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Safe and Affordable Drinking Water: The Value of One Vote

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Water Board District Elections and Your Drinking Water

South Bay! Do you know where your drinking water comes from? Not from San Diego County, that’s for sure. This semi-arid, bone-dry environment has seen droughts since settlers came to the region in the early 1900s.

San Diego County must import about 85 percent of its water. Rainwater, in good years, only accounts for about 5-10 percent maximum of water supplies. As a consequence, water districts have been focusing on becoming more water independent while still keeping water rates low for customers. Instead of importing more water from the Sierra Mountains and the Colorado River, both of which are drying up, water districts are looking towards local recycling and desalination plants.   [Read more…]

County Supervisors D3 Contest: A Whole Lotta Meh

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County Supervisor Dave Roberts is in the fight of his political life. He’s the lone Democrat (first in two decades, actually) in a powerful political entity with few of the checks and balances Americans expect to find in government.

He’s tried to go along to get along, continually stressing the virtues of the entire board in public statements. But a series of poor management (and maybe personal) decisions, costing the county $310,000 in legal settlements, within Robert’s office created an opening for local Republicans.

They’re pressing their advantage, hoping for a return to the one-party system that’s served them well in the past. The race for District 3 supervisor is one of the few bright spots on the local GOP’s horizon.   [Read more…]

City Attorney Campaign: Community Involvement vs Law and Order

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San Diegans don’t have a general election contest for mayor in 2016, and four of the five seats up for grabs on the City Council are already taken. But we do get to vote on City Attorney, and this happens to be an important contest.

The June primary winnowed down the field to Mara Elliott, currently serving as Chief Deputy City Attorney under CA Jan Goldsmith and Robert Hickey, a Deputy District Attorney under County DA Bonnie Dumanis.

Elliott has been endorsed by her Democratic primary opponents and has the support of the party apparatus. Hickey has the active support of Republicans in town save one: his boss.   [Read more…]

With No Contest in 4 Council Races, District 9 Matters

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What was supposed to be an epic, high-dollar struggle for the partisan upper hand on the San Diego City Council never came to pass. Odd-numbered districts elect representatives in 2016, and Republicans were hoping to gain a majority on the theoretically non-partisan body.

Of the five City Council districts having primary contests in June, only one will have a meaningful contest for the general election. In three (3,5,& 7) of those districts, there won’t even be a choice on the November ballot.

The city’s rules, giving an automatic win to any candidate with more than 50% of the vote in the first outing, are up for reconsideration via Measure K, which would allow the top two primary finishers to compete in November.

Today we’ll look at what’s left of the City Council contests.   [Read more…]

Vote Yes on 61 – Big Pharma is the Scum of the Earth

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Originally published with the headline: “Dispatches from the drug war: Or, why are Americans subsidizing the Europeans?” Given all the ads trying to scare voters into paying more for lifesaving drugs lately, we’ve retitled this story along with some of big pharma’s anti-Prop 61 propaganda for readers to contrast and compare.

By Susan Grigsby / Daily Kos

Let’s talk about other drug war: The one being waged against the American consumer by the pharmaceutical companies who benefit from our tax dollars that fund basic scientific research and make up the difference in the tax relief they receive for their own research and development.   [Read more…]

This is the Week That Was In Campaigning

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The official fall campaigning season is upon us. Labor Day marks the beginning of the final drives to persuade voters that it’s in their self-interest to cast ballots.

It used to be the goal of election campaigns was to persuade people it was in the national/regional/local interest to vote a certain way, but now that we’ve endured three decades of denigration of the institutions of government, it’s all about me, me, me.

Ayn Rand would be proud.

This week I’ve written about campaigns for US Senate, House of Representatives, & California Legislature. Meanwhile, odds and ends have accumulated in the Starting Line inbox needing saying.

So today’s the day. In a nutshell: Trump loves Putin, Sanchez is snarling, and Politifest is coming.   [Read more…]

Imperial Beach City Council Elections Heat Up

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As many of you may know, the Imperial Beach Mayor is Serge Dedina. He was elected to office in 2014 for a four year term. Two other city council members are not up for election this year: Mayor Pro Tem Ed Spriggs and Councilmember Lorie Bragg.

This week, Spriggs wrote in to explain his position on Prop 59, calling on IB candidates to decline any contributions by Super PACs.

Furthermore, two city council seats are open this November. Current council member Brian Bilbray will not be running for re-election, so the only incumbent in the race is Robert Patton. A total of six candidates are running for the two city council seats.

This week, I contacted the City of Imperial Beach for election information. The City Clerk, Jacqueline Hald, provided me with the following important numbers:   [Read more…]

A Look at San Diego’s Ballot Choices for State Legislature

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There’s bad news and good news about the partisan makeup of San Diego’s representation in Sacramento in 2017.

The bad news is that there is no real competition among the eight local contests for the State Legislature. A few seats are changing hands, but the resulting differences among the newbies will be of style rather than substance.

The good news is that the Democrats likely to be representing the area are all of above average or better quality. What happens in contests elsewhere in California will have a significant influence on just how effective San Diego’s delegation can be.   [Read more…]

Election Day Rx for Tri-City Hospital

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Will Voters Be the Cure?

According to a 2011/2012 San Diego Grand Jury Report, Tri-City Healthcare District Continuing Issues, May 30, 2012, “The Grand Jury believes the coming election to be an excellent opportunity for the electorate to remake the current Tri-City Hospital Board of Directors into a less distracting and more professional body.”

So, how did that go? In the four years since the 2012 election, the “remade” board fired its CEO, hired and fired his replacement, and hired another to take his place.

A series of failed lawsuits cost the hospital over $30 million in settlements, attorneys fees, and lost revenue resulting from bogus allegations related to the purchase of a medical office building that remains vacant to this day on the hospital’s campus.   [Read more…]

Applegate Versus Issa is the Congressional Race to Watch

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Of the five electoral contests for the House of Representatives including San Diego voters only the 49th, encompassing the cities of Oceanside, Vista, Carlsbad and Encinitas, looks to be competitive on November 8th. A small part of Orange County and the Marine Corps base at Camp Pendleton are also in the district.

Republican Darrell Issa is facing retired USMC Col. Douglas Applegate.

Issa, the wealthiest member of Congress (2015 estimate: up to $768 million), has all the advantages of incumbency, having served since 2001. Applegate has time and (dislike of) Trump on his side.   [Read more…]

Is Dr. Jill Stein and the Green Party a Good Alternative?

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Noam Chomsky advocates voting for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party in states that are securely Democratic, and voting for Hillary in swing states where every vote counts. This makes a lot of sense because it’s one way, maybe the only way, to build a third party in this country.

Due to our antiquated voting system, a third party can never be successful. However, it could conceivably replace one of the two present day mainstream parties at some point.

Jill Stein stands for a lot of the things that Bernie and other Progressives stand for. But even if, by some stretch of the imagination, she were to be elected in November, she would still face a Republican Congress. Hillary is right when she seeks to tone down Bernie’s rhetoric and make more modest claims.   [Read more…]

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