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John Laird is California State Senator, 17th District. It's Open Studios weekend #2 of 3, North Santa Cruz County, & John's husband will be showing his art (watercolor landscapes) at Studio 281, with Senator Laird guarding bicycles & greeting - with open studios, John loves going into homes & studios, like a voyeuristic Architectural Digest; Tax Expenditures & Tax Breaks: closing loopholes is NOT raising taxes; at Town Hall last Saturday Senator Laird went through all of the ballot measures in a non-partisan way, discussing what each one would do, who put it on the ballot, who's for & who's against, & the total amount spent on each side; started with Prop. 43, which would require local taxes, including special taxes (which are for a specific purpose, & include citizen's initiatives, which a court rule required 50% + 1 vote) to have a 2/3 vote to pass; Props. 40, 41 & 42, the "Billionaire's Tax" & competing propositions; Prop 38, a bond measure that would fund immunology research, which was put on the ballot by an interested party that would be the primary beneficiary, which is backed by both Dems & Republicans, but that the LWV is against because it lacks transparency. An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange, airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2026 is Bushwhacker's 37th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

The Assembly was on recess from July 2nd to August 3rd, and on August 4 Assemblymember Pellerin broke her ankle, was in a cast, & now in a boot; there are 10 days before the state Constitutionally mandated deadline for bills to pass the legislature, so the pressure is on; they are "in floor session as of Monday", but will be in "committees as needed"; what does this mean? Discuss Assemblymember Pellerin's "Gut & Amend" bill, where, when the legislature realized there was no minimum age for marriage in California (one of 3 states), they took all the language out of a bill that had passed the Assembly, and re-wrote it in the Senate so that Calfornia would have a minimum marriage age of 18 - once this passes the Senate, it will come back to the Assembly, where it would be assigned to a committee before coming back to the floor; discussion of 3 of Assemblymember Pellerin's bills that have been signed by the Governor, 3 that are on the Governor's desk; & 3 that continue to move (including one that would hold people under influence behind the wheel in a self-driving car liable even if the car is doing the driving; at the end of the legislative session on Aug. 31st, if the Governor has not vetoed a bill that passed the legislature, it becomes law..."when the clock strikes midnight, all bills stop."...except they done..."urgency bills" can be worked on by the legislature after midnight on Aug. 31; there are 213 bills on the Assembly floor, & 412 on the Senate floor; how do they maintain order? "The Assembly has an electronic voting system, green for yay, red for nay. The Senate votes by roll call, although they someimes do a 'substitute anonymous' vote." They got the Morgani Hill battery storage facility paused by submitting letters to the P.U.C. In Santa Cruz for the weekend, celebrating the O'Neill Sea Odyssey's 30th Anniversary tomorrow. An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange, airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2026 is Bushwhacker's 37th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

Earlier this year, California was 1 of 10 states without a minimum age to marry - with the signing of AB1267, it's now 18...no exceptions!! Assemblymember Pellerin sponsored this bill, which involved a "Gut-and-Amend" of a bill that she wrote that had been passed by the Assembly, but was languishing in committee in the State Senate...she changed all of the words & the name on the bill, thus "gutting-and-amending", it it passed the Senate, then came back to the Assembly where it also passed. The Governor hosted a signing ceremony with survivors & the author(s) of the bill in the Governor's office, singing it on the back of a large bear outside his office; shout out to the Girl Scouts of Northern California had come to Sacramento with Taylor Swift-style bracelets to raise awareness of the bill. At the signing ceremony, taking a line from Warren Zevon's "Werewolves of London", was Governor Newsome's hair perfect? A: "I've never seen it not perfect!" (and she said she "crushed it" with her hair! Deep dive into the Assemblymember's staff, with offices in Santa Cruz, San Jose & Sacramento - as a committee chair, Gail gets additional staff, with staff tailored to the geography of each district, so Gail may get more than some given that her district includes both San Jose & Santa Cruz. As a former county clerk, discussion of Alaska senate race with a 2nd "Dan Sullivan" recruited to be on the ballot: "People get recruited all the time." "There's always confusion", recounting a Bay Area race with 2 people on the ballot with similar names. In Santa Cruz to get out the vote. Discussion of walk in vote centers, and "naked voting", where you fill in your ballot at home, then walk it in in person, so that the elections officials do not have to open the envelope or match signatures, saving time...more streamlined. An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange & ""Miles-the-Mentee" (Miles Hewitt), airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2026 is Bushwhacker's 37th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

For this interview we reached out to 5 former mayors of Santa Cruz. All 5 of them (!!!) responded with suggested topics & questions. They were remarkably similar, and we distilled these down to a set of questions that both candidates will be given, with the same amount of time to answer them. First Q: Housing and development: How do you feel about the scale and pace of development happening across Santa Cruz, particularly on the Eastside (such as Soquel & Seabright)? What specific actions would you take to preserve neighborhood character while meeting the City's housing obligations, and how would your approach differ from that of your opponent? Second Q: Homelessness: It's clear we will need more locations for facilities that can help us address homelessness in our area. Whether it's shelters or treatment centers or camping zones or jails, these facilities will need physical locations and money. How would you address homelessness and encampments, balancing compassion & accountability, particularly given the distinct roles, responsibilities, and resources of the City and County? (for the remaining time, Ami was alerted that she could respond longer to the questions and, if she did, it would mean that we would not get to one or more of the other questions asked of the other candidate.) Third Q: Across the City of Santa Cruz there are many businesses that have been sitting vacant for long periods of time creating blight. This is especially the case Downtown. Santa Cruz needs development, to attract businesses, & revitalize Downtown. What will you do to encourage commercial property owners to fill these vacant storefronts? Last Q: What is one specific policy supported by your opponent that you disagree with, and what would you do differently?? An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange & ""Miles-the-Mentee" (Miles Hewitt), airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2026 is Bushwhacker's 37th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

For this interview we reached out to 5 former mayors of Santa Cruz. All 5 of them (!!!) responded with suggested topics & questions. They were remarkably similar, and we distilled these down to a set of questions that both candidates will be given, with the same amount of time to answer them. First Q: Housing and development: How do you feel about the scale and pace of development happening across Santa Cruz, particularly on the Eastside (such as Soquel & Seabright)? What specific actions would you take to preserve neighborhood character while meeting the City's housing obligations, and how would your approach differ from that of your opponent? Second Q: Homelessness: It's clear we will need more locations for facilities that can help us address homelessness in our area. Whether it's shelters or treatment centers or camping zones or jails, these facilities will need physical locations and money. How would you address homelessness and encampments, balancing compassion & accountability, particularly given the distinct roles, responsibilities, and resources of the City and County? Third Q: Across the City of Santa Cruz there are many businesses that have been sitting vacant for long periods of time creating blight. This is especially the case Downtown. Santa Cruz needs development, to attract businesses, & revitalize Downtown. What will you do to encourage commercial property owners to fill these vacant storefronts? Fourth Q: How do you define integrity in public leadership, and how have you demonstrated it during this campaign? Fifth Q: What is your vision for the role of mayor, and how would you bring people together to get the people's business done? Last Q: What is one specific policy supported by your opponent that you disagree with, and what would you do differently?? An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange & ""Miles-the-Mentee" (Miles Hewitt), airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2026 is Bushwhacker's 37th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

Lacy J. is into saving wild horses, & will be performing a benefit for Jimmy Jackson & his wife, Ellen O'Hanlon (both have cancer) - they have been artists for over 40 years. Ellen as a healer, artist, & painter. Jimmy got a lot of people started, & wrote a song for International Rotary about polio with Lacy J. - he also came up with the motto for Rotary; Radio Ranch Project. "Listen to the Wind" mentions Santa Cruz: it's the beginning, not the end. There was elemental magic of the 60s in Santa Cruz, where Lacy J. felt the magical energy of the Earth, getting a natural high! After 8 (long) years in Nashville, Lacy J. wanted to come back to Santa Cruz, but "couldn't buy an outhouse on a postage stamp for $450k!!" An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange, & "Kaos" (Katrina Clugston), airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2024 is Bushwhacker's 35th year on the air! Thanks for listening!  To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

Back in the day, Scott was in a band, "Secret Chimp", with Jim Lewin & Bill Layman, Lachlan Kane & Mark Corsolini...they split up, with Jim & Bill going one way, & the rest forming Rosebud (because Lachlan Kane went by "Citizen Kane")...the band allows Scott to get his non-Grateful Dead ya-ya's out; Rosebud has a new CD, "Record of the Year!"; deep dive into how songs / CDs are recognized by Spotify (ISRC code & metadata); "The Money Question" (e.g.: "Have you been able to make a living with your art, &, if so, how?") A: Yes! It's a combination of things...booking music for a venue in Half Moon Bay, working for a label in New York City, teaching, running sound, gigging; discussion of originals, vs. covers, but making a cover your own by playing it diferently. An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2026 is Bushwhacker's 37th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

Santa Cruz is the "only place that felt like home"...Lynn's grandfather built a 600 sq. ft. house on the East Side that Lynn would visit as a kid, having grown up off Camden Ave. in San Jose...she moved here in 1974 to help her grandparents as her grandmother was dealing with senility (what we now know as Alzheimer's) - she started gardening at around this time, launching a 49 year career in gardeining & landscaping; she started at Cabrillo Community College, majoring in photography (!)...she got a scholarship to the Art Institute in San Francisco, later coming to U.C. Santa Cruz to be a studio arts major (Porter College); she started the Santa Cruz Neighbors group to address the disconnect between people & services - it's non-partisan / non-political; in 2006 she ran for Santa Cruz City Council, winning 2 terms, & being mayor in 2014; her words of advice to the next mayor? "Be open to everybody!" When she was vice mayor in 2013 it was a difficult year, after Santa Cruz lost Butch & Elizabeth, 2 officers killed in the line of duty; after retiring as mayor, and a year off, Lynn started as Executive Director (ED) of Valley Churches United...this organization formed out of the storms of 1982 (El Niño!) when locals rallied to come together to take care of each other; Lynn was ED for a decade, overseeing a budget of ~$800k and 3 full-time employees - she had 2 floods, COVID-19, and the CZU fires on her watch; Lynn's super power is being calm in the face of disasters. An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange & "DJ Spark Plug" (Dylan Estevez) airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2026 is Bushwhacker's 37th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

A Bushwhacker's First!!!! A live, in-the-studio, interview at 6:30am!!! The show this weekend is a classic Nashville writer's round, where the singer / songwriters trade off songs; Andy grew up in Colorado, moved to Nashville with his wife with songwriting the impetus, & are now back in Colorado; songwriting comes to him in various ways, some like lightning, & some with hard work - he creates voice memos for himself, usually starting with a musical idea & a line, sometimes fighting with a riff & a line; songwriting came to him naturally - he's told that when he was 3 years old he re-wrote Giligan's Island about his family; one day in Colorado, when he was driving him, he heard Jackie Greene's "Gone Wanderin'", & loved it, deciding he wanted to try his hand at that kind of songwriting; for his "day job", he plays cover songs in lobbies, but he gigs 3 nights a week playing piano; "The Money Question" (e.g.: "Have you been able to make a living with your art, &, if so, how?") A: Yes! It's all music. Touring. Hotel lobbies/restaurants. Producing. Teaching. Anders Osborne, one of his biggest influences, produced his "Night Skin" album. There's a new promoter in town, "No Brainer Productions"! An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2026 is Bushwhacker's 37th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

"Flagship Romance" is the married duo Shawn Fisher & Jordyn Jackson; they have been touring with the duo "Rough & Tumble" on what they call the "Rough Romance Tour" for 5 months (they use their dual mailing lists to encourage each group's fans to come out to listen to their complimentary sounds), but they are not all in the same van - they start the show together, & then whichever duo booked the gig plays second; if they had tour T-shirts, they would be in the third column; the song "Ride the River" is in honor of a letter Johnny Cash sent Tom Petty on his 50th birthday; one of the first things Shawn did after he met Jordyn was make her watch a 5 hour documentary on Tom Petty to test her - she passed; Jordyn came from a background singing pop music (her earlier band, "Veronica's Veil", featured 2 drummers!!), and they landed a distribution deal with a record label in London & played on the BBC, but it didn't catch on, and the deal fizzled - Jordyn sang more bluesy / jazzy numbers at the Jacksonville Jazz Festival, which is where she met Shawn; Shawn''s earlier band, "Son of a Bad Man", was signed to a label, but had their dreams dashed in 2008-9: in this era, labels signed 30-50 acts per year, & threw them all against the wall to see if any caught on (vs. earlier A&R (Artists and Repertoire) men at labels discovering & nurturing a band); "The Money Question" (e.g.: "Have you been able to make a living with your art, &, if so, how?") A: Yes! There's a burgeoning house concert scene worldwide, plus Jordyn creates merch, such as jewelery from Shawn's used guitar strings, plus they sell USB drives with their entire catalog on them, plus they tour, and sites such as Patreon allow fans to support artists. An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2026 is Bushwhacker's 37th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

The Countess & Count flew to the KZSC studio in in their coffins carried by bats, after a night of (blood) drinking & terrorizing! They are in town for their Hallowe'en show, which will be an original Vaudville-style show with songs, skits, & dumb jokes, accompanied by "Batman" Owens & "Devil-Maycare" (Cheryl Henson); they have their own YouTube channel!! ...a slghtly modified "Money Question" (e.g.: "Have you been able to make an (un)living with your music, &, if so, how?") A: Yes. "We come from old money!" (Castles...15th Century...); thanks from the Countess & Count to DJ Spark Plug for not lighting himself on fire; for Annabel Lee, the Edgar Allen Poe poem, the new version includes cello parts arranged by Barry Phillips (who spent decades working with Ravi Shankar, & lead the string section at the Concert for George Harrison); Bonny June & Ken Kraft join to talk about touring with the Countess & Count, & how to find them online. An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange & "DJ Spark Plug" (Dylan Estevez) airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2026 is Bushwhacker's 37th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

Rita is calling in from Nevada City, California, in Grass Valley (shout out to KVMR!), & will be coming to Santa Cruz with her musical partner (& husband) Sean Feder, who accompanies her on Dobro (resophonic guitar) & banjo; Sean is a UCSC graduate (biology major), and a multi-instrumentalist who studied under Arthur Hull, legendary Santa Cruz drummer & widely considered the father of the modern drum circle movement; Sean taught drumming at U.C. Davis where he & Rita met, & they began performing together; during COVID, California had a budget surplus in 2022, & set aside money for the arts - they were looking for mostly visual arts, focusing on energy conservations, public health, etc.; Rita applied, and, much to her surprise, was funded - thus the EP "Climate Country Radio" was born; deep dive into songwriting - it runs the whole gamut, from songs arriving fully formed, to those that take a lot of effort & time...there's a great book "Songwriters on songwriting", with a wide variety; words first or melody? "Yes to both!" Rita is a goal-oriented person, who works best with a vision of where she's going; her song "Clean", about being a Merry Maid? No, she was not a Merry Maid, but she was a housekeeper during college; the "Money Question" (e.g.: "Have you been able to make a living with your art, &, if so, how?") A: Rita made a living as a musician for 10-15 years, but is now part time; yes, merch(andise) sales were a huge part of that, but touring has become much less affordable (due to fewer merch sales); Rita is still putting CDs out, even though she took some time off because of immense frustration - she's been writing a lot, and is planning a CD after this winter when she'll take a self-imposed residency in the North Star House, a Julia Morgan-designed historic estate in Grass Valley, CA. An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange & "DJ Spark Plug" (Dylan Estevez) airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2026 is Bushwhacker's 37th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

They are calling from the road, after Ian & "the boys" loaded their 2013 Toyota Sienna "Tetris-style" in Oregon; Ian's boys are 15 & 9, but "the boys" in the van are Ethan Boardman on drums, & Grazer Bazer Phelps on electric bass; this trio, Ian George & the Knee Pockets, is more of a rocker, with Ian plugging in & "shredding" the electric guitar; Ian hails from Bob Dylan's hometown of Minneapolis, Minnesota (the bluest state in the mid-continent! "Hell, yeah! We take care of our own!"); when Ian writes songs, does he have a vision of where they'll end up, acoustic or electric, & what style? "That's a really good question!"...it's a function of the structure of the song...the riff...some songs come in 3 minutes (like "Gone"), some take longer (like "Grassy Knoll"); they've got a new CD coming out, "Milk of the Moonlit Sun", which is a line from one of the new songs; their Oregonians now (Grazer Bazer is from southern Oregon; Ethan originally Portland, Maine); "The Money Question?" (Are you able to make a living with music full time, & if so, how?") A: "That's subjective." Ian does odd jobs to fill in gaps, but music is the priority; one of the other guys is in school, and the other works at a sick bar; Ian is on the verge of completing a score for an independent film which will come out next year; Spotify? Maybe he makes enough money to buy a 20 oz. latte every 6 months! Q: "How do the economics work with an album, where other artists are choosing not to put out physical media?" A: "We'll put out both a vinyl album & a CD. People are re-introducing themselves to how cool physical media is." Albums are curated, with an intentional order; this album is in the can, songs aligned, album art done...it's ready to go, working on pressing soon, plus visuals to go with singles that they will post. Show is tomorrow night at The Crêpe Place, with Dead Nettle opening. An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2026 is Bushwhacker's 37th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

Nina's band, "Duo Quartet" playing tonight; How did Nina meet Pam Delgado & Jeri Jones? "A happy accident!" - they were all playing a memorial show for Sarah Elizabeth Campbell, and Pam & Jeri were there as part of the band "Blame Sally"...later, they called Nina about doing a double bill at the Freight & Salvage; how did Nina end up playing with Kate Wolf? Nina and her brother were in a high school bluegrass band in Sebastopol, and her brother suggested they see Kate...she was playing at West of the Laguna, and Nina was blown away & moved with the music, the connection among the band...and said to herself, "This is what I want to do", deciding that night she wanted to become a professional musician and play in Kate's band; took mandolin lessons with Kate's husband, Don Coffin; sat in on some songs with Kate, then stood in when Don couldn't be there, asked to play more and more..."became part of Kate's band through a luck, being passionate, and tenacity; played with Kate for 8 years before she passed away, which was devastating; played with others because she was known for playing with Kate; was playing Strawberry with Sarah Elizabeth and Greg Brown approached her about joining him for some sons - she ended up playing the entire set; Nina has been able to make a living with music her entire life; her advice? Keep your expenses down! Keep your overhead low and work hard (needed to earn to support her habit of buying instruments!); Nina's goal was to be a side person - unusual in an industry where most seek the spotlight! Ken's line in the Barbie movie, "I want to play my guitar at you!" makes Nina want to see the movie; Nina's advice to aspiring side persons. An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange, "Kalamity Kyle" Weller, and "Kaos" (Katrina Clugston) airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2023 is Bushwhacker's 34th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!

Gail is just getting back after her daughter's wedding in Oregon last weekend; we're in a limnal period where all the bills that made it out of the legislature are out, and have either been signed, or are on the Governor's desk to be signed, vetoed, or become law if he does neither (with the deadline at the end of the month); rapid run down of the bills that have been passed (4) and those that are awaiting action (9); September is Suicide Prevention Month, & Assemblymember Pellerin has 15 Heroes in the district; correction on AB1919 regarding the Santa Cruz metro tax being given to the voters as a clear process because state law was not clear. Deep dive into "Objective Standards", California's approach to address the housing affordability crisis, with Santa Cruz & Santa Clara County, both in her district, as the most expensive. It's complicated, given impacts on traffic, water, etc. Q: has it gone too far? A: possibly, as it opens the door to the "builder's remedy"; deep dive into developments in the Seabright neighborhood - is there anything the city can do about it? And parking! 221 parking spaces for 560 units, because the state does not require developments to have parking if they are within a half mile of a bus stop! A: "That's the reality." Community members need to be involved, & there's a virtual meeting coming up next week. A record number of listeners engaged with the DJs via TextGroove during the interview, providing additional questions & comments. An interview on "The Bushwhacker's Breakfast Club" with "Dangerous Dan" Orange & "DJ Spark Plug" (Dylan Estevez) airing Friday mornings on KZSC Santa Cruz, California. 2026 is Bushwhacker's 37th year on the air! Thanks for listening! To support KZSC (& these podcasts), please go to KZSC.FM and click on the "Donate to KZSC" button in the upper right-hand corner. Thanks!