More Santa Barbara-Ventura Chapter happenings in photos

Santa Barbara Group Candidate meet and greet

SB Sierra Club Group (left) hosted a meet-and-greet with the candidates we endorsed for the 2024 election on Oct.8 at the Community Environmental Council Hub where over 40 environmental advocates attended. Here, our Chapter Chair Katie Davis listens to Rep. Salud Carbajal who offered hope and inspiration. SB City Council Oscar Gutierrez, Goleta City candidates Stuart Kasdin and Jennifer Smith, and Buellton mayoral candidate David Silva shared their visions for a greener Central Coast. (Photos by Emily Engle)

Don’t enable Sable protest at the SB County Administration Building, urging the board and others to reject reopening a pipeline that corroded and released hundreds of thousands of gallons of crude oil into the ocean at Gaviota with an eye to reopen now-idle oil platforms off our coast. (Photo by Laura Sanchez, of Surfrider)

An aerial view of the May 19, 2015, Refugio oil spill caused by a ruptured oil pipeline on the Gaviota Coast of Santa Barbara County. (California Coastal Commission photo)

Our club group on Nov. 12 (right) enjoyed a presentation by Rachel Nash and Nancy Kim about their work as MountainAdoras leaders in Santa Barbara. It promotes feminine-identifying gender participation in local biking with workshops, rides, and trips. Learn more at: https://www.mountainadoras.com/

Residents in the foothills above Camarillo who returned to their neighborhoods days after fleeing the Mountain fire were greeted by nothing more than devastation. More than 130 structures were lost, most of them houses, when flames marched through the area cementing the fire as one of the most destructive a Southern California neighborhood has seen in years. More than 80 other structures were also damaged. (Photo courtesy of CalFire)

A quarter of avocado fields were lost, and at least $7 million in agricultural damage is estimated. Farmworkers were also hit. As an LA Times headline said: “Mountain fire sent their paychecks up in flames along with crops” nor did they have any kind of ‘safety net’. The Times also reported that: “Without crops to harvest, more than 42,000 field workers in Ventura County are without a paycheck in such disasters,” said Primitiva Hernández, executive director of 805 Undocufund, a joint effort of immigrant-serving organizations in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties. Three days after the fire started, 805 Undocufund launched a needs assessment of field and domestic workers affected by the Mountain fire. Go to: https://www.805undocufund.org/