Google and Santa Barbara

by Bonnie Donovan

Santa Barbara Current

Jun 20, 2025

DID YOU KNOW?...

Bonnie Donovan

Google and Santa Barbara

Most people who are thinking about visiting Santa Barbara will Google to find out what to expect when they get there.

If you ask, for example:

Q. What is the most famous street in Santa Barbara?

A. Santa Barbara's most famous avenue, State Street, cuts through downtown for 10 blocks and leads right onto Stearns Wharf. It's nearly impossible to miss with its shops, art galleries, theaters, and attractions, including the Santa Barbara Museum of Art.

What happened to State Street in Santa Barbara?

Partly due to Covid, but also to closing down the access to cars they have been replaced by cheap souvenir stores and other cheap merchandise. State Street was known for better retail and better restaurants; now those are gone.

Life As a City Council Member

While we’re waiting for the Master Plan to be submitted, approved, and implemented this is how the outside world views us: (October 1, 2024)

Watching the City Council can be a full-time job with no pay or benefits. You will have many vacations, holidays, and 15-minute breaks that end up being 20 or 25 minutes.

It can also be watching council members show up for a vote on the one thing they want to vote on and then leave the meeting.

Ideology can manifest in various ways, particularly when a council member, city staff, or a member of the public raises concerns about ongoing actions. In such instances, it is troubling to see that the reasoning behind these concerns is often disregarded. This tendency to overlook valid critiques not only stifles constructive dialogue but also hinders progress and accountability within the community.

But even though they are paid the big bucks (your tax dollars), they have Bring Your Child to Work days whenever they want.

A week ago Tuesday, Council Member Meagan Harmon showed up to approve a five-million-dollar housing grab and then left the balance of the meeting.

This week (again) she had her daughter at the dais with the computer screen babysitter. Between her real job, Coastal Commission stipend, and City Council salary of $94,000, she should be able to afford a sitter.

Meanwhile, from one week ago and the hard work of our finance department, led by Keith DeMartini, with a balanced budget and a surplus of $800,000, and all reserves intact…., this week, we were informed that now our budget will be at a deficit of 1.6 million dollars.

Why, what happened in one week?

Mike Jordan and Eric Freidman asked and were approved for a Wildfire Assessment District at $100,000 (more on this below);
Kristen Sneddon, Meagan Harmon, Wendy Santamaria, and Oscar Gutierrez asked for and received five million dollars for the Housing Trust Fund.
Bada Bing, Bada Boom, the eight hundred thousand surplus was wiped out and has now put us in a projected deficit. You know, the thing that Measure I was to get rid of.

Help Them Before They Spend More

But even without any foolish spending, Santa Barbara will be back in a deficit due to employee pension/retirement increase soon anyway.

Back to Jordan and Friedman’s Wildfire Assessment District, with a cost of one hundred thousand dollars. It was clearly spelled out that we will be reimbursed for this cost by the property owners receiving this benefit. So, no need to worry.

Now on to the five million dollars…when and if we have five million dollars extra lying around, then we can give it away!

Meanwhile the public unions are back negotiating pay raises for city staff.

Another 5 million dollars was spent by City Council and staff on the State Street Pedestrian Promenade/E-bike Freeway.

Studies and surveys have been done at our expense and also by private citizens. I shared the one done by private citizen George Lilly before and remember councilmember Oscar Gutierrez's only comment was he should have just donated the money he spent on his study to the city. 😣

The Downtown Organization did a survey, and Strong Towns claims they also did one. I asked both for their results and only one responded:

“Bonnie,

“Robin has the final survey results and will respond shortly. The results are from 74 property owners in the Downtown State Street corridor. We focused on the State Street fronting properties because they see the biggest impact from the street closure. This survey was done in the December/January timeframe. Our survey has the names of all of the respondents.

“Best Regards, David”

Survey from the Downtown Organization (DO), now known as the Downtown Santa Barbara Improvement Association (DSBIA).

The survey asked eight questions.

DSBIA has a list of property owners who took the survey.

Here are the results of four questions I feel need to be shared with the taxpayers.

STATE STREET SURVEY ON OPENING THE STREET TALLIED ON FEBRUARY 11, 2025, TOTAL OF 74 PROPERTY OWNER RESPONSES (RESPONSES PER QUESTIONS VARY A BIT SINCE THAT ALL QUESTIONS BY RESPONDENTS WERE ANSWERED) SURVEY OF DOWNTOWN STATE STREET PROPERTY ON THE FUTURE STATUS OF STATE STREET

2. Do you have tenants that are currently operating with a parklet on State Street?

a. Yes (13) – 17% .

b. No (60) - 81%

c. No opinion (1) – 1%

3. Has the closure of State Street to vehicular traffic impacted your tenants and related businesses within your property?

a. Yes, positively (15) – 22%

b. Yes, negatively (38) – 53%

c. No opinion (18) - 25%

4. Do you support opening State Street to vehicular traffic and shuttles?

a. Yes (54) - 74%

b. No (18) - 25%

c. No opinion (1) - 1% 2

5. Is this an issue that you feel strongly about as a landlord and property owner?

a. Yes (57) - 80%

b. No (1) - 1%

c. Not Sure (13) - 19%

Survey results tallied by Marco Li Mandri, New City America.

These results reinforce the Magid study that Mr. Lilly paid for and shared with the City Council and all of us, and the Google downgrading (“Partly due to Covid, but also to closing down the access to cars, [shops, art galleries, theaters, and attractions] have been replaced by cheap souvenir stores and other cheap merchandise. State Street was known for better retail and better restaurants; now those are gone.”).

I will share anything I get from Sullivan Israel from Strong Towns when I receive it. Hopefully it will provide the date their survey was taken, list of respondents, and who conducted the survey.

UPDATE: My column deadline has arrived, and I just received a response from Strong Towns and its survey. I will have more from them in next week's column.

The date of Strong Towns survey: May 25 and 26 of this year.

The names and addresses of their respondents: Not available due to privacy concerns.

Name of who conducted the survey: Strong Towns volunteers

On Another Note:

The city hired Ed France of the Bicycle Coalition in the Downtown Parking and State St. Department, what does that tell you??

Hold the press, second update...

I was just notified that the city is pushing the state street master plan update to later in the fall (September or October) because the study of the emergency circulation plan was not complete and or sufficient per Kelly McAdoo and because of this it would need to be delayed.

Please excuse me for being unladylike, but this is complete poppycock, or should I say bullshit? Maybe they should read the above survey then go back to the Finance Department for a professional update. State Street businesses (and city revenue) are in freefall because the Council majority, along with the Bicycle Coalition, Strong Towns, and other behind-the-scenes actors are determined to keep our main business street for E-bikes only.

Oh, and by the way, the emergency circulation plan will never be complete, because there’s no way to provide adequate emergency services to a blockaded street.

… Calling the Search Committee, there has still been no sighting of over-paid and underworked Joe Holland …