Comments by lbsaltzman
Page 1 of 3 | Next
Posted on April 24 at 9:20 a.m.
First I am deeply offended at the misuse of police to stifle local beekeepers and other members of the community from vociferously protesting the sham meeting the state put on.
The use of neonicotinoid pesticides is insane. Many countries in Europe have banned this class of pesticides. The latest research shows that they do kill bees and other pollinators. And no bees equals no pollination with catastrophic consequences to the food supply.
These pesticides will also undoubtedly simply breed pesticide resistant Asian psyllids. And finally, this is the worst time of the year to spray. The neonicotinoids are systemic and work their way up the trees to the flowers which are drawing in pollinators and beneficial insects and will kill them along with damaging hummingbirds who are consumers of insects.
Posted on December 20 at 3:04 p.m.
At last somebody has pulled back the curtain revealing that the farmer's market wizard is a not what he pretended to be. Many farmer's who are local, with in a 100 miles or so radius and organic, have been excluded to the benefit of corporate farmer's from far away. These farmers often make long drives from the central valley to sell non-organic produce at our market, while local organic farmers lack access. This is not sustainable and in the era of rising gas prices and global warming it makes no sense to support these farmers over local family farmers. When the farmers from afar can no longer afford to come we want to be sure that we have local farmers to support our need for fresh organic fruit, meat, eggs, and produce.
The board of the farmer's market should be changed to include citizens and more local farmers. The emphasis should be on local family farms, hopefully many will be organic.
Posted on February 27 at 11:48 a.m.
The new board was elected with a mandate for change and they carried out the will of the majority of voters. The rest of this brouhaha is sour grapes. I believe that if some digging is done, it will be seen that there is a close personal relationship between some members of the accrediting committee and the former President Serban and board members left over from the previous regime.
Some of the statements in the preliminary letter are absurd on the face of it. The District Attorney has already ruled that there was no violation of the Brown Act. And it is wrong to criticize board members for probing deeply into how the college is run when that is their fiduciary responsibility. Finally how do you include an obstructionist, out-of-touch President in deliberations when you are dealing with the widespread distrust her administration engendered. I believe this letter is nothing more than an attempt to intimidate the newly elected members of the Board of Trustees and subvert the will of the voters who put them in office to clean up a mess.
Posted on July 29 at 8:14 p.m.
For those moaning about the money, getting her terminated was cheap at the price. Her presence would have continued to be disruptive and have distracted the Board from the vital business of the College. Now we can move forward and the Board can select a new President. I am sure a more appropriate candidate will be found.
Now the Community must pull together for one more fight and defeat the sour grapes recall effort. It is a destructive move and the recall will not succeed. The five Board members who voted for change are to be congratulated.
Posted on July 28 at 1:13 p.m.
I am outraged at the harassment tactics being used against our newly elected Board. The election is over, and the winners determined. Let the Board do its' job! If your candidates lost he last election, by all means express your criticism, even meet with the board members, but also accept the will of the people who spoke loudly and strongly just 7 months ago.
I am also outraged at the divide and conquer tactics that some of the opposition to the elected board members are using to try to create conflict between regular college students, ESL students and Adult Education students. They are all important customers of the college and I am confident the board is trying to give all of them their fair share of attention in this time of diminished budgets
I trust the Board of Trustees to decide whether Dr. Serban should stay on or be removed. If she opposes Board policy and refuses to cooperate with the Board I will certainly support them terminating her services. She works for the Board, the Board does not work for her. The board in turn works for the people of Santa Barbara and all the students. If she is in anyway orchestrating the near hysterical attempt to overthrow the new board, which I hope she is not then the Board should consider terminating her.
Posted on July 17 at 4:49 p.m.
I think we have a bunch of angry folks unhappy with the results of the election who are attempting to harass and intimidate the new board. They don't want the people's will carried out by the board.
Serban is just an employee and I trust the board to decide if she is doing a good job or not. Let's leave them to their job.
Posted on June 25 at 2:51 p.m.
I fully support this change towards sanity. The street is too fast, it is not often that crowded with cars. Creating an environment that is safer for pedestrians and bicycles is a worthy goal
Posted on October 13 at 8:41 p.m.
Thank you Independent. I know it is time for a change at City College will be supporting all for candidates against the incumbents.
Larry Saltzman
Page 1 of 3 | Next
Previous Month
Posted on April 24 at 9:32 a.m.
A note on the latest research by biological anthropologists and paleo archeologists. Our ancestors in the Paleolithic got most of their calories from a plant based diet including grains and seeds. Even Neanderthals who lived in extreme ice age conditions only ate about 25% meat in their diet. They also ate grains. The presence of grain in the diet of modern humans has been traced back 100,000 years to modern humans in Africa who ate Sorghum.
Most of the food was gathered by women and not hunted by men. Autopsies on ancient bodies of Inuit people who did eat mostly meat showed high levels of cancer present. Ancient people also got huge amounts of exercise and what meat they ate was far healthier than modern meat, even grass fed organic meat. The meat that was consumed was combined with an incredible variety of plant foods and fruit. The Paleo diet is a gross oversimplification and misrepresentation of the real plant based Paleo diet with moderate meat consumption. I will stick to limiting my animal protein consumption based on the solid medical evidence of the harm high meat diets cause.
On Stone Age Eating