OB Rag

Trump’s Supreme Court nominee could enact revenge against the EPA

By David Helvarg / Sierra Feb 1 2017

Neil Gorsuch, who won the rose from Donald Trump as one of two finalists for a Supreme Court nomination, is a deeply conservative choice in the mold of the late Antonio Scalia.

He is also the poisoned fruit of a partisan refusal to hold confirmation hearings on Judge Merrick Garland, who was President Obama’s nominee for Scalia’s vacant seat. That constitutional hostage drama played out very well for the hostage takers.

If Gorsuch is confirmed (something that the Sierra Club and groups across the progressive movement have vowed to prevent), his ascendance to the nation’s highest court might also play out as a family revenge-drama against U.S. environmental laws.

Ocean Beach’s own hostel has just won three global awards by the industry’s international association HOSCAR.

Owned and run by USA Hostels, Ocean Beach ranked best in the world in 3 categories. The 15th annual HOSCAR awards, which celebrates the best hostels around the globe just came out. The awards are based on travelers’ reviews of hostels in countries around the world, and this year’s are reportedly based on one million reviews.

The OB hostel won the following awards:

From City Heights Town Hall to Airport Protest

By Anna Daniels / San Diego Free Press

“Tell me what democracy looks like!”

“This is what democracy looks like!”

The chant ran up and down the whole length of Terminal 2 of San Diego’s Lindbergh Airport, up and down the opposite side of the terminal and could be heard on the second floor walkway. Three lines of cars ran between the two and those cars honked their horns while passengers waved flags and held signs outside of the windows.

This incredible shot of an incredible wave hitting the OB Pier, by OB’s own Joe Ewing, was taken – as close to he can recall – around Valentine’s Day, 2010.

Grok these photos from the San Diego Yoga Festival held last weekend in Ocean Beach. They were taken by Melanie Williams, one of the key organizers of the event.

Come Out to Love Your Wetlands Day 2017

Come on out to the eleventh annual “Love Your Wetlands Day” which will be held on February 4, 2017 from 9am till 4pm.

This means enjoying the Kendall-Frost/Northern Wildlife Reserve in the northeast corner of Mission Bay Park – it’s the only remaining saltwater wetland in Mission Bay and is normally closed to the public due to its fragile nature.

The Reserve is at 2055 Pacific Beach Drive in Pacific Beach.

Lost Opportunity to “Grill” Director Vacchi Over 30-Foot Height Enforcement

By Geoff Page

I want to relate some observations and opinions about the 30-foot height discussion and the sorry appearance of Robert Vacchi, Director of the Development Services Department (DSD), at the January 19 monthly meeting of the Peninsula Community Planning Board (PCPB). I wrote a report of the meeting that appeared in the OB Rag last week but that report was an attempt at an objective account of the meeting; my opinions, and I have a few, were held in check.

Let me start my piece with a little background. Recently, the editor of the OB Rag drafted me into his informal and diverse staff to provide regular reporting on the Midway and Peninsula monthly planning board meetings. To his credit, the editor is making a real effort to provide as much news as he can about the community around us, if he can manage to cajole enough folks to help. The main focus is OB, of course, and Point Loma, but also beyond.

By TG Branfalt / Ganjapreneur

San Diego California’s city council unanimously voted to allow adult-use cannabis sales at the cities current 15 medical dispensaries once the voter-backed program is fully implemented, the San Diego Union-Tribune reports. Officials also indicated they would consider regulations later this year that would permit commercial cannabis cultivation, testing, and distribution.

A “sunset clause” is included in the measure, which requires the council to vote whether or not to allow cultivation within nine months.

By David Helvarg / The Progressive

As a coastal developer, Donald Trump has bulldozed ancient sand dunes and opposed offshore wind turbines (because they “ruined the view”) in Scotland, sought to build seawalls and fill in (smother) seagrass meadows and coral reefs in Florida, and built golf club luxury homes on a geologically unstable bluff in California where the eighteenth hole had earlier fallen into the sea.

Myron Ebell, the man Trump tapped to oversee the transition team at the Environmental Protection Agency, is a well-known climate-change denier from the libertarian (and partly fossil fuel funded) Competitive Enterprise Institute. In the past he’s worked as the D.C. lobbyist for Chuck “Rent-a-Riot” Cushman, one of the more extreme leaders of the Wise Use movement of the 1990s. Ebell also promoted “safer cigarettes” (the “clean coal” of our lungs) with funding from Philip Morris.

Today, January 31st, the San Diego City Council will vote on a proposal involving recreational marijuana, that allows recreational marijuana sales, but would ban commercial and restrict personal cultivation and testing for safety and potency.

In response to the proposed ban, the Ocean Beach Planning Board wrote the City Council members to express their positions and concerns.

The Ocean Beach Planning Board holds its monthly meeting this Wednesday, February 1st. The meeting begins at 6pm and is held in the community meeting room of the OB Recreation Center, 4726 Santa Monica Avenue.

COME INSIDE FOR THE OFFICIAL AGENDA

Trevor Tice, the founder of a yoga fitness empire, whose death in December at his Point Loma mansion initially thought by police to be “suspicious”, accidentally inflicted serious injuries on himself in a number of falls and collapses. His death has been ruled an accident by the San Diego County Medical Examiner in a report released January 26th.

Tice, whose body was found by police December 12th at his house at 952 Cornish Drive, died of head injuries after several drunken falls inside his multi-million dollar home it was concluded. After testing, he was found to have been very intoxicated with a blood-alcohol level of .20 percent and had taken a benzodiazepine — a tranquilizer like Valium and other antidepressant drugs.