CAVANAUGH: Our coverage on the start of the health exchanges in California begins in a moment. Republican efforts to delay the start of Obama care have failed in Congress, so no budget bill has been approved, which has led to today's partial shutdown of U.S. government offices. Tomorrow we'll examine the full impact of that on San Diego. But today, we'll check in with two local reps of the two parties. Ron Nehring was California Republican party chair until recently. Hello, are Ron. NEHRING: Good afternoon. CAVANAUGH: I have time only I'm afraid for one quick question for you. So could you tell -- I think a lot of people in San Diego are wondering why disagreement about the start date of Obama care is worth shutting down the government. NEHRING: Well, I think that we have a government shutdown today because the Senate did not pass a bill that the House had passed that would keep the federal government open. And we have Harry Reid advising President Obama not to sit down and negotiate with Republicans and get this settled up. I think the federal government should be open today. I don't think there's anybody in Washington of either party who wants the government to be shut down. Under our democratic system, we have Republicans in control of one chamber with a legitimate point of view that Obamacare has a lot of problems. Anyone looking at it objectively would see that it does. And Democrats have a legitimate point of view as well. And that's why there has to be a negotiation. I don't think the president going out and playing golf and taking Harry Reid's advice not to sit down and negotiate with Republicans is helpful. We need to get this solved, we need all the parties to come together and to work it out, get the federal government open and fix Obamacare's major problems. CAVANAUGH: Ron, thank you for this abbreviated conversation. NEHRING: You bet. CAVANAUGH: And Congressman Susan Davis, other thank you for joining us. DAVIS: Hi, Maureen. CAVANAUGH: Again, I have time only for a quick question from you. I'm wondering, what are San Diegans affected by this shut down supposed to think about this? Is this because Democrats have refused to compromise? DAVIS: Well, I think what I'm hearing from my '20s actually, is that it does affect them, and I believe their irresponsible behavior has really create said hardship for people throughout San Diego, throughout the country, and brought the economy at risk. I've heard from a number of people -- -- we put up a question on the website, how is the government shutdown, how would shaaffect you? And immediately we got well over 60 responses, and those of course growing into the hundreds during the day. People really, really are affected by this. And one particular example, I heard from a woman who said that her daughter worked for Customs and Border Patrol. She's a single mom, has a child with autism, and she can't afford this loss of pay. And they're just asking questions about how could this happen. CAVANAUGH: Again, my question though, is this because Democrats refused to compromise? DAVIS: Absolutely not, actually what we did was accept their budget number in the negotiations. And yet, what they've chosen to do is to focus on an already passed law that takes effect today. People are going on the exchange in great numbers across the country. And rather than negotiating over a budget, which is what we should have been negotiating about, and again we took their number even though it's not a good number for us, it causes more pain than I personally would like to see, we accepted that, and yet they did not accept it because what they had in mind was getting rid of the Affordable Care Act. CAVANAUGH: Congresswoman Davis, be I have to end it there. Thank you so much for taking the time out. DAVIS: Okay, thank you, Maureen.
From Washington D.C. to San Diego, a government shutdown will have far-reaching impacts.
Thousands of government employees, including some of the 26,000 local civilian employees of the Department of Defense, will only be working a half-day today to take care of shutdown-related tasks. Then they’ll be out of work — and a pay check — until Congress comes to a resolution.
The region’s federal parks will be closed, including the Cabrillo National Monument in Point Loma, and there will be no federal loans available for small businesses and people buying a home.
One exception to the shutdown, military service members will still be paid; President Obama signed it into law late Monday night.
A bipartisan group of San Diego City Council members on Monday afternoon called on Congress to avoid a shutdown of the federal government, San Diego City Councilman and mayoral candidate David Alvarez said the city has a substantial reserve to keep essential services going, for now.
"If this goes on for a prolonged period of time then we’re going to have some situations we’re going to have to be dealing with in the next couple of months, but at least for the short time being, we have enough in our reserves to manage and continue our operations as normal," said Alverez.
Airport operations and the U.S. Postal Service are not expected to be impacted. Also unaffected will be people receiving Medicare, social security and unemployment checks.
There will also be no interruptions or delays for California's supplemental food program for women, infants and children, known as WIC. Officials stated in a news release: "California WIC currently has available funds, and will proceed with funding the WIC program in order to continue providing benefits to participants."
