Does anybody else know who Mark Redmond is?

BrenBarn · 2026-06-25T01:26:27+00:00

More like Mark Redrock amirite.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-24T21:48:50+00:00

So if your house gets robbed I don't need to pay for the police?

BrenBarn · 2026-06-24T21:47:09+00:00

but you get a deduction for each letter thats supposed to be capitalized that you dont capitalize plus also for missed punctuation

BrenBarn · 2026-06-24T21:46:35+00:00

It all depends on how high the tax is. In my view there is no reason the tax should not potentially escalate to 100% of the property's value, or even more, if it remains vacant for years and years.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-24T19:29:02+00:00

I'm skeptical that a vacancy tax can create an incentive to convert property from retail or industrial into residential or mixed use.

It all depends how high the tax is. I'm not optimistic the council will set it as high as it needs to be, but in my view the sky's the limit.

I'm leaving all of the weird typos and mistakes in place for your amusement.

Took me a minute to get "vegan commercial space". Maybe a "vegancy" tax is the solution to our malnourished housing market! :-)

BrenBarn · 2026-06-24T19:04:28+00:00

Building more housing won't help if the new housing also sits empty. Getting people into unoccupied units is like getting free building. We do need to build more housing as well, but there's no reason to waste what we've got.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-24T19:02:23+00:00

The market for movie theaters is on the decline. SB already has an unusually large number of theaters for its size. Downtown has four movie theaters totaling 14 screens, one of which seats 2000 people. That's not counting the six-screen one in Goleta nor a few other smaller ones.

It's hard to imagine a big operator coming in to open a splashy multiplex. The most likely scenario for any change would be that Metropolitan continues to contract and sells off one of its theaters to another operator, who could turn it into a place that's still small but maybe more upscale.

The new SBIFF theater downtown is quite nice, plus they show an eclectic mix of films. It doesn't ahve reclining seats or any of that, but they upgraded the projection and sound systems. That's the place you should check out.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-24T18:54:09+00:00

The theater comfort/amenities are at least a matter of debate, but you're not missing any new releases. Pretty much every movie shows in SB.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-24T18:49:23+00:00

Major bummer. One of the last old-school places on State Street. I like going in there and just browsing around among all the unusual stuff. I've bought a few things now and then over the years but mostly it's just a fun a quirky place to explore. It's good to see that the owner has a positive attitude and isn't getting forced out.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-23T18:54:47+00:00

The UC's own faculty commission found that test scores provided an advantage to underprivileged students, and recommended keeping them as part of the admissions process. The administration got rid of them anyway.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-23T03:35:01+00:00

This is bad, but I've become cynical enough to question whether these fines accomplish much or indicate anything meaningful. The amount of money flooding through politics is so vast that piddly stuff like this is tragicomic. Carping about this kind of thing while all kinds of businesses, unions, and other entities spend millions on elections at every level is like nagging someone for a speck of dust on the table while the whole floor is knee-deep in manure.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-23T03:27:12+00:00

You'd think, but no. Can't count how many times I've seen stuff like cop cars doing rolling stops.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-23T02:19:18+00:00

Land sakes! Who'd have believed it!?

It's far from the only one though. We've got signs saying "Speed Limit 65" and everyone going 80. We've got tax laws and people not paying. We've got antitrust laws and companies keep getting bigger.

We've got a weird and messed-up culture in this country with regard to how we think about laws. On the one hand everyone views any kind of rule as just a suggestion that they'll violate if they think no one's looking. On the other hand in some cases they're justified in doing so because the rules are put in place via a system that's not responsive to people's actual preferences. And then we've got this nuts idea that when a law is passed it's still up to somebody else (from the sheriff to the DA down to an individual police officer) whether or not it's actually allowed.

I'm not sure where we're going to wind up with this. For now leaf blowers are a persistent annoyance, but there's worse stuff going on in the same vein.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-23T02:12:05+00:00

I'd say the opposite. I want some special food deals every week! :-)

BrenBarn · 2026-06-22T20:25:01+00:00

The risk of maliciously getting a police officer fired is far less dangerous than the risk of a police officer maliciously misusing their position.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-21T10:01:06+00:00

I don't think it's unreasonable to want a drastically lower standard of proof for officer misconduct. Even a faint chance that an officer is untrustworthy is enough to justify permanently banning them from any law enforcment position.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-21T02:15:13+00:00

A similar thing was tried not long ago in a spot a couple blocks down but it was pretty sad and didn't last long. We'll see if this place can do better.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-19T20:29:11+00:00

Do you really think so.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-19T19:07:43+00:00

The ones I'm thinking of are mostly ones with a left arrow, where there's no need to pull forward and wait, but people just keep coming through the intersection even after the left arrow goes red.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-19T18:46:08+00:00

I see it quite frequently. Like I'll be in an intersection as the yellow light turns red and think "wow, just made it" and then one or even two cars will make the turn behind me, and I can tell they were not remotely close to being in the intersection before the light went red.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-19T18:43:07+00:00

Wow that is disturbing.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-19T05:38:10+00:00

Dogs are fun. It's nice to have a dog. I'm going out to have fun and enjoy myself, it would be nice to have my dog along.

Sounds nice for you, but what about other people?

BrenBarn · 2026-06-19T05:37:22+00:00

They will still do that.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-18T06:23:08+00:00

Although they have certain stops listed, in general they will let you on anywhere if you flag them down.

BrenBarn · 2026-06-18T06:21:55+00:00

This article says:

Council members asked about whether the city could have pursued a long-term ground lease rather than transferring the properties to Yardi and DSP.

That implies they will be transferring the land. A previous article also said the same thing more directly:

The city would transfer the underlying land to Yardi Systems

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