Can St. Mary’s Help the Homeless Crisis?

“Sometimes,” said Santa Barbara Sheriff Bill Brown, “you see a moose.” 

This folksy Zen aphorism dates way back to Brown’s days as chief of police in Moscow, Idaho. A consultant Brown had hired at the time recounted how one morning, his kids announced that three moose were grazing in the family’s backyard. The consultant, Brown said, would be late for work that day. His kids would be late for school. They all just sat and stared at the moose. What else could they have done?

The “moose” in the room to which Sheriff Brown now alludes is a wild-assed, creative, sure-to-be-controversial proposal hatched by downtown real estate investor Richard Berti to “buy” the long-vacant St. Mary’s Seminary. He had first unveiled the plan three weeks ago with the sudden abruptness of an impatient man on a mission, which is exactly what Richard Berti is.