California is losing farmers and farmland at an alarming rate, threatening the supply of local and organic crops even as demand for them increases. But a new generation of young farmers in Santa Cruz County is taking on a risky business to reclaim their home soil.
Articles by Garrett McAuliffe
Occupy Santa Cruz: Down But Not Out
With a reluctance to engage local government and little coordination or strategy, some wonder what sort of impact the Occupy movement will continue to have here and on the national stage. Appealing to public anger over wealth disparities has carried the movement so far. But without a strong blueprint or vision to inspire more people, can the movement continue to capture the sympathies and energy of local communities and become the grassroots democratic movement it hopes to be?
Time Banks Use Services as Currency
As the global economy continues to ebb between obstinacy and upheaval, the potentially prescient among us are taking measures to strengthen local resilience however possible.
Time banks are one such way, and Santa Cruz now has its first. It works like this: for each hour you spend doing something for a member of the network, you earn a TimeCredit. You can then spend that TimeCredit by receiving services from any other TimeBank member.
First-time Surfer Would Rather Float
My two most vivid memories of the ocean: being bashed in the surf at 7, an intimate introduction as sand scraped half the flesh from my left shoulder. Six years later an undertow dragged me out. Kicking and screaming for my life, I eventually dragged myself back in.
PaddleFest to Draw Spray, Crowds
The lineup of surfers anxiously awaiting a clean drop at Steamer Lane this weekend will have to wait a little longer. Here come three days of competitive surfing with a twist—the best paddle-powered wave riders the world over are set to take the beach by storm. After whipping wind and hail cut short the quarter-century-old competition last year, the Santa Cruz PaddleFest is back.
UCSC Alum Edited Occupy Movement Paper
Two weeks after the first protestors unrolled their sleeping bags in Zuccotti Park, Occupy Wall Street’s inaugural newspaper hit the streets of lower Manhattan, hot off the people’s press. Among those hawking that first free issue of The Occupied Wall Street Journal was UCSC graduate Michael Levitin. A journalist by trade, Levitin jumped at the chance to join in the paper’s creation and help broadcast the diversity of voices and shared frustrations from within the fledgling movement.
