By Deborah Brasket/Looking Forward

Santa Barbara County has been facing a serious shortage of affordable housing for its middle- and low-income residents for quite some time now.

The collapse of the national housing market has been especially hard on families living in the northern part of our county. Families seeking the American dream of home ownership have outreached their financial means because so little housing here is truly affordable for them.

State law requires that each county conduct a regional housing needs assessment every five years to ensure that enough land is zoned for all income levels. SB CAN advocates creating sustainable communities by building housing in urban areas within walking distance of basic needs and services, while also preserving open space and recreational areas.

The county largely mismanaged its obligation to rezone for high-density housing during the 2003-08 process, by not balancing the real needs of the community.

The county went from trying to put all the affordable housing rezones in the semi-rural Orcutt area, to putting all of them in Isla Vista, a tiny densely-populated community that serves a large university — hardly what you’d call fair-share housing that would meet the real needs of low-income families across the county.

By Olivia Uribe/Looking Forward

UCSB, the county’s largest employer, has announced a new long-range development plan (LRDP) that by 2025 would add 5,000 new students, 350 faculty positions, hundreds of new staff positions and other employees to provide services to the new students, faculty and staff.

This proposed development could have far-reaching impacts on nearby communities and across the county. To explore these issues, SB CAN convened a series of meetings, leading to the formation of a new coalition called Sustainable University Now (SUN).

SUN, which includes an impressive array of community and environmental organizations such as the Community Environmental Council and the Santa Barbara League of Women Voters, seeks to encourage wide community participation in reviewing and responding to the plans for UCSB’s expansion.

SUN members emphasize they do not seek to oppose the university’s future development, but rather to improve it. They urge careful scrutiny of the LDRP draft environmental impact report (EIR), which is expected to be recirculated soon.

Public celebrations all across the world and tears of joy marked the culmination of a truly amazing presidential campaign on Nov. 4.

In significant measure, the historic election of Barack Obama as the 44th president of the United States was an unprecedented grassroots effort, the kind we at SB CAN believe in and celebrate.

This grassroots effort has been at least four years in the making. In reflecting upon this momentous occasion, it's worth remembering that four years ago after the re-election of President George Bush, many of the same people who are now dancing in the streets were “mourning a sense of lost hope,” as I wrote then in a column for this newspaper.

In trying to make sense of that loss, I lamented that “maybe things have to get really, really bad” before people would realize we were heading in the wrong direction and be ready to turn things around:

Coming together on behalf of Measure A

By Deborah Brasket/Looking Forward

During an election year, when partisan politics are all the rage, it’s refreshing to have community leaders and organizations from vastly different viewpoints and political affiliations coming together to create and support an important ballot proposal: Measure A.

Without raising taxes, this measure will provide critical local funding for transportation projects, including improving and maintaining roads and highways, reducing traffic congestion, making streets safer for walking and bicycling, improving safety along rural highways, enhancing public transit and making it more affordable.

Measure A is a 30-year renewal of the current half-cent sales tax that was approved by voters in 1989 and set to expire in 2009.

Measure A is supported by all five county supervisors and every city council in the county. It is endorsed by organizations as diverse as SB CAN and COLAB, the Santa Barbara County Taxpayers Association and the League of Women Voters.

The full scoop on those oil seeps

By Deborah Brasket

Oil and gas have been seeping from the ocean floor into the sea for thousands of years, and the Santa Barbara Channel is home to one of the largest seep fields in the world.

This fact has been misused by some powerful interests, who would like to lift the offshore oil drilling ban. An industry-funded group called Stop Oil Seeps (SOS) is advocating for increased drilling off Santa Barbara’s coast, claiming this will reduce natural oil seeps harmful to the environment.

Peak oil meets global warming

By Deborah Brasket/Looking Forward

“Four Dollar Gas: Change you can believe in!” reads the caption of a recent Times cartoon. It pictures ways people are finally taking fuel conservation to heart, including switching to a smaller car, riding a bicycle or taking the bus.

The irony is that if we had made those changes 10 years ago, as many environmental experts urged, we might not be paying over $4 at the pump now, or at least we might have been better prepared for the shock of it.

 Oil production is peaking worldwide, at the same moment that global warming has emerged as the greatest environmental threat of the 21st century. This perfect storm has finally convinced the world that the time to act to avert disaster is now.

In this sense, the current crisis has positive benefits. When a major catastrophe hits any community, our gut reaction is to set aside our differences and help each other prepare for and weather the storm together.