C I T Y L I G H T S NEWS TICKER
Barrio Logan group tarnishes Chargers brass
Promises of stadium-related jobs dismantled by logic Chargers brass was in Barrio Logan on July 15 pitching a new stadium the team hopes will be built for them at the edge of the neighborhood during a community fundrais- ing luncheon.
C I T Y L I G H T S By Reader staff writers
All in the Jacobs family Irwin and son Jeff rev up the bulldozers Word that a son of La Jolla billionaire Democrat Irwin Jacobs is behind the port district’s controversial plan to demolish Seaport Village has come quickly on the heels of the elder Jacobs’s own back-room deal with Republican mayor Kevin Faulconer to bulldoze a megamillion- dollar road and parking- garage complex through Balboa Park. The twin moves have spawned accusa-
Irwin Jacobs
“Any new jobs are going to be for new residents who can afford to live here after prices spike.”
A group of locals billing itself as BASTA,
or Barrios Against Stadiums, quietly assem- bled across the street, picketing against a proposal they say could be devastating for local residents. “For us, a new downtown stadium one
block outside our community is going to have a tremendously negative effect on the renting residents and small businesses of Barrio Logan,” said local Brent Beltran. “Barrio Logan is a community of renters. If you build a stadium and an entire upscale entertainment district to go around it, the cost is going to leach into surrounding areas. “Property values will rise, which is great
for owners, but the majority of people who live here are renting, and the probability is that rents will go up both for residents and small businesses.” Beltran echoed the sentiments of several
others in the dozen or so demonstrators that the group held no ill will against the Chargers, despite their opposition to the team’s relocation plans. “Most of us are Charger fans — we’re
not bringing hate on the Chargers. But we don’t want a stadium that’s going to drive our residents out of our community.” Beltran also refuted claims that have
been floated proposing that redevelop- ment could result in a boon for the local jobs market. “If they’re bringing jobs into the com-
munity, who are those jobs going to be for? By the time the stadium gets built, many of the people living here now are going to be pushed out. So any new jobs are going to be for new residents who can afford to live here after prices spike.”
Dave Rice
A 480-foot “Spire” observation tower and an “OdySea” 178,490-square-foot aquarium are included to drive tourist traffic to the project.
The $1.2 billion plan calls for construc-
tion of three hotels with a total of more than 1000 rooms, along with almost 400,000 square feet of retail and restaurant uses, dwarfing current site improvements. A 480-foot “Spire” observation tower and
an “OdySea” 178,490-square-foot aquar- ium are included to drive tourist traffic to the project.
continued on page 33
tions regarding municipal corruption and the use of big political money by San Diego’s richest family to get its way. On July 13, the board of the San Diego
Unified Port District voted 6-1 to award exclusive negotiating rights for the Seaport Village teardown to a group headed by Yehudi Gaffen, a San Diego developer who has faced continued controversy over campaign con- tributions and alleged mismanagement of a massive public park development project in the Orange County city of Irvine. Gaffen has denied any wrongdoing, telling
KGTV/10News in September 2014, “We give money to organizations both politically and philanthropically that we feel aligned with — that are doing good things for our region, and I’m never gonna stop that — it’s very much part of our DNA and part of what we do.” Following the award of the Seaport Vil-
lage redevelopment deal, Gaffen told the Union-Tribune, “It’s very surprising, I didn’t expect to get it.”
C I T Y L I G H T S
Hillcrest skyline (view south toward downtown) Rules bent By Dorian Hargrove T
he Hillcrest Business Improvement Dis- trict has added com-
munity planning to its list of responsibilities. In June 2016, Ben Nich-
olls, executive director for the Hillcrest Business Asso- ciation, the nonprofit that manages the local business improvement district, cel- ebrated his role in circum- venting Uptown’s planning
Neal Obermeyer
group and convinc- ing city planners to draft a community plan that doubles the height limits of buildings in areas of Hillcrest, maintains density increases, and deletes a long- standing plan to create a historic district in the heart of Hillcrest. “I completed a plan that
in Hillcrest Is the business district flouting the law?
was begun in 2011 to engage with the Uptown plan pro- cess that sidestepped the Uptown Planners and pro- posed a business friendly agenda for the plan,” wrote Nicholls in his June 2016 annual performance review to the association’s board of directors. Sidestepping
Ben Nicholls
the local planning group, says Nich- olls, was essential, considering Hill- crest’s inadequate representation on the Uptown Plan- ners, the commu-
nity planning group that reviews projects for Hill- crest, University Heights, Mission Hills, Banker’s Hill,
PHOTOGRAPH BY ANDY BOYD
2 San Diego Reader July 21, 2016
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