September, 1999

Linda Davis. Paul Kennerson and Scott Peters, all seeking election as San Diego City Council Member for District 1, attended the National Night Out Against Crime at Villa La Jolla Park on August 3. We took advantage of that opportunity to ask them the question: What are the three most pressing problems facing the City of San Diego and how would you solve them? The following are their unedited answers.

Scott Peters

Choosing the three most pressing Issues in San Diego is no easy task, since we face a myriad of challenges and opportunities. I believe that education is a primary concern, but since that is the province of the school board, I offer the following:

Inadequate Preparation for Growth

San Diego faces unprecedented population growth in the next two decades. Unless we are careful, traffic congestion and overcrowding threaten the very things we love most about our city and our neighborhoods. But the prosperity growth brings can enhance our quality of life, if we direct it properly, If we take advantage of the opportunities that growth brings, we can make great progress.

As a board member and vice president of Citizens Coordinate for Century 3, I worked on Toward Permanent Paradise, envisioning for San Diego a great and thriving downtown, attractive and safe family neighborhoods, improved beaches and parks, and an efficient transportation system that is my dream for San Diego, too. And I am especially concerned for our natural environment, our beaches. bay. canyons, hillsides and open spces. The quality of our natural environment supports our thriving tourism industry and our ability to attract high tech workers, and determines the quality of life we demand for our children and ourselves. Yet our beaches are contaminated, our hillsides are threatened. and our bay is one of the nation's most polluted. I want to use my 14 years of professional experience in environmental issues to fashion strategies that simultaneously promote economic development and ensure environmental health. Preservation of our environment is a must if we are to maintain a high quality of life during the explosive growth we face.

To reach these goals, however, we will need to commit to good planning and careful budgeting. The city (which closed Its Planning Dept. in 1996) must recommit itself to planning for growth. As a councilmember, I will strongly encourage the city to support and engage each neighborhood in that effort, and foster each community's action to address its own problems. We need to stand behind the plans and solutions that our communities create by honoring them and implementing them. And we should promote an understanding of the role each community plays with respect to the rest of the region, so that all parts of the city can contribute to addressing the challenges we face.

Traffic

It is no secret that, as we continue to grow, our existing traffic problems will only get worse. The addition of more than a million new San Diegans would mean 685,000 new cars at current usage rates. There Is no way that we can simply build new parking lots, roads and highway lanes to continue our current auto use patterns. However, there are four strategies we can pursue that I support and will implement if elected to office:

1. Make Transit Competitive. In cities around the country, people choose to use transit systems when they are more convenient than the automobile. Our transit system does not compete well with the automobile. Until now, we have often put transit where it is cheapest or easiest to construct, instead of where it would be most useful to San Diegans. We need to target our investments in transit as if we were a business competing with the automobile for riders, because we are. We will not force people out of their cars. If we are going to reduce traffic through transit, we have to build stations that are attractive and convenient, and we must provide fast, safe, dependable -- and competitive -- service.

2. Land Use. If everyone is forced to drive where they need to go, traffic congestion is inevitable. Over the long term, we can reduce traffic by locating new housing units and businesses more centrally, near shops and businesses, instead of in outlying areas where the only access is via automobile. I participated on the County's Air Quality Strategy Development Committee, which developed a number of excellent strategies to reduce vehicle trips through land use strategies; I would promote these as a council member.

3. Highway Management. On Highway 1-15, we have begun to employ strategies like high occupancy vehicle lanes or zipper lanes that reward carpooling and take advantage of changing traffic flow from morning to afternoon. These strategies can also be employed on Highway I-5 and other roads.

4. Work Patterns. We should encourage local businesses, governments and other institutions to maintain flexible work hours to reduce peak hour traffic and congestion. New technology makes this a reasonable strategy.

5. Roads. We sill need to continue to build and improve out roadway system, considering community and environmental factors. But road-building alone is a losing strategy for fighting traffic congestion.

Economic Development

Our city and county are undergoing great changes as we move from an industrially-based economy to an information and knowledge-based economy. That change is positive because these industries -- software, biomedicine, telecommunications, and electronics -- are clean Industries that pay high wages. Although the change is driven by the private sector, there are things that the City can do to support this transition to a high-wage economy, and to promote prosperity at all economic levels:

1. Infrastructure Investments. Our local businesses need to ensure that they can move their employees and products efficiently from place to place. That means good roads, rail and air transportation. As a member of the Lindburgh Field Public Working Group, I learned just how close Lindburgh Field is to gridlock on the runways and roads. I support the Port beginning the 10-year process for improving the airport. If our regional business, government and community leaders can agree on a better plan in the meantime, we should consider it, but we can't afford to wait to improve Lindburgh. I also support development of Brown Field for cargo shipment.

2. Water Supply. This region needs a strong water policy that secures reliable and affordable water supplies for biomedical research and manufacturing, as well as for our residents. This will require that local government leaders support the implementation of the water transfer agreement with the Imperial Irrigation District and the assurance of supply from the Bay Delta System in Northern California.

3. Housing Affordability. The median sales price for a newly built home in San Diego is $281,000. Median family income is $52,500, which qualifies a potential buyer for a $200.000 mortgage. Since half of our population earns below the median, the American dream of home ownership is a mere mirage for many San Diegans. Rents are also high. The cost of housing is a serious business issue, since it poses a serious barrier to San Diego companies trying to attract workers. We need help from the state in providing subsidies for low-income housing, but there are many things we can do locally to create supply. We should encourage alternatives to suburban-type developments with single family homes, cul-de-sacs and two car garages; lots of older and younger singles and childless couples, could be interested in something else. We should also reduce processing times for building, perhaps by authorizing the city to contract for additional permitting staff during periods of intense building activity. Finally, we should be more innovative about our zoning, which is based on the historical notion that industrial, commercial and residential uses have to be separated. This may not be the case e in todays knowledge-based economy.

4. Maintain Quality of Life. When the raw materials for business are technology and ideas, success depends on attracting quality people to San Diego. That can only happen if we keep San Diego a clean, safe, beautiful, fun and family-friendly place. That's why maintaining our high quality of life has become a business issue. I have fought in my community for keeping the City from eliminating many of the environmental protections that make this a beautiful place to live, while supporting efforts to streamline our code. I have fought in my professional career for bays and ocean that are clean and safe to use. And I have served as president of the La Jolla Library and a trustee of the La Jolla Town Council to make sure that our city keeps an unparalleled quality of life. I will continue those fights as a member of the city council.

Scott Peters is an attorney with 14 years experience representing businesses and local governments on infrastructure and environmental issues. For more information on his campaign, please visit www.scottpeters.net or call 858-729-9920.

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