David Garrick at the U-T wrote an extensive status report on the “power struggles” between existing community planning groups in Uptown and La Jolla with the new, upstart groups that are challenging the status quo. The power struggle played out last week at the city council committee that deals with land use and housing issues. Garrick summarized it this way:
A group of mostly young renters is one step closer to ousting a group of mostly older homeowners as San Diego’s officially designated community voice for Hillcrest, University Heights, Bankers Hill and nearby areas.
In a similar power struggle in La Jolla, a group of mostly older homeowners appears to have staved off an attempted ouster by a rival group made up of mostly younger renters.
A key City Council committee voted 4-0 last week to support the young renters in the Hillcrest area, but the older homeowners in La Jolla. Both decisions must be finalized by the full council in May.
Garrick reported that “The power struggles are the result of San Diego’s sweeping, two-year effort to make neighborhood planning groups better organized and more diverse. The rival groups are asking the city to let them replace the existing neighborhood planning groups, arguing they match the local demographics better and would be more effective leaders.”
This is somewhat disingenuous because it’s not like all of a sudden and out of the blue these new groups formed to challenge the existing groups. If you’ve been following this issue over the last couple of years — like we have — then you know that it was the Gloria administration and many on the council that openly pushed to do away with the existing groups – all in the name of “diversification.”
And after two years of this pushing by city government on the 42 community planning groups, only two had challengers — only two — Uptown and La Jolla.
Garrick has followed the city line on this issue fairly consistently — and very consistently, the Rag and other critics of the top-down process initiated by Gloria to overturn the existing CPGs have pushed back.
For instance, back in February, the Rag took Garrick to task for standing developments on their head. Garrick went crazy with joy with the news that 2 of the planning groups had rivals. We pushed back:
U-T reporter David Garrick … gave the establishment narrative on the entire process and stood the results on their head. Garrick’s narrative focused on the two neighborhood groups that have rivals — and not on the other 40 that do not.
Garrick did quote Andrea Schlageter who is both the chair of the OB Planning Board and the leader of an umbrella panel of neighborhood groups called the Community Planners Committee.
“This process has continued the false narrative that we hold up projects across the city,” said Andrea Schlageter, leader of an umbrella panel of neighborhood groups called the Community Planners Committee.
Schlageter said the groups, formally called community planning groups, just want to provide valuable community input. She said city approvals typically delay projects much more than feedback from neighborhood groups.
Garrick back then did manage to offer the critics’ view:
Some critics of the city’s reforms have called them a power grab by city officials and developers who want to limit neighborhood input on controversial projects, especially high-rise projects the city hopes can help solve the local housing crisis.
They contend the city wants to replace neighborhood groups it sees as obstructionist with groups that are more supportive of dense developments.
The Rag also commented then that, “Garrick also noted that the process of ‘change’ was meant to ‘boost the professionalism … of the groups ….’ The irony here is that one of the key motivations for the grassroots folks who began the first neighborhood planning groups was to take planning out of the hands of the professionals — and place it in the hands of locals, of real people.”
How did I know that? I was there in 1976 when the movement for grassroots neighborhood planning groups was born and I ran for a board seat on the newly created OB Planning Board in an election in which thousands of OBcean residents, property owners and businesses voted. (I lost by 7 votes out of hundreds cast – we had district-type elections.)
Up to then, urban planning on the neighborhood level was monopolized by the “experts” – city planners and professional organizations that had very real top-down agendas on how they wanted communities to appear – high density construction, unbridled development of box apartments, no height limits, no restrictions on curb cuts, no input from neighbors … the list goes on. Many of the “professionals” who worked on the original plans for Ocean Beach were property owners who were to financially benefit from the designs for OB they chose.
In that first election for the very first OB Planning Board, the progressives and grassroots activists won big. Our coalition won most of the seats on that first board and Maryann Zounes — one of our local activists — was elected as the first chair of the first board.
So, there’s plenty of history out there – which the current San Diego establishment, Mayor Gloria and David Garrick ignore.
And people need to read between the lines in any UT reports. (This one by Garrick is for “subscribers only.” — Why the UT does this – reserve some of the most important news only for subscribers — at the same time trying to stem the bleed from their newspaper model — is one for speculation.)
Garrick:
In Hillcrest, the rival group is Vibrant Uptown and the existing group is Uptown Planners. Both contain the name “Uptown” because that’s how the city describes Hillcrest and the surrounding neighborhoods. In La Jolla, the rival group is the La Jolla Community Planning Group and the existing group is the La Jolla Community Planning Association.
City officials say the reforms aim to boost the professionalism and diversity of neighborhood groups, which have faced backlash in recent years for frequently opposing ambitious projects and policies.
The goal is to diversify the groups, which are typically made up of more older White homeowners than the neighborhoods they represent, by bringing in more renters, people of color and young people. …
Councilmember Stephen Whitburn, whose district includes Hillcrest, said he opted for the rival group because it would shift from mostly at-large seats to guaranteeing each neighborhood within Uptown at least two seats — one each for a renter and property owner. …
Ben Nichols, leader of the Hillcrest Business Association, said guaranteeing seats to each area will boost diversity now and in the future. “Oftentimes, Hillcrest candidates get swamped by a large voting block from another neighborhood,” he said.
Marc Johnson, a community leader in University Heights, called the move undemocratic. He also stressed that the rivalry is nothing new. It began in 2019 when a group of pro-growth residents took over the current Uptown group by winning several seats on its board. But slow-growth supporters struck back in the 2021 election and solidified their power in 2023.
“Rather than participate in an open, free and fair democratic process and win support for their agenda, they are attempting to usurp the community voice and replace it with their unpopular ideas,” Johnson said of Vibrant Uptown.
Here is Garrick going through the different factors that favor this or that group in Uptown:
The strongest argument in favor of the rival Uptown group is that its age demographics match better with Uptown overall, where a large share of the population is between age 40 and 49. A large share of the existing group, about 36 percent, are between age 70 and 79. The majority of the rival group is between ages 30 and 39.
The rival group has seven renters and only four homeowners, while the existing group has three renters and nine homeowners. Both groups are far less ethnically diverse than the community at large.
Income level appears to favor the existing group. More than 50 percent of the existing group falls in the income range of $75,000 to $124,000, while 42 percent of the rival group’s members fall into the category of $200,000 or more.
In the La Jolla power struggle, the committee favored the existing group, as Garrick describes.
The rival group has much more diverse members than the existing group, which is made up of 15 property owners and three business owners. The rival group has three renters, three homeowners, two business owners, one property owner and one youth representative.
The rival group is also more ethnically diverse than the existing group, which has no Hispanic, Black or Asian members. But both groups skew high income, with about 70 percent of each making more than $200,000 a year.
Half of the rival group is under age 50, while the existing group has no members under 50.
The ultimate decisions go to the full city council in May.
If the council chooses a rival group in either Hillcrest or La Jolla in its final vote in May, that group would have to stand for election within 90 days.
Other changes noted by Garrick:
- the merger of the Scripps Ranch and Miramar Ranch North groups
- the University Community Planning Group in University City is allowed to increase its number of members to 21 so it can include UC San Diego students.
One of the puzzling things about this is that, as David Garrick points out, the VU people are way more affluent that the existing uptown planners. Somehow I don’t think that this is an increase in diversity when it’s going to be dominated by young affluent people. My experience in planning issues is that the young and affluent are not open to a broad spectrum of ideas. They know what they know and what they know is right.
And, given the relatively little data provided by Garrick we really don’t know the ethnic composition of VU and we really don’t know about age distribution – just that 36% of uptown planners are between 70 and 79. That means that 54% of Uptown planners are most likely under 70 while “a majority” of VU is between 30 and 39. Poor reporting, I think, and we really don’t know if there is a real improvement in age distribution or ethnicity. All we really know is that VU is way more affluent than the average uptown resident.
When applications were submitted with “potential” board as you point out, income had to be reported. I for one had to report my income, I have since retired and that would lower the income. Many on Uptown Planners are retired so I’m guessing their incomes are also lower. None of that matters because if Uptown Community Planning Group is elected, an ELECTION has to be conducted with in 90 days. Your comment about affluence of Vibrant Uptown is moot.
Huh. An entire news report written about an event without a single quote from either of the two groups who were up to be ousted. And the U-T wonders why they’re bleeding out?
For what it’s worth, below is the text of my remarks at the meeting:
As a member of Uptown Planners, I object not only to the proposed changes to CP 600-24, but also to the singling out of Uptown Planners and the La Jolla CPA.
It has become increasingly apparent that CPG reform has been less about increasing representation than eliminating dissent, and to appoint those with vested interests to sidestep the electorate.
I strongly recommend that you read the article that I provided to you at the beginning of this meeting*. It examines how the staff report intentionally misrepresents the data to induce you to reach a foregone conclusion. Most notably, it ignores that Uptown Planners for years has a standing outreach committee and that the data reveals it is Vibrant Uptown members who are actually older and wealthier than those on Uptown Planners.
I urge you not to make a decision today so as to allow the full City Council to debate and decide this issue, rather than allow it to slink through on a consent agenda.
Otherwise, it is vital that you follow the recommendation of the CPC that any appointed group have no order of business other than conducting an election, to ensure that no group speaks on behalf of a community without recognition
* https://obrag.org/2024/03/the-san-diego-community-planning-group-shell-game-begins-at-todays-land-use-committee-meeting/
(You can skip to the 2:13:00 mark in the meeting video here to watch, https://sandiego.granicus.com/player/clip/8871?meta_id=932758 )
Thanks Matt.
Mat….as you know if Uptown Community Planning Group is selected, an election will be held within 90 days so the age and wealth of Vibrant Uptown is inconsequential. You can even run. Quit misleading people. Also, I’d like to note that Matt M and I started the Operations and Outreach Committee when we were elected in 2019, as there was no such committee when we were elected AND, it was a fight to get it as a standing committee.
What Gloria and Whitburn don’t know is to be on a Planning Committee group Board requires a lot of work, the younger people know nothing about, UNLESS Whitburn and Gloria will tell them how to vote on community projects, and they say yes daddy and do it. Whitburn has been on a Board, but the mandates were not so convoluted as they are now. Whereas the older crowd is not nearly as likely to drink the offered Kool Aid and give the mayor and council reps push back. They’re not as quick to believe the okie doke. If the people who can’t afford cars and have to live stacked up in small apts. think for a mili-second they’re going to somehow get cheaper housing, they REALLY are delusional. If VU kiddies win those seats, they will bail out. It’s not as easy to be a community informative group as they and others think it is.
It’s all true, Pats! Being on a planning board is hard work and usually 2 meetings a month. It means an occasional missed dinner with family, it means a study of the community’s plan, studying complicated documents and drawings, and being able to discuss and decide on recommendations for proposed projects. And it’s a very thankless job, too. No awards or rewards are handed out after a year on a board — it’s simply the satisfaction of helping out your community.
Frank,
I think it’s pretty wild you’re agreeing with Pats without a bit of pushback. Back in the 70s when you were a young activist were you willing to believe anything you were told? I doubt it!
Sometimes I read things on this website that are pretty insulting and dismissive of the concerns of younger residents. I think it might be a good idea to be a bit more open minded about the kinds of perspectives we tend to offer. Just because we don’t have nostalgia for the activism of the 1960s and 70s doesn’t mean we’re wrong or uninformed.
What is the OB Rag’s message to a young person like myself, that wants to continue living here but is finding it difficult to stay? How would you convince someone in my position to support Uptown Planners over VU? What are the policy proposals that the OB Rag can offer to younger people? It may be easy for some of of you who bought homes long ago, but to younger folks who rent it is genuinely hard and even more so when older “Nimbys” wag their fingers at us or accuse us of being corrupt or corporate sellouts.
There are so many openings here, I’d have to take a day to respond. You’re not just some “young person.” You interned with developer-friendly Circulate SD – you are the one that has drank the Kool-Aid, my friend. So, you are far from the “average” young person (if there is such a character). And at community meetings, you continue to push their narrative. The “kinds of perspectives” you offer conform to Circulate policies and the campaign to destroy the community planning groups under a fake flag of supposed “diversification.” Most of the young activists I knew were renters — including myself. 70% of the residents of OB are renters. Mull that over for a moment. Why is it incumbent of us to provide you with a purchased home of your choosing?
And talk about “insulting and dismissive” — that’s what you have been doing all along here in your comments. You’re such Gloria-freak. You refuse to understand history, refuse to acknowledge how Circulate is so very developer-friendly, refuse to say that Gloria’s governance and policies are corrupt … and I could go on.
Frank,
Yeesh Frank! What distinguishes me so much from the “average” young person? Yes, I interned at Circulate, which I will admit is indeed developer friendly. So am I not a pretty regular young person now? I really don’t understand the logic. Could it be the case that young people today, given the housing situation, may just be a bit more inclined to support developers as they tend to be the ones that build housing. Like I dunno man, am I some bought and paid for ideological weirdo or could it be that I just want some goddamn housing built in this city and I don’t really care exactly whether it conforms to community character or satisfies everyone’s aesthetic preferences? I’m kind of over that because I tend to find those concerns to be a bit luxurious given the situation we’re in. Also what is this about being provided a purchased home? I will buy my own damn home when I am able. However, most people are not able to do that anymore in this state. It is no longer a reality for a large majority of the state’s population. This is why people are leaving. Texas and Florida (yes god forbid Florida) are eating our lunch in this category and meanwhile they are gaining congressional seats while we lost one in the last cycle. Our political influence will wain if this keeps up.
So what about Texas, Zack?
Could be a nice trial balloon for property ownership and equity building.
Vern,
Texas is great but I would rather not leave my aging parents if I can help it.
I did.
And when things got tough I came back to SoCal and helped my aging parents.
Vern,
It is looking increasingly likely I will need to do the same.
Let me ask you though, are you saying that since you did it is therefore justified when others have to? You know your state is in trouble when only about a quarter of the state’s families can afford to buy housing here. That is a lot of lost talent that other states benefit from at our expense!
Zack,
Good on you to consider other options.
Still, “… since you did it is therefore justified when others have to?..”
My answer… To each…
I’m sure we can agree that SD is not the “finest city” or whatever the latest idiotic moniker is based on local news programming.
And every state is in trouble relatively speaking. You can find this out on your own.
FYI, my parents finally passed as will yours. I will and you will, too. Everything is temporary.
Like your whole issue with Circulate SD is that they tend to support developers because they happen to want what developers want, which is to build more housing. Perhaps I look at it the same way? I dunno Frank its just weird dude. Like you can disagree with developers and groups like Circulate all you want but to dismiss them as corrupt, and by extension people who agree with them, is just lazy. Reasonable people can disagree about this stuff! So I will say this until my voice gives out but I BELIEVE BUILDING MORE HOUSING WILL HELP STABILIZE PRICES AND I DONT CARE IF DEVELOPERS BENEFIT ALONG THE WAY.
Just a reminder everyone, I am not in a developer’s pocket and I sure as hell wish I was because I am way too broke not to be.
San Diego DOES NOT HAVE A HOUSING crisis, Zack – look at the houses for sale in the Sunday U-T; we have an affordable housing crisis. And you said it, you “don’t care if developers benefit along the way.” If left to their own, developers would only build market rate housing – they can make more profit that way. And that’s what they have been doing for decades. It takes community pressure and enlightened politicians to force developers to build the affordable units. Which SD has little of. Maybe it takes an elder like myself who’s seen what developers do to understand this – and maybe someone like yourself should sit up and listen, instead of hurling blindly into the breach. Yet, it was clear when we were young because we had the sense we were on “our own” and did not have layers of elders to assist.
Admit it, you follow Circulate and you follow your pal Gloria — who didn’t even make 50% of the vote in the Primary. Top-down, ‘we know better than you’ attitudes and undemocratic methods don’t work all the time – and that’s what they both advocate.
No surprise to me. City Hall has plans for Uptown but would not dare anything in La Jolla. This whole CPG reform movement was engineered to produce this one result.
Indeed. It’s almost as if this whole effort — including the Planning Department’s forced removal of me from Uptown Planners a year ago — has been a cat’s paw abuse of public funds and deprivation of rights under color of law for a Fraud Gloria vendetta against yours truly.
If only $AllOfUs in San Diego could live rent-free in the mayor’s mind.
Mat,
I am pretty confident that the entire CPG reform has little, if anything at all, to do with you personally Mat. Do you really think that the City Attorney concocted that review of CPGs a few years back just to undermine you personally?
Oh, you mean this*? It wasn’t even a memorandum or opinion — which would have official status. It was a “legal analysis,” a sop by Elliott to beg off these accusations — after the County Grand Jury and City Auditor in 2018 and 2019 had already slapped them down. (But even so, there’s been no consideration of Elliott’s mention that the City Charter, not just Council Policy 600-24, would need voter approval to make all these changes. Something to ponder.)
* http://oceanbeachplanning.org/files/2021/01/Legal-Analysis-Regarding-600-24.-Community-Planning-Groups-1.pdf
Again, not the flex you think it is.
And how else to explain why LaCava, the capo di tutti capering behind this, turned right around after banishing Uptown Planners to exempt his own La Jolla group, would say “the demographics in the staff report in detail today comparing demographics under old rules that have been canceled to individuals who have not yet been elected by the community and their interest[s] is dangerous”?
The point being: why has this been pursued down this particular stony end, only to single out Uptown Planners? Where are the other reports (which had also been submitted) regarding how ‘diverse’ the other extant planning groups are? Why only us out of the 42?
But you can rest assured, Zack: Fraud is glad he has friends in low places and never fails to recognize a lickspittle — even ones as “broke as” you — to spot an IPA at the next Circulate mixer.
As simple as following the money.
I think it may be time to consider the wise words of Jeffrey Lebowski, not the dude but the millionaire, “Your revolution is over Lebowski! Condolences! The bums lost!”
Here is what Zack said, which was not approved in comments:
“San Diego has a housing crisis Frank. Everyone knows it, denying it is out of touch. I feel it every goddamn month when the rent is due and I resent you insisting it isn’t true.”
Zack refuses to acknowledge the truth behind the housing crisis. Check out the Sunday UT and just look at all the ads for McMansions; lots of housing – just not affordable. And now he blames me for having to pay his rent.
Here is your mantra, Zack: “if developers build enough market rate housing that housing prices will be generally stable.” Is that what has happened over the last decade, when developers were allowed to run rampant and build market rate stuff?
Then Z claims, “Getting developers to build affordable units is actually something that Circulate, and yes “my pal” Gloria, have done. Thats what density bonuses and Complete Communities are all about.”
This claim is not true. And if Z you cared enough, you would study our critiques of these corrupt policies. But you don’t and you just keep repeating your mantras.
But Zack you did acknowledge the following: “[Developers or Gloria/ Circulate polices] don’t require very many affordable units because affordable units don’t make developers money. If they don’t make money they generally won’t get built.” This is our point, dude.
And then in a spate of spite, you make the following: “We don’t force auto manufacturers to make affordable cars?” No, but the government requires them to have safety measures and other standards.
z: “Given the sentiment I have seen on this website about possible subsidies for affordable housing in the Midway Rising project, I am not particularly optimistic that less progressive San Diegans will support them.” Glad that you mentioned Midway Rising … have yu groked that Gloria’s pal got the job? His biggest financial supporter is given the authority to build the largest redevelopment project in SD history.
Ok, Ok, Gloria is not your pal, dude. I said that because he and Circulate have a bromance going on strong, and you know the old saying, ‘birds of a feather’… And thanks for the insults that we “form at the mouth about him”… He’s the current mayor and its his policies that we critique for helping take down San Diego. We were critical of Faulconer too, or are you too young to remember?
You’re so sure Gloria will win. But see La Prensa’s latest – about Gloria has now joined the club of other SD mayors who didn’t complete their second terms, Murphy and ol’ Roger baby. https://laprensa.org/perspective-gloria-joins-infamous-list-damaged-mayors
In the recent Reader, Zack Farrell, a long-term renter in University Heights, is quoted: “In addition, I’ve seen the Uptown Planners group sort of arbitrarily delay a lot of housing projects.”
Zack, Mark Twain famously said, “it is better to keep your mouth shut and seem a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.”
Mark Twain had a good point.
I think I’ll keep my trap shut and let you speak for me on this.
You’re nobody’s fool.
There’s another old saying: ‘Don’t get into an argument with someone who has a lot of ink.’
This is like going to the grocery store, complaining the prices are too high, and demanding they be lowered, while thinking more government sponsored stores will give you relief. Meanwhile the same government is letting other secondary costs go up (insurance, water, trash, electricity) and throwing tax increases in this fall for a cherry on top. It’s not a sole housing issue. Gloria might cry housing crisis, but his other actions erode affordability.
Mat,
You have wonderful prose. Have you ever considered taking up poetry? I think it suits you better than getting upset about CPGs lol.
We’re some of the very few people who even know what they are and I guarantee you most people really don’t care
Frank, Pats, Geoff, Mat, Mateo – THANK YOU! Reading your comments this morning have really boosted my sails – especially when you’re telling Zach how it really is.
The “choice” between Republican or Democrat is analogous to being given the choice between Gonorrhea or Syphilis. That would make Gonorrhea the Republican Party because, unapologetically, they are out to screw everyone. As we have learned over the last 15 years, so will the California Democrats, making them akin to Syphilis, because they will drive you insane before killing you by incessantly lying to your face while telling you how much they love you.
Nice way to say both parties are the same — (and disregarding Calif Dems for a sec) — I totally disagree with you here – you are absolutely wrong!
Equating the 2 parties as basically the same is a very huge disservice and undercuts your other very valid views. One party wants to take us into fascism and other at least believes in the rule of law, democracy and those other trivia things, like history, fairness and decency.
You disregard the fact that the Dems are split into the corporate wing and the grassroots wing, and you appear ready just to dump them all into the Pacific Ocean.
You said it Frank! I’m a long time “lurker” as they say but I simply can’t stand this kind of talk. Thanks for shutting it down.
Is THAT what Gloria and Newsome are doing? Not end arounds on the electorate? LOL California Democracy is obtaining and using a majority (thru the city council or the assembly) to suppress alternate views? They don’t work to coalesce power like GOPhers, huh?
Frank, with all due respect I always enjoy and appreciate rigorous debate with you. I always feel treated fairly, but I also understand and respect that the OB Rag is your Sandbox, so your rules.
Parties were intended to reflect the ideologies and policies reprenentative of the will of the people,> Party platforms are intended to bend to the will of the people. As a Progressive the Democrats have alienated, castigated, denigrated, marginalized and eliminated our voices. I for one refuse any longer to bend a knee to “the Party”
73% of the entire country considers themselves Independent. That being said, abuse is abuse, and abusers are abusers. no matter how much you think you’re loved.
I should rather speak the truth to power and speak up for those that cannot be heard than to carry water for Oligarchs. There is no room in the Democratic Party for the Progressives, and I cannot in good conscience support one party rule in what our City is proving to be an ever growing Banana Republic.
As goes California so goes the U.S.
Okay – we just have to agree to disagree on this point — which is very important and crucial to maintaining what’s left of our democracy. I love 87% of your comments. (Where did you get that percentage figure?)
Disagreement is the heart of civil discourse.
We have seen, repeatedly now, the DNC financially back Republican candidates, as a matter of fact it has become Party accepted strategy. This stands contrarian to all things democratic.
The party platform would obviously be best served by two Democratic candidates amicably finding common ground and devising real world approaches to finding solutions that also best reflect the ideas and the wishes of their constituents. Instead we get more division. More representation that can care less what you or I or anyone else thinks and in many cases has nothing but a undeniably palpable disdain for us.
Solutions lay with the people; but the California Democrats have shut out and increasingly suppressed Progressives for nearly 2 decades now.
The San Diego Democratic Committee has squashed Progressive candidates at every turn since Todd Gloria took his seat on the City Council.
Toni Atkins once led a protest against the corporate colluding and union busting ALEC group that at the time was in essence setting Dept of Labor policies, nowadays her campaign has taken money from FOX and some of the very corporations that supported ALEC.
It doesn’t pay to represent your constituents, well it does for what we are lead to believe is the paltry sum of about a $175K/yr.
Billions in hyper-gentrifying Build-to-Rent policies have become far too critical to the money grubbin aparatus at the heart of “the Party. That is why you have never heard Joe Biden say the word “Homeless” in nearly 4 years. Remember, the Troubled Asset Relief Program, this is Joe’s baby, subsidies and all still fully intact.
The lions share of registered development corporations, Real Estate Investment Trusts, Air B&B’s and LLC’s that have been overdeveloping luxury rentals are registered in Delaware. Perfect Storm when you include 10 years of 0 % interest federal reserve funny money and stimulus money printed during the pandemic that nearly half was “stolen”. (Don’t worry the Merrick Garland DOJ’s crack-staff is on the job they’ll get to the bottom of all of that theft!)
If all we do is acquiesce to “the Party” they will undoubtedly continue to destroy any chances for any homegrown Progressive leaders, in many cases natural born leaders, have to become candidates.
There already exists a long list of impressive Democratic candidates that have been primaried by their own Party leadership at the behest of the DNC and the DNCC, and always with “dark money” coming from other Democrats.
Frank, I know this is true, and you know it true as well.
It is unrealistic to think that those party dems benefiting from the absence of genuine financial campaign ethics reforms are going to provide them to the public once elected to office. That Mara Eliot will open the skies, and public records request replies will fall from the sky for everyone to read in a glorias exposition of absolute transparency.
I don’t plan to vote for any of them
come November – that is if I’m still here.
I will most likely have moved to Florida for
an affordable rental that meets my needs
If all we had to deal with was corrupt Dems, sure I agree with every point you made. BUT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! we don’t. America is facing a fascist dictator who could win in 7-8 months and you aren’t dealing with that at all.
All politics is local. ‘The Party” leadership here in California and San Diego in particular now have 7-8 months to prove worthy of our support, and our votes.
What went down in Uptown seems indicative of the disregard “the Party” has once again shown for the public by Uptown Planning Group coup by putting in a puppet regime to LITERALLY suppress constituents. Doesn’t really bode well for the way that the average disregarded and deliberately disenfranchised Democratic voter can expect to be treated by “the Party”. Seems like it might be an ideal time for “the Party” to stop sh*##ing on San Diegans and give us a reason to believe in them.
Beating on the fear drums isn’t working. Telling Democratic voters how good we have it does not make it so. Chilling free speech by implying that engaging in honest analytical and evaluative dialog will somehow result in the willing participation of a traitorous duplicitous conspiracy to advance fascism rings quite hollow for two very genuine reasons:
1. the Trumpster fire is not going to carry California, and 2. I am not an electoral college delegate.
So what? It doesn’t mean Trump won’t win nation-wide. Like I said, I agree with a lot of what you write – just not equating the parties as the same – this was the mistake that the left made in pre-Hitler Germany.
In earnest, I’ve never suggested, nor equated the two parties with one another. I equated the two parties to being given a choice between two STD’s, I did, admittingly ,strongly imply that similar to syphilis, the Democratic Party will drive you insane first before killing you. (humor)
There were a lot of dissimailar factors between the U.S. today and Germany at the time Hitler was elected to office. The main one being a total absence of any German electoral college.
It seems to me to be victim shaming, and more akin to browncaoating for the Party to villify it’s own membership.
Isn’t honest dialog essential to critical thinking? Do we not have a reasonable expectation for the Party facilitate open discourse and the sharing of ideas? Isn’t silencing merited criticism and reasonable scrutiny critical to a well informed public in itself totalitarian?
An overlooked factor was that prior to that election in Germany, crystal methamphetamine was legal, advertised, wideley available in pharmacies, and in wide spread use some would say rampant use, nationwide, throughout Germany, throughout all of the classes. Simply put, the country was jacked up on meth. My guess is that abusing crystal meth was probably not creating the best headspace for the average German elector overall going into that election.
Did not know about the meth connection.
My stance doesn’t mean I’m not thoroughly disgusted with the Dems on the city council and some of them in Sacramento.
Mara Elliot works for the city mayor/council aside from the public. She’s conflicted. So who investigates?
Cali won’t vote Trump, that’s a given in this cycle and Trump/ Biden will theoretically be gone after. Who’s next? Newsome’s running the highest unemployment in the country, I predict the $20 minimum wage will add to it. Inflation will increase. And government plans are to tax you more. Our personal impact for change has to start here locally.
Frank I think you should really allow more perspectives on this website but why do I bother?
Zack – this is a progressive site. We don’t allow racist, misogynistic, or fascist comments or views (am not claiming you represent those views). Plus, those who want to destroy community planning groups are not progressive and have plenty of other avenues in the media (like the U-T and most of the TV stations for instance). Even though you are definitely a partisan in the campaign to destroy CPGs, you have a lot of leeway here. I’m sure you’re a nice guy and we could sit down and have a beer together and chitchat, but in the end you’re not just some “young person” but an ideologue and partisan.
Frank…no one is trying to “destroy” CPG’s. In fact the new rules are going to make them better. Elimination of meeting attendance for running in an election is just one of many.
Change is hard at first, messy in the middle, and gorgeous at the end – Robin Sharma.
Sorry Gail, this is not change for I know what change looks like as I was there at the beginning of all the CPGs. And you’ve apparently become one with the Gloria — and Circulate San Diego. The Rag has well documented how the city/ Gloria is drastically altering the CPG landscape. Just let me point out one new rule, which you mentioned. If a prospective CPG member who wants to run for the board can’t make one meeting beforehand to check out the group, its process, etc, than that person really doesn’t have a lot of interest in helping out their community. The planned destruction of the CPGs has basically faltered as only 2 of the 42 CPGs had challengers. But making members go thru the arduous task of re-applying is very insulting to those CPGs who’ve served their communities for decades, such as the OB Planning Board; plus the city would like to overturn all the March annual elections, if it could. This is not change and it’s not gorgeous. It’s what the developer class in San Diego wanted and Circulate / Gloria / council has faithfully complied. The curtailment of community feedback on projects is not change, Gail; and it wasn’t the CPGs who were holding up the process – it was the city. That’s a false narrative; change is not endowing false narratives with rewards.
That particular change is, frankly, idiotic. If a person does not care enough to attend a few meetings, to understand what a CPG is before running, that person should not be on a CPG. Makes no sense at all.
Elimination of meeting attendance for running in an election is in what way “better”, and for whom?
Anyone just can step off a plane, never even been to Uptown or even California, completely unfamiliar with community composition, dynamics, history, traditions, walk in, run for a seat on the board, and never having been to a meeting?And subsequently there would be no requirements to be present for meetings and still maintain that seat on the board.
I wonder if the Uptown Planning Group meeting met the Brown Act requirements of adequate public notification.
Zack, seems to me Frank allows you plenty of space.
I’m with Gail on this one.
Frank, what makes you thr ultimate arbiter of what makes a progressive? Could it be that your version of progressivism is different than mine? Not all progressives are the same
Sure, generalizations and broad sweeping descriptions aside, Circulate is NOT a progressive organization. Forcing the undermining of CPGs is not progressive. Of course, not all progressives are the same. I like walks on the beach too – we all do. We used to call ourselves “radicals” because we wanted society to change at its roots. So, Zack, I think you and I do want similar things – like affordable housing, clean energy, safe food, water, medicines, women’s right to choose, the upholding of rights, democracy, the rule of law – or am I going out on a limb here? I mean, it’s all relative and it’s all contextual. I’d choose Gloria over Donald Trump — but that’s not the choices before us. Quit dissing your elders and I won’t diss everything you say. No, Gail is either part of the G-team or in denial.
At times you sound like you truly want to engage and have fruitful discussions, then you turn around and smack one of us with your verbiage. Which is it, Zack? Are you a true partisan or are you really looking for genuine answers to these questions — which god knows, are not new.
I would like to have good faith discussions Frank but you use my age against me all the time and make allegations about me and question my motivations. Its ok to say you disagree without going after my character or you know, trying to figure out my identity which is kind of weird. It would also be great if you allowed my comments to be posted in full rather than taking then out of context.
I also think it would be a good gesture if you discouraged some of the other posters on here not to encourage people who complain about high housing costs to move away. It smacks of elitism and is not at all progressive.
Zack, when you first appeared here making comments, you would sign in with other people’s names, which is truly weird; and here you know most of our names but you were hiding behind your anonymity. I don’t use your age against you, just your ignorance of history and politics in ol San Diego, and your compliance towards profit-based developers. We all complain of high housing costs, but we’re not ready to throw the baby out with the bathwater, in other words, we try to understand how for decades, ordinary San Diegans had to fight by ourselves against the developer-class, which has ruled SD for most of the past 100 years (and it’s not in the past tense), and appreciate the role that CPGs have played in bringing some restrictions to the unbridled construction that has wrecked San Diego.
I think it would be a good gesture if you gave us any props – which you are loath to do. What about all the Midway Rising, Brad Termini crap? What about the good stuff we highlight or uncover? What about the uncovering of the “lucky stores”? (that part is a joke) You don’t because any props thrown our way goes against your over-all stance of pro-developerism. Talk about elitism, dude. But anyway, you know we don’t do this for money; I’m not getting rich off the Rag, and neither is Geoff or Mat or anyone else here. We’re a ‘no-money’ model. We provide a free discussion platform – for those who abide by our rules (no racist, misogynist, fascist comments, etc, or getting personal with people you disagree with).
Frank as a fellow old fart I do feel like these commenters just pile on young people so why aren’t you calling out their words like you’re rightly calling out Zack? Seems pretty unfair and makes me a little ashamed of our generation to tell you the truth.
How did our generation that said “don’t trust anyone over 30” now shout down anyone younger than 60?
Speak for yourself. Yes, there is a little piling on, but those who have been piled upon certainly have done their share. Some of the piling on is done with tongue in cheek, and other expressions are out of frustration at the mantras of some that have not changed, no matter what we post, no matter what scandals are uncovered, and no matter the historical evidence. Those who say, ‘move to Texas’ – and those who say Texas is all right, are simply left alone. Zack has been very partisan and an ideologue and I’m trying to get him to understand some of what he says is just plain wrong. I don’t think Gail is young and I don’t think some of the commenters who’ve been blocked because they violate our comment policies are young either – you just don’t see that because their comments are torched. We get racist and sexist comments, we get pro-Trump comments – which I try to moderate. So, there ya go, you fellow ol’ fart.
I dunno Frank, the entire tenor of these comments (not from you generally but from others) is incredibly anti-young people. Look at this for instance from Pats in this same thread “Board requires a lot of work, the younger people know nothing about, UNLESS Whitburn and Gloria will tell them how to vote on community projects, and they say yes daddy and do it.”
I can see why young people are mad – making more money than we could have ever dreamed of when we were that age but unable to buy a place in their home town then told by people who had every opportunity handed to them that they don’t know what they’re doing. It’s really sad honestly.
Jane, thanks for keeping at it. But maybe unlike you, most of us in the day were renters. Buying a house was not our dream; our dream was a just and equitable society. Still is. Again, 7 out of 10 residents in Ocean Beach are tenants, renters. Although, many of my friends have bought houses. But they didn’t tear others down before they made their purchases. The commenters who diss somebody cuz of age are in clear minorities here. I think it’s sad that so many people have drunk the Gloria / Circulate Koolaid. Honestly.
Have to agree to disagree.
I was one of the lucky ones who bought a home I absolutely could not afford now, like so many people our age.
Do you still rent in OB or did you end up buying a place Frank?
Frank,
You can call me an ideologue all day but partisan?
I have seen other people on this website who talk in support of building more housing because they think it is too expensive get criticized for their life choices and get encouraged to move elsewhere. I think it is totally OK for it to be posted but it would be great if you took a principled progressive stand on it rather than editing down my comments.
Is the OB Rag’s position that people should just move elsewhere? What would the principled progressive answer be to people who are struggling to afford housing here? Is the OB Rag planning on joining some kind of public policy campaign to address housing costs? I mean it! What are your solutions to all this?
See? There you go again. It’s not the Rag’s job of fulfilling your ideas of paradise. Our job is to hold government accountable. And by the looks of it locally, we’ve done a really piss poor job. You set up these ‘straw-man’ arguments (“Is the OB Rag’s position that people should just move elsewhere?”) to make us look ridiculous. I edit your comments because they’ve been ridiculous, insulting, and off the charts. We don’t have the money or resources like your friends at Circulate – so quit saying , “well, what is your solution?” There’s a lot of crap going on right now and you plainly are not being supportive of a lot of what we’re trying to do. See, you totally ignore other points I make to you, so you kind of delete them in your head. You pick the points you want to press on – and they’re always the same ones — “your mantra”.
Yes, you’re a Circulate partisan. Or maybe you can prove you’re not by sending us a critique of Circulate “from the inside” or something like that.
I think you should avoid criticizing other groups that try to address this stuff, albeit in a way you disagree with, if you can’t bother to articulate your own vision of what should be done. If you just want to be a protest publication that angrily shakes your fist at everyone then fine I guess, but don’t expect to make much change.
You seem to admit yourself that the Rag has failed at its mission to hold government accountable. Assuming that is true, why? What could the Rag do differently?
Put yourself in my position for a second. You’re 32 years old, born and bred San Diegan, you see a difficult housing situation and you see a lot of different people fighting about it but few seemingly doing anything about it. Circulate, like them or not, advocates for housing development which yes often benefits developers. It is something! The OB Rag on the other hand, doesn’t seem to be DOING anything, aside from being angry and resentful at the City because it enacts policies the Rag doesn’t like.
But that isn’t some ideological thing for me really. If you believe that increasing housing production will help with housing costs, and developers are the ones that generally do that, then logically you align with them. If they can help build housing then whether or not they profit is not really a top-level concern of mine. Do I expect San Diegans to support tax increases to cover government-subsidized housing? Not really, although I wouldn’t complain about it.
I just don’t share your aversion towards change, nor do I have any real nostalgia for 1970s or even 1990s San Diego. The present is now and the future is soon and I sure as hell would like to make a life for myself here. I’m not alone in saying that, lots of people would like to live here but our housing costs are just insane and really go beyond any reasonable explanation at this point.
That’s not change (see my comments to Gail). I’ve seen, as I’ve said repeatedly, that developers have run amuck in this county for decades – and what do we have? An affordable housing shortage and crisis. And this is the same leeway you wish the developers should keep having. When I said we “failed” I meant look at Gloria and the crowd at the council table. Obviously, change is what we’ve been about – you just don’t see it. I’m signing off
3 of 18 units here affordable. How do you reconcile a multi-story building, dwarfing over other houses, rendering their solar useless, fast tracked based on the Gloria criteria (aside from the developers wife having ties to Gloria)? Two main beefs have been DIF and community planning. The project is weak, based on affordable units, and has zero regard to the impact to other neighbors (with no parking). I think the number I read was 17 million lost in DIF by Gloria’s policies. And yet, they want to tax you more, your affordability, to make up for it. This is the rabbit hole you want to fool people with.
https://www.cbs8.com/article/news/local/logan-heights-residents-concerned-new-housing-development-construction/509-1e58d9dc-9536-4ad3-a82a-0bb98bdcd147
You wouldn’t complain about tax increases?
Try living here on a fixed, very modest, retirement income. California is worse than Massachusetts (“Tassachusetts”) in that regard.
You are young, and I respect your perspective, but put yourself in my shoes if you possibly can.
The people at the Rag (and many others who live here who are my friends) have battled for decades – the height limit, too dense zoning, etc. They have battled to keep some of the old houses that give cities character.
Of course there is a need for more affordable housing. Affordable to me is not in the $500,000 range.
Perhaps you can think a little bit harder about what you are espousing.
Just my opinion.
That was supposed to be “Taxachusetts”.
Zack has sent a fiery goodbye email to the Rag, insulting the Rag, me and everything we do; he donates some to Voice of SD, whose editor makes over $100K and asserts the Rag never does anything except rip on politicians who win.
Zack’s compensated influence campaign assignment was over following the successful take over and capture of the Uptown Planning Group. Cha-ching!!!!!
My BS meter went up when it was, pleeeeease daddy Frank, when did houses get so unaffordable, help me understand. Too many side streets with him.
Manipulate much? I am always astonished by how disingenuous the strip mall law school narratives you unsuccessfully try to cook up, incessantly backfire on you time and time again.
(Zack)
This whole process is trash. Some goons at the planning dept wasted a whole lot of community members’ time on this farce.
The city made it very clear that demographic diversity was their #1 criteria in choosing competing groups. And then soon after they were reminded that the existing group members were voted in by their communities. And that any upstart groups were simply a collection of self-appointed buddies of a particular cause, that would have to run an election before they could claim any membership. (And in uptown the competing group was predominantly white, wealthy and LGBT, with common policy interests… so much for diversity.) And the real kicker, if these buddies wanted to run for election to serve on their own group, they would be prohibited from managing the election. (Same rule that applies for existing groups.) Really all they ever truly were was a self-appointed bylaws committee. They will be subject to the same voter base the existing group was already accountable to.
So the city in all its wisdom set the table for council choosing diversity of an elected group vs. one that didn’t exist.
If they had issues with our bylaws and seats they could have simply mandated specific changes to them, and saved 42 groups the trouble of playing this guessing game of recreating all of their official documents to some standard that did not yet exist. The City didn’t provide a bylaws template until a month before our application deadline. By then most groups were deep into the process of figuring it out on their own, creating their own bylaws. As a result, there is probably LESS compliance with Council Policy then prior to this effort. We could not do all this in the month of December. We had to create subcommittees, notice our meetings and follow the brown act so that all this was done in public. During one of the webinars on this process, the planner suggested processes that were in violation of the brown act.
So city… next time you wanna f*** with the planning groups, how about getting a crew that actually understand how they work first? You know we work for free right?
Took the words right out of my mouth, kh – literally and figuratively, from almost three years ago: https://obrag.org/2021/11/another-assault-in-the-war-on-san-diegos-community-planning-groups/