Month: September 2013

Forming the Basis of a Sustainable Neighborhoods Initiative

Part One of a Two Part Series

By Jay Powell

As things stand now Kevin Faulconer, a two term City Councilman, appears to be the choice of establishment Republicans, while Nathan Fletcher, former State Assemblyman and David Alvarez, City Councilman, will be vying for the support of the Democratic Party faithful.

Questions still remain about IF other credible candidates will throw their hat in ring in the days remaining to declare and file as candidates for this accelerated special election.

While we hold our breath, I suggest that those of us who have embraced a platform that was characterized as “neighborhoods first” during the last Mayoral election take the initiative to define what we mean by that phrase.

Did Bob Filner jump? did he fall? was he pushed?

Here’s a link to Part One, A Story About Sex, the Birds and Bees and the Wolfpack

By Norma Damashek / NumbersRunner

Forget you, Nancy Drew. You’re being replaced by Perry Mason, super-sleuth defense attorney from the zero hour this guy would laboriously rise up in the middle of the courtroom and pull a rabbit out of a hat. First he’d say something enigmatic to the judge, then to the jury. Soon he’d turn to the seated onlookers and dramatically finger the real culprit… swindler… murderer… for a histrionic wrap-up to another solved case.

The case against Bob Filner, however, doesn’t lend itself to cheap theatrics. The complexity and political fallout of Bob Filner’s ouster bring his political demise closer to classic tragedy than pulp fiction — not merely for him personally but for the future of our city.

So let’s stick with the diligent approach of Ms Drew to arrive at some answers to this mayoral mystery: did Bob Filner jump? fall? or get pushed? and when the curtains are drawn back will we find a master manipulator slinking around in the shadows?

On Syria Vote, Trust, but Verify

By Congressman Alan Grayson / The New York Times / Sept. 6, 2013

WASHINGTON — THE documentary record regarding an attack on Syria consists of just two papers: a four-page unclassified summary and a 12-page classified summary. The first enumerates only the evidence in favor of an attack. I’m not allowed to tell you what’s in the classified summary, but you can draw your own conclusion.

On Thursday I asked the House Intelligence Committee staff whether there was any other documentation available, classified or unclassified. Their answer was “no.”

Point Loma Sewage Plant at End of Its Line – Only Large Plant in US Not Up to Fed Standards

U-T San Diego: After suffering years of budget cutbacks because of a pension crisis, San Diego now faces a bigger financial challenge: how to deal with a sewage project that could cost even more money — up to $3.5 billion once interest is included.

OB Man’s Bamboo Bicycle Stolen – Pledges to Pedal Across Country If Returned

abc10News: An Ocean Beach man is offering to pedal his one-of-a-kind bamboo bicycle across the United States as long as the stolen bike is returned. Rob Greenfield is an Ocean Beach resident who owns and operates The Greenfield Group, an environmentally-active marketing company.

Come inside for more ….

A family trust has completed the sale of a major piece of land that it has held on the 5000 block of Santa Monica Avenue in Ocean Beach. Total sales: $6.3 Million!

It was the Keen Family Trust that sold off its holdings, working via a successor bank trust.

First on the block – as we reported back in August – was the small, single-family house – nearly a hundred years old – and the 3 adjacent and separate rental units on Santa Monica Avenue – all right next to the Santa Monica mall. The old house – one-bedroom and one-bath – is at 5063 Santa Monica Ave. It sold for $675,000.

The three rental units are located at 5065-5059 Santa Monica – each with a side yard and parking in the alley. They were sold for $900,000, cash. They occupy a 7,000-square-foot lot.

Total price tag for the two properties: $1,575,000. They were all bought by Ku-Fong Tzung and Jean Tzung, trustees of the Fu-Kong & Jean Tzung Trust. Sell: U.S. Bank N.A., as successor trustee under the Keen Family Declaration of Trust Number One.

More recently announced was the sale of a the 22-unit apartment complex the Keen Family Trust had owned, located at 5041 – 5043 Santa Monica Avenue.

Kono’s Surf Club
704 Garnet Ave.
Pacific Beach, CA 92109
858-483-1669

It isn’t often that I leave Ocean Beach to try a restaurant in Pacific Beach, but today was an exception. We ended up at Kono’s Surf Club in PB.

Before we left the house, I had done some minor research on Kono’s and suggested we try having breakfast there. (It was 2:15pm). Ro checked her “Iphone” and found they were open until 4:00pm – so away we went.

OB People’s Food has just purchased property immediately to the east of its current parking lot, which will increase the organic food store’s parking availability. Parking – or lack of – has been one of the biggest problems that has accompanied the success of the store, officially called Ocean Beach People’s Organic Food Market.

Nancy Casady, executive director told the OB Rag this morning about the very recent purchase. The property consists of 1300 square feet that includes two rental units – one is occupied currently with a long-term tenant.

The new property located at 4747 Voltaire Street will allow the store to increase its parking by 6 to 7 spaces in the rear of the newly-bought lot, accessible from the alley.

By Jim Miller

Last Friday evening, after five grueling hours of candidate interviews and spirited debate, the San Diego-Imperial Counties Labor Council overwhelmingly endorsed David Alvarez for mayor.

This decision came after weeks of intense lobbying on the part of former labor leader Lorena Gonzalez, who, along with other powerful Democratic power brokers and money people were seeking to clear the field of genuinely progressive candidates in order to anoint Nathan Fletcher as the “only choice.”

Indeed, while Democratic money bundler Christine Forrester was writing to her well-heeled contacts praising Fletcher as “an astute business leader, worthy of representing and evolving Qualcomm’s business interests” and someone “well-suited to find common denominators between left and right” in order to create a “bipartisan platform from which San Diego can soar,” Gonzalez was repackaging him as a working class hero about whom she said to her list of labor folks, “the more he learned about economic justice issues, the better champion he became.”

By Joan McCarter / Daily Kos

Oct. 1 will be upon us before we know it, the launch date of the health insurance exchanges under the Affordable Care Act.

Note that while we’re hearing a lot about the Oct. 1 deadline for the exchanges, that’s when people can first start signing up in an open enrollment period that runs through next March. Coverage won’t begin, however, until Jan. 1, 2014.

We tend to hear more about the politics of all this (still!) than the mechanics of all this, so it’s worth talking about some of the basics for the people who it will affect.

Group brings challenge to patents on Monsanto’s genetically engineered seed to Supreme Court.

By Andrea Germanos / Common Dreams

A group of U.S. farmers is not giving up its fight against biotech giant Monsanto

In the latest step of a two and a half year legal battle, plaintiffs in Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association (OSGATA) et al v. Monsanto asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Thrusday to hear their case challenging the patents on Monsanto’s genetically engineered seed.

Another good piece of news from the Justice Department on the drug war.

April M. Short / Alternet

During the groundbreaking phone call on Thursday, August 29 in which U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder told the governors of Colorado and Washington the federal government would not attempt to intercept regulated legal marijuana in their states, he also said the Department of Justice (DOJ) is “actively considering” how to oversee the relationship between banks and marijuana shops.

According to the Huffington Post, Holder told the governors as long as marijuana shops “operate within state laws and don’t violate other federal law enforcement priorities” the DOJ is looking to regulate those interactions as legal.

From AlJazeera

Prison inmates in the US state of California have ended a nearly two-month hunger strike to protest policies that can keep some gang leaders isolated for decades, after lawmakers agreed to hold hearings on the issue, prison officials say.

More than 30,000 inmates had been refusing meals when the strike began in early July.

California’s prison system is one of the largest and most crowded in the US. About 3,600 inmates are housed in the isolation units, which are designed to discipline inmates who commit crimes in prison or keep gang leaders from easily communicating with their followers.

Critics have warned that long-term isolation can hurt prisoners’ mental health.