Developers of North County’s fiercely disputed Harmony Grove Village South have targeted a key county board of supervisors race, apparently hoping their chosen candidate will give their project his backing in exchange.

Quid pro Arsenault

The prospect of riches from high-end real estate continues to attract wealthy investors, who come up with major money for so-called independent political committees boosting elected officials here.

For example, developers of North County’s fiercely disputed Harmony Grove Village South have targeted a key county board of supervisors race, apparently hoping their chosen candidate will give their project his backing in exchange. Despite protracted opposition from nearby residents, who fear fire danger from runaway residential and commercial development in the unincorporated area, plans for Harmony Grove Village South, shot down by the board of supervisors in December 2022, remain alive and festering.

The saga began in February 2020, with a superior court ruling against a faulty environmental impact report. Developers took their case to an appellate court, which ultimately held that only a single adjustment was required before the document could be revived and “recirculated.” The ruling opened the way for another hearing by the board of supervisors after planners issue their recommendations. “The project will be on the agenda for the Thursday, September 12, 2024 San Dieguito Community Planning Group meeting at 7:00 PM,” says the county’s website. “Comments on the New Recirculated Section with attachments must be received no later than October 7, 2024, at 4:00 p.m.”

Meanwhile, anticipating a future hearing by the board of supervisors, Harmony Grove Village South developers are spending major money, including $15,000 on June 26 from RCS Harmony Partners, LLC to a political committee calling itself the Homelessness Crisis Response Committee Supporting Kevin Faulconer for Supervisor 2024. Republican Faulconer is a developer favorite who seeks to overturn incumbent Supervisor Terra Lawson-Remer, a Democrat.

Kevin Faulconer wants to build a better future — emphasis on “build.”

In addition to the RCS Harmony Partners contribution, other major money for the pro-Faulconer PAC came from the Infrastructure PAC of the Association of General Contractors, with $100,000 on May 13, and from fallen port commissioner David Malcolm’s La Playa, LLC, which gave $25,000 on June 27. During the first half of this year, RCS Harmony Partners, LLC came up with a total $30,000 for another of its favored development advocates, the San Diego Labor Coalition, Sponsored by Laborers’ International Union of North America Local 89. The committee has yet to post its fall voters guide, but in the March primary endorsed a host of Democrats for state legislature, along with San Diego Democratic Mayor Todd Gloria, and four fellow Democrats on the city council, Joe LaCava, Stephen Whitburn, Marni von Wilpert, and Raul Campillo.

The money man behind RCS is Denver, Colorado billionaire Marcel Arsenault, a peace and weapons control advocate, as well as real estate mogul who founded Eco-Cycle Boulder, where he was vice chairman. In December of last year, Arsenault went public with his real estate worries. “The real estate investor said he’d dumped many of his office holdings by last year as the values seemed unsustainable and interest rates shot up, amid other depressing trends,” per a December 4, 2023 account by the Colorado Sun. “But he held on to strong clients like Amazon, who ‘would pay their leases.’”

Katz’s tax and water torture

Two longtime San Diego big money power-brokers are heading up a new political committee promoting Measure E, a city sales tax hike backed by Mayor Todd Gloria and his fellow city council Democrats, per an August 14 disclosure filing with the city clerk’s office. City worker labor chieftain Michael Zuchett and wealthy Del Mar resident Mel Katz, currently chairman of the San Diego County Water Authority, are listed as principal officers of the effort. Katz and wife Linda were among the final donors to fallen county supervisor Nathan Fletcher, toppled by a sex scandal in April of last year, kicking in a total of $12,000 in December of 2022 to Fletcher’s subsequently abandoned 2024 state senate bid.

The $900,000 or so of left-over state senate campaign cash has since come in handy for Fletcher as he battles civil sexual assault charges brought against him by Grecia Figueroa, an ex-public affairs worker at the San Diego Association of Governments, which Fletcher once chaired. “Fletcher may be testing the boundaries of what is a legal campaign expenditure, according to campaign finance experts, as he converts his political war chest into a kind of legal defense fund,” notes an August 13 online dispatch by KPBS.org. 

Mel Katz: helping to pay Nathan Fletcher’s legal bills?

“The majority of Fletcher’s state Senate campaign expenditures have gone to his lawyers in the alleged sexual assault case.” An April 11 KPBS report said Fletcher used the senate fund to pay Los Angeles law firm Fisher & Phillips LLP “a lump sum of $323,220 for ‘professional services’ late last year.” Katz played a crucial role in start-up funding for New San Diego, a since-folded political committee that masterminded the 2023 cascade of hit pieces against ex-Assembly Democrat Lori Saldaña, which knocked her out of a San Diego council general election race against incumbent Democrat and Gloria favorite Jennifer Campbell, the ultimate winner.

Then, before shutting down in June of this year, New San Diego dispatched mail pieces promoting Republican neophyte Jane Glasson in what was widely seen as a failed attempt by monied Gloria backers to edge San Diego cop Larry Turner out of the mayor’s re-election race. So far, the money behind Gloria’s and Katz’s city sales tax boost push has come from San Diego City Firefighters Local 145 PAC, with $119,800 on August 9.

— Matt Potter

(@sdmattpotter)

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