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The Needed Fix For Our Broken Political-Economic System

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By Frank Thomas

I admire Bernie’s outspoken, honest portrayal of the breakdown of our egalitarian democracy – “a government of, for and by the people” – by a corrupt, immoral plutocratic political-economic ESTABLISHMENT threatening the very existence of our democracy. I was appalled by David Brooks’ disingenuous critique of Bernie’s call for a ‘political revolution’- systemic reform for a systemically broken, money corrupted governance. Brooks beguilingly discredits Bernie’s bold ideas in the recent article, Livin’ Bernie Sanders’s Danish Dream.

Brooks conservative polemic is the standard ‘Bernie is neither realistic nor pragmatic’ brainwashing line that Hillary, Republican presidential candidates, Tea Party people, and media are all chanting in a no-holds-barred attempt to degrade Bernie’s candidacy for the presidency. Brooks parrots the Washington Post’s editorial theme, Bernie Sanders’s Fiction-Filled Campaign.   [Read more…]

Readers Write: Assess Risks Before Reducing Charter School Permitting Requirements

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By Justin DeCesare

Recently, current 7th District City Councilman Scott Sherman released a brief description of a measure he intends to champion that is meant to speed the permitting process for charter schools attempting to open throughout the city.

The Conditional Use Permits (CUPs) charter schools need to obtain in order to open a facility are in place in order to ensure the city is making a proper land use decision as to whether or not the school itself is in a viable location.

As this proposal makes its way through the city decision-making process, it’s imperative we look at the ramifications far beyond just talking points and rhetoric about how the permitting process is unfair.   [Read more…]

On Moral Courage: By The Recipient Of The Award

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[Editor’s Note: Richard Lawrence received the Moral Courage Award during the Martin Luther King Jr. Breakfast at the Kroc Center in San Diego, CA on Janunary 18th, 2016. He delivered a keynote address, which was submitted to SDFP. The following is an edited version of his speech.]

By Rev. Richard Lawrence

During my undergraduate days at Albion College, located in a small town in Michigan, I spent the 1956 Thanksgiving holiday break with my college roommate in his home in the Detroit suburb of Royal Oak, Michigan. When we arrived, my roommate’s father came hurriedly down the stairs to greet us with the news that he was late because “he just had to finish a great book which proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that gorillas are superior to Negroes.”   [Read more…]

Crab & Salmon Fisheries Threatened By Historic Crisis

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By Dan Bacher / Indybay.org

Legislators, members of commercial fishing families, fishing group representatives and Brown administration officials testified about the dire situation that the salmon and crab fishery is in during the 43rd Annual Zeke Grader Fisheries Forum of the Joint Committee on Fisheries and Aquaculture held at the State Capitol in Sacramento on February 11.

“This forum works, but the fishermen are not,” said Senator Mike McGuire, Chair of the Committee, in his opening comments. “The salmon and crab fisheries are threatened by a historic crisis. We’re facing a fishery disaster that will impact many families.”   [Read more…]

Civic San Diego’s Plan to Bypass the Living Wage Ordinance

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Editor’s Note: The Board of Directors of Civic San Diego is set to approve an economic development work plan at their February 24th meeting. In short, this is their grand vision for San Diego. Sadly, this vision doesn’t include the living wage provisions required of large local development projects over the past decade. Board member Murtaza Baxamusa was the sole opposing vote at a recent committee meeting.   

By Murtaza Baxamusa

For low-income communities, the promise of “economic development” is often held as the basis for taxpayer-subsidized projects. However, developer-driven focus on projects, rather than people, has the theory of local economic development upside-down. This is what happens when a downtown development corporation starts working on a plan for economic development for other neighborhoods.

It is often easy to forget why we do economic development? Not every project, nor every neighborhood needs it. Ultimately, the key metric to measure the success (or failure) of any economic development intervention should be whether local residents are working in better-paying jobs. If the disposable income of the average household in a neighborhood increases, the market will respond accordingly. There will be more amenities, shops, restaurants, services that will be attracted to the buying power of local residents. On the other hand, if household incomes in a neighborhood stagnate, then local businesses stagnate too and perpetuate the lack of opportunity.   [Read more…]

San Diego Women’s Museum of California: “Women in Action”

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By South OB Girl/ OB Rag

Tucked in Liberty Station, across the street from Slater’s 50/50 Burgers, Ace Hardware, and Con Pane Bakery on Historic Decatur Road is a hidden gem of the peninsula and beach community — the Women’s Museum of California. Little did you know that in the second story above the first floor exhibit hall lies an extensive archive and collection devoted to women’s history.

Opening on Thursday evening Feb. 4th was the museum’s new exhibit, which showcases the history of the United Nations commitment to global equality and women’s issues, and celebrates the 70th year of the U.N.’s Commission on the Status of Women.   [Read more…]

Fukushima, Chernobyl, Santa Susana, San Onofre… and Rocky Flats

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Our controversial nuclear legacy and questions about health, truth and future risks By Nicole Hoepner Sleeping dragons. Stirring the thin blankets of secret cold-war facilities, nuclear power plants and feebly stored radioactive waste. We quietly sneak around their massive shadows. We tell our children fairy tales of mankind’s control over technology, over nature. The story […]

Cory Briggs Responds to Critique of Citizens’ Plan

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By Cory Briggs

I was thrilled to read in the San Diego Free Press the recent critique of the Citizens’ Plan that former City Councilmember Donna Frye and I have been promoting and that will appear on the November 2016 ballot. The critique’s author (a lobbyist and developer’s lawyer) raises an excellent question about the initiative’s effects on East Village and Barrio Logan, but he provides nothing except wrong answers that rest on a series of false claims. Responding to the critique thus gives me a good opportunity to explain some of the benefits of the initiative that have not yet received a lot of media attention.

Before debunking the specific claims in the critique, it is important to understand what the Citizens’ Plan does and does not do downtown. For starters, the initiative allows convention-center facilities, a sports facility (not necessarily football), or combined facilities within the boundaries of Imperial Avenue to the south, 17th Street to the east, K Street to the north, and Park Boulevard to the west – and nowhere else. Significantly, it includes no mandate that such development be given priority over any other development projects, offers zero guaranty that the development will come to fruition, allows the development to be done “in addition to” all other development already allowed, and requires that the development be done (if it’s done at all) “in accordance with all other applicable legal requirements.” In short, the initiative does nothing more than enhance downtown’s revitalization prospects.   [Read more…]

Highways as Rivers of Toxic Air: Millions are Impacted by Ultra-fine Particulate Pollution

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By Bill Adams / San Diego UrbDeZine

People know that air pollution is bad for their health, that auto exhaust emissions contribute to air pollution, and that certain cities suffer worse air pollution than others. Some people pay attention to smog reports and even avoid strenuous activities on smoggy days. What most people don’t know is that there is a certain type of auto emission pollutant that discriminates in a most predictable but unfair way. It’s also a pretty safe assumption that people aren’t fully aware of the severity of the health impacts from this pollutant.

Every year, hundreds of decisions are made in which the life and health of thousands of people are unknowingly sacrificed to this pollutant for the convenience or profit of others who are relatively safe from it. Second hand cigarette smoke, GMOs, and high tension power lines, have all captured the public attention and sparked outcries for change. When the public becomes aware of this auto exhaust pollutant and the pathology and inequality of its health impact, it is reasonable to believe they will demand a dramatic change in our transportation priorities.

To understand this pollutant and how it works, one most first understand that there are different types of air pollution – even from a single source like an automobile. Most people think of smog. Few people are aware of the more dangerous and discriminatory particulate pollution, also known as ultra-fine particulate pollution (UFP). Exposure to this type of pollution is entirely dependent on proximity to source. In other words, exposure depends on how close you live or work near a busy roadway, whether a road is expanded near you, whether your child is in a school near a busy roadway, or how much time you spend driving.   [Read more…]

Excerpt From Sunshine/Noir II: At the Chargers Game

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By Mario Lewis

“In the mid- to early ’70s my sister and I went to a Chargers game with my father. We (are) actually Raiders fans. My father, is a nice—nice-size man with some nice-size arms and everything and we were enjoying ourselves at the game and at the end of the game these four white guys were following my father out of the game calling him the n-word. Calling US the n-word, I should say.

“I was a youngster. I was maybe about 10 or 11 years old, if that. And so my father had a van and so my father, I guess he knew that he was about to get into a confrontation with ’em because they followed us all the way to the car. My father told us—he said ‘Run and lock yourself in the van.’ Right. So me and my sister ran and we locked ourselves in the van.   [Read more…]

Connecting Hip-Hop With Academics

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Gwen Pierce / The Chocolate Voice

Twenty-year old Austin Martin knows what it’s like feeling apathetic towards schoolwork. In a phone conversation with The Chocolate Voice, the graduate of San Diego’s Francis Parker High School, confidently tells us that although he considers himself a smart kid, he didn’t put forth much effort to improve his grades until the 9th grade.

He says that his lack of interest stemmed from the perception that creativity is valueless in schools. Currently an Ivy League student at Brown University, Martin is on a mission to change that perception in the academic system.

The creative light bulb went off for Martin as he was listening to hip-hop, and had the idea to develop Rhymes with Reason, an app designed to strengthen the vocabulary and English skills of today’s youth. Rhymes with Reason takes academic vocabulary words from the SAT’s, ACT’s and Common Core tests, and combines them with lyrics of hip-hop artists to create a culturally engaging curriculum.   [Read more…]

San Diego’s Opportunity to Invest in Better Transit, Safer Streets, Good Jobs and Clean Air

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Will SANDAG’s proposed sales tax increase serve your community’s needs?

By Monique López/ Environmental Health Coalition

We all need to move. How we get from place to place is deeply connected to our quality of life. Unfortunately, not all communities have the same access to healthy, safe, reliable and affordable transportation options, such as public transit and biking and walking paths.

That means some people don’t have access to the same quality of life, just because of where they live. Transportation justice is the equal access of all people to the transportation they need for a better quality of life.

Now, SANDAG has proposed a half-cent sales tax increase slated for the November 2016 ballot to generate new money for transportation projects in San Diego County   [Read more…]

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