Lookout Santa Cruz

For decades, California’s Central Coast watched major economic booms happen elsewhere, writes Doug Erickson, co-founder of Santa Cruz Works. Now, Monterey Bay DART, Joby Aviation, UC Santa Cruz and a coalition of both regional and international partners are building a new aviation ecosystem that is attracting investment, workforce funding and international attention.

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

The roads used to flood at Shady Lane Estates whenever it rained.

Water pooled on the mostly-dirt roads that ran through the mobile home park, combining with the waste of constantly backed-up septic tanks. Early on those wet mornings, parents would pack their kids into cars and ferry them through the noxious slurry to the front gate to catch the school bus. 

Summer days weren’t much better. 

Afternoon temperatures regularly exceed 110 degrees in unincorporated Coachella Valley. The park’s antique electrical system regularly failed, knocking out AC units and turning the decades-old, poorly-insulated mobile homes into family-sized kilns. Rubi Castro, a mother of four, remembers placing her small children in large buckets of cold water until the power lurched back on.

That chapter of the park’s history came to a celebrated end in late April when it reopened, renewed. 

Funded partly through a state program aimed at rehabilitating California’s aging mobile home parks, Shady Lane’s robust new electrical system can now endure the draw of dozens of air conditioners. Pipes connect the park to the local water and sewer utilities. The roads are paved, there’s a shaded playground for kids and each of the 32 old mobile homes has been replaced with new, built-to-last units — plus eight more, to boot.

Castro, speaking on June a day that topped out at 113, said it’s been warm out since she moved back in April. But she’s comfortable in her new home where, she said proudly, “it feels like we live in winter.” 

She “can’t wait to experience the rain.”

A dirt road in the Shady Lane Estates Mobile Home Park in Thermal in 2023. The community has since been renovated through a state program. Credit: Pablo Unzueta for CalMatters A two-bedroom, two-bath dwelling is one of 40 new manufactured homes serving more than 140 residents at Shady Lane Estates Mobile Home Park in Thermal. Credit: Alex Tapia

The glow-up of Shady Lane under the ownership of the nonprofit Caritas Corporation comes courtesy of another dramatic overhaul inside California’s housing department.

Back in 2023, as CalMatters reported, a state program designed to throw a financial lifeline to dilapidated mobile home parks had gone largely unused and forgotten for at least a decade thanks to a labyrinthine application process and a focus too narrow to help most applicants.

That year it was stripped down to its studs, rebuilt and renamed the Manufactured Housing Opportunity and Revitalization (MORE) program.

Along with funding from Riverside County and the city of Coachella, the Shady Lane overhaul received $10.6 million, one of 28 parks to receive an award and the first rehab project to be completed. Another 19 have broken ground, according to the state housing department. 

For a state facing a crippling housing affordability crisis and an affordable housing financing system often characterized as sclerotic and costly, the transformation is a rare bit of unquestionably good news. 

But the short history of the program also underlines just how challenging it is to maintain and rehabilitate old mobile home parks, a largely overlooked source of the state’s scant low-cost housing stock.

California is home to 4,635 mobile home parks, according to the state housing department. Together they provide space for nearly half a million units. Most are owner-occupied. They’re also significantly cheaper than comparably sized single-family homes or townhouses, making them one of the few homeownership opportunities that is even plausibly affordable to Californians with lower incomes. 

“While it’s not as shiny or flashy as a big beautiful new rental apartment, it’s a vital source of affordable housing,” said Betsy McGovern-Garcia, vice president of Self-Help Enterprises, an affordable housing developer in the San Joaquin Valley which manages two parks.

Even after receiving state funding through the MORE program, some projects are still mired in permitting delays or have been scaled back for lack of funding. And despite awarding nearly $140 million to more than two dozen parks that hold more than 1,000 mobile homes, housing advocates say that likely covers just a small fraction of the need. 

No more money is on the horizon.

A new program for old parks

The program emerged from the bureaucratic makeover of a 1980s state loan initiative called the Mobile Home Resident Ownership Program. As implied by the name, it was initially focused on helping California’s mobile home owners — who typically own their units, but not the land on which they sit — to buy their parks and run them as resident-owned cooperatives. Later, that narrow purpose was expanded to fund park purchases by nonprofits and local governments. 

After an initial wave of acquisitions early on, the program fell into disuse. Between 2013 and 2023, it awarded only a single loan, despite having tens of millions of dollars in the bank.

The 2023 overhaul expanded the program to serve a separate, pressing concern: The sorry state of many of California’s mobile home parks. Funds could now be used not just to fund purchases, but to repair and replace park infrastructure and even the dilapidated units themselves. Private owners could apply. The application was simplified and the terms made much more generous such that many of the loans might ultimately be forgiven. 

To top it off, lawmakers threw in an additional $200 million through two one-off budget bills.

“It’s more responsive to the range of challenges that park residents and park owners are seeing,” said Brian Augusta, a housing policy lobbyist who advocated for the change. Case in point: Roughly two-thirds of the funds awarded through the program went to repair and rehabilitation projects.

An empty mobile home lot in Stockton Park Village in Stockton in January 2023. Credit: Miguel Gutierrez Jr., CalMatters

The Caritas Corporation was the one organization to receive funding through the older version of the program in the preceding decade. Officials at the state housing department encouraged the nonprofit to give the money back and reapply for more funding through the new one.

“It’s a great program, much easier,” said Tracy Bejotte, chief operating officer at Caritas. “They really got their act together.”

The proof, she said, is Shady Lane.

“It used to be a rough, tough place,” said Joel Beltran, a produce vendor at a local shop, who lives at the park with his wife and five children. He recalls how sparks would leap from the outlets of his old mobile unit. 

“Today, it’s like Disneyland,” he said. 

The challenge of aging parks

The high cost of home upkeep and repair is a challenge bedeviling communities across the country, but mobile home parks in California make for a particularly tough case. 

Park residents are much less likely to have the spare money necessary to make home repairs. Nor are they as likely as traditional homeowners to be able to turn to insurance or home loans. Affordable coverage for manufactured housing can be hard to come by and banks don’t typically see them as worthy collateral. 

That’s especially true of older units, many of which were never designed to get old in the first place. Those built prior to 1976, when more onerous federal standards went into effect, are particularly vulnerable to moisture, mold and fire damage. They are often poorly insulated, making them uncomfortable — even dangerous — when temperatures fall or spike. 

Many of these pre-’76 units are ”probably no longer suitable to be living in,” said Andrew Rumbach, who has studied mobile home parks at the Urban Institute. They’re also disproportionately common in California. According to estimates by Rumbach and his colleagues, nearly 40% of California’s mobile homes were built before federal regulations kicked in, among the largest shares of any state.

Even if a park’s units are in good shape, the parks themselves are often not. Frequently located on the least desirable tracts of land along urban fringes, they are much more likely to be disconnected from public utilities and, increasingly, at risk of wildfire. Sewage, water and electrical infrastructure is frequently owned and operated by the park owners themselves. 

“These systems tend to be run by whoever runs the park, which may be an absentee owner or a property manager,” said Gregory Pierce, a UCLA researcher who studies urban planning and water insecurity. “Even if they have the best of intentions, that person may not be well-equipped to run a water system.”

Still waiting

Even as the Shady Lane project has been mostly wrapped up for months now, the promised overhaul of Buena Vista Mobile Home Park in Palo Alto has barely begun.

Of the 28 rehabilitation projects awarded funding through the MORE program, Buena Vista, owned and managed by the Santa Clara County Housing Authority, received the most: $24.6 million.

Awarded in the winter of 2023, those funds were initially slated for a full-scale redevelopment project. Decades-old mobile homes would be replaced with new models, as would the community’s leaky gas lines and patchy roads. For the park’s renters, the housing authority proposed a mid-sized apartment complex with a community center. 

But in 2024, those ambitions were radically scaled back. Housing authority officials blamed the change of plans on unanticipated cost overruns, a lack of sufficient funding, resident pushback and the fact that the state’s mobile home renovation funding came with a use-it-or-lose-it deadline of mid-2027. In a new plan released late last year, only the park’s common infrastructure — the water, gas, power and sewer lines — will be replaced. Residents from 49 homes have been told that they will be relocated during the eight months of construction and then returned to their existing units.

The Buena Vista Mobile Home Park in Palo Alto on June 16, 2026.
Credit: Manuel Orbegozo for CalMatters An exposed gas pipe at the Buena Vista Mobile Home Park in Palo Alto on June 16, 2026. Credit: Manuel Orbegozo for CalMatters Sabrina Ramirez at her home at the Buena Vista Mobile Home Park in Palo Alto. Credit: Manuel Orbegozo for CalMatters

The move-out date was originally scheduled for February. It has since been bumped to September.

“It keeps getting pushed back and pushed back,” said Sabrina Ramirez, a childcare worker who has lived at the park since 1999. The uncertainty has been stressful. But the delay through the summer has been good for her dozens and dozens of outdoor plants — a pandemic passion project that now surrounds her 1960s-era home. “My jungle’s loving it. I did not want to move them during the beginning of the year.”

She and Buena Vista’s other plant parents are coordinating with neighbors outside the park to care for the flowers, succulents and fruiting vines once construction begins.

Tapped out

The MORE program ultimately doled out $136 million in repair, replacement and acquisition grants in 2023, but denied applications that added up to another $186 million.

That mismatch between the money requested and the funding available reflects how much need is out there — but it’s also likely an understatement, said Kate Rose, deputy director at the California Coalition for Rural Housing, a Sacramento-based nonprofit. The owners of many parks may simply not have applied because they hadn’t yet heard about the new program. Others — mom and pop owners — might not have had the bandwidth to submit an application on time.

For those projects that lost out or never applied in the first place, additional help is not on the way. The bulk of the program’s prior funding came through one-time budget allocations. The coming year’s strained state budget does not include a top up. The remainder came from a special fund fed with park permit fees. At last count, that fund had $27 million and has grown at less than half of 1% over the last two years.  That’s not enough for another statewide funding round, said Rose, who described the total as “peanuts.”

For owners of aging mobile home parks, that doesn’t leave many other options.

When Self-Help Enterprises acquired La Hacienda Mobile Home Park in Fresno, “we really didn’t have a long-term revitalization plan,” said McGovern-Garcia. “We simply knew there had to be an intervention.”

After years of legal turmoil and bad blood between the park’s residents and the prior owner, the site was in rough shape. All of the units except one were built before 1980, she said. Nearly two dozen had been abandoned and left boarded up. Most were beset with water damage and mold.

Self-Help applied for a $3.7 million improvement grant hoping to provide the home owners with low-cost or interest-deferred loans to fund the replacement of the units. They didn’t get it.

“It would have changed the entire trajectory of the community,” said McGovern-Garcia. “It really is like getting Willy Wonka’s golden ticket for the mobile home world.”

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

Robert Henricks reluctantly voted to increase monthly homeowners association fees in his San Diego County community, lifting them by $100 a month to $550. 

“With the cost of living, the cost of projects, we’ve put off raising the monthly assessment two years out of three,” said Henricks, who sits on the board of his Rancho Bernardo HOA.

But even he concedes he’s now among the thousands of Californians feeling pinched by surging HOA fees atop unprecedented mortgage rates, utilities and insurance premiums.

One solution is to cap the fee hikes. California lawmakers are considering a measure, Senate Bill 1007, that would curb how much associations could increase members’ dues each year. 

It’s the latest bill targeting HOAs and how they levy fees in the Legislature this session in an attempt to address housing affordability. Although the crackdowns have been mostly successful and bipartisan, this biggest push yet to slow down rising fees has split some Democrats.

The rise of the HOA

HOAs are a near ubiquitous-phenomenon in today’s housing market. 

Nationwide, 67% of all new single-family homes in 2024 were in HOAs, up from 46% in 2009, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. More than a third of California residents live in one, including about 65% of all California homeowners.

Californians also pay among the highest median monthly fees in the nation, at nearly $300 per month, according to the Census Bureau. San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles owners can face even higher dues, up to several thousand dollars a month.

In an HOA, maintenance, repair and insurance expenses are divided among homeowners after elected board members determine annual budget costs. Some funds go toward routine upkeep for things like pools, clubhouses or golf courses, while others are set aside for major projects such as roof repairs. 

They’re self-governing and controlled by residents who create and enforce their own rules, covering everything from which paint colors are allowed to what kind of trees can be planted.

Under current law, dues can’t increase by more than 20% each year.

The new proposed legislation would cap annual HOA fee increases to no more than 8% without a vote by members of the HOA.

“This bill is about providing information to a homeowner to understand how much they’re gonna be paying,” Van Nuys Democrat Caroline Menjivar, the bill’s author, said at a March hearing.

‘Pay me now or pay me later?’

Consumer and realtor groups are championing the bill as a potential lifeline for low- and middle-income families already feeling squeezed by skyrocketing mortgage rates, gas prices and grocery bills.

Supporters point to examples such as a Walnut Creek man whose monthly association fees are $1,500. Those fees, along with his condo insurance and property taxes, now outpace his mortgage.

The U.S. Housing Department and most financial planners agree that Americans shouldn’t pay more than 30% of their monthly income on housing, and soaring HOA fees are getting in the way of people doing just that, said Marjorie Murray, president for the Center for California Homeowner Association Law, at the March hearing.

“This is unsustainable. Even regular assessments raised by 20% will double in four years and triple in five,” she said. “Nobody’s salary or Social Security or retirement income goes up by those kinds of percentages.”

Exorbitant fines and retaliatory lawsuits have made HOAs polarizing for decades. But soaring costs amid an affordability crisis have sparked numerous efforts from state lawmakers to rein in their authority, including a new state law capping fines at $100 per violation.

One billed as the “HOA transparency act” would push them to act more like local governments when it comes to open records and public meetings. Meetings would need to be more accessible for members and disciplinary actions could not occur out of the public eye.

Another proposal would require associations to stash money in a savings account to help stave off pricey one-time assessment fees to pay for major maintenance, an issue most common with older condominiums. Builders and real estate agents support it.

Follow the money

Under Menjivar’s bill, homeowners could still raise fees by more than 8% a year to cover expenses, but they’d have to do so by popular vote, California Association of Realtors lobbyist Sanjay Wagle said. The association has given more than $10 million to legislators since 2000, according to CalMatters’ Digital Democracy database. He argued that most people wouldn’t let a leaky roof or faulty plumbing go unfixed, for example, because it’d sink their property values.

“The realtors trust the homeowners. They’ll protect their investment,” Wagle said.

Building groups are more skeptical. They worry curbing fees too much would hurt HOAs’ ability to keep up properties. 

The divide became clear last month when six Democrats joined a majority of Republicans in voting against the bill during a Senate hearing, a rare public opposition in the Democratic-controlled Legislature where lawmakers typically opt to not vote at all rather than against a colleague’s bill. It advanced on a 24-13 vote. 

The bill’s opponents said it’s unlikely that a majority of residents would agree to dramatically raise their own fees. This could lead to some downstream effects, such as banks being less willing to fund mortgages if HOAs are low on cash.

And, one lawmaker defended HOA boards, saying skyrocketing energy and insurance bills are to blame for rising fees.

“I don’t think the HOA board members are personally profiting or charging more than what they’re trying to do,” said Encinitas Democrat Sen. Catherine Blakespear, who voted against the bill.

Henricks, who lives in an 88-unit condominium with his wife and cat, agrees.

He’s worried a lower cap would become a “pay me now or pay me later” situation where expensive projects in his 1970s era two-story condo — such as renovating all five of the building’s dated elevators — would become nearly impossible.

“That is the basic number one expense that we’re building our reserves to cover,” Henricks said. He said lower fee hikes would lead to gradual, more frequent increases in the future rather than larger increases spaced out over a few years.

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Software powered by artificial intelligence has allowed gas station operators across California to illegally collude and drive up prices at the pump, according to a federal lawsuit.

Santa Cruz County will receive $500,000 to help expand its litter cleanup and community beautification efforts.

The county has received $300,000 from the Clean California local grant program through the California Department of Transportation, which supports community cleanups and beautification statewide. The other $200,000 is from an anonymous donor, according to a media release. 

Currently, the county invests more than $1.4 million annually in litter abatement services and partnerships with nonprofit organizations such as Community Action Board of Santa Cruz County for local cleanup projects.

“This funding will expand our ability to reduce litter, address illegal dumping and strengthen environmental stewardship efforts to preserve and protect our environment for future generations,” county planning director Matt Machado said in the release. 

Have news that should be in Lookout Briefs? Send your news releases, including contact information, to news@lookoutlocal.com.

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A rural area of Northern California experienced its strongest earthquake since 1940 on Wednesday morning, but the 5.6 magnitude temblor caused only mild shaking with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was about 7 miles northwest of Willits.

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

The Trump administration is renewing its push to change the way it funds homeless shelters and housing in California and other states, and several agencies say it could disrupt their services.

It tried last year to move federal homelessness funds away from permanent housing and into temporary housing that requires sobriety. That move, which goes against the existing “housing first” policy favoring a no-strings-attached approach to housing, was blocked by a federal judge. 

Now, the Trump administration is trying again. Once again, it’s facing pushback.

This week, a group that includes the National Alliance to End Homelessness and Santa Clara County filed a challenge in Rhode Island’s federal court to the Trump administration’s latest funding guidelines. 

“The Trump administration’s callous decision to take a second bite at dismantling one of our nation’s most important homelessness prevention programs after a federal court already blocked the administration’s first attempt shows a complete disregard for the people who depend on this funding to keep a roof over their heads,” Santa Clara County Counsel Tony LoPresti said in a news release.

More than $4 billion in federal funding is at stake. The National Alliance to End Homelessness estimates the proposed changes could cost California nearly $238 million for permanent housing, and threaten to put nearly 15,000 Californians back on the street.

“The ‘housing first’ experiment failed Americans by warehousing the vulnerable without results. This ideology promised to end homelessness. Instead, billions of taxpayer dollars were spent while homelessness increased to record levels,” HUD Secretary Scott Turner said in a news release earlier this month. 

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This post is updated throughout the day to reflect the latest incidents. It was last updated at 9:02 a.m..

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

▼︎ new incidents

Road incidents as of 9 a.m. on June 24

• A traffic hazard was reported at Glen Canyon Rd and Glen Canyon Ct in Eastside / Live Oak on June 23 at 2:06 p.m. Low-hanging wires about 20 feet above the road were blocking trucks from passing. AT&T was notified and sent a technician. The incident was first reported as a possible collision with unknown injuries but was later identified as a traffic hazard.
   
• Defective traffic signals were reported today at the intersection of Green Valley Rd and Carnation Dr in Watsonville / Pajaro. The issue was reported to NETCOM and is being handled by the county.
   
• There are alternating lane closures on both northbound and southbound Highway 9 at Pool Drive in San Lorenzo Valley because of bridge work. This will continue until April 30 at 6:59 a.m.
   
• There is one-way traffic on Highway 9 at Cascade Avenue in San Lorenzo Valley because of ongoing work. This is expected to last until 7:01 a.m. on August 31.
   
• A lane on westbound SR-152 at Clifford Drive/Ohlone Parkway in Watsonville and Pajaro is closed for asphalt paving. The closure will last until 5:59 a.m. on July 3.
   
• CHP helped with construction work as part of the Safety Service Program at 11570 Highway 9, near 195 Capitola Rd Ext, San Lorenzo Valley. The work was scheduled from 7:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. today.
   

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 Wednesday morning traffic: Low wires block trucks on Glen Canyon Rd; lane closures on Hwy 9 appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

An Aptos surfer whose close encounter with a great white shark went viral is sharing what happened from his perspective, including the moment he realized a drone hovering overhead was trying to warn him of danger.

Ahead of a third budget hearing Wednesday, Santa Cruz County staff have found a potential solution to fill a $1.1 million funding gap for the public defender’s office after a proposal to create an in-house alternate office was rejected.

A proposed new policy regarding leases of city-owned property has the owner of Capitola Boat & Bait worried her business could be priced off the wharf, Jessica M. Pasko reports in her weekly column.

Three are dead following a solo crash on Highway 9 in the Santa Cruz Mountains on Monday night.

At 9:36 p.m. on Monday, officers from the California Highway Patrol’s San Jose-area division responded to a report of a vehicle crash on Highway 9 west of Redwood Gulch Road. Once at the scene, officers quickly confirmed that the crash involved fatal injuries, according to a media release.

Although the accident was still under investigation Tuesday, initial information suggested that a 2024 BMW M3 was heading eastbound when the driver lost control of the vehicle and veered off the road down a steep embankment.

The driver, a 21-year-old man from Yuba City, and two passengers, a 27-year-old man from Salem, Oregon, and a 17-year-old male from San Jose, died in the accident.

San Jose CHP Officer Ross Lee told Lookout on Tuesday that the cause of the crash has not yet been determined. Witnesses or anyone with information can call the San Jose CHP office at 408-961-0900.

Have news that should be in Lookout Briefs? Send your news releases, including contact information, to news@lookoutlocal.com.

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California intends to sue the Trump administration over its deal to end an offshore wind project proposed off Morro Bay on the Central Coast.

Businesses operating in Santa Cruz County must register with the county clerk. Lookout Santa Cruz reviews the public filings from local businesses to report on new businesses starting in the area.

Here is what’s new in local business recently.

New businesses

• A.M. MANAGING & CONSULTING was registered at 138 Victoria Lane, Aptos, by Angela Renee Manson as an individual business on June 8.
• DREW’S USED TOOLS was registered at 5000 Scotts Valley Dr., Suite 4, Scotts Valley, by Te Woo Kim as an individual business on June 8.
• COAST2COAST FIREPLACE SERVICE was registered at 20 Laurel St., Watsonville, by Juan Daniel Morales Aguirre as an individual business on June 8.
• EUCASEA was registered at 142 Baldwin St., Santa Cruz, by Christy Natsumi LLC as a limited liability company on June 8.
• CASTRO PRODUCTIONS was registered at 824 Encino Dr., Aptos, by Jacob Jean Glenn as an individual business on June 8.
• MERIDIAN COFFEE AND ELIXIR BAR was registered at 2910 Leotar Circle, Santa Cruz, by Santa Cruz Ski Lodge LLC as a limited liability company on June 9.
• ROOTED MEDICINALS LLC was registered at 66 San Tomas Way, Watsonville, by Rooted Medicinals LLC as a limited liability company on June 9.
• FOR HOP’S SAKE BREWING was registered at 317 Oak Creek Blvd., Scotts Valley, by James G. Johnson as an individual business on June 9.
• SC MOBILE MARINE AND AUTOMOTIVE was registered at 1870 Wharf Rd., Capitola, by Michael Devon Aylsworth as an individual business on June 9.
• CAPITOLA HOTEL was registered at 210 Esplanade, Capitola, by Capitola Inn, LLC as a limited liability company on June 9.
• PLEASURE POINT DESIGN was registered at 2825 S. Rodeo Gulch Rd., Suite 10, Soquel, by PPD Multimedia LLC as a limited liability company on June 10.
• GOPHERS LIMITED was registered at 317 Las Lomas Dr., Royal Oaks, by Neil Benjamin Evans as an individual business on June 10.
• EL BUEN TACO was registered at 101 Civic Center Dr. #314, Scotts Valley, by Gerardo Velasco Morales as an individual business on June 11.
• SIDEWALK was registered at 4637 Scotts Valley Dr., Scotts Valley, by Patricia Pollock as an individual business on June 11.
• DEMARK STUDIO was registered at 3611 Portola Dr., Santa Cruz, by Davis Maddry Architecture Studio as a corporation on June 12.
• VILLALOBA ESTATE was registered at 2570 Freedom Blvd., Watsonville, by Jose Villanueva Martinez as an individual business on June 12.

Have news that should be in Lookout Briefs? Send your news releases, including contact information, to news@lookoutlocal.com.

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The post Santa Cruz County business filings: Week of June 23 appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

This post is updated throughout the day to reflect the latest incidents. It was last updated at 6:31 a.m..

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

▼︎ new incidents   ▼︎ long-term incidents

Road incidents as of 6:30 a.m. on June 23

• Highway 9 at Cascade Avenue in San Lorenzo Valley has one-way traffic due to ongoing work. This closure will last until August 31.
   
• A lane on westbound SR-152 at Clifford Drive/Ohlone Parkway in Watsonville and Pajaro is closed for asphalt paving. The closure will last until July 3 at 5:59 a.m.
   
• There will be alternating lane closures on Highway 9 at Pool Drive in San Lorenzo Valley because of bridge work. The closures will continue until April 30 at 6:59 a.m.
   

Long-term projects

These have been going on for a while, but are still worth keeping in mind.

• Mill St. between Main St. and Highway 9 in Ben Lomond will be closed to vehicles from 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. on 6/6, 7/4, 8/1, 9/5, and 10/3 for the Ben Lomond Village Market event. Traffic control and detour signs will be posted.
   
• Overnight road work to improve bridges and ramps on Highway 1, Highway 9, and Highway 17 in Santa Cruz County will start Tuesday, May 26. There will be overnight closures at different times and locations through July.
   

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 Tuesday morning traffic: Highway 9 one-way traffic, SR-152 lane closed, overnight Hwy 1/9/17 work appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

A year after purchasing the historic Davenport Roadhouse, business partners Ginny Miller and Gavin Parsons have transformed the North Coast landmark into a destination with renovated guest rooms, an upgraded restaurant, expanded event spaces and a renewed focus on serving locals and travelers.

Santa Cruz County staff are proposing to cut a $170,000 contract with the Arts Council and reductions to a contract with the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History to address a funding gap in the county’s parks department in a tough budget year.

Watsonville police officers arrested a 22-year-old woman Friday after they say she posted a threatening comment on Instagram directed at the Pajaro Valley Unified School District board.

Editor’s note: A Lookout View is the opinion of our Community Voices opinion section, written by Community Voices Editor Jody K. Biehl and Lookout founder Ken Doctor. Our goal is to connect the dots we see in the news and offer a bigger-picture view — all intended to see Santa Cruz County meet the challenges of the day and to shine a light on issues we believe must be on the public agenda. These views are distinct and independent from the work of our newsroom and its reporting.

There is something profoundly wrong happening on Coral Street in Santa Cruz.

Coral Street has been a city problem for years. But the unsanitary conditions have worsened since April 1, when nonprofit Housing Matters stopped offering day services, including public toilets and showers used by 50 to 100 (possibly more) unhoused people regularly. 

When bathrooms disappear, people still need bathrooms.

Residents and service providers who work around Coral Street and the Tannery describe increasing odors of urine and feces. Every Thursday, city sanitation crews and police officers now move through the area to clean up conditions that everyone knew would follow the loss of basic facilities.

Staff at the Homeless Persons Health Project, which operates a clinic near Coral Street, have warned that the consequences extend far beyond inconvenience. Lack of sanitation drives infections, worsens chronic conditions and increases the risk of communicable disease. One case of giardia has already surfaced. If a more contagious gastrointestinal illness like shigella spreads through the unhoused population, it will not stay contained there.

Public health is exactly that: public.

To be fair, the City of Santa Cruz did respond, although many city leaders point out that providing services is a county responsibility. The city installed four portable restrooms and handwashing stations at three locations: two at Depot Park, one at the downtown library and one at parking Lot 32 in Midtown on Soquel Avenue. 

The efforts deserve recognition. But they do not solve the problem.

The people most affected by the closure remain concentrated around Coral Street, while the replacement facilities sit 1 to 4 miles away. 

A mile or two might not sound like much to people who have transportation, stability or housing. But if you have to carry everything you own, are dealing with illness or disability or addiction or simply trying to survive day to day, it is a great distance. “It might as well be in San Francisco,” one service provider told Lookout. 

People do not walk miles every time they need a bathroom. The question is not whether toilets exist somewhere in Santa Cruz. The question is whether they exist where people actually need them.

Right now, they do not.

And there are still no showers.

City and county officials insist they are “working on it” and have identified possible locations on the outskirts of downtown. Again, we applaud these efforts. We just believe they should have happened faster.  

The contrast to the COVID-19 response is hard to miss. During the pandemic, local governments moved quickly to install handwashing stations and sanitation facilities on Coral Street because they understood that disease prevention protects everyone. Today, many of those same agencies are tolerating the disappearance of sanitation infrastructure without a comparable sense of urgency.

County Public Health Officer Lisa Hernandez has told us she is not part of these ongoing discussions. Why not? Where is the Health Services Agency? Where is the county’s health equity officer? Where are the elected officials who routinely speak about dignity, compassion and public health when discussing homelessness?

The Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors has acknowledged the problem. Its primary response has been that it cannot dictate Housing Matters’ decisions.

That is true.

But county leaders can still act. They can identify locations. They can put real funding on the table, despite a budget deficit. They can work with the city instead of waiting for a solution to materialize. Some of that collaboration happens in monthly meetings, but the public does not see results. And the whole process is just too slow.

The public deserves to know what is happening and how much it would cost to provide permanent restroom and shower facilities. 

Yes, Housing Matters’ decision, announced in October 2025, came as a surprise to many. Its reasoning makes sense: As it shifts its focus toward permanent supportive housing, it no longer wants to serve those working to change their lives and those still living on the streets. But could it not have participated in a better workaround?  

The City of Santa Cruz spends roughly $11 million annually on homelessness-related programs and services. Can it direct some of that to bathrooms?

Santa Cruz City Manager Matt Huffaker told Lookout that the portable toilets and handwashing units cost about $8,000 per month to operate ($96,000 per year), funded through the city’s general fund, while city officials pursue a longer-term solution. Mayor Fred Keeley said he is open to adding toilets and showers to the budget, but that other services would need to be cut. 

That is a good start – and the public should be aware of those trade-offs.

Let’s be clear: The problem does not affect only unhoused people.

Businesses, residents, healthcare providers, sanitation workers — everyone who shares public space absorbs the impact when basic sanitation disappears.

Community groups have stepped up to help. Temple Beth El and the Belonging Collaborative have raised $2,000 for hygiene support. Service providers are trying to organize mobile showers.

Their efforts matter.

But access to bathrooms and showers should not depend on community volunteers.

It is a fundamental public health responsibility.

The city believes it responded. Technically, it has. But if people still cannot realistically reach the replacement facilities, then the problem has not been solved. 

Mail services, another offering Housing Matters ended on April 1, also remain largely unreplaced. The county’s Human Services Department has started holding government-related mail for one year, as it is required to do by law. But beyond that, people without housing cannot get mail unless they can afford a post office box. 

That makes something as basic as maintaining a mailing address a privilege — a dividing line between people who can stay connected to jobs, benefits and services and those who cannot.

Bathrooms. Showers. A mailing address.

None of these are complicated services. Yet almost three months after Housing Matters ended them, local officials still do not have adequate replacements in place.

The city and county can continue debating responsibility. Or they can recognize what should be obvious: When basic services disappear, the consequences do not stay confined to Coral Street.

The public deserves a clear plan, a timeline and a commitment to move faster. Local leaders knew this problem was coming. Now they need to solve it.

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

The post A Lookout View: Coral Street toilet shortage a stark contrast to local pandemic response – why doesn’t public health matter more? appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

This story was originally published by EdSource. Sign up for its daily newsletter.

At first glance, the preschool classroom in Paso Robles looks like any other: young students sing “Wheels on the Bus,” listen to stories and learn colors and shapes through play. 

But unlike most preschool classrooms, children with disabilities in this Marie Bauer Early Education Center classroom are learning alongside their peers who do not require special education services. This is unusual in California, where only 1 in 3 students with disabilities receive their preschool education in a classroom with their peers, according to an EdSource analysis of 2024-25 federal education data.

Parents, educators and researchers say this inclusive model improves outcomes for students with disabilities and reduces the need for more intensive — and costly — special education services in older grades.

“Kids with special needs, who have an IEP, need to be in programs with other, typically developing kids,” said Diana Makowetski, a special education teacher at Marie Bauer Early Education Center, referring to the individualized education program. “They need good language models. They need good social models.”

Supporters of inclusive early education argue that it can address one of the fastest-growing costs facing school districts: rising numbers of students who qualify for special education. In the upcoming state budget, school districts could see as much as a 43% bump in special education over the past year to address rising costs.

This new funding could be a golden opportunity not just to cover rising special education costs but to stop them from ballooning, according to Anjanette Pelletier, a special education finance expert and director of management consulting for School Services of California, Inc. In a recent report, she called for districts to invest in inclusive preschool settings, “one of the strongest opportunities for both educational and fiscal return.”

“Early education is not cheap,” said Heather Wahlberg, director of early childhood education at Paso Robles Joint Unified School District. 

But Wahlberg said that the district’s investment in early education has paid dividends. The number of students placed in special day classes with high staffing requirements has been cut in half, and 12% of students no longer require special education services in kindergarten at all.

Why don’t more districts offer inclusive preschools?

Researchers say that preschool is a great time for inclusion, because any gaps between students with disabilities and those without them is at its narrowest point. But the youngest children with disabilities are largely educated separately from their peers — in different classrooms, with different teachers — and sometimes even with different recess and lunch schedules.

That approach runs counter to the spirit of inclusion, which is enshrined in federal and state laws requiring students with disabilities to be educated in the least restrictive environment possible alongside their peers. The stakes are high in these early years.

“Once a child is not included, they’re almost never included after that,” said Karin Garver, an early childhood education policy specialist at the National Institute for Early Education Research. “So if we’re putting children in self-contained settings as preschoolers, we’ve kind of determined their fate as school children beyond that.”

Only 33% of California preschoolers with disabilities learn alongside their peers, compared with 45% nationally, according to federal data.

Moving to an inclusive model takes time, coordination and up-front investment, Pelletier said. 

Teachers and staff need professional development. Districts might need to modify classrooms and playgrounds to make them accessible for students with disabilities. Funding an inclusive preschool classroom requires districts to navigate a patchwork system of funds that could have complex staffing and licensing requirements, such as the California State Preschool Program.

Preschool funding isn’t like K-12 funding. This patchwork system means that where a child attends preschool, in practice, often depends on how much income their family earns or whether they have a disability — even within the same district.

“We, as a district, used to have a state preschool, a [general education] preschool, and our special [education] preschools all operating in separate silos,” said Wahlberg. “We finally came together as a district and said, ‘Those are all future Bearcats” — the mascot of the Paso Robles High School — “being educated in separate buildings by separate departments and by separate teachers.’”

Rather than maintaining separate programs, Paso Robles Joint Unified chose to bring all students together in inclusive classrooms. Depending on the child, Marie Bauer Early Education Center might receive state preschool funding, district funds for special education students or parent tuition payments.

The California Early Childhood Special Education Network is tasked by the California Department of Education with assisting school districts working to make the transition to inclusive classrooms. The state also provides grants for planning and implementation. 

“That really helped begin the conversation and alleviate some of that startup fears that many districts have about the funding,” said Wahlberg. “Having a grant like that and having that conversation happening at the state level was really supportive and powerful.”

Pelletier argues that the state should go even further. If inclusive early education can reduce the need for more intensive and costly services later, she said, districts should be required to invest more of their special education money in these early years.

Diana Makowetski, a special education teacher at Marie Bauer Early Education Center, helps students struggling with their speech skills. Credit: Emma Gallegos / EdSource ‘Leaps and bounds’

For families, the benefits of inclusive early education are often visible long before students reach kindergarten. 

Michelle Robinson said her 4-year-old grandson, Everest — “like the mountain, but he’s little” — was born prematurely and experienced delays in speech and motor development. He began attending Marie Bauer Early Education Center two years ago. Robinson said it’s made a world of difference.

“I have just seen this little guy grow by leaps and bounds,” she said. “Because it’s been such a positive experience, he’s super excited next year to go into TK.”

Her older grandson likely would have benefited from this program, Robinson said. But because of pandemic disruptions and a lack of awareness about available services, he never attended preschool. 

“When he got to kindergarten, it was a challenge for him,” she said. 

That’s become a common story, according to Wahlberg. Kindergarten teachers in Paso Robles Joint Unified have told her they can often tell which students attended the preschool. They are better at regulating themselves and have better language, social skills and fine motor skills.

The most common challenge in young children is delayed speech and language development. Speech-language pathologist Ashley Tsudama said children might struggle with communication because of developmental delays or autism. Children who were isolated during the pandemic or who spend a lot of time on screens also have limited opportunities to develop language skills.

Paso Robles Joint Unified is beginning to see signs of that impact. According to Wahlberg, behavioral issues among students who attended preschool have declined. For 2022-23, 14 preschool students were placed in either transitional kindergarten or kindergarten special day classes — a number that dropped to six for the upcoming school year. These classes are costly because they require heavier staffing than general education classrooms: one teacher plus aides for every 10 students.

When children struggle to communicate or regulate their emotions, those challenges can spill into the classroom and become more serious as academic expectations grow.

“We always say when we’re building our students’ ability to maintain regulation during disappointment and frustration, we’re building future mathematicians and problem solvers and readers,” Wahlberg said.

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

The post Could early education bring down rising costs to serve California students with disabilities? appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.