My answer to D’s trivia question is Palomino Road.. if that’s wrong I’m very curious what the correct answer is!
Not really the same. This lot size was zoned for two single homes. The first project was for six units with parking. Now this is 30 units? It seems idiotic to build this.
I have a pizza bone to pick with Mizza. We dined at the State Street location a couple of weeks ago, and the food and service were excellent—a pleasant surprise.
However, the next day when I looked at my receipt, I realized they had charged me $5 just to use a credit card. I politely wrote to the management there to express the bad taste that left in my mouth. It seemed tacky to be charged to pay that after paying over $150 for the (previously acknowledged) great meal and super waitress. The surcharge was never mentioned to me as I ApplePay'ed, and I never saw it on the menu or receipt at the time.
Some quick Googling revealed that these extra service charges and such had been outlawed, and a brand new one was to begin tomorrow, July 1st. The response I got from management (Craft House Group) was wholly dissatisfying. They basically said, the 1985 law you mentioned was later overturned, and the new one beginning on July 1st may still be amended.
Listen, I know it's challenging to pay restaurant leases and staff and run a successful business, but clearly, customers don't like all of these surreptitious surcharges, whether they're legal or not. Is Mizza really expecting people to carry wads of cash around to now pay their dining bills? I mentioned we're local and kind of thought management might have at least offered to refund the $5 (or give it to our waitress), but he didn't.
I'm always sad to see a good restaurant in town fail, but forcing locals to pay an additional 3.5% because you want your food prices to appear lower than they really are is not a solution. Dining out is more costly than ever. Don't nickel and dime us with tacky charges. If you can't make your margins without that 3.5%, then raise the menu prices by that.
Locals would very much like to support local businesses, but this is not the way.
The demise of the historic Coral Casino. Beyond sad. Warner continues to destroy the historic fabric of our community and join in turning everything into LA North
Agree with a lot of what you say, though similar concerns cropped up with the multiple units built on the old St. Francis grounds and the neighborhood absorbed it. This sort of seems like an extension of that.
It’s on the wall in La Arcada Court 1100 block of State Street
hasn't closed escrow yet
Very happy that Bibi Ji’s, my favorite Indian food anywhere, has reopened at 1213 State street.
John palmintieri reported on the St Anthony seminary auction: originally wanting $25m, no reserve, and they got $16m +-
barf. it's not fun having her as a local
Ellen doesn't pay her bills. please don't post or print anything that glorifies her.
I've been shopping at Art Essentials since they sublet space in the Frazzee paint store on Chapala, that had to be about thirty years ago. While I love the store I hope they relocate to an area with somewhat reasonable rents, not downtown. And BW, Liz & NL seem to be church haters. Y'all don't see anyone using the church? I could say the same thing about every church in town, and look at the amount of real estate they occupy that could be used to house the homeless. . . I'm pretty sure that's what their Lord commanded them to do, but why take the Bible literally? One more thing, I watched the ABR meeting when the church proposed taking over AE. I was surprised and impressed that the interior design is modest and probably fits with the needs of the parishioners. I think it would be nice if more churches scaled down their footprint (tax free, btw) and actually took care of the poor and the meek.
If they build it, they may attend?
I work right near there and you are 100% correct. Art Essentials has been there a long time and is exactly the kind of unique and interesting store we need downtown. I'm appalled that a church would do something like that. And by the way, I've never seen anyone actually use that church.
Agree 100%. So much for the golden rule.
That is terrible news about Art Essentials. Having a church there adds nothing to downtown. It’s empty most of the time and gives dead storefront vibes and often has people camped out in front. It doesn’t seem very Christian to me to push out a neighbor who’s been there much longer than you. The church should do the right thing and seek a different location for itself.
I live around the corner from the [currently] vacant lot on Grand Ave. This plan for 30 units is absurd. It’s simply too dense for this neighborhood. First of all, the lot isn’t that big. I always imagined three slender homes on that lot (sounds like it’s officially zoned for two). Second, the surrounding streets aren’t well suited for the existing traffic, much less the addition of 30 families. E. Valerio is so narrow and congested with parked cars that two way traffic must stop and wave one another through. California St. - on the other side of the property - is both narrow and steep. Once again, the good ol’ neighborly “you go ahead!” wave is required to keep things moving in an orderly fashion. Finally, I’m concerned for those across the street who may potentially see a significant hit to the value of their homes. I recognize that we have a crisis-level housing problem, but we need to tread carefully as we work to remedy the problem in order to avoid negatively impacting the lives of current residents (speaking as someone who went all in with a cottage-sized home purchase in beautiful Santa Barbara).
StongtownsSB, enjoy State street being closed to cars. I couldn't watch the SSAC meeting yesterday but I've read that no action was taken, and things were considered, and mulled over. I believe that's the future of State street. Meetings will be held, words will be spoken, no action will take place. However, there is some work going on now under the 101. That's $11 million and rising. Where's the revenue to transform these blocks to "flat, flexible and curbless?" (I would like to get my torso back in that condition. . .)
Exactly. This assessment will be passed to the local business via their lease cam.
Thank you for getting involved. Having almost been run over by out of control electric bikes on several occasions, we are shocked that there are no police officers on foot patrolling this area. I don’t know how anyone, especially the eldergly would ever feel safe walking on this street, let alone any vistor feeling a sense of welcome to walk on an asphalt street with nothing of interest. When you walk on the sidewalks you feel the charm, but there is nothing charming about the current scene in the middle of State Street. The architecture and preservation of downtown Santa Barbara is critical. Business owners, residents and vistors are NOT happy with the current situation.
Shoutout to Strong Towns Santa Barbara for their leadership in articulating a thoughtful vision for the future of State St., helping organize the community, and making sure our voices are heard. Will be joining as a new member!
We lost a handful of trees in the winter storms and now there seems to be an overreaction where we are proactively cutting down trees that might fall. The thing about trees is… they can fall. We accept all sorts of risks in our day to day lives and the trade off of having large beautiful trees that provide shade and support our ecosystems seems worth it. The alternative is bleak, literally
A majority of property owners in Downtown Santa Barbara DID NOT agree to assess themselves to pay for a variety of public improvements. Only 57% of the property owners returned ballots, and while a majority of the retuned ballots were in favor that only represents 40% of Downtown SB property owners supporting this measure - which is an additional tax that is paid by our local small businesses via their commercial leases for services (not improvements) the city should be providing already.
The Grand housing project should be dead already. This is NOT what Santa Barbara and especially this area needs
Stella Mare's has been such a consistently good restaurant with lovely greenhouse dining; it
is another great loss. I think we need to write to the Runyon group and urge them to reconsider for the sake of the community. This loss of leases for really well loved and successful restaurants is the result of corporations/businesses buying up places and then booting out long steady businesses in order to boost the corporations profits. Their greed is ruining Santa Barbara--look at the empty spaces for lease in downtown Santa Barbara.
