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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 Predictable Demise of the Plaza de Panama Plan

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The San Diego City Council arrogantly and knowingly ignored its own laws in supporting the planned Balboa Park renovation.

Last week Judge Timothy Taylor ruled that the proposed Balboa Park redevelopment plan put forward by the Irwin Jacobs sponsored Plaza de Panama Committee violated city law and could not move forward. The controversial plan to remove parking and vehicular traffic altogether from the Central Mesa of Balboa Park, build the Centennial Bridge that would circumvent the museums around to the south as an offshoot of the historic Cabrillo Bridge, and build a three story paid parking structure to the south of the Organ Pavilion, would have cost a projected $45 million, with $25 million being donated by Dr. Jacobs himself.

The plan was highly suspect from the very beginning, and tensions on both sides ran rather high. Shortly after the City Council voted to approve the plan, I wrote a piece explaining how the plan could very well be found illegal, laying out the several ways that the plan was legally flawed.

Turns out that Judge Taylor agreed, at least in part, reaching “the reluctant conclusion” that in approving the Plaza de Panama plan, the City did in fact violate city law. In order to approve the project, city law clearly states that the City Council must find that there is “no beneficial use” for the property; that without the Jacobs plan, Balboa Park would be useless to the public, the entity for whom the park exists.   [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…]

California Leads Nation in Fighting Global Warming

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As of January 1, 2013, the cap-and-trade portion of California’s Global Warming Solutions Act, AB 32, went into effect. Over 300 major polluters in California will face emissions reductions obligations, and in 2015, the program’s size will double to include transportation fuels and natural gas. These companies were given an allowance as to how much carbon pollution they can dump into the atmosphere. They can buy additional “allowances” from the state which held its first sale November 2012. There are more auctions scheduled.

Eventually companies will be able to trade allowances among themselves. So a company that emits less CO2 than they are allowed to can sell the remaining portion of its allowance to a company that exceeds its allowance. As years go by, the allowances will be reduced thus reaching California’s goal to cut its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions back to 1990 levels by 2020.   [Read more…]

North Park – Mid-City Regional Bike Project – Community Input Wanted!

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The San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG) is in the planning process of a project to improve the bicycle infrastructure in the North Park – Mid-City area. The first Advisory Group meeting for this project was held on January 30th in City Heights and will be followed by additional meetings open to the public to solicit ideas and insights into what this plan should include.

The project is schedule to be in the planning and feedback stage until Fall 2013 at which time a final report will be issued and the results of community input will be taken into consideration by engineering and then construction. The dollars allocated to this project have not yet been determined. (Read: The more people that show up, speak up, and act up the more likely this project will receive attention and funds to make it a reality and not just another plan that finds itself in a waste bin rather than implemented on our streets.)   [Read more…]

Getting away with murder

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New Series: What you always wanted to know…

Dear NumbersRunnner,

This question has been on my mind for a long time but it’s one I’ve been afraid to ask: How come so many San Diegans get away with murder?

Yours truly,

Timid Questioner

Dear TQ,

Murder is a serious allegation.  If you’ll settle for the lesser charge of white-collar crime (the FBI says it means “lying, cheating, and stealing…the full range of frauds committed by business and government professionals…”), you need only take a look at some of Don Bauder’s investigative stories about our hometown white-collar crooks.

But yes, when it comes to San Diego miscreants of a political persuasion these guys really DO get away with murder – both the metaphorical and bloody types.

Consider the case histories of two recently-departed politicians — ex-mayor Jerry Sanders and ex-councilmember Tony Young.    [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…]

Bernie Sanders and Ralph Nader Both Condemn Postal Service Decision

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By Matthew Rothschild / The Progressive –RSN

Consumer advocate Ralph Nader and Senator Bernie Sanders condemned the U.S. Postal Service for its decision to end Saturday delivery.

“The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) today continued its tradition under the leadership of Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe of shooting itself in the foot,” Nader said. “The only question that remains is: When will the madness end? By ending Saturday letter delivery in August 2013, as the USPS has proposed, millions of customers who take advantage of its services will be harmed, mail service will be slowed, and the USPS’s current death spiral will deepen.”

Nader also called into question the legality of the move.   [Read more…]

Robert Reich: Coming Tuesday (Hopefully): The State of the Union’s Economy

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By Robert Reich / February 9, 2013

If you’re sitting in the well of the House when a president gives a State of the Union address (as I’ve had the privilege of doing five times), the hardest part is on the knees. You’re required to stand and applaud every applause line, which means, if you’re in the cabinet or an elected official of the president’s party, an extraordinary amount of standing and sitting.

But for a president himself, the State of the Union provides a unique opportunity to focus the entire nation’s attention on the central issue you want the nation to help you take action on.   [Read more…]

Tax Refunds are Good, Despite the ‘Conventional Wisdom’

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It’s the most wonderful time of the year – time to dig out your receipts, examine bank statements, call up your accountant, and “render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s”. It’s time once again for that most thrilling and enjoyable civic duty – the filing of income tax returns and paying of taxes.

While it is on the minds of many I want to share my advice to my fellow tax-paying Americans for 2013 in anticipation of our next season of tax filings: Set yourself up to receive a refund next year. Increase the tax withholding on your paycheck (via Form W-4). Refunds are good.

Technically speaking, the conventional wisdom is correct – if you receive a refund you have overpaid the government during the year, for most people via wage withholding on paychecks. However, this overpayment isn’t necessarily a bad thing. There are a number of reasons why receiving a tax refund is a good thing.   [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…]

Edison and Mitsubishi Knew San Onofre Steam Generators Were Defective

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By Michael Steinberg / Black Rain Press

A press release issued Wednesday by two prominent members of Congress charged that Southern California Edison (SCE) and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) knew that the two replacement steam generators for the San Onofre nuclear plant were defective, and avoided adding safety measures to keep from triggering stricter scrutiny by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Senator Barbara Boxer of California and Congressman Ed Markey of Massachusetts send a letter to NRC Chair Allison Macfarlane on Wednesday stating,

“Southern California Edison and MHI were aware of serious problems with the design of San Onofre nuclear power plant’s replacement steam generators before they were installed. Further, SCE and MHI rejected enhanced safety modifications and avoided triggering a more rigorous license amendment and safety review process.”

San Onofre units 2 and 3 have been shut down for over a year, because of serious problems in the replacement steam generators that caused serious damage and rendered operation of the two nuclear reactors unsafe.   [Read more…]

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