Author: Frank Gormlie

It’s city budget time in San Diego (and elsewhere) and that means the head executive (Mayor Gloria) presents his budget for discussion to the legislature (city council) and they and their constituents then bob heads for several weeks in response, and the electeds all come back together and finalize the final financial plan.

Although this is 2025, so that means we’re in for a “mean” budget (in both senses of the word) because San Diego voters refused back in November to pass Gloria’s tax measure and he’s now in a mood to punish the rest of the city for this miscreant act. (See below for the budget)

So, the process is basic: the chief exec proposes all kinds of cut-backs to favored programs and services — and then the screaming begins, with those with the loudest objections are handed some relief, but those other program cuts are then enacted.

And this year, there’s another new wrinkle. City Council members are concerned that Gloria called the spending plan he released April 15 a “draft” budget instead of a full-blown “proposed” budget ready for debate and haggling. As David Garrick at the U-T explained:

The mayor’s subtle shift in terminology appears to begin the next front in an ongoing war between the mayor and council for control and influence over the city budget. The new battle comes at a crucial time, with the city facing deep cuts and potentially significant employee layoffs for the first time since the aftermath of the Great Recession 15 years ago.

It’s the day of the showdown at the San Diego Planning Commission at city hall over the city’s ADU policies — and the Rag will attempt a “live blog” of the event.

This means we’ll try to bring a contemporaneous account of the happenings right here.

For a live view of the meeting, go here.

It is a showdown,  however, between residents of neighborhoods across the city that have been negatively affected by Mayor Gloria’s so-called “Bonus ADU Program.” On the agenda of the Commission are proposed “reforms” both by Gloria and by the numerous groups that are arguing for a slowdown in enacting any reforms until the residents of the city have had a chance to make their voices and opinions known.
Some of the groups that have members in the audience include Neighbors for a Better San Diego, the Community Coalition, UC Peeps, Neighbors for Encanto, Neighbors for a Better California, and Community Planners Committee.

1:36 pm the Commission passed a motion unanimously to accept staff’s recommendations with a 2-story cap for ADUs and a request that staff return with options of limiting the number of ADUs on one lot. (Unfortunately I don’t list the staff’s recommendations here.)

12:32 Commissioner comments.

10:29 Encanto resident Lisa Becerra asks, “Are we a tyranny?” She represents 857 of her neighbors who don’t want more than one ADU in a singlefamily lot. “The city is not listening to us.”

“Don’t you dare allow ADUs using Footnote 7”

10:19 An African American speaker from Encanto speaks (didn’t get his name) complaining of the lack of infrastructure in Southeast and Encanto. “Get in line with the state, San Diego.”

9:05 a.m. — Kate Callen of the Rag just spoke during non-agenda comments and asked the Commission to refrain from calling opponents of the ADU policies “anti-housing” and received a good round of applause.

People involved in the drive to make La Jolla its own city scored a win just recently when the Local Agency Formation Commission (LAFCO) announced the Association for the City of La Jolla (ACLJ) had collected sufficient valid signatures to start the process of forming a city.

LAFCO is the county office that oversees the creation of new cities and it has determined that the secession movement had collected more than the 6,750 signatures.

In doing so, LAFCO reversed the Registrar of Voter’s decision that some of the ACLJ’s petition signatures were invalid.

San Diego Mayor Gloria is not having it and called LAFCo’s decision “outrageous.” He has vowed to explore legal action against the county agency.

Well, we’re finally here. The first hundred days of Trump’s authoritarian regime. What do we have?

Amidst falling stock markets and his “Day of Liberation” of tariffs, Trump’s poll numbers on just about every issue are crashing. And crashing badly.

An average of different polls on his job approval rating at 100 days has Trump at the lowest level of any other president in 70 years. That average has him at a 43% approval rating with a 54% of disapproval. Some polls, like the recent Washington Post / ABC / Ipso poll, have him down to a 39% approval raring.

Economists are predicting empty shelves in markets across the country within a couple of weeks, especially if the tariff war with China continues; some are predicting a recession by summer. On trade and tariffs, the poll averages have 39% of Americans approving and 61% disapproving.

He’s under the water on every issue.

In her State of the County speech last week, San Diego County Supervisor and acting chair Terra Lawson-Remer took on the Trump administration and all his cut-backs to local programs that benefit a lot of vulnerable residents.

She declared:

“Right now, the federal government is slashing programs we rely on for health care, housing, clean air and water, public safety and disease prevention. Every decision Washington makes impacts our ability to serve you.”

Yet her solution was to propose a new tax ballot measure that could raise $1 Billion a year. The San Diego U-T reported:

Lawson-Remer said she will propose a local tax ballot measure to offset federal cuts and boost services.

“We can raise the money ourselves, right here at home,” she added, “not by waiting, or begging for D.C. to do its job, but by taking the wheel of our own destiny and steering our own San Diego County ship through this storm.”

This funding, she said, would help the county adhere to an ambitious plan, introduced last month, to double behavioral health and substance use disorder treatment slots from 16,000 to 32,000 by 2030. …

Lawson-Remer had floated the idea of a ballot measure in February but pulled the discussion from the board’s agenda.

A supervisor-led tax increase would require the support of two-thirds of county voters, but there are ways to structure a ballot measure so as to require only a majority vote, she said.

In her address, Lawson-Remer said such a measure could generate $1 billion a year.

What? What was she thinking? Was she here when city voters rejected Mayor Gloria’s tax measure last year? (And Gloria has been punishing San Diegans ever since with high trash fees, increased fees for parks and facilities, higher parking rates and now cut-backs to police, libraries and rec centers and the arts.)

This is NOT the answer, Terra! It’s absolutely DOA – dead on arrival.

Reporter Robert Vardon at the OB-Point Loma Monthly (which is a publication of the Union-Tribune) picked up our story about Corey Bruins, the former head of the OB Town Council forced to resign in early 2024, and now facing 9 felonies.

Based on his reporting, here are more details of the Bruins’ affair.

Bruins is 34. At his arraignment on March 28 where he pleaded not guilty, he was ordered by the court not to possess any “personal identifying information” about current board members Jenny Brengelman, Shelly Parks and Stephanie Kane of the Ocean Beach Community Foundation, which succeeded the Town Council after the board decided last year to drop the Town Council name after nearly six decades because of the scandal.

It’s deja vue all over again. San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria’s proposed budget cuts resonate with history and closely resemble the cuts that then-Mayor Jerry Sanders wanted back in 2008. Today, our Democratic mayor sounds like the former Republican mayor, 17 years later.

Earlier this week, Gloria unveiled his proposed budget which included slashing funding for arts, libraries and recreation centers, among other targets.

He proposed to close all 37 city branches every Sunday and Monday, and proposed cuts to recreation centers by slashing hours from either 60 or 65 down to 40 a week. And Sanders years ago, wanted to some similar cuts. As we reported :

Three years into his first term as mayor, Sanders … (was) faced with a huge budget crisis — wanted to solve it by making substantial cut-backs to key public services. And he chose San Diego’s libraries. In order to balance the city’s budget, he threatened to close all San Diego libraries — including the OB Library, of course — or seriously cut back their hours.

Corey Bruins, the former president of the Ocean Beach Town Council, currently faces 9 felonies.

These include one count of fraudulent appropriation by agent, with an aggravated white collar crime enhancement, one count of grand theft, six counts of use personal identifying information of another, and one count of money laundering also with an aggravated white collar crime enhancement.

Bruins was arraigned on March 28 and pleaded not guilty. He was ordered by the court to stay away from Shelly Parks, Jenny Brengelman, and Stephanie Kane — either current or former members of the OBTC (now OB Community Foundation).  A readiness hearing is set for May 7 at 8:15 a.m. in Department 1102 in downtown San Diego. Because he’s charged with felonies, there is a preliminary hearing currently set for May 21 at 8:30 a.m., assigned out of Department 102 downtown.

The investigating agency is the San Diego Police Department’s Financial Crimes Unit. His retained defense attorney is Earll Pott.

As OBceans may recall, Bruins was forced to resign from the OBTC in disgrace in January 2024, which threw the Town Council into months of turmoil and crisis, so much so that the organization had to change its name.

Without listing each felony count in detail, here’s several examples verbatim:

Exactly one year ago, the Rag ran a story about a 3-story multi-unit building being planned for 8 ADUs at 4591 Pescadero Avenue in Point Loma.

We reported then that applicant Chandra Slaven wanted to build a 3,836 square-feet three-story detached multifamily building consisting of (8) accessory dwelling units, comprising:

• (3) accessory dwelling units on the first floor,
• (3) accessory dwelling units on the second floor, and
• (2) accessory dwelling units on the third floor,
• at a site with an existing single dwelling unit.

This serves two purposes: it reminds us of the massive outpouring of resistance to Trump and Musk’s plans of fascism on April 5th, which marks a new reality. 5 to 6 million of our fellow Americans rallied that day in direct opposition their plans.

There’s a brand new 3-story project planned for 4870 Voltaire Street in OB. The City of San Diego just announced the project on April 15 with a “Notice of Future Decision.”

An application has been made for a Process 2 Coastal Development Permit for development of the following:

• new detached three-story building
• with commercial tenant space on 1st level,
• office tenant space on 2nd level, and
• 2-bedroom dwelling unit on the 3rd level,
• conversion of the garage of the existing one-story dwelling unit into a bedroom.

The 0.11-acre site was once the location of Dover Plumbing and has had previous commercial development proposals that did not pan out.

By Eric S. Page / 7SanDiego / April 10-11, 2025

Nobody seems to know when, exactly, a stretch of towering Mexican fan palms were planted along one of San Diego’s most iconic streets in one of its most iconic neighborhoods, but most would agree that the gently swaying giants, visible to the east as far away as the runway of San Diego International Airport, have come to be identified with the community of Mission Hills.

On Wednesday, April 9, the city of San Diego took steps to protect the trees for the future, placing 33 soaring fan palms under Conserve A Tree status after prodding from one local historian and the San Diego Community Forest Advisory Board, which recommended such an action at a meeting last month.

“Trees under protection status are meant to deter damages and tree removal by adjacent private property owners and identify the importance of the tree(s) to the community,” city spokesman Anthony Santacroce said in an email to NBC 7 on Thursday.

With the designation, the trees are believed to be the first examples of palms — of 400 or so historically designated trees in the city — to be offered the protections by the city in the two decades or so of the program.