Category: San Diego

Rare Coastal Habitat In San Diego Needs Volunteers July 24th

By Ed Joyce / KPBS / July 19, 2010

San Diego is home to one of the few remaining coastal dune habitats in California.The area is also a key nesting area for an endangered bird. The rare jewel can be found in the midst of Ocean Beach.

Rob Hutsel is the executive director of the San Diego River Park Foundation, which is involved in helping to protect the coastal dune habitat in Ocean Beach.

UPDATE from Saturday morning: There were about a dozen protesters at Petco Park on Friday. Across the street were some counter-protesters. The protest for Friday was I am told a ‘last-minute’ thing, and many more are expected today Saturday 4 to 6:30 pm.

It’s heating up on and off the baseball field these days. There is a call by a local San Diego group to boycott the upcoming series between the Padres and the Arizona Diamondbacks. It’s all because of the new Arizona law restricting brown-skinned people.

The May 1st Coalition of San Diego is demanding that the Major League Baseball Commission move the 2011 All Star Game out of Arizona …

Editor: New rules for dog handlers at leash-free dog parks are being considered that would limit the number of dogs a handler can bring to three. Three is the number. The new rules also include prohibiting people from bringing a dog in heat to those parks as well, and also not to leave a dog unattended.

If passed, these rules would affect dogs and their lovers at Dog Beach and Dusty Rhodes Dog Park. The new regs were unanimously passed by the San Diego Park and Rec Board, but still have to go to a full Council committee, and then to the Council itself before becoming law.

My name’s Scott and I’m unemployed. So here I was, just minding my own business, providing for my family and just living the dream.

For 15 years I’d been running staffing agency territories and training the recruiters. Things were great. In 2006 my wife and I sold the house we’d owned for 12 years, put a $250K down payment on a bigger place.

One day I’m checking my 401k online and almost 1/2 was gone! What the heck!?

A little bit later, there’s a foreclosure across the street. Same floor plan as ours – ends up selling for $100k less than what our 1st mortgage is. Doggone it!

By Gustav Wynn / OpEdNews / July 10, 2010

As was widely predicted, a former employee at the San Diego ACORN office has brought a lawsuit against right-wing activist journalists James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles who surreptitiously recorded him while posing as a pimp and a half-naked hooker seeking accomplices in the commission of crimes of prostitution, statutory rape and kidnapping.

Juan Carlos Vera was fired after O’Keefe’s San Diego ACORN exposé was released.

We met Lane Tobias during the fight to save the Ocean Beach branch library back in the fall of 2008. He enthusiastically joined our staff as the youngest blogger at the time and wrote for us for a year and a half. One of his posts about the lack of food stamps in San Diego County remains one of our most popular articles of all time.

Alas, Lane, originally from New Jersey, and his partner Carianne, had to permanently return to their roots …

If there were ever any doubt about the extent of waste and ineffectiveness in private contracting, San Diego City Council member Carl DeMaio has just given us more proof.

Since his election to City Council, DeMaio has been relentless in his attempts to privatize San Diego’s city services, including the city’s drinking water and wastewater systems. In the latest attempt, DeMaio paid over $160,000 for contractors to gather signatures from San Diegans in support of a proposed ballot measure that would have required the city to take bids from private contractors for services. The measure would have also allowed the city to directly privatize services without taking a public bid and would have eliminated the city’s living wage and domestic partnership benefits ordinances.

YUp, another one, just now at 4:54 pm.

The livingroom here twisted. Patty felt it even before the big shake. She still has a sick feeling in her stomach.

Epicenter is our close desert, probably another one in a series of aftershocks from the Easter big one.

5.4 – (downgraded from a 5.9) 13 miles north of Borrego Springs.

Pat Abbott, PhD, a geologist interviewed by NBC local TV says this could be a brand new earthquake. On the San Jacinto Fault Zone – the Coyote Creek Fault.

Finally, we’ll get to see what the future public restrooms at the foot of Brighton Avenue will look like. There will be a public presentation of the new designs and plans of what the City calls the Brighton Avenue “Comfort Station” at Wednesday night’s OB Planning Board meeting.

The Planning Board will be determining approval or denial of the project’s conceptual design during the July 7th meeting at the OB Recreation Center, located at the corner of Santa Monica Ave and Ebers Street. The meeting begins at 6:00 pm.

by Peter Callstrom / Regional Task Force on Homeless / Special to the OB Rag

Kudos to Ocean Beach! This progressive community held a forum last night to proactively address homelessness in their community. A diverse and overflow crowd gathered to constructively dialogue, listen, and find common ground. A number of persons who are homeless were in attendance and actively participated in the discussion. There are no easy answers, but dialogue is so critical: to build understanding, empathy, and ideas. Wisely, more forums are planned.

By George J. Janczyn / Groksurf / July 1, 2010

San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders just yesterday announced a new recycled water hookup with Canyonside Park for landscaping irrigation (see video of announcement).

In his speech, Mayor Sanders proclaimed:

“Finding more uses for recycled water is an important way to maximize resources.”

Councilmember Sherri Lightner also spoke, saying:

“I have always and will continue to support the expansion of recycled water in San Diego as a smart reuse of water and as a water conservation measure.”

Was this really a sign of wholehearted support for water reuse, or was it just lip service?

[ALL DETAILS AND LINKS INSIDE]

* Will the City Ban Floatopias?

* Petition puzzle: Pulling back the curtain on Carl DeMaio’s costly signature-gathering campaign

* San Diego City Council Gives Go-ahead to Central Library Construction

* Mayor Sanders Now Wants Half Cent Raise In Sales Tax

* Mayor sued to enforce rope barrier for seals in La Jolla