OB Rag

By Joni Halpern

It is often said by holiday revelers that they are exhausted by the holiday season. Too much pressure to meet expectations. At the close of the season, those who participate in the festivities are ready to seek rest and distance from others. Those who spend the holidays alone await the return of the everyday hum of relationships among colleagues, neighbors, and acquaintances who might have been away spending time with loved ones.

In either case, people seem spent emotionally and financially by the holidays. They are relieved when the Holiday Spirit retreats into its lair like the octopus off the island of Maui who I heard escaped the commotion and expense of energy from too many visitors by sliding into a Coke bottle on the ocean bottom, reaching out one last tentacle to slap sand over the bottle and align small rocks to cover the opening. Like that octopus, the Holiday Spirit can almost be heard breathing a watery sigh of relief as it settles back for another nine months until the merchandising gods dig it up and force it to overtaxed prominence.

In America, it is at least substantially true that the Holiday Spirit involves a full-court press to convince us that those to whom we desire to show love or friendship, respect or neighborliness, connection or concern can only become aware of this message by conveyance of some material object, preferably purchased, sometimes homemade, and only rarely labeled “fruitcake.”

The Rag has an update on the Corey Bruins’ criminal fraud case stemming from allegations against him that he stole thousands of dollars of funds from the then-OB Town Council.

A Rag reporter attended his readiness conference just recently. During that brief conference, the parties agreed that the preliminary hearing scheduled for January 26th in the New Year will go as scheduled — unless a plea is reached before then.

Preliminary hearings — or “prelims” — are part of the process in which any felony is charged. It gives the prosecution a chance to place sufficient evidence before a judge in order for the case to proceed. It also causes much of the evidence to be brought out into the light of day, before the public as it were.

Friday’s injunction requires city officials to stop processing permits for the controversial Chalcifica project until after they determine how to analyze its impacts.

By David Garrick / San Diego Union-Tribune / Dec. 23, 2025

A new court injunction could jeopardize a controversial 136-unit ADU development proposed for eastern Pacific Beach by requiring the city to thoroughly analyze its potential impacts, including on Native American artifacts there.

The ruling by Superior Court Judge Katherine Bacal could also lead to more rigorous approvals for other projects with large numbers of accessory dwelling units, or ADUs, that were proposed before the city rolled back a generous incentive in late August.

The injunction, issued Friday, requires city officials to stop processing permits or other approvals for the Pacific Beach project, called Chalcifica, until the city determines how to analyze its impacts.

By Michael Smolens  / San Diego Union-Tribune / December 19, 2025

[Go to original here for links]

It seems there’s hardly anything good to say about reducing homelessness in San Diego these days.

Keep that word “hardly” in mind for a minute.

San Diego’s perpetually stressed rental voucher program faces rent increases for recipients, some of whom are at risk of becoming homeless. Some cities may no longer add people to their years-long voucher waiting lists.

Greater state and local cooperation to clear out encampments on freeway-adjacent property was cheered by some officials. But the subsequent surge in shelter requests was mostly met with a no-room-at-the-inn response at the packed facilities, as reported by Blake Nelson of The San Diego Union-Tribune.

The safe parking program in Encinitas that gives homeless people a place to sleep in their cars may shut down at the end of this month amid a funding dispute.

The prospective rent increases planned by the San Diego Housing Commission are moving forward in anticipation of sweeping Trump administration cuts in homeless and housing programs that have yet to take effect. The other problems are largely independent of those coming reductions.

By Brian White / CBS8 / December 19, 2025

Imagine driving across a busy bridge at night with little to no lighting. That’s the concern one CBS 8 viewer is raising after noticing all the streetlights out on the Sunset Cliffs Boulevard bridge near Ocean Beach.

Lifelong San Diegan Carole Otterstad says she first noticed the problem months ago while driving a route she travels often between Point Loma and Pacific Beach.

“I noticed that it was darker, then all of a sudden realized, ‘Gosh, the lights are not on on the bridge,’ and so then I started paying closer attention to it,” Otterstad said.

Otterstad says she’s filed several “Get It Done” reports with the City of San Diego since November. She says all of the streetlights on the Sunset Cliffs Boulevard bridge over the San Diego River are out. In addition, many lights along the approach from Ingraham Street are not working, and several lighted street signs in the area are dark as well.
She believes the lack of lighting creates a dangerous situation, especially at night.

by Lawrence A. Herzog / Beach & Bay Press / Dec. 21, 2025

San Diego (and southern California) face a watershed moment in our quest to build more affordable housing near the sea. We are in, let us call it, a “zeitgeist design moment,” when intersecting concerns — environmental protection of our precious coastal zone, community character in low- to medium-density beach towns, social justice, and the right of all citizens to housing — collide.

This has created a maelstrom of decision choices that challenge elected officials, planners and designers. A buzzword that continues to pop up in these debates is “density.” How much is acceptable and where?

But, glaringly absent in these conversations about affordable housing, density and land use, is the question of “place.” We cannot look at a new building proposed for a given location merely in terms of its height, floor-area ratio, or the number of affordable units, or even what it looks like from the outside.

We must also consider the larger context, the types of nearby commercial establishments, the scale of existing buildings and homes, and their relation to the street, how people move around, and the mix of land uses, neighborhood institutions, cultural landmarks, and local ecological features — in short, the overall quality of the “place” where a building sits.

By Anonymous 

‘Twas the night before Christmas in San Diego town,
And all through the streets, potholes still could be found.
The meters were standing with QR codes near,
In hopes that a plate number soon would appear.

The trash cans were placed by the curb with great care,
Though fees now were charged just for leaving them there.
The residents nestled all snug in their beds,
While nightmares of parking fees danced in their heads.

By Kate Callen

Paid parking in Balboa Park is scheduled to begin Monday, January 5. If you’re willing to pay standard hourly or daily rates, permit kiosks have been installed, and their operation will be familiar: punch in your license plate number, choose length of visit, and pay with a credit card.

But if you want to use the discounted permits that were promised to San Diego residents, you’ll have to trust that City Hall can roll out a new multi-step system of permit application and payment in just 10 business days – including two city holidays.

In the seasonal spirit of good will, we are going to believe that. For once, the Rag will have faith that Mayor Todd Gloria will fulfill a pledge to the people of San Diego. We’re just not sure how he can pull it off in such a short time.

The original plan was for paid parking to begin in October. But under fire from angry constituents, the City Council decided in mid-September to extend the start date to January 1.

On December 18, we asked the Mayor’s office if another postponement might be in the works. The answer was “No.”

by Dave Schwab / Times of San Diego / Dec. 19, 2025

The battle over the controversial 23-story Vela “Turquoise tower” project in North Pacific Beach could be headed to court.

The development at 970 Turquoise St., which includes both hotel rooms and residential units, with some reserved for low-income residents, has become a poster child for growing opposition to city policies meant to spur dense homebuilding.

But even city officials who have long been advocates for the city’s housing push have sided with local opponents who say the project is out of scale with the neighborhood.

Los Angeles-based developer Kalonymus and its attorneys are now arguing the project should be considered “automatically approved” because the city missed a state deadline meant to expedite housing approvals. Their argument would require the city to issue building permits immediately.

City planners acknowledge that the project has not been approved yet— but they say Kalonymus itself has played a big role in the project’s delay.

By Donna Frye

On December 17th, a city council majority voted to adopt their Legislative Priorities for 2026. Included in those priorities was language specific to Mission Bay Park that supports amending the State Surplus Land Act to exclude Mission Bay Park so it could not be used for housing development.

Their priorities also included supporting “ legislation that would amend the State Surplus Land Act to clarify that not all public land is suitable for housing, particularly where development would conflict with the City Charter or voter-approved measures, including, but not limited to, dedicated public parkland such as Mission Bay Park, Balboa Park, Mission Trails Regional Park, other regional parks, open space, or canyons.”

This is the outcome we all have worked so hard for since July, when we first learned about the issue of surplus land.  At that time, it looked like it might be a done deal since the Land Use and Housing Committee had voted to support it. But we got the matter continued when it went to the city council and here we are- not out of the woods but headed in the right direction.

On Tuesday, December 16, the San Diego City Council approved new updates to community plans of two long term neighborhoods– Clairemont and the College Area. The updates are considered blueprints for development changes over the next 30 years — and both project thousands of new residents to both of the neighborhoods by allowing mid-rise and high-rise housing in more places.

Although approved on the same day by votes of 7–1, the updates were treated differently. The College Area plan slams the community with a projected tripling of the current population to nearly 77,000. U-T reporter David Garrick calls the approach to College as “more aggressive…” Clairemont is projected with a 50% population increase.

Also, as Garrick reported:

The number of housing units in Clairemont would rise by 59%, from 33,300 to 52,800, while the number of units in the College Area would more than quadruple, from 8,200 to 34,000.

By David Garrick / San Diego Union-Tribune / Dec. 17, 2025

San Diego Councilmember Raul Campillo believes asking hard questions and standing up for residents with “inconvenient” beliefs got him kicked off the City Council’s pivotal Land Use and Housing Committee.

Campillo, who was replaced on the committee Wednesday by Councilmember Stephen Whitburn, says he’s being punished for not being a “yes” man and debating too vigorously during meetings.

“Council committee assignments where controversial issues are discussed seem to be reserved for those willing to say ‘yes’ or go along with the program,” Campillo said.

But simply going along with ideas presented by Mayor Todd Gloria’s staff would be a disservice to his constituents and the city, Campillo said.

“Some folks might not like my prosecutorial style or my probative questions,” he said. “Too bad — that’s what many ideas and items around here clearly need.”