My Goleta Wish List

Goods and Services We Still Need

By Silvia Uribe

Life in Goleta is pretty laid back. Most of us can agree that we have many things to enjoy on a daily basis: a lovely coastline, several beaches, mountains not only to admire but with different levels of trails to hike, a small lake of our own, the bluffs-and such good weather can be found almost nowhere else, which makes it the perfect place to live.

However, the same praise cannot be heaped on the necessity of traveling to Santa Barbara, or even further away, to look for, buy, and pay sales tax on things that are simply unavailable in Goleta. Those of us who live in the northernmost part of our city not infrequently find ourselves imagining that what life would be like if we had this or that store, restaurant, or service close by. We would not have to make that 24-mile round-trip to Santa Barbara.

As we know, the holidays are almost here. This is the time when we start making wish lists of what we want Santa to bring to us, and one of the few opportunities to ask for those things that we might never otherwise get. So, I've decided to just put out there the things that, in my opinion, our city is missing, to see if city government or entrepreneurs might make my wishes come true.

Personally, I would love to be able to stay local in order to find the following:

City appearance:

* An attractive, inviting downtown where families will congregate, and spend their time and money, and where business would thrive.

Entertainment:

* An amateur theater group to perform frequently at the Dos Pueblos High School auditorium. (I might even venture to participate in it)

Information:

* A Goleta newspaper. I join the voices of those would-be readers who have expressed this same wish over and over again.

Restaurants:

* El Bajio Restaurant (not only delicious, but very authentic Mexican flavors), The Olive Garden, and more restaurants serving breakfast besides the ones we aleady have (Cajun Kitchen, Plaza Deli, and Jack's famous bagels).

Services:

* A shoe repair, a hair/waxing/massage salon, a tanning salon, a butcher shop, Firestone auto repair/oil change, and a seamstress.

Stores:

* Ross Dress for Less, Tuesday Morning, So Good Store

Views:

* I love our great views. Kudos to our government! I encourage them to keep up the good work, and to continue protecting our agricultural land zoning, and our open spaces

Watering Holes (day):

* An on-line cafe (for those of us who don't own a computer)

Watering Holes (night):

* Live music bar. Soho type, with all kinds of music and a dancing area.

I recognize that you may or may not share my choices for what I call my wish list for Goleta. The good news is that this wish list is not finished. You're invited to add your own items to mine to let us know what you would like to incorporate into our nearly perfect, everyday life in Goleta.

Happy Thanksgiving Day to you.

Silvia Uribe is a freelance writer with a Latina perspective.

Cross-posted at the Independent.com