Cover Story
Gone cold: A look at SLO County’s unsolved homicides
A desolate stretch of highway near the Kern County line. A sprawling field of sugar peas in Nipomo. The wilderness near a campground in the California Valley. A home tucked away off a stretch of rural road in Templeton. They are lonely places, many of them far from the day-to-day bustle of life in SLO County.…
Should we be taking Donald Trump seriously as a presidential candidate?
Mike Shanahan unknown “Yes. If it wasn’t for him, there wouldn’t have been a Congressional hearing on the children being killed by illegals.” Marshall Neal sales-client services manager “No. Somebody that expresses the views that he has, how can you take him seriously? Kacey Held engineer “Definitely not. He’s making a fool of himself.” Downtown…
Spice of Life’s Chai Black Tea and Paso Robles’ Wineshine
I recently upped my morning black tea game with a smell-good satchel of Spice of Life’s chai black tea. Seriously: This stuff smells so good I want to leave a teabag in every room of my house—car included. Cardamom, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, oh my! Why drink boring old black tea when you can experience the…
Recommendations
Stuff you should know: Have you been to 36 Degrees C in Templeton lately? The craft beer is cold; the cava is bubbly; they have a super cool outdoor fire pit, and you can get down on some awesome small plates, too! (624 S. Main St., No. 101; call 434-1554 for more information) … Gaviota…
Whalebird Kombucha is taking over your neighborhood, one tap at a time
Something weird is happening around SLO. A massive colony of bacteria and yeast is spreading from High Street to Higuera, bubbling its way into coffee shops, restaurants—even the Thursday night Farmers’ Market. No, this isn’t a clip from the 1958 cult flick The Blob, but it could be. Run, don’t walk, from … the kombucha!…
The California Mid-State Fair offers plenty of entertainment this week including Mötley Crüe on July 25th
It appears the un-seasonal, muggy weather is dissipating just in time for the California Mid-State Fair, “the biggest little fair anywhere!” Thank goodness, because it’s usually hot enough in Paso in July with just the normal summer heat. This year marks the 59th anniversary of the Mid-State Fair. Just imagine the sheer number of hotdogs,…
Clubs 7/23/15 – 7/30/15
Goin’ South THE CLIFFS RESORT: 2757 Shell Beach Road, 773-5000 or cliffsresort.com. F. MCLINTOCKS SALOON: Two locations: 750 Mattie Road in Pismo Beach and 133 Bridge St. in Arroyo Grande. 773-1892 or mclintocks.com. Live music at the Pismo Beach location every Fri. and Sat. from 6-9pm. Tennessee Jimmy Harrell and Doc Stoltey play on alternating…
Win art at the SLO-Poke Western Art Rodeo at Seaside Gallery
Partner, this show is not to be missed! Celebrate the fifth annual SLO-Poke Western Art Rodeo at Seaside Gallery with a Buffalo Head Nickel drawing slated for July 18 between 1 and 4 p.m. The prize is art, of course. The piece up for grabs, Urban Cowboy, by local artist Gene Francis, is a contemporary…
Unfinished Business plays Arroyo Grande’s Heritage Square Park on July 19
The 1960s will come swirling to life at an Arroyo Grande summer concert featuring local retro rock band Unfinished Business on July 19. Starting at 1 p.m., get in on the raffle, food, drink, and dance action. Did I mention you can also snag a free tour of historical buildings in Heritage Square Park? This…
Santa Margarita Ranch Vintage Times Trials brings out the gearheads on July 11th
It’s Saturday, July 11, and my wife and I are pulling into Santa Margarita Ranch on a warm, clear Central Coast morning. As we make the turn to the ranch that cuts through a residential area, we see a homemade sign that says, “Drive Slow.” As soon as we’re through the gate into the ranch,…
Three art-minded surfer dudes make a splash with The Cayucos Collective
It doesn’t get much more small-town than Cayucos. Here, everybody knows your name—and you may not know what you’re doing, but your neighbor surely does. Leave it to three local surfer dudes to breathe new life back into the somewhat insular art scene of Cayucos. The Cayucos Collective, originally started as an online gallery helmed…
Festival Mozaic parties like it’s 1749
You know how tiny and miniscule you feel when you’re lying on your back, looking up into a clear, starry night? That’s how Festival Mozaic Music Director Scott Yoo feels when he listens to Johann Sebastian Bach’s Mass in B Minor. And he totally loves it. “In a great way, I feel like an ant…
Kudos to New Times’ new staffers
Thank God the New Times is back!!!! The last few years the New Times produced a marginal product. I was surprisingly excited to read this week’s (July 16) New Times! I read it cover-to-cover laughing out loud at some of the articles: the Target porn scandal and The Shredder. The “Shower to flower” article was…
A look at the first round of fundraising in the battle for the 24th Congressional seat
While California voters won’t be hitting the polls for the 2016 election’s June 7 primary for about 10 months, candidates in some of the hot races are already working hard to get their votes. In the race to fill the U.S. House of Representatives 24th Congressional District seat, that hard work isn’t yet on public…
Vive la révolution!
People are sick of being screwed, sick of stagnant wages, sick of economic inequality, sick of corporate fat cats and bankers playing by a different set of rules, sick of CEOs making 300 times as much as their workers, just sick, sick, sick of the status quo. How else do you explain Bernie Sanders, presidential…
The Shredder needs to have a little more respect
I have always been a strong supporter of The Shredder, but after the column “To V or not to V” (July 9) regarding parents vaccinating their children or not, I’ve changed my mind. The column, being anonymous for one puts it in a different category. The author (or authors) don’t have to identify themselves and…
SLO’s media is full of liberals
Larry, my next-door neighbor, is convinced that the only way the SLO Tribune can remain in business is that they are subsidized by the DNC, which got me to thinking that this must be why there is never anything printed that is positive toward conservatives. So yesterday I picked up a copy of New Times…
Storing rain should come before gray water
Kylie Mendonca’s piece (“Save some for the passion fruit,” July 16) on gray water usage was excellent, distilling the intricacies of a water conservation approach many more people need to consider implementing. However, as Josh Carmichael stated in the article, there is a “hierarchy of water conservation” starting with the installation of efficient fixtures such…
Elections are for you to decide
It offends me to the core each election cycle that a few powerful individuals decide who can run for the President of the U.S., according to the candidate’s willingness to maintain the status quo. That tradition continues on the Central Coast. Recently Lois Capps endorsed Salud Carbajal to take her seat in Congress. That endorsement…
Gray water and soft water don’t mix
The article (“Save some for the passion fruit,” July 16) on gray water was informative, but appears to have left out a major issue. Gray water systems are not appropriate for homes with soft water systems. The sidebar said that water should not contain sodium or potassium chloride, but the article itself never bothered to…
Don’t forget about soft water
Thank you for your article on recycling water for use in gardens (“Save some for the passion fruit,” July 16). There is one major concern your article doesn’t address, and that I haven’t seen in several water reuse articles, and that is the danger to plants when reusing softened water. If one has a soft…
Make change count
This is a response to the July 9 article written by Chris McGuinness, “Spare change: SLO’s homeless meters don’t bring in much money, but supporters hope to keep them around anyway.” Homelessness is a complex issue. Many communities and organizations struggle with funding, resources, or solutions to address the problem. The city of San Luis…
Nail bling and blowouts await at Posh Couture in SLO
Yessie Nojas says she can’t draw to save her life, but give her a tiny nail as a canvas and she will let her imagination run wild. So wild, in fact, that she reached the finals of an international nail competition, and, most recently, opened her own nail studio. “I just have a big passion…
Cougars & Mustangs
Yeah, I know. You don’t really want to be thinking about September yet. I mean, SCHOOL? Yuck! That’s for nerds! But suck it up, buttercup, let me lay this down, it might turn you around. From Sept. 18 to 20, Cuesta College will host the 31st annual Central Coast Writer’s Conference, a San Luis Obispo…
Cal Poly SLO’s reported sexual assaults have increased in the past five years
Reports of sexual violence at Cal Poly have skyrocketed since 2012. According to preliminary data from university law enforcement, police received 13 reports of sexual assaults on or around Cal Poly’s campus in 2014—that’s up from six in 2013, and just one in 2012. That’s the highest number of assault reports in at least a…
SLO’s still looking for its next police chief
The city of SLO is still in the early phases of finding a new police chief and is currently gathering input from city officials and the public to determine just what they want from SLO’s next top cop. July 21 marked the final day for residents to participate in an online survey that sought public…
Conviction overturned in 2010 Arroyo Grande vehicular manslaughter case
The last five years of Rene Rosas’ life have left him in states of confusion and despair, but he’s finally able to start rebuilding his life. On July 2, Rosas was released from San Luis Obispo County Jail after his conviction for vehicular manslaughter was overturned on appeal. The original conviction stemmed from the Sept.…
SLO City Council approves unruly gathering ordinance, version 2.0
If at first your city ordinance doesn’t accomplish what it was designed to do, try, try again. That’s the spirit carried by San Luis Obispo while the city amended its aptly named unruly gathering ordinance. The SLO City Council approved the amendments at its July 21 meeting, which essentially beef up the police department’s ability…
More cash for Cal Poly SLO president
Cal Poly President Jeffery Armstrong will see a little more cash in his paychecks thanks to a recent vote by the California State University system’s board of trustees. The trustees voted July 21 to approve an across-the-board 2 percent raise for system executives, including CSU’s 23 campus presidents. The increase bumps Armstrong’s annual base salary…
Maldonado family sued for alleged labor violations
A prominent Santa Maria Valley farming family is facing a class-action lawsuit filed by former employees for allegedly violating several labor laws. The complaint alleges that the agricultural businesses Agro-Jal Farming Enterprises Inc., Agro-Jal Farms Inc., Paloma Packing Inc., and the companies’ owners Abel Maldonado Sr., Abel Maldonado Jr., and Frank Maldonado, violated several California…
