U-T reporter Jeff McDonald disclosed in a piece on Feb. 25 that there are at least three individuals with connections to Mayor Gloria who are “indirectly linked” to the lawsuit challenging Gloria opponent Larry Turner’s campaign for not meeting the residency requirements of running for mayor and which argues that any votes for him should not be counted.
Turner claims he lives in a cottage in Ocean Beach along with his spouse and small boy and has for months.
So who are these three guys?
- One is Shawn VanDiver whose mother, Helen, brought the lawsuit. VanDiver sits on the San Diego Convention Center board member and was appointed to the mayor’s military advisory council.
- Another is Guillermo “Gil” Cabrera. He set up an independent political committee in favor of Gloria’s re-election, New San Diego. He was appointed to the regional airport board by Gloria and also runs a charity that solicits donations to support the mayor. The evidence in the suit was collected by a private investigator paid for by New San Diego. Gil also was responsible for sending out attack fliers against fellow Democrat Lori Saldana for Gloria back in 2022.
Ryan Clumpner - The third guy is Ryan Clumpner, a political consultant who also serves as vice chair of the San Diego Housing Commission, but was also the guy who hired the private investigator who surveilled Turner, according to a New San Diego campaign disclosure. The investigator was paid for by the committee.
The merits of the case have yet to be settled; a San Diego Superior Court judge last week pushed the matter to late March — after the primary election — without deciding whether Turner legally resided in the city when he filed campaign papers last year.
The top two finishers in the March 5 primary will move forward to the November general election.
Looks like someone is running scared, for people to resort to trickery or is it illegal to try to sabotage a candidate’s campaign, to win an election? His cohorts were appointed to prestigious seats in SD government. Does that mean all appointed Dept. heads, have tradeoffs going on to keep their high paying jobs? How about the variety of Board members are they using some sort of trickery to maintain their also appointed seats. I read Gloria is the Primary Board member at SANDAG, if he doesn’t get re-elected as Mayor he can slide in there, as the head honcho after the last occupant didn’t do much. SANDAG got resignation notice from Ikhrata in Aug., with a departure date of the end of Dec., 2023, so why did SANDAG wait until the end of Jan. to publicize they had started their nationwide search for a new Director? Why didn’t they start looking in Sept.????? Is it to see how the primaries come out? Enough trickery. We need “Clean Elections”, to wade thru the compost in SD politics!!! Vote for no incumbents, and Larry Turner for Mayor.
Todd doesn’t even attend the SANDAG Board meetings anymore. Sean Elo Rivera does. Lay off the glue.
You could have provided the information without the unneeded and impolite second sentence.
Thank you, Frank, for shining a light on this shady web that so obviously entangles Todd Gloria with his appointees and political cronies in this attempt to discredit his strongest opponent in the Mayor’s race. So far, Gil Cabrera’s New San Diego Pac has spent almost $200,000 trying to undermine Larry Turner and elevate Jane Glasson, because Todd obviously wants the luxury of picking his opponent, when that is a task that rightfully belongs to the voters in a democracy. An insecure candidate plays dirty games like this and looks the other way when his cronies do it for him.
I agree with “Pats”, that someone is “running scared.” This incumbent Mayor is unwilling to run on his record, so he hasn’t shown up at any mayoral candidate forum to allow his constituents to measure his answers against those of his challengers. If he cannot control the audience and the questions and walk away when the tone is not to his liking, Todd Gloria is a no show. San Diegans deserve better. They deserve a Mayor who will show up for them – when it is easy and when it is challenging. Apparently, Todd Gloria is not that guy!
Pat/Danna, I agree with all your points. Todd is maniacal and started his confidence game by using his ‘person of color’ and openly gay’ talking points as credentials. They are not, they are his personal birthright.
Then he tells us about his humble beginnings with a father who was a gardener and a mother who was a maid. His father actually had a career as an Aerospace Engineer. So, this is what we get with someone who has a Napoleon complex. It’s about them and not about us.
Let’s stop the labels and talk about solutions not knee-jerk reactions to crisis’s like homelessness and affordable housing. We need adults back at city hall. I hope that we, as informed voters, connect the dots and vote Todd and all the city hall incumbents out of office this November.
Then Todd can pack up his highchair and move on. Hopefully, he will stop being coddled and leave in shame for all the damage he has done to our once finest city.
Makes me wonder why the UT stopped offering the “Comments” after each article on Feb.1, 2024??? Was it because the UT is a Gloria supporter and he didn’t like reading all the factual but negative comments and the Editor knew the closer to the election the worse the comments would get???? I asked the UT why at this particular time of the year, they removed the “comments” from each article. They said they reformatted the digital version and didn’t have room for all of them.
But said they do have room for some. So now the UT can pick and choose which articles they will allow the subscribers to comment on. So far I’ve not seen any “comments”.
Is that democracy, or what? Seems more like a controlling agenda…..
This is a great article Frank Gormlie has published, and “comments”, allows the readers to know what’s going on in SD.
KFMB, KGTV, KNSD, and KPBS are all on the politico-corporate real estate complex dole. The corporate real estate industry, including mortgage banking and vacation rental advertising brings in tens of millions in revenue for the corporate media and PBS. Which is why Californian’s never hear about Wall Street’s staggering acquisitions of hundreds of thousands of single family homes since the TARP program of 2008 while the Politicos fast track high density luxury apartment development construction by the hundreds of thousands units. With no houses available for purchase by residents, the market has been mindlessly politically manipulated with no end game plan, that will result in a catastrophic global collapse. (See China)
Let’s face the fact that Todd Gloria is well-funded and has $$$$$ to pull shenanigans for his political gain. It’s why he didn’t show up for the mayor’s debate this month. He didn’t need to.
Any thoughts on how Gloria can possibly win?
The above tactic certainly does seem to be an act of desperation.
I have met no one who thinks he has done/is doing a good job.
Maybe he could just outright pay people to vote for him, or some
variation of that?
Good grief.
His own supporters don’t think too highly of him. They vote for him because of some specific agenda they support. Dense housing being a main one.
Dense SVTR construction is really what is going on. Wouldn’t it be great if there were bike lanes going from one overly developed lot to another? Vote this fool out of office.
“Dense SVTR construction is really what is going on.”
That too. When the explosion of dense housing doesn’t result in the lower rental costs it’s supporters claim (which in effect will result in a shortage of new long term residents), these projects WILL end up being STVRs instead.
The bike lanes on the other hand are a good thing, regardless of the type of developments that go up.
Todd is the dirtiest mayor this city has ever seen and that is saying something given the ongoing corruption of this city and its officials. He knows ther people are angry and he can’t run on his record. As a lifelong Dem, I can’t wait to vote for Turner and hopefully campaign for him in the fall.
The city is facing a $167 MILLION budget deficit as reported by the UT this morning. Time for a change.
And thanks for reporting facts, nobody else does.
Sales tax revenue during the current fiscal year, which ends June 30, is projected to be $27.6 million less than expected last summer. Hotel tax is projected to be $6.5 million short of projections.
Sales tax had been expected to rise this fiscal year to $401.6 million but is now projected to be $374 million. Hotel tax was predicted to be $172.7 million but is now projected at $166.2 million.
City finance officials blame the drops primarily on inflation curbing consumer spending and leisure travel in recent months. They said high interest rates also are discouraging purchases that generate sales tax revenue.
https://www.lajollalight.com/news/story/2024-02-28/san-diego-faces-167-million-budget-deficit-as-revenue-shrinks-and-expenses-rise
Revenue projections didn’t meet proposed estimates. Oops, hate it when that happens. There are $215 million in reserves.
Hotel tax (TOT) will continue to decline as long as STVRs climb in number, as they’re stealing clients from hotels. Yes, they STVRs are supposed to pay TOT to the city but how many bootleg/unpermitted STVRs are out there? Does the city audit STVR income to make sure TOT is paid? I don’t think so.
Add to that the hotels that have been taken out of circulation to house illegal aliens and the homeless (Comfort Inn on Rosecrans, Wyndham Garden on Sports Arena, Ramada on Midway, and the Crowne Plaza on Hotel Circle North among many others) and you wind up with falling TOT revenue.
Being an illegal alien is not fun:
All of the STRs pay TOT. Airbnb and VRBO have been automatically collecting TOT for years. They both created and signed a “Voluntary Collection Agreement” with the city, which was genius because it made the city feel dependent on their illegal behavior and encouraged them to legalize it. Anyways, STRs don’t really impact TOT revenue, the only thing that reduces TOT is if visitors stop staying here. Hotels and hosted-STRs have plenty of vacancies. So all we’re talking about is moving the vegetables around on the plate.
I’d be very surprised if the City knows how many STR’s are in the city. I followed all the Bldg. Permits applied for, city-wide every month for over 3 yrs. The applicants got very creative and used a wide variety of different adjectives other than STR or Air B and B. They used granny flat/studio/artist loft/game room with kitchen and bathroom, nanny/guest quarters/companion suite/etc. BUT much like the Permitted Hotel above Louisiana Purchase who also advertises on an Air B&B website, the City employee who looks at the Permit Application may or may not have recognized the “use” of the structure, in all reality, be an STR. I understand why folks want to rent STR’s vs hotels, it’s much cheaper, and you can cook in them. So when I read where the TOT had decreased, between so many STR’s and no parking SD is losing it’s charm, so no surprise to a common thinker why TOT revenue is down.
Also the city is allowing entire apartment buildings to be converted to Airbnbs without a permit or change of occupancy or proper insurance. This is a violation of the building code and puts guests at risk. Transient occupancies like legal hotels have stricter requirements for fire protection and egress, because it’s a higher risk occupancy type. Again, the city doesn’t care.
Unfortunately they think allowing housing to be converted to STRs is a financial boon…. it isn’t. They are just shifting tourist butts over from hotels. Meanwhile the city has so much unused hotel space they’re solving the housing crisis by converting them into shelters. It’s comical really.
“All of the STRs pay TOT” is not true. Those STVRs listed on VRBO and AirBnB pay TOT but many owners handle repeat customers and referrals outside of the booking agency’s umbrella to save fees and to get paid up front. Just think of all the families who return to the same unit in OB and PB summer after summer. You think they book through VRBO? Nope. And my neighbor across the street is unlicensed, he books through realtor buddy. A lotta that going on.
That is an insignificant amount. Without Airbnb, these places could not exist. Some had their own websites prior to airbnb and still do, but it was not a viable model. Which is precisely why it has exploded since about ~2012 when these platforms became well known. Also you do not need a license to list on Airbnb. Well, legally you do, but hundreds are doing it without consequence. Airbnb doesn’t care, they will let you list illegal units, tents, RVs, etc. They don’t care if you have a license, an illegal garage conversion with a leaky water heater in it, or insurance, or even permission from the property owner. There are no repercussions for Airbnb.
Penny wise, and pound foolish.
This type of dirty campaign activity is exactly why I won’t vote for Todd. This is also why Larry Turner has my vote. Todd & Jen also did not show up at the community discussion about H Barracks. It was a very well planned event. We (about 700 people) received a lot of good information about how to get ahead of the homeless crisis. Todd’s plan is to spend $2400 or mo on each person, to live in a tent. You can rent an apartment with a floor, kitchen and bath, beachfront for that price. Where is the money going and why won’t he listen to any other plan? Why is behind that? We the people need to be heard. Remember “No taxation without representation!