OB Rag

By Matt Brower

I am challenging Gary Kreep in the upcoming November election for Seat 37 – California Superior Court Judge. This race stands out as the only one of six county-wide races from the June primary to advance to the general election in November. No matter where you live in San Diego County this race will appear on your ballot.

I began running for this seat when I saw the Commission on Judicial Performance had censured Judge Kreep in August of 2017 for committing over two dozen violations of the Cannons on Judicial Ethics that govern the behavior of judges in our local courts. Though these ethical violations were varied the ones that caught my attention were those involving unprofessional and disrespectful treatment toward women and minorities in court by Judge Kreep.

Apparently, after all the dust-up, the Sunset Cliffs Street Fair is still on for Saturday, September 1. Although, it will scaled back, according to local writer, Judi Curry.

Judi sent us the following:

There have been many rumors about this event. I have talked to the City Planners, Officer Lavelle, Richard Aguirre, and others and here is what I found:

Since this is a “first time event” it has been scaled down from the original plan. Sunset Cliffs Blvd. will not be closed off; only the 4700 block of Pt. Loma Avenue will be closed from Ebers to the east side of Sunset Cliffs.

Unfortunately, we predicted it back in February that big changes were coming to the 4800 block of Voltaire Street in north Ocean Beach. And it looks like they are. We predicted that somebody could come in and purchase both Jim Bell’s old house and the old Dover Plumbing building – and make way for a huge complex.

It’s happened. The city has posted notices that Jim Bell’s former house at 4862 Voltaire and the former Dover Plumbing at 4870 will both be demolished, to make way for a 3-story mixed use building, with 10 residential units and near 3,000 square feet of commercial space.

UPDATE: Long Range Planning sub-committee meeting set for Aug. 29 has been cancelled.

It appears that the Peninsula planners’ sub-committee meeting on the Famosa property scheduled for Wednesday, Aug. 29, is in doubt. The board’s Long Range Planning sub-committee was due to begin a discussion of possible additional action items to be recommended to the full board about the Housing Commission Project and/or other alternatives for the Famosa site.

After an outcry from certain quarters of the Peninsula about a “lack of notice” for the meeting, Board chair Robert Goldyn questioned whether the action item regarding the property ought not to be cancelled. In an emailed shared with a number of people, Goldyn stated:

by Frank Gormlie

50 years ago today, the Democratic Party was in the midst of holding its 1968 national convention in the city of Chicago. While hundreds of party delegates met in the steamy convention hall to hammer out who was to be the nominee. Thousands of anti-war demonstrators had converged on the city, an armed camp.

50 years ago today, I was 20 years ago and living with my 19-year old spouse, Susan, in a small, one-bedroom cottage on Brighton Avenue in Ocean Beach.

By Michael Steinberg/ Blackrain Press

Nuclear Shutdown News chronicles the decline and fall of the nuclear power industry in the US and abroad, and highlights the efforts of those working to create a nuclear free world. Here is our August 2018 report.

More Scandals Rock San Onofre

The eighth month of the year saw additional scandals erupt at Southern California’s San Onofre nuclear plant, which has been shut down since 2013.

Another potentially catastrophic accident occurred, a previously unknown whistleblower spoke out,

By Ernie McCray

I began this writing a day after one of the president’s thuggish friends, a man who led his campaign, was found guilty of several counts of fraud, and his personal lawyer and “fixer” pleaded guilty to illegal payments under his direction.

I waited a day to see how the Republicans in the Senate and the House would react, foolishly holding out that they would finally say “Enough” to the lunacy coming out of the West Wing of the White House – considering that the clock should have run out on his presidency months ago.

And all they’ve done so far is claim that a sitting president can’t be indicted when, whether that is true or not, they have the power to take him down. Like they could impeach the sordid clown.

By Huiying B Chan / Daily Kos

Wildfires continue to ravage California. Instead of hiring firefighters to put out the fires, the government is turning to incarcerated people for labor. More than 3,400 prisoners risk their lives every day to tackle the wildfires. While the average California firefighter earns $74,000 plus benefits annually, imprisoned people are paid as little as $2 a day. By relying on prison labor, California avoids spending $80 to $100 million a year.

On Saturday, Aug. 25, the Ocean Beach Town Council partied. It was their 50th anniversary – and the celebration rocked the patio of Newbreak Church.

Local bands played, pizzas from Pizza Port and SurfRider were the menu, draft beer from the OB Brewery was on tap – and raffle prizes were handed out.

President Marcus Turner got the ball rolling with welcomes and intros; past presidents Dave Martin and Gretchen Newsom were on hand, and Councilwoman Lorie Zapf joined the fun – and stayed quite a while.

The infamous Mike James gave an inspiring speech. Happy Birthday was sung and a delicious birthday cake was carved up and dished out.

A federal judge last week ordered San Diego police to temporarily stop ticketing homeless people living in their vehicles. Sitting in San Diego, U.S. District Judge Anthony Battaglia issued the injunction until he makes a final ruling in a case brought to court by a class-action suit by a group of disabled homeless people living in recreational vehicles.

They filed the suit last year against the law, which they claim is discriminatory, with the help of the Disability Rights California and The National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty. In his order issued August 21, Battaglia called the city ordinance that prohibits people for living inside vehicles too vague

It shouldn’t be news to readers of the OB Rag that life here under the perfect sun isn’t always so easy, particularly for working people. Indeed, as a Bloomberg report outlined last May, “The gap between the have and have-nots in San Diego was the ninth-highest out of 100 cities between 2011 to 2016.”

As usual, this report received not much more than a shrug in the place where happy happens as we were too busy spectacularly failing to address our shameful homelessness crisis yet again while the supply of high-end condos downtown and elsewhere continues to grow. So it goes.

It’s the same old story over and over again here–and everywhere else.

According to a new ranking by a food website, The Daily Meal , San Diego has seven of the top 50 burritos in America. Wow!

On top of that, two local OB and Point Loma burritos made it to their “Top 10”.

Here is what they say: