San Diego Free Press

Grassroots News & Progressive Views

How a Prop 13 Fairness Campaign Could Win

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By Chuck McFadden/Calbuzz

As a political matter, Proposition 13 is sacred.  It’s been described by lazy reporters as the “Third Rail of California Politics” so often that you probably want to hurl every time you hear the phrase.

As a policy matter, however, Proposition 13 rests on a fundamental inequity: it provides a gaping, pro-corporate loophole that pushes the statewide burden for property onto single-family and other residential homeowners. As Calbuzz has reported, data from the Board of Equalization and county assessors proves that “in virtually every county in the state, the share of the property tax borne by residential property has increased since the passage of Prop 13 in 1978, while the share of the property tax borne by non-residential property has decreased.”

Forget fairness, though: If you want to start taxing business the same way you tax homeowners, you’ll have every chamber of commerce in the state and taxpayer groups come down on you like Chris Christie on a chocolate éclair.  Not that it would count for much, but the Republican Party would oppose any modification as well.  Unless you’re heavily into masochism, forget it.   [Read more…]

I’m Afraid of the SDPD

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By Will Falk

The San Diego Police Department scares me. All police, for that matter, scare me.

I’m writing this because I cannot drown out the sharp pops of a burst of police gunfire hanging on the still desert air.

I heard the eerily common sound of gunshots as I watched a video of police shooting an unarmed 20 year-old black man named D’Andre Berghardt near Red Rock Canyon in Nevada the other day with my partner.

A few days before viewing the video, we were on our way to Red Rock Canyon for a rock-climbing trip with friends. Highway 159 provides access to the canyon, but was closed due to a “police incident.” We made a mental note to check on the incident when we got home.   [Read more…]

Another Day, Another SDPD Sex Scandal: Can City Leaders Put a Lid on It?

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By Doug Porter

Police Chief Bill Lansdowne called a press conference yesterday evening to announce yet another reported incident of sexual misconduct involving a SDPD officer.

One of the women contacting the SDPD following allegations against officer Christopher Hays, provided information leading to yet another officer, who is now under investigation for allegedly touching and exposing himself to a female arrestee.

The chief told the assembled press that the officer has been placed on paid administrative leave while the investigation continues. “We are doing everything we should be doing in this case,”  Lansdowne said, and repeated an earlier plea for any other potential victims or witnesses to come forward to report wrongdoing   [Read more…]

Time for San Diego Democrats to Broaden the Base

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By E.A. Barrera

I was proud to support David Alvarez and his campaign for Mayor. His life is an inspiration and his future is the future of San Diego. But now it is time for all San Diego Democrats to come together, and grow beyond our basic base of supporters. There are floods of Independents and Republicans out there disgusted with the modern Tea Party-dominated GOP. The new Confederacy has taken hold of the Republican Party, leaving millions of Americans ready to join with the Democrats in reasonable dialogue and solutions to our nation’s problems.

But in the next few months, San Diego Democrats must start to consider how the negative campaign against Nathan Fletcher by Alvarez supporters – both officially, unofficially, and by rumor, innuendo, and deception – created a bitterness that caused many Fletcher Democrats (much less Independents who did not want to vote for Faulconer) to either sit at home or vote for Faulconer in protest. I became an enthusiastic Alvarez backer, but it was very disheartening during the primary to be called a “DINO” (Democrat In Name Only) or worse because I thought Fletcher the better candidate to keep the Mayor’s office in Democratic Party control.
  [Read more…]

Report Reveals The Unequal States Of America

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By Isaiah J. Poole/Campaign for America’s Future

The top 1 percent captured all of the income growth between 2009 and 2011 in 26 out of the 50 states and the District of Columbia, the Economic Policy Institute found in a reportreleased February 19.

The report is a detailed look at the geography of income inequality. The broad contours are familiar: University of California at Berkeley economist Emmanuel Saez has estimated that the top 1 percent received 95 percent of all of the income gains between 2009 and 2012. So it is not surprising that state-by-state profiles would show similar lopsided gains concentrated at the top. But they are still sobering.

The full EPI report looks at nearly a century of data, but the comparisons from 2009 are important because they mark what has happened to income growth since the end of the Great Recession.   [Read more…]

Candidates Jockey for Kevin Faulconer’s City Council Seat; OB’s Gretchen Newsom Garners Endorsement from Women’s Group

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By Doug Porter

The dust hasn’t settled from the February special election, but the jockeying for a soon-to-be-open position on the San Diego City Council in District 2 is getting into high gear.

Run Women Run, the non-partisan group advocating for increased female participation in electoral politics, announced their support for Gretchen Newsom as the interim appointee this morning. Let the politicking begin!

Kevin Faulconer’s ascendancy to the city’s top job in March will leave his seat on the city council open. Within 30 days after he takes the oath of office the remaining council members are tasked with appointing a replacement who by law cannot then run for re-election for that seat.

There are four candidates (that I am aware) of vying for the job: Ed Harris (Life Guard) , Don Mullin (Former Chief of staff for Marti Emerald), Gretchen Newsom (OB Town Council President), and Howard Wayne (Former Assemblyman). Since the campaigning in this situation is largely out of public view, today I’ll take a quick look look at those seeking the position.   [Read more…]

NLRB Upholds Vote by Sutter California Pacific RNs to Join CNA

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By Chalres Idleson and Liz Jacobs/Beyond Chron

It’s official. The federal government has upheld the vote by registered nurses at San Francisco’s largest private hospital, and largest non-union facility, Sutter’s California Pacific Medical Center’s Pacific campus with 800 RNs, to join the California Nurses Association/National Nurses United. It was the single biggest hospital organizing win for non-union RNs in a decade.

In a ruling issued late last week, the National Labor Relations Board San Francisco region resolved outstanding challenged ballots from the December secret ballot campaign, in which the RNs voted in mid-December by a count of 351 for CNA to 321 for Sutter.

Concurrently, Joseph Frankl, the NLRB regional director, dismissed Sutter CPMC’s objections to the election, writing that the employer “failed to identify potential witnesses or even to allude to
testimony,” in support of their objections. Formal certification by the NLRB of CNA/NNU as the elected representative of the RNs is expected later today.   [Read more…]

California Needs High Speed Rail Now

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By Robbie Hunter/State Building and Construction Trades Council of California via Labor’s Edge Blog

California urgently needs high speed rail now. The nay-sayers are still searching for reasons to delay this great public works project further, but they are out of  excuses. The delays need to stop. It is time to move forward and begin building. The transportation needs, the workers and the dollars are there to get started.

Governor Brown has made the sensible suggestion to use cap-and-trade dollars for some of the funding. That makes sense because the very purpose of cap-and-trade is to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels–one of the greatest benefits high-speed mass transit rail will bring to California. Without question, providing electrified mass transit for the people of California will reduce our use of fossil fuels.

That’s in addition to the other obvious benefits of a cleaner and healthier environment, the easing of congestion on our highways and at our airports, the more efficient movement between our state’s population centers, and the immediate economic jolt of  thousands of good construction jobs.   [Read more…]

Walmart’s New Research: A Flattering Self-Portrait

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By Steven Mikulan/Capital and Main

Last year Walmart commissioned a study on itself, and now its findings can be revealed: Walmart is the greatest thing since penicillin. More specifically, the study sees the chain-store titan’s widening footprint on America’s retail landscape as a gift for the communities lucky enough to have a Supercenter land on them.

The research, conducted by the Hatamiya Group, a Davis-based firm owned by Lon Hatamiya, is predicated on a comparative analysis of taxable retail sales and retail business permits, and reaches two conclusions: “On average,” California communities with Walmart Supercenters in them have fared better economically than those without them.   [Read more…]

The Carl DeMaio as Moderate Fallacy

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According to the national media, being a gay Republican candidate for office automatically qualifies one as a moderate.

By Andy Cohen

Carl DeMaio has himself back in the news again.  And this time—for him, at least—its’ for the right reasons.  And no, it’s not the usual UT-San Diego drivel about how Carl is the “Savior of San Diego,” Doug Manchester’s Golden Boy (although given the most recent mayoral selection process, it seems that DeMaio may have fallen out of favor with his “Papa.”)

This time DeMaio has garnered the attention of the national media.  The Wall Street Journal first picked up the story about the first openly gay Republican candidate for Congress to feature his partner in a web ad, a serious departure from accepted GOP norms and surely a shock to the system of the Republican establishment.

The Washington Post then picked up and ran with the story, calling him “a moderate Republican who is running for Congress in Southern California who is openly gay.”   [Read more…]

The First Order of Business for the Post-Election City Council: A Minimum Wage Referendum

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By Doug Porter

It’s time to give the Lincoln Club and their allies a dose of their own medicine. They’ve collectively decided to wield veto power over our elected officials, effectively turning San Diego into a case study of rule by initiative.

Fine. It’s likely the City Council will have a veto-proof 6-3 majority for the foreseeable future. If there’s one issue that polls well with the general public, would actually benefit people not in a position to belong to the yacht club and will simply drive Jerry Sanders along with the rest of Kevin Faulconer’s transition team crazy, it’s raising the minimum wage.

Putting such an initiative on the November ballot, which the council can do without hiring professional truth twisters to harass shoppers, will have the additional benefit of increasing voter turnout, something favoring Democrats and progressive causes.   [Read more…]

A Challenge to Kevin Faulconer: End Homelessness Now

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By John Lawrence

You kibitz with the homeless in your campaign ads. Now that you’re Mayor Kevin Faulconer, are you really going to do anything about it? Or are you going to continue to procrastinate. Other cities are ending homelessness from Phoenix to Salt Lake City to Nashville.

You have the model to follow. It’s a no-brainer. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Just follow their successful models. You don’t have to continue to study the problem in order to address it ten years from now.

These cities and others have decided that treatment and supportive services should not be conditions or precursors to permanent housing. Instead, the very ability to address personal mental health goals, beat addiction and gain stable employment stems from the safety and stability that comes from having a permanent home. This approach is called Housing First.   [Read more…]

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