San Diego camping ban a challenge for homeless services

Good Morning, I’m Andrew Dyer. It’s Friday, February 28th.

Foodborne illness cases in the county doubled last year.

More on that next. But first... the headlines….

The daylighting parking law grace period ends Saturday.

The law bans parking within 20 feet of marked and unmarked crosswalks.

The law went into effect January first, but the city hasn’t been issuing citations.

Circulate San Diego’s Will Moore told reporter Scott Rodd late last year more than 40 states already have rules like this in place.

“California decided it needed to come in line with the rest of the country because California’s traffic fatalities are 25% higher than the rest of the country,”

Crews are painting curbs red but the law applies to all intersections, painted or not. 20 feet is about the length of one and a half cars.

New employees at San Diego Unified no longer have to prove they’ve been vaccinated against COVID-19.

According to the San Diego Union-Tribune the item passed the school board this week without discussion.

The decision follows the end of CAL-OSHA’s coronavirus regulations earlier this month.

The district’s student mandate was struck down in court in 2023.

San Diego’s new Major League Soccer team plays its first home match this weekend.

SDFC faces St Loius SC Saturday night at 7:30.

Parking lots at Snapdragon Stadium will open at 2:30 for tailgating and a fan fest for what is expected to be a record-setting crowd.

San Diego’s expansion team stunned the league Sunday when they beat defending champions LA Galaxy two-nil in Carson.

From KPBS, you’re listening to San Diego News Now.

Stay with me for more of the local news you need.

SAN DIEGO CITY COUNCILMEMBERS ARE ADVANCING A 25-DOLLAR PER HOUR MINIMUM WAGE FOR WORKERS IN THE TOURISM INDUSTRY. REPORTER ANDREW BOWEN SAYS IT FOLLOWS SIMILAR MEASURES ADOPTED IN L-A AND LONG BEACH.

The $25 minimum wage would apply to hotel workers, event center staff and janitors in the city's tourism industry. At a meeting of the council's new cost of living committee, hotel owners came out in strong opposition, saying it would hurt business while they're still recovering from the pandemic shutdowns. Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera, who brought the proposal forward, said he's not convinced. Decisions in this city for too long have been made to benefit out-of-town corporations, wealthy investors and a few powerful people while the people who make San Diego run, our workers, are left struggling just to survive. That has to stop. Elo-Rivera's staff will do an economic study and draft an ordinance that will come back to the committee in June. Andrew Bowen, KPBS news.

MORE AND MORE TENTS ARE POPPING UP ALONG THE SIDES OF FREEWAYS …. STATE PROPERTY MANAGED BY CALTRANS. SAN DIEGO CITY LEADERS CALL IT A GROWING PROBLEM. REPORTER KATIE ANASTAS SPOKE TO HOMELESS SERVICE PROVIDERS WHO SAY THEIR CLIENTS ARE MOVING TO STATE PROPERTY TO ESCAPE MORE FREQUENT ENCAMPMENT SWEEPS UNDER THE CITY’S UNSAFE CAMPING ORDINANCE.

Walk through downtown, and you’ll see them. Neon green signs giving people 24 hours’ notice before an encampment sweep. San Diego has prohibited tent camping in public spaces for more than a year. Aldea Secory got used to it when she was camping downtown.  Every other day, pretty much, they make us clean up and move. She found authorities were less likely to make her move next to the freeway. We were on the side of the freeway for, like, a month down by 17th Street, and that was okay, you know? And then more people started to come. Outreach workers with the Father Joe’s Villages street health team say more and more of their homeless patients are crossing from city to state property. Tuesday Moon is on the health team. She says It makes it harder – and more dangerous – for them to provide care and connect people to services. We try to encourage folks to come out for health care outside of the fence. But since the encampments have moved on to the Caltrans areas and behind fences near freeways, it scares me more on a personal level. The team visits encampments weekly to provide things like wound care, substance use disorder counseling and prescription management. Without it, minor health issues can have serious consequences.  That small, ingrown hair turns into an abscess. And so if we can't find them in that interim, when that is going on, it goes from it being a mild wound care situation to an antibiotic situation.  The team hasn’t always been able to find Lee Alirez. There was a couple different times they couldn’t find me, and I was just literally across the street, around a corner. They monitor her high blood pressure and make sure she has her medication. I have noticed that it helps considerably. At first I was hesitant to realize that it was working or helping. But then when we started seeing the results in the blood pressure readings, they were, like, more normal. And I wasn't, I wasn't getting them my headaches. I wasn’t getting headaches like I was. Jenni Wilkens manages the street health team. She says more frequent and aggressive abatement sweeps since the city passed its unsafe camping ordinance have made it harder to keep track of patients. On one hand, I have seen where there have people have been more willing to accept help or take advantage of, of alternate opportunities because they're tired of being shifted and, and moved around and displaced, you know, so regularly. And then I've also seen where people have retreated into the recesses and they're like, never to be found, you know? And so we're left wondering what happened to them where they went. Are they okay? City leaders say the camping ordinance has helped them connect people to shelter services. Franklin Coopersmith is the deputy director of the Environmental Services Department’s Clean SD Division. He says the city’s homeless outreach team recently spent several days at an encampment at the Chollas Parkway Open Space. They were able to get 16 of the 20 people into some type of housing option.  Before the ordinance, the city gave 72 hours’ notices before clearing an encampment. Now, they give 24 hours. We found that as a really good middle ground of trying to be compassionate while also addressing public health and safety. Once people move onto state or private property, they can’t enforce the ordinance. It's an imaginary real line that exists right there. And they know they can go on the other side. And that's where our resource stops. We don't go on to state, we don't go on to private. We don't go on to county property to do the abatement process. Caltrans says it prioritizes removing encampments that present a threat to infrastructure or people. The agency gives 48 hours’ notice unless there’s an imminent safety risk. Steve Shebloski, captain of SDPD’s neighborhood policing division, says they’re talking with state authorities about how they can work together. We can only do so much and we have to focus on city property. And I don't know if we can get into the world of policing 151 miles of state highways within the city. We just don't have enough resources. Last week, State Sen. Catherine Blakespear announced a bill that would require Caltrans to coordinate with local governments to address encampments and fund cleanup efforts, outreach programs and shelter services. Mayor Todd Gloria co-sponsored the bill, saying he hopes it will help cities like San Diego address the growing problem of freeway encampments. Secory is still living in a tent. But now, she’s at one of the city’s Safe Sleeping sites. She can keep track of her belongings — and stay with her husband and their dog.: Having somewhere to keep your stuff and not worry about it getting stolen or messed up. Yeah, it's a big help. It’s also easier for the health team to find her — a growing challenge as other homeless patients move out of reach. Katie Anastas, KPBS News. 

2024 WAS A BAD YEAR FOR FOOD-BORNE ILLNESS IN SAN DIEGO COUNTY. REPORTER HEIDI DE MARCO EXPLAINS WHAT’S BEHIND A SPIKE IN CASES AND HOW TO STAY SAFE.

San Diego County reported 50 foodborne illness outbreaks last year—twice as many as in 2023. An outbreak is two or more illnesses from the same food source. Norovirus is behind most cases. The highly contagious virus causes vomiting, diarrhea and stomach pain. It was linked to 15 outbreaks of contaminated raw oysters last year. Heather Buonomo’s team investigates complaints from both doctors and the public. Our team will do a little diet recall. We'll talk to them about everything they've eaten in the past few days and try to get more information to determine if, you know, their symptoms were caused by a food that they consumed from a restaurant. Another culprit? Raw milk. In 2023, it was linked to salmonella. Last year, health officials investigated it for possible bird flu.  Buonomo says simple precautions can lower your risk.  Hot food, keep it hot. Cold food, keep it cold. And washing your hands are really going to be some of the best preventative measures against foodborne illness no matter where you are eating. If you think food made you sick, health officials say it's important to report it. Tracking cases could help stop an outbreak. Heidi de Marco, KPBS News

Today SANDAG could narrow down some options for moving the tracks on the Del Mar bluffs inland.

Reporter Alexander Nguyen says staff have narrowed the options down to four.

Every day, hundreds of people and millions of dollars worth of goods move through these tracks in Del Mar. So, anytime there’s a bluff collapse disrupting service … it’s not only an inconvenience for commuters … but also a major economic impact for the region. “And it's important to the military, too, because it's a strategic railway.” Lesa Heebner is the board chair of the San Diego Association of Governments or SANDAG. She says it’s essential to make the rail line safe and stable. And that could mean moving it inland. “We've got to get this, make sure that this, rail line is stable and safe.” Three of the options involve tunneling underneath Del Mar or the fairgrounds. Residents and the fairground have voiced opposition to that. The fourth option keeps the tracks where they are and shores up the bluffs. FRIDAY… SANDAG’s board will vote on which of the four to move forward to the next stage. Alexander Nguyen KPBS.

HE BECAME SAN DIEGO’S FIRST CARDINAL… AND NOW ROBERT MCELROY IS LEAVING TO LEAD THE ARCHDIOCESE IN WASHINGTON, D-C. REPORTER TANIA THORNE SAYS HE’LL BE JUST A FEW MILES FROM THE WHITE HOUSE… AND CAPITOL HILL.

it has been a great grace for me being here, and part of my heart will always be here in San Diego, when I'm in Washington or wherever I am,  McElroy held a final news conference with San Diego media on Thursday, first speaking about the health of Pope Francis. Throughout the world, people are raising their voices in prayer for the Pope and praying that God will be with him, help them in the suffering, give him peace and give him strength and give him healing. McElroy shared that Francis appears to be making a recovery.  McElroy is considered one of Pope Francis’ most progressively like-minded allies. In the past, McElroy has called President Trump’s threats of mass deportations of immigrants “incompatible with Catholic doctrine.”  He will remain in the San Diego post until March 11th when he will be installed as the Archbishop of Washington. Tania Thorne KPBS News.

Expect patchy fog early today. then sunshine and temps around 70.
The National Weather Service says this weekend there will be cloudy skies, a chance of showers and highs in the mid-sixties.

That’s it for the podcast today. This week’s podcast episodes were produced by Lara McCaffrey, Brenden Tuccinardi and me, Andrew Dyer. It’s edited by Brooke Ruth. As always you can find more San Diego news online at KPBS dot org. For your next listen, check out this week’s KPBS Roundtable for conversations on the latest in immigration and California’s high speed rail project. I’m Andrew Dyer. Thanks for listening and have a great weekend.