With the City of Santa Barbara’s last odd-year election right around the corner, Santa Barbarans find themselves confronting many uncertain futures all at once. Issues that have perennially confounded us — like housing affordability and chronic homelessness — have achieved new critical mass. Other issues, like the cultural and economic vitality of our downtown, have popped up recently with a sudden urgency. Looming in our peripheral vision are more dire global threats that call into question the city’s water supply and sea-level rise.
In other words, lots of big questions. No easy answers.
Objectively speaking — it must be acknowledged — Santa Barbara is a well-managed, professionally run city. Our problems, as piercing as they feel, would be the envy of most municipalities on Planet Earth. But the growing level of public frustration and impatience with the lack of leadership and direction from City Hall is palpable. And for good reason.