OB Rag

Councilwoman Lori Zapf on Thursday, July 21st, introduced the newly-installed police surveillance cameras at a brief news conference held on the greens near the OB Lifeguard Station.

With ranking police officers and OB merchants on both sides of her, Zapf led off the presser before 2 TV cameras, and a handful of protesters opposed to the cameras.

Zapf said that over a year ago, police leaders at Western Division working with her office to come up with safety measures came up with the idea to install ten cameras along OB’s waterfront.

Now they’ve all been placed, from the OB Pier to Dog Beach, and the signs went up just now, Zapf said, and the cameras can now go live.

Emphasizing the cameras were a crime-prevention tool, a deterrent, they’ll make the beach more safe, she said, mentioning that the cameras will bring relief to the tourists worried about being victimized.

Why the cameras? Zapf asked.

By Averi Melcher / San Diego UrbDeZine /June 29, 2016

Last month, I accepted the challenge to camp out for a total of 31 nights between May and September. It’s not for any big campaign or some sort of a contest – just a gentle nudge in the rear to remind you that you don’t have to sail away on a month-long sabbatical to reconnect with nature.

I really think that’s the best way to do it – a night here, a weekend there. Getting out when and wherever you can.

One week ago exactly, the OB Rag began a fund raising campaign – having found ourselves broke.

We set a goal of $1,000 to raise for the week – Friday to Friday.

And wow! Our supporters and readers came through – and we raised nearly $1650 ($1642.50 to be exact) in that week.

That’s two-thirds over our goal!

By Terrie Best – San Diego Americans for Safe Access

The thin-as-air manufacturing case against medical cannabis patient and collective operator, Shaun Smith swept so quickly through trial that before we knew it, Attorney Michael Cindrich had queued up his third cannabis-related not guilty verdict in four months.

The Cindrich winning streak started with defendant John Mazula in El Cajon, moved north to LA and then touched down in San Diego County’s Vista yesterday – surely making waves in District Attorney’s office and changing the landscape for medical cannabis patients.

Editor: This is a continuation of the debate over the future of Fiesta Island. It began with op-eds in the San Diego Union-Tribune, and we helped it along with our earlier post. Here below, Judith Swink rebuts the rebuttals.

By Judith Swink

Improvements on Fiesta Island will happen eventually because they must.

The 1994 Mission Bay Park Master Plan carried forward that intention from the previous master plans. The proposed Fiesta Island improvements will make the island more useful and inviting to a much larger number of people than just those who want to use it as it is today. It is a key tenet of both the Mission Bay Park Master Plan and the California Coastal Act that coastal recreation areas be developed to enable use and access for everyone.

A Local Coastal Program amendment in 2002, in conjunction with approval of the Sea World Master Plan by the Coastal Commission requires the City to develop Fiesta Island as proposed in the 1994 Mission Bay Park Master Plan and LCP.

Two Dollar Thrill Only Shop of Its Kind on Main Commercial Street

By South OB Girl

Newport Avenue has a long history of thrift shops and vintage clothing shops. A history that is decades long.

Some folks are excited for the new coffee shop, OB Beans, opening at 4879 Newport Ave. But some folks are sad that Thrift Trader ended up closing its doors in that location.

Thankfully — two doors down from the old Thrift Trader location is Two Dollar Thrill. Run by the owner of Thrift Trader. Two Dollar Thrill is now the only thrift shop on Newport. Since the thrift shop for animals on Newport also closed its doors this year.

The current location at 4871 Newport — between OB Hardware and The Corner Store –is actually the original location, where Two Dollar Thrill first opened in OB 6 years ago. The larger store at 4879 was part of an attempted expansion.

We Don’t Need Another Gadget

What the world needs now is love… so wrote Hal David in 1965 with music by Burt Bacharach. It was true then and even truer now.

We don’t need another gadget. We don’t need another smartphone. We don’t need another IPO, which only increases the economic divide between the 1% and the 99%.

Economic progress has utterly failed us. It won’t prevent the world going up in flames and/or being flooded out due to global warming. It hasn’t prevented war and violence crowding out every other story on the evening news and getting worse by the day.

Here is the Press Release for a Press Conference on the surveillance cameras installed in Ocean Beach.

OB Crime Fighting Cameras Set to Go Live

What: The City of San Diego has installed cameras in Ocean Beach near the ocean and parking lots to ward off potential criminals. The cameras are on a loop that is not monitored or reviewed unless a crime is reported. This will give law enforcement a valuable crime fighting tool to provide evidence and allow prosecutors to go after criminals to the fullest extent of the law.

When: Thursday, July 21, 2016
11:30 AM

Where: Ocean Beach – at the intersection of Newport Ave and Abbott Street.

Our good friend and photographer, Byron Morton, visited OB’s famous Farmers Market on Newport Avenue and captured some of the good folk who were in attendance – this was last week, July 13th.

See a friend or 2 – give a shout out!

A Good Samaritan by the name of Sean Hanrahan saved a woman after she fell off Sunset Cliffs into the ocean, Tuesday night, July 19th.

Around 8:15 pm at the end of Del Monte Avenue, the woman, with friends, somehow fell from the cliffs into the ocean and was immediately pulled out further by the rip current.

Sean Hanrahan, who lives nearby, saw that the woman apparently having trouble in the waves, and saw her hit her head against rocks. Hanrahan jumped in and kept her afloat until lifeguards arrived.
appeared to be struggling in the water and her head was hitting against the rocks. He jumped in to try and help her before lifeguards arrived to the scene.

By David Helvarg / Blue Notes – Blue Frontier /July 19, 2016

The party conventions are now underway starting with the Republicans in Cleveland to be followed by the Democrats in Philadelphia.

The stark contrasts between presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump: on immigration, education, health care, trade, foreign policy, etc. do not end at the water’s edge where you might also find a Trump resort or golf course.

The ocean has yet to be mentioned on the campaign trail although our organization, Blue Frontier, is coordinating a letter to the candidates from ocean leaders in business, science, conservation, education and other fields that will be sent to the candidates after the conventions.