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If any sector of Santa Barbara life should be on the cutting edge of environmental know-how, it should be our colleges. It’s no secret that UCSB has long been a bastion of clean living, at least as far as the environment is concerned. Its Environmental Studies Department has educated many about what must be done to live sustainably.
Assigning a grade to Santa Barbara County is a difficult prospect, as efforts toward reducing its residents’ impact upon the land involves examining the likes of college students in Isla Vista, affluent families in Montecito, and ranchers in North County. However, the county has made notable progress to ease the burden it and its residents place on the land on which they live.
During its 20 years in operation, The Santa Barbara Independent has distinguished itself with the speed and diligence with which it has embraced a host of environmental passions. But when it comes to the mundane details by which such causes are put into meaningful practice, The Independent’s customary speed and zeal has been notably lacking. There have been some exceptions, however.
There is perhaps no more appropriate landing ground for eco-savvy sensibilities and future-conscious principles than the farmland of Santa Barbara County. Our rolling rangeland accounts for some 723,000 acres-approximately 90 percent of all privately owned land in the county. Add to that the fact that ag activity is invariably “upstream” from the Pacific Ocean, and you get a situation in which broadly applied agricultural techniques can have a sweeping, positive impact on the community.
More homeowners than ever before are retrofitting their homes with solar panels, according to those in the solar industry. Ironically, estate owners who may use as much energy as an entire downtown residential block are reluctant to install solar paneling.
Summer Camp Guide- The Arts
The days are getting longer, the school year’s winding down, and summer is almost upon us. All of which means one thing: It’s time for The Indy’s annual Summer Camp Guide. This year, we’re sure we’ve got something for everyone: 42 pages full of camp listings for everything from ceramics to surfing, dancing to drama, horseback riding to fencing, even circus camp and scuba. So have a look-see, and get ready to spend your summer learning something new, having fun, and making new friends while you’re at it!
When Dan Randall first started coffee roasting 15 years ago, it was with one intention-to create the kind of gourmet, organic coffee he loved. His girlfriend at the time was unimpressed. “She didn’t like my stuff,” Randall said recently. “Her idea of a good cup of coffee was Farmer Brothers. If it didn’t taste like a brown paper bag brewed through a gym sock, she didn’t like it.”
Got a rack full of Santa Barbara County wines? Walk over to it, yank out a bottle, and inspect the label. Odds are that in your hands is a wine whose grapes came from Bien Nacido Vineyards, the 800-plus acre spread along the northeastern flank of the Santa Maria Valley. Nope? Well, then double-or-nothing that your bottle passed through the Central Coast Wine Services (CCWS) somewhere along the line from the vineyard to your cellar. Don’t believe me?
Traditionally, much of art has been devoted to communicating an understanding of nature. For cycle after cycle in the history of art, new movements and aesthetics have sprung from imaginations fired by direct observation of the natural world. In the 21st century, this imperative for art to “go to nature” to renew itself has been complicated by the increasingly artificial state of nature itself. With mounting scientific evidence that such pervasive features of the natural world as global climate are in significant flux due to the activities of humans, it has become more and more difficult to separate out the natural from the artificial world.
