Bradley, I should have used the word "attention" rather than "coverage" when referring to Tent University. I wasn't criticizing your reporting, which is always timely and thorough. I really appreciate what you do.

I was trying to provide a counter-point to Pat True's petition and to express frustration with what I see as an obsession among community members. Some of the "immediate issues" that people might want to monitor, when they get tired of Tent University:

* The City of Santa Cruz is repealing an illegal tax on working people and asking the voters to approve a replacement tax that is just as regressive.

* The Governor is in the process of squandering $4 billion of one-time money, some of which may not even actually be his to spend.

* Naive folks in Felton are agitating to repurchase their water system, when here in Santa Cruz, public ownership and mismanagement are causing huge water rate increases -- again shouldered by working people. The City of Santa Cruz is using dirty tricks to hide the increases.

* A renovated library branch is about to open in our own county, but without enough staff. A rookie supervisor blocked the closure of a tiny, deficient branch -- a plan that would have allowed proper staffing at the new branch. Now he's bent on discrediting the library system's executive director, even though his own financial largesse (and that of his Democratic cronies) keeps putting her in the awkward position of having to recommend service reductions year after year after year.

* Someone is circulating a ballot measure petition and pretending that it will tax big corporations like PG&E, when in fact the law compels PG&E to pass the tax on to working people. The latest draft of the measure is better than it used to be: the old version would accidentally have raised taxes for renters!

I could research and write articles on or more of these topics, but these issues don't appeal to the community in the same way that Tent University seems to. That's what I find frustrating.