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| City namesake Señorita Encinita. |
Jeff Spicoli told me Encinita’s is named after a Mexican señorita who was here before anybody except the Indians. That must be right.
Two things pushed me into paying attention to Encinita’s politics: the Streetscape “workshops” and Dan Dalager’s getting caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
I was first here as a visitor in ’63, came to surf Cardiff Reef, Swami’s and Beacon many times in ’66, and became a Cardiff resident in September ’69.
Like most residents, I assumed because it was still a small town when the city incorporated in ’86 — a place where you’d often cross paths with council and staff members — that the City Council would do right by the residents. After all, government is a representative democracy and, further, these people are our neighbors.
I was shocked and disillusioned to find that the same selfish, dishonest, backstabbing crap that goes on in county, state and federal government happens right here in little ol’ Encinita’s.
Well, I thought, they can’t be all bad, so a few years ago I devised a little test of the council’s decency, honesty and integrity. I did deep research that proved the authentic, historically accurate name of Leucadia’s midway beach access is Beacon. There was an aeronautical navigation beacon on the bluff there. That’s where the name came from. I demonstrated that the City Council circa 1986 had made a mistake in naming it Beacon’s.
I showed the documentary evidence to council and staff members. Nobody could say it was wrong. Some groped for lame reasons to keep the name wrong. The issue was agendized for a council meeting. In effect, the council said, we know it’s wrong, but we’ll keep it that way. They didn’t have the decency, honesty and integrity to admit the error and fix it.
Some people think this is a small thing. It’s not. It represents the attitude and action of every City Council since I started paying attention. They were against Prop A, they were for Measure T, they are for Measure U. With one weak exception, they are for Streetscape. Those are four examples among a countless number where the council does not represent the majority of residents. We elect them to serve us. They don’t. They do whatever they want, residents be damned.
Encinita’s cross to bear is local government that serves itself and special interests, not us.
— Doug Fiske
