"This was never about money for us it was about us against the system that system that kills the human spirit."
Tough financial times in San Diego, California otherwise known as “America’s Finest City.” A $258 million budget shortfall is stalking, haunting, forcing elected officials to consider many drastic measures in order to close the loop. Included in Mayor Todd Gloria’s chops is closing beachside restrooms during the winter as well as permanently removing beach fire pits.
According to projections, the fire pit removal will save around $135,000 per year as well as reducing noise levels at night and other naughty activity like beer drinking plus young couples making out underneath blankets.
Mission Beach local, and likely surfer Rogelio Huerta, was not happy about the potential loss, telling the local ABC affiliate, “No, $135,000 isn’t worth it. Maybe you invest a little more in managing the resources and prove that they’re not efficient before you take away the public’s benefits because we, you know, we pay taxes.
Christian Barroso, likely not a surfer, came out as pro no beach fire pit, declaring, “I don’t think it’s very safe having these fire pits around.”
Regarding the issue of winter bathroom closures, that move is projected to save over $1 million a year, the sound of which local Steve Jones, maybe or maybe not a surfer, likes.
“I believe it’s a good thing for them to do that because it’ll help balance the budget and alleviate other cuts to resources that are more important than the bathrooms, like police and fire for our public safety,” he said.
On one hand, surfers enjoying using wetsuits as bathrooms during the winter. On the other, more police means more tickets for beer drinking/public indecency.
Do you have thoughts?
I have one. How does removing beach fire pits save $135,000?
Here’s a nice beach fire scene while you’re thinking.
Commented on Disqus? Log out, tap the Disqus button, and your old name and comments come back. The box is ours.
Your comments are still here. Every one of them.
Twelve years of BeachGrit comments came across from Disqus. Connect and we will show you how many are yours. We get your username, nothing else.
Connect Disqus to reveal.
San Diego is very affluent .
If they need to do those things then they’re mismanaging the money.
So if they close the bathrooms and beach goer has to go……they go ….where? ……Ewww.
Hey City Knuckle-Heads…..
Closing public bathrooms is not the answer.
You will still have the same amount of sewage being deposited.
Only difference is it will be in the street, sidewalk, side of buildings, bushes, sand, etc.
You know all the places you and your children visit.
If you’re truly looking to save money….
You can quit and hire me at half your salary.
WOW
Born and Raised in SD.
Beach Fires were awesome in my youth if 70′ & 80’s. All the way til I left for Kauai in 2000. As I walk the “pathways” at the beaches there now. There’s about 8-10 things no longer allowed. This is the Final Nail. Well until they ban anyone from being there after 6pm before 6am.
im sure in my “Boomer” lifetime I’ll too see that. Glad Im where I’m at to ride out the Wave if Life. Aloha
SD was my adopted home on the 70’/80’s.
Countless nights at MB or Fiesta Island with friends around the fire pits.
Sad to see the culture get dismantled.
I’m in Orange County California but people in San Diego you need to get a hold of your state representative Carl demaio. He lives in your district. Maybe he can get a hold of Mike Johnson in the federal government and somehow get the federal government to come over there and straighten that County out. Find out where all the money is going and see if there’s any fraud. If there is some people are going to pay the price.
Pretty rough on the Obecians getting evicted from their stalls…. definitely gonna need more cops….
There will be new logs washing up on the beach and you can’t even burn them.
Fire pits at San Onofre,
my best teen memories.
Our federal taxes go to the rest of the deadbeat country
Anybody remember the comic soap opera “North Mission Beach?” 20 years later the guy in the aloha shirt was the eligible bachelor on the reality show “Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire.”
San Diego is a weird fucking town
Wasn’t it called O.B. Vice.? RIP Larry Himmel, San Diego icon For sure.
Anyone remember Barret Robbins going AWOL on the Raiders on the eve of Super Bowl 37 in SD? He had a bi polar episode and left the team to bar hop all night. Was spotted all over SD and TJ, including The Pennant and Beachcomber in South Mission. He wore a full ski mask over his head and face all night so folks wouldn’t recognize em. At 6’4 330 everyone noticed.
Loved South Mission way back. Best left hand wedge in SD.
The best place to shit in Mission Beach is your insecure out of state blow-in fuck buddy’s apartment. If you have to shit in a public toilet in Mission Beach, you aren’t doing Mission Beach right.
San Diego south of LaJolla is it’s own freak show circus. More Phoenix by the Sea than California.
the cancer is you have one of the most broken health systems in the world….with the highest per capita $ spent of any western country…..
if California wants universal healthcare for Californians, they can legislate it.
that’s the great thing about a constitutional republic. every state can legislate it’s own laws for it’s citizens.
We … have that already
pharmaceutical system broken
BREAKING NEWS
SAN DIEGO FIRE RIOTS 2025
Mission Beach Villagers Battle Neanderthal Government
https://youtu.be/uXjDyLGNd2E
After Kelly’s thing about semen retention the other day it seems heaps of SoCal residents do it too.
Will that same crowd now retain their poop ?
If so it might not change much, as some would say half of them are full of shit anyway…
If you live in Mission Beach by law you have to do bong rips and surf the worst beachbreak of your life at least once a month
“Concerned residents” Rich people should be banned from owning coastal property. Boring moaners.
Bonfire and beers on the beach is almost as good as surfing itself.
“Bonfire and beers on the beach is almost as good as surfing itself”
Isn’t it main event and the pesky surfing bit is the trials ?
No
the thing about locking public toilets is that it doesn’t actually stop the public from taking shits , just moves the dump location over a few feet. Seems like a bad idea.
Colapinto won’t have a problem with locked public toilets.
I concur. As a longtime skateboarder I’ve taken multiple shits squatted back against locked bathroom doors.
how you been Pauly?
🎯
Removing firepits is assumed to be motivated by keeping the riff raff out of town after dark until proven otherwise.
At least the city of San Diego is sorta honest about it. The cowards in Orange County used California state air quality regulators to get that job done.