Uptown Planners Need Your Support — Today, Tuesday, May 21

by Mat Wahlstrom

City Council will be deciding today, Tuesday, 5/21 on whether Uptown’s current Community Planning Group (CPG), Uptown Planners, will continue or whether a new CPG proposed by a group calling itself Vibrant Uptown will be chosen to take over advising the city on how our community feels about development.

We need your support on Tuesday! The developers who want to make Uptown into the new Downtown will be coming out in force. The people who promote 20 to 30 story high rise apartments will be there. The people who oppose off-street parking requirements in new buildings will be there. The people who don’t care why you selected Uptown to live and work in will be there. We need to be there too!

There are important ways you can help!

Attend the meeting in person: The meeting is on Tuesday, May 21st at 2:00 p.m. Council Chambers, 12th floor at City Hall, 202 C Street. If you wish to speak, on arrival, file a written request (speaker slip) with the City Clerk to speak IN OPPOSITION of Item 333. You can also elect to oppose the item without speaking.
Attend the meeting virtually: If you cannot attend in person, the link to join the Meeting Webinar by computer, tablet, or Smartphone is: https://sandiego.zoomgov.com/j/1607807743. To join by telephone: Dial 1-669-254 5252 When prompted, input Webinar ID: 160 780 7743

Comment on Agenda Item 333 using the Webform indicating the comment type and item number for which you wish to submit your comment. Comments received by 8:00 a.m. the day of the meeting will be distributed to the City Council and posted online.
Send a note to your councilmember and the mayor.

Some talking points:

• Council Policy 600-24 calls for diversity of Community Planning Groups and Uptown Planner is diverse in age, income, ethnicity, renter, owner, and business. This council policy also specifically states that preference should be given to an existing CPG – that is Uptown Planners.
• That Vibrant’ s structure provides for 6 business positions in an area mainly residential – too much business power. Uptown is not Downtown.
• Uptown Planners is Tested, Diverse, Balanced, and Representative and ready to continue doing good work within the community.
• Vibrant Uptown is not Tested, Not Diverse, Not Balanced, and Not Representative and would pit businesses against owners, renters against property owners, and neighborhoods against neighborhoods.
• Selecting Vibrant Uptown’s is all about politics and takes away the voice of a community which just elected its representatives to the Uptown District CPG. Don’t take away our voice and vote.

Todd Gloria mayortoddgloria@sandiego.gov
Joe LaCava joelacava@sandiego.gov
Jennifer Campbell jennifercampbell@sandiego.gov
Stephen Whitburn stephenwhitburn@sandiego.gov
Henry Foster III henryfoster@sandiego.gov
Marni von Wilpert marnivonwilpert@sandiego.gov
Kent Lee kentlee@sandiego.gov
Raul Campillo raulcampillo@sandiego.gov
Vivian Moreno vivianmoreno@sandiego.gov
Sean Elo-Rivera seanelorivera@sandiego.gov

On Why Uptown Planners Is Representative of the Communities

The Uptown Planners board is a recognized Community Planning Group that has been serving these six neighborhoods for the past 20 years in an advisory role to the City of San Diego on topics related to land-use, development, and discretionary projects in Uptown.

Uptown Planners is currently being challenged as not reflecting the diversity and makeup of the communities of Uptown and for not initiating active outreach efforts. Here’s why this statement is incorrect.

As noted by the Planning Department staff, Uptown Planners applications meets the planning group requirements. It has board members who represent decades of volunteer service from the six neighborhoods in Uptown. Well attended, regularly held meetings occur among the board and committees. Hundreds of people have participated in these meetings during the past year and is considered one of the best attendances for planning groups across the city.

This past March annual elections were held, and Uptown Planners added 10 new people to the board. Those are people who were elected by the Uptown residents. This is a very diverse group of individuals ranging in ages (as young as 24) who are renters, homeowners, and business owners who represent Uptown. They include people of color (Hispanic and multi-racial) with economic diversity that matches Uptown residents.

With its new, existing board, Uptown Planners is a far better match to Uptown’s demographics than the proposed, Vibrant Uptown board. To emphasize this point, a comparison has been provided to show the differences between both groups .

Vibrant Uptown’s proposed board membership will not be representative of the Uptown community. That’s because 60% of the board would be “appointed” representatives of businesses/organizations that are not required to live or work in Uptown (and similar representatives of two large businesses also would be additional non-voting members).

The other two-thirds of voting members would allow only two members from each of six neighborhoods, even though those neighborhoods differ significantly in size and demographics. Therefore, some individuals in the community would enjoy a greater proportional share of representation then others.

Making the process more complicated and divisive only leads to confusion, and the belief by the public at large that this an intentional effort to restrict them from having a voice in land use issues in their neighborhoods and communities.

The proven, democratic process that works best is to allow the whole population of Uptown to duly elect their representatives.
Recently, Councilmember LaCava stated, “You shouldn’t get rid of a CPG just because you don’t like its views.”

Uptown Planners has asked the City Councilmembers to make the obvious choice, which is also noted by policy. Preference should be given to existing community planning groups.