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The Starting Line – Strike Two for the Sanders’ Mayoral Legacy: Pension Proposition Was Illegal

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Last week a court invalidated the City’s scheme for renovating Balboa Park, saying that lawmakers blatantly ignored a city statute. The judge liked the plan, which included building a parking garage and a by-pass, but couldn’t abide the process.

Yesterday an administrative judge with the Public Employment Relations Board (PERB) ruled that former Mayor Jerry Sanders violated state labor law by failing to offer unions the opportunity to negotiate on pension issues prior to launching a ballot initiative.

Could these rulings portend that an era of lawlessness going back decades in America’s Finest City is coming to an end? I’m not so sure. After all, San Diego does have a rich tradition of politicians just doing whatever the hell they want to and hoping they don’t get caught.

INSIDE: The State of the Union, Poor, ‘Misunderstood’ Doug Manchester, Why Carl DeMaio Won’t Ride the Trolley   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – Papa Doug’s Got a Brand New Bag, Maybe

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The Tweets were flying last night after the associate regional editor for Patch (AOL/Huffpo’s hyperlocal web news outfit) reported on twitter that a “source” told her UT-San Diego publisher Doug Manchester told a group of Republican women that he is “in negotiations” to purchase the Tribune Company.

For San Diegans, this prospective purchase would mean that the Los Angeles Times, long considered a viable source of news for non UT-SD readers, would now be joining Manchester’s media empire.

There’s plenty of reason to be skeptical about this story. I might choose to “negotiate” for a new Mercedes Benz; that doesn’t mean I’ll be buying one. And IF Manchester does buy the LA Times (and the other newspapers in the company) it’s just one step closer to the end of the road for dead tree journalism.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – Petition Drive Seeks Removal of San Diego School Official

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A teachers group has initiated an online petition drive urging the Superintendent and Board of Trustees for the San Diego Unified School District (SDUSD) to dismiss newly hired Chief Financial Officer Stanley “Data” Dobbs.

The movement comes in the wake of a recent Q&A interview with Dobbs published February 1st by Voice of San Diego (VOSD). The CFO’s factually challenged assertions about the challenges facing the school district along with his one-dimensional analysis of the politics of education in this city has reverberated throughout the community for nearly two weeks now.

VOSD responded to complaints about inaccuracies in the interview by publishing “fact check “ articles which have proved that, indeed, the Chief Financial Officer for SDUSD had no command of actual dollar figures associated with the single biggest expense in any education system: the people who teach. Nor is he familiar with studies relating to concerns in the academic world over the impact of class size on educational achievement; Dobbs simply said they don’t exist.

MORE INSIDE: DRONES SEEKING DORNER, THE GOP/VEGETARIAN PLOT, RON PAUL JOINS UN CONSPIRACY   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – Call Out the ‘Lynch’ Mob: The Mayor’s a Liar and the School Board Stinks

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I expect it won’t be too long before a campaign to recall Mayor Bob Filner is launched, given the way the UT-San Diego is poised to pounce on every action regardless of significance taken by hizzoner. And the interview posted by Voice of San Diego with SDUSD’s CFO ‘Data” Dobbs is now grist for an editorial in the Daily Fishwrap blasting a “scandal’ with the school board.

Today’s front page ‘gotcha’ story on Filner concerns a story attributed to the Mayor about the impact of the managed competition (approved by voters in 2006) process on the city’s fleet services. It’s a tangled up story dating back to October 2011 when City workers won out over two private companies seeking handle maintenance for municipal vehicles. (And it’s also a story about just how complicated the process of outsourcing (or not) government services can be.)

As I predicted last week, the unfiltered version of the Voice of San Diego interview will live on way past any subsequent ‘fact checks’ the crew over there publishes.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – Republicans at War: “Grab the popcorn, pop a beer, sit back and enjoy this goat rodeo”

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Long simmering tensions between Republican Party stalwarts and their Tea Party allies have emerged from the backrooms of politics over the last few days. The announcement that Karl Rove’s new group, the Conservative Victory Project, aims to weed out ‘unelectable’ candidates has the Tea Party set in a frenzy.

Jonathan Collegio, spokesman for the Victory Project, claims that the new group won’t pick its opponents according to ideology — rather, electability. The Tea Party types aren’t buying it, and a coalition of conservative leaders is demanding the new organization fire Collegio, for calling Brent Bozell, a pundit who runs the conservative Media Research Center, a “hater” in a recent radio interview.

The coalition includes Phyllis Schlafly, Tony Perkins, Tea Party Patriots co-founder Jenny Beth Martin, Manuel Miranda and Richard Viguerie — all big names in the conservative ‘grassroots’ world. A letter attacking Rove/Collegio, signed by the aforementioned names and a score of other big names, brought the dispute out in the open, saying, “You obviously mean to have a war with conservatives and the Tea Party. Let it start here.”

INSIDE: TEXAS STUPIDITY, ISSA FOR THE GIPPER, FILNER FOR THE TREE HUGGERS, ROSE CREEK FEST & more…   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – A Slow Death for the Post Office, Courtesy of the US Congress

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It won’t be long now.  CBS News reported this morning that the United States Post Office is ending Saturday delivery of first-class and will phase out the practice by the end of this summer. Effective August 1st, all first-class mail—which includes pretty much all letters, bills, cards, and catalogs—will only be delivered on weekdays.

Packages, express, and Priority Mail will still get delivered on the weekend. The change will mark the end of weekend deliveries for the first time in 150 years.

It didn’t have to be this way. Yes, the times have changed. The days of mail as the primary means of long distance communication and sending money are over. And the Post Office knows that. They’re just not allowed to do anything about it.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – Judge’s Ruling Against Balboa Park Remake Raises Lots of Questions

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Superior Court Judge Timothy Taylor made good yesterday on his earlier suggestions that the City of San Diego’s case for renovating the Plaza de Panama in Balboa Park wouldn’t pass a legal challenge.

San Diego City Attorney Jan Goldsmith appeared in court for oral arguments last Friday, arguing that the City was free to reject protections offered by the area’s historic status because of the additional benefits construction of a by-pass and parking lot would provide.

Taylor’s 15 page ruling rejected that argument saying, “Respectfully, this strikes the court as re-writing the Municipal Code. The City Council did not enact language permitting alteration if it determined that the proposed alteration would result in a more reasonable beneficial use; rather, it required that there be no reasonable beneficial use absent the alteration.”

UPDATE: Via KPBS MidDay Report- “I’ve told the committee that the project is over,” (Irwin) Jacobs says. They’re not taking part in additional plans, activities.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – San Diego Schools’ CFO Takes a Long Walk on Voice of San Diego’s Short Pier

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Since the voters spoke back in November and handed the proponents of darkness and austerity a resounding defeat, the forces of reaction throughout the State of California have been seeking to throw a monkey wrench into the process.

At San Diego’s UT, this process is blatant, with factually challenged front page articles suggesting that businesses are fleeing California followed by editorials citing the suppositions minted earlier as gospel truth.

With San Diego’s ‘independent’ news source, aka The Voice of San Diego, the propagation of the reactionary agenda is accomplished via mindless contrarianism. The need to push controversy overwhelms any need for fact checking; it’s okay to let public officials yell ‘fire’ in the schoolhouses of our city.

So it was with this sense of ‘newsworthiness’ that the VOSD published an interview on Friday with Stan “Data” Dobbs, the newly hired Chief Financial Officer for the San Diego School Unified School District.

After telling interviewer Will Carless that “I get bored quickly if I don’t have enough problems to solve”, Dobbs proceeds to create a whole lot of problems for the School District and, most likely, his future employment prospects.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – The Sky is Falling! UT-San Diego Taxifornia Version

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Our local daily is featuring an article today hewing to its meme that the end is nigh for the Golden State in the wake of voter support for raising taxes in the last election. Here’s the lede:

Texas Gov. Rick Perry quietly came to San Diego last week to lure biotech companies seeking to escape from higher income taxes under Proposition 30 to the Lone Star State.

While I wouldn’t go so far as to say there are no negatives about California, at least we don’t have schools being required to use text books that whitewash the McCarthy era and fail to mention the slave trade. There’s another side of the story…

INSIDE: HEDGECOCK BOYCOTT ON, IMMIGRATION WARS, SOURING ON THE SUPERBOWL…   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – They’re Coming for Your Guns and Other NRA Falsehoods

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The national conversation over gun regulations continues to dominate the news cycle. The Senate Judiciary Committee hearings yesterday saw astronaut Mark Kelly directly confronting the NRA’s Wayne LaPierre over the shooting of his wife, former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords.

Giffords (D-Ariz.) was the first witness called yesterday, and at the end of the day it was her seventy two word statement that still echoed in the halls of Congress:

 Speaking is difficult but I need to say something important.

Violence is a big problem. Too many children are dying – too many children. We must do something.

It will be hard. But the time is now. You must act. Be bold. Be Courageous. Americans are counting on you. Thank you.

  [Read more…]

The Starting Line – San Diego: Have a (Great) Beer While You’re Waiting for the Marijuana Dispensary to Open

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Our fair city finally got national recognition for what it does well yesterday when a writer who actually drinks beer put San Diego at the top of a “Non Fiction” list of the best beer towns in America. And our new mayor got schooled yesterday in what it really takes to be a game changer when it comes to medical marijuana.

Columnist Steve Body, who pens The Pour Fool column for Seattlepi.com did a little research into the business of compiling best beer cities and was shocked to discover that even big time media outlets weren’t using any sources with backgrounds in the field.

In other news, Mayor Filner walked back an earlier promise to get the City of San Diego out of the business of prosecuting medical marijuana dispensary owners yesterday.

MORE Inside: Immigration Reform, ‘Yes We Cannibus’, DeVry University Sued…   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – ‘Future Facts’ Fail to Sway Judge in Balboa Park Plaza de Panama Ruling

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A San Diego judge has issued a tentative ruling that could halt city plans for building a parking garage in Balboa Park and associated renovations of the Plaza de Panama. Oral arguments will be heard in front of Superior Court Judge Timothy Taylor on Friday, whose preliminary written decision reflected a clear reluctance to derail the project.

At issue is the legal interpretation of a single phrase, “reasonable beneficial use.” Since the plans included removal of a section of the historic Cabrillo Bridge, the Save Our Heritage Organisation sued, citing (among other things) San Diego’s municipal code, which says the city cannot touch an historic structure unless it’s ruled to have no reasonable beneficial use. In approving the project, the City Council said this was the case as part of the approval process.

INSIDE: The Battle Against Generic Biologics, Sick Stuff About Gun Nuts, and the Death of Football?   [Read more…]

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