If residents of Pacific Beach, Mission Beach, and Ocean Beach have questions about corporate neighbor SeaWorld San Diego and its expansion plans, they will have to call a different office.
Although residents of those beachfront communities are mapped in the San Diego City Council’s 2nd District and are represented by Councilman Byron Wear, the marine park, which was in the same district, was moved to the 6th District and now is represented by recently elected Councilwoman Donna Frye.
According to Wear, that makes no sense.
“The environmental impact report for SeaWorld showed about 90 percent of the impact of noise, traffic and viewshed affects the area of council District 2,” Wear said. “SeaWorld clearly has a greater environmental impact on the residents of Pacific Beach, Mission Beach, Ocean Beach, Point Loma and the Midway District more than Clairemont.”
The San Diego Redistricting Commission voted Aug. 22 to split Mission Bay Park between districts 2 and 6. The 5-1 vote moved SeaWorld and De Anza Cove into the 6th District from the 2nd District.
Frye, a staunch environmentalist, said the move is a “coming home” for the area, because Mission Bay was in the 6th District before the last redistricting effort. She also said it’s not unusual for residents of one district to have concerns about a project in another district.
“I’m glad the commission made the right decision to share the bay,” Frye said. “Two council people working together and both fighting for funding and finding solutions , that’s the way things get done.”
Frye has been critical of the SeaWorld master plan for expansion and was the lone opposing vote against the plan when it was before the council in July. Wear, on the other hand, favored the expansion plan.
Frye said the move is about more than SeaWorld and whether she favored their expansion plan.
“I see this (the district change) as a way to solve problems and enable District 6 to get funding and allow us to go upstream and reduce and stop contamination of Mission Bay,” Frye said.
SeaWorld officials said they are not concerned that Frye’s opposition to their plan will affect her role as their council representative.
“If that’s the will of the Redistricting Commission for us to be in District 2 than District 6, then we are all for it,” said Bob Tucker, SeaWorld’s director of public relations. “We’ve never made any attempt to oppose that.”
Tucker noted the park’s expansion plan received approval from the council as a whole, and although they would have liked to have a unanimous vote, Frye’s opposition was OK.
He said if having Frye as a representative will clean up the bay, then they welcome the change.
“We have fought hard for that just as Donna Frye and anyone else in Mission Bay has,” he said.
The public will have 30 days to challenge the adopted final map. If there is no challenge, the new boundaries will go into effect for the March 2002 primary election. The complete redistricting map is available on the city’s Web site at (www.sandiego.gov).