The North County Roundtable, which would have been this Thursday, is cancelled.

Next month, we plan to have guest speakers on the subject of Community Choice Energy. The County and the cities of Carpinteria, Santa Barbara and Goleta have all taken actions to move ahead with forming an organization to bring local control and cleaner supplies to meet our electricity needs. It's time to get North County jurisdictions interested and on board. It's going to take a lot of advocacy, like it did in South County. 

We will get back to you on the new date for the meeting.

We invite you to participate in CAUSE's Community Town Hall meeting regarding the Santa Maria General Plan on Thursday, August 30th at 5:30 pm at the Veteran's Memorial Hall. Santa Barbara County Action Network (SBCAN) is a co-organizer of the event. We hope you will attend.

Please see the flyers below in English and Spanish and the message from CAUSE N.C. Organizer Abe Melendrez:

The North County Roundtable, which would have been this Thursday, is cancelled. The next one is scheduled for September 13.

SBCAN South County Roundtable

Friday, August 10, 2018, Noon to 1:30

Union Bank’s Board Room, 15 East Carrillo St., Santa Barbara, CA

AGENDA

 (times are approximate; feel free to bring your lunch)

1. Call to Order by Chair and SBCAN Co-President Dick Flacks.Introductions; Agenda Review (5 min.)
2. Santa Barbara City Councilmember Kristen Sneddon will speak about key city issues especially housing issues. (40 min.)
3. Joanna Kaufman & Ben Werner will present a proposal for a pilot housing initiative called the “Commons Collaborative.” (10 min.)
4. Alena Simon will report on Food & Water Watch Activities. (5 min.)
5. Proposal to Restart Offshore Oil Production and Transport Crude Oil by Truck. (5 min.)
6. Sharon Rose will report on the Mobile Homeowners Project. (5 min.)
7. Brief updates from participants. (2 to 5 min. each)
8. Open discussion about other items of interest. All (5 min.)
9. Next meeting. Our next meeting is scheduled for September 14. 

Please join us at one of our roundtables - Thursday in Santa Maria or Friday in Santa Barbara --

SBCAN North County Roundtable

Thursday, July 12, 2018, 6:00 PM to 7:30 PM

Rabobank Conference Room, Battles and South Broadway, Santa Maria

AGENDA

1. Call to Order: Co-president Janet Blevins. Introductions; Agenda Review (5 min.)
2. Community Choice Energy. On Tuesday, July 17 the Board of Supervisors will be receiving an updated report on the efficacy of Community Choice Energy (CCE) participation for Santa Barbara County (and participating cities). The report states that all scenarios will be cost competitive with the Independent Owned Utilities, and that the participation of North County entities, particularly the City of Santa Maria, will improve the overall prospectus for all potential participants. This is a significantly different finding than the earlier study that evaluated CCE for a tri-county area. (15 min.)
3. Discussion of Santa Barbara County Supervisorial Redistricting Proposals. (10 min.)
4. Status of 750+ Unconventional Oil Wells Proposed for Cat Canyon. ERG’s DEIR is available; a second workshop to comment to staff on the adequacy of the DEIR is scheduled for July 17. Aera Energy’s DEIR is expected soon. PetroRock’s scoping hearing was held recently. (20 min.)
5. Santa Barbara County-Wide Integrated Stormwater Resource Plan.SBCAN submitted some project ideas. The County is holding a stakeholder meeting to solicit comments on the draft plan on July 19 at 5:30 P.M. in Santa Barbara. SBCAN staff will report on the matter. (10 min.)
6. Open Streets Event in Santa Maria. October 21 is the target date.  Staff will attend the monthly planning meeting on July 11 and will provide the latest updates.  (5 min.)
7. Strauss Wind Energy Project. The wind energy project near Lompoc surfaces again. A scoping meeting is to be held on July 19 at 6 PM in Lompoc’s City Council chambers. (5 min.)
8. Report on July 11 Scoping Meeting for Exxon Trucking Proposal. (5 min.)
9. Brief updates from participants. (2 to 5 min. each)
10. Open discussion aboutvother items of interest. All (5 min.)
11. Next meeting. Our next meeting is scheduled for August 9.

    ---

One of the biggest issues for SBCAN right now is the prospect of more than 760 oil wells being drilled in Cat Canyon by three companies, all of them penetrating and putting at risk the Santa Maria Valley Groundwater Basin. They all propose to use risky thermal-drilling techniques that have high rates of well-casing failures, leading to contamination of groundwater. This aquifer provides drinking water for 200,000 people and irrigation for over 50,000 acres of farmland.  If approved, these three projects would triple the amount of on-shore oil production in our county. 

The first of the three proposals is ERG’s.  A Draft EIR is published and is available here: http://sbcountyplanning.org/energy/projects/WCC_DEIR.asp. (Our Firefox browser did not display content correctly. Safari worked fine. Perhaps other browsers will be fine also.) Comments are due by August 3, 2018.

The first of two public workshops, at which County staff will take comments about the adequacy of the DEIR, is being held Monday, June 25 at 6 PM at the Betteravia Government Center, 511 E. Lakeside Parkway, in Santa Maria. A second one is scheduled on July 17 at 3 PM in Santa Barbara.

Food & Water Watch has organized an informational meeting about these three proposed projects. The meeting is in Santa Barbara tomorrow (Sunday, June 24) at 3 PM.  SBCAN and other organizations are co-sponsoring. Here is the information: https://secure.foodandwaterwatch.org/act/stop-new-wells-santa-barbara-county?ms=dist_re_06212018_SB-public-forum&oms=dist_re_06212018_SB-public-forum 

Please help us oppose these dangerous proposals. Check out SBCAN’s maps showing the relationship of past, current, and proposed oil and gas wells to the Santa Maria Valley Groundwater Basin; find them at http://www.sbcan.org/issues_maps.

Thank you to everyone who came to our 2018 North County “Looking Forward” Awards Dinner & Fundraiser held Sunday, June 3 at  the Radisson Hotel in Santa Maria.

We especially thank our sponsors, entertainers, volunteers, honorees and all of you who brought your loving sentiments to celebrate with us. 

For some of you, this will be your first email from us. If you would not like to receive further emails, please unsubscribe at the bottom of this page. If you would like to become involved with us, we'll email you when we have events and issues coming up. You can also check out our websiteand our Facebook page for more information.

We've posted event photos on Facebook. Click here to see them: https://www.facebook.com/pg/SBCANORG/photos/?tab=album&album_id=10156303790180833

There is also an article in the Santa Maria Times: https://santamariatimes.com/news/local/santa-barbara-county-action-network-honors-volunteers/article_3d3204a8-3ca4-5627-b6a2-0cba1229875e.html

We'd appreciate your feedback. Tell us what you liked about the event. Tell us what we might do differently next time. Email us at [email protected].

Thanks again. We hope to see you soon!

Ken Hough, Executive Director

Jeanne Sparks, Associate Director

Six individuals received awards from Santa Barbara County Action Network during its awards dinner on Sunday. From left to right, they are Ines Ruiz, Virginia Souza, Elsa Velasco, Pati Cantú, Herb Kandel and Steve Heuring.

From left to right, Nai-Yun Chang, Gerrit Sperling, Will Sperling and Quentin Karamitsos perform “Wagon Wheel” for Virginia Souza as she received the “Looking Forward” Award from Santa Barbara County Action Network during its awards dinner on June 3.

The Santa Barbara County Action Network Board of Directors voted to support Proposition 68 and oppose Proposition 70. The propositions are on the ballot on Tuesday, June 5, 2018. Polls are open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. 

Click on the graphics below to call up those pages on the Secretary of State's site: http://sos.ca.gov