OB Rag

May is National Bike Month. This will be celebrated in Ocean Beach, as what other community is so stoked on biking?

There are several events around the City throughout the month of May for avid and amateur cyclists alike. (If you know of an event not listed below, please add it in the comment section.)

May 7 (Today): National Bike to School Day

This is pretty self-explanatory. Be on the lookout for kids of all ages riding their bikes in the morning and afternoon, and help by sharing the road.

by Lois Lane

Why do we live here, when the streets are dug up, the sidewalks are dirty, and we are overwhelmed with people some other people don’t want here?

It all turns on the beach, of course.

Our hearts do not belong in Penasquitos. All of Ocean Beach is beautiful, and so is Sunset Cliffs – a designated national and endangered treasure.

If you attend the Sunset Cliffs Natural Park Council meetings the first Monday of every month, you will hear more about how we keep the cliffs from eroding if we can, and how the trails project will enhance the experience for park-goers.

Failed Program Has Drowned Dozens of Dolphins and Now San Diego Civilian

By Rick Trout / May 6, 2014

The recent drowning of Navy dolphin worker/Science Application International Corp. employee, 29 year old Coll Perske, during nighttime rehearsals for deployment of American dolphins into Black Sea waters near Ukraine’s turbulent coast is made even more tragic knowing that Congress tried to eliminate this ill-conceived program in 1992.

Poway Student Organizes High School Proms Away From SeaWorld Zach Affolter is a young San Diego area activist in support of Orcas held by SeaWorld. …

The 66th Annual Ocean Beach Kiwanis Kite Festival and Craft Fair Is Saturday, May 10th!

Film night at The Green Store Documents Harvey Milk – Thursday, May 8th at 7 pm

Worker Trapped by Overturned Crane on Point Loma A man is in the hospital with serious injuries after the crane he was operating tipped over while lifting a cargo load ….

Judge to rule on De Anza Cove settlement Tuesday
From KPBS: This week San Diego could see an end to the legal battle over removing a mobile home development from Mission Bay Park. …

and much more …

Adapting to a Changing Ocean: The Future of Our Beaches

Falk Feddersen researches the implications of sea-level rise on our beaches.

By Mario C. Aguilera / Scripps Institute of Oceanography / May 02, 2014

Falk Feddersen is an acting professor of coastal physical oceanography at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego. His studies on various aspects of coastal and nearshore oceanography—spanning waves, currents, turbulence, and biological processes— have helped further the scientific understanding of how pollution moves across coastlines. His research includes instrument development, observations, theory, modeling, and extensive field work. He received his Ph.D. from Scripps in 1999.

What is your role in researching sea-level rise and its implications?

I study how waves come into the beach, break, and dissipate their energy, as well as how sand moves from the top of the beach all the way out to many hundreds of yards offshore. The processes that I’m studying happen on time scales anywhere from an hour to a couple of months. The time scale for sea-level rise is, of course, much longer than this—on the order of decades to a century. With climate change there is also very likely going to be increased storms and wave activity, which is going to act to reconfigure the beach much more strongly than is happening right now, along with sea-level rise.

159 Tornadoes, 35 Deaths as Torrential Rain and Flash Floods Pound East, South and Midwest

By John Lawrence / San Diego Free Press

The last week in April saw extreme weather over as much as half the nation. Over 20 states were affected. In some places a month’s worth of rain fell in a day. In New York City there was close to 5 inches of rain in one day. In Pensacola, FL there was over 20 inches of rain in 24 hours, 6 inches in one hour alone, more rain than Los Angeles saw all last year. More rain fell in Pensacola than during Hurricane Ivan. There were nearly 6000 lightning strikes in fifteen minutes. First responders rescued people in boats. Roads and bridges collapsed.

By Ernie McCray

A couple of years ago at a showing of “Sing Your Song,” a documentary that highlights Harry Belafonte’s role in pursuits for human and civil rights, I met Ben Kamin, a scholar who has written much about the social struggles of those times. I just finished reading, with delight, his latest book, “Dangerous Friendship.”

The book puts the spotlight on Stanley Levison, a little known figure in the civil rights movement, who fully dedicated his life to helping Martin Luther King.

Regarding this man, Clarence Jones, another prominent aide to Martin, says “I am extremely upset, and I get angry, 24/7, and have been for many years about the glaring omission of the name and history of Stanley Levison in the civil rights chronicle.”

We all need to cut our neighbors some slack, even if they’re urban chicken farmers.

By Jill Richardson / OtherWords

I met my friend Rachel because we were both in the same situation: We each had neighbors who inexplicably hated our chickens. Rachel and I each had small flocks of hens, no roosters, and sprawling, fertile, organic vegetable gardens in our yards. And we live in urban San Diego.

There certainly are reasons you might complain about chickens living next door in the city. If they’re noisy, smelly, or unhygienic, that’s a problem. If their owners let them escape into your yard, that’s a problem.

And I’m guessing that you might not like glancing out your window to behold your neighbor killing chickens in the back yard, either.

Here is the agenda for Wednesday’s – May 7 – meeting of the OB Planning Board. Peter Ruscitti is the new Chair and John Ambert the new vice-chair. This is the monthly meeting of the Board, and it meets at 6pm sharp in the meeting room at the OB Recreation Center, 4726 Santa Monica Avenue.

Action Item No. 2 is the second appearance and presentation/ vote on the Brito project at 4626 Cape May Avenue. The owner-applicant is proposing to build a new residence over an existing garage – and they wish to maintain the front 1298 square foot residence, and construct a new residence with 1220 square feet over the detached garage, which is 704 square feet.

(Sixth in a series)

By Cara Wilson-Granat

This is the sixth in a series of ten in which we meet one of the San Diego 10 orcas and hear from an advocate who continues to be one of the voices of these imprisoned voiceless, never stopping until the whole world listens.

This week’s Advocate is Steve Christianson. After reading about Prisoner #6, Shouka, please scroll down this article and “meet” one of the top San Diego 10 Prisoner Advocates. [Here is Prisoner Orca Profile #1 and #2, #3 ,4 and #5 .]

Prisoner #6: Shouka

Age: 21

Imagine living in quiet desperation in solitary confinement for 10 YEARS. Pretty horrendous, right? The crime for such enforced aloneness? Nothing more than being held captive by those who considered her merely a source of entertainment and breeding opportunity for them. Nothing else. Just a money commodity. That’s Shouka’s story–the first orca to be born at Marineland in Antibes, France on February 25, 1993.

By Jim Miller

Last week, May Day came and went and, while there was a small march downtown, most people barely noticed. Indeed most Americans don’t know much about May Day and if they do, they associate it with the state sponsored holiday in the former Soviet Union.

The truth of the matter is, however, that May Day has deep American roots. It started in 1866 as part of the movement pushing for the 8-hour day.

As historian Jacob Remes reminds us:

The demand for an eight-hour day was about leisure, self-improvement and freedom, but it was also about power. When Eight Hour Leagues agitated for legislation requiring short hours, they were demanding what had never before happened: that the government regulate industry for the advantage of workers.

By Bob Dorn / San Diego Free Press

Aren’t we really just being chumps for weather reports?

Last week was hell. I tuned in every night to the weather forecasts, and that for me IS hell; all that almost-innocent T&A, witless humor and mirthless studio laughter, chartreuse simulations of doppler radar defining drizzle somewhere I don’t live, the pictures of puppies being sprayed in the back yard… these people get paid to do this stuff.

(I’ll bet the guys who managed to choose ‘lectric chartreuse don’t get paid as much as the on-air hooters and hootees do.)

These people are all over the map, without a weather map.

Let’s get to the 7-day summary.