From Linkage Fee To Mt. Soledad, San Diego Mayor Provides Update

wwMAUREEN CAVANAUGH: This is KPBS Midday Edition, I am Maureen Cavanaugh. Our top story on Midday Edition, San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer joins us for his monthly update on the business of the city. That that the Mayor's first budget has been approved, Mayor Faulkner and the city Council have a number of issues they hope to address, before the recess at the end of July. The Mayor will be taking your questions, give us a call at 888-895-5727. Welcome, Mayor Faulconer. MAYOR FAULCONER: Good afternoon Maureen, great to be back. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: Since you were here last time, San Diego lost a sports legend Tony Gwynn. How do you think he should be remembered here in San Diego? Do you think there should be a street, building, or freeway named after him? MAYOR FAULCONER: Well, Tony was an absolute icon for the city. We saw the outpouring of support just last week throughout the last fifteen days after he passed, in a city of about 25,000 strong at Petco Park, I think was a testament to what he did off of the field as much as it was when he did on the field. So many folks said that. I don't think the city could do enough to recognize Tony Gwynn. We do have Tony Gwynn Way and we have the statue, and a couple of things that people are talking about. He was just a great, kind, caring, optimistic individual. When I had the opportunity to get a few remarks last week, I said he represented the best of who we are as San Diegans. We will miss him. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: Some people say that Ted Williams Parkway should be renamed Tony Gwynn Parkway, do you think that is appropriate? MAYOR FAULCONER: Ted Williams meant a lot to this area as well. I think there are a lot of good ideas out there. I think we will figure out something to continue to add to all of the ways in which we remember a great legend for our city. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: Luiz is on the line from Mira Mesa. Welcome to the show. I see you have a number of questions, I will ask you to pick one. NEW SPEAKER: I have one in regards to the budget and neighborhood repairs and Mira Mesa. First of all, I think the Mayor has done a great job in the first hundred days of office. He has had a great transition into the Mayor's role. My question is in regard to the budget and street repairs and the library for Mira Mesa. When will we start seeing those improvements in my neighborhood? MAYOR FAULCONER: The budget takes effect tomorrow. As Maureen mentioned, I am proud that it was approved by the super majority of the council. The answer is, you will start seeing changes immediately. We have added four hours to every single branch library. We have increased police and fire academies, and most importantly as far as seeing results in every neighborhood, is the amount we will be doing on street repair. A big focus of this budget was Street repair. Not only resurfacing streets, but we talked a lot about doing a much better job in the way that the city addresses potholes. We are doing a more efficient process, and we have added more staff to go out there and do that. The answer is you will see those changes right away this summer. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: So it starts this summer. Thank you very much for the call. It starts this summer? MAYOR FAULCONER: It does indeed. I think that is the great news, I signed the budget the day after the Council approved it. It takes effect July 1, just as an example on the potholes copier hiring more folks to go out there and do the work, and they have the freedom and flexibility they should have had all along. If they see another pothole fix it while you are there. I think you will see a much better improvement, the employee certainly like the new system as it has been laid out. The proof will be in the pudding as we see results. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: There's been a considerable change in the push for San Diego to increase minimum wage. Council President Todd Gloria is now supporting an increase of $11.50 an hour over the next three to years, over the figure of $13.09 an hour. With this new number get you to support the plan to boost and wage here in San Diego? MAYOR FAULCONER: I am a supporter of raising the minimum wage level across the board. What I have said all along, and as you rightly pointed out at the top of the hour, the state minimum wage has gone up in California, to $9 and then $10. My concern remains, if we have a different wage structure for San Diego that puts us at a competitive disadvantage to the other areas in the region. We all spending a lot of time, but I have made it a major focus of mine to make it as we come out of this recession to really focus on creating good quality jobs for San Diegans to get them back to work. But I don't want to see happen, that we get put at a disadvantage when we're trying to be competitive when it comes to other cities, that is how I view this. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: The $11.50 an hour is a number determined by the San Diego Taxpayers Association on how much it takes for a worker to live in San Diego, even sharing rent on an apartment. I guess the question is, shouldn't a full-time worker be able to afford that much in San Diego? MAYOR FAULCONER: I think that is an important question. The other important question to ask is, I'll be creating jobs that actually allow somebody to get the job to begin with? We have heard from small businesses struggling to come back from one of the worst recessions that we have had that want to hire more people, and are very cognizant of all of the costs it takes. You want to get the opportunity to get a job, give them the opportunity to move up, and make additional dollars as well. You cannot do that if you don't have a job to begin with. That is the balance we're trying to look at. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: Let's take another call. Stephen is calling from San Diego, welcome to the program. NEW SPEAKER: Thank you very much. Mayor Faulconer, thank you for taking my call. I think we're extremely concerned about wildfires here in San Diego County, and as a citizen, I feel that the dense brush in the forest is extremely dry tender, and we will have a huge fire. What can we do on this side to get Chief Maynard the authority to start doing controlled burns, and burn the brush that is very thick and dense, to decrease the amount of fuel for the upcoming wildfire season? MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: Stephen, thank you for the call. MAYOR FAULCONER: Thank you for the call, Stephen. In the budget that we just passed and the council passed and I signed, it does have additional dollars for brush management which gets to the heart of your question, I think means to make sure that we not only are cutting it back, but being proactive. We saw particularly in the Bernardo Fire, here in San Diego several weeks ago, how important defensible spaces are around people's homes. You can see where the fire went right around where people had cleared the brush. It works. That is part of it, also, part of it is to make sure that our fire rescue Department is prepared as they can be. We have added more dollars to hire more fire recruits. One thing I was so impressed with, was the communication between all of our agencies during the fires. It was not the case when we look at the Cedar Fire and the Witch Creek fire. City, county, CalFire were all working much better than they have. There is always room to improve, but I was impressed with all of the things that we have put into place that seem to work. Particularly when we needed them the most. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: Isn't there a controversy as to whether controlled burns actually work with Southern California vegetation? MAYOR FAULCONER: Certainly in an urban environment the focus is on brush management and clearing brush rather than controlled burns. Chief Maynard knows, he and his team are out there constantly in this effort. In fact, we will do an awareness effort on that in a couple of weeks. Fire season in San Diego traditionally used to be September and October, and we have seen the worst drought of our states history, we have a lot of fuel out there, clearing that and taking care of that, anyone who is listening today, if you have it around your house, now is the time to create if it's. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: Dave is calling from North Park, welcome to the program. NEW SPEAKER: Hi, thank you for taking the call. I have a serious concern. I know that when you ran, part of what I heard from a lot of local candidates is the importance of bicycling and being by friendly, I appreciate that and I have a very serious concern about the new design of Park Boulevard in the North Park area I know you probably know the project are they are putting a bus lane down the center of Park right South of El Cajon. That used to be a wonderful place to bike, it was two lanes wide, flat and easy to ride as a bicyclist. Now it is down to less than one lane, that all of the traffic get said into because of the redesign and frankly, I think it is a danger as a bicyclist to be there. I am curious, I appreciate you saying that you're a bike advocate. I'm curious what kind of bike advocacy was involved in the design. As a bicyclist, is dangerous and faulty design and I think the city will be liable if there is ever an accident with a bicyclist there, because frankly, it is a faulty design. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: Dave, thank you. MAYOR FAULCONER: Dave, I will take a look at that, thank you for the call. The bus rapid transit that we are putting down is important to make sure that we're doing everything we can to get people out of cars, particularly in the urban center of San Diego. It is also very important that we are creating bike infrastructure to be successful. We spent a lot of time on that, particularly on making sure that not only bike lanes that we are creating, painting the share arrows on the streets to make sure that we are reminding people to share the lane with bicyclists, painting in some places green paint to further the awareness. We are moving forward the bike sharing program, which we will kick off in a couple of months from Decobike. I am a huge fan and believer in that we had the ability to be one of the largest bike sharing cities in the country once we get up and running. We have to make sure that we're providing the infrastructure in the right way, so I will go out there and take a look at that, and make sure if it is all completely done yet. Maybe there are some things coming in particular that might help with that, but I appreciate your question and I will make sure that the team is looking at that right away. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: There's an audit underway at the San Diego Police Department, in light of several incidents of police misconduct. Voice of San Diego reports that the group conducting this audit, the Police Executive Research Forum has strong ties to former Police Chief William Lansdowne. It was under his watch that these allegations of misconduct were reported. Doesn't this gives the appearance that the outcome of this audit is a little biased, the investigation itself? MAYOR FAULCONER: We have asked for an independent audit, and I am confident that is what we will get. Chief Zimmerman asked for that audit. The Department of Justice is involved. The Department of Justice is going to ensure that there is a very thorough independent and open review of police practices. That is what I want, that is what I am counting on. And as I said before, when I appointed Chief Zimmerman, I appointed somebody that not only has strong experience in this department, but understands very clearly my views on the type of behavior that we will accept. And the type that we won't. I am very proud of the men and women who put on the badge every single day for this department. We need to make sure that we are doing absolutely everything to set highest possible standard. I think this audit will help with that and I am looking for to its conclusions. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: Are you concerned at all about these ties between former chief Lansdowne and this organization? MAYOR FAULCONER: The organization that is doing it is very well respected, and has done audits across the country. I have no reason to doubt that they will give us a very thorough, open analysis, as I said, one that I am looking forward to. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: I also want to ask you about the compromise that is expected on the biggest fees, commercial developers, what they pay to the city and what goes towards affordable housing. There was a reversal of the city council vote to increase those fees, the housing commission was to adjourn, and come up with some sort of plan. Now, Todd Gloria apparently believes a compromised plan will come before the city council in the next few weeks. What do you know about this plan? MAYOR FAULCONER: Well, I think we have a real opportunity to get a plan that will work, and that achieves the right balance. When we're looking at increasing fees, noise have to say you do not want the unintended consequences, for example spending a lot of time trying to increase manufacturing here in San Diego with biotechnology. To increase that the in some cases would have been 500% to 800%, it is not what we want to see happen. We want good quality of affordable housing. We want to make sure that we are providing all of the tools to get us there. I am pretty optimistic that we will have a compromise that I think makes the most sense, not only for the affordable housing that we are going to continue to make, but also for the economy. That is something that as mayor I am extremely focused on, giving businesses the opportunity to put people to work and to succeed, I think we have the makings for that, and I am pretty confident we will reach a resolution in the coming weeks. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: This went so quickly, but I have a question to ask you, it is a tweet from Vince Vasquez. He asks you, will be Mayor join soccer fans at tomorrow's World Cup viewing party USA versus Belgium? MAYOR FAULCONER: The answer is yes, we will be down there and we will put up the big screen, it will be great and yes, I will be there for at least a little bit in the beginning. MAUREEN CAVANAUGH: As always, thank you sir. MAYOR FAULCONER: Great to be here, thank you.