"Locally Owned” is a regular column highlighting local business owners — the backbone of our community and economy. The column explores the personal stories of the owners and the businesses they built. With feet rooted in contrasting cultures, Monica Hall’s life pattern has been to tread different paths and seek to find a balance between them. In her newest endeavor, the Monica Hall Spa Collection of organic skin care products, Monica has found the perfect synthesis. Born in Canada, and half-Native American Cree, Monica was uprooted from her family in the “scoop” of the 1950s and ‘60s, when Native American children were taken from their homes and placed with non-Native American families

Two Sacramentans are looking to bring a kombucha bar to the Midtown space that formerly housed Hina’s Tea by the end of July, if they can raise $50,000 via the Internet to launch. The drink, which is carbonated through a fermentation process, contains probiotics and a living culture, co-owner Joseph Melrose said, adding that the probiotics are good bacteria that typically are absent in the average American diet. “It really works to helping with everything from irritable bowel syndrome to bad hair and bad skin,” he said. “People have been drinking it for 2,000 years for its health benefits.” Kombucha Kulture will not brew its own kombucha – a fermented tea drink – but stock about 10 flav

Occasionally in life you meet someone who has developed such an incredible gift it makes you want to tell everyone else about that person. That is what happened when I ventured into the Sunrise Natural Foods store in Roseville with my girlfriend and she introduced me to a friend of hers that works there. His name is Alden Okie and he is the epitome of  the kind of person people need to see and ask advice of when they enter a natural food health store. Alden, a very distinguished looking man in his 50's, is also a very humble and gentle man who probably never sees himself as a superman. But to the people who have come to know and trust his advice, he is a super man to them. I remember the

 Tree clean our air and water, store carbon in their trunks, create habitat for wildlife, reduce air pollution, increase property values, and provide countless other benefits. The Sacramento Tree Foundation works to leverage all of the benefits that trees provide to create healthy and sustainable communities through building the best urban forest in the Sacramento region. A major keystone in building the best urban forest is the Greenprint initiative, a multi-decade regional framework created to meet Sacramento's sustainability and livability goals by expanding urban forests and optimizing the benefits of tree canopies. Greenprint partners, comprised of 22 cities and 6 counties, have agree

Come join us in celebrating 22 years of the Hoes Down Harvest Celebration in the Capay Valley (Yolo County).  This celebration will promote agricultural arts and sustainable rural living through two fun-filled days of workshops and events.  Located within two hours of San Francisco and Sacramento’s busy metropolitan areas, the rural Capay Valley region is home to many small farms that supply Northern California’s families, restaurants, and neighborhood grocery stores with fresh organic produce.  The Celebration will offer the public a special chance to enjoy rural life and deepen their understanding and connection to the local food system. On Saturday, October 3rd, the Harvest Festival at