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San Diego Rescue Team Dispatched To Florida For Hurricane Dorian

 September 3, 2019 at 2:55 AM PDT

Speaker 1: 00:00 It's Tuesday, September 3rd I'm Deb Welsh and you're listening to San Diego news matters from KPBS coming up, a San Diego rescue team has been dispatched to Florida for Hurricane Dorian and California's primary care doctor shortage is going to get worse over the next decade, especially in inner cities and rural areas. It's difficult to find anyone Speaker 2: 00:23 in this area but specifically doctors because there are the shortage is everywhere. Speaker 1: 00:29 That more San Diego news stories right after the break. Thank you for joining us for San Diego News Matters. I'm Deb Welsh. San Diego firefighters are in Florida helping coordinate search and rescue missions. As Hurricane Dorian continues its path of destruction. KPBS reporter Matt Hoffman says more local firefighters could be heading to Florida soon. Speaker 3: 00:51 San Diego fire rescue heads up a FEMA sponsored urban search and rescue team on Saturday five firefighters from San Diego County were deployed to Florida from the team with Dorian threatening to move through parts of the southeastern us as many as 70 local firefighters could be tapped to help rescue people. San Diego Battalion Chief David [inaudible] both leads the search and rescue task force and says they are just waiting for the call to be any minute, any minute, we'll uh, our entire cash that's in our warehouse. Um, we'll get stacked and, and uh, we need to be out the door in four hours. If deployed, the task force could be going door to door to save people. They would take boats and special equipment to breach homes during a rescue situation. Matt Hoffman, K PBS News, Speaker 1: 01:32 California State University has working with immigrant rights organizations to provide legal services at 22 campuses within the next six months. KPBS as Maya troubles, he has more on what that means. For some students at San Diego campuses for San Diego State University and CSU San Marcos Jewish family services of San Diego will be offering legal immigration aid to students, staff and faculty, JFS attorneys and paralegals will routinely visit to help with things like green card and docker renewals as well as know your rights presentations. Hiero casting Yetta and attorney with Jewish family services says as immigration laws change, he's already seeing more students coming into JFS. Offices for hell. Speaker 2: 02:15 Studies have shown that students, staff and faculty are being affected by worrying about their immigration status or family member's immigration status. And so this is the logical next step. Speaker 1: 02:28 CSU doesn't have a clear count of how many of their students are in the country illegally, but officials estimate 9,500 of their students receive ab five 40 waivers which allow undocumented students who went to a California high school to pay in state tuition. Maya Treble, c k PBS news, a pair of immigration attorneys from Texas. I've come up with an app that tells them if a client has been pulled over by local police or federal agents have shown up with a warrant. Now the legal hopes to convince attorneys in Arizona to buy their product from the Front Tara's desk in Phoenix. KJ Is Easy's Matthew Casey reports Speaker 4: 03:08 the app is called law pilot Guardian and it has text to voice messages which a lawyer can customize for their client to communicate with police or federal agents. Speaker 5: 03:18 I am exercising my right to remain silent. I do not wish to stay or sign anything without my lawyer. Speaker 4: 03:24 The app plays warnings like that one. If a client pushes a big red button, alerts go out to their attorney and loved ones. The app uses gps so the lawyer can see where their client is. Cofounder Martin Falco says the app automatically records audio of what's happening Speaker 5: 03:40 and it's stored to the cloud. So even when they confiscate your phone, the lawyer has that information. They can act immediately. Speaker 4: 03:48 Balco says the audio can then be used as evidence in court in Phoenix. I am Matthew Casey, Speaker 1: 03:54 eight months into his term as California governor, it's still not clear whether Gavin Newsome plans to hire a cabinet level homelessness secretary, something he vowed to do during his campaign as capital pelvic radios. Chris Nichols reports that's left some advocates for homeless people worried. Speaker 6: 04:11 Here's what Newson promised in a campaign video. Speaker 7: 04:14 We must address homelessness. I'll create an inner agency council to end chronic homelessness led by cabinet level secretary committed to solving the issue, not just managing it. Speaker 6: 04:27 Chris Martin, who advocates for homeless funding and services at Housing California says the state could really use that position right now. Speaker 8: 04:35 There's so much that we could gain out of a secretary or cabinet level position. Really giving leadership around the issue as well as being somebody that has the authority and and um, the ability to do some of the more systems change work that we need at the same level. Speaker 6: 04:52 Newsome offered a confusing response this week when asked by a reporter about his plans for the post. After that, two major newspapers reported he's dropped those plans. The governor's spokesman on Friday told cap radio. That's not necessarily the case, but declined to elaborate. Newsome has set a state homelessness task force is providing leadership on the issue. That taskforce is led by Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg and La county supervisor Mark Ridley Thomas in Sacramento. I'm Chris Nichols. Speaker 1: 05:25 The California legislature is considering a bill that would dramatically decrease the number of independent contractors in this state. KPBS reporter, Priya Sri there spoke to some of the workers who'd be affected by it. Ab Five authored by San Diego, Democratic Assembly woman Loraina Gonzales. Would limit when businesses and companies could classify their employees as independent contractors and then their all pee people who will get the labor protections. They need thousands of workers in California from Uber and Lyft drivers to nail technicians and hairstylists would become full time employees of companies that would give them access to rights and benefits like minimum wage, paid sick days and overtime, but not all impacted workers are happy about it. In fact, I couldn't find one Uber or Lyft driver at the San Diego airport ride share parking lot that favored the change. They typically said they liked the freedom of not being an employee. Chris Whitehead has been driving for Lyft for a few months. Speaker 9: 06:27 People who ride Lyft and do this are typically doing it because they like to do things in between doing other things. Lots of entrepreneurs, college kids, all sorts of people, people from the military. And uh, I think if you tell them, hey, you have to work this time to this time, they're going to view this like any other job. Speaker 1: 06:44 Gonzales expects the bill to pass both houses of the legislature before they recess on September 13th. Prea Sri, they're k PBS news, the counties warning hikers to take extra precautions after ticks carrying what sometimes called rabbit fever were found at one park. KPB As reporter Steve Walsh says, Lopez Canyon is Ground Zero Speaker 10: 07:07 County vector control is located six cases of ticks carrying tularemia, sometimes called rapid fever. All of the cases were found in Lopez Canyon trail and Sorento valley. That's where Quintin Munoz was hiking. Speaker 9: 07:20 Definitely look out like always check up on dogs, check your legs. Um, we'd like to, as soon as we go home we have like a special shampoo to wash off. Um, but yeah, just staying really cautious. Speaker 10: 07:31 County vector control found ticks carrying to the Romeo last year. Also in Lopez Canyon. The disease is treated with antibiotics, but it can sometimes cause death. Cases of tick related illness in humans remain rare in the area. There hasn't been a case of tularemia diagnosed in San Diego County since 2005. Steve Walsh. KPBS news. Speaker 1: 07:53 Access to primary health care is a fundamental need, but that access may be more challenging in the years to come. For most California's, the state is on the precipice of a huge doctor shortage by 2030 researchers say the state could be down more than 10,000 primary care providers including nurse practitioners and physician assistants. Inner cities and rural areas are already feeling the squeeze and it's going to get worse as part of our California dream collaboration. Elizabeth Aguilar of cal matters reports. Speaker 9: 08:28 Are you short of breath all the time or just when you get up and move around comes and goes. Okay. Speaker 1: 08:36 Dr Dan Dalley visits Wilma ch Hasbro in the hospital where she's in longterm care. The 88 year old former operating room nurse used to work with dally. Speaker 9: 08:46 I been working here for 34 years and I'm a family practice physician. Dolly Speaker 1: 08:51 cares for thousands of patients at the big valley health center in a part of the state where so few people live that it is considered friends. Speaker 11: 08:58 Timberlands. This valley is about as beautiful place you can get from his car. He pointed out the landmarks. You could see Mount Lassen over there in that direction and Mount Shasta. Here you can see two of the most beautiful mountains on the planet and all this area, farming and water and lakes out here and it used to be that this place would recruit itself, Speaker 1: 09:21 not anymore. Dolly is 71 and has postponed his retirement over and over again waiting for a new doctor to arrive. His situation is not unique. High Medical School debt pushes future doctors towards specialties that pay more and new primary care doctors tend to practice in bigger cities, near medical centers or for large medical groups. It's a problem in the inner city too though. Not just agricultural meccas or bucolic settings with mountain views. Speaker 12: 09:50 It's difficult to find anyone in this area, but specifically doctors because there are, the shortage is everywhere. Speaker 1: 09:59 Shannon Garrick is CEO of mountain valleys, health centers, Speaker 12: 10:02 and then we have a problem because we're so remote and rural, so often providers will come on site to visit and they will say, oh, well we didn't know that it was this rural. Speaker 1: 10:13 An added challenge in rural counties is that doctors have to be able to do a lot dally mans, the Big Valley Health Center and Bieber does a 24 hour shift in emergency room at the nearby a hospital every week and does patient rounds most mornings at the hospital. Speaker 11: 10:29 You have to be able to fly by the seat of your pants at times. You have to think on the run and you sometimes have to do things that are out of the ordinary. Speaker 1: 10:39 He's done it all from delivering babies to saving people out in the woods. Dolly is a local celebrity of sorts up here. Friends and patients greet him everywhere he goes in the area, the market, the bar restaurants, what they waive when they pass him on the road. That's why it's been so hard for dally to retire right now. He's got his eye on a young doctor couple, Speaker 11: 11:05 a lady who is in her third year of Ob Gyn residency at UC Davis and her husband is a family practice resident. Well, we're trying to recruit him back up here because that will be when I retire. Speaker 1: 11:20 Sounds perfect except for one very big snag. The local hospital closed its obstetric department a few years ago and dally has been pushing hard to reopen it. Women in these parts travel more than 100 miles to deliver. One recent morning Dolly and patient will much Hasbro reminisced about their friendship. Speaker 11: 11:39 How many years did we work together? Okay, got it. She's going to say too many working with you. We had London. Yes we did. Speaker 1: 11:47 It's important to dally to leave his patients in good hands. Speaker 11: 11:51 They're part of my family and they ski. Guess what? I do get a little tearful, but you know, because I've had so many people praise me and stuff. I mean, I don't need all the gratification and all that stuff, but I'm so honored by the fact that they think that I'm a good doctor, Speaker 1: 12:17 good doctors that are increasingly hard to find, not just in rural California, but across the state. And if nothing changes, that means longer wait times for patients traveling further to see a doctor or skipping care altogether from Bieber, California. I'm Elizabeth AG. Dulera. Thanks for listening to San Diego News matters. If you're not already a subscriber, take a minute to become one. You can find San Diego news matters on apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

San Diego's fire department has sent a five-member task force to Florida to help coordinate search and rescue missions amid Hurricane Dorian. Also, at least eight people were killed in a deadly boat fire off the California coast, some Uber and Lyft drivers are speaking out against a bill aimed to curb independent contractors, and San Diego water rates are going up.