Morning Report: The Areas Most in Need of New Homes Aren’t Getting ‘Em

We’ve got good news and bad news on the homebuilding front. 

Let’s start with the good news: From 2018 to 2024, San Diego County issued nearly 100,000 permits for new homes. That’s a lot of homes.

The bad news is that those homes often aren’t being built in the areas where they’re most desperately needed, according to an analysis of housing permit data by Voice of San Diego and KPBS.

Take UTC and Sorrento Valley, home to the UC San Diego, a slew of tech companies and multiple hospitals. Those neighborhoods are the largest job centers in the whole county. Sorrento Valley alone, for example, hosts 169,000 jobs. 

But here’s the rub: There are only about 20,000 homes in Sorrento Valley. And despite the heap of new homes being built countywide, very few are being built in Sorrento Valley, where all those jobs are actually located. Only 336 permits have been issued for homes in the area over the past six years, less than 1 percent of the homes permitted countywide.

KPBS’ Jake Gotta reports for our In Whose Backyard series that the huge mismatch means the tens of thousands of San Diegans who clock into workplaces in Sorrento Valley each day are forced to choose between long, traffic-choked commutes or sky-high housing costs.

Read the full story here. 

In Whose Backyard looks at where homes are being built, what kinds of homes are popping up and how that impacts the surrounding communities. Read more stories in our series here.

Mayor Gloria Really Likes His New Ninth-Floor Office

The city of San Diego’s recent budget wrangling was no walk in the park. It put into stark relief the deep divisions that have developed between councilmembers and Mayor Todd Gloria. 

In a recent Q&A with our new City Hall reporter and Report for America corps member, Mariana Martínez Barba, Gloria makes clear he has no regrets.

Gloria is now working from the ninth-floor office of the chief operating officer, whose position he subsumed against the wishes of the City Council. Between the savings from eliminating the position, his new power as COO and even his new office, he feels he’s now more effective and answerable to San Diegans.

He also made a prediction we’ll continue to keep an eye on: “My strong belief is that this means that stuff will happen faster.”

Read the whole Q&A here.

101 Ash Is Turning Into Affordable Housing

On Tuesday, the San Diego City Council unanimously approved a 60-year lease deal to redevelop the notorious 101 Ash building into affordable housing. 

Currently, the city owned building has been sitting empty since 2020 after a series of bad real estate deals, high profile lawsuits, and environmental hazards like asbestos. 

With the new agreement, the property will be turned into a mixed used building to include over 200 units of affordable housing, a daycare, and retail commercial space. 

How much will it cost? Noah Fleishman with the Independent Budget Analyst’s Office said the total development costs will be $267.6 million with each unit costing $1.1 million. 

Where’s the money coming from? The funding comes from a combination of federal low income housing tax credits, historic tax credits and bonds. The Union-Tribune has more on the deal here.

A report by the Independent Budget Analyst’s Office said the proposal is financially and economically feasible, and emphasized the need to be transparent with the new leasing process. 

Song of the Week 

Bachata Surf, “Playa Papaya”: If you’ve been craving sweaty, seductive nights, look no further. On Bachata Surf’s “Playa Papaya,” brief crackles of bird sounds and vocals seemingly piped in from a megaphone crisscross over a pulsating bassline and kick drum. Flashes of guitar awash in tremolo beckon you into the slightly ajar backdoor of this deep-fried, Latin-tinged haunted house. Step inside. You’ll make it out in one piece. Probably. 

Like what you hear? Check out Bachata Surf at Soda Bar on Friday, Aug. 1. 

Do you have a “Song of the Week” suggestion? Shoot us an email and a sentence or two about why you’ve been bumping this song lately. Friendly reminder: all songs should be by local artists. 

In Other News

• Another person has died in a San Diego jail – this time an 82-year-old man who was found unresponsive in his cell at the San Diego County Central Jail on Monday morning. (Union-Tribune)
• Mayor Todd Gloria wants to make way for a hotel in Mission Bay. But first, the City Council will have to consider declaring the land as surplus. That’s because of a state law that requires public agencies pursuing land deals to first offer up the land to affordable housing. The Union-Tribune has more.
• Two Customs and Border Protection officers pleaded guilty to allowing drugs to be trafficked into the U.S. through the Otay Mesa and Tecate borders using an emoji-based text message code. (Associated Press)
• The National Weather Service issued a tsunami advisory for the San Diego County’s coastline after a magnitude-8.7 earthquake struck Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula on Tuesday. (Fox 5) 

The Morning Report was written by Jakob McWhinney and Mariana Martínez Barba. It was edited by Andrea Sanchez-Villafaña. 

Clarification: We’ve updated In Other News to clarify how the state’s surplus land law applies to the development proposed in Mission Bay.

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