Hundreds of San Diego federal workers go without pay during partial shutdown
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Good Morning, I’m Lawrence K. Jackson … it’s TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 17TH
>>>> [ A PARTIAL GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN BEGAN THIS PAST WEEKEND]More on what that means for San Diego next. But first... the headlines….#######
SAN DIEGO’S SHELTER PROGRAM FOR THOSE EXPERIENCING HOMELESSNESS DURING BIG STORMS IS NOW IN EFFECT
NUMEROUS SHELTERS ACROSS THE COUNTY ARE NOW ACTIVATED
FATHER JOE'S VILLAGES AND LIVING WATER CHURCH OF THE NAZARENE OFFER MULTIPLE SHELTER OPTIONS FOR ADULTS AND FAMILIES
BEDS WILL OPEN UP ON A PER-NIGHT BASIS WITH CHECK-IN AND OUT
TIMES VARYING BY LOCATION. GENERALLY THOSE BEDS MUST BE VACATED THE FOLLOWING MORNING
THE PROGRAM PROVIDES THIS ADDITIONAL SHELTER DURING SEVERE WEATHER FOR SAN DIEGANS IN NEED
IT GOES INTO EFFECT WHEN TEMPERATURES ARE 50 DEGREES OR LOWER AND THERE IS AT LEAST A FORTY-PERCENT CHANCE OF RAIN
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ANOTHER IMPACT OF THE INCLEMENT WEATHER: A
HIGH SURF ADVISORY FOR SAN DIEGO BEACHES
THE ADVISORY IS IN EFFECT RIGHT NOW, AND GOES UNTIL
10 P-M THIS FRIDAY
BREAKING WAVES RANGING FROM 6 TO TEN FEET WITH SETS AS HIGH AS 12-FEET ARE ANTICIPATED
THERE IS EXPECTED TO BE SOME COASTAL FLOODING AS WELL AS SOME TIDAL OVERFLOW INTO PARKING LOTS AND BOARDWALKS
THE SURF IS EXPECTED TO PEAK ON WEDNESDAY
AUTHORITIES ARE ASKING INEXPERIENCED SWIMMERS AND SURFERS TO STAY OUT OF THE WATER DUE TO THESE DANGEROUS CONDITIONS AND TO HEED THE ADVICE OF LIFEGUARDS AND BEACH PATROL SIGNS
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THE COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE IS INVITING MEMBERS OF THE
COMMUNITY TO GIVE FEEDBACK ON FUTURE PLANS TO MODERNIZE THE VISTA DETENTION FACILITY
THE SAN DIEGO COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE SAYS THIS IS AN
OPPORTUNITY TO BETTER UNDERSTAND THE PLANNING PROCESS THAT'S CURRENTLY IN PLACE
THE OFFICE SAYS YOU CAN PROVIDE INPUT BEFORE DECISIONS ARE MADE ALSO ADDING THAT THE FACILITY IS IN DIRE NEED OF REPLACEMENT
THE FORUM WILL TAKE PLACE AT 6 P-M IN THE MORRIS B VANCE COMMUNITY ROOM WHICH IS INSIDE VISTA'S CITY HALL COMPLEX ON CIVIC CENTER DRIVE
QUESTION OR ACCOMMODATIONS CAN BE EMAILED TO COMMUNITY AT S-D SHERIFF DOT GOV
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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HUNDREDS OF FEDERAL WORKERS IN SAN DIEGO ARE AGAIN WORKING WITHOUT PAY.
A PARTIAL GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN BEGAN SATURDAY AFTER LAWMAKERS FAILED TO AGREE ON A FUNDING DEAL FOR THE DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY.
REPORTER ANDREW DYER SAYS THIS SHUTDOWN IS OVER ONE ISSUE – IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT.
SHUTDOWN 1 (AD) (:55) SOQ
AFTER TWO FATAL SHOOTINGS BY IMMIGRATION AGENTS LAST MONTH DEMOCRATS SAY THEY WON’T FUND THE DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY WITHOUT MORE OVERSIGHT OF IMMIGRATION AGENTS.
THEY WANT BODY CAMERAS MADE MANDATORY AND FOR AGENTS TO STOP WEARING MASKS.
REPUBLICANS SAY THE MASKS PROTECT AGENTS, SOME OF WHOM THEY SAY HAVE BEEN SUBJECT TO DOXING AND HARASSMENT.
BUT D-H-S IS ALSO THE COAST GUARD, THE SECRET SERVICE AND THE TRANSPORTATION SAFETY ADMINISTRATION. THOSE WORKERS ARE ALL DEEMED ESSENTIAL BY THE GOVERNMENT AND REQUIRED TO WORK WHILE PAYROLL IS FROZEN.
ROBERT MACK REPRESENTS T-S-A UNION WORKERS IN SAN DIEGO. HE TOLD KPBS MEDIA PARTNER 10 NEWS HE HOPES THIS PARTIAL SHUTDOWN IS OVER QUICKLY.
RM: (:09) WE CURRENTLY JUST GOT OUR PAYCHECK, OUR LAST PAYCHECK. SO HOPEFULLY IT'LL BE TAKEN CARE OF WITHIN THE NEXT WEEK OR SO.
FUNDING FROM THIS SUMMER’S BIG BEAUTIFUL BILL IS KEEPING IMMIGRATION OPERATIONS GOING BUT NOT DEPARTMENT PAYROLLS.
ANDREW DYER, KPBS NEWS
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IT’S BEEN ALMOST A YEAR SINCE ICE AGENTS BEGAN ARRESTING PEOPLE AT THEIR IMMIGRATION COURT HEARINGS AND VOLUNTEERS BEGAN DOCUMENTING THEIR ACTIONS.
REPORTER GUSTAVO SOLIS SAYS THE ADVOCATES REMAIN COMMITTED, DESPITE THE INCREASING FEAR AND TENSION FROM PRESIDENT TRUMP'S DEPORTATION CAMPAIGN.
ICEWATCHERS PT 1 (gs) 4:29 SOQ
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Each shift begins with a prayer.
IMG_5743 00:00:02:13“God here we are today grateful to be servants of love and compassion. Grateful to be your witness…
That’s Reverend Kathleen Ownes – a retired minister.
ContMay you open our hearts so that we may stay with – side by side with those who are checking in, who have hearings, who are afraid…
She’s one of dozens of volunteers observing immigration court in San Diego. .
The group meets regularly outside the downtown federal courthouse. They introduce themselves to immigrants going through the process, offer prayers and resources and document any arrests. They do not obstruct or even touch law enforcement officers.
Rev. Owens says there’ve been some encounters she’ll never forget. Like the family with a newborn child Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE agents arrested last year.
IMG_1993 00:00:15:23“Saying prayers offering a peaceful presence, when the room door to the interview room opened and the father pushing the stroller rushed out…”
She saw a masked ICE agent walk to the elevators and hold the door open. Waiting for someone to come out.
IMG_1993 00:00:51:08“this young woman in handcuffs crying is led from that interview room across the hall into the elevator.”
It happened so quickly that Ownes didn’t get a chance to approach the family.
IMG_1993 00:01:11:42“And the hardest part is we don’t know her name. we don’t know what happened and it lives with me that baby crying as dad was pushing that baby down the hall and the woman crying as she was led away.”
Last Spring, San Diego was among the first cities nationwide where ICE agents began arresting people at their immigration court hearings. Within days, these volunteers were showing up to offer help and support. They captured some of the first courthouse arrests on video. Showing masked ICE agents lining up the courthouse hallway detaining people as they left their courtrooms.
Despite all the rhetoric from the Trump administration, the vast majority of people arrested at immigration court do not have violent criminal records. They are, in fact, following the law … showing up to their court hearings … honoring their scheduled check-ins with ICE …attending their Green Card interviews.
Rev. Paige Blair-Hubert is another volunteer.
IMG_5736 00:04:23:12“The general public doesn’t realize how sweeping this immigration enforcement has been and the impact on people has been – particularly folks who are doing things by the book
Meanwhile, she says ICE has taken steps to block volunteers from seeing what’s actually happening.
They are no longer allowed to film in the courthouse hallway … breaking a long-held norm in public buildings. Signs prohibit loitering. Immigration judges are barring entry to their courtrooms.
The crackdowns coincide with increasingly aggressive rhetoric coming from the White House. That portrays volunteers and observers as outside agitators or even domestic terrorists.
Blaier-Hewbert says volunteers feel that tension here in San Diego.
IMG_5736 00:05:30:03“We know who we are. We are citizens we know we are clergy and lay people who are here called by God to be love in this place. And we pray for everyone in this building.
All of this has taken a toll on the volunteers. One volunteer, Mary, asked KPBS not to share her last name.
IMG_2006 00:05:59:06“It’s very scary for us.
She says some volunteers have stopped coming – they’re afraid of being harassed by security or arrested by ICE.
If the situation weren’t so tense, Mary says she would laugh at the thought of her fellow volunteers being labeled domestic-terrorists. Most of them are retired women who go to church every Sunday.
IMG_2006 00:08:55:51“The people that are here are amazing – that volunteer for this work. We see the injustice and the pain and the suffering – unnecessary suffering that is happening and we can’t sit at home and watch it unfold.”
Mary says they are people who feel called by God to be a witness and help those in need.
Gustavo Solis, KPBS News
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ENROLLMENT IS GOING DOWN AT SCHOOLS ACROSS SAN DIEGO COUNTY AS WE’VE PREVIOUSLY REPORTED. BUT FOR THIS WEEK’S WHY IT MATTERS SEGMENT, VOICE OF SAN DIEGO’S SCOTT LEWIS EXPLAINS HOW HARD IT HAS BEEN TO FIND OUT HOW MANY STUDENTS ARE CURRENTLY ENROLLED IN SAN DIEGO’S LARGEST DISTRICT.
SCHOOLS 1 (vosd) 01:16 SOQ why it matters
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We requested demographic reports from San Diego Unified School District that may shed light on how many kids each school had versus how many it could fit.
District officials denied they had any analysis like that. Even the district’s superintendent was getting nowhere when she asked her own staff for the data.
Finally our reporter Jakob McWhinney obtained a report from the 2024-2025 school year. And it’s a bit alarming. The district may be “underutilizing” 47 percent of its schools. About 16 percent of schools – a total of 27 schools – are less than half full.
These are scary numbers because they point to very difficult decisions in coming years. Few discussions are more controversial for a community than ones about closing schools.
But at this rate, they may become unavoidable.
Unfortunately, this may be the last report of its kind that we get.
The district no longer has a full time demographer on staff to map and project changes in populations. Other layoffs have left it unable to provide this kind of data even to Superintendent Fabiola Bagula who told us she’s been asking for it with no response.
Those cuts came from major budget deficits the district has had to close. And those deficits are fueled in part by declines in enrollment.
For Voice of San Diego, I’m Scott Lewis and that’s why it matters.
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THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT’S DECISION LAST WEEK TO END REGULATION OF GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS IS PERSONAL TO SCIENTISTS IN SAN DIEGO.
THAT’S BECAUSE ONE OF THE SCIENTIFIC FOUNDATIONS OF THAT POLICY IS ROOTED IN DECADES OF LOCAL RESEARCH.
ENVIRONMENT REPORTER TAMMY MURGA HAS MORE ON THE KEELING CURVE.
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You may not know it by name but the Keeling Curve is iconic in scientific circles.
ENDANGERMENT 00:12
“For decades here, starting with my father, we've been tracking the buildup of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere through measurements around the world. But most notably in Hawaii on Mauna Loa.”
That’s Ralph Keeling. He’s the director of the CO2 program at Scripps Institution of Oceanography.
He recognized at a young age that the work his father Charles David Keeling, began was important.
ENDANGERMENT 00:
“The Keeling Curve was really the first clear evidence of human impacts at that scale of the global climate. And so it was the alarm bell that went off. But it's also the pulse of the planet. We're seeing what's going on. It is our it is our bottom line. So bending the curve means bending the Keeling curve.”
That curve links carbon dioxide levels increasing at a much faster rate to fossil fuel burning, a primary driver of global warming.
The Keeling Curve has been foundational to the policy that enabled the federal government to regulate those emissions under the Clean Air Act.
ENDANGERMENT 00:07
“Now the endangerment finding is hereby eliminated, as well as all greenhouse gas emission standards that followed.”
Lee Zeldin heads the Environmental Protection Agency, or EPA. Last week, he said the policy known as the endangerment finding led to too much red tape for automakers.
ENDANGERMENT 00:07
“Manufacturers will no longer be burdened by measuring, compiling, or reporting greenhouse gas emissions for vehicles and engines.”
He argues that the Clean Air Act is meant for regulating pollutants that linger in the air people breathe, like smog. And it doesn’t give the EPA the authority to regulate greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide that stick around in the atmosphere.
But Keeling says those greenhouse gas pollutants create health harms too.
ENDANGERMENT 00:
“To me, a pollutant is something that we are putting out there that we didn't need to put out there. That's changing the environment in a way that's that that's harmful. And CO2 checks that box pretty easily.”
Keeling worries about what the government ending its obligation to regulate these emissions will mean for our future.
ENDANGERMENT 00:11
“CO2 is not going down, CO2 is going up. It's going up faster than ever.
ENDANGERMENT 00:09
“We're burning fossil fuels and it's simply building up. We're taking carbon that was in the ground in the form of fossil fuels. We're burning it and we're flooding the zone.”
And that, he says, has already led to wildfires, sea-level rise, flooding and heatwaves. And that has had an impact on energy bills, emergency room visits and insurance premiums.
Keeling says he worries about the country losing momentum in curbing planet warming emissions.
ENDANGERMENT 00:09
“If we care about our own well-being, we have to lead the world. And so the signals we give to other countries about how to behave are as important as anything we do domestically.”
If his father were here today, Keeling says he would say the same thing.
ENDANGERMENT 00:09
“We have to get fossil fuel burning under control, and these actions don't help. And then we have to lead the world in the crusade to reduce dependence on fossil fuels. Our country needs to do that badly.”
The state of California and environmental groups, like the Sierra Club, are vowing to challenge the EPA in court. Tammy Murga, KPBS News
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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 have a great day.
