‘Sensitive-Lands Initiative’ Fails to Make Fall Ballot

The petition drive by San Diegans for Managed Growth to qualify a “sensitive-lands initiative” for the city ballot in November died Monday when the group failed to meet its deadline to submit signatures in support of the measure, City Clerk Chuck Abdelnour announced Tuesday.

But the group claims that it abandoned the petition effort after becoming convinced that the initiative has enough support on both the San Diego City Council and the county Board of Supervisors to be placed on the ballot by elected officials.

“The cost and expense and time involved in getting the signatures is tremendous,” said Bob Glaser, political consultant for the slow-growth citizens organization. “We simply have found so much support as we have been working that we are backing down on” the signature drive.

Volunteer Operation

The sensitive-lands measure, designed to protect hillsides, flood plains, wetlands, and endangered animal and plant habitats from development, needed the support of 50,454 people to qualify in San Diego and slightly fewer to qualify on the county ballot, Abdelnour and Glaser said.

San Diegans for Managed Growth had collected about half that number, spending about $3,000 to $4,000 in a drive that was operated entirely by volunteers, Glaser said.

But, along the way, the initiative has won endorsement by the San Diego Assn. of Governments and has the solid support of a majority of San Diego City Council members and county supervisors, Glaser claimed.

“The votes are there, and they’re solid,” Glaser said. But he declined to name the members of each panel who he believes will support the initiative.

Although exact language is still being hammered out with city and county committees working on growth-management plans, Glaser said he believes that the sensitive-lands initiative will be incorporated in those plans. However, the measure will be presented separately on the November ballot, he said.

Glaser said he is not concerned about losing the leverage on council members and supervisors that a petition drive gives his organization.

“If they start fiddling with the intent, the integrity of the initiative, many of our members will just go to work for the Quality of Life Initiative in the short term,” he said, referring to a more stringent slow-growth measure that will compete with the city-sponsored measure on the November ballot.

“And, in the long term, we’ll be back with another initiative in 1989,” he said.