OB Rag

Submitted by Gilbert Field

The “Compassion Campaign” of the San Diego Veterans For Peace is again giving out free sleeping bag sets to the many homeless folks downtown who have no sleeping gear whatsoever. Each set consists of a new Coleman polyester sleeping bag and a nice nylon stuff sack to put it in when the client wakes up each morning.

Three (3) outreach trips took place in the last two weeks and they gave out 60 bag sets to folks who they personally confirmed had nothing at all to sleep under in these colder temperatures. Another outreach trip is scheduled soon, and they hope many, many more trips downtown at night will follow this winter, based on the continued support of the generous folks in San Diego.

The new trolley does not go to the beach or La Jolla. What it does do is to impact surrounding neighborhoods.

By Michael Pallamary / Op-Ed San Diego Union-Tribune / December15, 2021

I relocated to San Diego in 1976 to work on what was then a political hot potato — engineering the so-called “Tijuana Trolley.” I moved here because of my expertise as a railroad engineer, in Boston, where I was responsible for the field engineering and layout of many essential elements of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, one of the nation’s oldest rapid transit systems dating back to 1897.

By Kathy Blavatt

Happy birds make for a Happy Holiday Season. Pelicans, seagulls, and cormorants dance among the shore-break, diving and feasting on critters in the floating kelp.

Ocean Beach’s front yard is an ocean garden full of kelp, seaweed, and seagrass. Like any garden, it is brimming the small critters hiding and feasting on the plants. The larger animals eat them and so on. The food chain continues.

Our deeper water kelp bed forests are vital to the health of the ocean and animal life.

Residents on Abbott Street in OB have been complaining for a long time about broken and non-working street lights. At least for a year.

Neighbors are worried about crime and accidents at night on the darkened street.

Take Jon Carr, for instance. The Abbott Street resident and former vice-president of the OB Town Council (and former Rag writer) told News8 that he’s filed many complaints on the city’s “Get It Done” app and has written Councilmember Campbell’s office about his complaints and concerns. He’s been told more than once that they’re ‘get back’ to him.

The street light at the intersection of Newport and Cable found no shelter. Photo by Cassidy Elyse, reposted from Social OB facebook.

On Wednesday, December 15, the volunteer San Diego Redistricting Commission decided by a 7-2 vote on the final map of the city council boundaries (which we previewed the other day).

The big, “dramatic” changes for District 2 are that Pacific Beach joins District 1, and District 2 takes the eastern half of Clairemont and Old Town. Unless something happens – like a comet – this will remain and be official for the next ten years. Although, the city is now in a 30-day period where residents can raise objections before the map becomes official.

Other changes:

By Edwin Decker

Dear Ed, I have 3 or 4 friends that are Grammar Nazis. If I dare spell, “there” as “their,” they’re there to call you a dumb ass. Obviously, I know the difference. I’m just texting or emailing quickly and not thinking. And half of these people end up having terrible grammar themselves. Ok, maybe they have good spelling, but they’ll write, “How are you!!!!” which makes me want to respond, “You should end that sentence in a question mark, not an exclamation point. And why multiple exclamation points? Is a piano falling on your head?” So my question is, Do any spelling and/or punctuation things get to you?

Josh Board
Movie Reviewer
KOGO 600 AM

Editordude: “Save Our Access,” the group that brought the lawsuit to block the implementation of Measure E, the lifting of the 30-foot height limit in the Midway District, responds here to the recent court ruling in their favor.

Regarding the 30′ Height limit lawsuit

Save Our Access brought the lawsuit because of how the city asked the public to lift the 30′ height. Established law says that an Environmental Impact Report must be made that includes public participation when major changes to a neighborhood plan is made. The city failed to do that.

A voter-approved ballot measure lifting the 30-foot building height limit in the Midway District was improperly placed on the November 2020 ballot and cannot be implemented, San Diego Superior Court Judge Katherine Bacal said in her final ruling last week.

Bacal said the city of San Diego should not have asked voters to remove the 30-foot coastal height limit in the Midway area on the 2020 ballot finalizing a tentative ruling that throws a major city redevelopment effort into limbo.

The vote on Measure E lifted the height limit in the entire Midway area,

By Eric DuVall / Point Loma – OB Monthly / Dec. 13, 2021

What do you know about the OB tree? It always leans to the left … right? Well, that would depend on your vantage point. Or what side of the (chain link) fence you’re on.

But all that aside, the Ocean Beach community Christmas tree is greeting its 41st consecutive season this year, and its preposterous, zany and improbable history is certainly something to celebrate.

By Colleen O’Connor

If you are reading this column, you will “bigly” appreciate the best Christmas gift ever. A book.

Not just any book, but one that draws you into the joys of the season, the thrill of holding a new pages containing amazing mysteries and adventures inside; and the ability to share it so it lives on, past anyone’s lifespan.

In short, a treasure. A genuine heirloom. And a timely antidote for any complaints.

The Gifts of Reading is an engrossing collection of short essays by some of the world’s finest and most celebrated writers. Their international prizes won are too long to list here.

Originally posted Dec. 14, 2021
There are 5 remaining redevelopment teams bidding to take on San Diego’s 48 acres of city-owned land around the sports arena in Midway District. Proposals from the Panacea Group and Cotterkey Investments were deemed not responsive and have been eliminated.

The developer groups are going for a longterm ground lease for the city’s real estate holdings at 3500, 3250, 3220 and 3240 Sports Arena Blvd. These include San Diego’s sports arena — the long-time home of the San Diego Gulls. Bidders are supposed to be submitting site redevelopment plans with a new or improved sports arena, and withat least 25 percent of proposed housing units for lower-income families.