San Ysidro Has Only 40% Of The Parks They Need, and Sweetwater Union High School Denies Transfer For Student In Eastlake, Despite Promises
By Barbara Zaragoza / SouthBayCompass.com
Chula Vista father wakes up to car painted in obscenities and the N-word
Michael Chen at ABC10News reported that a Navy veteran’s two cars were caked with a chalky film. In the dust, the vandals had written obscenities, the N-word, along with OHS (Olympian High School). Both the man’s children attend OHS. The cars had hundreds of dollars in repairs. Apparently, in mid-March police said there was “an ongoing concern — a series of arrests and other cases linking Olympian High and other high school students in thefts, vandalism and burglaries.”
San Ysidro Has Only 40% Of Parks Needed
Councilman David Alvarez hosted a community rally in front of a Beyer Boulevard empty lot. The space should have become a park 15 years ago. Joe Little at News10 reported that Alvarez wants $300,000 in next year’s budget to have the park completed by 2017.
Chula Vista Bond Measures
For those of you interested in following more about bond measures that may be on our November ballots, Focus on Chula Vista is writing a series on bond measures. This week, he explains that bonds are basically huge loans. “Often, the very same people who will get the contracts are the ones who pay for the marketing of the new bonds.” Once a bond is passed, there’s no telling if the money will be mismanaged or spent appropriately.
It’s a quandary, isn’t it? We need bond measures to repair and keep our communities healthy, but we never know if the individuals managing the money will do it effectively. So how do we vote?
For Eleventh Consecutive Year, CV libraries are non-compliant
Chula Vista Library has a half-million-dollar deck planned. For several years, the GMOC has reported that the Chula Vista Public Library is in dire need of renovations. In 2015 they wrote in their report, “For the eleventh consecutive year, Libraries is non-compliant. The Libraries Strategic Facilities Plan approved by City Council last April confirmed that a minimum of 500 square feet of library space per 1,000 residents is the standard that the City should be using, yet the City’s library square footage continues to be grossly low, with a deficit of more than 30,000 square feet and growing.”
Unfortunately, the city has not dedicated the funds to our public libraries. Now, according to the Chula Vista Star News, Mayor Casillas Salas has at least a partial solution. She wants an outside deck that reaches from the windows to cover the driveway. The estimated cost is $600,000 and will be built entirely from fundraising efforts.
More Smart & Finals
Smart & Final‘s are cropping up in the South Bay, filling the spaces after the recent Hagens bankruptcy. One Smart & Final had a ribbon cutting ceremony in the Terra Nova Shopping Center on East H Street in Chula Vista.
Oh, if only the Albertson’s owner would lease the property at San Miguel Ranch, rather than keep it closed. As News10 Joe Little reported as far back as October 2015, apparently the owner keeps the property empty so that customers will shop at the nearby Vons, which he also owns. Small businesses in San Miguel Ranch, however, are suffering because the large building remains an eye-sore and, therefore, people would rather take their business elsewhere. Is this really what capitalism is all about?
SUHSD Denies Transfer For Student In Eastlake Despite Promises
The Sweetwater Union High School District approved changes to attendance boundaries last January. Since then, parents West of the I-125 have been upset that their children will have to attend Bonita Vista Middle & High School rather than Eastlake Middle & High School. They say they paid Mello Roos for Eastlake and their children should be able to go there. Realtors have launched a petition, saying housing prices in that area may decrease.
This week, the upset continued at Next-door. Although the SUHSD at a community meetings on March 15th “told us in in Eastlake Shores and Hills that if we live in a CFD/mello-roos area, then we will have priority consideration to transfer into ELM AND EHS with 99% certainty of getting in,” one angry father posted on April 7th that his daughter received a transfer denial despite that promise.
Some Disturbing Events This Week Around The South Bay
- A woman who had been on probation started a fire at a rehabilitation home in Palm City (South San Diego). Firefighters rescued a man trapped in a back room and the American Red Cross had to relocate displaced residents. Investigators estimated that the damages were about $120,000 and the woman was taken to Las Colinas women’s jail in Santee. She was then charged with arson and may face nine years and eight months in prison if convicted. (Imperial Beach Patch)
- On Easter Sunday, a mother laid out Easter eggs for her down-syndrome son and then went to church. Upon the family’s return, all the eggs on the front lawn had been stolen. The father caught the pilferer on tape — who wore a hat and returned more than once to take the eggs. Neighbors were so surprised at the robbery, they held a special Easter Egg Hunt for the boy. (Fox 5 News)
Good News Too, Including For Our Mexico Neighbor
- On a happy about humanity note: the Imperial Beach Neighborhood Watch Group had a member post the following: “Thank you to the homeless man named Dave who found my husbands wallet on Palm and brought it to our home with nothing missing from inside.”
- Tijuana is getting an upscale face lift with the opening of Estacion Federal, a mixed-use compound housed in an abandoned 1950s structure. It’s all within a 10-minute walk of the San Ysidro pedestrian border crossing. (San Diego Magazine)
- Baja California’s secretary of economic development at the World Forum for Foreign Direct Investment said he wanted to develop infrastructure in the region. The current potentials include: a desalination plant in Rosarito Beach, a cargo airport outside Ensenada and an expansion of Ensenada’s seaport. (San Diego Union Tribune)
- City Beat is calling Chula Vista’s Third Avenue the next 30th Street. Two more breweries are set to open, including 3 Punk Ales and Chula Vista Brewery. To continue the #SouthBayRising, Chula Vista is hosting 20 local breweries on May 14th at an “Avenue Amps & Ales“.
CV Community Group Crossroads II came out with their 4-page annual report
Their summary statement focused on land-use and taxes. They wrote, “Crossroads II believes that over the last several decades, the Chula Vista City Councils have mismanaged the affairs of Chula Vista, particularly with respect to land-use issues… Chula Vista City Councils have consistently encouraged more land devoted to residential and less land available for commercial and industrial. We have become a giant “bedroom community.”
On taxes they said, “Because of the lack of commercial development, Chula Vista is second from the bottom in terms of sales-tax revenues per resident in San Diego County. And the Council continues to switch zonings from ‘commercial‘ to ‘residential‘ unabated.”
Two Book Events I’m Touting
On Saturday, April 16th from 11-Noon, the San Ysidro Civic Center (212 W. Park Avenue) will host author Gilda Salinas who will talk about her book Out of the Shadows: Sex Trafficking Awareness about prostitution in Mexico.
You may also remember Patricia Maxwell’s great articles in January about the Great Flood of 1916. She’ll be signing copies of her book When Rain Comes at the Chula Vista Civic Center Library on Monday, April 18 at 6pm. Angelo Miranda will also be playing ragtime music.
***North of the Fence will not appear next week. Instead, I’ll be spending all week on the South Bay primaries.