The Harvey West Community Pool could reopen this summer if a trio of local activists, hoping to develop a partnership with the City of Santa Cruz, secures funding to reopen the public facility.
Articles by Alastair Bland
SmartMeter Report Released
A report released last week that dismisses some of the potential dangers of PG&E’s new SmartMeters hasn’t fully alleviated the concerns of some government officials who worry that the wireless household energy gauges could cause long-term health problems.
Frankenfish Labeling Bill Introduced
Whether or not the federal Food and Drug Administration approves a genetically engineered salmon for sale in U.S. markets and restaurants is one question now pending. Whether the public will know they’re eating the fish if the feds approve it is another.
Attorney Calls for Public Dialog on Street Musicians
The latest incident between Santa Cruz police and the long-displaced band of drummers that once gathered weekly at Wednesday’s downtown farmers market has prompted a local attorney to suggest a new approach to resolving the old and tiresome conflict: talking it out.
Scotts Valley’s Silent Chopper
Officers with the Scotts Valley Police Department will be rolling a little less raucously in 2011 after the department assumed ownership in early December of a brand new electric motorcycle. The machine, the first zero-emissions bike to serve a California police department, is capable of 50-mile trips, freeway speeds, instant acceleration and perfectly soundless patrols of the streets.
Holiday Foods: Seasonal Suds
’Tis the season of wintry things: a sun that hardly rises, gloom and gray all day, farmers markets flooded with kale and the anguish of gift shopping.
But with December, at least, we also enter the months of the big-boned malt bombs, often billed by brewers as their “winter” or “Christmas” beers. Such brews currently on shelves at local supermarkets and better beer stores include Ginger’s Winter Warmer from Santa Cruz Mountain Brewing, Sierra Nevada’s annual Celebration Ale and Anchor Brewing’s yearly Christmas Ale. San Francisco’s 21st Amendment has released Fireside Chat, a strong brown beer named after Franklin Roosevelt’s weekly radio talks with a nation that was then burning its furniture to keep warm. And from breweries further afield, beers like Deschutes’ Jubelale and Avery’s Old Jubilation Ale have arrived with the rains and the nasty north swell.
Seafood Markets Ranked
The dos and don’ts of buying sustainable seafood have become common knowledge for many Americans, thanks in large part to the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch program and its wallet-sized reference cards, which offer simple guidelines to making smart purchases in the seafood department. Yet even as many consumers do their best to dodge red-listed items, fishmongers still dangle them before our noses.
Eating The Pests
Many gardeners know that dandelions and other weeds go well in salads. Fewer know that the common garden snail, Cantareus aspersus (formerly known as Helix aspersa), does well when sautéed in butter and garlic (what doesn’t?) and served in the shell in which it lived its life. Yep, the garden snail that ravages your chard and kale is among the snails esteemed as escargot. In fact, it was introduced to California from France, no less, in the 1850s as a food source, according to a UC Davis online report. It now lives around the world.
Bug Bites: Sustainable Eating Hits A New Low
Americans crave efficiency. We esteem cars that burn less gas for each mile driven, jobs that generate the most money per hour and mobile phones that pack the most capabilities into the smallest possible package. In short, we want bang for our buck. But we skimp on efficiency when it comes time to eat, because we just can’t resist meat.
Gray Whales Under Fire
Each March, gray whales by the thousands flood into the large lagoons of Baja California’s Pacific coast to give birth. The animals congregate densely, and as boatloads of tourists move in to watch, the whales vocalize and sing to one another across the still waters.
“You can hear them all across the lagoon, singing and talking,” says Sue Arnold, CEO of the California Gray Whale Coalition. “But this year it was silent. It was spooky.”
