Critics’ Picks It’s our biggest issue of the year, and in it, your votes—more than 6,500 of them—determined the winners of The Best of Santa Cruz County Readers’ Poll. New to the long list of local restaurants, shops and other notables that captured your interest: Best Beer Selection, Best Locally Owned Business, Best Customer Service and Best Marijuana Dispensary. In the meantime, many readers were ever so chatty online about potential new categories. Some of the suggestions that stood out: Best Teen Program and Best Web Design/Designer. But what about: Dog Park, Church, Hotel, Local Farm, Therapist (I second that!) or Sports Bar—not to be confused with Bra. Our favorite suggestion: Best Act of Kindness—one reader noted Café Gratitude and the free meals it offered to the Santa Cruz Police Department in the aftermath of recent crimes. Perhaps some of these can be woven into next year’s ballot, so stay tuned. In the meantime, enjoy the following pages and take note of our Critics’ Picks, too, beginning on page 91. A big thanks for voting—and for reading—and an even bigger congratulations to all of the winners. Enjoy.  -Greg Archer, EditorBest of Santa Cruz County Readers’ Poll INDEX | Shops | Food & Drink | Arts & Entertainment | Health & Fitness | Professionals | The Rest |

 

Dancing Creek Winery

At the Pinot Paradise event back in March, I tasted some very good Pinots from the Santa Cruz Mountains, and Dancing Creek Winery’s 2009 Pinot ($27) was one of them. This plummy dark brew, made from grapes grown in Corralitos, has delicious flavors of pomegranate, prosciutto, dried cherries, and mint julep.

 

Paying it Forward

Pianist Benny Green wants jazz’s past to continue to inform its future I can honestly say I’m still learning.” Hearing such an admirable, humble statement from someone like Benny Green—a jazz pianist, arranger, composer and band leader whose 30-plus year career includes performances and recordings with jazz luminaries like Oscar Peterson, Art Blakey and Betty Carter—might be surprising at first. But Green’s insatiable desire to keep learning has served him well. That desire—and his deep love of jazz—is something he wants today’s younger musicians to feel, too.

 

A Very Fine House

Adjacent to the front door, the long, clean wooden bar is surrounded by pumpkin-colored stools. At the entrance to the dining rooms, there is a new low-slung cafe door hung in the wood-covered arch. Where there once was a stage, stocky wooden tables are neatly arranged perpendicularly on a new tile floor, each set with square white plates and burnt orange cloth napkins.

 

Exposed

David Cay Johnston’s new book explains how big companies rob us blind In his late teens David Cay Johnston started to ask questions. “Why do we have these guys in uniforms with guns driving around in cars all day?” “Why is the Santa Cruz County Courthouse being built in such an unusual shape?” He wrote an article, while still living in his hometown of Santa Cruz, proving that the off-kilter courthouse building, which officials had promised would save money, actually cost more than a conventional building.

 

What’s your secret to avoiding the summer swarms?