Roundtable: Dallas Police Attack, Homelessness In San Diego And Balboa Park

The sniper shooting of 12 Dallas police officers reverberated every US city. And arrest after the big homeless problem took a deadly turn. Irwin Jacobs has revived his plan to remove cars from the center about ballpark. The KPBS Roundtable starts now . Welcome to our discussion of the week's top stories. Joining me today are Laura Wingard. Reporter Lisa Halberstadt of voice of San Diego. And Roger Shelley who covers growth and development for the San Diego Union Tribune. Five officers are dead and seven Mark wounded along with two civilians. They were shot by a sniper in camouflage who told police he was there gunning for white cops. The home are played out on the streets of Dallas last night and made a peaceful demonstration against a pair of fatal shootings in Baton Rouge in a suburb of St. Paul. Dallas police chief David Brown said this about the murder of his officers. There are no words to describe the atrocity that occurred in our city. All I know is that this must stop. This divisiveness between our police and our citizens. Police in Dallas into that and sent in a robot with a bomb and kill the suspect at the end of this long thing. What we know about the suspect? His name is Micah X. Johnson. He is 25 years old. He is from the Dallas area. He served in Afghanistan. He is an Army veteran. It is not clear if he acted alone. It is looking more and more like he did not and that others are involved. We know that at this point, there is no connection with him in the black lives matter movement which is what was being protested last night. I should say the Dallas morning news reporting here at midday that this was from an anonymous commander in the Police Department. He said that Johnson did not act alone -- act alone and that it was a conspiracy. I'm sure a lot more will come out on this. The Mayor was at about that and he said we're not going to talk about that particular thing today. We did have chief Brown who I should tell our radio listeners is African-American. He talked about what the suspect said. He wanted to kill officers. He express killing white people. He express killing white officers. He expressed anger. Anger for black lives matter. None of that makes sense. None of that is a legitimate reason to do harm to anyone. Texas, of course, is known for his gun culture. Is legal to openly carry in that state. What we know about the Dallas Police Department? What is there reputation? It is led by David Brown who has been there in that department for four decades. He has been achieved since 2010. He has a very good reputation. He is well-liked in the community because he has been tough on cops. If you do wrong, you get punished. One example I read, three officers beat up a motorcycle -- motorcyclist and it was captured on video. They try to cover it up, the officers, and he fired them and released the video the public to show that they had been lying. That has given him a lot of credibility with the public. He is also emphasizing since he became chief de-escalating. When you are a cop and you have to interact with a member of the public and if it gets tense and confrontational, de-escalate. That has been very successful. They have had fewer officer involved shootings and things like that. And many other cities. I think it generally has a very positive, it's got a very positive reputation. This is from the Mayor of Dallas at that same press conference about the Police Department's reputation. This year we have the fewest police officer related shootings than any large city in America. So we are working hard to improve and there is always room for improvement. But we are best in class, we feel. He is making the point and you noted there, the suspect in this long standoff said he was retaliating for police shootings of black people. We had two of those tragedies this week. In Louisiana it was an African-American selling CDs. A call came into the police of a man with a gun. They arrived on the scene and it escalates. It gets captured on video. He is on the grounds with several officers on top of him when he a shot to death. That happened in Louisiana. A couple of days later at Minnesota, we have an incident where a man is pulled over for a broken tail light. People of color is, they will tell you, is why they get pulled over all the time. He hit his girlfriend is in the car and he told the officer I have a permit to carry the gun. The girlfriend says that he was getting out his ID with the officer asked for an officer story is that he was reaching for a gun and he shot and killed him inside the car. The girlfriend strained that life on Facebook in the aftermath. I wanted to get into that. We all deal with this. Modern media is all about social media in these videos are the new witness in recent years to incidents like this. How much of a catalyst is social media on storing people up and getting them angry? I think is huge in today's world. I think this is a new form of citizen journalism that we are seeing that empowers different communities that did not have the power to get their story Apple for. One thing that really struck me about this girlfriend sitting in the car was how composed she was as she explained the situation repeatedly referring to the officer's serve. Her idea in doing that was that she wanted millions to see this video. That empowers her and others like her to get that story out in force a conversation. In the past it was always he said she said and people believe the officers. Sometimes the officers were telling the truth but sometimes they weren't. There was no one there and people believe the person with the badge. And now you have a new video witness. We can go all the way back to 1991. The days of Rodney King. The reason I bring that up is because I was an old-fashioned camcorder. He ways that one question, that profound question of the whole tragedy, can't we all just get along? We have the Mayor and the police chief in Dallas asking the same thing. It doesn't appear that we can. This is been a sad week I would hope for all Americans. It is almost incomprehensible what has unfolded. Coming on the heels of Orlando where clearly, people more vulnerable, homeless people in our community here in San Diego being attacked, it is a sad time, I think, and why can't we all get along. I am wondering whether not to say it's inevitable but the NRA says we should all carry guns to protect ourselves. Now they have an example where the authorities are targets from people carrying guns. We are at the end of this argument about should we or shouldn't we have guns. You can see the ultimate result. The two previous shootings with the black citizens who were carrying guns. Legally carrying guns. You've got to wonder if those were white victims that if they would've said wire police shooting these people carrying guns. There are layers of this and it's very multifaceted. Gun violence and racial disparities. This has been decades-old in America. You and I spoke this morning. I have been pulled over for a tail light. I did not fear for my life. I thought that officer and he gave me a fix-it ticket. I do not have to fear for my life. Eric holder, former Attorney General, he tells his son what to do if he gets pulled over. And African-American. It is a whole different world of you are a person of color. On the social media thing. They have this new camera you can where the takes a picture every 36 -- every 30 seconds. Everyone will be carrying cameras all the time reporting everything they do toward the soft. I think the police body wearing cameras, Shellie Zimmerman M, the chief in Dallas, I think they will be a game changer as well. We will have those videos and everyone seems to record everything. I think it will be a game changer in how law enforcement acts and how things get prosecuted. We're going to move now to unfortunately another kind of shocking crime. Two homeless men were killed and two seriously injured in San Diego. The attacks came all they were sleeping. There was and -- there was an arrest announced. Who was the man? 36-year-old Anthony Padgett of Chula Vista. We know very little about him or any motive behind this at this point. How do the zero in on him? The police are providing that much detail right now. They are adamant they have a lot of work still to do on this case. I will note that a Chula Vista sores mentioned to NBC seven San Diego that this individual was definitely the same individual who had been arrested for setting his homeless friend on fire in 2010 and had been sentenced. Are the same type of incident? Same type of incident and very troubling. There was a security camera that did have him, a lot more details we expect. Backing away from that particular incident which again, made national news before the whole Dallas thing broke last night, these attacks are shocking. Being homeless in San Diego or any city is a violent existing, is it not? It really is. You hear Mary -- you hear many stories. Megan Burke's always a great when this week. People talking about the dangers and feared they face on the street. Sitting on the street is not a comfortable existence. In shelters, those can be really scary places for people also. Not just downtown where we see them congregating. It is really all over San Diego. What's interesting is, overall, homelessness per the point in time count that happens every year is slightly down. Street homelessness, people intense is up about 19% countywide. Just to illustrate the point of how dangerous it is, we took a suspect off the street yesterday, we being our Police Department. They took this man off the street but another homeless man was assaulted last night near hazard Center in Mission Valley. He was just a homeless man living down there probably along the river. It is odd that the homeless are ganging up on each other. Why is that? I think it's a pretty complicated situation. You have some people with mental illnesses. Some people are addicted to drugs. You have people that a been alienated from the communities. I would say the majority of folks to congregate in groups and to kind of partner route. Watch each other's backs. There are different folks, and those are the ones we are especially concerned about who prefer to sleep on the road and get away from the crowd. May be out of fear and some of the reason and that's who a lot of advocates are concerned about. We been hearing warnings to sleep together. Maybe consider city during the day because at night, you were so vulnerable even with a group Be aware of your surroundings etc. We as a Congressman if we're doing all we can to address the issue. I think too often the discussion about homelessness centers around Thanksgiving and Christmas. Maybe what we have a lot of out-of-town visitors for something like the All-Star game. Code -- boats cannot just care about this when it's interesting or convenient. I actually think Sandy Aikins care about this problem every day of the year but we have to care about it and funded and prioritize it. For folks like myself to a been working on homelessness issues for decades, it is difficult when the most common topic of conversation and dialogue in San Diego is a football Stadium and not ending homelessness. We talk about reactive things and we had -- what are some of the things the city is doing proactively? Programs you been writing about? If I were to give an overarching picture of what folks are trying to do right now, our leaders, is to take more of a systemic approach to this rather than in the past lots of different folks meeting nonprofits, governments, doing different things and programming in different directions. That is still happening. There are big efforts underway. One city of San Diego looking to house 1000 veterans over the next year from March to March. They're throwing incentives that landlords and have offered up vouchers. We will be watching to see how successful that is. Also, there is a countywide group who we just heard from God the regional continuum of care Council. A mouthful to say but this group has taken over more regional aspects and looking to see how are we addressing regional goals. In the past San Diego has been behind on goals. The federal government set a goal for us to in veteran homelessness in 2015. That did not happen. The goal of this group is to be watching and pulling everyone together. And also making it so if you were to walk in the door of a different nonprofit, you could potentially be paired with services from another that might better serve you. They are looking to try to make a list of all the homeless veterans in San Diego. These are things that are an effort to work in the system and not just on an individual area. Are we behind in housing first in this concept is not what San Diego has been following from transitional services instead of displacing people in homes? San Diego, by my last count, has more transitional housing the just about any other Metro when the country. Transitional housing means that you provide the services up front and get that person ready to go into housing maybe for up to two years and then move them into housing. The goal is to give them the housing first. I should note that the county has made a big announcement that is a very big deal and is more toward the housing first goal called Project 1 for all. That effort is to house 1250 homeless folks who have serious mental illnesses over the next to years -- over the next two years. We still have a lot of work to do. We have run out of time on this segment. There are a lot of follow-up stories. To San Diego landmarks Balboa Park are being targeted for major makeovers. One of them for the second time. Roger, start with Balboa Park. Panama hits and snacks but it's back in the fast lane There was a disconnect between the sad stories and part planning and city planning. Those things have to go on at the same time and we can stop everything. In the case of Balboa Park, six years ago, the call qualm founder and major supporter of KPBS to post an idea for solving the problem of cars versus pedestrians and Balboa Park. The city Council approved it, they were sued and they lost in a couple of weeks ago Dr. Jacobs came back and said I am ready to start this over again. Just to describe what it is, he is proposing that we build a bypass of the Cabrillo Bridge on the west side of the park and route cars that why were they would build a new garage. The property in between on the pluses and streets would all be back for pedestrian use. The garage would be level with the ground. The interesting thing is of a cost about $45 million back then. We don't know what today's estimates are. I found it interesting that he said he hopes others will step up to the plate and pay for it because he's already spent the -- will they be paid parking? If they start charging for new -- charging for parking in this new garage, they will still have to pay off the bonds to build the garage. They think of you can fill the garage, I guess you could argue in this is a citywide issue about free parking anywhere, beaches and parks and everywhere, I think urban planners would say we are at the point in civilization where you can't have free parking. Very few places are free anymore. Of course there will be free parking for the immediate future but ultimately, there's no parking at all in central Park. Some folks have advocated we start charging because then people would leave their cars behind in use mass transit and. That would help with climate change in achieving those goals. I think one of the things that the fines San Diego versus are -- Orange County, LA, San Francisco, is my neighbors and your neighbors, we can go to Mission Bay Park, Mission Beach, Balboa Park, you can sit -- take the family and you don't have to pay. Lots of people are out there biking and rollerskating and enjoying San Diego life and you don't have to pay. I hate Newport Beach. I hate those places. It's not as much fun as being here. There are 105 million parking spaces in the United States. Five spaces for every car. It reminds me of the 19th century when there were staples everywhere. We are in another stage for you have to be a bit more careful about where you go in how you get there. We've got Councilman We have to be mindful. This is a public park. We should keep that number is low as possible and any proceeds like our other community parking district should be reinvested. We have hundreds of millions of dollars of maintenance needs that we don't have funding for. At this can be used to benefit the long-term health of the park, I think that's a no-brainer. He's pretty optimistic about this projects chances overall. I believe it will go through and be implemented. I voted for this plan four years ago. The city prevailed. We have the L'Enfant -- the support is there. I believe the project according to the mayor is going to proceed. What you think? The losses, he walked away from Balboa Park. He being urban Jacobs. Other big donors in San Diego basically said the same thing. You can argue about the details but the bigger question is if you're going to upset the philanthropic community, you're just going to shoot yourself in the foot. I understand what people say about certain elements of his plan. You have to look at the bigger picture. He's not going to pay for it. Who was? We don't want taxes or even parking fees. Onto Seaport Village. A makeover. Doesn't need a makeover? This is another example of money. If San Diego's not going to raise taxes, you have to turn to other people to pay for them for you. Seaport Village. It has nothing to do with San Diego architecturally. Is the old ferry landing. The port district which runs that is in charge of that land. They said that we need to redevelop it. This is among several other projects they have going on San Diego Bay. They have and institutional interest in doing this because of really getting about $2.5 million from the Seaport Village lease. This we kick up the revenue stream. Give us a high points. There are six developers circling around this. Next week the port will hear from them and what their plans are from hotels and aquariums and a big Ferris will and aspire and a lookout tower. Potentially, 10 times as much money per year. And they say they need this because they've got so many parks to maintain. With the public have input on this? There will be some hearings of course the robberies is. There's a lot of money at stake. Who's going to fund all this? It is all developer paid. What about the California coastal commission? It seems like all of these plans I've read, are they going to be okay with San Diego Bay? They want to have public access assured. In this case, they want enough parking, they want to make sure you honor the water, there's also the question of whether tidelands for. Commercial versus recreational. And they also realize that the port has to pay for things. One of the things coming out is if you put more hotels in, where there be affordable hostile type developments and they due to plan to do that. Real?. Wednesday you will hear the plans of by the end of the year, they will probably pick one of the developers. That wraps up another week of stories. I would like to thank my guess. A reminder, all the stories we discussed today are available on our website. Thanks for joining us today on the roundtable. Police in Dallas ended that and sent in a robot with a bomb and kill the suspect at the end of this long thing. What do we know about the suspect The Mayor was asked about that and he said we're not going to talk about It's legal to openly carry in that state. What we know about the Dallas Police