OB Planning Board to Review ‘Nix on the Cannabis’ Code Proposals and Establishment ‘Reforms’ to Neighborhood Planning Groups – Wed., Nov.6

This Wednesday night, November 6, the Ocean Beach Planning Board will hold its monthly public meeting. The volunteer panel of community members has one development project to review, but also will review issues from the weighty to the more lightweight. This all happens at 6 pm sharp at the OB Recreation Center at 4726 Santa Monica Ave. Here are the agenda items of note:

1776 Cable Street

The Board will review a Coastal Development Project application for 1776 Cable Street, one which seeks to add and alter an existing one story single-family residence and its detached garage. The applicant wishes to add second floor additions and alterations to both, converting the whole shebang into two units – one a 2-story house and turning the garage into “an accessory dwelling unit” – in other words, a granny flat.

‘Nix on the Cannabis’ Update to the Land Development Code

We’re told there are 41 proposed amendments to the City of San Diego’s Development Code. And that populist and renter-oriented group the SD Planning Commission – made up of Mayoral appointees – supports them all. (Okay, that was a joke. The Planning Commish usually represents the Republican establishment.) Oh, the Commission supports all of them EXCEPT for those sections relating to Cannabis Facilities. (Need another joke here ….) Sometime after December 12, the City Council will vote to approve these proposals – so now is your time to give your elected reps – including the Planning Board, of course, – just how you see all this, but first you have to know what you’re talking about, so show up at this meeting. [See below for more detail.}

Another Uh-Oh. Scott Sherman Wants to Reform Community Planning Groups

This could be another red flag warning. Of recent, San Diego’s neighborhood planning committees have been under fire, for a variety of good and bad “ills”, like Nimbyism, being unrepresentative of their communities, racism – and for standing up to developers.

So, the City Council formed a “special task force” to reform those wayward neighborhood groups, and Councilman Scott Sherman was put in charge. Sherman, you may know, is probably the most right-wing politico remaining on the council, always standing up for the “property rights” of developers, first to lead the charge against transparency and accountability.

Some of the concerns about community planning groups are valid; they do need to genuinely represent their communities and guard against the challenges of doing that. But the whole concert of these groups is to make urban planning and decisions about infrastructure more of a grassroots and democratic process. Up until the mid-1970s, these important decisions were left up to planning commissioners, engineers, planning department managers and to developers themselves.

In fact it was the good citizens of Ocean Beach who were the first to rail against the inequities of having the elite make all the decisions that carved up and gutted our community space. (This whole story is worthy of your notice.) When the dust settled, OB in 1976 had the very first, democratically-electing planning committee in the city’s history, the OB Planning Board.

Let’s not forgot, also, the it’s the city that monitors and guides these neighborhood groups. Each one has a community-wide election of members to its board and has to be accountable to the city for its process.

OB Holiday Float and Theme

On a lighter note, the Board will also determine if it will have a Holiday Parade float and what kind of budget to provide.

Here’s the official agenda:

San Diego may loosen rules for food trucks, granny flats and more

BY David Garrick SDU-T Oct 27, 20198AN DIEGO

San Diego is proposing looser rules for food trucks, granny flats, child care centers, housing projects for the homeless, parking at entertainment venues and establishments that sell alcohol in certain neighborhoods.

The changes are among more than three dozen municipal code revisions the City Council is expected to vote on later this fall. The San Diego Planning Commission unanimously endorsed the changes this week.

The commission declined to endorse one proposed change that would have softened rules that prohibit marijuana businesses within 100 feet of housing and within 1,000 feet of churches, parks, schools and youth-oriented facilities.

Commissioners said community leaders did not have enough opportunity to analyze that proposal. (For the balance, go here.)

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