Meeting jointly for the second time ever, members of the Santa Barbara City Council and the Santa Barbara Community College Board of Trustees got an angry, if respectful, earful from City College neighbors about loud, drunken, and out-of-control students living next door. They wanted the council to adopt a stricter noise ordinance that would address the growing problems of what was described by one speaker as “Isla Vista East." And by the meeting’s end, it was clear many councilmembers felt the same way.
One Oceano Avenue resident complained that there’d been 128 calls for police service in an eight-month period about the goings-on of a property owned by one of the city’s better known slumlords. Tires were slashed, he said, and at least one throat, too. A 20-year resident said it was his misfortune to have 6-to-9 City College students living next door. His wife, he said, approached them respectfully to keep it down. “The response is not what you’d expect,” he said, adding he’d called the police at least 20 times for help. Another resident complained of fights, drug deals, and nonstop shouting. “Don’t bother to ask whether I got a good night’s sleep,” she fumed. “I don’t know what I could tell you.”
Inspiring this outpouring of lamentation and woe was a discussion of what progress has been made in the plan adopted last spring by the Neighborhood Improvement Task Force, assembled by City College administrators in response to community complaints. The effort — as well as SBCC President Lori Gaskin — received considerable praise at the time. But mostly, the neighbors didn’t want to hear how a proposed noise ordinance had been caught in a procedural quagmire as downtown hotel, restaurant, and bar owners weighed in on what impact such a measure might have on them.