Advocates react to proposed Medi-Cal changes

Good Morning, I’m Debbie Cruz….it’s Friday May 16th.

Local immigrants are reacting to proposed Medi-Cal changes for undocumented residents.More on that next. But first... let’s do the headlines.

Freeway drivers will find a significant closure this weekend in San Diego.

All eastbound lanes of State Route 52 will be shut down in Kearny Mesa starting at 9 tonight.

The 3-mile stretch between the 805 and 163 interchanges will reopen at 5 a-m Monday morning.

Detour signs will redirect traffic.

Caltrans says the closure is due to scheduled roadwork.

After more than two decades of planning... the centerpiece of Chula Vista's bayfront redevelopment project is celebrating its grand opening this week.

The Gaylord Pacific is a 1-Point-3 billion dollar resort & convention center that's expected to generate 475-million dollars a year for the local economy.

Pete Borum is the Gaylord Pacific marketing and p-r director.

“Expect a larger-than-life experience. Whatever you think of when you think of a hotel, this is bigger. It's bolder. It has a lot more interesting components to it.”

Those components include 16- hundred hotel rooms … 12 bars and restaurants … and a water park with a view of San Diego Bay.

The resort is part of a 535-acre redevelopment project led by the Port of San Diego and the city of Chula Vista.

Thousands of music fans are expected to attend the Wonderfront Music and Arts Festival this weekend.

Organizers say more than 80 acts will perform on 7 stages located in downtown San Diego along the Embarcadero.

The event begins at Noon and runs until 10 p-m Friday, Saturday and Sunday.One way to get there is by public transit, with the closest trolley stop at Seaport Village along the green line.

From KPBS, you’re listening to San Diego News Now.Stay with me for more of the local news you need.

Amid the state budget deficit, Governor Gavin Newsom’s new proposal to freeze access to Medi-Cal for immigrants without legal status has advocates worried.

Health reporter Heidi de Marco says they’re warning the move could end up costing more in the long run.

“Entonces para mi sería devastador.”

That’s Blanca. She says losing Medi-Cal would be devastating. 

Blanca is a 64 year old Mexican immigrant.

We’re only using her first name to protect her identity.

Medi-Cal covers her doctor’s visits and medications.

Under Newsom’s proposal, immigrants without legal status already enrolled would have to start paying a $100 monthly premium.

And new applicants could be locked out entirely by 2026.

Mayra Alvarez with The Children’s Partnership says cutting access to preventative care will backfire.

“They're waiting until it is in a more dire situation. They are then using the emergency room…that raises the cost for all of us.”

Laurel Lucia agrees. She’s a researcher at the UC Berkeley Labor Center.

“That when people have Medicaid coverage, they're more likely to use primary and preventive care and less likely to use emergency room services.”

“Pero saliendo de emergencia, ¿cómo yo voy a comprar la medicina que me den en el hospital de emergencia?”

But Blanca says even if she does end up in the emergency room, she won’t be able to afford the medication.

She says without Medi-Cal she’ll have no choice but to rely on home remedies or go without care altogether. 

Heidi de Marco, KPBS News.

Government agencies that fund and regulate drug discoveries, this year announced a broad plan to move away from testing drugs on animals for safety and effectiveness.

Sci-tech reporter Thomas Fudge says San Diego scientists have already taken those steps.

Pradipta Ghosh is a professor of cellular medicine at UCSD who’s founded a research center, dedicated to improving drug discovery by testing with human tissue.

Ghosh says the problem with animal trials and the current system of drug approval is pretty clear. 

“We have a report card that we can’t really ignore. Can we? The report card says we get it nine out of 10 times wrong. That is a drug at least.”

Yes. About 90 percent of drugs under development fail in human clinical trials, the final stage of the approval process.

Those failures can happen after a decade of work and a billion dollar investment.

Alternatives to animal trials include growing organoids, a model organ made from stem cells or testing toxicity in computer models.

But moving human-based testing models comes with challenges. 

 “Cost is high. Skills. Knowledge. Limited to a few labs, still, in the world.” 

Translating results in animal trials to humans is a problem because mice are not people.

Defenders of animal trials say there is still value in testing on a complex living organism.

Thomas Fudge, KPBS News. 

At the Logan Heights library, students of all ages are learning to perform in a mariachi ensemble.

Education reporter Katie Anastas says it’s given a father and daughter a chance to learn new skills and build community.

[music from rehearsal fades in…]

CHAVARIN

I love mariachi because it just comes from your soul, your heart.

Veri Chavarin grew up singing and playing piano. One day, her son’s school sent an email about activities at the Logan Heights Library— including music classes run by the nonprofit Villa Musica.

CHAVARIN

And as I was scrolling through, I saw mariachi and adults were welcome. And so I was like, oh my God, dad, you know, like I called him and I was like, they have this group, it's free. I was like, do you want to join? I don't know what to expect, but let's see what happens.

For her dad, Rosalio, it was a dream come true.

ROSALIO CHAVARIN

Yo, desde chico, mis deseos era tocar en mariachi. Yo buscaba y buscaba ver dónde podía encontrar un grupo que me enseñara… [fade under]

Since he was a kid, he says, his wish was to play mariachi. Now, thanks to the class, he is.

ROSALIO

Mi nombre es Rosalio Chavarin…

Here he is performing at a past recital.

[Rosalio singing, fade out]

VERI CHAVARIN

I really treasure this time with my dad because obviously, you know, we won't be here forever. And so these are things I'm going to really hold dear to my heart.

Villa Musica offers music classes at five libraries across San Diego. They ask each community which instruments they want to learn. At Logan Heights, it was violin and guitar. Fiona Chatwin is the nonprofit’s executive director.

CHATWIN

Five or 6 years after we'd been here, we had enough students playing at a high enough level that they were really interested in doing something together. And I thought, well, a mariachi ensemble sounds like violins or guitars coming together and making music.

Classes are free, and instruments are provided. Andrew Rodriguez teaches the mariachi class for all ages. 

RODRIGUEZ

We have from little kids to older gentlemen and everything in between, both Mexican, Latino and non. So it's the diversity that really makes it special.

Rosalio Chavarin says he looks up to Rodriguez as a role model. He says the group makes him feel like his younger self.

ROSALIO CHAVARIN

Estoy feliz, estoy contento porque yo estoy haciendo lo que yo quiero…

He says he’s happy because he’s doing what he loves.

The mariachi ensemble performs their end-of-the-quarter recital Saturday at 5 p.m. at the City Heights Performance Annex.

[end of song from practice]

Katie Anastas, KPBS News.

The San Diego International Fringe Festival kicks off what it calls 11 days of eyeball bursting shows.

This year, there are 45 shows from local, national and international artists across 8 venues.

Beth Accomando previews the festival with some of the performers.

It’s not often you’ll find Guns for Jesus and Sonnets from Suburbia under the same roof. 

Or a cocktail of Holy Water and Tequila. Or Charlie Chaplin and Mae West rubbing shoulders.

But the San Diego International Fringe Festival has a habit of making strange bedfellows, and that suits the scandalous Mae West just fine.

WENDY WYNAZZ (as Mae West): “I got arrested in 1927. I went to Roosevelt Island for eight days for my play sex. Then they came back again the next for Drag. And that's what attracts me so much to this fringe festival. It's 100% uncensored, which is exactly the way that I like it.”

Performer Wendy Wynazz brings the legendary Hollywood sex symbol to life in her new Fringe show “Mae West Cleans Up Her Act.”

WENDY WYNAZZ (as Mae West): “It’s going to be opening night of the comeback tour, they will be immersed in the process and they will learn about me, Mae West, and they will also go on a bit of a ride.”

Fringe goers can also catch silent clown Charlie Chaplin in a show called Smile where Marcel Cole displays his enchanting physical comedy.

More verbal humor comes from Australian performer Matt Harvey in Wage Against the Machine.

MATT HARVEY: “These stories are all stories about my old dodgy jobs, this thing called Robo debt, which I got a $20,000 unlawful debt from the Australian government.”

Although Harvey is from Australia, the humor is universal. 

MATT HARVEY: “It's interesting to have this, what I call a intercontinental trauma bond over poor government choices.”

SHOW CLIP: Look at Monopoly. The most capitalist game on the planet has a universal basic income. That's guys that have jobs. They're just wander the streets. Every so often someone walks up and be like, You're still alive. $200. Go and have fun.

MATT HARVEY: “To get all Mary Poppins about it, the jokes are the sugar, the spoonful of sugar, and the story is usually the medicine.”

In Do Better, magic provides the sugar in a story about grief, says Izzy Salant.

IZZY SALANT: “Do Better is a one-person comedic drama with magic, or as I'm calling it, a dramagity that explores how we navigate life after unwavering grief. Sometimes the only thing you can do is laugh at the pain and do a card trick, and that's what we're doing.”

Jacqueline Witt is a veteran of multiple San Diego Fringe shows.

This year she directs Alterations.

JACQUELINE WITT: “It is a combination of the way that fashion really molds your lives and the removing of layers, the adding of layers to really create your own style and really express yourself through fashion. We're using circus as a story to tell that.”

Sonnets from Suburbia taps into the Bard for inspiration with unexpectedly modern results.

SONNETS: “Why dost thou tweet when surely thou could call. Thou bastard, too, hath posted on my wall.”

And backstage melodrama fuels Death and murder and poison and scene, a wickedly funny mystery from Riot Productions

CLIP: “David, Katherine, we're at Places. Thank you. Places. Places.”

Sarah LeClair is the artistic director of Riot Productions.

SARAH LECLAIR: “We asked the question about this Wacky: A murder mystery, a perfect crime, which is the longest running show off Broadway that still has a one-star Yelp review. How has it been there for 30 years with the original cast? And because they killed a bunch of people, obviously, and buried their bodies in the wall.”

CLIP: “The thing is that Emily is going a little off the rails. She's method. It's her process. The thing is that she applied She hasn't slept or isn't sleeping or is completely altered from her total lack of sleep, and she's getting a little manic. The thing is that later on, she murders someone on stage, and I'm worried that she'll get murdery in a sense that she actually kills someone on stage.”

SARAH LECLAIR: “It's a silly murder mystery where everyone is trying to keep everything from going off the rails while trying not to murder each other, sometimes successfully, sometimes not.”

If you want to know the final body count, you’ll have to see the show.

This is just a small sample of what San Diego Fringe is offering this year.

So I hope you will accept this invitation to binge on Fringe with me.

Beth Accomando, KPBS News.

The San Diego International Fringe Festival continues through May 25th at multiple venues, with Balboa Park’s Marie Hitchcock Theatre as its home base.

That’s it for the podcast today. You can find more San Diego news online at KPBS dot org. I’m Debbie Cruz. Thanks for listening and have a great weekend.