Category: Ocean Beach

Twenty years ago, the San Diego Reader ran a long cover story called “90 Years of Curl,” an in-depth review of surfing history, particularly in San Diego, written by Jeannette DeWyze.

Then this year on March 30, the online version of the Reader republished it as “San Diego surf heroes going back to 1910 — When Duke Kahanamoku tried the OB Pier.”

[What OB Pier would that be? The one that is permanently closed right now was opened in 1966. There was another pier built earlier – south of where the 66 pier is.]

This story first appeared in the Reader on December 14, 2006.

There’s a good chance Ralph Noisat caught the first wave in San Diego. He died in 1980, and as he wasn’t a man to brag, his pioneering role might have been lost were it not for his board. He made it himself when he was a boy, and it was still in the Noisat family home in 1998 when Ralph’s daughter, Margie Chamberlain, was preparing to sell the Mission Hills residence. Chamberlain realized the heavy wooden board might have historic value, so she called the California Surf Museum in Oceanside. No one there knew anything about Noisat, but the museum staff was thrilled to accept the board when they heard what Chamberlain had to say about her father.

The building at 4833 Santa Monica Avenue — known as the OB Post Office — is for sale! LoopNet advertises it. For $4,995.000.

It’s been there for decades — back to the 1950s. Yet now it’s on the chopping block. For nearly $5 million. Prime location. The ad above says “Trophy Coastal … Property.”

Many questions abound.

Are there plans to open another post office in Ocean Beach?

by Tessa Balc / Times of San Diego / March 31, 2026

The next chapter in San Diego’s pursuit of Midway Rising will play out in Sacramento.

State Senator Akilah Weber Pierson introduced a bill last week to exempt the project from review under the state’s landmark environmental law and make way for the plan to redevelop the roughly 50-acre area around Pechanga Arena into an urban district with 4,000 homes, acres of parks, and a new arena.

[Please see original for any and all links.]

Weber Pierson’s proposal follows a California Supreme Court decision not to review a previous court ruling that threw out a 2022 voter-approved initiative to raise the height limit in the Midway area. The lower court ruled that the city failed to consider the environmental impacts of allowing taller buildings there.

Midway Rising’s developers quickly said the court’s ruling would not halt their project, because other state housing laws allowed them to exceed the height limit regardless.

Editordude: The following is an unsolicited response to a recent Rag post entitled, “Open Letter to the Demonstrators at the Corner of Sunset Cliffs & West Point Loma,” which has garnered quite a bit of attention but not a lot of actual dialog, which was our intent in publishing it. Until this … from Code Pink activists. 

Dear Clandestina Urbanista,

We appreciate you taking the time to write. We also want to be straightforward in response.

We are members of the San Diego chapter of CODEPINK, and we speak for our chapter only. Together with members of Veterans For Peace, Jewish Voice For Peace, and several other organizations throughout San Diego, we gather each week because what is happening in Gaza is not an abstract “complexity” – it is mass killing, carried out with the full support and funding of the United States government. As U.S. taxpayers, we refuse to be silent in the face of it.

We reject the framing that asking the public to hold “all sides” equally, in this moment, is a neutral act. It risks obscuring the scale, power, and ongoing nature of the violence being inflicted on Palestinians, as well as Iranians and Lebanese.

By David Garrick / San Diego Union-Tribune / April 1, 2026

San Diego’s efforts to cement its long-term control over Liberty Station have hit a snag that could force the city to sell the leafy complex of public parks, artist studios, restaurants and shops just east of Point Loma.

The city must get several local school districts, community college districts and health districts to agree to payouts as part of a complicated process required to retain control of former redevelopment agency properties.

Eight of those 14 agencies have recently agreed to Liberty Station payout offers from the city — but the San Diego Unified School District board is raising questions and voted unanimously last Tuesday to delay any decision indefinitely.

That vote came after the board was lobbied by the private company that manages much of Liberty Station to reject the city’s $1.4 million payout offer, contending the payout should be closer to $10 million.

City officials say the management company, Seligman Properties, is disingenuously trying to scuttle the deals so the city will be forced to sell it Liberty Station at a substantially deflated purchase price.

Because Seligman already controls 330 acres of Liberty Station’s commercial areas under no-rent leases that run through 2070, city officials contend it wouldn’t make sense for any other company to bid against Seligman — limiting how much the city can get.

The City of San Diego has begun the process of replacing the 44-year old Mission Beach lifeguard station. On March 14, the city began fencing off the existing lifeguard tower from the public and started installing a temporary lifeguard tower and trailer just north of the current dilapidated station.

“These temporary facilities will allow lifeguards to operate safely and efficiently while plans are developed to upgrade the existing station,” the city of San Diego said in a released statement at the time work began.

This is all well and good — a lifeguard station that old deserves to be replaced. And the surrounding community deserves it also.

Yet — what about the Ocean Beach lifeguard station? It’s even older than the Mission Beach one. It was built in 1980-1981. (See comments to that post.)

Sure, the city can argue that the Mission Beach station serves a larger community and there’s more beachgoers there than in Ocean Beach. Okay, replace them both.

This also fits a pattern all too familiar with observant OBceans who’ve seen city resources go to other communities over the years — no, over the decades. South Mission Beach got a new lifeguard station; Pacific Beach got a new station; La Jolla got a new one.

But not OB.

Perhaps due to the marginal size of the neighborhood — not that many voters or property owners — Ocean Beach has been repeatedly passed over on infrastructure projects that have been needed.

Editordude: The following was sent to us unsolicited and requested we publish it as an effort to open some dialogue. 

Hello,

I’ve passed your gathering many Saturdays at Sunset Cliffs and West Point Loma. Almost every time, I feel the impulse to pull over and speak with you – but my throat tightens, my stomach knots, and I keep driving. I’m writing instead because I don’t want to keep avoiding it.

When I moved to San Diego from the Bay Area, I knew I was leaving behind a certain kind of political energy that shaped my 20s. I lived a block from the Occupy Oakland encampment and spent time there almost daily. I marched in early Black Lives Matter demonstrations, long before 2020. I was engaged in activism around global issues, including Israel/Palestine, for many years.

So I don’t see you as apathetic. I recognize what it means to care enough to show up.

At the same time, I want to be honest that I experience what you’re doing very differently than you likely do.

Every Saturday at 10:30 am. San Diego Climate Mobilization Coalition Meetings April 4th, 11th, 18th and 25th

Every Saturday 10 am – 12 pm Peace Vigil for Palestine:

The San Diego River Park Foundation has volunteer opportunities in Ocean Beach:

Every Sunday 1:30 pm – 4 pm Otay Mesa Vigil

League of Women Voters EMPOWERING VOTERS & DEFENDING DEMOCRACY Information on upcoming forums for City Council Primary Races:

April 1st, 8th and 15th Wednesdays 4:30 pm – 5:30 pm Resist Trump Flash Banner Action –

April 2nd Thursday 6 pm – 7:30 pm Surfrider Open House

April 4th Saturday 4pm -7 pm Jewish Voice for Peace San Diego Passover Seder

April 4th Saturday 4 pm – 6 pm Spring GBM with Green New Deal

April 5th Sunday 11 am – 2 pm EASTER SUNDAY OUTREACH — Factory Farms Awareness Action

April 6th Monday 6 pm – 8 pm Friends of Famosa Slough 40th Anniversary

Congrats to Mandy Havlik, Andrew Hollingworth, Angela Vedder, Dee Brown, Cori Salcido, who were elected to 3 year seats on the Peninsula Community Planning Board and Eric Law and Robert Jackson who were elected to 1 year seats.

Here are their bios from the PCPB website:

Mandy Havlik

Mandy Havlik currently serves as the First Vice Chair of the Peninsula Community Planning Board (PCPB). She is a proud spouse of a disabled Navy Combat Veteran, a mother of two, and an indigenous woman who is a registered member of the Timiskaming First Nation in Canada. Most recently, Mandy ran for City Council in District 2 in 2022 and is preparing to run again in 2026.

If You Want Chaos and Community — Go to Dog Beach in OB

By Lark Coryell / DogTrekker

San Diego has more dedicated dog beach than any city in California, and most of the state doesn’t even come close. Four beaches allow dogs, each with a different personality. Here’s what actually matters at each one.

Dog Beach, Ocean Beach
This is the original. Dog Beach at the south end of Ocean Beach has been off-leash since 1972, making it one of the first legal off-leash beaches in the country. It runs about a quarter mile from the Ocean Beach Pier south to the San Diego River channel.

The sand is wide and flat, the surf is mellow, and on any given Saturday there are 100 dogs doing exactly what they want. No permit, no check-in, no nonsense. Just park on Voltaire Street or Abbott Street, walk past the sign and unclip the leash.

Two things to know: the river mouth at the south end gets murky after rain, and the parking situation is genuinely bad on weekends. Go before 10 a.m. or accept your fate.

Fiesta Island
If your dog needs to run — really run — this is the place.

Spicer’s ADU Mega-Projects Caused the City to Crackdown and Enact Some Reforms

By David Garrick / The San Diego Union-Tribune / March 31, 2026 

Christian Spicer, a developer who became notorious last year for pursuing giant ADU developments across San Diego that eventually led to a change in city policy, is being sued for many millions by his lenders and investors.

Spicer’s investors filed suit two weeks ago seeking more than $13 million in damages, alleging Spicer exaggerated how quickly he could get city approval for projects with many accessory dwelling units, or ADUs.

That litigation followed a February lawsuit filed by one of Spicer’s lenders seeking nearly $5 million in damages based on claims Spicer failed to make loan payments or pay taxes on properties earmarked for ADU farms.

The county treasurer-tax collector filed six notices of default totaling more than $98,000 for unpaid property taxes against Spicer last fall. But Spicer paid up in January, and those default notices were then cleared.

Spicer — who is responsible for two massive proposed ADU projects that would each build more than 100 homes and several others with more than 20 — declined to comment Monday on the lawsuits.