Motion Sickness

Motion Sickness… Sometimes, if Squid can’t sleep, Squid looks for something to watch. On Wednesday, Sept. 3, at Squid’s bedtime of 11pm, Squid curled up on the couch with a bowl of shrimp-flavored popcorn and found the Marina City Council meeting still going – no surprise, given that their meetings often stretch to near or past midnight.

Normally, at least items listed for approval on the consent agenda go quickly and require no discussion. But around 11:20pm, Councilmember Liesbeth Visscher announced an item Councilmember Brian McCarthy had pulled from the consent agenda: approving the minutes of a July 1 council meeting. He didn’t feel the confusing, back-and-forth banter of a 23-minute-long, multi-part motion about Locke-Paddon Park was accurately reflected, and that the minutes stated things that weren’t actually said by councilmembers, even if that’s what they meant. McCarthy wanted the minutes to be verbatim, “So when the [Monterey Peninsula Regional] Park District sees what we talked about, they know what a shitshow we are, quite frankly,” he said. “It’s messy, but we don’t get to rewrite history.”

Over his objections, council voted 3-2 to approve the minutes, shitshow not included.

Boom and Busters… Squid oozed over to Northridge Mall in Salinas over the weekend to hit the arcade and a few pins at Round1. As Squid tried to leave, Squid got the jalopy stuck in circles in the parking lot, a sea of pavement and faded lines.

This is especially true at the southern end of the mall, where the massive former Sears building has been vacant for five years. But it is starting to show signs of life. Squid is excited to see all the new businesses coming. Who’s not excited? The Northridge Mall itself.

Among the new businesses is Dave & Buster’s, a national arcade and sports bar chain. On July 15, the Salinas Planning Department approved an alcohol permit for the business, yet 10 days later, a law firm representing mall owner Steerpoint Capital appealed the decision. (Despite being connected physically to the mall, the Sears building is under different ownership, Ethan Conrad Properties.)

At a Sept. 3 Salinas Planning Commission hearing, Jason Jaffe, representing the mall’s ownership, called Dave & Buster’s a “literal half-acre bar” that will bring trouble to an area that already has a higher crime average than other parts of the city. Stephen Jamieson, the attorney representing Dave & Buster’s, suggested the mall was acting in “bad faith,” using “fearmongering” tactics by cherry-picking headlines about other locations around the country.

The commission sided with Dave & Buster’s and unanimously denied the appeal. That’s one win for the tenant – let the games begin.