The Ocean Beach Planning Board meets this Wednesday, November 7 and at the top of their agenda, figuratively speaking, is a review of the new plans for the Saratoga Park, also called the Ruth Varney Held Park. (Here is a representation of those plans – handed out at the OBTC meeting on 10/24/18.)
Also on their agenda is something that would have caused an uproar 10 to 15 years ago: the Board is being asked to help pay for the police trailer in the OB Pier Parking Lot.
The Board will meet at 6pm in the Community Room at the OB Rec Center, 4726 Santa Monica Avenue.
Here is the Legend to the new plans.
Saratoga / Ruth Varney Held Park Plans
The OB Community Development Corporation has updated their plans for Saratoga / Ruth Varney Held Park – and the Board will review them. The Board could write a letter of recommendation for the plans, if it so votes.
OB Mainstreet Assoc. Asking Planners to Help Pay for Police Trailer
Apparently, the OBMA is approaching the Board in a request to assist them in paying for the SDPD trailer that has sat in the middle of the OB Pier Parking lot – literally for decades. As mentioned, this issue would have caused an uproar as a decade and half ago, there were a number of OBceans who were protesting the police trailer being in the lot at all, including then-members of the Planning Board.
Over the years, dissent around the structure has faded, but a number of concerns have stayed with it. Officers used to write reports inside, etc, but over time – and after the interior restrooms went broke – the trailer quit being a type of sub-police station. Police and merchants have acknowledged that the trailer – and its cameras – were not much more than deterrents to crime and other hooliganism in and around the Pier and parking lot.
Also, some merchants and locals have complained about the loss of parking space due to the presence of the trailer. And every now and then, locals repaint the trailer and chip in for various signs on the structure.
Here is the official agenda:
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
If the OB merchants want to keep the police trailer, then the OB merchants should pay for it for it. Not the planning board.
The surveillance cameras are useless as we all know. They haven’t stopped anyone from committing crimes at the beach, or on boardwalk. Just ask any of the people who have been stabbed or robbed.
Is #12 the bike rack?
The OB Planning Board can’t pay for the police trailer, planning boards do not have and are not allowed to have funds other than to pay for minor expenses. Town councils can and do have funds, they are registered as non-profits with the state.
I’m glad they made the playground small and mostly kept the park open grass.
A play ground for the beach.
My have times changed.