Morning Report: Police Dramatically Increase Ticketing of RV Dwellers
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Enforcement impacting people living in RVs has more than doubled since police started cracking down in July.
Our Mariana Martínez Barba reports that police wrote almost 700 tickets for violations of the city’s oversized vehicle ordinance which bars parking large vehicles on city streets from 2 a.m. to 6 a.m.
That’s up from 244 citations in July when police ramped up ticketing after the city opened a new safe parking site for people living in vehicles near the airport.
Refresher: Police crackdowns on people living in vehicles slowed for years after people living in vehicles sued the city over that enforcement. Ticketing picked up again after a settlement between the city and the plaintiffs and the opening of the new H Barracks parking lot. But the city and attorneys for people living in vehicles continue to disagree over some nuances of that settlement.
And the Acorn Award Goes to …
This week, we featured the San Diego County schools that are going above and beyond to serve students. It was all part of our inaugural Acorn Awards.
We picked our winners using the income vs. test score metric we developed with our partners at UC San Diego for our A Parent’s Guide to San Diego Schools.
Voice intern Rami Alarian wrote about our award winners.
Fallbrook Union Elementary School District won our most dedicated district award for focusing on the holistic needs of its students, not just academics.
San Onofre Elementary School is our top performing elementary school thanks to the intensive work it does to help students from military families who move often get up to speed.
Our top performing middle school, College Preparatory Middle School, attributes its high test scores despite having many students from low-income families to its focus on outreach and support.
Helix High won three awards. Our Jakob McWhinney wrote about the school here.
Mission Bay High was the school that has most improved since 2021. And Edison Elementary was the best performing school with a disproportionate percentage of English language learners.
Filing Day Drama: Is Issa Still Running?
San Diego Republicans were abuzz Wednesday and Thursday when Republican Armen Kurdian, a retired Navy officer, withdrew from the state Senate District 38 race (seat held by Sen. Catherine Blakespear) and instead filed to run in the 49th Congressional District (seat held by U.S. Rep. Mike Levin).
The 49th is the seat that County Supervisor Jim Desmond is running for. Kurdian and Desmond aren’t the kind that would battle for something like that so a lot of people began reading the tea leaves that something bigger was afoot.
The best theory: Rep. Darrell Issa may not actually run for re-election in the 48th Congressional District. The race got much harder for him after California voters approved Proposition 50 turning his solid Republican district to a district with a slight Democratic advantage, attracting major Democratic candidates.
The idea is Issa plans to step aside and allow Desmond to run for the 48th instead. But Assemblymember Carl DeMaio, a longtime foe of Issa, appears to also be interested and sources told Voice that DeMaio reached out to the White House Thursday to gauge support for the bid.
Or: Issa may have decided to run for re-election after all (perhaps just to keep DeMaio from doing it). Kurdian would only confirm for Voice that he is all in on his race for the 49th Congressional District.
Kurdian got the Republican Party endorsement for the state Senate race just a couple weeks ago. It would be odd for him to jump into a very different race against Desmond unless Desmond also had another thing cooking.
The filing deadline is today and we’ll know exactly who’s running for what by the end of the day.
South County Report: The Near Pariah Turned Mayoral Candidate
Last year, our Jim Hinch wrote about local Democratic Party leaders’ push to censure Chula Vista Elementary School District Trustee Francisco Tamayo for his role in a scheme to oust a fellow Democrat from the school board.
Now Hinch has an interesting update: Tamayo now wants to be the next Chula Vista mayor and is hoping to unseat Republican John McCann.
Hinch’s latest South County Report explains how the seemingly unlikely bid came together. He’s also got the latest on the continuing redevelopment of the Chula Vista bayfront.
Read the full South County Report here.
In Other News
- Chula Vista has named an acting police chief while following Chief Roxana Kennedy’s move to extend her medical leave. The change follows Kennedy’s claims that some city officials are trying to oust her. (NBC 7)
- Adam R. Scripps Street Soccer Park at Horace Mann Middle School has been open to the public for a few weeks. Run by Street Soccer USA, this field provides an alternative to the pay-to-play model to capture momentum from the upcoming FIFA World Cup that will visit San Diego. (KPBS)
- On Tuesday, San Diego Unified School District’s board voted unanimously to cut more than 200 classified jobs, a decision that is expected to lay off roughly 70 people. Positions such as paraeducators, assistants, clerks, custodians, special-education staff, food service staff and more are to be cut with 88 already vacant. (San Diego Union-Tribune)
- Despite multiple warnings about dangerous behavior, a San Diego woman is now suing the Lafayette Hotel, claiming staff failed to protect her from a guest who beat, raped, sodomized and tortured her for eight hours inside of the historic hotel. (ABC 10)
- An ordinance allowing for separate sales of accessory dwelling units without more eligibility requirements was unanimously approved by the San Diego County Board of Supervisors on Wednesday. Supervisor Monica Montgomery Steppe said it was an important decision for encouraging ownership with some saying it was an innovative approach. (CBS 8)
- Street medicine providers across the state fear that President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” will cause a majority of unhoused people to lose medical coverage. Medi-Cal provides health insurance for low-income and disabled residents in California and new law requires states, starting in 2027, to verify able-bodied adults younger than65 are performing 80 hours of work or more to qualify for Medicaid. (CalMatters)
The Morning Report was written by Lisa Halverstadt, Andrea Sanchez-Villafaña and Rami Alarian. It was edited by Andrea Sanchez-Villafaña.
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