With St. Louis brewing giant Anheuser-Busch battling a hostile $46.4 billion takeover attempt by Belgium’s InBev, locals are bracing for the possibility that SeaWorld, the long-controversial aquatic park on City-owned land along the shores of …
Problems aboard a San Diego–based “mini-jet” have caused the temporary grounding of the nation’s fleet of Eclipse 500s, a new generation of light executive jets capable of ferrying four business passengers into small airports. On …
Ex-Democratic congresswoman Lynn Schenk, fresh from the local campaign trail as Hillary Clinton’s San Diego chairwoman, has circulated a lengthy email to volunteers and contributors giving her take on her candidate’s defeat, which she attributes …
Former Union-Tribune enterprise reporting editor Susan White has departed the paper and is now in New York working as an editor for a new foundation-funded website that debuted last week, promising to deliver in-depth reporting …
It’s been a very good San Diego election cycle for Linden Blue, proprietor with his brother Neal of General Atomics, the La Jolla defense contractor responsible for the Predator unmanned aerial vehicle and other nifty …
La Jolla’s Blue brothers aren’t the only locals in the business of making unmanned aerial vehicles. In fact, San Diego is such a hotbed of UAV development that last week it hosted the Association for …
Last-minute political expenditures made in local campaigns are often an indication that the people spending the cash don’t want their identities to become an issue with voters. The tactic works well because local media outlets …
The library at UCSD has just purchased some letters and related miscellanea belonging to Gary Snyder, a Northern California poet famous for hanging out with fellow Beat Generation writers Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, Philip Whalen, …
Now that Hillary Clinton has finally bowed out of the Democratic presidential race, the bets placed by local contributors can be tallied. Perhaps the biggest loser is Lynn Schenk, an ex-aide to then-governor Jerry Brown …
With election results now in hand, members of the city’s lobbying corps can adjust their strategies as needed. And despite the threatened economic recession and housing crash, there’s plenty of business, judging from recent disclosure …
An engineer from Burlingame, California, has been told by the City of San Diego’s Ethics Commission that he doesn’t have to register as a lobbyist if he provides only “technical data” to city officials. “If …
Late last month, San Diego voters began getting so-called robo calls on behalf of city councilman Scott Peters, one of four candidates running against incumbent city attorney Michael Aguirre. The taped caller identified herself as …
A good example of how money is channeled through state campaign committees, obscuring the original, sometimes controversial sources, can be found in the recent campaign filing of George Plescia, termed-out GOP assemblyman from La Jolla. …
On April 27 of this year, craigslist, the online classified advertising behemoth, carried this small notice: “I am requesting information on Jeffry Wetzel from Poway, CA. We invested $135,000 with what he calls a hedge …
A bevy of some of California’s biggest plaintiffs’ attorneys are lining up behind San Diego Community College District Board president Marty Block in his Democratic primary bid for the 78th District seat of termed-out GOP …
It was September 17 of last year, and City Attorney Mike Aguirre was making headlines again. This time the subject was an impending water shortage, and Aguirre had called a news conference to demand a …
The League of California Cities, operating out of a posh Sacramento office, is funded by cities with taxpayer dollars to lobby for legislation dear to the hearts of city councils throughout the state. The group …
The University of California just hiked annual student fees by 7.4 percent, but that hasn’t stopped the hallowed institution from handing out of ever-higher salaries. UCSD is still searching for someone to become the school’s …
General Atomics megamillionaire Linden Blue and ex–Jerry Sanders chief operating officer Ronne Froman have been an item for more than three years now, showing up together once a month or so in the column of …
Average San Diego citizens who have a hard time getting through to Mayor Jerry Sanders and the city council might be amazed at how easy it is for high-powered city lobbyists to get their feet …
In his latest annual financial disclosure statement, filed last month, San Diego police captain Bob Kanaski reported receiving four tickets to the Chargers-Colts game in November of last year worth a total of $900. Kanaski …
San Diego State University has been getting more than its share of bad ink lately, what with the campus drug raid last week. But at least one top SDSU executive has good news to report: …
Some San Diego city hall insiders are expecting the investigation announced this week by Mayor Jerry Sanders of that controversial Otay Mesa Blackwater training facility to be a whitewash. Exhibit number one, they argue, is …
EdVoice, that controversial Sacramento lobbying organization, has already rolled out at least two mailers on behalf of 78th District Democratic assembly candidate Marty Block, chairman of the board of the San Diego Community College District. …
The long-running dispute between the Barona Indians and their neighbors over pumping water for the tribe’s golf course apparently demanded a recent firsthand inspection by county supervisor Ron Roberts. On February 20, according to recently …
Political observers are scratching their heads over the unfortunate strategic timing of a new mailer being sent out by the campaign of Auday Arabo, the mini-mart advocate running in the 78th Assembly District Democratic primary …
Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins — the former law firm of now-imprisoned superlawyer Bill Lerach — is throwing a fund-raiser for Mike Lumpkin, running in the 52nd Congressional District Democratic primary for the seat …
The by-now-infamous F-word meltdown by San Diego mayor Jerry Sanders is only the latest instance in a long history of bad-boy behavior by the onetime chief of police, who was tutored on the mean streets …
It’s campaign season, time to delve into some colorful divorces of San Diego’s more-or-less rich and sort-of famous personalities. Earlier it was GOP city attorney candidate, ex-Poway mayor, and superior court judge Jan Goldsmith who …
The United States Navy is still using software sold to it by ADCS, the Poway outfit founded by Brent Wilkes, convicted of bribery, fraud, conspiracy, and money laundering and sentenced in February to a 12-year …
Thirty-Ninth District Democratic state senator Christine Kehoe is the chairwoman of the senate’s Energy, Utilities, and Communications Committee, holding life-and-death power over bills crucial to big power, phone, and cable companies. So when Kehoe puts …
Maybe it’s something in the water, but many of San Diego’s top Republican political players have lived to a ripe old age. Banker C. Arnholt Smith, the town’s preeminent Daddy Warbucks — who owned a …
While the State of California is threatening to slash funds for everything from school teachers to parks, higher-ups out at UCSD continue to party on. Local politicians and other favored VIPs have received a special …
More UCSD spending: recently appointed UCSD health sciences counsel Anthony Perez is being paid an annual base salary of $210,000 and will be eligible for a mortgage loan not to exceed $1.33 million made by …
Ex-mayor Pete Wilson, who retired as governor to a tony house in Los Angeles, returns to San Diego only occasionally these days to accept tributes from his wealthy friends in the local establishment; the most …
Faced with continued departures from the ranks of its sworn officers due to low pay, low morale, and competition from other law enforcement agencies, the San Diego Police Department is casting an ever-wider net for …
The National Organization for Marriage California, a political committee sponsored by the National Organization for Marriage, a group backing a state measure to ban gay marriage, has picked up support from Poway’s Margot Kyd, vice …
Information Week is out with a list of organizations that obtained H-1B visas to bring foreign “guest” workers into the country last year. They included Qualcomm, with 158; UCSD (69); San Diego State (8); San …
It’s getting hard to tell who is financing whom in the increasingly combative races for San Diego city council and city attorney. As the jousting intensifies, so does the cost of campaigning, but not all …
The source of campaign money recently given to Marty Block may come to Democrats as a bit of a surprise. Block is the San Diego community college board president running in the Democratic primary to …
San Diego’s GOP mayor Jerry Sanders has announced that under his direction the City has made a $5 million deposit at Neighborhood National Bank. “This deposit will continue my effort to utilize the City’s financial …
It’s politics with an inside twist at the County Administration Building, where Jim Duffy, a sheriff’s lieutenant, took over earlier this year as Republican county supervisor Ron Roberts’s chief of staff. Son of the late …
Employees of a small defense contractor headquartered in Mission Valley have created a stir in local political circles with their flurry of contributions this past fall to Third District San Diego city council candidate Todd …
Big labor is throwing in big money to oppose San Diego fifth district Republican city council candidate Carl DeMaio, a self-styled government reformer opposed by city employee unions. A state campaign disclosure filing made earlier …
District Eight San Diego city councilman Ben Hueso has been told by the general counsel of the City’s Ethics Commission that he can’t vote on anything concerning the Dells Imperial redevelopment project area, which includes …
EdVoice, a controversial Sacramento lobbying and political action group closely aligned with Los Angeles billionaire Eli Broad and other wealthy advocates of public school privatization and charter schools, has placed a high-stakes bet on the …
Padres owner John Moores continues to pour cash into the legal defense fund of departing California Senate president pro tem Don Perata of Oakland, under investigation by the feds relating to alleged kickbacks from consultants …
It’s March, and that means it’s again time for San Diego State University Month, when the taxpayer-funded institution flexes its public relations muscle and shows off to local denizens what all that money is ostensibly …
You know the political season is in high gear when candidates file their ballot statements, describing their personal achievements, with plenty of hyperbole thrown in for good measure. San Diego city councilman Brian Maienschein touts …
Texas buyout magnate T. Boone Pickens, who has a spread in Del Mar Country Club Estates near Rancho Santa Fe, is throwing a St. Patrick’s Day fund-raiser for GOP Congressman Brian Bilbray. The host committee …