Things that start badly, end badly.
By Mat Wahlstrom
For those who live in or follow the news in Uptown, the scandal involving the dismissal of Uptown Planners as the elected community planning group (CPG) for the six neighborhoods directly north of downtown for over fifty years, has been a slow-motion disaster.
On May 21, the San Diego City Council voted to single out Uptown Planners from among the 42 city CPGs in favor of a handful of single-issue partisans hell-bent on promoting reckless development. Although couched in high-minded terms like “equity” and “inclusion,” the effort from start to finish has been to privilege plutocrats and exclude dissent.
None of this is news to those who have been paying attention. What is news is the depths to which the city’s Planning Department and the appointed CPG have violated the very rules that needed to be followed to legally accomplish this coup.
The very first amendment to Council Policy 600-24 that was passed to enable this takeover specifies can be found here.
“In the case that Council decides to recognize a new planning group over an existing group, staff is proposing to amend Council Policy section II.D to allow City Council to recognize a new group contingent upon the completion of elections for new voting members within 90 days after City Council action managed by an independent election committee consisting of members appointed by the newly formed CPG and affiliated with the community in accordance with Section D of Council Policy 600-24, none of whom would be candidates for election.”
That ninety day statutory deadline was August 26. In order to meet it, Vibrant Uptown scheduled the last round of voting — which included the mandated minimum two-hours of in-person voting — for August 20, and to seat the new board immediately upon its conclusion.
But instead of also following the crystal-clear council policy requirement that the two-hour minimum for in-person voting actually be conducted in person by manual not electronic ballot, they unilaterally decided to use tablets — with disastrous results.
After days of delays and without certifiable authorization, Vibrant Uptown not only blew past the compulsory deadline but reopened voter registration entirely rather than restrict new voting to those who had already registered or shown up to vote in person. Instead, “We have kept registration open, but had suspended sending out ballots or allowing those you may have received to be used.”
The reason for this disenfranchisement soon became clear: within hours, Vibrant Uptown selectively released what would have been the final vote tallies to their allies, specifically in order to motivate them to change the outcome of the election. And based on the barrage of electioneering by Vibrant Uptown and its endorsed candidates that followed, that effort mostly succeeded.
Here is the link to the chart with those audited results that Vibrant Uptown refused to release either to the general public or as specifically requested by Uptown Planners and other concerned citizens.
And after all these contortions and violations, once the unaudited tallies were presented last night, Tuesday, Sept. 3, the single change accomplished was to reverse the results of only one of the legitimate winners: the renter seat for Hillcrest, Mat Wahlstrom — this author.
Now, some may allege sour grapes by this author, but that doesn’t change that voter fraud was committed and willful violations of the very council policy that enabled this upstart group in the first place occurred.
What matters is that Vibrant Uptown failed to complete their election, certify the vote and seat a new board within the time mandated by law. That is more important than me or any one candidate.
The fact is that Uptown Planners remains the only legitimate CPG authorized to represent the six neighborhoods in our community. And this will continue to be the case until or unless the San Diego City Council revisits its decision.
What a shitshow. All that is happening in Uptown has pulled back the curtain on the mayor’s smarmy smile. This was so blatantly engineered it reminds me of a chronically manipulative relative.
Over the years this manipulative relative put less and less actual effort into the mechanics of manipulations. The relative became so confident in their ability to manipulate easily, and achieve their end with impunity, that they stopped exerting much energy on the actual manipulation.
As you said, Mat. at this time the only legitimate group in Uptown is the original one.
Thank you, Geoff. Your analogy is sadly appropriate.
I didn’t even get into how Vibrant allowed candidates who didn’t qualify to run because they endorsed them; or how suspect it is that they only posted the “final” results in an Excel spreadsheet rather than provide the audited official output from their election software, as they had on 8/20.
We’ll have to see how the city handles the challenges, but I’m not holding my breath.
Mat, I think your grievances about being knocked off by a questionable process deserve to be high-lighted even more. This is outrageous (know any lawyers?)!
Thanks for laying this out so clearly. The preliminary results would have been different if those who waited in line to vote in person by the deadline had not been sent away. Instead, many of them probably never voted, while the totally unjustified extension of online voting privileged the votes of those who were subject to intensive (and misleading) campaigning after that deadline–especially for the races in Hillcrest, which Vibrant Uptown considers its sacred ground. The city planning department allowed all of this to go forward despite the obvious violation of City Council policy.
The election results also highlight why voting by neighborhood is a bad idea: The different demographics of the neighborhoods, the number of candidates splitting the vote in each race, the varied turnouts, the number of votes required for a win, etc. made some neighborhood races closely challenged, others not at all. Yet all 0f the individuals on the board are supposed to represent the interests of all of Uptown, which was better done by the at-large method of voting used by Uptown Planners and most city CPGs. Plus, there now are open seats that could be filled undemocratically by appointment.
Our entire Uptown community has been robbed of the representation that it deserves.
Thank you, Lu. For several years now, our “public servants” have been micturating on our legs and telling us it’s raining. That the MSM hasn’t called it out is shameful.
The new group should not have been trusted to run this first election. It should’ve required oversight from both groups as well as neutral parties.
The tally should not released to anyone until voting is closed. This is common sense. Obviously some election committee members will have access to it, to ensure the software is working,but they need to keep their mouth shut otherwise. Any correspondence on results or trying to selectively solicit more turnout is a huge breach of trust. I’m curious to see the other side of the story on this.
I also noticed some districts had very little turnout or no competition. It sounds like they are putting districts on equal footing that are not close in population. Who lives in Medical Center? We removed our districts because it was too granular and made many seats non competitive, while blocking out other candidates. But we had 7. If we had 3 it could work, but we are not a large enough geographic area to even justify that. Our CPG is less than a square mile in area and easily walkable from one end to the other.
Mat,
Sounds like you lost? I dunno man I lost too and I am not alleging fraud. You performed well in the first round and in the second you got less votes than your opponents. I lost by two votes in the first round and lost by four in the second. Shit happens
Well, maybe in your case, Zack, you just lost honestly because you weren’t popular. That has nothing to do with what Mat says happened to him.
Geoff,
That’s right! That is exactly why I lost and I am not upset about it. I lost fair and square and I think Mat should admit the same
Zack Defazio Farrell: you lost because you were betrayed by the “Vibrant Uptown” ringers you kissed up to hoping for their endorsement, but they kicked you to the curb on behalf of the Hillcrest Business Association’s flunky.
The fact that I received more votes than you — by a margin of 3-to-1 — simply proves that you’re unlikable. It doesn’t mean that serious and credible violations didn’t occur.
No betrayal on Vibrant Uptown’s part. I don’t know exactly what went into their endorsement of my opponent but he seems like a caring, good guy and I am happy he will represent my neighborhood.
Yes, I suppose since you received more votes than me that by definition you are a more likeable person. I had no idea neighborhood elections were popularity contests where one’s general likeability is measured but hey you learn something new every day. I do think it is worth pointing out that more than 2x as many people voted in the Hillcrest renter election vs. the UH renter election so perhaps that is why you earned more votes than I did. There are, after all, more people living in Hillcrest than UH.
Sigh. Either your clear misrepresentation of my remarks indicates you’re inadequate to the task of practicing law or fail to exhibit the ethical requirements for being a lawyer. Either way, my sympathies to anyone foolish enough to pay you.
And any election committee or judgment authority in an officially impartial legal setting pick sides, is proof of its illegitimacy — despite what Colin might have taught you at his knee.
I would thank you, though, for finally admitting that the vaunted division into neighborhood from at-large voting and representation is ridiculous. The record shows* you wrote in favor of it for the City Council meeting on 5/21; but why did it take getting your posterior handed to you to realize the error of your ways?
*https://tinyurl.com/Zack-Backtrack (comment #13)
Mat,
You claim I have realized the error of my ways regarding at large voting vs. district-based voting? Is that true? Have I admitted that I was wrong in supporting it? Where did I say that? What do you mean about being taught at Colin’s knee? Is that some sexual reference?
It’s really in poor taste for those running the election to be endorsing slates of candidates. This was a clear violation of CP 600-24 up until the recent rewriting. That doesn’t make it ok. I also notice Vibrant’s website that they are endorsing political candidates. Also a violation.
I’m sure they will say they are not the same org, which we know is crap if they make up the entire election committee. They could’ve done a better job to at least pretend to be an independent election committee.