The Whipping Post Take on SB County Board of Supervisors

COUNTY BUREAUCRATS PLOT FEE HIKE ARMAGEDDON! (FOR 2026, NATURALLY)

Your 'elected' officials plan to 'consider' jacking up Ag Commissioner fees in a marathon 15-minute session, quietly deeming it 'not a project' under CEQA. Because nothing says transparency like waiti

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6/5/2026 · Inspired by “Set a hearing to consider recommendations regarding an Ordinance Amending the Agricultural Commissioner’s Fee Schedule - Weights and Measures Fees section, as follows: (Set a hearing for June 23, 2026. Time estimate: 15 minutes) a) Approve the introduction (first reading) of an Ordinance amending the Weights and Measure’s section of the Agricultural Commissioner’s Fee Schedule; b) Read the title, “Ordinance Amending Ordinance No. 5145, the Agricultural Commissioner’s Fee Schedule,” and waive further reading of the Ordinance; c) Continue to the Administrative Agenda of July 7, 2026, to consider recommendations, as follows: i) Consider and approve the adoption (second reading) of “An Ordinance Amending Ordinance No. 5145, The Agricultural Commissioner’s Fee Schedule,” and ii) Find that the proposed actions are administrative activities of the County, which will not result in direct or indirect physical changes in the environment, as they are fees necessary to cover operating expenses, and are therefore not a “project” as defined for the purposes of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) pursuant to CEQA Guidelines sections 15273(a)(1), 15378(b)(54) and Public Resources Code Section 21080(b)(8)(A) and (B); and d) Find that the proposed actions are administrative activities of the County, which will not result in direct or indirect physical changes in the environment, as they are fees necessary to cover operating expenses, and are therefore not a “project” as defined for the purposes of the CEQA pursuant to CEQA Guidelines sections 15273(a)(1), 15378(b)(4) and Public Resources Code Section 21080(b)(8)(A) and (B).” via SB County Board of Supervisors

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SB County Board of Supervisors · The Whipping Post · NO.215 · PANEL 6/6 · SB-3X3

Santa Barbara County’s Board of Supervisors, in a move that redefines 'fiddling while Rome burns,' is setting a hearing for — wait for it — June 23, 2026, to discuss amending the Agricultural Commissioner’s fee schedule. That's right, two years from now, our esteemed leaders will devote a breathtaking 15 minutes to decide if they should nickel-and-dime local farmers and vintners even further, all under the guise of 'operating expenses.' Perhaps they're giving the peasantry ample time to prepare their wallets and, more importantly, forget by then who voted for this fiscal folly.

Our intrepid Supervisors are already pre-approving the 'introduction' of this fee hike ordinance and, in a stroke of bureaucratic genius, plan to waive 'further reading' of the ordinance. Because who needs to know the details when you're just rubber-stamping another tax on the county’s lifeblood industries? This is a level of efficiency usually reserved for Soviet five-year plans, except here, the 'plan' is to extract more cash from an already struggling agricultural sector, all while our roads crumble and our homeless population explodes. Priorities, people, priorities.

But the real masterstroke, as only the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors could conjure, is their confident declaration that these proposed actions are 'administrative activities' and 'not a project' under CEQA. That's bureaucratic speak for: 'Don't worry your pretty little heads about environmental impacts, folks, we're just picking pockets, which apparently has no physical consequences whatsoever.' It’s astonishing how quickly inconvenient truths, like the impact of increased operating costs on family farms, vanish when the County needs to justify another raid on taxpayer funds. Leave it to our local government to invent a new form of fiscal alchemy – turning the sweat of labor into gold, without actually 'doing' anything.

So, mark your calendars for 2026, Santa Barbara. Our Supervisors will be hard at work, in a blistering 15-minute sprint, ensuring that the burden on our agricultural producers just keeps 'administratively' rising. One wonders if they’ll finally get around to fixing the potholes by then, or if that too will be deemed an 'unnecessary project.'

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