OB Rag

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates announced today that he is lifting a 1991 ban on news coverage of the return of the remains of fallen service members to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, although he will leave the decision about press coverage up to the family of the dead.

The controversial ban on photography and other media coverage of the solemn return of flag-draped coffins — upheld by both Republican and Democratic administrations — has generated lawsuits as well as conflicting emotions on the part of military familiies.

by Frank Gormlie

(Reposted from Feb.19th) I finally sat down with Dr Jefe inside the hollow chamber once known as Rock Paper Scissors and got his side of the controversies surrounding the closing of the popular arts and crafts store. It had suddenly closed without notice earlier this month.

There was a disappointing turnout of Ocean Beach residents and businesspeople today at the City’s Budget and Finance Committee hearing. There was literally two OB residents present at this morning’s meeting. The Clairemont library had a number of supporters, plus sitting in the back of the large room were organizers from the city-wide library coalition-in-forming.

As a writer and once upon a time film student, I found this year’s Academy Awards to be an exemplary display of the breadth of possibility that Hollywood’s insular, but nonetheless public, progressive political scene presents.

This year, the Academy rewarded actors not just for being beautiful people in rented jewelry and expensive clothing, but for the emotions they conjured and the political movements that their roles represented.

On the corner of Sunset Cliffs Boulevard and Santa Monica Avenue resides a historic landmark, one that has served the Ocean Beach community and surrounding areas as both a valuable storehouse of knowledge and a tranquil study haven for over 80 years. This unique site is the home of the Ocean Beach branch of the San Diego Public Library, and today, it faces threats of possible closure.

On November 6th, 2008, San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders announced the tentative closure of the Ocean Beach branch due to budget cuts, along with 6 other libraries, 9 recreation centers and a gym. An astounding response from the community has led to the mayor’s decision to forego the issue and revisit it this spring.

A higher-than-normal rate of cancer diagnoses in the building that houses UCSD’s literature department has been the subject of near-constant discussion in recent months, but it’s an issue that’s been on the department’s radar for years.

“We’ve been talking about this in the hallways for almost as long as I’ve been here,” said Anna Joy Springer, a creative-writing professor who’s been teaching at UCSD for six years.

Between 2000 and 2006, faculty and staff who work in the building reported at least eight individual cases of breast cancer. Of these people, two have died.

BORDER AGENTS BLOCK MARCHERS
In the end, immigration activists never made it to the site of yesterday’s planned demonstration, a plaza dubbed Friendship Park that sits on a bluff overlooking the ocean at Border Field State Park. For the first time, Border Patrol agents formally sealed off access on the U.S. side to the plaza, for years a popular meeting place on the U.S.-Mexico border for families to visit through the fence.
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POWERLINK CAUSES OUTRAGE
Jody Morgan cherishes his 100-acre property in El Monte Valley, where El Cajon Mountain rises above the rural community that’s home to a dairy and horse farms. At a Lakeside planning group meeting Wednesday night, Morgan held up a photo he created of what the valley would look like if the proposed Sunrise Powerlink transmission line were built there.

by Anna Daniels

The third community input meeting on the upcoming budget was held this Saturday, February 21, at Hoover High School in City Heights. The auditorium was packed to overflowing! Fifty seven citizens provided public testimony about what services they considered essential and non-essential as well as ideas on how to save money and generate more general fund revenue. Fifty of those citizens said libraries and park and recreation services are essential because they provide kids with safe meaningful alternatives to the streets and opportunities for their future.

Through my work alongside social service and mental health professionals, I am occasionally presented the opportunity to do more than provide direct services. Today I came across a call to action for all San Diego community leaders, and in my opinion that includes anyone who takes part in the OB Rag – either as a contributor, a reader, or both.

As a result of the slumping economy and the California Legislature’s longstanding inability to agree on a viable budget, there will be a number of far-reaching consequences. One of those consequences is in direct relation to the well-being of San Diego’s poor, namely those receiving cash aid or food stamps.

We’ve learned that the popular crafts store Rock Paper Scissors, which shut its doors suddenly a couple weeks ago, had a very rocky closure, indeed. The store’s closure was so rocky, that many of the store’s vendors feel ripped-off and say the store’s owner, Jeff Fagan, owes them thousands of dollars. Some of the vendors are talking about suing Fagan.

Accusations are flying, anger is rising. When he closed the store, Fagan gave the vendors insufficient notice; he hasn’t paid back February rents, or even for some vendors January rents, or for some monies from December, or the original deposits. He owes his vendors thousands, tens of thousands; one estimate is a quarter million.

At a time when jobless rates are hovering around 8%, one in ten homeowners can’t afford their mortgage payments, and the average cost of staple foods have risen astronomically, we should all be proud to know that those of us living in San Diego County reside in a region with the lowest accessibility to food stamps in the ENTIRE COUNTRY.

According to the Food Research and Action Center, only 29% of eligible recipients receive Food Stamp benefits, good for last among the 24 largest metropolitan areas in the country.

by Frank Gormlie

Residents in this County, when asked what San Diego County government does, are often hard-pressed I have found, to list more than a couple of things. Uh, collect taxes they’ll respond, … uh, run the sheriffs office, uh, … and then there will be a long, thoughtful pause. And maybe they’ll add one or two other services.

Well, the County does collect property and other taxes, and it does finance the Sheriff’s Office – although the Sheriff is elected separately. But the County does so much more.