Golden Oldie - Developer vs Theatre

Tonight's city council meeting includes the agenda item for  General Plan Update (GPU) of the Kristin Gaspar construct, ERAC (pronounced erase here):

Council Discussion and Direction regarding the  regarding the Element Review Advisory Committee (ERAC) vacancy, attendance and quorum; and the Housing Policy Report presentation schedule.

This prompted thoughts of how deeply embedded key commercial development companies are in Encinitas city government.  (What Gaspar defines as the city stakeholders). The relationships are all intertwined with the past council majority.

And the dance that was the pretense of doing the public's business while actually serving these key players simply spells ERAC to this writer.

So Encinitas thought they were promised a theatre?  That was not going to happen with this crew.  Not ever . . .

Betrayal is part and parcel of so many city decisions over the years.  Remember this summer's cartoon from Mary Fleener, 2nd oldest profession?

Not for nothin', betrayal looms large in Washington, DC right now with lies that are the fiscal bluff.  

Cardiffian Matriarch - Dorthea Patricia Smith

This remarkable woman is remembered in a piece submitted by her family to Encinitas Patch, including this vibrant picture by Michelle Haymoz.

Encinitas history is writ large in this memorial to Dorthea Patricia Smith and well worth reading.

"Dorothea Patricia Smith: A Creative Life. She encouraged us to live boldly, paint large, make music, and put our hands in dirt. To stretch the envelope into another space. To reject crawling into a hole with work. To paint big pictures of color and put them up on your walls. To get out and do things, have picnics, enjoy all the seasons, go exploring. Most importantly, to dream big."

Her love of architectural was especially fascinating with her sharp perception of utility and flow. Dorthea and her husband Milton had four children.  In looking through the archives here it seems we have posted a video clip that included her daughter Tricia speaking out against the proposed developer's agreement for the agricultural property owned by the Brown family of flower growers.  The Smith Family, Dorthea's parents, grew flowers too.

"Her parents grew gladiolas commercially on rented land throughout Cardiff and Encinitas. Flowers remained popular during the Depression for weddings and funerals, and when the flower crop was good and the demand high at the Los Angeles flower market the family frequently sold out every last organic flower. However, the year Dorothea was planning to attend college at UCLA, 1935, a devastating freeze wiped out the flower crop. She stayed home to work and help the family, and consequently did not attend college."

This adds a textural background to the video clip of her daughter's points five years ago at city hall.  Given her mother's keen design interests, the construction business and the family legacy in the flower fields, she speaks with real authenticity about quality in development the landowners and how they should not be pitied for their changing circumstances.  They have extracted a great deal and have enjoyed many breaks and benefits.  The arguments are as current today as they were in 2007.

It was just last week we highlighted another Cardiffian, Chalmers Johnson, though this one was known by a tiny proportion within his community and by a larger group outside Encinitas.

Crest Drive

On Aug. 15, the Encinitas City Council will hear arguments against City Engineering Department mandates for curb, gutter and pedestrian walkway on Crest Drive, a rural residential subdivision of one-acre lots within old Encinitas.In the proposed single family home, the city originally asked for 8 feet of concrete pavers with curbs 450 feet long and a 5 foot walkway, eliminating 13 feet of natural landscaping and threatening old growth trees and vegetation along Crest Drive. 

All the land adjacent to the pavement would also need to be removed and graded down to the level of the street, thereby widening the street by over 26 feet when both sides are complete. 

The City Engineering Department stated, “ Our goal is to have curb, gutter and sidewalk on every home in Encinitas.”

Excerpt from Coast News article by Kevin Farrell, we recommend reading the whole piece. It ends with this call to action.

"We don’t understand the benefit the city would get from this. With so many people opposed throughout Encinitas, it would be a win, win, for the City to re-evaluate and leave our neighborhoods the way we want, not some Engineers personal preference. We have appealed the engineers finding to our City Council members for a final determination. We are optimistic the Council will assist in helping preserve our trees and vegetation thus maintaining the Community Character we love. 

Please join me at the City Council meeting next Wednesday at 6 p.m. and help support this worthy cause in keeping Encinitas, the way it was. A presence in numbers will help to get our point across." 

This council agenda item triggered the memory of Joni Mitchell's song we posted on Thursday, singing "They paved paradise and put up a parking lot."  The lyrics are perfectly apt for Mayor Stocks bragging at his state of the city address last April 18th.  The following clip was first posted after the last council meeting before this break with this introduction.

"Jerome Stocks' perspective on parking lots, traffic, commerce, pot holes, walkable streets, safe routes, etc. at last April's state of the city speech. This speech was directed at a car-centric approach to city planning. Wrong decade, false assumptions and giant omissions."

It's probably no coincidence that Stocks is called out for including tree-lined Crest Drive in his bragging, while city engineers are ginning up rationale to fell these same trees.  The man either has no ethics or no clue what the words coming from his mouth mean.

Photo at Opening from April 21, 2012 article, North County Times, about Crest Drive Petition. 

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