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Did interim mayor Todd Gloria have the authority to rescind stop-use order for Jack in the Box?
This is in line with Gloria's infamous history with the Golden Hill maintenance assessment district. While first running for city council, he told me he opposed it. Then he was instrumental in allowing the city to vote illegally (and disproportionately) for it. It barely passed. The double taxation was eventually overturned by the courts after years of pro bono work by a neighborhood attorney. Gloria fought against the neighborhood the whole way, then fought the issuance of refunds to property owners, delaying the process just long enough they didn't have to issue refunds for the first year of the MAD, after a statute of limitations kicked in. This latest shenanigan with Jack in the Box exceeds his authority as interim mayor and once again is going to cost the city millions in lawsuits from residents of South Park/Golden Hill. Meanwhile, more condos pop up on every corner, with less street parking, hurting neighborhood businesses. It's a bad recipe for the future, and Gloria is solidly behind the wrong-headed process, all the while touting his pro-neighborhood stance. He has his eyes beyond San Diego, perhaps to the state legislature, but will hurt San Diego just like he hurt South Park.— September 1, 2013 9:20 a.m.
City Issues Partial Refunds To Residents in Greater Golden Hill
The Golden Hill MAD is just the latest example of Todd Gloria and the city perpetuating an antagonistic relationship with its taxpaying citizens, the very residents the city is supposed to be serving. Instead, the city colluded with a flim-flam man who established the MAD based on lies. The city redrew the boundaries to include city-owned land, giving it a disproportionate "yes" vote to double-tax citizens for basic city services already paid for with our property taxes. Then it turned a blind eye to fraud by the Golden Hill CDC, who doled out no-bid contracts to its buddies in other cities (remember the $6,000 logo?). Finally, when faced with a lawsuit to dismantle the MAD, the city fought us, its citizens, tooth and nail, delaying the inevitable court decision for years, and deriding anyone who fought on the right side of the issue, all to protect their jobs and their bloated pensions. The refunds should have been sent months ago; instead, the city delayed and obfuscated, claiming they couldn't be sent until the end of the fiscal year (June 30), just long enough for a statute of limitations to kick in so they wouldn't have to send full refunds. The whole crooked thing is sickening. I'm so glad I decided to get out of California in 2011 and move to Texas, where the government doesn't spend all its time trying to figure out new ways to bilk the people it's supposed to be serving. I urge all Golden Hill residents to withhold the amount you were shorted on the refund from your property taxes. Simply direct the county assessor to the city's liability fund for the money. If confronted about it, tell the county you can't pay it until your fiscal year is over, say 2019.— July 31, 2012 8:52 a.m.
County To Refund 2011 Assessments For Greater Golden Hill MAD
What I emailed Gloria this morning: Thanks for the recent email regarding refunding the money we paid into the now-defunct Golden Hill MAD. I love that you're suing anyone and everyone to recover your money (our money), when the city arranged to give itself a disproportionate "yes" vote to form the MAD in the first place, redrew the boundaries to include city-owned property, then derided residents for suing the city after years of inaction to redress the wrongs done to us. Good luck explaining THAT in court. Anyway, as complicated as you make the issue sound, this part of it really isn't. It doesn't take months of focus groups or stakeholder meetings or any other bureaucratic gobbledygoop: 1. Send checks in the next 30 days refunding what everyone paid in over the years. I can even tell you exactly how much to send me. There's no need to wait for MAD/GGHCDC money to end up in the city coffers; that can come later, at your convenience. We shouldn't have to wait for all that. Goodness knows what you would have done to any property owner who refused to pay that part of our property taxes. It would have taken only a few days for you to slap a lien on my house. 2. Call the head of public works, and have them pick up the trash from all the trash cans in the neighborhood, not just city-owned ones. If their union balks, have Jerry threaten to fire them. As the attached photo shows, it's becoming a sanitary issue for the neighborhood. I can only imagine you've let it get this bad out of subconscious spite (or conscious spite), to "punish" us for voting against the MAD, then fighting it tooth-and-nail for years. OK, you're made your point. Just make a quick phone call to remove the trash, then the cans, before you have a nice cholera outbreak in Golden Hill to rival 1850s London. Sincerely, Jason Ford http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/apr/1…— April 13, 2012 8:49 a.m.
Judgment Finalized In Legal Battle Over Golden Hill Maintenance Assessment District
I've lived in Golden Hill for 20 years, and attended the earliest meetings about the MAD. I was initially in favor of it IF the MAD assessments were offset by lower property taxes, since the city would not be providing services covered by the MAD. But no, it was double taxation. Not only that, the map shown to me at the Broadway and 24th meeting showed boundaries that clearly did not include GH Park, 28th Street Park, or the SE corner of Balboa Park down by Pershing. But the final boundaries were much different, which gave the city a huge vote. Even then, the illegally-formed district barely passed. When Todd Gloria was running for office, I met him at the South Park street fair, and told him the MAD would be a huge issue. He promised to look into the various problems with its formation and fraudulent administration. Instead, he became its biggest fan, ignoring GH taxpayers like me, and ignoring two court orders to disband the MAD. Now I'm sure they'll drag their feet on reimbursing us for all that money we wasted on new logos for the MAD/CDC's buddies. Now that the MAD is gone, I hope someone runs against Gloria and sends him packing, too.— February 10, 2012 9:49 a.m.
Golden Hill Residents Aren't MAD Anymore
I've been urging Councilman Gloria to disand this illegal MAD since before he was even in office. I urge everyone to call or email him, since he is passing this off as a few people for, a few against the district. I reminded him last week the city got a disproportionate YES vote to form it, which they said they wouldn't do, then denied. And it's double taxation, because our property taxes didn't go down, so now we pay twice for many city services that we used to just pay for in our property taxes. The city will likely fight another court loss, since if this district goes away, others are likely to follow suit (so to speak). I told him the city has limitless resources for losing legal battles (like the SR 905 project in the early '90s which took a large landowner's land, barely compensated him, and ended up costing the city $90 million in the end). They have no problem spending $200 million and counting for a new library no one wants or needs, either (remember when it was originally $85 million?). I have an HOA in my new neighborhood which charges $40--A YEAR--to do tree trimming, pool maintenance, all sorts of things. If Gloria understands it's political suicide to keep supporting this MAD, maybe he'll change his tune. Keep up the pressure on him!— September 25, 2011 8:11 a.m.