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New Santa Cruz company SH Theatrical makes an impressive debut with Tom Stoppard’s “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead,” a smart, well-acted and laugh-out-loud production led by Zed Warner, Chris Salem and Ward Willats.

The post Existential crisis has never been this funny: SH Theatrical takes on Stoppard appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

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Like most Santa Cruzans, when I saw the plans submitted to the city for the Ace Hardware shopping center at Soquel and Seabright avenues, my reaction was instant: I hate it. 

If elected mayor, I will fight this proposal with every legal tool available.

The developer, Workbench, filed two concepts: a six-story building with either 173 senior residences or 281 affordable apartments, plus 5,000 square feet of commercial space. The city says the Soviet-looking renderings are preliminary, not a finished design. 

Good. Now is the time to say the massing and nearly everything about this project is wrong.

The proposal is several stories too tall for this neighborhood. The drawings show a structure pushed to the sidewalk, with no meaningful setback. One concept provides a mere 23 parking spaces for hundreds of residents and businesses. Pretending that nearly everyone will live car-free does not make cars disappear; it punishes residents and pushes them onto nearby streets, which in turn impacts residents and businesses in the neighborhood.

ELECTION 2026: Read more Lookout news and Community Voices opinion coverage of the race for Santa Cruz mayor

Even worse, the project would demolish an active and vibrant neighborhood center. The Bagelry, Ace Hardware, Akira, Real Thai Kitchen, Surecuts, Fog City Tattoo, CleanStyle Laundry Lounge and other businesses provide needed services, jobs, tax revenue and gathering places. They make the neighborhood walkable and unique. They give us character. Moving a small business is expensive and risky. Many businesses never reopen.

We desperately need affordable housing. But affordability cannot be a blank check for bad planning. If we destroy places that provide jobs, services and character, we have not created a healthy neighborhood or city. 

Santa Cruz is actually doing its part to address the housing crisis. We’ve earned some room to slow down, listen more to the community and get the next projects right.

California housing regulators require Santa Cruz to plan for 3,736 new homes through 2031 – nearly five times our previous allocation. Yet a CalMatters analysis shows Santa Cruz is permitting housing faster than the overall pace needed. We are at 197% of the required pace for very-low-income homes and 248% for low-income homes. Statewide, only 5.9% and 13.4% of jurisdictions are even on track in those categories.

To meet our allocation, I believe most large-scale development should be located downtown. Developments should be shorter than our tallest existing building – the Palomar – and well-designed. Underused parcels and surface parking lots should be the priority for development.

Downtown is walkable and close to jobs, transit, shopping and services. It can support more residents without forcing six-story monstrosities into Santa Cruz’s neighborhoods.

Outside of our city center, we should welcome well-designed, at-scale housing projects – including “granny” units and modest multifamily buildings – that fit their surroundings, provide reasonable setbacks and parking and minimize displacement.

One of the most important things we can do is join with other communities with a university to push Sacramento to count new UC Santa Cruz housing toward our allocation. Because UCSC housing doesn’t currently count, our community is being doubly impacted by its growth plus our state mandates. 

We also must require UCSC to build housing on campus before it adds more students. 

None of these changes will be easy. Since 2017, Sacramento has enacted 209 housing laws, taking away local power and discretion. Santa Cruz needs a mayor with experience navigating complicated state statutes and regulations – and who knows how to turn the authority we still possess into results.

State law has narrowed the city’s authority, but it hasn’t erased it. Santa Cruz can use regulatory power and incentives. When necessary, we should go to court. The next mayor’s job is to find every remaining point of leverage and use it to benefit our community.

I have experience doing exactly that. I’ve worked to bring disaster resources and relief from the state and federal government to our community, as well as hundreds of millions in grants for water, roads and bike routes. Over the years, I’ve successfully pushed back against policies that would harm minority communities, small businesses and nonprofits.

After public outcry over the Seabright project, my opponent, Ami Chen Mills, now says she opposes it. I welcome that. But her views on housing policy, as detailed by Santa Cruz Local, would increase development pressure on smaller neighborhoods while de-emphasizing new projects downtown. In a Facebook post from July 10, Chen Mills wrote that her housing policy is that Santa Cruz should “spread new housing throughout the city.”

It’s far past time to address the constant development pressure that is negatively impacting small neighborhood business districts, where height, traffic and parking impacts are hardest to absorb.

Santa Cruz mayoral candidate Ryan Coonerty. Credit: Kevin Painchaud / Lookout Santa Cruz

The choice is not between building housing and preserving Santa Cruz. The question is whether we grow according to a coherent plan that protects neighborhoods or scatter oversized projects across the city and fight over them one neighborhood at a time.

I support housing – especially affordable housing for local working people, seniors and families. Residents also deserve a city that protects local businesses, respects the neighborhood scale, and builds beautiful places that people will value for generations.

The Seabright project and several others proposed or being built on Mission Street, Water Street and Soquel Avenue fail that test. Santa Cruz can build the housing we need without losing the character and small businesses that make us special.

Ryan Coonerty is a candidate for mayor of Santa Cruz. He is a Santa Cruz High graduate and former county supervisor. 

The post Time’s up: Constant development pressure on Santa Cruz’s neighborhoods must be addressed appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

A strong reentry plan after time spent in jail can disintegrate over something as small as a phone, a bus ride or a $75 fee, writes Heather Rogers, Santa Cruz County’s public defender. She and her staff of 64 attorneys regularly solve complex problems, but public dollars often can’t cover these immediate, practical needs. That is why she has helped co-found the BRIDGE Foundation, a nonprofit designed to fill gaps in the system and help people overcome small barriers – like access to transportation or fees for an addiction program – that can keep them stuck in the criminal legal system. The BRIDGE Foundation is launching with a fundraiser Thursday in collaboration with the Homeless Garden Project.

The post What if $75 could help someone leave the criminal legal system? appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

Furthur, the bus made famous in the 1960s by Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters, is leaving the Oregon farm where it has sat for the past 57 years and heading to San Francisco, where it will go on display as part of the Haight Street Art Center’s “Forever Grateful” celebration of the Grateful Dead next month.

The post After almost six decades on the farm, Ken Kesey’s Furthur bus leaves Oregon appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

Feb. 28, 1942 – July 28, 2026

Watsonville, CA

Victor E. Rugh III, age 84, of Elgin, Illinois, passed on to his eternal home on July 28, 2026. He was born on Feb. 28, 1942 to his parents, Victor E. Rugh II and Geneva (Booth) Rugh. Vic lived in the Watsonville area from 1954-1958, attending E.A. Hall and Watsonville High. He graduated from Lawrence High School, Lawrence, Kansas in 1959, after which he worked in broadcast engineering and took music classes at the University of Kansas. He enlisted in the U.S. Navy, 1964-1968 serving as a linguist, then returned to work in radio. After completing a degree in computers at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire in 1985, he worked as a computer programmer/analyst with Underwriter Laboratories in Northbrook, Illinois, retiring in 2004. Music and family were Vic’s greatest loves. He loved his children, Victor E. Rugh IV (Tory) from his first marriage, and Jessica, Katie, Sarah and Molly from his second, and he shared his love of music with all five of them. He was preceded in death by his parents and his brothers-in-law Bill Davidson and Craig George. He is survived by his children and their spouses, twenty grandchildren, two great-grandchildren and his sisters Sandra Davidson, Karla Hancock and Dana George.

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Nov. 14, 1941 – July 20, 2026

Aptos, CA

Donna Gale Crane-Bailey, 84, of Aptos, California, passed away after a long struggle with cancer on July 20, 2026. She was born on November 14, 1941, in Bend, OR. Donna was an instrument-rated private pilot who called Watsonville, CA her home base, flying since 1989 with more than 2,000 hours of flight time. She was very active in the local aviation community and was a longtime member of The Ninety-Nines, an international women pilots’ organization. Donna is survived by her husband, Delbert D. Bailey; her daughter, Megan Bailey-Jacques; stepson, Tristan Bailey; her grandchildren Abigale Jacques, Emma Jacques and Nicholas Jacques; her brothers Steven Crane and Douglas Crane; and many nieces and nephews.

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Jan. 31, 1944 – July 20, 2026

Aptos, CA

Suzanne Theriot-Large passed away at age 82 on July 20, 2026, at Dominican Hospital in Santa Cruz, California. She was born January 31, 1944, in Los Angeles. In 1958, Suzanne moved with her family to an apple ranch in Aptos, and graduated from Watsonville High School in 1962. She had a beautiful voice and loved to sing, performing in high school and Cabrillo College musicals. Suzanne was married in 1966 to Roger Large, who died in 2000, and with him she has a daughter, Mara, and a son, David, who both survive her, along with two granddaughters.

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A teenage lifeguard and the boy he rescued off Seabright State Beach in Santa Cruz were reunited Monday at the White House as President Donald Trump honored both as heroes.

The post Santa Cruz teen lifeguard and boy he rescued are honored at White House after Trump saw dramatic viral video appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

A Santa Cruz County Superior Court judge agreed Monday to seal an earlier juvenile protective order against a local teen now facing murder charges for the stabbing of a 73-year-old woman outside Capitola Mall.

Tyler Leibelt, 19, has been charged with murder, along with enhancements for using a deadly weapon and lying in wait. As of Monday afternoon, he was being held without bail in Santa Cruz County Jail.

Investigators say he chose his victim, Rachell Sue Summers, at random. She managed Art of Santa Cruz gallery in Capitola Mall and had recently become a grandmother for the first time. 

Leibelt was arrested on July 20 after calling police shortly after the crime. He reportedly did so to confess.

public defenders Lisa McCamey and Ariana Alejandre filed the defense request to seal last week, stating a Nov. 7 firearms restraining order contained “highly prejudicial information … not intended for public consumption,” which would influence potential jurors against their client.

The Gun Violence Emergency Protective Order listed a previous alleged crime that had been winding its way through juvenile court, records show. The case was dismissed earlier this year. The reason is unclear.

Assistant County Counsel Yesenia Cardona-Muller filed response stating she did not oppose the defense request on Friday, on behalf of the Sheriff’s Office. 

It’s unclear how long the sealing of the document will take, but Monday morning it was still available for public viewing at court. The allegation was reported by at least one area news outlet, Salinas-based KSBW television station, per defense attorneys.

Leibelt was residing in a sober living home not far from Seabright Avenue in Santa Cruz when arrested. Earlier, he had been a student at San Lorenzo Valley High School.

On Monday, the 6-foot teen sat quietly in the courtroom’s bailiff-guarded section for those in custody, with other men wearing orange jail clothing. He appeared to be paying very close attention, his mouth slightly open, eyes moving to take it all in. Moments later, he nodded as his attorneys flanked him, talking quietly. He was escorted out by 9am.

The November protective order had been prepared by the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office and granted by Superior Court Judge Nancy de la Pena. It also stated Leibelt had, more than once, expressed a desire to kill people.

He is due back Wednesday for his third arraignment. Photos, videos and recordings by news organizations were ruled out last month, after the defense prevailed in challenging them, again citing potential prejudice to their client.

Judge Gary Paden presided over Monday’s hearing.

Outside court, McCamey declined to comment, but told reporters she is not ready to consider an plea of not guilty by reason of insanity.

Aptos resident Jennifer Schacher has withdrawn her candidacy for the Trustee Area 5 seat on the Pajaro Valley Unified School District Board of Trustees.

In an emailed statement, Schacher said family obligations contributed to her decision.

“This was not an easy decision, but at this time, my family needs my full attention, and I believe that is where I need to focus,” she said.

Schacher served on the board from 2018-22, when she lost her reelection bid to Olivia Flores.

“I am proud of the work I have done in our community and of the accomplishments that led me to consider serving on the School Board in the first place,” she said. “As a mother, educator, and businesswoman, I have worked to advocate for children, families, and our local schools, and I am grateful for the many conversations and relationships built throughout this campaign.”

Schacher thanked those who supported her candidacy.

“I remain deeply committed to our children and our community, and look forward to continuing to serve in ways that allow me to put my family first,” she said.

Schacher’s withdrawal leaves two candidates vying for the seat.

Alicia Jimenez worked for PVUSD from 2001-25, serving as executive assistant to the superintendent, the district’s public information officer and Community Schools Leadership Coordinator.

Jimenez will face Curt Wilcox.

The Pajaronian has attempted to reach Wilcox, but an email sent to the email address listed for him on votescount.com was returned as undeliverable.

Little information about Wilcox is available online, and he has not listed a campaign website.

This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for its newsletter here.

Farmworkers, their loved ones and advocates lined up out the door of a California state legislative hearing room last week to urge elected officials to hold pesticide regulators accountable for failing to protect their communities from life-threatening chemicals. 

Women spoke of being sprayed while working next to fields treated by crop dusters and seeing coworkers caught in drifting pesticide clouds. They spoke of suffering from asthma and liver disease and watching family members die of cancer. They spoke of being exposed to pesticides while pregnant, having children born prematurely, with birth defects, autism, ADHD or other neurodevelopmental problems.

Children of farmworkers described working alongside their parents at age 11, sometimes with even younger kids, to help their families afford food and pay bills.

The details of their challenges differed but converged on a common refrain: California’s pesticide regulatory system is broken. 

PESTICIDES IN THE PAJARO VALLEY: Read Lookout’s news and Community Voices opinion coverage here

California pesticide regulators allow growers to use nearly three dozen chemicals that are not approved for use due to health concerns in scores of countries around the world, including nations in the European Union, Asia, Africa and Latin America. They have been “re-evaluating” the fumigant chloropicrin since 2001 after monitors indicated that air levels beyond treated fields and greenhouses could exceed safety thresholds. 

Chloropicrin, an industrial chemical so noxious it was deployed as a choking agent during World War I, is banned in more than 40 countries, but agricultural applications of the chemical were implicated in more than 1,000 pesticide-related illnesses in California between 2000 and 2015, according to a 2019 study in the journal Environmental Health.

California growers applied more than 49 million pounds of chemicals banned in other countries in 2023, the most recent publicly available data shows, including more than 8.5 million pounds of chloropicrin and more than 7 million pounds of the cancer-causing fumigant 1,3-dichloropropene, which is banned in 40 countries. 

The disconnect between California’s reputation as an environmental leader and its willingness to rely on pesticides many other countries reject as health threats has not gone unnoticed by the assemblymember who chaired the Aug. 11 hearing.

“We’re here today to learn about our state’s pesticide program and hear how the Department of Pesticide Regulation, or DPR as we’ll be calling it, tackles its mission of ensuring that pesticide use doesn’t come at the cost of human health or the environment,” said Assemblymember Damon Connolly, chair of the Assembly Environmental Safety and Toxic Materials Committee, which held the Joint Oversight Hearing with Senate Environmental Quality Committee Chair Sen. Catherine Blakespear.

California Assemblymember Damon Connolly (D-San Rafael) chaired a joint oversight hearing on the Department of Pesticide Regulation called “Putting Public Protection First: Is California’s Pesticide Program Achieving Its Purpose?” Credit: Liza Gross / Inside Climate News

When the Legislature passed Assembly Bill 2113, it increased funding for the Department of Pesticide Regulation and initiated a process to prioritize and expedite safer products and implement a sustainable pest management program (SPM).

“It’s been two years since A.B. 2113’s enactment, three years since the state released the SPM roadmap and nearly a decade since the last oversight hearing on DPR,” he said. “Now is a great time to review the state’s pesticide program.”

Disproportionate burdens

DPR rarely removes even the most dangerous chemicals from the market because the lion’s share of its budget comes from fees on pesticide sales, panelists and residents of some of the state’s most productive farming regions told legislators. As a result, they said, California’s predominantly Latino and Indigenous agricultural communities are shouldering the burden of the $60 billion agricultural industry’s heavy reliance on toxic chemicals. 

Earlier this week, DPR announced that manufacturers of pesticides containing the weed killer paraquat-dichloride voluntarily withdrew their products’ registration. The agency noted associations between paraquat exposure and impacts and birth defects but ignored the growing body of evidence linking the herbicide to Parkinson’s disease. 

Angel Garcia, co-director of the nonprofit Californians for Pesticide Reform, testified that while he welcomed DPR’s announcement of paraquat’s voluntary cancellation, the European Union banned it almost 20 years ago. Garcia also expressed concern that existing stocks could still be used for two more years, citing paraquat’s links to acute poisonings and long-term neurological damage.

Garcia and other policy experts, health professionals and scientists called on regulators to phase out the most toxic pesticides, transition to safer alternatives, identify heightened risks from cumulative exposures and inform residents exactly where growers intend to apply dangerous chemicals so they can protect themselves and their children. 

“Exposure to pesticides is universal, and it begins before birth,” said physician and environmental epidemiologist Ana María Mora, referring to what she and her colleagues at the UC Berkeley Center for Environmental Research and Community Health found in studies of mothers and children in the Salinas Valley.

The team found pesticide breakdown products in the urine of every pregnant woman at much higher levels than the U.S. average in the CHAMACOS study, which enrolled more than 900 mothers and children in one of the longest-running studies investigating pesticides’ effects on children’s health. They detected the chemicals in 97% of breastmilk samples and in nearly all dust collected from participants’ homes.

A sign at a Watsonville strawberry field warns of pesticide use. Credit: Liza Gross / Inside Climate News

Mothers with higher exposures during pregnancy bore children with poor working memory by age 12, more traits associated with autism by age 14, poorer lung function and signs of cardiovascular and metabolic disease as young adults. 

And the people who are suffering most from these harmful effects are primarily low-income, Spanish-speaking immigrants, Mora said. 

Compared with the residents of 25 California counties with the lowest proportion of Latino residents, people living in 11 counties with majority Latino populations were four times more likely to suffer an acute pesticide-related illness, said Jacob Sandoval of the League of United Latin American Citizens at a news conference before the hearing.

“These are people who are experiencing and suffering because of these pesticides,” Sandoval said. “They are farmworkers going to work every day to provide for their families. They are parents worried that their children may be exposed by playing outside.”

Social stresses can exacerbate these harmful health effects, Mora said, pointing to an analysis showing that prenatal exposure to organophosphate pesticides like the insecticide malathion was associated with lower IQs in children facing challenges at home.

“Pesticides and social stress are like a double burden,” Mora said. “And they fall hardest on the children who can least afford them.”

Cumulative impacts

Legislators also heard from representatives of regulated industries, including manufacturers of consumer and commercial pesticide products, agricultural associations, pest management professionals and small farmers. They raised concerns that the state’s additional layer of scientific review can delay access to safer, more targeted tools for years, leaving businesses and farmers in California at a competitive disadvantage with those in other states.

“Before any insect repellent, disinfectant, or pet flea product reaches a California store shelf, it has already undergone months, often years, of scientific evaluation at the federal level,” said Christopher Finarelli on behalf of the Household and Commercial Products Association. As a result, he said, manufacturers can’t make reliable plans to introduce new products in California.

“Delayed access means delayed environmental and public health benefits too, and unfortunately, the challenges are only going to become even more complex,” said Taylor Triffo, legislative affairs director for the influential lobbying firm Kahn, Soares & Conway. 

Community members who flocked to the Capitol from nearly every major agricultural region in the state want to see DPR act faster, but only if it means getting safer products on the market and banning the most dangerous chemicals.

A farmworker in a Watsonville field. Credit: Kevin Painchaud / Lookout Santa Cruz

Mora and several other experts emphasized that protecting workers and communities depends on evaluating cumulative exposures to these chemicals.

“We should evaluate these chemicals as classes, but also as mixtures,” Mora said. “Not one molecule at a time.” 

California law requires pesticide regulators and county agricultural commissioners to consider the cumulative impacts of pesticide use, said Timothy Malloy, emeritus law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. While DPR has ample information to identify and prioritize the most harmful cumulative exposures, he said, “it’s not doing that except in very limited circumstances.”

“Our people are dying”

At the hearing, DPR’s director, Karen Morrison, said she was “mindful” of community concerns and aimed to demonstrate how the department’s coordinated efforts and recent updates safeguard human health and the environment.

“Effective pest management is critical to protect the health of our urban and rural communities and the environment, provide stability to California’s healthy food supply, and to protect critical infrastructure,” Morrison said.

She said existing resources had limited her agency’s ability to implement sustainable pest management goals but that new investments authorized by A.B. 2113 would allow the agency to “expand the efficiencies, urgency and transparency of our work.”

That transparency does not include telling families exactly where dangerous pesticides are going to be sprayed near homes, schools, playgrounds and other places where children may be at risk. It doesn’t include clear information about how the state coordinates enforcement with county agricultural commissioners to ensure they respond to pesticide drift incidents, levy adequate fines for violations and enforce buffer zones consistently across California.

Democratic Assemblymember Nick Schultz, who authored a bill to phase out pesticides containing toxic PFAS “forever chemicals,” noted that DPR had identified paraquat as a pesticide of “high concern” in 2011, then only started to review its safety after the Legislature passed a bill two years ago that required it to do so. 

Schultz wanted the public to know that DPR requested registrants to submit scientific data by June 2026 to address newly identified gaps in DPR’s human health toxicology database, among other requirements. 

“Rather than submit the data to the department as requested, the manufacturers began voluntarily canceling registration of paraquat pesticide products in California,” he said. “I do think we should all be incredibly troubled that some of these folks in industry would not provide the data that’s requested and rather take the product off the market.”

Morrison said she was “very mindful” of the practice.

Garcia of Californians for Pesticide Reform urged Connolly and his colleagues to address what he called DPR’s structural conflicts of interest. He recommended higher fees on sales of the most toxic pesticides and reforming a policy that allows pest-control advisors to receive commissions on pesticide sales.

“As long as DPR’s budget depends on pesticide sales, as long as we refuse to account for the true cost to people and the environment and as long as we tolerate conflicted pest management advice, California will remain dangerously behind the curve,” he said.

At the news conference before the hearing, legendary farmworker activist Dolores Huerta joined the families urging the DPR to get rid of cancer-causing pesticides.

“In normal life if you gave somebody poison and they died, it would be called murder,” Huerta said. 

“Let’s get rid of some of these poisonous pesticides,” she said. “Our people are dying.”

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The post California pesticide agency hopelessly captured by industry, critics charge appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

The Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office says UC Santa Cruz student Alli Singh, 19, was killed after the car she and another person were in crashed into the ocean off of West Cliff Drive at Steamer Lane in Santa Cruz last Thursday morning. 

Singh was originally from Selma, in Fresno County, and was living in Santa Cruz as she was about to start her third year as a psychology major at the university. She was a John R. Lewis College affiliate, according to UCSC officials.  

Last week, UC Santa Cruz spokesperson Scott Hernandez-Jason said in a statement that the university was “heartbroken” to learn that the victim was a UCSC student. 

“Our deepest condolences go out to the student’s family and friends during this difficult time,” he said. “We are providing support resources to those affected by this tragedy.”

Last Thursday at around 12:50 a.m., Santa Cruz Regional 911 received a call and units from several agencies responded. Rescue crews found one victim who escaped from the car and said Singh was still inside. Rescue swimmers extracted her from the car and she was transported to a medical facility where she passed away. The first victim sustained minor injuries.

Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here.

The post UC Santa Cruz student who died in West Cliff Drive crash identified as 19-year-old Alli Singh appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

This post is updated throughout the day to reflect the latest incidents. It was last updated at 7:01 a.m..

Here’s what’s happening on the roads this morning…

▼︎ new incidents

Road incidents as of 7 a.m. on August 17

• There is one-way traffic on Highway 9 at Cascade Avenue in San Lorenzo Valley because of ongoing work. This closure will last until 7:01 a.m. on August 31.
   
• Alternating lanes are closed on Highway 9 at Riverdale Park in San Lorenzo Valley because of bridge work. The closure is expected to last until 6:59 a.m. on April 30, 2027.
   

Disclosure: Traffic incidents are partially generated by artificial intelligence. We are constantly working to improve the accuracy and quality of our AI-generated content. However, there may still be errors or inaccuracies. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact us.

The post Monday morning traffic: Highway 9 lane closures in San Lorenzo Valley appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

A new survey will help city staff create a design guide for developers in Santa Cruz that may include suggestions for building materials, shapes and landscaping. (Contributed)

Santa Cruz design standards survey

• Take the survey in English.
• Toma la encuesta en español.
• For questions or to give more feedback, email ajayewardene@santacruzca.gov.

SANTA CRUZ >> As developers continue to propose and build large-scale housing in Santa Cruz at a rate faster than prior decades, city staff are planning to nudge them towards designs that people don’t hate.

What does that mean, exactly? A city survey open now aims to find out.

The survey will help staff create a design guide for developers that may include suggestions for building materials, shapes and landscaping. Those guidelines, however, will be entirely voluntary. State law prohibits any design standards not considered objective, and restricts many changes that could reduce the number of new homes built.  

State laws have severely curtailed local leaders’ ability to change, downsize or block new housing developments. Instead, developers who adhere to the design guidelines could receive faster review or approval. 

The survey also asks for feedback on strategies to transition between single-family neighborhoods and newly-upzoned lots on major corridors like Mission St., which could host buildings with five or more stories. Options presented include incorporating more landscaping, including community spaces in new developments, and upzoning some surrounding lots to provide moderately-dense “missing middle” housing like triplexes and quadplexes.

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In March, the Santa Cruz City Council created an ad-hoc committee with Vice Mayor Shebreh Kalantari-Johnson and council members Susie O’Hara and Scott Newsome to coordinate with city staff about the guide. A draft guide would be considered by the city council before approval.

The survey is open through August.

Questions or comments? Email info@santacruzlocal.org. Santa Cruz Local is supported by members, major donors, sponsors and grants for the general support of our newsroom. Our news judgments are made independently and not on the basis of donor support. Learn more about Santa Cruz Local and how we are funded.

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The post As big buildings come to Santa Cruz, leaders want suggestions to make them less ugly appeared first on Santa Cruz Local.

Santa Cruz has approved a $150,000 contract with the Davey Tree Expert Company for a new lidar-based inventory of its public trees, part of a broader push to grow the city’s urban forest to 3,000 more trees by 2030.

Santa Cruz’s Transportation and Public Works Commission will review the city’s road safety action plan at its Monday meeting. Staff are recommending that the commission request that the city council approve the plan, pursue speed limit reductions on certain streets and establish a road safety task force.

This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for its newsletters.

Even on chilly January days in years past, it was possible to see and hear more than 100 kinds of birds at the Vierra Wetlands in the San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuge. But last winter, dozens of species like the snowy egret, northern shoveler and the strikingly colorful wood duck did not appear. 

The seasonal wetlands, which are part of a larger pit stop for migratory birds on the Pacific Flyway, were nearly bone dry — and not because of a drought. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service simply didn’t have enough employees dedicated to opening the levees that flood the wetlands.

It’s a reality playing across many of the national wildlife refuges in the country, including the 35 in California. Labor shortages at the federal government’s various land management agencies — which have intensified in President Donald Trump’s second term — have left departments with less capacity to manage the refuges. 

What’s left at Vierra Wetlands are dried up cattails and bulrushes standing on a landscape that was once teeming with waterfowl, shorebirds, beavers and other wildlife. And while the wetlands occupy only about 50 acres of the 7,500-acre refuge, the dearth of staffing means there is no on-site refuge manager to readily ensure the land is well-maintained and safe for visitors, organize educational programs for the public, approve permits or monitor habitats for the refuge’s myriad of species.

“For an agency that already cut the fat … it’s not even at the bone now,” said Desirée Sorenson-Groves, the president of the National Wildlife Refuge Association, an advocacy organization. “It’s just lopping off limbs.”

‘Humans have to take care of the wetlands’

Eric Hopson had hoped the federal wildlife agency would hire his replacement shortly after he left his post in Central California. 

The 64-year-old retired in April 2024 after 30 years of service — 23 of which were devoted to stewarding the San Joaquin River refuge, west of Modesto. 

Unlike coastal counties where state and regional parks are abundant, the refuge serves as a rare open space in the Northern San Joaquin Valley. It also functions as part of California’s vast network of public lands, which overall provide food and sanctuary for countless animals and plants, and protect sensitive habitats and clean drinking water from urban development.

Besides interacting with the public like birders and families, Hopson’s favorite part of the job was managing the refuge’s habitats. This entailed diverting runoff water in coordination with adjacent farms, or from Hospital Creek and Ingram Creek. The process mimicked the terrain’s natural water cycles by “flooding up” the wetland basin in time for fall migration during September or October. When spring arrived, Hopson would draw down the water or, in most cases, let the water recede on its own.

“Our rivers and wetlands are very altered,” said Hopson. “For that reason, they don’t take care of themselves anymore. So for better or worse, we humans have to take care of the wetlands.” 

His threadbare staff included just him and one other equipment worker who drove tractors to clear trails, installed pipes for water control and generally served as a jack-of-all-trades. 

But a year after his colleague retired, Hopson decided he should take his leave too. 

“My time was up,” he said.

The department didn’t immediately hire a successor, which wasn’t so unusual given it was already understaffed. But seven months later, Trump won reelection. 

‘Legs cut out from under them’

By the time Hopson retired, the country’s wildlife refuge system had already been plagued by a decadeslong staffing shortage that persisted through the Obama and Biden administrations. From 2010 to 2025, national wildlife refuges lost 30% of their staff, according to the National Wildlife Refuge Association. More than half of refuges have zero staff on site — a statistic San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuge became a part of when Hopson left.

“It’s crucial that we have people in those roles to support those ecosystems,” said Matthew Hutchinson, an assistant professor at UC Merced’s life and environmental sciences department, referring to refuge managers.

“The planning they have to do to make sure the water is in the right place, at the right time, at the right depth and for the right amount of time is really crucial to the success of these ecosystems. … There is a lot of care for the landscape that goes into this work.”

At the start of Trump’s second term, he issued an executive order creating the Department of Government Efficiency within the White House. He tapped tech billionaire Elon Musk to lead a sweeping campaign that they professed would eliminate government waste and fraud. Before it shut down in July, DOGE careened through various federal agencies with little to no oversight, slashing staff, rescinding grants and rolling back initiatives that promoted diversity.

Though some federal workers have been reinstated, one recent estimate citing federal data found that DOGE gutted about 350,000 federal jobs. Between 2024 to the end of May 2025, staff at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service dropped from 9,957 to 8,179, or 18%, according to the Center for Biological Diversity, a nonprofit advocacy group for endangered species. Policy watchdog groups reported that DOGE hit California the hardest second to Colorado in total public land agencies’ job losses, cutting 14% of staff throughout nine agencies.

“The second Trump administration and DOGE accelerated any preexisting challenges through their hiring freezes, their massive workforce reductions and all the restructuring across many federal agencies,” said Mary Lunetta, a national conservation strategist at the Sierra Club.

“It left fewer people to maintain everything from mountain trails and campgrounds, to doing critical scientific research and restoration of habitats, issuing permits and fighting invasive species.” 

A poll released Thursday by the conservation advocacy group Power in Nature found that nearly 70% of California voters surveyed, from both sides of the aisle, want their congressmember to support a bill prohibiting further cuts to park and public lands staff.

Hopson doesn’t blame Trump for the department’s workforce shortage, but the situation “just keeps getting worse and worse.” DOGE “got rid of all the temporary and up-and-coming young staff” that did not have protective job status, he said.

“These young biologists, these young refuge managers … the younger staff that are the hope for the future and they had their legs cut out from under them.”

‘Back to what it was’

The refuge receives support from staff at the San Luis National Wildlife Refuge Complex office in Merced County, said the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which is about an hour drive away. 

It’s not enough to provide the same level of oversight and service as before, said people who use the refuge. In addition to the manual flooding, Hopson prepared special-use permits. These included ones that, for years, allowed the Stanislaus Audubon Society access to count heron rookeries, survey nests and take the public along trails that aren’t typically open, said Sal Salerno of Modesto, the birding group’s president.

With Hopson’s departure though, “this year we haven’t done it,” said Salerno. “We just can’t do any of those activities. It’s very frustrating to want to volunteer and help count the birds.” 

A partial view of the Vierra wetlands in the San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuge in Vernalis. Credit: Lynn La / CalMatters

The federal wildlife service did not comment on why the Vierra Wetlands appeared unflooded last winter. After CalMatters’ inquiry, the department said it plans to flood the wetlands this fall and that “the seasonal wetlands continue to provide habitat for upland-dependent migratory birds and resident wildlife.”

(Upland is a term to describe areas that lie beyond wetlands or rivers, or above the elevation where flooding occurs.)

Experts agreed any amount of water would be an improvement. But restoring a wetland that has been parched for an extended period of time can be complex. Flood a basin too much and it could lead to mosquito issues or water-loving plants outcompeting other plants that are more critical to the ecosystem. Plants that grew over the dry period also may not be beneficial or nutritious for the returning waterfowl to eat. 

“There are a lot of moving pieces and just because you throw water into it doesn’t mean that it’s going to bring it back to what it was,” said John Veon, a Ph.D candidate in ecology at UC Davis. “It’s not impossible to bring it back 100%, but you do have to sit and think about the challenges.”

In the meantime, people can still visit the refuge and walk its trails — it receives roughly 11,000 visits each year, according to the wildlife department — and birds seeking food, rest or a mate can find them within reach at Sacramento or Merced national wildlife refuges.

But when the days get colder and the birds in Alaska, Canada and the Arctic begin their long flight down this fall to the Central Valley and beyond, they may find Vierra Wetlands filled with water once again. Until then, the basin remains dry. Hopson, who now lives in New York, visited the refuge a few times when he was back in California. He said the landscape is “sobering,” but empathizes with the public lands workers who are still left standing.

 “They’re just overwhelmed,” said Hopson. “They’re heroes who are basically trying to … keep the ship from sinking.” 

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Attorneys for a 19-year-old charged with a recent Capitola homicide will be in court Monday asking to seal a protective order against the teen granted last year, which included an alleged offense they state was “not intended for public consumption,” and which they argue will prejudice potential future jurors.

The earlier case against Tyler Leibelt was a Juvenile Court case that was dismissed Feb. 11. It is unclear why it was dismissed. And while a defense pleading for the hearing itself contains redactions, court documents refer to the case as a juvenile case, stemming from when he was a minor.

Leibelt was arrested July 20 and charged with murder and other enhancement allegations, including lying in wait, for the fatal stabbing of Rachell Summers, 73, who managed Art of Santa Cruz gallery in Capitola Mall and had recently become a grandmother for the first time.

Leibelt was residing in a sober living home not far from Seabright Avenue in Santa Cruz when arrested. Last year, he was served the Nov. 7 Gun Violence Emergency Protective Order that led to Monday’s hearing at a county psychiatric facility on Soquel Avenue in Santa Cruz. Earlier, he had been a student at San Lorenzo Valley High School.

Details in the protective order contain “highly prejudicial” information about the allegation that would unfairly prejudice any potential jury pool, Public Defenders Lisa McCamey and Ariana Alejandre stated in a court request filed Tuesday in Santa Cruz Superior Court.

The order had been prepared by Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s deputy Kade Archer and granted Nov. 7 by Superior Court Judge Nancy de la Pena. In it, Archer also stated Leibelt had expressed a desire to kill people and a desire to kill as many as possible.

The document has been available for public viewing at court. The juvenile justice allegation, which was not identified as such in the court order, was reported by at least one area news outlet, Salinas-based KSBW television station. Defense attorneys argue, in part, that the KSBW story sowed in readers’ and viewers’ minds the conclusion that the offense occurred but was not made public.

Investigators allege Leibelt chose his victim at random. After stabbing Summers several times, he fled on foot and called 911 to turn himself in to police a short time later, while standing behind a 41st Avenue hotel.

He remains in County Jail, and has appeared in court twice without entering a plea. His third scheduled arraignment is Wednesday.

Cabrillo College’s Watsonville Center has seen enrollment jump 71% and course pass rates climb from 70% to 84% since fall 2022, a surge that Watsonville Center Dean Eduardo Cervantes credits to dual-enrollment growth, pandemic-recovery outreach and new programs tailored to local students’ interests.

“Made in Santa Cruz: Why Art Matters” is a new video series, published every other Sunday, exploring the artists who shape Santa Cruz County’s creative landscape. Each episode offers a peek into an artist’s practice, the places and experiences that inform their work, and the ways creativity helps us see our community differently. Today’s artist is Watsonville painter and art educator Rhia Hurt.