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At last, we finally know what’s inside 374 of the 692 emails that the city has fought so hard to keep secret.
Brace yourself. The once-forbidden emails hold shocking revelations of … um, well, nothing, at least as far as we can tell.
One email that the city coughed up yesterday listed 22 ways to save energy and water in apartments. In another email, a mayoral staffer called our reporter “The Eiminator.” (When we asked him about it, he helpfully clarified that he left out an “l.”)
Why did the city keep emails like these secret, preventing us from understanding the city’s internal debate over water conservation? It took a threatened lawsuit to convince the city to release these emails, and more remain secret.
Beats us. “There’s simply no rhyme or reason to what the city tried to keep secret,” our story says.
The state of negotiations between San Diego schools and the local teachers union is anything but hidden: It’s strained and it’s taking forever.
The two sides have been talking for more than a year, but the two sides are still far apart.
“Key issues,” our story says, “include pay, whether health benefits will be trimmed or altered, how teachers will be evaluated and how often, and how to protest warnings.”
In other education news, the San Diego school board next week will consider whether to study the idea of putting a parcel tax — a flat fee for property owners — on the ballot. The district would have more flexibility to spend the proceeds than if it floated another bond measure.
The district expects to pay $130,000 to hire a political consultant to look into the idea and then develop it if it seems feasible.
Our letter writers this week are also thinking about the art of the possible.
For example, the new central library that’s on so many minds these days: Why not forget downtown and relocate it to a prominent building in Mission Valley that now has several floors available for rental?
The writer, by the way, calls the building “handsome.” That seems a bit generous. You be the judge.
Other writers tackle the debate over turning recycled sewage into drinking water and say they’d be perfectly happy guzzling the stuff. In fact, one contends, it will be “significantly cleaner than our current water sources.”
“There is no such thing as fresh, pure, virgin water,” says another writer. “… think about it! I know everyone learned about this in elementary school.”
We did? I remember talk of birds and bees but nothing about virgin water.
Elsewhere, the U-T reports that a municipal airport in Oceanside could pose an obstacle for a Chargers football stadium in the city. Also, the U-T reports that the state Assembly voted to give San Diego more leeway to deal with seals at the Children’s Pool. But the governor still needs to weigh in, and he might not do that for quite a while.
Finally, our apologies for a flubbed link in yesterday’s Morning Report. Scott Lewis‘s column about cell phones at Comic-Con, a city councilman’s blurred “vision,” and another delay for San Diego’s new computer system can be found here.