Special date on the calendar sends lovers to county clerks offices for marriage papers

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. - The calendar reads February 22. This year, in numerals it lines up as 2/22/22. For those who believe it will be a special day for them, especially if they are in love and ready to wed, they wanted to make it something to remember.

The Santa Barbara County Clerk-Recorder's office had a full lobby this morning.

Chief Deputy Melinda Greene said she and her staff were ready.

"Because people are excited about repeated numbers, we had a surge in wedding requests today we had express weddings all mornings long.  We did 22 weddings this morning,  last year the same day we did six,  so we did know there would be a lot of  interest so we had all of our windows open and we were  ready to go," she said.

Those numbers went up, significantly.

By the end of the day, there were 32 marriage ceremonies, up by more than three times the average for this date.

There were also, 51 marriage licenses up from the average of 20.