OB Rag

City Council Decision on December 12th Will Decide Future of Ocean Beach and Other Coastal Communities

If San Diego City Councilmembers from inland districts get their way and legalize short term vacation rentals with hardly any restrictions, coastal neighborhoods like Ocean Beach will be inundated with a flood of new such rentals. And it could have a devastating impact on OB, uprooting the sparse housing stock and turning entire sections of the community into “Airbnb Beach”.

The City Council meets on Tuesday, December 12th, and come hell or high water, will make policy on vacation rentals that day.

By Cynthia Wootton and Angela Deegan / SanDiego350

A recent presentation by Dr. Veerabhadran Ramanathan of UCSD’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography on climate change held locally (at the San Diego City Council Environment Committee meeting), made us wonder what climate change might look like here in San Diego County.

Typically, weather events will conform to two characteristics of climate change: more extreme and, generally, more frequent weather events.

Heat Spells

With climate change, “heat spells increase in temperature, frequency and duration, while cold spells decrease.”

The numbers of vacation rentals in Ocean Beach don’t look good.

Numbers compiled by the group Save San Diego Neighborhoods were announced at the recent rally against short term vacation rentals in OB – and the crowd was not pleased.

For the month of October, OB had 387 total AirBNB listings (source AirDNA from October) and of these, 325 were listed as whole units.

The same month, VRBO had 212 listings (source VRBO).

A couple of smaller sites, such as Nancy with 6 (source her website) and Jonah Mechanic with 6 add to the total (neither Nancy or Jonah list on AirBNB because they have their own sites).

So we have a total of

Volunteers to pack and deliver boxes and wrap gifts join in the magic of the OB Holidays during the “Season of Love !”

From OBTC:

OB Food & Toy Drive

The OB Food and Toy Drive – coordinated by the Ocean Beach Town Council – provides assistance to over 90 local families and seniors in need during the holidays. The OBTC partners with community groups and volunteers to package a week’s worth of groceries, care packages and new gifts and toys for those in need of help during the holidays.

Park Committee Votes to Advance Draft Plan that Fails to Address Sea Level Rise to EIR Process

Edited from San Diego Audubon Society:

At the Mission Bay Park Committee hearing held on Tuesday, December 5th, a divided Mission Bay Park Committee narrowly approved a plan for the redevelopment of De Anza Cove over objections from hundreds of community members. The Park Committee took action to approve “alternative 2,” which forwards the plans to a formal environmental review process with the City.

Representatives from San Diego Audubon joined Campland on the Bay, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and California State Coastal Conservancy in opposing the two proposed alternative plans offered by the City of San Diego.

By Beau Grosscup,

We have seen it coming.

Starting in 2009, the massacres at Virginia Tech, Binghamton, N.Y, Foot Hood, TX, Sandy Hook, Conn, Washington D.C, Charleston, SC, San Bernardino, CA and Orlando FL along with many ‘minor’ shootings too numerous to list, provided strong evidence that American society was becoming a ‘soft target’ for domestic terrorists. The Las Vegas and Sutherland Springs, Texas massacres, that combined killed 111 and wounded 509 people, confirm it.

The Ocean Beach Planning Board meets Wednesday, December 6th, and by the looks of it, the agenda is full of controversy – but no development projects. The Board meets at the OB Rec Center at 6pm.

First of all, the Board will determine if it has to take action against a Board member, Richard Aguirre, for his multiple absences. According to the Board bylaws, if a member misses sufficient meetings without cause, he or she can be suspended or removed.

Restaurant Review –

To The Point
4161 Voltaire Street
San Diego, CA 92107
619-226-6222

The one thing that really impressed me when I ate at To the Point several years ago was the slices of cucumber in their drinking water. I remember at the time it tasted so refreshing that to this day I still add a slice or two in my own water at home. But is pretty much all that I remembered from my eating there then so didn’t know what to expect this time.

Today two of the widow’s from my support group – Candy and Irene – and I got together to have lunch, and I had been asked just this morning if I had had a meal at this restaurant. She told me that the Chef had been changed; the service was better, and the menu and food was very good. I had no trouble deciding where we would go after we met at 11:00am. … Yes. The restaurant has really changed.

Back during the halcyon days of the Obama administration, political scientists Martin Gilens of Princeton University and Benjamin I. Page of Northwestern University published a seminal study on American democracy that illustrated that:

Despite the seemingly strong empirical support in previous studies for theories of majoritarian democracy, our analyses suggest that majorities of the American public actually have little influence over the policies our government adopts. .

Better late than never. Here are some great photos of the OB Holiday Parade – “California Dreamin'”. Most are by Adam Ewing and a couple by Joe Ewing [no relation].

The meeting on what some call the “City’s flawed De Anza plans” is about to happen, as the City presents its proposals before the Mission Bay Park Committee on Tuesday, December 5, at Mission Bay High School, at 6pm (2475 Grand Avenue, San Diego 92109).

This is a continuation of the meeting originally scheduled for November 7th but which was cancelled at the very last minute.

The OB Rag was waving the flag at the time trying to get the attention of OBceans and Point Lomans to get involved in planning in OB’s neglected “side yard” – Mission Bay, “It’s time for Ocean Beach and Point Loma to pay attention to Mission Bay“. Important decisions are coming right up – and they will affect everyone in the surrounding communities.

Why now?

Is the City Council about to make OB’s “Gateway Park” part of Mission Bay Park?

You know, that small slice of land that used to be a pizza place off to your right as you drive into OB on Sunset Cliffs Boulevard? This little park has a history of its own controversies – but now it’s besieged by yet another.

On the docket at the San Diego City Council