Remember eating dinner in the middle of the street?
Six years ago, deep in the throes of the Covid-19 pandemic, cities across the United States gave restaurants and cafes permission to move their businesses outside and into the streets.
Restaurants built what became known as parklets (or, in New York City, where I lived at the time, dining sheds). The rigged-up outdoor platforms proliferated in curbside parking areas wherever restaurants needed open-air space to serve food.
Chula Vista’s Third Avenue business district, which the city long has sought to make a regional desination, was the epicenter of South County’s Covid-era outdoor dining scene.
Restaurants loved it. The city wasn’t so sure. Two years ago, amid complaints about lost parking and unfair encroachment on public space, officials ended the practice – to applause from some and howls of protest from others.
This week, city officials reversed course. On Tuesday, the City Council unanimously approved an outdoor dining ordinance that allows business owners throughout the city, not just on Third Avenue, to build dining platforms in what officials called “the public right-of-way.”
That’s bureaucrat-speak for “in the street, where you used to park your car.”
The new rules require a permit, impose fees and set rules governing how big parklets can be and what they look like. The goal, officials said, is to help local restaurants attract more customers and take advantage of Chula Vista’s near-perfect climate to make the city a regional entertainment destination.
Economic development officials said they plan to follow the curbside ordinance with a separate ordinance governing sidewalk cafes.
Why the turnaround?
Councilmembers and city staff gave various reasons for expanding outdoor dining, including boosting the city’s restaurant scene and making Third Avenue a more attractive destination for guests at the recently opened Gaylord Pacific Resort.
City officials have taken to calling Third Avenue and surrounding areas the “urban core.”
Moments before approving the outdoor dining ordinance, councilmembers also uanimously approved expanding the city’s downtown business improvement district to encompass more streets adjacent to Third Avenue.
The new Chula Vista Downtown Community Benefit District will encompass 27 square blocks radiating out from the intersection of Third Avenue and H Street.The district incorporates and expands the previous Third Avenue business district and adds to it businesses along H Street from Third to Fourth avenues.
Businesses within the district will pay annual dues to the benefit district, which in turn will use the money to beautify and maintain streets, hold public events and add what urban designers call “place-making infrastructure” to give the area a more cohesive identity.
Parts of the district, such as the intersection of H and Third, already look and feel urban, with multi-story buildings, traffic backups and occasional pedestrian traffic at certain times of day.
New projects, including planned renovations at the Chula Vista Center mall and several new or recently constructed housing developments, add to the urban character.
At the same time, city councilmembers Cesar Fernandez and Jose Preciado, who together represent the city’s more densely populated west side, have been working over the past year to develop and implement an economic development plan for the area.
Part of that plan includes possible new business districts not just downtown but also along Broadway and other shopping corridors.
The expanded downtown district, which takes effect in January, is expected to generate close to $700,000 in assessment income its first year.
New City America, which manages downtown San Diego’s Little Italy district, will manage Chula Vista’s expanded downtown district. It already manages the current Third Avenue district.
During debate over the district, both Fernandez and Preciado pressed city staff to ensure the city performs oversight and makes changes if the district does not achieve its aims.
Many Third Avenue business owners say they are struggling amid rising costs, shifting consumer preferences and competition from other parts of San Diego County.
Several have said they have yet to experience an uptick in business following the Gaylord opening.
Preciado said he wants to ensure the city can change course “should we find we don’t like something on an annual basis or earlier.”
Mayor John McCann said the expanded district is a step in the right direction.
“We’ve had a great first start,” McCann said of the Third Avenue district. Now, he said, it’s time to make all of downtown “a place you want to go enjoy the restaurants and microbrews and [be] able to walk around.”
ICYMI: South County’s Post-Election Bombshell
Most South County election races have wrapped up and I’ve been covering the results (here and here). One National City Council race remains too close to call, with just 46 votes separating the candidates.
The big post-election bombshell, of course, was the report this week in La Prensa about federal agents raiding the homes of disgraced Chula Vista Democratic political consultant Jesus Cardenas and top labor union official Kelvin Barrios.
Barrios’ union, Local 89 of the Laborers International Union of North America, has played a major role in South County politics over the past year. As the union’s political director, Barrios was responsible for much of that effort. According to La Prensa, Barrios is no longer with the union.
Last year, the union spent heavily backing San Diego City Councilmember Vivian Moreno in the race to fill a vacant seat on the San Diego County Board of Supervisors.
This year, LIUNA was essentially the sole financial backer of Chula Vista Elementary School District Trustee Francisco Tamayo’s unsuccessful effort to unseat Mayor John McCann.
The union also waded forcefully into Chula Vista politics this summer in an ultimately failed bid to promote an overhaul of city government that would have strengthened organized labor’s role in city affairs.
Most recently, the union collaborated with the Chula Vista Elementary School District teachers union in efforts to place union-aligned candidates on the school board and knock off an incumbent who has clashed with the district’s union-backed board majority.
The investigation could center on potential political or financial ties between Cardenas and Barrios.
I already reported on one instance when LIUNA paid at least $18,000 to a political consulting firm owned by Cardenas’ wife that operated out of his home – the same home raided last week by federal agents.
I’ll be reporting in greater detail on how the union has sought to use its political war chest to influence politics in South County and beyond.
Also ICYMI: School District Drama
I reported today on how the Chula Vista Elementary School District is moving to give a senior administrative job to the leader of the district’s teachers union. That follows an election in which the union spent heavily to back school board candidates who now could be in a position to approve hiring the union leader.
And inewsource’s Andrea Figueroa Briseño has been doing excellent reporting on what appears to be an effort at the Chula Vista district to modify or cut funding for the district’s vaunted arts programs. You can read her coverage here, here and here.