Many thanks to Mayor Filner and Donna Frye for establishing a new framework at City Hall for an accessible system of online information about how San Diego government works!
Regular people (who are not investigative reporters) will look forward to the details of how this new openness will work. We depend on traditional media like KPBS to provide the web address, the template of newly accessible items and how-to-get-there instructions.
For example, I haven't seen specific information made public yet about what areas of inquiry are now readily available that weren't previously. Keeping a tally of what's new on the City Hall sunshine website would be helpful. If there is a revamped system, it should be described fully for the hoi polloi.
You compound the problem here by skating away from responsibility for both Mark Sauer's false statement about Mel Shapiro and David Rolland's dismissive characterization of him by changing the subject. Now all three of you owe Shapiro an apology and your listeners a promise to be less glib in future.
Importantly,Shapiro has weighed in publicly -- and with documentation -- that both he and the City Attorney believe there is a clear distinction between levying "fees" and assessing "taxes" that require a public vote. This will be an issue in days to come as the Mayor decides what to do about his embargo of money taken by hotel owners to promote their Tourism Management District.
KPBS' Mark Sauer pejoratively mischaracterized civic activist Mel Shapiro as someone who is always "anti-tax" and David Rolland only semi-corrected that misstatement by labeling Shapiro as a "gadfly."
The truth is that Mel Shapiro is a very intelligent long-time advocate for transparent good government. Shapiro believes that San Diego hoteliers' 3% "fee" levied on tourists is an illegal surtax that requires a vote of the people, and he has made public City Attorney Goldsmith's concurring written opinion.
Thank you for this refreshingly balanced and accurate report.
I sat in the Balboa Theater next to an African-American gentleman who, in retirement, has relocated to San Diego where his adult son lives. We introduced ourselves and shook hands. I asked what moved him to attend the State of the City event. He said, "This is a historic occasion," and mentioned that he was a native of Alabama and wanted to be present as Mayor Bob Filner, a Democrat and former Freedom Rider, now took the helm of San Diego city government.
Thanks for this comment, JeanMarc, it reminds me to pass along what I heard on KPBS today. Apparently there are about 300 million guns circulating in the United States -- almost one per person. But the NUMBER OF GUN OWNERS is NOT GROWING. Rather, the increase is because GUN OWNERS -- presumably like you and the late Mrs. Lanza -- ARE BUYING MORE GUNS.
Jaeger -- the name of a hunting falcon, if I am not mistaken -- we could also outfit our school principals with small grenades to neutralize potential threats at their campuses. Or how about lethal drones?
Instead, we need to get on Dianne Feinstein's bandwagon here, thank her for her courage in proposing this legislation and encourage our legislators in Congress to support it. Period. Do it today.
Personally, I don't want my elementary school principal armed to the teeth. I don't want to shop in malls alongside people carrying concealed weapons. "Legally armed people" get on my nerves. We want to model something else for our domestic society. We need to eliminate the likelihood of people being blown away in a home-accident or an argument or as a result of a grudge or because of paranoid ideation by someone bearing legal high-powered firearms.
Assault weapons need to be removed from the For Sale table and ammo clips of many rounds need to be prohibited as well. After that, we can start to re-fund our decimated mental health programs and work on finding peace and love.
In Scotland, where there were FIVE shooting deaths in the last year, assault weapons are banned and handgun ownership is strictly limited. After a similarly horrific school massacre in a small Scottish town some years ago, the national gun law was further strengthened to require that legal handguns be secured at gun clubs, not at home.
This is an important story and an excellent thorough examination of the issues and the judicial rating process. You are to be congratulated.The community needs to know how much is at stake when ideologues of any persuasion infiltrate our justice system.
Good luck, Peking Duck, on getting any action after filing a formal complaint to Secretary of State Debra Bowen.
I wrote to her last May 31 and still have received no response about a new practice by San Diego Registrar of Voters Deborah Seiler who had sold information to a conservative blog called San Diego Rostra concerning the political parties of absentee voters whose ballots are returned to the Registrar prior to the election.
I think publishing such numbers can discourage late voter turnout, much as exit polling does, and that it also breaches voter ballot privacy. Seiler dismisses such concerns, saying, it's all public information available to whomever wants to pay. She said to the U-T, "If a voter stays out there because of something like this, I think it is just an excuse." She refused to answer my follow-up questions, so I wrote to the Secretary of State Bowen on May 31. No answer from her either, and it's already September 17.
That was a disgracefully content-free conversation yesterday about the Manchester takeover of daily journalism in San Diego with reporter Rob Davis, the ever-glib Tony Perry and emcee Mark Sauer. If KPBS is to be an alternative news source, you will need to do better. For starters, your moderator needs to quit interrupting callers in mid-comment and cutting them off!
I heard the program and have reviewed the transcript here. Not one word was devoted to the important influence of a metropolitan daily newspaper's investigative journalism on the commonweal -- the public good. That's why it's called the Fourth Estate -- as important in its role as the Executive, Legislative and Judicial branches of government are in theirs. If the people don't learn the facts about what's happening -- or get a skewed version of the truth -- they cannot act in their own best interest.
Yesterday you delivered shallow buzz about personalities, style, money, celebrity gossip and insider trivia. The sole example given of enterprising journalism -- when long-gone San Diego Union-Tribune Washington Bureau's Marcus Stern finally got the green light to uncover the bribery scandal of GOP Congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham -- is so ancient it could be moss-covered.
Opinionating and cheerleading belong on the editorial page, not in the news columns of a reputable newspaper. "Being positive" about the community only works when there's something "positive" to talk about -- and never to the exclusion of reality. If the positive news is big-business National Football League sports, that belongs on the sports page. We may be experimenting with fashionable notions of "multiple platforms" for journalism, but the old rules apply -- now more than ever. Without a strong daily newspaper, there will be no free marketplace of ideas, and the community will suffer.
First of all, Ed Harris is another well-intentioned interventionist who cannot speak for the Lifeguards or for the City -- a point he made explicitly clear when presenting this idea to the La Jolla Parks and Beaches committee. Secondly, his idea is preposterous. Moving boulders around on the beach seasonally? Bulldozing sand for an annual "cleaning?" Ridiculous and profoundly intrusive.
Understandably, Harris does not like mediating conflicts among seal-lovers and divers at the Children's Pool site. But he should tend to the more pressing issue of getting the eyesore temporary pipe-and-plastic Lifeguard station off the sidewalk at Coast Blvd. and continue to focus on the safety of folks in the water.
It should be noted that Coastal Commission staff has opined in favor of a "year-round rope" to protect people and seals from each other on the sand. That's what's up for consideration at the meeting next week.
In fact,the first untoward human intervention occurred long ago when a well-intentioned and misguided benefactress paid for construction of a seawall at the so-called Children's Pool. That act has led to today's literal and figurative mess at the site.
If the City Council and Mayor had an ounce of courage or independence, they would agree it is imperative to open the sluice gates in the seawall to clean the beach with tidal flows or raze the wall entirely and return the shoreline landscape to it original form. The seals would still haul out on nearby rocks or occasionally on the sand, but they would no longer cause the environmental and social mess that now exists.
Today the beach is filthy; the water is polluted with unhealthy bacteria; seals and humans come into too-close contact endangering both species; everyone quarrels over beach access on the sidewalk and now, even fed-up Lifeguards are getting in on the act.
There is an answer here, but Ed Harris' boulders and backhoes are not it. City Council and the Mayor should act in common to remedy what has become an intractable civic and environmental problem.
69° A Few Clouds
Frye Leaves Open Government Director Post
Many thanks to Mayor Filner and Donna Frye for establishing a new framework at City Hall for an accessible system of online information about how San Diego government works!
Regular people (who are not investigative reporters) will look forward to the details of how this new openness will work. We depend on traditional media like KPBS to provide the web address, the template of newly accessible items and how-to-get-there instructions.
For example, I haven't seen specific information made public yet about what areas of inquiry are now readily available that weren't previously. Keeping a tally of what's new on the City Hall sunshine website would be helpful. If there is a revamped system, it should be described fully for the hoi polloi.
April 6, 2013 at 11:20 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Roundtable: Hotel Tax Judged; 10 Years In Iraq; Some Homeless Housed; Padres Fans V. Broadcasters.
Pat Finn:
You compound the problem here by skating away from responsibility for both Mark Sauer's false statement about Mel Shapiro and David Rolland's dismissive characterization of him by changing the subject. Now all three of you owe Shapiro an apology and your listeners a promise to be less glib in future.
Importantly,Shapiro has weighed in publicly -- and with documentation -- that both he and the City Attorney believe there is a clear distinction between levying "fees" and assessing "taxes" that require a public vote. This will be an issue in days to come as the Mayor decides what to do about his embargo of money taken by hotel owners to promote their Tourism Management District.
March 15, 2013 at 6:17 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Roundtable: Hotel Tax Judged; 10 Years In Iraq; Some Homeless Housed; Padres Fans V. Broadcasters.
KPBS' Mark Sauer pejoratively mischaracterized civic activist Mel Shapiro as someone who is always "anti-tax" and David Rolland only semi-corrected that misstatement by labeling Shapiro as a "gadfly."
The truth is that Mel Shapiro is a very intelligent long-time advocate for transparent good government. Shapiro believes that San Diego hoteliers' 3% "fee" levied on tourists is an illegal surtax that requires a vote of the people, and he has made public City Attorney
Goldsmith's concurring written opinion.
March 15, 2013 at 12:29 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Filner Stresses Transit, Environments, Neighborhoods In State Of The City
Thank you for this refreshingly balanced and accurate report.
I sat in the Balboa Theater next to an African-American gentleman who, in retirement, has relocated to San Diego where his adult son lives. We introduced ourselves and shook hands. I asked what moved him to attend the State of the City event. He said, "This is a historic occasion," and mentioned that he was a native of Alabama and wanted to be present as Mayor Bob Filner, a Democrat and former Freedom Rider, now took the helm of San Diego city government.
January 16, 2013 at 11:56 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Sen. Dianne Feinstein To Introduce Gun Control Legislation
Thanks for this comment, JeanMarc, it reminds me to pass along what I heard on KPBS today. Apparently there are about 300 million guns circulating in the United States -- almost one per person. But the NUMBER OF GUN OWNERS is NOT GROWING. Rather, the increase is because GUN OWNERS -- presumably like you and the late Mrs. Lanza -- ARE BUYING MORE GUNS.
December 17, 2012 at 2:47 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Sen. Dianne Feinstein To Introduce Gun Control Legislation
Jaeger -- the name of a hunting falcon, if I am not mistaken -- we could also outfit our school principals with small grenades to neutralize potential threats at their campuses. Or how about lethal drones?
Instead, we need to get on Dianne Feinstein's bandwagon here, thank her for her courage in proposing this legislation and encourage our legislators in Congress to support it. Period. Do it today.
Personally, I don't want my elementary school principal armed to the teeth. I don't want to shop in malls alongside people carrying concealed weapons. "Legally armed people" get on my nerves. We want to model something else for our domestic society. We need to eliminate the likelihood of people being blown away
in a home-accident or an argument or as a result of a grudge or because of paranoid ideation by someone bearing legal high-powered firearms.
Assault weapons need to be removed from the For Sale table and ammo clips of many rounds need to be prohibited as well. After that, we can start to re-fund our decimated mental health programs and work on finding peace and love.
In Scotland, where there were FIVE shooting deaths in the last year, assault weapons are banned and handgun ownership is strictly limited. After a similarly horrific school massacre in a small Scottish town some years ago, the national gun law was further strengthened to require that legal handguns be secured at gun clubs, not at home.
December 17, 2012 at 10:53 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Judging San Diego's Judicial Candidates (Video)
This is an important story and an excellent thorough examination of the issues and the judicial rating process. You are to be congratulated.The community needs to know how much is at stake when ideologues of any persuasion infiltrate our justice system.
September 18, 2012 at 11:28 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Some Question The Tactics Of The Election Integrity Project In San Diego
Good luck, Peking Duck, on getting any action after filing a formal complaint to Secretary of State Debra Bowen.
I wrote to her last May 31 and still have received no response about a new practice by San Diego Registrar of Voters Deborah Seiler who had sold information to a conservative blog called San Diego Rostra concerning the political parties of absentee voters whose ballots are returned to the Registrar prior to the election.
I think publishing such numbers can discourage late voter turnout, much as exit polling does, and that it also breaches voter ballot privacy. Seiler dismisses such concerns, saying, it's all public information available to whomever wants to pay. She said to the U-T, "If a voter stays out there because of something like this, I think it is just an excuse." She refused to answer my follow-up questions, so I wrote to the
Secretary of State Bowen on May 31. No answer from her either, and it's already
September 17.
September 17, 2012 at 8:27 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Roundtable: Manchester, Orchestra Nova, Vets and Martial Arts
That was a disgracefully content-free conversation yesterday about the Manchester takeover of daily journalism in San Diego with reporter Rob Davis, the ever-glib Tony Perry and emcee Mark Sauer. If KPBS is to be an alternative news source, you will need to do better. For starters, your moderator needs to quit interrupting callers in mid-comment and cutting them off!
I heard the program and have reviewed the transcript here. Not one word was devoted to the important influence of a metropolitan daily newspaper's investigative journalism on the commonweal -- the public good. That's why it's called the Fourth Estate -- as important in its role as the Executive, Legislative and Judicial branches of government are in theirs. If the people don't learn the facts about what's happening -- or get a skewed version of the truth -- they cannot act in their own best interest.
Yesterday you delivered shallow buzz about personalities, style, money, celebrity gossip and insider trivia. The sole example given of enterprising journalism -- when long-gone San Diego Union-Tribune Washington Bureau's Marcus Stern finally got the green light to uncover the bribery scandal of GOP Congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham -- is so ancient it could be moss-covered.
Opinionating and cheerleading belong on the editorial page, not in the news columns of a reputable newspaper. "Being positive" about the community only works when there's something "positive" to talk about -- and never to the exclusion of reality. If the positive news is big-business National Football League sports, that belongs on the sports page. We may be experimenting with fashionable notions of "multiple platforms" for journalism, but the old rules apply -- now more than ever. Without a strong daily newspaper, there will be no free marketplace of ideas, and the community will suffer.
September 15, 2012 at 11:08 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Lifeguards Pose Solution For Children's Pool
First of all, Ed Harris is another well-intentioned interventionist who cannot speak for the Lifeguards or for the City -- a point he made explicitly clear when presenting this idea to the La Jolla Parks and Beaches committee. Secondly, his idea is preposterous. Moving boulders around on the beach seasonally? Bulldozing sand for an annual "cleaning?" Ridiculous and profoundly intrusive.
Understandably, Harris does not like mediating conflicts among seal-lovers and divers at the Children's Pool site. But he should tend to the more pressing issue of getting the eyesore temporary pipe-and-plastic Lifeguard station off the sidewalk at Coast Blvd. and continue to focus on the safety of folks in the water.
It should be noted that Coastal Commission staff has opined in favor of a "year-round rope" to protect people and seals from each other on the sand. That's what's up for consideration at the meeting next week.
In fact,the first untoward human intervention occurred long ago when a well-intentioned and misguided benefactress paid for construction of a seawall at the so-called Children's Pool. That act has led to today's literal and figurative mess at the site.
If the City Council and Mayor had an ounce of courage or independence, they would agree it is imperative to open the sluice gates in the seawall to clean the beach with tidal flows or raze the wall entirely and return the shoreline landscape to it original form. The seals would still haul out on nearby rocks or occasionally on the sand, but they would no longer cause the environmental and social mess that now exists.
Today the beach is filthy; the water is polluted with unhealthy bacteria; seals and humans come into too-close contact endangering both species; everyone quarrels over beach access on the sidewalk and now, even fed-up Lifeguards are getting in on the act.
There is an answer here, but Ed Harris' boulders and backhoes are not it. City Council and the Mayor should act in common to remedy what has become an intractable civic and environmental problem.
July 6, 2012 at 10:58 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )