Electric Cars Could Put A Charge In The Economy And More Local News

February 3, 2020 at 2:48 AM PST

Speaker 1: 00:00 Speaker 2: 00:17 Speaker 1: 00:24 Speaker 3: 00:36 Speaker 1: 00:37 Speaker 2: 00:50 Speaker 4: 01:07 Speaker 2: 01:21 Speaker 1: 01:39 Speaker 5: 02:59 Speaker 6: 03:19 Speaker 5: 03:40 Speaker 1: 03:54 Speaker 7: 04:05 Speaker 8: 04:17 Speaker 7: 04:25 Speaker 8: 04:35 Speaker 7: 04:44 Speaker 1: 04:49 Speaker 9: 04:59 Speaker 1: 05:37 Speaker 5: 05:53 Speaker 10: 05:58 Speaker 1: 07:03 Speaker 2: 07:31 Speaker 10: 07:46 Speaker 2: 07:49 Speaker 10: 08:01 Speaker 2: 08:08 Speaker 11: 08:57 Speaker 2: 09:12 Speaker 11: 09:37 Speaker 2: 09:45 Speaker 11: 10:37 Speaker 2: 10:52 Speaker 1: 11:29 Speaker 9: 11:52 Speaker 12: 12:28 Speaker 9: 12:44 Speaker 12: 13:01 Speaker 9: 13:16 Speaker 1: 13:38 Speaker 9: 14:00 Speaker 1: 14:28 Speaker 9: 14:41 Speaker 1: 15:12 Speaker 9: 15:28 Speaker 1: 15:36 It's Monday, February 3rd I'm Deb Welsh and you're listening to San Diego news matters from KPBS coming up, electric cars could put a charge in the San Diego economy and just when it looked like there wouldn't be any Republicans in the race for San Diego mayor. I think we need to change the conversation on a few things that we are doing here in San Diego, mostly around homelessness and around housing. That more coming up right after the break [inaudible] [inaudible] California's economy could get a major boost if a significant number of drivers switch to electric vehicles. KPV has reporter Eric Anderson says the steady comes from the nonpartisan think tank. Next 10 widespread adoption of electric cars and trucks could generate $140 billion for the state's economy in just 10 years. David Rowland Holst is an economist at the university of California Berkeley. His analysis examined the effect of drivers making the switch from petroleum fuels. California spend about $60 billion a year on gasoline and redirecting a significant amount of that expenditure to the other things that households want to buy. You know, the services they want to buy. Could be a really potent stimulus for the state economy. Roland Holst says that economic stimulus could also generate 400 to 500,000 new jobs as the shift away from fossil fuels happens. He says EVs would help the state hit greenhouse gas reduction goals and that would create a cleaner, healthier environment. Eric Anderson KPBS news, the coronavirus continues to be a big story with more than 10,000 cases in China and over 200 deaths. KPBS as Sarah Casianos gives us a business take on the virus, the Corona virus isn't just affecting health. It's been spreading to the economy to the Dow. Jones was down 600 points on Friday due to the fear about the economic impact of the virus last week. The chairman of the federal reserve said it's too early to tell, but it has the potential to have a significant impact on the global economy. Mural COPEC is a lecturer at San Diego state and cofounder of bottom line marketing. He says it's already had an impact. Currently 19 airlines either have suspended or reduced the number of flights to China, hotels and hospitality, even consumer products like Nike. Shipping stuff out is going to be a challenge. And even Apple stock earlier in the week took, took a dive, a couple of points. The world health organization declared the Corona virus, an international public health emergency, which could fuel more economic fear. Sarah gets Yannis KPBS news. How are we residents and businesses suffered through a week of water restrictions late last year. Now they might be getting some help from the city council. KPBS reporter Matt Hoffman explains after storm water contaminated pathways, water supply. In late November, officials told residents not to drink their water for a week. Now the city is looking to reimburse residents and businesses for lost water service. The city council is voting Tuesday on whether to give customers a onetime credit that on average would be $28 depending on water usage. Michelle Meeks lives in Poway. My initial reaction was that so very small credit considering sick days, six days, having to boil water every single day. And if you have children that's um, every time you cook you clean. If you have animals, you take a bath, you brush your teeth. So every single day you're on high alert, you're extremely inconvenienced. Nearly 200 stores and restaurants were forced to close for nearly a week during the water crisis. Restaurants use more water than the average home, so their water credit would likely be higher, but some say it won't be enough to cover loss business. Matt Hoffman, K PBS news, the Marines rolled out the newF 35 fighter jet at Miramar Friday. KPBS military reporter Steve Walsh says neighbors are concerned about noise and safety. Marine air station Miramar held an open house for the new [inaudible]. Friday. The Marines are predicting that theF 35 won't increase the noise levels dramatically. Says Colonel Charles Dockery who runs Miramar. If I was to compare it at 35 to fat and it's about a one to three decimal difference depending on if you compare it to an [inaudible] or an EP 16 or an ABA. Neighbors in nearby university city remain where he says Ron Bellinger in 2008 a fighter crashed into their neighborhood. They continued to see fighters flying low. That's what we have. We signed up for our own and got our houses here, but we didn't sign up for the ones that are just at the top of the Palm trees going 400 miles an hour and they're in the wrong spot. Cradle Dockery says the Marine flights are controlled by the FAA. Steve Walsh KPBS news, the Iowa caucuses get underway today. The same day, California begins sending out ballots to many voters, Capitol, public radio, Scott rod reports, unlike in previous years, California's presidential primary is on March 3rd or super Tuesday, but voting in the golden state starts well ahead of election day. If you vote by mail, you should expect to see a ballot in your mailbox in the coming days. Haven't registered yet. Don't panic. California allows voter registration through election day. If you receive your ballot and don't see any presidential candidates, also don't panic. That likely means you've registered no party preference. If you'd like to vote in the presidential primary, you just need to request a ballot from your County for that party's presidential election or re-register for that party in Sacramento. I'm Scott. Rod, if movie musicals make you want to get up and sing that a monthly event at digital gym cinema called the big gay sing along maybe just for you. KPB has arts reporter Beth like Amando speaks with the event organizer who started the program last year. Bobby Gordon has loved musicals all his life. But watching on TV is just not the right way to enjoy them. You know, you can watch these musicals at home, all that you want and it's just not the same as seeing it on the big screen. It's a different thing to watch it on the big screen with other people in the theater. So we created the big gay sing along to bring musicals, like the best little whorehouse in Texas to the big screen for people who can't help but clap their hands and stomp their feet and sometimes even sing along. But he's quick to point out that although it's called the big gay sing along any invites, LGBTQ plus groups to come and fundraise. Everyone is welcome. The other gay part is not so much LGBTQ. Plus it's more about just being gay and happy and fun. And celebrating and in my mind that the title big a sing along. I certainly didn't create it, but it certainly just fit with the tenor and the fun and the vibe of the event that I wanted to create. Best little whorehouse in Texas starring Burt Reynolds and Dolly Parton screens twice on Wednesday at digital gym cinema. You're not required to sing along, but it is encouraged. Beth like Amando KPBS news Councilman Scott Sherman who represents district seven is running for San Diego mayor with mail and voting starting this week and election day on March 3rd KPBS is speaking with the top candidates for San Diego. Mayor Republican Scott Sherman told KPBS mid day additional was Maureen Kavanaugh that after seven years in politics, he was looking forward to going back to the private sector, but he joined the race for mayor just before the deadline. Literally every time my wife and I for the last couple of months would go out in public, we'd get stopped by two or three people saying, Hey, are you going to run? We need you to run. We were asked to run the first time I got into this race. I didn't look to get into politics and it was kind of playing out the same way for mayor as well. Why do you want to be San Diego mayor though? Um, I think we need to change the conversation on a few things that we are doing here in San Diego, mostly around homelessness and around housing. I don't think we're, I mean we're moving somewhat in the right direction, but we're missing part of the conversation. Okay. So what in your opinion is stopping more housing from being built in San Diego? Um, I think it's twofold. I think politicians a lot of times who haven't been in the private sector look to government to solve the housing problem. And when 47% of the cost of building housing is government regulation and red tape, I think if we look to incentivize the marketplace, we can see more production of affordable housing, middle income housing. Because right now with the cost of building housing here in San Diego, it forces home builders to build either luxury units cause they gotta make their money back at, you know, expensive, expensive amounts or they take the incentives that we've put in place for taxpayer subsidize affordable housing. We are missing that missing middle someplace to go once you get out of affordable housing and get into the middle. I mean both of my kids have moved out of the state because they can't afford housing. Okay. So one pushes for a higher density housing in the city and other is for more alternative transportation. Now you're not really a fan of more bike lanes in this city, but how do we reach our climate action goals if we don't get more people out of their cars? Well, I'm okay with bike lanes. I mean even in Linda Vista, we're approving a bike lane. I'm here pretty soon. But the key component of that, it doesn't take away parking spaces and it doesn't take away car lanes because as it stands right now, well into the high 90 percentile of people still take a car to work. We need to try and make it easier for people to choose alternative transportation, but we can't do it at the expense of people who take their car. Now you've said that you think the missing piece to addressing homelessness in San Diego is increased enforcement. What do you mean by that? Well, we've done a lot on the compassion side. We've built tent shelters. We've done affordable housing, permanent supportive housing, but a lot of times what we haven't been concentrating on are the consequences side. I mean, we've been doing a ton of the compassion side, but nothing on the consequences side and so many times if there's no consequences, then it just becomes enabling people, especially the drug addicted types that we see in the river bed and those types of things. It enables them to keep doing what they're doing. I mean, I talked to a guy, Brian, which is over at Zephyr, which is a permanent supportive housing for veterans. He came up to me at the ribbon cutting and thanked me for breaking up the tents downtown. He said, look, I was in those tents shooting meth in my veins every day. He says, it wasn't till the city came in and broke it up and said I had to do something else. From there he went to the shelter, he got a caseworker and the next thing you know he's lived in a sobriety program, living in permanent supportive housing and now he's 11 months clean and sober. We have a federal court ruling now that says cities can't ticket people for living on the street unless the city can provide shelter for them. We don't have enough shelter beds in the city. So what's your priority? Shelter, beds or tickets? Uh, both. We need more shelter beds so we can have more places for them to go. San Diego is actually kind of been ahead of a lot of the other cities when putting in shelter beds and those types of places to get people out of the shelters to their next step. I think we need to do a little bit more of both. The council is committed to doing it in every district, but if I look at districts one in five, there's no permanent supportive housing been built. There's nothing permitted, there's nothing in the pipeline. And district seven in my district where I've been for seven years, which is North of the aid, we've put in over 170 permanent supportive housing. We have stuff in the pipeline, stuff that's permitted. It needs to be in every district because it's a citywide problem that needs to be addressed on a citywide level. That was city Councilman Scott Sherman, who's running for San Diego mayor. The Chula Vista elementary school district is proposing to raise property taxes to help subsidize housing for teachers and staff. KPBS education reporter Joe Hong explains how the bond measure would work and how other districts across the state have tried to cover living costs for their employees. Across California, school boards and superintendents are lamenting the lack of funding from the state, declining enrollment, rising pension costs, and more students receiving special education services have tightened budgets statewide and this housing costs continue to rise in California. One school district could be the first in San Diego County to house its employees. True. Avista elementary school district is asking voters to raise local property taxes to build a 100 unit affordable housing complex and subsidized rent for teachers and staff. Oscar ask avail oversees the district's finances. He said a school bond could help the district recruit and keep employees. It's, it's a result of this survey but also a result of the school districts need to um, incentivize coming to children's to elementary school district for those positions that we have a difficult time hiring. For example, special education, English language learners, measure M on the March ballot. The district is proposing a $300 million bond. Most of it would go to school repairs and modernization, but $65 million would go to affordable housing units for teachers and staff. Escoval said investing in these facilities is an investment in students. They are important. I've been here for almost 20 years now and we were one of the first school districts who have completely air conditioned all our schools classrooms. So it was a priority to make sure students are comfortable in a learning environment. Chula Vista elementary school district employees, more than 2,500 teachers and staff teacher salaries range from about $50,000 to just over a hundred thousand dollars a year. Susan skull is the president of the teacher's union that Chula Vista elementary school district. She said the union supports the bond over all, but it has concerns about district employees living in the same housing complex, you know, I mean here we are, we're good friends and then all of a sudden maybe I'm up late at night playing my music too loud and then you know that goes to work with me or you know, it's another issue with another employee at a different site and I just see potential for complications. The bond measure would raise property taxes by up to $30 for every a hundred thousand dollars of property value. The San Diego County taxpayers association, which reviews school bonds throughout the County did not endorse the measure. Telly Baton is the director of policy at the association. She said the teacher housing component was the only thing holding me association back from endorsement. She said the district didn't provide enough details on how the money would be spent and how the housing complex would be maintained. When we look at bonds, we, if a district isn't specific on how they're going to use it, we tend to not support those because we want the voters to be aware and you know, be educated on exactly how those funds are going to be spent. But Chulavista isn't the first district in California to tackle affordable housing with a bond. Jefferson union high school district, just South of San Francisco is breaking ground this week on their employee housing unit, which is being funded with a bond measure that passed in 2018 school board president Kalema Salahudin said that 122 unit housing complex will help. But she called it a bandaid to the problem of recruiting and keeping teachers. She said the state needs to take education funding seriously for a more permanent solution. I didn't run for school board and become a housing developer, you know, that was never my intention or goal. Um, and to me it's just a reflection of where we are in the state. When it comes to education that school boards are looking to have to do this. In order to keep the staff that we need to educate our students needs 55% of the votes to pass Chula Vista voters decide on March 3rd Joe Hong KPBS news. That's it for San Diego news matters today. Consider supporting this podcast by becoming a KPBS member today. Just go to kpbs.org/membership.

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Think-tank economist says if people don’t have to spend on gas they’ll spend money elsewhere, giving the economy a boost. Plus, neighbors of San Diego’s Miramar airfield aren’t crazy about the Marines’ new F-35 fighter jet. And Republican Scott Sherman tells us why he wants to be the next San Diego mayor.