Here Is a Better Idea: Bill Walton for Mayor

By Colleen O’Connor

Why not? Todd Gloria is unpopular. City residents are unhappy with his tenure. And most San Diegans want a “new direction” with a new leader.

For an in-depth accounting of Gloria’s scandals and misdeeds, read the recent column, “Sins of San Diego Mayors Part 2.”

Then look at the obvious decline of the City once dubbed, “Camelot by the Bay.”

The Mayor and City Council, “Cannot maintain. Cannot Sustain. Cannot deliver.”  Where are the improvements they promised?

Certainly not fixing the roads. Cleaning the streets.  Protecting or Improving the “Jewel of the City,” Balboa Park.  Not saving open spaces, let alone adding to them. Or building something other than Lego-Land replicas for housing and rushed in-fill projects.  Where is the City’s Architect?

Here are Gloria’s big successes; more unsightly developments, more neighborhood-crushing granny flats, and more high-rise buildings in all the wrong places. Plus lots of unpopular bike lanes in areas that strenuously objected amid loss of parking spaces (North Park, Balboa Park, Point Loma, Clairemont, etc.).

Ignoring neighborhood input and ushering in pre-ordained contracts to friends and major contributors to his campaign coffers is another Gloria habit.

Small wonder, Gloria is unpopular. This is not a minority view.

A new poll conducted in the last month found that, “Nearly six-in-ten voters (59 percent) think the city has gotten off on the wrong track.”

“Only 36 percent say it is heading in the right direction.”

“The poll also suggests that the blame for the City’s wrong direction lies with one person: current Mayor Todd Gloria.”

Not surprisingly, “the negative view of the City’s direction was highest among older voters, with 72% of voters over 45 years of age saying the City is heading in the wrong direction.”

That strong voting bloc being those who have lived here, worked here, and witnessed the decay firsthand.

What to do?  Look for a challenger.  Look to new blood.

So, who can replace the unpopular Gloria?  Former Mayor Kevin Faulconer is considering another run. Rep. Scott Peters is mentioned.

Here is a better idea.  How about Bill Walton, a native San Diegan, an NBA superstar, a sports announcer, a team player and one who has actually come up with a positive idea on homelessness? And its attendant ills.

Bill Walton. UCLA grad.  Great name I.D. A man with a deep affection for San Diego and willing to do something to improve it.  Disciplined and admired. Plus, he is not looking to use one office to run for another office ad infinitum.

Refreshing. And winnable candidate.

After witnessing first-hand the serious decline of Balboa Park, the aggressive side of homelessness and drug addiction, as well as the inability of the City to make any significant improvements, Walton wrote a Times of San Diego opinion column with co-author George Mullen (also a native San Diegan) to detail the problems obvious to everyone.

“Most of us can no longer walk or bicycle our downtown city streets, sidewalks, and parks without facing an obstacle course of tents, bodies, human excrement, needles, trash, and a slew of walking-zombies who are impossible to distinguish between those just down on their luck and others who are out-of-control substance abusers about to attack us.”

“In San Diego, we have had enough. We are no longer going to follow other once-great American cities into the abyss of homelessness, lawlessness, and roadside shantytowns.”

His idea. Sunbreak Ranch.

“Sunbreak Ranch is designed to be a large-scale temporary ranch in the layout of the old California ranchos. It will be a creative, one-of-a-kind location featuring 35-plus amenities and benefits that strive to make the ranch the best possible temporary home for our homeless fellow citizens.

“Sunbreak Ranch will maintain a ‘clean, healthy, safe and secure environment’ for everyone at all times.”

“Walton and Mullen called on President Joe Biden to donate the land, and “deploy the military and security services to build a tent city using surplus equipment from the Afghan and Iraq deployments.

“Our military and security services have the manpower, expertise, and equipment to build out this entire tent city within weeks.”   They have proved that repeatedly in warzones, disaster areas and other emergency incidents.

The ranch would be located on unused federal land near Miramar Way exit, 12 miles from San Diego, and include:

Portable toilets, portable showers, mess halls, medical tents, and storage facilities. Also, dedicated teams of mental health professionals, substance abuse rehabilitation specialists, and vocational trainers, with 24/7private security.

As with everyone pleading for a change, Walton wrote,

“We can either rise to the occasion and tackle this challenge, or we can let the destructive, cruel, and inhumane downward spiral continue.  We have a choice.”

A better idea than the status quo failures. Bill Walton for Mayor.