OB Rag

Editor: The following letter was received by the OB Rag from the Ocean Beach Planning Board, undated and addressed to San Diego’s new mayor, Bob Filner, and signed by Jane Gawronski, Chair of the Board. We post it below in its entirety (although we made more paragraphs for easier reading).

Dear Mayor Filner,

This letter is submitted on behalf of the Ocean Beach Planning Board in regard to the ongoing issues between the City and the Ocean Beach community involving the multiple variances granted on West Point Loma Avenue in Ocean Beach. The block in question was purposely zoned under the Ocean Beach Precise Plan to be consistent with the rest of the Ocean Beach community.

A “McJob” play set? Makeup for babies?

By Lauren Kelly / AlterNet / December 6, 2012 |

If you, your siblings, or your close friends have children, you know that the holidays often involve toy shopping. And if you’re a progressive, you know that a trip to the toy store can be very depressing indeed.

It’s not that toys plastered with corporate logos, or gender-essentialist toys, or toys made from toxic chemicals are a new phenomenon. But with the holiday season becoming more and more consumer-driven each year, and awareness of these issues increasing, the “problem toys” seem to stick out more than ever. (At least for this writer, whose friends are all starting to have kids.)

By: Taylor Hill and Eston Ellis / The Log / December 6, 2012

Holiday boat parades are a treasured tradition in Southern California — and some boaters spend all year getting ready for them. Bringing together the right holiday decorations, lights and onboard spirit to “wow” the crowds of fellow boaters on the water and spectators on shore takes planning, cleverness and a lot of creativity.

But even if you haven’t been obsessing over your decorating scheme since July, there’s still time to join in the fun of this month’s annual holiday boat parades. String some lights, bring along some friends and family, and make your plan now to take part in one of the season’s top boating activities.

By John Lawrence / San Diego Free Press

Weeks after Hurricane Sandy struck, millions of people were still without electricity. At its peak Sandy left 8.5 million without power. A lot of people were angry. Why did it take so long to get the power back on even with crews coming from as far away as San Diego? One power company in New Jersey came in for a lot of criticism – Jersey Central Power and Light (JCP&L)- owned by First Energy based in Ohio.

On Halloween this year, over in Mission Bay, there was a staged “Zombie Attack” as part of a simulated combat-type event and paid with Homeland Security funds. Now that event – and other expenses from the Homeland Security bank account around the country – are being questioned and criticized as excessive.

The Mission Bay zombie event is one of several questionable expenses of a $7 billion in Homeland Security money called out Wednesday in a report from Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla. Senator Coburn highlighted several San Diego expenses in the report. San Diego received a total $134 million under the program.

Nuclear warfare: Nuclear backers, opponents present opposing ideas on San Onofre

By Dave Rice / San Diego Reader / December 5, 2012

The World Resources Simulation Center played host Tuesday evening to an open forum: “Green Scene – the Costs and Benefits of San Onofre Nuclear Power in our Backyard.” The Downtown-area Center, described as an “immersive visualization center,” outfitted with a dozen large-scale projectors and internet-equipped laptops scattered amongst the crowd, …

It appears that the applicant of a residence on West Point Loma Boulevard has withdrawn its appeal of a denial for variances by the Ocean Beach Planning Board. The applicant of the Douma residence at 5168 West Point Loma notified the City Clerk that it is taking its appeal off the docket for the San Diego Planning Commission; the project will now fall back to city staff.

At the February 15th meeting this year of the OB Planning Board’s Project Review Committee, the board voted to deny the Douma applicant’s request for variances the applicants claimed they needed in order to build their planned demolition of the existing duplex and construction of a three story residence.

At their regular meeting this Wednesday, December 5th, the Ocean Beach Planning Board will take up the issue of the bronze memorial lifeguard sculpture planned for OB’s waterfront.

The Planning Board meets at the OB Recreation Center on Santa Monica Avenue at 6pm.

Here’s more on the memorial sculpture:

Sculpture to Honor Drowned WWI Soldiers in Tragedy that Forced City to Hire First Lifeguards

Ocean Beach leaders and surfers are actively lobbying to receive City funding for a bronze sculpture to honor San Diego lifeguards. Called the “Ocean Beach Lifeguard Bronze Memorial”,

When we awoke this morning – for the first time in history – Bob Filner is the mayor of San Diego, the eighth largest city in America. Yesterday, Monday, December 3rd, was his official inauguration. (Please see Annie Lane’s wonderful photo spread of the event.)

Representing progressive media in town, I accompanied my good friend Doug Porter to the Balboa Club in Balboa Park to be witnesses to this historic event. Filner is only the second Democratic mayor in the last forty years in this town – and decidedly it’s most liberal. And Filner wasn’t the only politician being inaugurated, as there was an entire shelf of them waiting around when we arrived at the Balboa Club – all those veterans who had been elected, selected and rejected by the voters were going to be there.

In the northwest corner of east Mission Bay, The Friends of Mission Bay Marshes, organized by Roy Little, local PB resident, and Isabelle Kay, UCSD Marsh Manager, along with UCSD students and environmental volunteers, are meeting every other week (first and third Saturday 9-12am) at the bungalow at Pacific Beach Drive and Crown Point Drive to continue their ongoing projects of : re-establishing native plants and removing non-native invasive ones, reclaiming natural slopes of the land to help re-establish water flow to bring essential sediment and nutrients to the starved marsh, and nurturing endangered bird species.

There was standing room only at the Balboa Park Club as Bob Filner was sworn in as San Diego’s 38th mayor on Monday, Dec. 3.

Mayor Filner thanked City Council members and outgoing Mayor Jerry Sanders for “reforming city finances and for getting us on the track to financial stability” before reaffirming his campaign promise to focus on San Diego neighborhoods, eliminate homelessness, protect our beaches and expand maritime operations.

The Center for Public Integrity / By Susan Ferriss

Arresting and putting low-level juvenile offenders into the criminal-justice system pulls many kids deeper into trouble rather than turning them around.

Marijuana — it’s one of the primary reasons why California experienced a stunning 20 percent drop in juvenile arrests in just one year, between 2010 and 2011, according …