Senate passes a bill to restore tribal lands in San Diego County

Good Morning, I’m Debbie Cruz. It’s Monday, December 16th.

The Senate passes a bill to restore tribal lands in San Diego County.

More on that next. But first, let’s do the headlines….

San Diegans could see more money in their paychecks in the new year.

The city of San Diego’s minimum wage will go up on January 1st for people who work in the city.

The current $16.85 an hour will bump up to $17.25 an hour.

The change is in accordance with the City’s “Earned Sick Leave and Minimum Wage Ordinance” that was approved in 2016.

Flu cases continue to increase across San Diego.

Last week, the County reported 761 flu cases, up from 468 cases the week before.

That week-to-week increase was the biggest so far, this flu season.

County public health doctors are reminding San Diegans to take care of themselves and loved ones this holiday season.

They’re recommending a few different steps to reduce exposure to the virus.

Such as opening windows or using air filters, getting the flu vaccine and washing your hands.

San Diego will maintain sunny, but cool weather for the start of this week.

The National Weather Service expects a high of 67 today.

In the mountain areas, temps will reach a high of 61 degrees. Desert temperatures will top out at 75 degrees.

If you didn’t get the chance to ride the King Tide waves over the weekend, big swells will continue to hit our coasts this morning (Monday).

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reports the waves are expected to taper off over the course of the week

From KPBS, you’re listening to San Diego News Now. Stay with me for more of the local news you need.

The U.S. Senate has passed a bill to restore tribal lands in San Diego County.

The bill would put 172 acres owned by the Jamul Indian Village into trust.

Putting land into trust makes the tribe eligible for certain federal programs and services, including some tax credits and land use exemptions.

The tribe hopes to build housing, a health clinic, a child care center and other resources there.

Democratic Senator Alex Padilla spoke on the senate floor after the bill’s passage last week.

“By establishing this land in federal trust, the United States government is now fulfilling our obligation to the Jamul people and returning their tribal members back to their permanent and proper homeland.”

The bill now moves to the House, where Republican representative Darrell Issa [eye-sa] leads a companion bill.

San Diego voters shot down Measure E. The results show a distinct divide among the city’s neighborhoods. Inewsource editor Jennifer Bowman has more.

City leaders said Measure E would help pay for much-needed infrastructure projects. Their pitch wasn’t enough. Voters rejected the one-cent sales tax increase by less than a percentage point. But the results show support is largely divided by Interstate 8. Opponents were in areas to the north … while the strongest support came from southeast San Diego, where an aging sewer system devastated homes during the January floods. Measure E would have also helped pay for general services. Now, the city is facing a quarterbillion-dollar deficit and possibly budget shortfalls beyond that. For KPBS, I’m inewsource editor Jennifer Bowman.

Inewsource is an independently funded, nonprofit partner of KPBS.

Last week, San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria announced he was halting the effort to redevelop the six blocks around city hall. Voice of San Diego CEO Scott Lewis explains how we got here.

The news that Mayor Todd Gloria was ending efforts to draw up a master vision for the city’s civic core surprised the Downtown Partnership and Prebys Foundation. They had hired world renowned civic planners to create a cultural hub for San Diego – with needed housing, schools and arts organizations and a restoration of the civic theatre. The mayor though said the effort could no longer continue because voters had rejected the sales tax increase in Measure E. But Gloria had never said he needed a tax increase to pursue the civic center vision. The city spent 132 million dollars to buy the two towers downtown – 101 Ash Street and Civic Centre Plaza – because city leaders said they had a once in a generation opportunity to realize a vision for the heart of downtown. It was a bet on the future, Council President Sean Elo-Rivera said. “I’m willing to make that bet… but there's going to be accountability.” Not that much accountability, actually though. The effort is dead. So what about the buildings? Turning them into housing and a new Civic Center was what we were, as the council president said, betting on. Did we lose the bet? On our podcast last week, Mayor Todd Gloria said maybe something smaller could actually happen still. “What we can do is continue to negotiate to convert that into much needed housing.” I’m Scott Lewis, from Voice of San Diego and that’s why it matters

Poway and Ramona are looking at ways to share water resources.

North County reporter Alexander Nguyen says the move could save money and increase water reliability.

The city of Poway has been looking to diversify its water resources for the past 30 years. Eric Heidemann is the director of public works for the city of Poway. He says the city is at a point where it needs to develop this. “So currently we receive imported raw water from the San Diego County Water Authority. And so in order to diversify our portfolio and just build resiliency and redundancy in our own system, we wanted to have a treated water connection.” Right now, there’s a control valve that connects Poway and Ramona, but it only flows one way … to Ramona. Both agencies have entered into a memorandum of understanding to explore the feasibility of building a two-way valve. The preliminary results of the feasibility study won’t be ready until early next year. Both agencies would still need to formally approve the project before work can begin. Alexander Nguyen, KPBS News.

There’s a graveyard in Del Mar that’s a monument to a historic Latino neighborhood called La Colonia de Eden Gardens. It’s the place where they buried their dead. Now they’re using technology to get a better idea of who made it their final resting place. Sci-tech reporter Thomas Fudge has the story.

It’s down a hill from St. Therese’s church in Del Mar, just north of highway 56. A plot of land that was used and then forgotten for a very long time. Joe Beltran is 96 years old and he remembers it from when he was growing up in La Colonia de Eden Gardens. “Years back when people died this is where we came to bury them, you know. And after that for a long time nobody took care of this place.” Beltran describes La Colonia, founded in the 1920s, as a little Mexican village in what is now Solana Beach. The overgrowth that consumed the forgotten graveyard caught the eye of Armand Olvera, a member of St. Therese’s church and the Knights of Columbus, about 20 years ago. “The brush and everything was anywhere from four to six feet high. So you couldn’t see anything in here. And so as I came down the hill and I was walking through the cemetery, I tripped on one of the gravesites.” And that was when a small community began to come together to clean up the cemetery and try to find out who was buried there. Joe Beltran has found gravesites here of his uncles and great grandmother. He first visited the place about ten years ago when he came with his son Michael, who remembers that day. “My dad calls me over and says I found my great grandmother. And that touched my heart and his. I could see the expression on his face. So at that point we kinda made it our duty to try to do something about this cemetery.” In the meantime, some of its history has been unearthed. Olvera says he found records at St. James Parish that indicated 83 people were buried here. So far, he says volunteers have found 57 gravesites, many of them unnamed. And the search is not complete because now they’re looking underground. Jimmy Daniels is an archeologist with Michael Baker International, an engineering firm, which agreed to examine the ground free of charge. Daniels pushes what looks like a lawn mower but it’s a tool for Ground Penetrating Radar. GPR for short. Daniels talks about finding anomalies underground. Sometimes they’re tree roots or gopher warrens. And sometimes they’re unmarked graves. “There’s definitely some unmarked graves that in my preliminary analysis from the data from a few weekends ago. But my goal is to process all of the data and look at it as a whole.” He says unmarked graves have a distinct radar signature and they’re easier to find when a person was buried in a casket. Above ground evidence is also helpful to predict what you’ll find below. He offers this scenario. “Here’s a row of burials. Here’s an anomaly that doesn't have a marker. Maybe it matches up to the other anomalies that are in that row. So we’ve got a burial there.” Michael Beltran says the end goal is to identify all of the graves and pay respects by putting up white crosses to mark them, even if they’re not sure who the person is. He says stories from the community do lend a hand. He spoke with a woman who says she knows where her sister was buried in an unmarked grave. Maybe they can scan the area to confirm it. Another story tells of two infant twins who died and were buried here. The stories often come back to La Colonia and the families who came from that place and who still live in the San Diego area. Again, Michael Beltran. “For myself, it started out as a personal journey, with my great grandmother. But as more families have started to come down and help out now, it’s turned into a community event.” Lisa Montes talks about her uncle and grandfather who are buried in the graveyard. “My grandfather always instilled in me the importance of honoring our ancestors and never forgetting them.” Montes said La Colonia has changed a lot in the 100 years since it was founded. When her mother was a child she went to a segregated school for Latinos. The old homes are mostly gone and the area has been greatly gentrified. But the graveyard has remained as a part of the community. It’s a place where people can remember the past, and maybe even find a gravesite that holds a member of the family. Thomas Fudge, KPBS News.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposed adding the monarch butterfly to the threatened species list. Military reporter Andrew Dyer visited Camp Pendleton where the Marines say they have an important role to play in saving the species.

Officials from the Fish and Wildlife Service are at Camp Pendleton to announce a plan with the Pentagon to conserve monarch butterflies. Nicole Alt is the director of the Center for Pollinator Conservation at the Fish and Wildlife Service. She says Camp Pendleton is one place monarchs spend the winter. “There are historic, overwintering sites, whether they're currently active or have been active in the in the past.” Base Commander Brigadier General Nick Brown says they have staff to manage conservation efforts. “Birds, reptiles, mammals. So, so this is a long list of protected species here on Camp Pendleton, that our environmentalists work to preserve every day.” The service says the number of western monarchs that migrate to California have declined more than 95 percent since the 1980s and have a 99 percent chance of extinction by 2080. Andrew Dyer, KPBS News.

That’s it for the podcast today. As always you can find more San Diego news online at KPBS dot org.

For your next listen, make sure to check out the Midday Edition podcast this afternoon. Today’s show is on motherhood and mental health.

I’m Debbie Cruz. Thanks for listening and have a great Monday.