GOLETA'S NEW COASTAL PLAN: MORE RULES, FEWER BEACHES, SAME OLD TAXPAYER TAB

The Santa Barbara Independent, bless its busy little heart, recently informed the public that Goleta has deigned to release its draft Coastal Local Program for review. In other words, get ready for another thousand pages of bureaucratic brilliance designed to make sure nobody actually enjoys the coast without first filling out a 37-page permit application, attending seven 'listening sessions' in a dimly lit community center, and sacrificing a small, locally-sourced redwood sapling.

This isn't about protecting the coast; it's about protecting the jobs of the pencil-pushers who write these endless dictates. Every environmental 'crisis' seems to result in a new cottage industry of consultants, planners, and regulators, all paid handsomely by the very taxpayers they're now preventing from parking within a mile of the ocean. The environmental zealots in Goleta clearly believe the best way to preserve nature is to make it utterly inaccessible to human beings, unless those humans are driving electric vehicles to 'interpretive centers' that explain why you can't touch anything.

The real story here isn't the draft plan itself; it's the financial undertow. How many millions has Goleta already sunk into this regulatory labyrinth? And what will be the real cost to local businesses and property owners when the inevitable 'enhancements' and 'mitigations' start piling up? When local elected officials prattle on about 'coastal resilience,' read 'taxpayer-funded boondoggles that will tie up development for decades.' Don't be surprised when the only people still allowed on Goleta's 'pristine' shoreline are the consultants measuring the 'public access' that no one can afford to use.

Meanwhile, while they craft legislation about the precise shade of seagrass, common-sense issues like affordable housing and actually fixing the roads get punted to the next decade. But hey, at least we'll have a beautifully worded, heavily footnoted document explaining why you can't build a new home or, God forbid, open a business that might create a few jobs. Priorities, people, priorities.