Morning Report: Chula Vista Mayor’s Race Challenger
EM - News Moderator 
A controversial school board trustee in Chula Vista wants to unseat the sitting Republican mayor.
As a naturalized citizen from Mexico, Francisco Tamayo said fear among the Latino-majority community due to the increased presence of Immigration and Customs Enforcement is widespread. And Tamayo said Mayor John McCann isn’t doing anything about it.
Tamayo is the lone challenger attempting to flip the seat for Democrats. But as our Jim Hinch reports, he’s not without baggage.
“A recent series of controversies has shadowed Tamayo’s years in public service,” writes Hinch.
A former district administrator previously accused Tamayo of pressuring him to award contracts to a particular construction company. (Tamayo denies this.) The San Diego Democratic Party also came close to censuring Tamayo last year.
His critics are pretty blunt.
“With all the scandals in that man’s past, he thinks he can walk through life completely unscathed and the citizens of Chula Vista are stupid enough not to pay attention to it,” said Laurie Humphrey, a Democrat who served on the school board with Tamayo from 2016 to 2020.
City Reaches Settlement with Former Homelessness Official
The city settled a lawsuit with the former deputy of its homelessness strategies department after he alleged racial discrimination and wrongful termination.
The ex-homelessness official, James Carter, left city hall in September 2023. He alleged that city officials didn’t pay him equitably and passed him over for multiple promotions. He also submitted a complaint regarding racially insensitive remarks made by his former boss.
The City Council approved a $290,000 pay out to Carter on Tuesday to come out of the city’s public liability fund.
National School District Hires Insider as New Superintendent
The National School District in National City on Monday selected Assistant Superintendent for Educational Services Dr. Laura Philyaw as the district’s new superintendent.
The district’s former superintendent, Leighangela Brady, announced last year she plans to retire this June.
The district educates students in some of San Diego County’s lowest income communities. It has won awards for environmental stewardship, but experienced declining test scores in recent years.
District Trustee Alma Sarmiento said school board members selected Philyaw from a pool of 21 applicants because she has worked on curriculum changes intended to raise test scores since arriving at the district last year from the Escondido Unified School District.
“We’re very impressed with her progress,” Sarmiento said.
In Other News
- Immigration arrests in San Diego have decreased the first two months of this year compared to late last year. Since the beginning of the Trump administration, data shows 59 percent of arrests at the San Diego field office were individuals with no pending criminal charges or prior convictions. (Union-Tribune)
- Want to catch Artemis II splash down on Friday? Though the astronauts won’t be visible when they land 50 miles offshore, the San Diego Air and Space Museum and Fleet Science Center will host viewing events. (CBS 8 San Diego)
- Park leaders and advocates are pushing to repeal paid parking at Balboa Park as part of a “Repeal The Fees” Campaign. If the petition gathers 24,000 signatures then the item will go to City Council’s agenda for a hearing. The petition would need 80,000 signatures to automatically qualify for the November ballot. (NBC 7 San Diego)
- Correction: A previous version of our story about a no confidence resolution aimed at teachers union president Kyle Weinberg misstated the final vote total. The resolution passed 10-2 with two abstentions.
The Morning Report was written by MacKenzie Elmer, Mariana Martínez Barba and Jim Hinch. It was edited by Will Huntsberry.
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