Category: History

San Diego Mayor Attends ASA Meeting

See Video of Filner’s Remarks (inside)

By Eugene Davidovich / San Diego ASA / January 9, 2013

Last night for the first time in our chapter and city’s history, a sitting mayor attended the monthly chapter meeting. Former Congressman and newly elected Mayor Bob Filner arrived at the La Jolla Brew House around 7:30pm and walked into a packed meeting room where over 100 of you greeted him with cheer and applause. In his initial remarks the Mayor laid out a specific strategy for how to achieve safe access through a three pronged approach. In order to make it possible for the strategy to work, the Mayor called on us stand with him, help organize, educate, and campaign for safe access.

The Mayor’s three pronged strategy included:

Editor: The following are comments to an article published recently at the Voice of San Diego, entitled The Coastal Height Limit’s Legacy, that to us, at least, signals the beginning of the attack on the thirty foot height limit at San Diego’s coast.

Comment from Geoff Page to Citybeat article:

The pro-development comments here sure stand out; I agree with Mr. Wood. The language used, like smart growth, walkability, city of villages, is designed to make increased density sound acceptable. The 30-foot height limit law is perfect example of the difference between what people want and what development interests want. . … (come inside for more)

Coastal Height Limit Protects Public’s Interest

comment posted as article :

Posted: Thursday, January 10, 2013 4:05 pm | Updated: 4:11 pm, Thu Jan 10, 2013.

By David Little |

Your article relative to the 30-foot height limit reminds me of the Vietnam military official who famously said we are going to have to bomb that city to save it. . … (come inside for more )

Editor: John Lawrence, a regular writer for San Diego Free Press, has teamed up with Frank Thomas, a nationally-known progressive researcher, to lay out a Cultural Comparison between gun violence in America and Europe, in a three part series, all reposted below.

By John Lawrence and Frank Thomas

Introduction

While US gun crime and all crime levels are slowly but almost imperceptibly declining, they still remain relatively astronomically high compared with Europe. In this article, we compare US and European levels of gun violence and gun control to see if we can make any sense of the gun debate in the wake of the increasing frequency of mass murders as well as the almost mundane everyday killings in urban areas like Chicago and Detroit. Frank is an ex-pat who has lived in Europe for over 30 years. John has lived in San Diego for over 40 years.

On New Year’s Eve
as I sat quietly
in my easy chair,
out of thin air
from a place called nowhere,
Maxi, my cat,
skittered across me
in the middle of my ease,
creating a little breeze,
landing on the mantle over the fireplace
with a couple of tip taps of her feet
and I picked up the beat
and patted rhythms on my thighs
and on my knees
and my bongos
and the next thing I know
I’m scatting jazz riffs like a cross
between Lambert Hendricks and Ross
and Satchmo
and humming sounds

As the Police Trailer and its future in the parking lot of the popular OB Pier is a big issue for a good number of people in Ocean Beach (see our current poll in the sidebar), we thought we’d remove some layers of the ol’ proverbial onion by adding some complexities that surround the trailer issue.

There are three basic positions among OBceans on the trailer itself:

1. those who want to make it “permanent”;
2. those who are okay with it being temporary, but want it moved somewhere else;
3. and those who want to remove it ASAP.

If we examine each of these positions, we’ll find each has strengths and each has basic contradictions that somehow need to be resolved for each to become the dominant one.

For the brief background on the situation (see my report of the OB Planning Board decision on the trailer here), the trailer was installed in 1999 to create a stronger police presence in the parking lot as an agreement between the police and OB merchants;

This was a wonderful year for Christmas lights in my City Heights neighborhood. They cheerfully, often exuberantly, illuminated the night from the day after Thanksgiving until the day after New Year’s. It is sad to see them extinguished, put away, for yet another year, although ours stay up in the house year round. You can never have enough illumination in the darkness…

But that is not to say the seasonal celebrations are over- far from it. Sunday January 6th is the Three Kings Day celebration in Mexico and other Spanish speaking cultures; it is also Orthodox Christmas Eve for those religious traditions based upon the Julian calendar, as opposed to our Gregorian calendar. What that boils down to is that I have to order my rosca de reyes so that I can take it to our Orthodox Christmas Eve dinner.

The San Diego CityBeat recently ran a post by Alfred Howard about his favorite profession and music store where he currently works: OB’s “Cow” at 5029 Newport Ave.

The Cow is a special place. Where the sidewalk of America ends, the neighborhood regulars congregate to gaze at the vast blue expanse of the Pacific. Nearby stands a museum of sorts—4,000 cassettes on the wall, 8-tracks in the back and vinyl for days. We even have Waterworld on LaserDisc (so help me, God, I will sell that thing). …

He describes his position as clerk:

I feel a weight of importance behind my position—I’m a kind of preservationist.

Editor: This accounting of the recent meeting of the OB Planning Board on the Police Trailer was written for the San Diego Free Press, therefore has a slightly different spin on the issue. And BTW, please let us know how you feel about the trailer by participating in our poll on the trailer in our sidebar.

The meeting room at the Ocean Beach Recreation Center was quickly filling up last Wednesday night, the 2nd of January, as the monthly meeting of the Board was about to begin. No “OB-time” here, as the Chair, Jane Gawronski, gaveled the meeting to order right at 6:00 pm. In the audience was a “who’s-who” of the community’s merchant establishment and friends, and it included the heads of the OB Town Council; the merchants’ group, the Mainstreet Association; the local non-profit OB Community Development Corporation.

It was standing room only last night – Wednesday, January 2nd – at the monthly meeting of the Ocean Beach Planning Board. At the peak of the evening, there must have been 30 people – not counting the ten members of the Board itself – , and most had come for the controversy over the Police Trailer in the middle of the OB Pier parking lot. Among those standing about was a ‘who’s-who’ of OB’s merchants and the village establishment.

Jane Gawronski, Chair of the Board, gaveled the meeting to order right around 6pm. After a few reports, she brought the meeting to the Action agenda.

UPDATE: Go here for an update of the Planning Board decision.

There are two somewhat controversial issues before the Ocean Beach Planning Board tonight at their monthly meeting. The Board will discuss them during their publicly-held meeting which starts sharply at 6pm, at the OB Recreation Center, 4726 Santa Monica Avenue.

Wireless Upgrade at Masonic Lodge

First up on the Action Calendar is Sprint Wireless application for an upgrade and renewal to their permit which they hold on their wireless antennas on the Masonic Lodge, located 1711 Sunset Cliffs Boulevard. . … (come inside for more)

Police Trailer to be Permanent?

The second issue of note, is the application by the City of San Diego via the Police Department for a Coastal Development Permit for the existing “Police Trailer” in the middle of the OB Pier parking lot. … (come inside for more.)

In some Buddhist traditions people bring in the New Year with contemplation, evaluation, and meditation. One element of this celebration can be a fire ceremony where the karma of the old year is symbolically burned leaving one open to the next moment. Usually, after yet more meditation, at midnight a bell is rung to welcome in the New Year. Or, to put it more accurately, they bring in the happy new instant.

So, before the old moment bleeds into the new one, here are a few things cultural and political to remember and be grateful for about the last calendar year in San Diego as the next one comes into being.

By Naomi Wolf / Guardian UK / December 29 , 2012

New documents prove what was once dismissed as paranoid fantasy:
totally integrated corporate-state repression of dissent

It was more sophisticated than we had imagined: new documents show that the violent crackdown on Occupy last fall – so mystifying at the time – was not just coordinated at the level of the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, and local police.

The crackdown, which involved, as you may recall, violent arrests, group disruption, canister missiles to the skulls of protesters, people held in handcuffs so tight they were injured, people held in bondage till they were forced to wet or soil themselves -was coordinated with the big banks themselves.