Thursday, July 23, 2009

This was left as a comment by Anon. under the Beach Protection charter amendment post...

And is worthy of being brought forward for more visibility:
Here we go again! Using the beach as a political football to further one's career, rather than really doing anything to improve access to, use, environmental function, or appearance of the beach. I can hardly wait to hear all the horror stories about the (straw)(boogie)men who are about to rape our glorious beach (that we have taken oh such good care of these many decades!). The threat of course will not include those concessionaires who have been engaged in systematic banditry -- with full City cooperation -- at the beach for years. There will be endless opportunity for self-righteous, self-congratulatory piety and chest pounding. Promoting a charter amendment is certainly a lot easier than actually doing anything useful at the beach. Not a single tree will be planted; instead, groves of trees must die to provide paper for political flyers and door hangers extolling the virtues of the Charter amendment's proponents and how much they truly "love" our City. Let's endlessly replay these stale political canards. Will we ever learn? It seems not...
Unfortunately, I agree. And it recalls the last election cycle of Commissioner's Jennings' ethics ordinance that had little to do with ethics and was supposedly designed to end "pay to play" campaign contributions. But, since it wasn't passed, Commissioner Jennings' used it in her re-election campaign as a sledgehammer to hit competing candidates over the head with. Never mind that her candidate for the District #4 seat took massive campaign contributions from beach casino tenants - all of who's businesses had contracts with the city in the form of their leases. Those contributions would have been outlawed under her supposed "ethics ordinance." Expect this to be another "litmus test" for candidates. Think how "Beach Protection Charter Amendment" will sound uttered by the lips of Commissioner Jennings' political machine - can you say "Motherhood and Apple Pie?"

I'll be at City Hall tomorrow and will try to get more detail. Expect this to appear on the August 7th Commission agenda to put it officially on the ballot. The timing is tight - the amendment has to be to the Supervisor of Elections by 5 p.m. and requires two readings...hmmmm.