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S AT U R DAY, O C TOBE R 15, 2 02 2
Commissions, residents discuss State Street’s future
Westmont Downtown building dedicated Newly-established center to house school’s nursing program
Planners, others stress importance of looking beyond the street closure and dining parklets
By JARED DANIELS NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER
Friends and faculty of Westmont University came together Friday evening to dedicate a newlyestablished center that will
be the new home of Westmont Downtown/Grotenhuis Nursing Program. The center will serve as a hub for the university’s fledgling nursing program, and will also further integrate Westmont with Please see WESTMONT on A10
KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS
Students of the Westmont/Grotenhuis Nursing Program will have the opportunity to hone their skills in a realistic hospital setting within a new Westmont Downtown building dedicated on Friday.
KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS PHOTOS
As State Street Master Planner Tess Harris listens, project planner Timmy Bolton discusses the components of the plan during a joint meeting Friday of the Santa Barbara historic landmarks and planning commissions.
By DAVE MASON NEWS-PRESS MANAGING EDITOR
Think about Spain. That’s what resident Michael Bruce suggested during a twohour joint meeting of the Santa Barbara historic landmarks and planning commissions Friday as everyone looked at the big picture — a 30- to 50-years-from-now big picture — for lower State Street. Planners, members of both commissions and residents, including those involved with businesses, discussed how that big picture goes beyond lower State Street’s current closure to cars and outdoor dining parklets. That was the discussion at this stage for the State Street Master Plan. But for the moment, Mr. Bruce advised the commissions to consider a city in southern Spain that he visited. “It was only in 2002 that they decided to make one of their streets pedestrian,” Mr. Bruce said. “One thing that really impressed me was there were no curbs on the street.” And he said no one was bicycling down the street. “You got off your bike and walked your bike.” During the two-hour meeting in a packed Faulkner Gallery at the Central Library, commissioners debated questions such as whether a 30- to 50-year plan is applicable to the ever-changing nature of the retail industry. But at the start of the meeting, Tess Harris, the State Street master planner, said the plan is a visioning document covering what the next 30 to 50 years would look like for State Street. “To be successful in the long term, we need to think beyond closing the street and beyond outdoor dining. We want to think bigger. … “How can we use it (State Street) in a way that makes
downtown a place where people want to be, regardless of the activity they’re doing or the time of day it is,” Ms. Harris said. “We have created opportunities by closing the street for businesses to expand, and we want to think about how we can create a future space for businesses and the community and a space that the community wants to be a part of — not just building for what is there currently today, but what could be there in the future.” Ms. Harris said the area covered by the plan extends from Sola Street to the Highway 101 underpass and between Chapala and Anacapa streets. And Molly Pearson, a Santa Barbara resident who walks, rides a bike and drives a car, said Please see STATE STREET on A10
By KATHERINE ZEHNDER NEWS-PRESS STAFF WRITER
The Community Association for the Modoc Preserve has proposed its “Greenbelt Alignment” to save more trees from the Modoc MultiUse Path project. The debate over the proposed
FYI
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To read the full article by the CAMP, go to modocpreserve.com/theoaktober-surprise. The petition to “Save the Modoc Trees” now has more than 4,300 signatures. To sign the petition, go to www. change.org/p/save-themodoc-road-trees?utm_ source=share_petition&utm_ medium=custom_ url&recruited_by_ id=74a99e20-f65c-11ec-b7174152e9f36e45.
Richard Yates, who owns the Opal Restaurant and Bar in downtown Santa Barbara, speaks during the public comment period.
An audience packs the Faulkner Gallery at the Central Library for the two-hour meeting.
number of trees that Santa Barbara County plans to remove for the path, which users would include bicyclists, has been ongoing since July. And the debate led residents, acting together as CAMP, to collect signatures on a petition to save the trees along Modoc Road, which is in an unincorporated area outside Santa Barbara. The petition now has more than 4,300 signatures. In addition to the debate over the number of trees, residents contend that the county right of way violates the Deed of Conservation Easement of 1999, which the La Cumbre Water Co. made in favor of the Land Trust for Santa Barbara County. The county has drafted a new Mitigated Negative Declaration, which was released in September. The updated MND, among other things, has scaled back the number of trees that would be removed for the construction of the path. The Community Association for Please see MODOC on A3
Local residents and supporters living near Modoc Road in Santa Barbara protest the proposed plans to remove canary palm and eucalyptus trees along Modoc Road on Aug. 27. A petition drive to save the trees now has more than 4,300 signatures.
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Association backs alternative alignment for Modoc Multi-Use Path
KENNETH SONG / NEWS-PRESS FILE PHOTO
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CAMP proposes ‘Greenbelt Alignment’
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