OB Rag

The City continues to charge $10 per hour at downtown parking meters during Padres’ games and other “special events”.

Padres’ fans are definitely not the only ones subject to this outrageous fee, which starts two hours before the event, and continues for four hours from the event’s start time, for a total of six hours.

The area subject to this $60 per event fee extends well beyond any logical boundaries, all the way north to Broadway, and east to 17th Street and the I-5.

Worse, it’s a devastatingly regressive tax, because it penalizes renters who don’t have off-street parking, and can only park at meters. It hurts downtown’s restaurants and small businesses, who lose customers who can’t or won’t pay $10 an hour to buy groceries, mail a package, or eat a meal.

Here’s more on the District 2 candidates — first in a video of the April 7 Ocean Beach Planning Board meeting where 3 candidates were questioned, and second, in interviews of 3 candidates by the editor of Explore Clairemont, an online platform.

OB Planning Board video

— Only three were present as per plan by the OBPB. They will interview others at the next board meeting. See OBPB for the video.

h4>Interviews of Bailey, Rickey and Crosby by Explore Clairemont publisher Tanja Kropf

Belmont Park in Mission Beach is unveiling a multimillion-dollar revamp just in time for the busy summer season, featuring upgrades to its historic Giant Dipper roller coaster and new attractions for visitors.

The nearly century-old amusement park expects about 150,000 visitors during peak summer months as families return to enjoy the updated rides, beachfront views and classic attractions.

One of the park’s most iconic features, the Giant Dipper, recently underwent a $1.6 million rehabilitation project focused on improving the ride experience.

“So the Giant Dipper, which just turned 100 years old last year, it’s going into a 101st birthday in July, just went under a six-week rehab this past February,” said Sarah Abelsohn, marketing director for Belmont Park.

The work primarily focused on smoothing out the wooden track to enhance comfort for riders while preserving the coaster’s historic charm.

In addition to the coaster upgrades, Belmont Park has introduced new attractions, including a free-access play structure near Shipwreck Cove designed for younger visitors and families.

By David Garrick / San Diego Union-Tribune / April 15, 2026

San Diego would sharply reduce funding for local arts organizations, city libraries, recreation centers and many other programs in a proposed budget for the new fiscal year Mayor Todd Gloria will release Wednesday.

The proposed $2.2 billion spending plan would close a projected $146 million deficit with $26 million from worker furloughs, $44 million in new revenue and $76 million in service cuts that would come with about 130 layoffs.

The budget, which will be debated and adjusted by the mayor and the City Council between now and June, also merges three city departments into others and eliminates entirely the Office of Child and Youth Success.

Other cuts include homeless services, facilities maintenance, zoning enforcement, park rangers, restroom closures in some parks and elimination of a team that adds bike lanes across the city.

The cuts are required because of recent employee pay raises, including 23% hikes over three years awarded to most workers in 2023, and relatively sluggish growth in city revenue.

Hotel tax revenue is projected to decrease 3% when it usually goes up about 6% per year, sales tax revenue is expected to rise 2% instead of its usual 4% and property tax revenue is projected to rise 4% instead of its usual 6%.

By Joni Halpern

We have a new savior. We saw his picture on the holy card of Truth Social.

He wasn’t exactly like the old Jesus, but the new look was brighter overall. The new savior’s hair was shiny blond and precisely coiffed, as if he had emerged from a salon only minutes before ministering to the crowd of sick people and worshipers. His white cassock looked as if it were a discard from a “Call the Midwife” scene, just before the wet, bloody baby is hauled into the world, spoiling the bleached white garment of the imperturbable midwife.

The red shawl that draped over the new savior’s shoulders was only shades darker than the ruddy red complexion of his face. In this picture, the new savior’s eyes were nothing like those in the portrait that presently adorns the walls of federal buildings. None of that glowering, sinister presence that dares his supplicants to ask for mercy.

The image of the new savior does contain some anomalies, of course: fighter jets and warriors riding the rays of the sun above a battle flag; the Statute of Liberty stuffed into a small space between the worshipful face of a soldier gazing at the new savior; an adoring nurse looking upward at the new savior’s right hand, which lies upon the forehead of a presumably sick fellow slumbering on a pillow, his head emitting rays of blinding light due to his contact with the new savior; the palm of the new savior’s left hand holding a concentrated source of light, and finally, a couple of other contented admirers whose faces and prayerful hands suggest they have finally contacted the Real Thing.

On the beach at the end of Cape May in the sand has stood what locals call “The Lifeguard Chair” — a neighborhood treasure that has been maintained and repaired by people who live on those sandy blocks.

However, lately – after locals spend hours and money on repairing the chair after it had been swept out to the water during a storm — someone with a hatchet walked up to it at night and destroyed it. People were heartbroken … but they haven’t given up.

They’ve established a gofundme to raise dough to rebuilt the chair “one again.”  Here’s their statement:

The Cape May community is coming together to repair ‘The Lifeguard Chair,’ a beloved fixture on the beach in front of our neighborhood for nearly two decades. This chair has been a gathering spot, a symbol of our shared love for the ocean, and a project that many neighbors have poured their time and resources into over the years. After a recent storm destroyed the chair, a group of us spent countless hours and hundreds of dollars rebuilding it, determined to keep this tradition alive for everyone who enjoys our beach.

The new owner of The Black has been finally revealed!

He’s Peter Yaldo, a local businessman from Chula Vista, but with strong family ties to Ocean Beach.

His uncle is the landlord of the building where The Black rents and that’s where he met up with Kurt Dornbusch, the now former owner. Dornbusch did still had a lease obligation on the space. Yaldo assumed Dornbusch’s lease and acquired The Black.

Yaldo had a “soft opening” on April 6th and plans a grand opening later in the month.

Here’s the details from Steve Anderson’s great piece at Times of San Diego

In early February, The Black announced it was closing its doors for good.

Owner Kurt Dornbusch announced his retirement after 45 years at the helm, ending The Black’s 57-year run as a defining countercultural landmark on Newport Avenue.

Rag intrepid reporter Geoff Page checked out what was going on at the foot of Narragansett.

The Rag was prompted by a reader who requested we investigate the scene, and “request immediate clarification regarding the apparent staging and anticipated installation of fencing at the western terminus of Narragansett Avenue in Ocean Beach, near the coastal open space and shoreline access points adjacent to the pier area.”

Instead of a written report, Geoff offered these photos.

Letter to City of San Diego & Mayor Todd Gloria 

By Shannon Greenlee

My April property tax bill increased by over $500 due to the added trash fee — and that’s only one of two annual payments.

If I refuse to pay the portion related to the trash fee increase (more than $1,000 total), I face penalties and even the risk of losing my home.

Today, we’re having fun and games with Richard Bailey, a candidate for District 2 of the San Diego City Council.

First, a new PAC for Bailey has just been announced. This is serious stuff. But it’s also a game. Steven Richter, a semi-retired tax attorney, is the principal officer for ‘SD Policy over Politics’, the new PAC.

Here’s Arturo Castañares’ write up about the new PAC, published April 13. Castañares is the editor at large of La Prensa.

A longtime Point Loma resident has launched a new political action committee (PAC) to support a candidate in the upcoming election for San Diego City Council, according to documents filed with the California Secretary of State last week.

By Mandy Havlik, Candidate for San Diego City Council District 2

I didn’t decide to run for City Council sitting behind a desk or at a political event. I decided to run after years of standing and advocating with neighbors asking, why is this still not fixed?

After watching people I care about feeling ignored by a system that’s supposed to serve them. And one of those moments that really stayed with me happened at my kids’ school. As a new parent and the elementary school garden coordinator at Ocean Beach Elementary, I started noticing traffic safety issues along Santa Monica and Sunset Cliffs Boulevard. Cars moving too fast. Lack of signage. No designated pick and drop off area. Kids walking and biking through an area that didn’t feel designed to protect them and keep them safe.

It wasn’t something difficult. It was about protecting my kids and other children in the neighborhood. So I did what I’ve always done, I spoke up. I went to the school administration, thinking this would be something we could work on together. Protecting children shouldn’t be complicated or controversial. But instead of support, I was met with hesitation. Questions about liability. Deflection. A sense that this wasn’t really the school’s responsibility, that it belonged somewhere else.

By Kate Callen

On April 14, 2025, activists from 14 San Diego communities gathered at a South Park pizzeria to explore how they might band together in their common fight against citywide saturation density.

A year later, the San Diego Community Coalition has doubled in size to represent 28 communities – from Encanto in the south to University City in the north and from the College Area in the east to Ocean Beach in the west.

Its mission has expanded as well. When Frank Gormlie, Paul Krueger, and I invited community leaders to gather last spring, the impetus was City Hall’s push for predatory development. We were all struggling with multi-story Bonus ADUs and mid-rise towers in neighborhoods where parking was scarce and fire risk was high.

That is still a problem, and it will continue so long as builder-supported YIMBY politicians run the city. But the political pendulum has begun swinging back because communities have demanded more responsive local government. Going forward, we must intensify that effort.

At the start, the Community Coalition was inspired by Neighbors For A Better San Diego (NFABSD), the most effective local grassroots organization in recent history.