Welcome to BBR's Blog
Building a Better Redondo is dedicated toward preserving and improving resident quality of life. It was formed to give residents a voice on activities that will impact our quality of life. BBR is proud of our success with Measure DD, which gives Redondo residents a vote on major upzonings in our city. We are also proud of our recent lawsuit victory, in which a judge ordered the City to put Measure G zoning on the ballot. We are now opposing Measure G zoning which will foster overdevelopment, traffic gridlock and the loss of the last remaining views of our harbor.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
As a grass roots volunteer organization concerned about our community and its future, most of our supporters have family obligations over the holiday season that take priority. So we powered down our activites from Thanksgiving through the new year. But now we are ramping back up.
Our first activity of 2012 is going to be a No Power Plant Rally.
Join us at the rally...it's a fun way to get our message out!
Hope to see you there! The rallies are lots of fun!
Hello friends,
I know it has been a while since you heard from me. I wanted to update you on the latest with the Knob Hill property. Carden Dominion is no longer at the site. They moved to a new location just a few blocks east on Knob Hill. I am sad to see them go. And, the School District no longer gets their much needed rent. SELPA administration offices has moved in. But, rumor has it, the lease is only for one year. I do not know what the rent is. But, I cannot imagine the district is getting even the amount the city was paying when they were there. Looking back at the track record, here are the schools who have expressed interest in leasing the Knob Hill site, but were unable : Montesorri School, Ambassador School, Lutheran High School, and now Carden Dominion. We also had interest from AYSO. And yet, I continue to hear the school district say they cannot find a tenant.
As the bulk of the school now sits empty, I worry about the preschool house/building. This school is one of the oldest structures in South Redondo. It is a beautiful school house inside and out.
And now, the school district and the City have made a deal to engage in a land swap in North Redondo. If you have not already heard about this, I will quickly summarize. The surplus property, “the Edison site” currently houses the South Bay Adult School. This site was approved to receive money from the Measure C bond to make material improvement at the school for the benefit of the South Bay Adult School. But, now there is a planned land swap. The school district will swap the Edison site to the City in return for the Franklin site (owned by the City). The city will put low income housing on the Edison site. The school district will move the South Bay adult school to the Franklin site. The Measure C Bond funds would potentially be moved from the Edison site to the Franklin site for the benefit of the South Bay Adult School. The bond attorneys are currently researching whether this bond money can be moved from one site to another.
This raises many questions for me. In June 2010, the Knob Hill Community Group asked the School district to allocate some of the Measure C Bond funds to the 320 Knob Hill site. We were told and given a written legal response that our request was impossible to fulfill because the 320 Knob Hill site was not explicitly listed as a site on the bond initiative voted in by the Redondo Beach residents. If this is indeed true, how can they now move the funds from Edison to Franklin? If they can move the funds, why not consider moving the South Bay Adult School to Knob Hill and moving the funds Knob Hill to retrofit our aging structures? And if not, why not simply allocate the surplus funds to retrofit the beautiful preschool (historical candidate) at the Knob Hill site?
There are two important meetings next week. I have forwarded a message from Holly Osborne (leading the community effort against the land swap) from North Redondo. Please read below. I will do my best to attend both meetings. It would be great if we could get representation from the Knob Hill Community Group at one of both meetings.
Sincere regards,
Kelly Martin
Knob Hill Community Group
From: “Osborne, Holly (AS) (Contr)”
No decision on the bond measure C yet, as to whether the bond attorney says the funds can be moved to Franklin. The bond attorney has taken 5 weeks; Janet Redella told me they now expect a decision on Monday, Sept 26. (Recall: The issue is the funds were supposed to go to the Edison school site according to the ballot measure passed in 2008; the school district wants to move the funds to Franklin, saying if they move the Adult school to Franklin, it is “legal”. They then want to let the city build “affordable housing” on the Edison site.)
There are two important meetings next week: Monday at 5:00 PM, and the School Board meeting Tuesday at 6:30 P.M.
The Monday Sept 26 meeting is at the school district office at 5:00 PM, and is the “monthly” meeting of two city council people and two school district people. The agenda is on the school district web site,
http://rbusd.org/calendar/view?id=1303568061605&return_url=1316832346288
Measure C will be discussed, as well as the land swap. These meetings are informal, and are GREAT for asking questions and getting feedback. I need about 10 -15 people for this at least; I expect that they will announce the bond attorney’s decision here. The city council people are Aspel and Kilroy; the school people are Avrick and TBD. Other city council people and school district people sometimes show up. (Note: The school board is meeting the next day in closed session on the properties; this will be our last chance to get to at least one of them fact-to-face)
Now if the bond attorney rules that the city CAN move the bond funds to Franklin, I need everyone and his brother, sister and kids to PACK the school board meeting on Tuesday to protest. It is plainly unethical to promise one thing on a bond measure, and then do another, regardless of what their attorney says about the “legality.” (I also want people to PACK the school board meeting on Tuesday if the attorney has not ruled yet. Get there early so we can fill the seats.)
If the bond attorney rules that the city CANNOT move the bond funds to Franklin, then I need a good size number to show up, and demand that the school district actually spend the money on Edison for the promised upgrades.
I will send out an email on Monday night letting you know what has happened.
This past week, there were about 6 of us who went to the Bond Oversight committee meeting. There were several issues discussed, but the simplest was that the Bond Oversight chairman believes that the school district would have to refund to the Measure C pot of money the $200,000 that the bond fund has already spend on Edison, should the school district move the Adult School to Franklin. (Not good news for the school district!)
Councilman Diels’ – see it my way or bullying, intimidation, denigration, slander
Councilman Diels publishes an online North Redondo newsletter. In it he repeatedly attacks BBR. Here is one entry:
“BBR Lawsuit: The city offered to settle with BBR for a matching rate for attorneys fees = $127,000. BBR tripled that rate and demanded for $385,000 of Redondo Beach residents’ money. We obviously could not make a gift of public funds (your money) to BBR. They are suing the City again to argue for a larger share of your money. The greed continues. We continue to fight to protect your money. Not sure what the special interest group has planned for the extra $260,000 of your money they seek.”
The problem is, that this entry is an unbridled attack with no basis in truth or facts.
- The City never extended an offer to BBR or our lawyer to settle the lawsuit.
- Councilman Diels misleads the public in calling the lawsuit fees a “gift”. BBR’s lawyer capped his fees to BBR and worked the rest of his hours on the contingency of an award by the judge. If public cause lawyers did not do this, no average resident could ever afford to fight City Hall. The money awarded to BBR by the judge is to cover the legal costs incurred by our lawyer. The judge did not have to award BBR these legal fees, but he felt the City’s action to ignore the City Charter were egregious enough to warrant covering our lawyer’s costs.
- BBR did not sue the city again for legal fees. As the City continues the appeal of the judges’ finding that the City violated the City Charter, our lawyer has to generate more legal arguments to answer those submitted by the City. This increases the legal fees incurred by BBR on this case. It is the City driving up the costs not BBR.
- The greed is on the Diels’ side. He got caught violating the City Charter and he does not want to the City to pay our attorney his just legal fees incurred successfully challenging Diels’ violation.
- Mr. Diels knows that BBR will not get any money back on the lawsuit other than the retainer we paid to our attorney. That is about $30K donated by the residents of Redondo. That money will to into fighting the rebuilding of the power plant, but we will not likely see it until next year.
In his latest “On Local Government” column, former Redondo Beach Councilman, Bob Pinzler, finally admitted what many residents have suspected for years. The article is a good piece on why he liked Les Guthrie, despite constant lawsuits between the City and Marina Cove Ltd., Les’ company that runs the King Harbor Marina amongst other activities in their harbor leasehold.
“ However, the City’s problem was that their unstated goal, never spoken anywhere within earshot of the public, was to “let things get bad enough so the residents will allow them to do anything necessary.”
It is unwritten policy in the City, when they want an unpopular zoning change (like up zoning the harbor for example), the city allows things to deteriorate to the point the residents welcome ANY change…no matter horrific or impactful to resident quality of life in the long run.
So two things to take away…
First…when the City attacks BBR for our lawsuit on behalf of the residents, when the city says it is afraid to rezone the power plant for fear of a lawsuit…. here was a business in Redondo with numerous lawsuits throughout the years. The City was unafraid of these lawsuits. It did not castigate this businessman. Why are they so afraid of an AES lawsuit and why is BBR so bad for suing the city to follow its own city charter?
Second… when the city says they have to rezone something (like the harbor or Torrance Blvd) because it is so run down…remember the strategy finally admitted to by a former City Official. Always demand good, balanced zoning.
Despite city claims to the contrary, Redondo Beach population grew by more than any other South Bay City:
http://www.dailybreeze.com/news/ci_18585297?source=rv
As usual Councilman Diels and the others made excuses for not putting any funding toward this park. They pointed to the fact that Southern Califormia Edison, who owns the power line right of way, has not yet signed an agreement to allow the park. Funny thing is that SCE required the City to stand behind it, and it wasn’t until recent SBPC/Bill Brand efforts to get SCE and the City in the same room even talking about the issue. So that was a convenient excuse.
The second excuse was that SBPC has not raised any money for the park yet. This is amusing as well. In the meeting SBPC held with the City, SBPC clearly stated fundraising and grant applications could not proceed until AFTER the city negotiated the park agreement with SCE. You cannot successfully apply for grants until the grantors have some assurance of success, and without the agreement with SCE, there is no assurance of success.
Instead, Diels and the other Councilmen voted to put the money into existing parks in their own districts. And their lack of vision and leadership again stalled the only addition of parkland to Redondo Beach in decades. It is clear this was pure politics and NOT voting in the best interest of the people of Redondo.
Redondo has a measley 2.35 acres of parkland per 1000 residents (which includes our beach which is funded by the County). The average across the US is 12.9 acres per 1000 residents. The average for LA is 8.2 acres/1000 residents. California defines any city with less than 3 acres per 1000 residents as “critically underserved”.
In Redondo our parkland ratio has been in decline. We have grown in population by 5% in the last ten years and have added zero parkland. In fact, the Council just voted to allow the shrinkage of Moonstone Park to the absolute minimum required by the Coastal Commission – again demonstrating our Council is anti-park
The West Basin Water District has published water consumption statistics for its severive area (largely the South Bay). Here are the numbers:
- South Bay 227 gal/day/resident
- Los Angeles 124 gal/day/resident
- Long Beach 102 gal/day/resident
It is obvious we South Bay residents could do more to conserve water compared to people in communities right next to ours. Conservation is much cheaper than desalination plant.
We have a once in a lifetime opportunity to rid Redondo of the power plant. AES recently released its plant to repower. The plan states they will keep the current plant while they build a whole new one. Add a desal plant to the mix, it gets even worse. Can you imagine the entrance to Redondo and King Harbor adding even more industrial development than what is depicted below?
Last night the City Council passed zoning changes to the Mixed Use zoning ordinances. The ordinances were modified at the last minute after BBR pointed out that their attempt to add Mixed Use zoning to new properties would be an upzoning from current uses and require a vote of the people. The last minute updates deleted sections of the new zoning that would have allowed this upzoning.
Councilman Brand asked if there was a process to evaluate whether a new zoning had to go to a vote of the people per Article XXVII of the City Charter (formerly Measure DD). The City Manager replied there was not.
Measure DD passed in 2008 and was made part of the City Charter. Over two years later the City has yet to define a review process to ensure they follow it. It seems they would rather ignore it unless they get caught by vigilant residents.
West Basin Water District’s Test Desalination Plant, located at Redondo’s Sea Lab facility, is having substantial problems.
First they cannot get the plant to run reliably. It has yet to operate eight days in a row.
Second, the screen that is supposed to demonstrate how a desal plant can take in water without killing marine life has corroded away and the plant is killing marine life on the few days it has been able to operate.
According to an AES Redondo Power Plant study, the AES plant, which provided less than .01% of our power in 2008, killed more than 2 billion marine animals - halibut, bat rays, lobster, game fish… through their ocean water intakes.
If the screen system is ineffective, a full scale desal plant would have a huge impact on the local sea life. And the unreliability and the substantial maintenance required of the desal plant would drive the cost of desalinated water even higher than currently predicted.
