Memo to California GOP: Don
Mayor Richard Riordan built the modern Los Angeles. Supervisor Brooks Firestone kept Santa Barbara County from splitting. Gov. Ronald Reagan created the economic foundation for the Silicon Valley boom. What ever happened to achievement-driven Republicans? If you ask state Sen. Abel Maldonado, R-Santa Maria, the GOP in the Golden State is locked in a battle Read More →
Exports of region
With a population of 1.3 billion, China is undoubtedly the world’s manufacturing powerhouse. But as Chinese families rise to the middle class at unprecedented rates, the country is starting to be viewed as something different: a relatively untapped market for wine and other “Western” goods. According to export experts, serious wine sales to China have Read More →
Half-baked Apple store takes shape behind walls on State St.
Ask anyone what the worst-kept secret in town is, and they’ll tell you: the new Apple building in downtown Santa Barbara, which is undergoing an extensive renovation. The computer giant is spending a small fortune – and making a large racket – demolishing and rebuilding the 9,594-square-foot retail space at 928 State St., which housed Read More →
SLO pays a hefty price for curbing free enterprise
The toll of bankruptcy, foreclosure and financial mayhem in San Luis Obispo County is adding up to more than $120 million. That’s a tremendous amount of money for a county of just 250,000 residents, and the total seems destined to climb higher before things turn around. Reporting by staff writer Stephen Nellis in the current Read More →
Madoff
When Elaine Dine sold her attorney head-hunting firm about a decade ago, an employee told her about a seemingly solid investment called Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities. “He closes the books day to day,” the employee told her. “It’s like having cash.” So Dine, a South Coast resident for the past five and half years, Read More →
Sorry to be bearer of bad news: the market hasn
After attending the Santa Barbara Association of Realtors meeting at the Montecito Country Club along with about 200 other people on Feb. 5, I decided I didn’t want to do it again. I didn’t want to come back to this column with more depressing statistics, more somber quotes and another bleak outlook. But it seems Read More →
Ways to encourage small business in the Tri-Counties
You might say the economic stimulus bill currently before the Congress represents the best thinking by Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill. It’s a combination of old fashioned prime the pump spending plans with Kennedy-Reagan era tax cuts to give the public more money. On top of that, banks and large auto makers have gotten Read More →
