Grease is the word
Passion and energy of dance
‘Grease’ to open to open tonight at Pioneer Valley High School - A4
State Street Ballet ends season with dances from ‘Don Quixote,’ ‘Romea and Juliet’ and more - B1
Our 166th Year
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Plaza’s next chapter Officials consider removing turf and giving De la Guerra Plaza a hardscape
Attorney general investigates ExxonMobil for plastic pollution By KAITLYN SCHALLHORN NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER
Attorney General Rob Bonta announced a first-of-its-kind investigation into fossil fuel and petrochemical industries for alleged deceptive practices regarding plastic use. And he’s starting with ExxonMobil. With ocean waves cascading behind him, the California attorney general announced his new initiative Thursday from Dockweiler Beach in Los Angeles near a Chevron refinery. He said people have been “aggressively deceived by some of the largest and most influential corporations” on plastic pollution. “In California and across the globe, we are seeing the catastrophic results of the fossil fuel industry’s decadeslong campaign of deception,” Attorney General Bonta said. “Plastic pollution is seeping into
KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS FILE PHOTO
Attorney General Ron Bonta
our waterways, poisoning our environment and blighting our landscapes.” Attorney General Bonta accused companies such as ExxonMobil of knowingly and Please see PLASTIC on A4
DAVE MASON / NEWS-PRESS
Grass has stood for nearly a century on De la Guerra Plaza, but Santa Barbara officials say it’s time for the turf to go and give the plaza a new look.
By KAITLYN SCHALLHORN NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER
Officials are beginning to come to a consensus on reimagining De la Guerra Plaza. The Historic Landmarks Commission and the De la Guerra Plaza Advisory Committee recently met to continue to lay the groundwork on specific design elements and features for the plaza adjacent to Santa Barbara City Hall. “The plaza is functioning more as a back-of-house for trash and recycling and an inadequate parking lot. But it’s not a park,” Brad Hess, Santa Barbara’s principal project manager, said. “I guarantee that when people say, ‘I’m going off to the park,’ they’re not referring to this plaza.” “We have beautiful parks in this city, but really the quest for this project and the advisory committee is to create a beautiful civic plaza that functions really well, that’s appropriate for the setting, that is historic and that can facilitate activities year-round that honestly cannot happen in the current condition and configuration of the plaza,” Mr. Hess said. “We see so much more for this space.” The idea is to flatten the plaza, making it more level and accessible to visitors. Foliage, restrooms, a pavilion and a bubbler have been suggested as elements for the plaza. “Preservation projects, when they work well, provide continuity between the past and the present,” said Dr. Anne Peterson, a member of the advisory committee and executive director of the Santa Barbara Trust for Historic Preservation. “They help bring an important historic resource into the present so it can be used again and loved again by the community. And that requires that it changes.” Although it has caused Please see PLAZA on A4
KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS
The Michael Towbes Library Plaza was fenced off Thursday. A groundbreaking ceremony will take place next week.
This is an overview of how De la Guerra Plaza would look with a hardscape.
By KAITLYN SCHALLHORN NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER
CITY OF SANTA BARBARA IMAGE
A new water feature, called a bubbler, would be in the reimagined De la Guerra Plaza, seen here with the News-Press building in the background.
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Groundbreaking on the new Michael Towbes Library Plaza will take place next week. The groundbreaking at the Santa Barbara Public Library, 40 E. Anapamu St., will commence at 11 a.m. Wednesday with light refreshments, speakers and an official shovel ceremony. The Central Library event is expected to conclude around 12:15 p.m. The Michael Towbes Library Plaza is touted as an effort to provide an attractive, accessible and safe outdoor space at the library, which can be used to expand literacy and cultural programs. It will host book, career, college and volunteer fairs; new citizen celebrations; GED graduations; and other
activities for children such as puppet shows and science experiments, according to the Santa Barbara Public Library Foundation. The plaza is a public-private partnership between the city and the Santa Barbara Public Library Foundation. Santa Barbara has contributed more than $1.6 million to the effort, the foundation said. The plaza is designed to be low-maintenance and droughttolerant, and the foundation is creating an endowment fund for care. Additionally, the library will prohibit loitering on the grounds, and the plaza will be designed to be flat and open to discourage vagrancy, according to the foundation. email: kschallhorn@newspress.com
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Santa Barbara library plaza groundbreaking set for next week
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