‘RIMBY’ — Responsible In My Back Yard — Agenda and Goals

By Trudy Grundland

YIMBY, NIMBY, RIMBY. The name calling started when the City of San Diego (YIMBY, yes in my backyard) eliminated single family home zoning in an attempt to create affordable housing.

AB1287 (YIMBY) made it possible for developers to buy lots in residential neighborhoods and build ADU apartment complexes, 91-units on a residential street of historical homes and get plans quickly approved for massive apartment buildings in Pacific Beach and a 100+ year-old Mission Hills neighborhood. If this rapid and intense building makes you break out in a cold sweat, you could be a NIMBY, no in my backyard.

Now there’s the grassroots effort by Neighbors For A Better California.org, to tell our mayor and governor, we need responsible zoning and planning to prevent overdevelopment (that ruins a person’s ability to enjoy the sanctuary of their home). If you like this, call yourself a RIMBY, responsible in my backyard. You want to preserve the charm of California communities.

RIMBY.net links to NFABCA website and newsletter

RIMBY Agenda January 2025: STOP THE TURQUOISE TOWER at 954-980 Turquoise Street in Pacific Beach 92109: raise public awareness*, send emails and paper letters to the mayor, signs in yards, wear buttons, Turquoise is the hi-rise protest color.

A) Pacific Beach: a developer wants to build a 240’h luxury housing tower in a San Diego coastal community with a 30’ building height limit.  The developer Kalonymus is waiting for a building permit for the Vela Tower, 954-980 Turquoise Street, Pacific Beach 92109. They have purchased one of the four parcels, and expect to close escrow on the other lots soon, giving them .64 acre/29,134 sqft., to build 408,6401 sqft. building.

B) It’s up to Kalonymus and Mayor Gloria to agree/disagree in February 2025, if the 5 very low income and 5 moderate income apartments offered as “affordable housing” (which earn the right for 34 “bonus units”) are legal reason to allow the developer to build over 30’h.

C) Vela Tower is luxury housing, not affordable housing, with 64 luxury ocean-view apartments, including a penthouse, 139 hotel rooms with kitchenettes rented long-term as Airbnbs, 315 spaces underground/aboveground parking, retail at ground level. Kalonymus is offering 10 affordable housing units but a loophole in the AB1287 law allows the affordable units to be at another location elsewhere in San Diego.

Developer: Kalonymus (LA office run by the son Max Zeff), Carmel Partners (SFO-based, privately owned by Ron Zeff), one of America’s largest builders of multi-family luxury buildings with 5 offices nationwide. Carmel Partners got fined $1.2Mil by the feds in 2021 for bribing a LA City Council Member Jose Huizar and the LA deputy mayor Raymond Chan, to reduce the number of affordable units in a hi-rise building. Carmel Partners has built high in many LA neighborhoods, despite organized protests by neighbors.

RIMBY – NFABCA Protest the Vela “Pencil” Tower:
1) the 240’ height breaks the coastal 30’ limit, a law passed in 1972,
2) if this tower gets built, it will set a precedent for the Miami-ization of the California coast,
3) it’s not affordable housing,
4) this street is at 400% traffic capacity and it’s a Tsunami Evacuation Route,
6) the beach area doesn’t have fire equipment that can handle a 240’ building,
7) the tower will put the houses north of it permanently in shade, eliminating their use of solar and their right to air space,
8) the tower will ruin ocean views for people living on the southwest side of Mt. Soledad,
9) the sewers & water system might fail,
10) increased traffic could cause local school children to be tardy.

Anticipation of 1,000 additional vehicles using Turquoise weekly due to the tower: 100’s of long-term renters, 1,000 Airbnb guests, dozens of cleaning staff, maintenance workers, daily Ubers, Amazon/Fedex/UPS/USPS, Grubhub, local restaurants & grocery stores, party buses, caterers, booze, dispensary, party equipment deliveries, etc.

NFABCA 2025 RIMBY goals:
1) STOP the 17-story hi-rise Mission Hills, 3677 Columbia St 92103,
2) STOP the 24-story hi-rise Outer Sunset, San Francisco, 2700 Sloat Blvd 94116,
3) PREVENT buildings like 1905 Broadway 92102, 91-units 15” from a restored Craftsman home. Two lots permitted for 14-units, AB1287 density bonus law allows 91 units.
4) protect the entire California coastline from overbuilding and looking like Miami, STOP hi-rises where they don’t belong,
5) protect and enforce the San Diego law passed in 1972 to protect the coastal 30’h limit.

*Local media. Social media: Instagram, Facebook, website. Yard signs & flyers & buttons.

Click on https://www.neighborsforabettersandiego.org to connect to an organization fighting against ADU apartment complexes in backyards

Imagine if this building went up next to your home! That wall is 15” from that lovingly restored Craftsman home.