Goleta Valley Beautification Project

Goleta Valley Voice article
Project Photos

On June 19th, 2007, Judith Ishkanian and Gary Earle, Neighborhood Defense League of California, appeared befor the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors. The following statement read by Gary Earle describes the NDLCA sponsored beautification project that took place on June 16th. We wish to thank all of the volunteer organizations whose contributions made the project a success.

Good morning Chairman Firestone and Supervisors,

I’ve appeared before you in the past sometimes to speak critically of county government.

But last Saturday something unique was accomplished in a partnership between citizens and their county government so I felt it only right to come before you today to praise those individuals and departments involved.

As is happening in a number of communities, graffiti is on the rise in the Goleta Valley. Citizen painting patrols are at constantly at work painting out the markings left by graffiti vandals in our area.

One particular 900 foot long stretch on Hollister Ave. near Turnpike has been particularly targeted most likely due to its proximity to San Marcos High School. A better and long term solution had to be found for this wall other than the never ending chore of painting over the graffiti. It was advised that by planting the wall with a natural landscape buffer, this wall of graffiti canvas could be taken away from the vandals and would also serve to beautify the Hollister Ave. corridor.

Consequently, the community approached the Neighborhood Defense League of California (Judith Ishkanian, its president is here today) with a request for a $10,000 grant to be given to Goleta Valley Beautiful, a respected organization in the Goleta Valley, in order to provide materials, management and long term maintenance for the planting along this wall.

The request was granted and while attempting to implement the plan we encountered a bit of bureaucratic red tape. We contacted Supervisor Wolf’s office and she and her staff took immediate steps to see what they could to bring this effort to fruition. Supervisor Wolf met with county public works and in a short time county obstacles were removed and the project moved forward. Once on board, county public works could not have been more helpful to our efforts. Supervisor Wolf went so far as to find a professional landscape architect, Martha Degasis, to donate her services in providing a landscape plan for the project.

As a final result, 36 volunteers from the Rotary groups in Goleta, Santa Barbara North, Downtown and Rotaract along with neighbors and NDLCA board members contributed 174 service hours to plant 11 trees and 90 Climbing Aloe and Boston Ivy plants along with installing 900 feet of drip irrigation.

In conclusion, I want to thank the county public works department and Supervisor Wolf and her staff for their part in making this concept a reality. We hope it will serve as a pilot project for other neighborhoods that are experiencing graffiti problems which can often be a harbinger of increased gang activity.