Living The Dream, With The Help Of A Home And A Pension And More Local News

April 26, 2019 at 2:59 AM PDT

Speaker 1: 00:00 Speaker 2: 00:24 Speaker 3: 00:30 Speaker 2: 00:57 Speaker 3: 01:09 Speaker 2: 01:21 Speaker 3: 01:26 Speaker 2: 02:14 Speaker 3: 02:21 Speaker 1: 03:21 Speaker 4: 04:15 Speaker 1: 04:22 Speaker 4: 04:43 Speaker 1: 05:38 Speaker 5: 05:57 Speaker 1: 07:28 Speaker 6: 08:41 Speaker 1: 09:27 Speaker 7: 10:49 Speaker 7: 11:58 Speaker 7: 12:59 Speaker 7: 14:08 Speaker 1: 14:52 Good morning. It's April 26th I'm Deb Welsh and you're listening to San Diego news matters. There was a time in California when middleclass families could easily afford to buy a home. Over the decades of those homes have appreciated leaving many seniors in the state able to continue to afford the good life. As part of our gray in California series KPBS as a Meetha Sharma has this profile. Today is the first day of spring. Let's celebrate it with the fire. Carlos Luis itwe are tape piles, logs in the fireplace as his wife Gerta Govind each forte watches on with a big grin and Luis is a fire master now he has it down to a science. Luis has 75 Gerda is 77 they just moved into this three bedrooms, Spanish style home nestled in the hills of San Diego County. They have a pool, four and a half acres of land. It's like going back to the country, you know? Totally. This is a dream land, if you will. It's as though this place was waiting for us all of our lives. Faith didn't finance the place though. California real estate did. The couple bought their new home and Hummel for $610,000 after selling their Pasadena townhouse last fall for half a million. Without owning that town house in Pasadena, there was no way we could have bought this place good about the townhouse for $99,000 in 1985 when homes were still affordable for middle class California families. She's a retired educator and diversity consultant. Luis worked in cultural affairs at the city of Los Angeles today. They live off of retirement savings, social security, and a pension. It's a survival and they know they are fortunate to own and to have a pension. Something fewer and fewer Californians can depend on. We have some benefits on the fact that we're older and we came to a certain time. Benefits they recognize aren't spread evenly. Benefits that allow them to follow their creative passions. Luis and Gerda, our artists, he's a sculptor and painter. He points to a painting and Bright Blues, pinks and Greens of geometric shapes. This piece is called the [inaudible]. The same front data, the seven months without Borders and Gerda is a poet. I love when he's in paint mode. She started writing after both her daughters died. She's working on her fifth book now. Purple Green stands close to canvas, almost cross side. The couple see this new home as a place for their art to flourish. They also want other artists to find inspiration here. Gerda envisions leading weekend retreats, women 60 plus who are writers or poets, but they're shying away from it. I wanted to come here and experienced the freedom, the air to tap what's they're ready to roll, but they have to make it happen. Looking out on there. Sprawling property on this overcast day, the couple put their arms around each other. We're going to take a chance. We're going to go into this wide open space and see what happens in San Diego. I'm Amethyst Sharma. This story is from our California dream collaboration. Find out more about our series@graincalifornia.org a federal judge in San Diego says the u s as six months to identify potentially thousands more children who were separated from their parents at the border unless something unexpected stands in their way. KPV has border reporter. Gene Guerrero was at the hearing. Commander Johnathan white of the Department of Health and Human Services testified that he was leading the effort to find the remaining children as quickly as humanly possible. They do it quote by nick or by Crook. He said adding that he thinks it's possible. In six months, the u s government had asked for up to two years, attorney legal learned of the ACL. You praise the judge's decision to order the six month deadline. He said he expects to start reunifying hundreds or thousands of children in the coming months. We could not be happier with the way it went today in court. We have an enormous task ahead of us now to try and find all these families. Judge Dina's sobre asked for regular status updates from commander white who he calls a quote beacon of light in this family reunification process. Gene Guerrero KPBS news, the state assembly simply Thursday, approved a bill that would prohibit gun and ammunition sales at the del Mar fairgrounds. KPBS reporter Matt Hoffman has more. The state assembly approved the bill authored by San Diego Assembly men. Todd. Gloria, the del Mar fairgrounds sits in his district and Gloria says the communities around the fairgrounds sake, they do not want gun shows on the state owned land. The bill is coauthored by assembly members, Tasha Burner Horvath events, and he does and Loraina Gonzalez of San Diego Gonzalez says the state should not be in the business of using public land to let the firearms industry profit off the sale of guns and ammo burner. Horvath says to proposed bill prioritizes quality of life and public safety. KPBS found last year there were 29 people arrested at the San Diego County Fair and the Kubu music festival combined. That's compared to one arrest during for gun shows. Even though firearms are sold at gun shows, there's still a state mandated 10 day waiting period before someone can actually get the firearm. The bill now moves to the state Senate for a vote. If approved, it would then head to the governor's desk, Matt Hoffman, Kpbs News, California counties or reviewing criminal cases to find marijuana related to convictions that could be expunged or reduced to misdemeanors. Capitol. Public radio is Bob Moffit reports counties from Sacramento to Los Angeles took part in a pilot program that helps them to easily identify the cases. Marijuana is now legal in California and previous convictions for sales or possession must be reviewed by district attorneys. The Sacramento DA's office has filed dismissal requests for 1900 marijuana related convictions and requests for 3,400 felonies to be reduced to misdemeanors. Rob Gold is with the DA's office, people who sold marijuana to another person cultivated marijuana or those who possess marijuana for purposes of sales. Those were all felonies prior to the passage of prop 64 and then possession of small amounts. Those were misdemeanors. Gold says the DA's office met with community groups and went beyond the minimum requirements under state law for sentence review. Also recommended for reduction or expungement cases in which the conviction was the only one on a person's record. The person hasn't committed a crime and 10 years or if the person convicted was under 21 nia more weather's as a community organizer with the group youth forward and says 44% of marijuana convictions in Sacramento have been African American, which continued their cycle of poverty. This is going to allow these people to pursue jobs. This has got to allow these people to pursue housing. Um, and it's also gonna allow these people to um, economically provide for their families and invest back and be functioning members of their community. Before he 2018 law, people were required to apply to the court to have their sentences reduced or dismissed. Sacramento and for other counties are part of a pilot project with a group called code for America that created a computer program you use to identify cases that qualify on Bob Moffit in Sacramento County health officials are reporting three more flu related death while confirming that overall flu cases continue to fall. Details from KPBS is Sally. Excellent. The three most recent flu victims ranged in age from 55 to 96. All had additional medical issues. According to the county health and Human Services Agency, the death spring, the county's fluid season, death toll to 67 through April 20th last season. At this time, the county had recorded 341 flu deaths. The county also confirmed 171 flu cases last week down from a revise total of 243 cases the previous week. Countywide confirmed flu cases have now fallen for four consecutive weeks even so, the county's public health officer, Dr Wilma Wooten says San Diegans should continue to be vaccinated. Flu shots are available at doctor's offices, retail pharmacies, community clinics, and the county's public health centers. Sally Hixon, Kpbs News, Mexico estimates 300,000 people have answered his territory this year with the intention of reaching the u s from the Mexico City Bureau, Kj,Z , Z, or Hey Valencia reports for the front Tara's network. Mexico has long been a thoroughfare for migrants headed to the US this year. Mexico has seen an increase in people arriving from around the world, including from countries in central Africa and Southern Asia, and a press conference Tuesday interior. Olga Sanchez Gordito reported an unprecedented figure for the number of us found migrants in Mexico so far this year. 300,000 [inaudible] Sanchez Cordero says those migrants intended to enter the US without visas, but she's been loose with estimates before. Earlier this year she said a caravan of 20,000 migrants was headed toward Mexico and it never materialized in Mexico City encore. Hey Valencia, California parents of children with disabilities have reached a settlement with the State Department of Health Care Services. They say the state wasn't providing promised and necessary medical care capital public radio, Sammy Kay. Kayla has more, more than 4,000 California kids are entitled to in Home Nursing Care through medical, but nearly a third of those hours go unfilled because parents can't find nurses to do the work. Families filed a class action lawsuit against the state last year for not providing enough assistance under the preliminary settlement. The Department of Healthcare services, we'll have to give each family a caseworker to arrange their approved nursing hours. The state is currently notifying the families about the ruling, which will give them a chance to weigh in before final approval is granted in Sacramento. I'm Sammy Kay Yola research shows global warming is an expensive problem costing us $250 billion each year. One local researcher is bringing light to a tool that just may have a big impact by cooling the planet. It's called solar geoengineering, which is where small particles are put into the stratosphere to reflect sunlight back into outer space. Uc San Diego climate change scientists k Ricky spoke with mid day edition host jade Hindman about this new research. Kate, welcome. Thank you for having me. So how could geo engineering help fix this problem? One thing that we do feel pretty certain about you engineering is that it is a tool that could be used to cool down the planet. Uh, we know at the basic level that GeoEdge, solar geoengineering would work because it's exactly what happens whenever there is a large volcanic eruption. Basically. Um, for example, when, when Mount Pinatubo in the 90s, in the 90s are updated in the Philippines, it blasted a bunch of material up into the stratosphere. Um, that material made little particles that reflected sunlight and the planet actually cooled down by about a half a degree centigrade. Uh, so we've observed, uh, things like geoengineering in the natural climate system in the past. So we know it would cool down the planet. How would you get the particles into that part of the atmosphere? So the, the most likely method would be to use high altitude aircraft to basically spray aerosol precursors into the stratosphere, which would then form very fine particles, aerosols that would sit in the stratosphere and reflect sunlight. And are there any ethical concerns with it? I mean, how could you ensure that using that in one area wouldn't cause an adverse impact? And another, this is really the million dollar question as is all of the ethical and social, um, issues that come up when we actually think about the reality of trying to implement to engineering in a very complex geopolitical atmosphere. Because basically if you want to cool down the climate over the u s using solar geoengineering, that's going to affect everyone else in the entire world. You can't just geo an engineer over one country or one state or one town. Uh, so there would be a lot of governance issues to work out in terms of who gets to decide when we do geoengineering, how much we do, how might, uh, people or places where there's a harmful side effect be compensated. Um, and we'll this exclude, uh, some people who don't have power in the world but who may rely on the climate more than anyone else. A lot of the really thorny issues to work out when we think about whether we should do, do, are not actually have to do with these, with these governance and ethical issues and his solar geoengineering already being used. Solar geoengineering is not being deployed yet. Um, we, I mean we, we have other analogs in the world that we can observe that do similar things to what solar do you engineering would do. Like I mentioned, volcanic eruptions mimics sort of the activities of, of solar geoengineering. Likewise, um, air pollution. So when we burn coal in a power plant, uh, that also creates these aerosols in the troposphere and they reflect sunlight. And as the research continues, how soon do you think we could see governing agencies use Geo Engineering? Oh my goodness. I hope not for quite a while still. Uh, we still have a lot of research to do to understand, uh, the details of the side effects and the best way we would want to do this. And do you look at Geo engineering as a solution or tool? Geoengineering could be a valuable component of the climate risk reduction toolbox, but it's absolutely never going to be a substitute for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. I've been speaking with Kate Ricky, a climate change scientist leading the way for solar geoengineering. Kate, thanks so much for joining us. My pleasure, Kate. Ricky, we'll be speaking Saturday at the event commemorating the 30th anniversary of Uc San Diego School of global policy and strategy. For more information, go to kpbs.org thanks for listening to KPV SS San Diego News matters podcast. For more local stories, go to [inaudible] dot org.

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For middle-class seniors who bought their homes decades ago, the California dream remains well within reach. Plus: A federal judge says he will give the Trump administration six months to identify children who were separated from their families at the U.S.-Mexico border early in the president's term; the State Assembly passed a gun show ban at Del Mar Fairgrounds and more San Diego and California news.