A few days ago, I penned a column critical of two things: The Supreme Court decision allowing communities to exercise their rights of eminent domain to take properties away from homeowners and give them to developers, and the decision by National City, California to exercise such rights to take away a neighborhood gym so luxury condos could be built.
I received communication from Ron Morrison. It explains his side of the story.
I found it compelling enough to post verbatim.
I greatly admire Rick Reilly, thge Sports Illustrated writer who penned the piece that got me all riled up. I’m eager to see what his reaction to this is.
And now, the rebuttal:
I’m writing this as a blanket response to the e-mails I have
received. Most were from individuals who were concerned and desired more
information. But there were some that could only be classified as vile
hate e-mails, advocating personal violence. This response I hope will
address the legitimate concerns and questions raised in the e-mails.
I have currently received 28 negative e-mails from you and others
from around the U.S. and Canada concerning a column in the August 13th
edition of Sports Illustrated by Rick Reilly. I’m assuming his motive
was to try and get people to read his column by stirring up hatred,
because it certainily wasn’t motivated by trying to tell the truth. If
you will bear with me for a few minutes, I will share with you some
information that the columnist decided you did not deserve to hear.
First of all, the City of National City has never ‘threatened to
seize their property through the right of eminent domain’. In fact we
made available a copy of a letter to the columnist that was an offer to
sell by Community Youth Athletic Center (CYAC) to the developer,(who is
not ‘some slick in Armani’ but their next door neighbor, who wears jeans
and has owned the bulk of this block for decades and has been a great
citizen working with local youth and community programs) that is signed
by the President of the Board of CYAC that states; “The sale is not
being made on the threat of eminent domain. Since the city of National
City has not made any gestures towards eminent domain proceedings of our
property.” Hmmmm, I wonder why he didn’t include that in his column?
The City has worked with the Barragan’s for many years and has been
among their top supporters, both financially and otherwise. In fact when
the columnist refers to work being ‘done free by good neighbors’, he
forgets once again to mention that it was the City who paid for the
roof, and City funded groups painted the gym, and the City gave CYAC
$210,000 for their program. As a matter of fact, before the gym opened
and they were not able to get their framing completed, I went in there
personally at night and helped frame the interior so they could open
their doors.
The History is the Barragan’s approached the City about a former
sporting goods store that was vacant in 2001 and asked about it’s
availability. We informed them that there were two problems with the
site; 1) it was scheduled for development in 5-7 years, and 2) it was
not zoned for their use. They then asked if we would let them move into
the building, and they would paint and fix it up so it would not be
vacant, so they could have a building(which they didn’t at the time) and
that they would work with the City to get a permanent site when
development was ready to go. The City Council, who has always supported
the Barragan’s, gave them special permission to occupy this building
(casting aside requirements as we have never done) with a Conditional
Use Permit and a full promise that we would find them a better facility
when the block was finally developed. I guess no good deed goes
unpunished. The problems started up when the gym established a Board of
Directors, most of whose members (non-locals)were from various
government agencies and whose tactics have tended to be highly combative
and confrontational. These were the individuals that I was referring to
in the quotes in Reilly’s column, not the Barragan’s, and this was
emphatically stated to Rick Reilly twice and yet he deliberately
inserted the Barrigan’s name into the quote. Why would he do something
as unprofessional as that? Well…. maybe the story line sounds much
better if it is made to sound like big bad government against this nice
family as opposed to two government types disagreeing. Are you starting
to feel used yet?
We have been working hard to find a permanent site for this youth
gym that can meet both the present and future needs for which their
current buiding is inadequate. We have done everything possible to keep
our word and will continue to do so, and we have asked their board of
directors to do the same. This has been made difficult by members of
their board of directors making unreasonable demands and running to the
media saying we are throwing kids out on the streets and shutting them
down, which is a absolutely untrue. But then it’s easy to say those
things when you’re standing behind kids. Besides it make a great story,
especially if you are using a writing style learned at the ‘Jerry
Springer School of Journalism’.
To those that e-mailed me saying that after reading the column they
were distrubed but assumed that there was another side, let me say I
understand their concerns and appreciate their open-mindedness and
fairness. And to those who jumped to illconceived assumptions and
allowed yourselves to make harsh allegations, I hope the next time
before you let a sports columist (whose job it appears is to
sensationalize a story so he can hook the reader in and impress his
publishers who are in the business of making big money and wearing
Armani suits) lead you around by the nose that you will stop and think
for yourself and give others the benefit of the doubt until you know the
facts. And those few who wrote nasty hate e-mails about my city, myself
and my family I hope you believe in re-incarnation and maybe next time
you’ll come back as a human being.
The people of National City are very sensitive about our youth and
any way in which they may get slighted. So believe me, if any of the
things Rick Reilly tried to imply was true there would be a major uproar
in our city, and there is not. As an example of this, I was on our High
School campus this week and fielded hundreds of questions from hundreds
of students and this subject never came up. It has been the same way at
our City Council meetings and our neighborhood councils, which we have
seven different ones per month. That is why this so-called Institute for
Justice group from Virginia is trying to peddle this ‘story’ outside of
our area. They came to our town and promoted a ‘save the gym’ rally.
They generated a small rally, which they took plenty of pictures of, and
then had the people come to a Council meeting. Once the small group of
sign carriers heard what was really going on, realizing they had been
misled, they dropped their signs, went home and we have not heard from
them on this subject again. But the Institute for Justice is sending
their packet of mis-information with photos of ‘the rally’ to media
around the country. Who knows, maybe someone outside of our area will so
impressed by their ‘standing up for this righteous cause’ that they may
send in a donation to help. Hmmmmm…..maybe this story really is about
money.
So for the record let me make sure I have been perfectly clear on a
number of items;
1) The CYAC Gym has not been eminent domained and eminent domain has
never been contemplated for this site. And the City has not now or ever
had any thoughts of closing or shutting down the gym.
2) The City of National City has been a (if not the) major funding
provider for this program.
3) The Barragan’s have been assured over and over that their gym is a
welcomed part of our downtown and we want them to be an integral part of
it.
Thank you for hearing me out, I could say a lot more, but I hope you
understand that when a city works as hard as we have to provide and
expand services for our youth and seniors and then have a manufactured
media publicity show like this one it makes us madder than you could
ever think of being.
In closing let me say that this irresponsible column is an insult to the
people of National City and an absolute disservice to the readers of
Sports Illustrated.
Ron Morrison
Proud to be the Mayor of National City, CA
