When the alarm goes off in the morning, Kate Coulouras has good reason to get out of bed.
“The kids are my purpose,” says Coulouras, in her third year as principal of Cristo Rey High School at Jackson and Florin-Perkins roads.
“These kids work so hard and face obstacles I can’t imagine having to face in high school. Their work ethic is phenomenal. Their families are also fabulous and committed to wanting to learn and support their kids. They’ve made huge sacrifices for them to be able to be here. That really drives me to be creative and solve problems. The students deserve the absolute best education.”
If you’re a cynic convinced government rarely gets anything right, walk to Seventh and P streets and check out the new headquarters for the California Natural Resources Agency. Then let me know how you feel.
You enter a different kind of state building when you step into the light-drenched lobby, see a quote from poet Gary Snyder emblazoned over the outline of a grizzly bear—“Nature is not a place to visit. It is home”—and learn part of the wall is covered in wood salvaged from the deadly Paradise Camp Fire.
When Joe and Kai Gilman opened their restaurant, Twin Lotus Thai, early in 2022, they had no intention of turning it into a music venue.
Joe says the business was an “empty-nest” project for his wife Kai. But the humble spot in College Greens quickly became one of Sacramento’s best jazz rooms.
How did this transformation happen within 12 months? It’s no mystery once you know the Gilmans.
Relationships distinguish the farm-to-fork movement. While farmer-to-chef seems like the obvious partnership, one joy I get from this column is digging beneath the surface to see a myriad other relationships that bring food to our tables and connections to our neighborhoods.
Researching last month’s column on the city’s Urban Agriculture Incentive Zone Program, I met Earl Withycombe, a landowner, community activist and incentive zone pioneer.
He told me how as a landowner he collaborated with city officials to help develop the zone program and work out details so other landowners might benefit.
Next time you visit Earl J. Koobs Nature Area in Carmichael near La Sierra Community Center, look for groundskeeper Linda Rose Jones.
She’ll be playing in the mud.
“I love going into the area looking for millipedes,” Jones says. “I love following little kids and watching their discovery. That’s what lifts my heart.”
We are grateful for engagement with readers. It primarily comes from email, but for me engagement also happens while I’m shopping or at community events. It’s almost always positive.
The compliments often end with one thought: “I appreciate what you write, but I wish it was read by more people.” I chuckle at this because we are—by miles—the widest read print publication in the city and county.
Each month we print 83,000 copies of Inside Sacramento. More than 80,000 are mailed to homes in our readership area. The rest are distributed through newsstands.
