Encinitas safe parking program expected to close due to funding issues
Good Morning, I’m Lawrence K. Jackson….it’s MONDAY, DECEMBER 8TH>>>> [AN OVERNIGHT SAFE PARKING PROGRAM WILL CLOSE DUE TO A LACK OF FUNDING…]More on that next. But first... the headlines….#######
THE MARINE KILLED LAST WEDNESDAY IN A TACTICAL VEHICLE INCIDENT AT CAMP PENDLETON HAS NOW BEEN IDENTIFIED
PRIVATE 1ST CLASS TANNER RUBIO WAS 21 YEARS OLD AND HAD BEEN IN THE SERVICE LESS THAN A YEAR
RUBIO WAS A RIFLEMAN AT 1ST BATTALION, 1ST MARINE REGIMENT WHO JOINED THE CORPS [CORE] IN JANUARY
IN A STATEMENT THE 1ST MARINE DIVISION SAYS HIS DEATH WEDNESDAY OCCURRED DURING TRAINING UNRELATED TO THE ONGOING EXERCISE STEEL KNIGHT AT THE BASE.
THE MARINES AREN’T SAYING WHAT TYPE OF VEHICLE WAS INVOLVED OR THE NATURE OF THE INCIDENT CITING AN ONGOING INVESTIGATION.
TACTICAL VEHICLES ARE HEAVY WITH HIGH CENTERS OF GRAVITY MAKING THEM PRONE TO ROLLOVERS.
MORE THAN 100 TROOPS ACROSS THE MILITARY HAVE BEEN KILLED IN TACTICAL VEHICLE CRASHES SINCE 2010.
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POWAY WESTVIEW HIGH SCHOOL SENIOR LEANNE FAN HAS BEEN CHOSEN AS AN ALTERNATE TO SERVE AS AN HONORARY REPRESENTATIVE FOR THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
THIS IS ALL PART OF THE 64TH ANNUAL UNITED STATES SENATE YOUTH PROGRAM
BEING CHOSEN IS CONSIDERED A HUGE HONOR AS STUDENTS ARE NOMINATED BY THEIR SCHOOL’S PRINCIPAL
THE PROGRAMS WEBSITE SAYS STUDENTS CHOSEN WILL GET A CLOSER LOOK INTO THE U-S SENATE AND FEDERAL GOVERNMENT
THE PROGRAM’S GOAL/ TO PROVIDE ENCOURAGEMENT FOR THOSE CONSIDERING A FUTURE IN PUBLIC SERVICE
ALL STUDENTS CHOSEN WILL BE RECOGNIZED DURING A MEETING IN JANUARY
STUDENT LEADERS EACH RECEIVE A 10 THOUSAND DOLLAR UNDERGRADUATE SCHOLARSHIP AND AN ALL-EXPENSES-PAID TRIP TO WASHINGTON DC
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BAT CONSERVATION IS TAKING A STEP FORWARD IN SAN DIEGO
THE SAN DIEGO HUMANE SOCIETY RECENTLY SHARED NEWS OF SUCCESSFULLY REHABILITATING AND NOW RELEASING A HOARY BAT
THE DIFFERENCE WITH THIS RELEASE IS THAT, FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER, THAT BAT IS EQUIPPED WITH A MOTUS TRACKING DEVICE
BASICALLY, ITS BAT G-P-S
THE NEWS MARKS THE FIRST TIME A HOARY BAT HAS BEEN OUTFITTED WITH THE TECHNOLOGY IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
AND WITH A WILDLIFE TRACKING TOWER LOCATED NEARBY, RESEARCHERS HOPE TO GET VALUABLE INFO ABOUT WHERE THE BAT IS HEADING NEXT
THE HUMANE SOCIETY SAYS HOARY BATS ARE KNOWN FOR THEIR LONG-DISTANCE MIGRATION
DUE TO THIS, THEIR HABITATS AND SEASONAL MOVEMENTS ARE LESS UNDERSTOOD
THE ADULT MALE BAT WAS RESCUED DURING A STORM ON NOVEMBER 14TH AND THEN RELEASED IN CARLSBAD LAST SUNDAY
From KPBS, you’re listening to San Diego News Now.Stay with me for more of the local news you need.
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THE SAFE PARKING PROGRAM IN ENCINITAS IS ENDING.
JEWISH FAMILY SERVICE RUNS THE PROGRAM AND SAYS IT WILL CLOSE AT THE END OF THE MONTH.
NORTH COUNTY REPORTER ALEXANDER NGUYEN LOOKS INTO WHY.
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ENCSAFEPARKING 1 trt: 0:52 soq
NATS car/nature sound
The Safe Parking Program is operated at the Encinitas Community and Senior Center lot.
It has spaces for up to 25 cars each night … serving people who live in their cars.
“I feel bad for them because they need a place to go.”
Gregg Trachtenberg lives around the corner from the lot and plays basketball at the community center every day.
He’s sad the program is ending.
GREGG TRACHTENBERG // ENCINITAS RESIDENT
“I don't know if it's a money thing, but, I thought it was reallyworking pretty well. It's been here for a couple of years.”
Encinitas Mayor Bruce Ehlers says it **was** a money thing.
The city had offered to fund the program for a six-month extension … Jewish Family Service says that wasn’t sustainable.
The agency had asked the city for a one-year contract costing 610-thousand dollars.
According to J-F-S … in October … 17 people used the lot. The only other safe parking program in North County is in Vista. That is also operated by J-F-S.
AN/KPBS
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A RECALL PETITION TARGETING A GROSSMONT UNION HIGH SCHOOL DISTRICT BOARD TRUSTEE FAILED TO GET ENOUGH SIGNATURES.
EAST COUNTY REPORTER ELAINE ALFARO SAYS THE RECALL EFFORT WAS A MOVE AGAINST THE BOARD’S CONSERVATIVE MAJORITY.
RECALLFAIL 1 (1:07) SOQ
Critics of the four-member board majority were hoping to oust Trustee Scott Eckert in a special election … but didn’t gather enough signatures before last month’s deadline.
Eckert and other members of the majority have drawn fire for eliminating librarian positions and advocating for controversial school prayer and protest policies.
Laura Preble is a recall leader and a retired librarian.
Laura Preble SOT
“We feel very strongly that these people are not there in the best interests of students or teachers or community members.”
Eckert declined an interview request and sent an emailed statement.
QUOTE “Since taking office, my full attention has been on the work I was elected to do: raising graduation rates, promoting safety and ensuring East County taxpayers’ dollars are wisely invested to create opportunities for all students to thrive. ” END QUOTE
Stephanie Macceca is vice president of the teachers union. She says opponents of the board majority are now focused on next year’s elections.
Stephanie Macceca SOT
“We've started way earlier than we normally do for an election cycle this year. ”
Three of the board’s five seats are up for election next year.
Elaine Alfaro, KPBS News.
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SAN DIEGO’S MIDWAY RISING PROJECT WAS DELAYED ONCE AGAIN IN RECENT WEEKS…EXTENDING THE TIMELINE ON THE 4 BILLION DOLLAR DEVELOPMENT NORTH OF THE SAN DIEGO INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT.
PUBLIC MATTERS REPORTER JAKE GOTTA HAS THE STORY OF HOW WE GOT HERE, AND WHAT’S NEXT.
MIDWAY (jg) (4:14) SOQ
The San Diego sports arena, now called pechanga arena, is surrounded by a big, mostly empty parking lot.
Cars fly by on the freeway on one side, and along sports arena boulevard on the other
And the rest of the area is filled with warehouses, auto body shops, and big box stores with more huge parking lots.
Midway rising, a major housing development, aims to revitalize this area. It’s a key piece of mayor todd gloria’s plan to boost housing production—especially affordable housing. Here’s gloria speaking at a recent press conference.
“it will be the largest affordable housing project in California history. And we are proud but not surprised that that's happening right here in San Diego.”
But it’s been in the works for years now, and was recently pushed back again by a court ruling.
The issue is a coastal height limit that was approved by voters in 1972. It prohibits buildings taller than 30 feet.
The city rezoned the entire midway area in 2018 to allow ten thousand new homes, and did the review required by the California environmental quality act, or ceqa.
But the city also wanted to exempt the area from the height limit to facilitate projects like midway rising. Here’s what councilmember jen campbell told kpbs in 2020.
"It can become an area not only for a new sports or entertainment arena, but also a vibrant transportation, residential, commercial, recreational and employment area."
The city put forward a ballot measure in 2020 to remove the height restriction, and a majority of San Diego voters approved it.
But not area resident john mcnab. He leads a small organization called save our access that challenged the height limit exemption in court.
“save our access filed this- this lawsuit because of the severe impacts that this project would have on San Diego.”
The lawsuit claimed the city’s initial environmental report didn’t study the potential impacts of tall buildings. The courts agreed.
So the city went and studied the impact of tall buildings. Voters re-approved the measure in 2022.
And save our access sued again, saying the city essentially had to redo the whole environmental report to include tall buildings. The courts once again agreed.
Over the sound of cars on the highway, mcnab says his primary concern is traffic from midway rising.
“you put 150,000 to 200,000 people here. You freeze the freeways, the north-south corridor people take every day.”
The development team says they are working with the city and transit agencies to reduce reliance on cars for the project. That includes building things like bike lanes and walking paths.
Mcnab isn’t convinced.
“you're going to jam and cram all these people in here. What are the impacts to the quality of life of everybody?”
Mcnab said he wouldn’t support midway rising even if it was built below 30 feet.
Uc davis law professor chris elmendorf said the city believed its first environmental report was sufficient…and argues the courts should have deferred to that analysis.
“that's the only way that ceqa can be implemented in a manner that allows, like, a modicum of predictability for the city,”
Elmendorf says the state legislature has passed laws in recent years to minimize what he calls ceqa abuse.
“for the court just to say none of that has any bearing on whether we interpret ceqa in a way that allows one rando who doesn't like dense housing to hold it up for a decade – that’s insane.”
But former San Diego planning director bill fulton said the courts probably ruled how they did because the issue was a ballot measure.
“the judge made that point very, very clear that particularly in the case of a ballot measure, the public needed to know all of the potential environmental impacts, not just those that had been previously discussed,”
Mayor gloria says the city is going to appeal the decision to the California supreme court. Legal experts say that case could make it easier or harder for cities to fulfill ceqa’s requirements.
But the midway rising project has another tool it may use to exceed the 30 foot height limit regardless. The development team said the state’s density bonus law lets them build higher that threshold because the project includes affordable housing.
The timeline on midway rising, , has been extended even further, as the city and the developers re-evaulate their path forward.
Jake gotta, kpbs news
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LAST NOVEMBER, A TIKTOK VIDEO MADE MARIGOLD BAGELS SO POPULAR THAT THE BUSINESS HAD TO MOVE UP PLANS TO EXPAND FROM A BOOTH AT A FARMER’S MARKET TO AN ACTUAL STOREFRONT.
ARTS REPORTER BETH ACCOMANDO SAYS A YEAR LATER, MARIGOLD BAGELS IS FINALLY OPEN AT ITS NEW NORTH PARK HOME.
MARIGOLD 2 (ba) 1:07 SOQ
Mike Rabinowitz is an organic chemist by training. But he decided to retire to try his hand at making authentic New York bagels. Now he is taking the next step and opening a storefront in North Park.
MIKE RABINOWITZ But it's terrifying. I've never done this before. This is a whole new industry to me. But I actually surrounded myself with really good people… So it's a little less terrifying.
He signed the lease for the El Cajon Blvd location last December.
MIKE RABINOWITZ I love North Park. It's a great location, surrounded by great stores, fun mom and pop places, just have a great vibe.
Having his own place rather than renting a ghost kitchen means less hassle and more bagels for customers.
MIKE RABINOWITZ And so this will allow us as many as many people as we can hire, as big of a mixer as we can buy. We had to set numbers. So how do you know how many people are going to show up the first day? How many? You know what your demand is going to be? We had to guess. So we guessed at 750 bagels.
That may not be enough for a city that has been without Marigold Bagels for months. But at least now there will be a steady supply of its New York style bagels.
Beth Accomando, KPBS News.
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ALRIGHT SDNN LISTENERS, TODAY IS YET ANOTHER EPISODE OF THE ‘THE POD BEHIND THE PKG’!
ONCE PER WEEK, I’LL BRING IN A REPORTER, ANCHOR OR VIDEO JOURNALIST FOR A BEHIND-THE-SCENES, DEEP DIVE AND INFORMAL CHAT.
JOINING ME THIS WEEK IS NORTH COUNTY REPORTER ALEXANDER NGUYEN ON HIS STORY ON OUR SITE UNDER THE HEADLINE “CARLSBAD MOVES FORWARD ON BANNING E-BIKES FOR KIDS 12 AND UNDER.” NGUYEN AND I ARE BOTH GRADUATES OF SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY
(0:00) Yeah, Alexander Wen, my brother and alumni is here. Talk to me a little bit, A Wen, about the impact SI Newhouse for public communications had on you and your career. (0:10) I mean, Newhouse is how I got here, because previously that I didn't.
My undergrad was not in communication. I was in theater and philosophy with a little minor in journalism, but, and then I felt like I was getting stuck in my career. (0:25) So Newhouse is when I went to get my Masters and I threw that.
I got a job at NBC and then I got that got me here. So got you absolutely transitioning now to your piece on Carl's bad banning eBikes for kids 12 and under. (0:42) According to the city data, right? Since 2022, there have been nine eBike crashes for kids 12 and under in Carlsbad.
You spoke with Skyler, one of the voices in your story, who saw a crash firsthand. Is this something that he said he sees often or did he reference just that one crash? (0:56) Skyler does see these kids doing dangerous things, you know, going down the street in Carlsbad Village. So it is something that happens a lot for him to reference it.
(1:08) And yeah, he says, you know, my kids will never ever ride an eBike because of what he sees. (1:14) Yeah, and you know, eBikes are interesting to me right now because I don't know if you can remember like me a few years back. You remember when hoverboards were getting popular? (1:21) Yeah.
And we all thought we were the Jetsons and we were like, oh, man, the car is old news. I'm just going to hoverboard everywhere. (1:27) And then the accidents started happening and then they were immediately illegal and then the fines came in.
It seems like eBikes now are that topic, right? (1:37) Where people are seeing underage kids out of control going against cars and they want to stop it, right? (1:42) Yeah. And I mean, when we talk about eBikes for people who are not familiar, they're not your typical, you know, you know, pedal bikes of old because you remember as a kid that's the best Christmas kids you can get is that bicycle. (1:55) Nothing better.
But these bikes can go up to 20 miles an hour and for class three bikes, they could go up to 45 miles per hour, which by the way is illegal for kids under 16 to drive those class three eBikes anyway. (2:09) So these eBikes are just not the typical pedal bikes that parents got when they were kids. So I think a lot of parents don't realize how fast they go.
(2:20) But it's also how people in North County get around because Carlsbad is so spread out and other parts of North County is that if you want to see your friends who lives maybe a mile or two away, you need to get on an eBike. (2:33) You can't just, you know, pedal like a mile away because these streets are wide and they're farther away than your typical just neighborhood going from one person's house and the suburbs to another. (2:44) Do they see these eBikes as almost a way of their freedom being taken away? Like they see it like, hey, this is just how I get around Carlsbad.
(2:52) I'm not really trying to get into an accident. I just want to get to my friend's house. When you talk to people in Carlsbad who were for it, you know, you talked about the 550 people submitted comments supporting the ban.
(3:02) But maybe for those 25 to 50 people, whatever the majority, the minority amount of people, when they said they were for keeping it, what was their defense? Was that part of their defense saying, hey, my kid needs to get over to his friend's house. (3:14) It's a mile and a half away. I can't drive him there and back.
This is what his eBikes for. (3:18) Yeah, and that's what the city council, a lot of them do have younger kids in that age range and they say, well, I can't drive them all around. (3:26) And these kids needs to go from school back home.
These kids needs to go to visit their friends. These kids needs to go to, you know, soccer practice, after school sports, stuff like that. (3:36) So they are not interested in banning bikes at all.
But if you're under 12 years old, maybe these are not for you, maybe possibly a pedal bike as a start. (3:47) But eBikes, let's make them 12 and older. And again, this is a pilot program by state law.
So it's only in San Diego County. So it's not statewide. (3:57) And a lot of cities in San Diego are starting to adopt it.
(4:01) So the difference really is that motor when you talk and you can you go over the different types of bands. (4:06) Alright, so the proposed ordinance includes like banning anybody from 12 and under from riding an eBike. And then anybody's 12 and under cannot have passengers with them riding that eBikes.
(4:20) And then for eBikes type three, it's already illegal for anyone 16 and under from riding those bikes. So they're also looking at an ordinance to see if they can ban anybody from 16 and under from riding a class two eBikes. (4:34) And that is something that came out of Marine County.
So they're looking into it. They may not be able to legally. So we'll see.
(4:41) And talk to me one last time, Alexander one, a little bit about the education impact where for a lot of these places that they put these restrictions or these bands in place. (4:51) There is usually a grace period of time where they're going to pull somebody over and they're going to say, Hey, stop speeding on your eBike. No more wheelies.
(4:58) And then they give them a warning or or some sort of educational impact versus just instantly finding. Is that correct? (5:06) Yeah. So that is one of the things that Carlsbad is proposing is that, you know, there is a grace period of I believe 60 days before you can take it.
(5:17) And then within the first six months, you know, that ticket could go away if they attend a safety class on eBike safety. (5:26) So that is some of the things that the city is discussing. And I think that will make it into the final ordinance once they ride it and vote on it.
(5:36) All right. We will wait and see on what's next as far as any eBikes and Carlsbad. Thank you, Alexander one with us on pod behind the package.
Thank you.
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That’s it for the podcast today. As always you can find more San Diego news online at KPBS dot org. I’m Lawrence K. Jackson. Thanks for listening and subscribing by doing so you are supporting public media and I thank you for that. Have a great day!
