The VC fire board Thursday night approved fees for safety inspections of businesses.
Safety inspections for businesses have been free up until this point, however the newly appointed fire marshal, George Lucia, recently recommended to the board that fees be adopted to offset the cost of the inspections.
The fee will be $35 for most businesses, and $50 for businesses whose square footage exceeds 5000. For the complete fee schedule, visit our Web site: www.valleycenter.com/
However, says Lucia, businesses where inspections are not mandated will be allowed to do self-inspections and mail in the paperwork, for free.
Last month the board adopted Lucia’s recommended updated fee changes for planning inspections and building inspections prior to a builder getting a building permit. Those costs are based on the actual costs to the district of doing the inspections.
The Fire Prevention Fees, which, as stated, are new, are needed because there are now state-mandated inspections required for existing structures.
“I put together a fee structure that would last forever,” said Lucia. “It’s built so that as Valley Center develops we will have the format in place.”
It was also developed to have a “minimal” impact on businesses.
Most of the businesses in Valley Center fit in the “under 5,000 sq feet” category, said Lucia.
If you want to do a self-inspection the fire district will mail you the three-page form. Businesses that might still have to have a physical inspection include operations that have onsite propane tanks or pump fuel of some sort.
“I don’t see this as having a tremendous impact on the community right now but it prepares us for growth,” said Lucia.
“It removes the onus from the taxpayer to pay for the inspection and moves it to the business that causes the problem.”
Even if most businesses choose the self-inspection route, Lucia said he thought it would lead to more safety. “It will make people more aware. We’re creating awareness and offering help where they need help.”
He added, “My job is to keep people in business, not put them out of business. I sell safety, and I proportion my time to best use. We’ll do the best we can with it.”
For more information about the program, call the fire district office at 751-7600.
Lynn Lackey, owner of Lesco Electric, is hopping mad about the closing of the county Dept. of Planning & Land Use’s (DPLU) office in San Marcos.
As reported in the July 11 edition of The Roadrunner, DPLU now only issues building permits at its Ruffin Road location in Kearny Mesa.
The VC contractor last week sent a letter to the County detailing his reasons for feeling that the closure was a bad decision.
The County’s reason for closing the office is the slowdown in building permits, and the need to cut the budget by cutting down on redundancy. The department is funded entirely through fees, not tax dollars.
Lackey isn’t buying it.
He provided 11 examples of why he questions the County’s logic (these are in his words):
1) The County of San Diego owns the building that housed the planning and permit office.
2) The other departments such as health, inspectors office, and the inspector supervisor are still operating out of this building.
3) The building still has to use the same lighting and power for departments left behind. Its not like the county vacated the premises and leased out the building to cut overhead.
4) All of the employees transferred to Ruffin Road lived in the San Marcos area. (Did the county give these employees a raise to help with the higher gas expenses? Probably not! )
5) Parking has always been a problem at the Ruffin Road complex. Now you can enjoy watching it get even worse.
6) Cost of pulling a permit for a job dramatically increases due to time involved with getting a permit. ( Travel and waiting time to obtain a permit. )
7) Possibility of fewer permits being pulled because of commute and hassles therefore causing even a larger shortfall of funds hence causing layoffs not transfers.
8) Increasing more traffic congestion on I-15 that is already on the news as some of the worst traffic in the nation. Not to mention more accidents, road rage, and posing more dangers for the work crews trying to remedy the traffic problems we already have.
9) Now lets talk about pollution. I don't see me or any other contractor walking to Ruffin Road to get permits. Everyone in the world is already talking about the global warming effects and smog our vehicles produce. Contractors can't haul or pull with an electric car.
10) Government is always telling people to conserve energy and energy resources. This is very hard to do when you have to drive 60 miles or more round trip and wait for hours just to get a piece of paper giving the OK to do a job.
11) The County says that the employees in mention were not paid by county tax dollars so now I have two questions for you. One is who is paying them and two is where is all the monies going that we pay for permits?
Lackey added, “These are very strong issues that needed to be considered when making such a decision when affecting so many people. Obviously issues such as these were not considered when making this very important ‘business’ decision.’ ”
The decision, he says, was made without regard to the hardship to contractors, the economy, traffic congestion, or the pollution caused by this decision.
“Three of these problems is something that all the governments of the world and the world are supposed to be working on to make this a better world in which to live and work.”
He also put in a plug for the San Marcos DPLU employees, who now have to work in Kearny Mesa.
“The staff at the San Marcos office were the most hard-working, dedicated, resourceful, and respectful government employees that I have ever experienced. They really cared about one’s project. Also when I would have to call the office for any reason, I was always able to get a staff member on the phone that handled my problem immediately. True professionals that were truly a pleasure to work with.
“Now on the other side of the fence. When I have to go to Ruffin Road to get a permit its like going to hell. First I commute to get there. Then I drive around the parking lot hoping to find a parking space. Now I'm finally getting into the building. Then comes the three-hour to all day ordeal. Most of the people in this office act like they could care less what you've been through to just get to this point or if you even walked through the door or not.”
Children this week participating in Ridgeview Church’s annual Vacation Bible School. See more photos on Page A8.
Bruce Howard, general manager of Valley View Casino, has resigned to accept a new opportunity to move back to his prior hometown of Las Vegas.
Howard was offered the opportunity to return to Las Vegas with his wife to be general manager of the M Resort Casino Hotel, scheduled to open in 2009 at the south end of the Las Vegas Strip. This will allow them to spend more time with their son and daughter-in-law who also reside in Las Vegas.
Valley View Casino will continue running its operations as usual through the collaboration of the San Pasqual Casino Development Group, Inc. and its Operations Committee.
Chief Financial Officer Michael A. Gorczynski will serve as interim general manager, effective immediately. He will maintain his role as chief financial officer and assume the responsibilities of general manager until a permanent replacement is appointed.
Gorczynski has served as the vice president of finance and CFO at Valley View since 2003 and has been a member of the San Pasqual Casino Development Group's board of directors since 2004. He was vice president of finance for the Ameristar Casino in St. Charles, Missouri from 2000–2002. He also worked in the management of the Sheraton Casino & Hotel in Robinsonville, Mississippi, and the Sands Hotel & Casino and Caesars Atlantic City, both in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
“We're very excited and pleased about Michael accepting the role of interim general manager,” said Joe Navarro, president and CEO of the San Pasqual Casino Development Group. “We have the utmost confidence in his capability to continue the tremendous success and growth of our company.”
Navarro added, “On behalf of the entire casino and the San Pasqual Tribe, we offer Bruce and his family our best wishes for a wonderful future in Las Vegas. Bruce has helped build a solid foundation for our casino’s success and I am one hundred percent confident that we won’t skip a beat in running San Diego’s finest casino.”
We’ll get the alarming part out of the way first, so readers won’t spend all week worrying that someone wants to put a women’s jail in Valley Center: The City of Santee doesn’t want a jail in its backyard. It wants it in someone else’s backyard.
Last week it suggested Valley Center. Or appeared to.
However, it turns out that the “Valley Center” it suggested is nowhere near Valley Center. It’s actually San Pasqual Valley, specifically the San Pasqual Academy.
Not that the Sheriff’s Dept. wants a jail at any such location.
“Valley Center is not geographically acceptable, not that we don’t love it,” said San Diego County Under Sheriff Bill Gore this week, after he was asked whether VC is under consideration for a jail.
Gore is in charge of finding a place for a new women’s jail. The current Los Colinas Detention Facility, is in Santee. The Sheriff’s Dept. would like the new one to be there too, on 15 acres that the County owns, plus 30 acres it also owns occupied by the old Edgemore Hospital.
However, Santee disagrees. It funded $100,000 for environmental impact reports and an economic study and for a study suggesting alternatives. That study, released July 17, was done by San Diego economist Gary London of the London Group. You can find it on the Santee Web site: www.ci.santee.ca.us/ under “news.” All of the alternative sites suggested in the study are owned by the County.
One of four alternatives that his report suggested is in “Valley Center” (although, as we said, it actually isn’t in Valley Center). Two others are in Otay Mesa. A fourth is 58 acres owned by the San Diego Unified School District near I-15 and State Route 52.
The “Valley Center” site is at 17701 San Pasqual Valley Rd., and is 187 acres “which could likewise accommodate the construction of a ‘campus style’ facility. The property does not encroach on residential or commercial/industrial development and offers reasonable access to ancillary facilities,” according to the study. The parcel is listed as APN #242-130-26-00.
The Roadrunner, aided by county watchdog/activist Charlene Ayers searched records and discovered that the address and parcel number was actually that of the academy.
The Roadrunner spoke to Barbara Waldon, the administrator at San Pasqual Academy, which is a boarding high school for foster children.
She was surprised. No one has contacted her about the idea.
“We have a 20-year lease here,” she said.
The land reverted to the County after the old Seventh Day Adventist academy closed several years ago.
Waldon pointed out that when the County later explored putting a juvenile hall facility it aroused a firestorm of controversy. “It was roundly defeated,” she said.
The County operates seven jails, says Under Sheriff Gore.
“The idea of a deputy transporting a prisoner from, say, National City, to Valley Center defies logic,” he said.
Asked specifically if Valley Center is being considered, Gore reiterated “Valley Center has not come up.”
A spokesman for the Santee mayor’s office, when asked if the city intended to suggest siting a jail on a site occupied by a boarding high school, said that was obviously a mistake.
She conceded that the report misidentified the San Pasqual Academy, and added another correction: “It’s incorrect to say that we spent $100,000 on the study. I’d say it cost probably a third of the total money appropriated for the issue.”
Although the study identified the wrong land in one case, Santee’s point is that the County owns at least 30 parcels that fit the criteria for locating a jail.
She noted that the land around the academy, about 300 acres, is also owned by the County.
“I really believe that given that they own three hundred acres they could find 45 acres for a women’s facility,” said the spokesman.
She called it unfair to ask the city to accept a jail, which is really a camp, three times larger than the current one. The land is located near land the city sees as a redevelopment area.
She added that Santee is pushing for the east Otay Mesa alternative.
Leonard Baron, senior investment analyst at the London Group, conceded that the address and parcel listed in the report, “is clearly not in Valley Center.”
His group provided 30 alternative sites to the city, although they are not listed in the report.
Two are in Valley Center, he said.
“We’re not recommending any sites,” said Baron. “We are providing a list of sites that could accommodate the jail. That was the purpose of the study.”
“We picked four that were felt to be decent alternatives. But there were 30 others noted that were of a good size. There’s hundreds of other sites that are either agency owned or privately owned, that would be better sites than the current Santee site,” he said.
The two County-owned sites in VC that the London group identified are as follows:
Valley Center Refuse Disposal Area, APN: 185-112-20-00
Grid Map 1089-J2
This is the site of Aerie Equestrian Park, which Valley Center Parks & Rec. District leases. The land covers an old abandoned county dump, and has vents to draw off methane gas produced by the rotting garbage buried underneath.
Old Castle Road Donation Site
APN: 185-250-16-00
Grid: 1069-E6
This site is apparently on County land somewhere in the vicinity of the Blackington Airport.
“Not every parcel has been developed so they don’t have street addresses,” said Baron.
The Valley Roadrunner
P.O.B. 1529, Valley Center, CA 92082
Tel. 760.749.1112 Fax 760.749.1688
Website: www.valleycenter.com
Email: editor@valleycenter.com
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