Author: Staff

On Monday, August 26, a group of Mira Mesa residents protested the removal of nearly 70 mature trees from a local park. They said the chopping down and killing of 50 to 75-year-old trees at the Mira Mesa Community Park is not in line with San Diego’s efforts to build out the urban tree canopy as part of its climate action goals.

The trees are set to be removed ostensibly to make room for improvements at the park, including added parking spaces, a proposed pool and skate park, and other improvements, which have been in the works for some time. But residents said they were in the dark about the fact that 68 mature trees in the area would be torn down and replaced with young saplings.

Fortunately for California’s coast, Assemblymember David Alvarez (D-San Diego) was forced to withdraw his controversial bill, AB 2560,  last week when amendments added went counter to Alvarez’ intent.

Alvarez and his so-called YIMBY supporters claimed the bill would have streamlined the approval of housing developments in the coastal zone that make use of the state’s affordable housing density bonus law. Developers liked the bill because it offered them a streamlined process if they set aside a portion of the homes in their projects as affordable housing.

Yet the bill ran afoul of the powers of the California Coastal Commission which, of course, has broad veto power over density bonus projects

Now that the OB Rag has closed the entry-phase of our “Worst ADU” contest, it enters the judging stage where our judge panel will examine the entries and eventually decide the Gold, Silver and Bronze awards.

The Rag received 43 entries from 20 neighborhoods

The response to our contest has been astonishing. By last Friday’s deadline, we received 43 entries from 20 communities across the city — from Torrey Hills to Logan Heights, from Ocean Beach to Kearny Mesa.

While the volume of entries was great for our contest, it also speaks to the disaster Todd Gloria’s “Bonus ADU” program has brought to many San Diego neighborhoods.

The City of San Diego wants residents’ views on the new trash service and charges.

So, the city is holding an online meeting on Saturday, August 24, and an in-person meeting in Point Loma next week about implementing Measure B, which amends the People’s Ordinance to allow the City to begin charging for trash pickup from single family homes. Plus, they’ll be out at OB Farmers Market on that Wed. (See below)

As part of the Cost of Service Study, the City is holding public meetings in all the Council districts to collect input from the public on services and fees.

Tomorrow — Friday, August 23 — is the deadline for the OB Rag’s “Worst ADU in San Diego” contest. If you haven’t yet sent in the address of a local ADU eyesore, time’s running out.

This contest set out to convey how the modest “granny flat” concept has spawned grotesquely large buildings on small lots. Along the way, it opened a heated debate about the social and ethical aspects of building massive ADUs:

Less than a half hour after Point Loma High let out for the day on Wednesday, August 21, gunshots rang out on Zola Street — about a block from the school. Two people were killed, a mother wounded and her son was arrested as the suspected shooter.

When police arrived, they found the wounded mother, who is in her 80s, in the front yard of her residence. She was taken to a hospital with “very serious” injuries.

Her 60-year old son was also in the yard and was arrested without incident.

By Geoff Page

On Monday, August 19, Channel 5 Fox News did a story on, well, signs. A person might wonder why a news station would do a story about signs. Fox was not motivated by a tip about a fascinating, untold sign story. Fox was showing how this city’s administration works by doing the city’s bidding.

The story was about new signs the city posted on the pier. A little background first.

The Rag carried a piece on these signs July 31.

In that story, this writer related telling the lifeguards about the missing sign on the pier, warning surfers to stay 75 feet away from the pier, that had been there for decades. Not trusting the lackluster reaction from the local lifeguards, the following email was sent a week later, on August 8, to the lifeguard management.

Earlier this week, MSNBC host Rachel Maddow issued a warning to America that those Republicans on election boards across the country could refuse to certify the 2024 election results if Trump loses in November.

In an op-ed in the New York Times (behind paywall) Maddow wrote:

“Election boards across the country now include Republican officials who have not only propounded Mr. Trump’s lies about the last presidential election being ‘stolen,’ they have tested how far they can go in denying the certification of the vote.”

The spread of what Maddow called “refusenik Republicans” started back in 2020, she argued, when Trump and RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel pressured two election officials to certify vote totals in a key Michigan county. As The Hill stated in a recent article about this:

Since then, a number of election officials across at least eight states have been charged for alleged efforts to interfere with the certification of the 2020 election and 2022 midterm results, Maddow noted.

The Project Review Committee of the OB Planning Board meets Tuesday night, August 20, at the OB Rec Center at 6pm. It has two projects up for review. They will be meeting again in the Activity room at the end of the hallway on the left.

The sub-committee of the full board does a first review of a project and then usually makes a recommendation to the board

Bunt Residence, 4711 Del Monte Ave.

This is a Process 2 review of a permit to construct a 2-story dwelling unit over a subterranean garage and construct a 2-story “companion unit”.

Here’s the City of San Diego’s official notice for the large ADU project proposed for 4705 Point Loma Avenue in south OB (be aware that none of the blue links “work” as this is a photocopy or the original notice). OB and Point Loma residents are being urged to attend the hearing.

It stood there for years – the second hand sports equipment store at 4811 W Point Loma Blvd — but now it’s up for sale.

The one-story storefront with 2,800 square feet is on the market for $1,850,000. Built in 1947, the building is on a .11 acre site, zoned C-1, with a floor area ratio of .6.

A rare bee — the San Clemente Digger Bee — has been spotted out at Cabrillo National Monument’s Bayside Trail. The reason this discovery has some weight is because this type of bee has been rarely seen on the mainland — known to only be on San Clemente Island.

According to the National Parks Service, in early September 2020, a population of Anthophora urbana clementina (San Clemente Digger Bee) was discovered at Cabrillo National Monument.

Community scientists and researchers began gathering data about the island bees to confirm their presence on the mainland, and a scientific note was later published in the journal Apidologie.