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Vote Like You Mean It on June 3rd – The Bad Guys Certainly Will

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By Doug Porter

The 2014 primary elections in California are just a week away. I’ll go out on a limb here and predict victories for well-funded incumbents and many causes supported by a minority of the public. The reason is simple. People aren’t voting. When people don’t vote, bad things can and do happen.

It wasn’t supposed to work out this way. The “top-two” primary system opening the ballot to all voters, reformers told us, would increase turnout as decline-to-state voters, once excluded from partisan races, became more engaged.

What the experts haven’t taken into account is the collateral damage from increasingly cynical and factually challenged campaign advertising. Now that restrictions on campaign funding are largely absent, the noise level is rising and the bullshit is getting deeper. People are getting more conditioned to swallow the lies; it’s less work that figuring out the truth. And the course of least resistance is to do nothing, as in not vote.   [Read more…]

Barrio Logan Residents Spoil Mayor’s Pro-Pollution Presser

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Desde la Logan columnist amongst “hecklers”

By Brent E. Beltrán

Oops, we did it again.

A handful of Barrio Logan residents, including artist Hector Villegas, my wife Olympia, my son Sandino and myself, gave Mayor Faulconer, ex-Mayor and current corporate shill Jerry Sanders and shipyard mouthpiece Len Hering a piece of our minds and vocal chords at a press conference against Propositions B and C and the Barrio Logan Community Plan.

The press conference took place outside City Hall and was attended by the same suits that have been speaking out against the plan for months. Except this time they didn’t bus in shipyard workers.

Having received a tip, from someone close to the No on B and C campaign, an hour before the presser Hector and my family decided to take action. Olympia made a couple of handmade signs for her and Dino to hold. I brought dust masks to wear as a symbol of Barrio Logan pollution and Hector brought the respirator that he uses while painting.

We got there a few minutes before the press conference started and saw the suits lingering around. When the Mayor showed up we knew it was about to start and we were ready.   [Read more…]

Republi-Logic™: From the Battle of Benghazi to Barrio Bullies

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By Doug Porter

If you thought the latest GOP Benghazi Select Committee was an over-the-top idea, wait until you hear about Congressman Duncan Hunter’s amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act. It’s an open ended measure that would authorize the “use of force against those responsible for the attack against United States personnel in Benghazi, Libya.”

Duncan’s amendment amounts to a declaration of war in response to the Benghazi attack. It cites no specific enemy and its open-ended nature means that any future president, not only Barack Obama, could use it as a pretext for military action.

Unlike much of the whack-a-doodle dreck that gets proposed as amendments in Congress, this broad, sweeping measure looks to make it to a floor vote this week without even a hearing in the Foreign Affairs Committee, according to an article in the American Prospect.   [Read more…]

Councilman Alvarez Calls Out ‘No on B and C’ Phony Flyers

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By Doug Porter

Assertions being made by opponents of the Barrio Logan Community Plan in mailers to San Diego residents are under fire this week. At issue is an attempt by multinational corporations to overrule a five year process involving residents and businesses to address the lack of consistent zoning in one of San Diego’s most economically challenged communities.

Telling the truth has always been problematic for the group now calling itself ‘No On B and C’, and stories at two local media outlets over the past day indicate not much has changed. But when you’ve got enough money to flood the city with fliers, truth is hardly a concern for these folks.

San Diego City Councilman David Alvarez, who lives in and represents Barrio Logan, told KPBS that mailers headlined ‘Wrong Place for Housing Next to Shipyards’ “just aren’t true.”   [Read more…]

Junco’s Jabs: Jerry Sanders and Kevin Faulconer Share Their Disdain for Barrio Logan Residents

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By Junco Canché

San Diego Free Press introduces our first editorial cartoonist: Junco Canché! Junco has lived in the San Diego/Tijuana border region his entire life and currently resides in the city of San Diego in the South Bay right next door to Imperial Beach. His cartoons have been featured prominently at Southwestern College’s The Sun newspaper and now shares his work here at San Diego Free Press. Please welcome him by posting your comments below.   [Read more…]

What’s at Stake With Propositions B and C?

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“Everyone who wants to preserve community control over the planning process should be afraid because your community will be next!” –Georgette Gomez, Associate Director of the Environmental Health Coalition

By Jim Miller

As we head toward the June 3rd election, the same corporate interests who spent big money to fund a petition drive based on lies  to force a vote on the Barrio Logan Community Plan are now funding an equally dishonest campaign to defeat it.

The only thing that will stop a great injustice from happening in the case of the Barrio Logan Community Plan is if San Diegans stand up against this threat to their local democracy and vote yes on B and C. For that to happen, San Diegans need to be educated. The central organization doing this work in the service of the Yes on B and C Campaign is the Environmental Health Coalition (EHC).

This week, I interview Georgette Gomez, the Associate Director of the EHC to learn a little more about who the folks are who are fighting this good fight and what is at stake in this election.   [Read more…]

San Diego Goddam! The June 3rd Election And Why You Should Care

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By Doug Porter

I borrowed the first part of today’s headline from one of my favorite songs by Nina Simone, who sang about a certain southern hellhole of a state of mind as her response to the murder of Medgar Evers in Mississippi; and the bombing of a church in Birmingham, Alabama that killed four black children back in 1964. The song speaks to the level of angst and frustration I’m starting to feel about the upcoming election.

Bad things are more likely to happen and good things probably won’t happen if you and your friends pass on your obligation as citizens to vote come June 3rd. Starting today and in the coming weeks we’ll be talking about those possibilities, so you need to (please!) pay attention.

Fast forward 50 years from Ms. Simone’s lament and there are 8 million eligible but unregistered voters in California. Of the 17.7 million voters that are registered to vote in the Golden State, only about one third will bother to cast ballots in the upcoming June 3rd elections. That works out to 14% of the total population deciding how things will be for next few years.   [Read more…]

Remember the Folks Who Brought You the 8-Hour Day?

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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.

In the course of this effort, the nationwide American labor movement was born. Workers joined together in the service of the principle that, in the emerging industrial age, they should have a say in their economic lives and a voice in our politics—neither of which would come without a struggle.   [Read more…]

He Wants Them to Leave Barrio Logan

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By Sara Kent /Sara’s Ramblings

Chris Wahl, spokesman for Shipyards industry executives, wants Barrio Logan residents to move away.

Under the new Barrio Logan Community Plan Update, the foreign-owned companies Wahl represents can expand up to 20% by right, then go through special permitting processes if they want to grow further.

Nobody is kicking them out, the zoning for the Shipyards remains untouched, and the Navy has unilaterally stated it will not leave San Diego because of the Barrio Logan Plan (if you heard that condos were being built at the Shipyards or that the Navy was leaving, it’s because Shipyards representatives like Wahl lied about it).   [Read more…]

San Diego’s Maritime Industry Calls the Cops on Peaceful Protestors

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Five Barrio Logan residents and supporters stand their ground

By Brent E. Beltrán

I wasn’t planning on writing a column today but since maritime industry called the cops on my two year old son, his grandma, two others and myself, I changed my mind.

On Thursday morning I got up early. The day before, I found out that maritime industry was going to hold a press conference at 10:30am at R.E. Staite Engineering near the shipyards. This was only about 6 blocks or so away from my Barrio Logan apartment.

I’ve been itching to do a protest against maritime industry and their opposition to the Barrio Logan Community Plan Update. With them holding their presser within walking distance I knew I had to do something.

With the press conference taking place on a weekday morning, and less than a day’s notice to quietly get the word out (catching them off guard would be key), I knew there would not be a large turnout. Nonetheless, I had to do something, even if it was just my son Dino and myself.   [Read more…]

San Diego Doctors, California’s Nurses Announce Support of Propositions B & C

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June 3 ballot measure saves Barrio Logan’s community plan, improves community health

By Mia Bolton

Yesterday at the UCSD Medical Center in Hillcrest, a group of doctors, nurses and healthcare advocates announced their endorsement of the Yes on B & C campaign to protect children’s health in San Diego.

California Nurses Association members were there to support Yes on B & C that, if approved, will uphold the community and business supported, City Council approved Barrio Logan Community Plan Update.

In the first public media appearance by the campaign, the healthcare professionals reflected on Earth Day and the environmental health effects of polluting businesses next to schools, playgrounds and residences.

“Environmental health and justice in San Diego is being threatened,” said Georgette Gomez, of Environmental Health Coalition. “Kids in Barrio Logan have the same right to clean air and healthy neighborhoods as every other community in San Diego and the entire city should support Propositions B & C to protect all of our children’s health.”   [Read more…]

Toxic Contaminant Releases in Barrio Logan Confirmed – Another Reason to Support the Community Plan

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By Doug Porter

The release of a statewide list of census tracts most impacted by pollution by the California Environmental Protection Agency (CEPA) will add to the controversy surrounding two ballot measures presented to San Diego voters in the upcoming election.

A story in today’s Los Angeles Times, along with a scalable map, provides a dramatic assessment of impacts by types of contaminants within neighborhoods throughout the state. The CEPA report gives advocates for the Barrio Logan Community Plan hard evidence supporting their contentions concerning health problems caused by the current mix of industrial and residential uses.

Opponents of the Community Plan have dismissed health claims about industrial pollution as the cause of asthma and other health problems, blaming nearby freeways for contaminants. The CEPA study clearly indicates a serious problem with the release of toxic contaminants– as opposed to diesel particulates– into the air specific to the Barrio Logan area.   [Read more…]

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