Happy 101
Sacramento State’s first-ever professor of happiness unlocks the mysteries surrounding what is arguably the holy grail of human emotion. As Prof. Meliksah Demir explains, the path to joy is a winding road and the journey requires a bit of effort, but in the end, we all have the tools we need to find our happy place.
Q&A with Anne Stausboll
In 2018, Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg and then-West Sacramento Mayor Christopher Cabaldon launched the Mayors’ Commission on Climate Change to develop a comprehensive strategy for helping their cities achieve carbon neutrality by 2045. Anne Stausboll, the retired CEO of CalPERS (California Public Employees’ Retirement System), was tapped to lead the effort. In addition to heading up the largest public pension fund in the United States from 2009 to 2016, she served a decade as chair of the Boston-headquartered nonprofit Ceres, which seeks to combat climate change through financial markets. The 19-person climate commission presented its findings to the Sacramento City Council last August, unanimously adopting a report Stausboll calls “ambitious” in its recommendations.
Q&A: Sacramento's Creative Economy Manager Megan Van Voorhis
Growing up in Flint, Michigan, Megan Van Voorhis wanted to be a ballerina like the one she saw twirling on an episode of Sesame Street. It wasn’t until she took a business administration class in college that she realized her calling wasn’t to make art, but to make art possible. As the head of Arts Cleveland, she introduced innovative programs linking art with health care and helping creators access their inner entrepreneurs. As Sacramento’s freshly appointed Cultural and Creative Economy Manager, the former dancer takes the stage for her next act. Here the new 916 resident talks about the arts’ influence on the GDP, how to reopen venues safely in the age of Covid, and why the ability to create is a basic human right.
Spreading His Wings
Inspired by "Lady Bird," psych-pop artist Anton Barbeau is back home (at least for the time being) after a long spell in Europe. He chronicles his own coming-of-age, leaving-the-nest story in a new double album and music video filled with classic Sacramento iconography.
After the Fall
Tresa Honaker started 2012 on a high note. The local aerial artist and the troupe she founded were performing to sold-out audiences, creating mesmerizing vignettes with bodies wrapped in billowing ribbon up to 60 feet in the air. Then a terrible accident during practice left her paralyzed below her mid-spine, suddenly grounding the life-long dancer. But Honaker refused to stay down, and eight years later, her troupe is still going strong and so is she, having forged a new identity as a competitive athlete. This is the story of one woman’s life-changing fall and her life-affirming rise.
SF Giants Assistant Coach Alyssa Nakken
On the evening of July 20, San Francisco Giants assistant coach Alyssa Nakken coolly jogged out to first base in an exhibition game against the Oakland A’s. There were no fans in the stands to cheer her, but the world was watching as she became the first woman to coach on the field in a Major League Baseball matchup. The historic moment was the second, in fact, for the former Sacramento State softball star, who was anointed as the first full-time female coach in the major leagues in January. Here, the Woodland native talks about breaking down barriers, coaching in the age of the coronavirus, and trading the turf for the surf in her off time.
Sacramento Film Commissioner Jennifer West
As a one-time Hollywood studio accountant, Jennifer West used to routinely play one of the most important roles on a movie set: She was the one who made sure megastars like Julia Roberts, Anthony Hopkins and Val Kilmer got their paychecks. Today, after a two-decade industry break, West wields a new kind of celluloid influence as Sacramento’s first-ever full-time film commissioner. She talks about building the city’s film office from scratch, nurturing the next generation of local auteurs, and her bold vision for creating a mini Hollywood of the North.
Murders, She Wrote
Over the past decade, Granite Bay author Theresa Ragan—or T.R. Ragan, as she’s known on Amazon, where she has sold more than 3 million books—has been penning mysteries and thrillers in which female vigilantes exact not-so-sweet revenge on their male predators. Her latest page-turner stars a Sacramento crime reporter and a crew of femmes “fatal.” Get ready for a bloody good read.
Rob Archie
In the wake of George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police on May 25 and subsequent protests, Sacramento restaurateur Rob Archie (Urban Roots Brewing & Smokehouse, Pangaea Bier Cafe, and Bawk) channeled his anger and sorrow into positive action, organizing We Stand with You, an unprecedented service-industry “walkout.” For three hours beginning at noon on June 4, over 200 restaurants, bars and breweries around the region—from Kru in East Sacramento to Crooked Lane Brewing Company in Auburn—closed for service and held staff discussions about workplace racism while also showing support for the Black community. Here, the Woodland native talks about his impromptu campaign, the problem with color-blind hiring, and the importance of listening.
Sacramento Public Library CEO Rivkah Sass
Since taking the helm of the Sacramento Public Library system in 2009, Rivkah Sass—who was named Librarian of the Year by the "Library Journal" in 2006 while serving as the executive director of the Omaha Public Library—has shepherded the 28-branch organization through the past decade with the introduction of services like digital access to more than 200,000 e-books and the ability to check out everything from an electric guitar to a GoPro camera. We spoke to the Manteca native about what’s new at the SPL, ways to keep the library relevant in 2020, and bringing big names—from best-selling author Neil Gaiman to rapper 50 Cent—to town.
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