I lived in Santa Barbara back in late 70s, early 80s, when JT had his place, outside town, north of Goleta, quite a ways from downtown SB. JT had a charge account at the store where I worked. He never came in, but he did answer the phone, when called about someone charging on his account. His voice is unmistakable.
The SB Mission at that time was downtown, across the street from the Good Earth Restaurant. Honestly, I don't think JT went there. He probably had people come to his place north of SB. He was pretty famous by the time he bought the place. But who knows. And he was flying at the time, and/or had a plane - maybe even a chopper. The airport was closer to him than Santa Barbara - and he had property, lots of it, if a chopper wanted to land there.
It was a year or two after that, that I went in to the SB Mission, at the coaxing of a friend, who had a friend who was an auditor in LA, who was urging her to get into scno. The place was a dump, no toilet paper. That was the impression of a wog, anyway. I took a few public courses, and ran like hell when I was shocked by some goings-on, which I probably never should have seen/experienced, as 'fresh meat/a wog'. And I got regged by a gang of thugs. That set all the hair on the back of my neck to rising. I was terrified, and worried I wasn't going to be allowed to leave the place.
Anyway, later on - not sure when, it moved to a building on lower State, and at that time, lower State was not a tourist attraction. It was a dump, lots of homeless and gangs/thugs, porn stores and theaters and seedy night clubs, etc. The entire area was run down and seedy, including the building co$ moved into. I assumed they ran out of money and couldn't afford mid-town State Street anymore.
Later on, lower State Street was rehabbed, and a connection/walkway built to the beach, which WAS a tourist area. A bridge was built for the 101, and the walkway went under it, as did a roadway connecting lower State to the rail station and the beach boulevard. All the buildings were rehabbed, and legit businesses and restaurants encouraged to establish there. The co$ building has always been just a store front - though the building is actually huge, and reaches back into the public parking lot. I have never been inside, so I don't know how big the interior is, or how much of the building is for scno. The store front is small, and dinghy looking. Dark and not welcoming. At least not to me, but then I had experience with scno/co$, so maybe I am prejudiced . . .
It has been my contention for a while now, since finding out stuff about and around it, and because of the weird stuff I witnessed and was made a part of, when I was there, that the SB Mission was one of the first ones taken over and raped - secretly - before the big Mission Rape. I think there was SO there, running things long before the Mission Rape. There was a fear and an ominous, sinister feel about the place, when I was there. I was at that co$ SB Mission before the David Mayo break-off. In fact, I left SB shortly after escaping from that first building, and came back later, after the Mission Rape, when David Mayo was going strong in Montecito.
Every so often I get back to Santa Barbara, pass through, and I always notice when I drive by the co$ building. It gives me the creeps, just like it did way back then, when I managed to get the hell out of that first building . . . I had my landlady send back all mail from co$, with the word "Deceased" on it. I stopped getting mail from co$ for some 30 years. Then all of a sudden, in last handful of years, since signing on here, in fact, it started coming again. Getting that mail embarrasses me, ya know. I mean, what must my mail person think of me . . .