The 805

Santa Barbara is having a vigil tonight for the 34 people who died in the Conception diving boat fire. We look at the history of diving in the area. Also, a new collection of personal essays written by a Westmont professor addresses the complex process of grieving. 

Hope Refuge helps underage sex trafficking survivors transition to a new life of freedom. And a San Luis Obispo Assemblyman hopes to keep California’s last nuclear power plant running with his proposal to reclassify nuclear power as renewable energy.  Laura Capps will challenge Das Williams in the upcoming County Supervisor election with a family-values campaign just as the first recreational cannabis store opens in Santa Barbara. 

Scientists hope to reduce whale fatalities from ship collisions. A new sound technology will detect when the endangered animals are present and then alert cargo ships to slow down.  More Mesa is on the market for $65 million and community members may come together to try to purchase the coastal bluffs. And during Prohibition, Santa Barbara served as a hideaway for rum runners and many of the surrounding islands and caves were used for illegal operations.

Santa Barbara author T.C. Boyle explores how technology affects our lives in his short story The Relive Box. In Testimonios: Early California Through the Eyes of Women the authors have translated and transcribed taped oral histories from early California settler women as tell their often forgotten stories. Hollywood screenwriter Billy Ray talks about his work writing political stump speeches. And Santa Barbara is the hometown of some world-famous foods. 

Pacific Standard employees took to social media to express their shock and anxieties over the magazine’s abrupt end. As fears of deportation grow among undocumented immigrants, complaints about fraudulent immigration lawyers are also on the rise. The city of San Luis Obispo may take a bold stand against public art that honors individuals over ideas. And a new hashtag spreads awareness that women often pay more than men for identical products.

The last standing nuclear power plant in California may face safety issues if there's an electrical power outage during wildfire season. A new Sea Center exhibit at Stearns Wharf looks at efforts to revive the endangered wild abalone. And the Ensemble exhibit at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art highlights the intersection of sound and art.

A couple’s regenerative farming practices in Moorpark inspires the popular documentary “The Biggest Little Farm.” Santa Barbara’s Old Spanish Days’ tradition of selling decorated eggs on the sidewalk is under scrutiny for its environmental footprint. A new report suggests ideas for addressing lower State Street’s high vacancy rate. And Santa Barbara County Supervisor Das Williams may see a challenger within his own party in 2020.

The youngest of a 15-generation family farm in Carpinteria leaves the family history of growing fruit and flowers to embrace the “green rush” of cannabis cultivation. After six deaths this year at the Oceano Dunes Vehicular Recreation Area - and some unhappy neighboring residents - the Coastal Commission is taking a hard look at California’s last public beach open that allows vehicles. And saxophonist Ted Nash from the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra plays his musical interpretations of some famous paintings at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art.

Kids’ free summer food programs are seeing low attendance following fears of increased ICE raids. California regulators hear public comment on ideas for decommissioning Platform Holly - the only oil drilling platform in the Channel that lies in California state waters. Berkeley economists reevaluate the cost of closing the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant.

Santa Barbara County uses a state grant to boost programs aimed to keep minors out of prison. An iconic Santa Barbara architect weighs in on his ideas for better downtown housing design. Lotusland’s renovated Japanese Garden offers an opportunity for contemplation.

County Supervisor, Das Williams, discusses cannabis permits in Santa Barbara County. Scientists look to explain the spike in gray whale deaths. Some new wine trends might impress your friends.

William Finnegan talks surfing, writing, and growing up.

Ventura approves a 24-hour homeless shelter. Marc McGinnes talks his new book “In Love with Earth”. And State Street gets cozy with some new shared commercial spaces.

The public weighs in on fracking California’s public lands. Gun shows will continue at Ventura County Fairgrounds. Trash collection rates rise in Santa Barbara. And a lifelong Santa Barbara forager shares his mushroom tales.

A memorial helps mark this week’s five year anniversary of the deadly Isla Vista shootings. Pest control issues crop up for avocado farmers in Carpinteria who neighbor with cannabis cultivators. And, Ventura, Santa Barbara, and Goleta all remain slow to issue permits for pot shops.

Yvon Chouinard, founder of Patagonia, talks about his new book “Some Stories: Lessons from the Edge of Business and Sport.” And the Rosewood Miramar hotel in Montecito opens its flagship restaurant, Caruso’s.

Santa Barbara homeless residents will receive more wrap-around services, but may also face tougher rules on city park behavior. One woman explores the culinary and social joys of eating out alone. The Squire Foundation partners with the Santa Barbara Public Market to bring the Short Edition Story Dispenser. The Museum of Contemporary Art Santa Barbara brings multi-media artist James Benning’s show Quilts, Cigarettes & Dirt to Santa Barbara.

Plains All American and DCOR face court decisions for business in the Santa Barbara Channel. A new program at UCSB hopes to encourage more students to study the humanities. Three UCSB music students share the stage with world-famous cellist and humanitarian, Yo-Yo Ma, while he offers the public a free master class at the Grenada Theater. And a new fee may be placed on bottles of wine sold in Santa Barbara county as a way to raise money for regional wine marketing.

The Santa Barbara City Council voted to require landlords to provide one-year leases to tenants. It also took a big step toward approving a "just cause" eviction ordinance. After years of drought water conservation, the City of Santa Barbara lifts its restrictions. Matt Kettman, food editor at the Santa Barbara Independent, visits Montecito’s $550 a plate restaurant, The Silver Bough.

Debris nets go up in the slide zones of Carpinteria and Montecito in an effort to save money and reduce mudslide risks. Large container ships are asked to voluntarily slow down as the pass through the Santa Barbara Channel during the summer to reduce coastal air pollution and reduce the risk of striking endangered whales.

The trees at the Ellwood Mesa preserve have been dying off, and the California Monarchs are following suit. Santa Barbara’s newest poet laureate talks about her two year tenure and her quest to take poetry from the university to the streets. And first it was helicopter moms, now it’s lawnmower parents.

The city of Santa Barbara gets a state grant to try and help the roughly 900 people who are homeless in the city. Old Town Goleta has a reputation for being pretty sleepy. Can a booming beverage industry pour some life into the area? Bakers in Santa Barbara are going to extremes to make the perfect tartine loaf. And as we head into spring, one local nonprofit prepares to receive thousands of wild baby animals in distress.

An investigation by the Ventura County Fire Department says power lines owned by Southern California Edison started the Thomas Fire. The debate continues over whether or not the county should approve new onshore oil drilling near Santa Maria. And hundreds of ultramarathoners will descend on the Los Padres Mountains this weekend for the Nine Trails Race.

Birds are chirping, creeks are flowing and wildflower buds are beginning to pop up and down the Central Coast. A landscape architect who understands the complicated and delicate nature of creating public memorials offers advice to Montecito. And neuroscientists from UC Santa Barbara have developed a new theory that helps explain why some people drink too much.

A new Crisis Intervention Team in Santa Barbara County pairs a sheriff’s deputy with a mental health specialist. Photographer James Balog explains the massive impact humans are having on the elements. And KCRW tours Santa Barbara's largest landfill, which is nearing capacity.

Confidential records detailing police misconduct and use force are on the verge of becoming public in California, but the union representing Ventura’s sheriff's deputies is pushing back. There’s a new executive director at the Santa Barbara Museum of Contemporary Art, and her first exhibit feels like walking through a car wash. And the Goleta Chamber of Commerce wants to freshen up Old Town, but a number of property owners are worried they won’t stop there.

The president of Santa Barbara City College announces his retirement as students fume about how he handled disputes over race and gender. A local historian walks through a 4-mile-long tunnel below the Santa Ynez mountains to learn about Santa Barbara's complicated history with water. And the Santa Barbara City Council selected 32-year-old Meagan Harmon to represent the downtown district.

Tensions flare in the town of Carpinteria over the smell of pot. A local air traffic controller, who went without pay during the government shutdown, reflects after attending the State of the Union Address. And a new documentary highlights Santa Barbara’s global influence in the world of surfing.

The debate over gun control and gun shows heats up in Thousands Oaks after the Borderline shooting. A new documentary tells the controversial story behind a park that was once a cemetery in Ventura. And a rising Chicano musician returns home to Oxnard to support the local music scene.

Southern California’s largest utility company is suing Santa Barbara County for failing to prepare for last winter’s deadly debris flows. Award-winning author George Saunders believes fiction can help bring the country back together. And it’s been 50 years since an oil rig off the coast of Santa Barbara spilled 3 million gallons of crude oil into the Pacific and brought the environmental movement to the nation’s consciousness.

Local federal workers are picking up free food as the government shutdown continues. More than 1000 PG&E workers in San Luis Obispo fear for their jobs as the utility declares bankruptcy. Santa Barbara is beginning to automatically enroll residents into the county’s emergency alert system. And an art show explores the laborious, sometimes hopeless task of striving for justice.

One year ago, torrential rain pelted the hillside community of Montecito, which was scorched a month earlier by the Thomas Fire. It unleashed a flow of mud and boulders the size of cars and killed 23 people. We check in with the community one year later and talk about what’s being done to prevent another debris flow.

A proposal to build tiny homes for the homeless in downtown Santa Barbara comes to a bitter end. A local production of Charles Dickens’ ‘A Christmas Carol’ has an unusual twist -- a woman playing the role of Scrooge. And an energy company scraps its plan to build a new power plant on Oxnard’s coast.

A year ago, the Thomas Fire swallowed large swaths of Ventura County and lept into Santa Barbara’s front country, setting the stage for the late-night debris flow that took 23 lives. As we observe those anniversaries, we’re checking back with those we spoke with in the immediate aftermath.

A local environmentalist says we should spend more time and money preparing for natural disasters than responding to them. A Ventura resident who lost his home in the Thomas Fire says rebuilding is taking longer than he’d hoped. Local animal shelters are becoming critical evacuation centers. And California counties must now hold public meetings on their relationship with federal immigration agents.

A year after the Thomas Fire began, a new book out of Ojai tells stories of the community’s destruction and regrowth. Cuddle groups are popping up all over the place, including Santa Barbara. And, according to a newly released report, sea level rise could cover nearly two-thirds of Santa Barbara city beaches by 2100.

The city of Santa Barbara says it needs a new police station, but building one means displacing either farmers or lawn bowlers. The Woolsey has not only destroyed hundreds of homes and forced thousands of people to evacuate, but it’s displaced a diverse mix of wildlife. And a new contemporary art exhibition takes a deep dive into the most famous art heists in history.

On the heels of a deadly mass shooting at the Borderline Bar and Grill in Thousand Oaks, two blazes in the area are forcing more than 100,000 residents in Ventura and L.A. Counties to evacuate their homes.

At the peak of his career as a palliative care doctor in Santa Barbara, Michael Kearney found himself burned out and in a state of personal suffering. Even though he had become an expert in treating the pain of others, he couldn’t treat his own. That changed when he had a revelatory experience that provided him with a path forward. Meanwhile, the November election is just days away, a look at what could happen to the Central Coast if California voters pass Proposition 10.

California and the Trump Administration finally found something to agree upon: offshore wind farms, which could be coming to the Central Coast. In the wealthy enclave of Montecito, an expensive race is shaping up for the local water district. Also, we’ll explain two local measures in Santa Barbara County that appear almost identical and run through the pros and cons of the state gas tax repeal.

Author Pico Iyer returns to Santa Barbara to preview his upcoming speaker series. Columnist Starshine Roshell brings us inside the surprisingly large world of local trivia nights. And more controversy at the Santa Barbara Unified School District, as a group of anonymous parents threatens to sue school leaders over an implicit bias training program it claims discriminates against white people.

California becomes the first state to impose gender quotas on corporate boards, but will the new law make it through legal review? It’s a close race for the 25th Congressional seat in Ventura County, as Democrats try to flip the district from red to blue. A wine from the Central Coast plays a lead role in “Somm 3,” and artists debut performances inspired by the Thomas Fire and subsequent mudslides.

The race for two open seats on the Santa Barbara Unified School Board is heating up. Engineers say an aging levee in Ventura could put thousands of homes at risk. A new documentary connects the dots between the 2015 Volkswagen scandal and the 1969 Santa Barbara oil spill. Lois Capps opens up about her time in Congress and how she relied on her faith to get her through two family tragedies.

Cases of Valley Fever are spiking along the Central Coast. If Governor Jerry Brown wants to decrease the state’s carbon footprint, why is he approving new onshore oil drilling? A journalist tours a ranch in the Santa Ynez Valley owned by McDonald’s tycoon Ray Kroc. And starting next year, female surfers will earn the same amount of prize money as male surfers.

A third of the storefronts along downtown State Street in Santa Barbara sit vacant, and the city is trying to change that. Park officials in the Santa Monica Mountains say four new mountain lion kittens are a product of inbreeding. Latinos in Santa Barbara are speaking out about evictions, rent increases, and lackluster landlords. And a new storytelling workshop open to the community begins next week.

Police officials in Lompoc are kicking homeless people out of an encampment along the Santa Ynez river. A local entrepreneur says his product reduces the risk of shark attacks. The United Farm Workers labor organization has a new female president. And legal warfare is about to break out in Santa Barbara over three recreational marijuana dispensaries that got the green light earlier this summer.

California may become the first state to require large companies to have women on their boards. An economics professor from UCSB says we should prepare for a future with no physical cash. A new cookbook tells the story of one successful Funk Zone restaurant. And we tour Mar y Cel, also known as the Tea Gardens, to learn about the history and future of this mysterious property in Montecito.

Officials with the Los Padres National Forest want to create fire breaks to protect communities from wildfires, but environmentalists worry about the harmful effects of commercial logging. Writer T.C. Boyle’s latest piece of fiction in the New Yorker tackles survivors guilt after the mudslide in Montecito. And residents in Santa Barbara are invited to tour the city’s new desalination plant for the first time.

This Saturday, LA Philharmonic conductor Gustavo Dudamel will lead students from the Music Academy of the West and the LA Master Chorale in Mahler’s Symphony Number 2, the “Resurrection," at the Santa Barbara Bowl. As wildfires continue to rage throughout the state, Southern California’s biggest utility company is taking steps to make sure it doesn’t start a future fire. And, a look at whether fuel breaks work to stop blazes, plus other top local stories of the week, including a cascarone controversy during Fiesta.

The City of Ventura is struggling to come to terms with story of a man who was murdered by a homeless person in a popular local restaurant. We’ll get reaction. Then, to San Luis Obispo where a mentally ill inmate died behind bars. One journalist says this story is representative of a national crisis.