Category: Culture

The San Diego Community Coalition publishes this email bulletin to keep our members and the public informed about important Council and Planning Commission hearings and other city public meetings.

Monday, February 2: City Council, 2:00 p.m.

Agenda

Item CS-1: Ordinance Approving Contract with NEOGOV for Applicant Recruitment, Tracking, and Hiring

Why it matters: NEOGOV would be paid nearly $4.2 million over 10 years for HR software systems. That seems like a lot for a city that 1) has a personnel department responsible for recruitment, tracking, and hiring; 2) is supposed to be in the middle of a hiring freeze; and 3) is nearly insolvent.

Wednesday, February 4: Budget and Government Efficiency Committee, 9:00 a.m.

Agenda

By Jack Fitzpatrick / MS NOW /  Jan. 28, 2026

With less than 72 hours until most of the federal government runs out of funding, a partial shutdown now appears likely. The more pressing question is how much of the government will close — and for how long.

Senate Democrats told MS NOW that their support for a Department of Homeland Security funding bill hinges on new restrictions on President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement agencies.

Republicans, who are also facing political pressure after officers killed two U.S. citizens in Minnesota, say they’re open to hearing the Democratic proposals. But time is short, and any agreement would need to clear both chambers of Congress — with House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., signaling no plans to bring the House back from recess.

Instead, Johnson and other GOP leaders are urging Senate Democrats to join Republicans in passing the remaining six of the 12 annual appropriations bills without changes, even though Democrats are adamant they won’t do that.

As Friday night’s deadline looms, lawmakers need to move quickly to avert a funding lapse that could affect roughly four-fifths of federal agency budgets.

But there’s a massive barrier in the way. Republicans want a handshake agreement with Trump on changes at Immigration and Customs Enforcement, rather than codifying restrictions in the Homeland Security funding bill itself. Democrats say they don’t trust the administration to follow through.

By Judy Harrington

126 San Diego residents gathered recently at the Salvation Army Kroc Center on January 20 to hear vital advice from firefighters and other experts on surviving wildfires like the Los Angeles area experienced last winter.

Speakers included Alex Kane, Assistant Fire Marshal/ Wildfire Program Manager and his team members, Sierra Brown, Deputy Fire Marshal, and Helen Sylvia, Firefighter Paramedic III, as well as Carie Chouinard, San Diego’s Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) Program Manager and Melissa Altman, Regional Preparedness Manager for the American Red Cross San Diego.

“If you’re not prepared, you become part of the problem, and the fire department has to focus on evacuations as opposed to fire suppression.” Assistant Fire Marshall Alex Kane said in urging folks to not become “part of the emergency.”

Kane explained that he is now heading up a new wildfire prevention and mitigation division of the San Diego Fire Rescue Department, focused on creating wildfire resilient communities.  Among his many tips: get involved with your local fire safe council –” …they are making a difference.”  San Diego county has 54 FSCs, the most of any county in the country.

by David Smollar / Times of San Diego / Jan. 26, 2026

The wielding of excessive force bringing chaos, injury and death across American cities by officers with Immigration and Customs Enforcement makes for painful viewing when captured by social media.

American history is checkered with federal, state and local police actions carried out against advocates of labor unions, marchers for civil rights, and anti-war protesters, among many others — and it can’t be sanitized or erased by those who prefer their history viewed through rose-colored lenses.

San Diego’s past also includes major government-sanctioned violence.

In the heart of downtown, at the intersection of Fifth Avenue and E Street, the city’s worst street violence — the Free Speech Riots — emanated in 1912 from February through May when police and vigilantes violently assaulted members of the militant/anarchist labor union International Workers of the World, known as the IWW or “Wobblies.”

In January, the City Council had acted to curb public assemblies in the city of 45,000 residents at the behest of business and real estate owners. They feared an increase in the number of union members coming to San Diego to organize streetcar and construction workers — many of whom were  immigrants — and to back radical factions in the ongoing Mexican Revolution. An armed group of Wobblies supporting a radical Mexican faction had assisted in a brief capture of Tijuana, then a border town with less than 1,000 people, in spring 1911 during an initial phase of the revolution.

by Debbie L. Sklar / Times of San Diego / Jan. 16, 2026

High above San Diego Bay, Fort Rosecrans occupies one of the most commanding pieces of land in the city. Long before it became a national cemetery, the Point Loma military reservation played a central role in coastal defense, guarding the harbor entrance from the late 19th century through World War II. Today, Fort Rosecrans is best known as a place of remembrance — but it has also, briefly and intentionally, become part of San Diego’s film history.

Hollywood Backlot

What Fort Rosecrans is not is a forgotten Hollywood backlot. Unlike larger, active Southern California military installations, there is no documented evidence that Fort Rosecrans served as a regular filming site during Hollywood’s Golden Age. From the 1930s through the 1950s, studios making war films typically relied on expansive Army and Navy bases that could support large-scale productions, complete with troops, equipment, and training grounds. Fort Rosecrans, originally developed as a coastal artillery post and formally designated a fort in 1899, never functioned as that kind of production hub.

By the end of World War II, advances in military technology had reduced the importance of fixed coastal defenses, and the site’s military role diminished. Portions of the reservation had already been set aside as a cemetery decades earlier, beginning in the 1880s. Over time, Fort Rosecrans’ identity shifted decisively from active defense to commemoration.

That context makes its on-screen appearance far more meaningful.

By Sue Taylor

There are people who tell those of us who don’t want to pay for parking in Balboa Park, “Just take transit!” I’m sure this works fine for people who live near the park. For the rest of us, it’s more of an adventure.

Today I had a public meeting downtown at 10:00 a.m. Having commuted downtown many times in the past, I know that if you want to arrive on time by transit, you need to leave very early and build in a generous margin for… surprises.

I left my house at 8:30 and walked to the bus stop for the 8:45 bus. I like to get there early because buses can be early, and there’s nothing quite like watching yours drive past as you’re jogging downhill waving at the driver to stop for you!

At 8:45, no bus. I checked the “One Bus Away” app. It said the bus was delayed by 12 minutes. Fine. That’s why I padded my schedule.

by Deborah Brennan / Cal-Matters / January 23, 2026

[Please see original for more photos and links]

For decades, parking lots at San Diego’s Balboa Park were packed, with lines of drivers snaking through lanes in search of a rare open spot.

Last Saturday there were plenty of open spaces, and on Wednesday several lots were half empty, while people lined up behind kiosks to pay newly imposed parking fees.

This month San Diego city imposed the first parking fees for the century-old cultural site, provoking confusion and contempt. Museums reported that visitation dropped 20% immediately, vandals defaced the meters and San Diego County mayors urged the city to reverse the unpopular policy.

“The negative impacts paid parking on Balboa Park have been immediate and they have been measurable,” Jessica Hanson York, executive director of the Mingei Museum and president of the Balboa Park Cultural Partnership, which represents the park’s museums, said at a press conference Wednesday. “Our visitors are feeling it and our cultural institutions and our museums are feeling it across the park.”

San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria has said the parking fees will provide stable revenue for the park and its museums, and help close a city budget gap of roughly $300 million this fiscal year and $110 million next year.

It’s amazing. Saturday morning, January 24 — the morning that ICE / border patrol agents shot and murdered Alex Pretti — was 3 days ago – and today we still don’t know who shot him. We still don’t know which agent or agents fired the 10 bullets into his body at point-blank range.

Is it because there were so many agents surrounding Alex and pummeling him that investigators can’t figure out the individual identities?

No, authorities know who it is – they’re just not saying. ICE agents operate with impunity, under masks and with loaded machine guns.

Okay, so Greg Bovino is leaving with a few other agents and ol’ Tom Horman is coming in to quiet everybody down. You know Horman, he’s the gruff-speaking, bulldog looking guy from central casting — he reminds me of actor Broderick Crawford of the TV show Highway Patrol — who allegedly accepted a bag of $50,000 cash from FBI agents during a crime investigation — and got to keep it and who of course was not charged.

Meanwhile, Senate Democrats are getting ready to shut the government down unless funding for ICE is removed from the spending packages.

Well what do we know? What have authorities said about the trigger happy agent? (What happened to the idea that multiple agents actually fired into Pretti?)

The San Diego Community Coalition publishes this email bulletin to keep our members and the general public informed about important Council and Planning Commission hearings.

Monday, January 26: City Council, Closed Session, 10:00 a.m.

Agenda.

Item CS-1: Conference with legal counsel regarding 56 flooding litigation suits brought by nearly 2,000 residents.

Why it matters: It’s been a full two years since Southeastern San Diego neighborhoods were flooded because the city failed to maintain storm drain channels. Victims are still seeking reparation.

By JW August – Special to the OB Rag

The San Diego region, which has a history of birthing hate groups, most notably white supremacy organizations, has seen an increase in the number and the power of these groups locally – and there have been also increases seen across the country.

White nationalist groups aren’t just about the hatred of Black, Latino / Hispanic and Jews but they’re also about “remaking the country as an ethnostate, where citizenship is limited to whites,” Rachel Carroll Rivas of the Southern Poverty Law Center told Times of San Diego.

Rivas says the National Coalition For Men, now headquartered in San Diego, is “very much impacting young men who are joining this male supremacist movement with claims of what true masculinity is.” Researchers are finding that the anti-feminist appeal to young male voters, instrumental in Trump’s recent election, is helping recruit people to the male supremacist movement.

This recruitment and indoctrination of men by these types of extremist groups is expanding, not just locally but across the globe, Rivas says.

For more about these Men’s Rights Activists go to SPLC website .

The OB Rag also interviewed criminologist and civil rights attorney Brian Levin who provided  information on the hate trends from 2025, when President Donald Trump entered office. Levin is projecting we will be seeing a drop in reported hate crimes in San Diego and elsewhere.

By Sarah K. Burris / AlterNet / January 22, 2026 

Former special counsel Jack Smith spoke to the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday where he clarified some details that Republicans have tried to use as talking points against him.

Legal, analyst, reporters and commentators took to social media to attack the questioning of Smith.

“Republicans on House Judiciary don’t want answers from Jack Smith. They keep on interrupting him as he responds to their questions,” said legal analyst Katie Phang.

“Jack Smith reminds us that the cases against Trump were dismissed ‘without prejudice.’ Meaning they could be brought again,” legal analyst and podcast host Allison Gill, of @MuellerSheWrote pointed out.

National security analyst Marcy Wheeler cited Rep. “Hank Johnson still has it: While we’re deposing Marshall Miller (the guy who got Jack Smith hired) perhaps we can depose Donald Trump why he hired his personal lawyer to run DOJ.”