Did You Know? Bonnie Donovan
Once again this column advocates for a decision oversight board to apply logic and common sense to the decision-making of the Santa Barbara City Council and its committees.
The latest episode of market economics ignorance appears to be on a par with some council members’ efforts to destroy the private rental housing market.
This is in the Finance Committee’s current push to expand restaurant seating that will effectively cannibalize the restaurant trade on State Street and surrounding areas, as described by downtown business owner Kevin Boss.
In fact, he indicates they want to permanently maintain and increase restaurant seating on the sidewalks and parklets that violated many building and use codes and were permitted only because of a state of emergency proclaimed by the governor. This is now set to expire in February 2023. In fact, after the grace period following the cancellation of the state of emergency, almost all the concessions granted to restaurant owners will become illegal.
This could put the city council in violation of its own legal safety codes and rules and potentially in conflict with those government departments responsible for enforcing the same rules and codes.
In a letter to the city council, its Finance Committee and others, Kevin Boss, has written that the committee, is, by its apparent policy of trying to expand restaurant seating on State Street beyond the already excessive capacity, “encouraging the wholesale destruction of the restaurant industry in Santa Barbara.”
He goes on to say, “What you are advocating will lead to more seats than this small market can support. It is happening now. And, has been happening for the last two-plus years. You are advocating the destruction of my business, my tenants’ business and those of countless others that are not on State Street.”
He says, “Why is it so difficult for you to understand that unlimited expansions of restaurant seating beyond their permitted and legal areas will, in fact, kill the restaurant business in Santa Barbara?”
He says: As has been pointed out to you before, the city policy of allowing restaurants to expand seating beyond their permitted limits is forcing landlords and businesses out of compliance with Uniform Building Codes, The Plumbing Code and Health Department rules.
He goes on to identify some of the specific law-breaking violations that will become effective again after the state of emergency is rescinded in February 2023.
The current inflation rate in Southern California was 7.5% higher in October 2022 than in January of this year, and we are now seeing a wave of employment lay-offs. Expanding restaurant capacity now would seem incompetent, to say the least.
Mr. Boss ends with, “This is all such nonsense. Can’t wait to see what a mess the full council makes of this in a month or so.”
Since we are talking about State Street and common sense, Did You Know? did some research on rats.
It is well known that Santa Barbara has a significant rat problem, although there are concerted efforts to deny it. We looked at the evidence provided by others to understand the numbers.
It seems: Female rats are ready to give birth at age 2-3 months. They can have 5 to 6 litters per year, each litter producing 8-12 babies per litter.
Let’s assume that at any one time, we have at least 100 fertile female rats with enough males to mate with, on and around State Street. The maximum rate of new rat production could be 100 x 10 x 5, which equals 5,000 rats per year, from 100 female rats. Remember, not all rats are confined to State Street.
However, if we assume that the actual rate of new rat production would be only half the maximum, we would have a rat birth rate of 2,500 a year. If we assume that the lifespan of a rat is only 18 months, the natural death rate of the original 100 female rats is, let’s say, 75 after one year, and an equal number of males die at the same rate
Per news articles, Lenz has said that they are trapping 40-50 rats a month on and around State Street. So the annual rat death rate from natural causes and trapping would amount to 45 x 12 + 150 = 690
Our question is: If the powers that be say we don’t have a rat problem on and around State Street, where would all the surviving, newborn rats go? 2,500 – 690 = 1,810.
Here is the Public Works’ response:
“This program using traps (one rat trap, one mouse trap, and an extra attractant if both traps are snapped in each station) has been in use since 2010. The City is guided by the Integrated Pest Management (IPM) Strategy, which has wisely moved the City Rodent Abatement program away from poisons and rodenticides placed in the Right of Way to Traps.
“There are definitely bait stations in the zone, but these are placed by the private businesses or owners. The rodents seen on State Street are mostly coming from the private properties, which are offering the best safety and harborage for the rodents. The type of rodents downtown is mostly the Norwegian Roof Rat, which lives in doors mainly. Over the years, we have eliminated a lot of the potential harborage in the City Right of Way through vegetation maintenance (i.e. cutting back bushes and removing shrubbery up to 1 foot off the ground). This has been guided either by high catch counts or complaints.
“There are rats on State Street. There have been since the inception of the town. It is not possible to completely remove rodents. The program offers solid and continuous rodent population control in the City Right of Way, and our catch counts back this.”
Should part of the rat eradication plan be birth control? Did You Know? looked into this and found it to be a way to substantially cut the rat population before it occurs.
So we believe we should be investing in contraceptive bait boxes. We agree with the city that we don’t want to use poison that can harm wildlife (Integrated Pest Management).
We do request the city to get on this asap as we have seen an increase in our areas. It could totally be due to the lack of maintenance of the previously maintained area.
The city must protect all areas of town, not just State Street.
