Public Parks, Not in My Back Yard, Are Ideal for Housing Social Problems

San Diego County is now officially split into two camps when it comes to seemingly intractable social problems.

There are the NIMBYs.

Those are the Not In My Back Yard folks who oppose certain things moving into their neighborhood: homeless shelters, migrant housing, halfway houses, trash plants, bus stations, etc.

Then there are the MORALLY SUPERIORs.

Those are the folks (often from Del Mar) whose neighborhoods are not at risk of getting a homeless shelter, migrant housing or anything else controversial.

This lack of direct involvement sharpens their moral sense and allows them to scold the NIMBYs for a dearth of concern for social justice, the environment, mass transit, multicultural diversity, etc.

So how to bridge the gap between NIMBYs and the MORALLY SUPERIORs?

Forget trying to push controversial things into neighborhoods. Even people who live in the mobile homes of San Marcos or boonies of Elfin Forest can hire attorneys and stall a trash plant for years.

A suggestion: Put all cases of what planners call “nonconforming uses” in public parks.

I can see three advantages. First, the NIMBYs are placated.

Second, the MORALLY SUPERIORs can feel even more virtuous. They use parks, too, and now they can say they’re bearing some of the load of solving the problems that make their hearts ache.

And third, frankly, it would just codify reality.

Balboa Park has already become the city’s unofficial homeless center. Why not just admit it?

I’m not alone here. A woman wrote to one of the coastal newspapers about the plan to turn a Leucadia motel into migrant housing.

Instead, she modestly proposed using the San Elijo State Beach campground in Cardiff, where there are already toilets, tents, nearby shopping and beach access.

She figures her idea would be cheered in Cardiff because officials there have already shown their concern for the migrant problem by endorsing the Leucadia plan.

Surely they’ll be just as concerned when it lands on their doorstep. Won’t they?

Betty II: The Sequel

Words, words, words.

* Betty watch.

With her second trial for murder looming next month, media interest in Betty Broderick is reheating.

The New York Times has scheduled a long free-lance story on the Broderick case by San Diego Tribune reporter Alison DaRosa.

The feminist magazine Mirabella, in its September edition, checks in with: “Why Did Betty Broderick Wait So Long To Kill Her Husband?”

And in Hollywood, early work on a made-for-television movie continues. No word yet on casting.

* Seen on the shelf of a Del Mar video store.

The movie “Clean and Sober.” Right next to “Cocktail.”

* Truth in advertising.

A San Diegan recently returned from the gambling mecca brings this ad from the personals column in the Las Vegas Sun:

“45 yr. old, married, white business executive. Looking for older, slender woman for daytime companionship. Call . . . “

* And then there’s the down-and-outer flashing a sign at commuters entering downtown off Interstate 5:

“Will Consult For Food.”

No Stinking Badges Here

Not so uniform. Or: A few stubborn men.

Marines are not taking kindly to an order issued by the Pentagon in June.

The order allows (but does not require) Marines to wear strips of tape giving their name and service over the pockets of their work shirts: just like the Army, Navy and Air Force.

Wrote a grumpy major from Camp Pendleton:

“Leave the badges, patches, braids, doohickeys, geegaws--and name and service tapes--to those other guys. I joined the Marines.”

And how many Marines are putting the voluntary tapes on their uniforms?

Says a Pendleton spokesman: “None.”