Alternative Reality

Published: Friday, July 11, 2008 11:36 AM PDT

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You might have noticed the Union-Tribune editorial board swoop in today with an opinion about the burgeoning scandal over the Southeastern Economic Development Corp.

As president of the Southeastern Economic Development Corp., a redevelopment entity overseen by the City Council, Carolyn Smith has an annual salary of $158,000, as approved by the City Council. But what Mayor Sanders and the City Council didn't know until this week was that Smith actually was collecting a paycheck of $206,328 -- a whopping 31 percent more than her City Council-approved salary.

Smith doesn't have, currently, a budgeted annual salary of $158,000. It's actually much higher now. That was the 2005-2006 figure. The editorial board cribbed the numbers so fast they didn't realize they were old.

Just a little thing, I suppose. Then the paper stumbled over itself to make the mayor look as good as possible in this situation:

To his credit, Mayor Sanders now is demanding straightforward salary disclosures from SEDC's board chairman, Chip Owen.

Yes, the mayor does deserve credit for reacting so swiftly to the news broken this week by Will Carless that revealed all of this information. He and the City Council members who spoke out about it in Carless' report -- Kevin Faulconer, Donna Frye and Ben Hueso -- all immediately recognized the significance of the facts his investigation revealed. Their colleagues, on the other hand, weren't so perceptive. Or they have long since checked out.

But the mayor and council were reacting. As the U- T stumbled through a recounting of the facts that so incensed Mayor Jerry Sanders, they also pushed away the uncomfortable reality about how this information got to him.

It was neither the mayor's staff nor the Union-Tribune that uncovered the troubling facts.

The mayor's memo made it clear in its first line:

I have followed the Voice of San Diego's coverage of SEDC and am very concerned about this morning's report regarding possible irregularities in compensation practices.

The mayor didn't mind admitting how the information came to light. Why does the U-T?

Ahh, it doesn't matter. The U-T's editorials were never meant to shed light on reality. They are meant to create alternative realities.

For some more revelations on the state of things as they are, not how that secluded little group wants them to be, you should check out Carless and Andrew Donohue's latest revelation today.

It's powerful stuff.

-- SCOTT LEWIS

6 Comments so far on this story...

HA! The UT and its editorial board have become irrelevant in San Diego. The sad part is, they don't even recognize that they get their tails kicked on stories like this on a regular basis.

Posted by Point Loman | reply to this comment
July 11, 2008 8:03 am

Nice observations, Scott. It's amazing how the UT editorial can critize the City Council (no matter how deserved) for being asleep at the switch, then praise the Mayor for writing a letter when IT'S HIS RESPONSIBILITY TO MONITOR SEDC to begin with.

Posted by Get A Clue | reply to this comment
July 11, 2008 8:49 am

It's been said before, but given the topic of your post, Scott, it bears repeating: Until Mr. Copley sells the paper to another company that is more competent at running it than he apparently is, the U-T will just continue its ugly slide down into irrelevance. Even then, traditional broadsheet newspapers are in decline anyway, supplanted by online journals like Voice, by blog sites (of which I now have one), and other specialty publications, online and off...

Posted by Robert | reply to this comment
July 11, 2008 12:07 pm

I'll play editor for Scott Lewis...Here's a revision of his copy from above, edited down to its salient point: 'Ahh, it doesn't matter. The U-T's editorials were never meant to shed light on reality. They are meant to create alternative realities.'

Posted by Christopher Hall | reply to this comment
July 11, 2008 1:44 pm

The U-T is a shill for the Mayor and others and has zero editorial integrity. Not surprising that we see another glimpse of this obvious point on this story. But more importantly, Smith and her deputy have stolen money from the tax payers. The board should have known where all the money goes in SEDC and about the scheme to bypass the City Council's compensation directives. This is stealing. The board should be replaced for negligence (if this were a public company, shareholders would sue individual board members), and these stealing employees should be terminated, and criminally prosecuted. They should also have to return all ill gotten income, and if they don't, be pursued civilly. At what point does this San Diego city government of ours finally learn and cleaned up?

Posted by Richard | reply to this comment
July 12, 2008 5:52 am

The UT simply cannot admit that they are totally outclassed by the VOSD. Kudos Scott and all the staff at VOSD. I predict another sweep of the press awards this year.

Posted by Fred Williams | reply to this comment
July 12, 2008 7:14 am

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