Category: Economy

A locally-based real estate company has just purchased a huge, 180-unit project in the Point Loma / Midway area — the site of the former Barnard Elementary School.

MG Properties, a San Diego-based multifamily real estate investment firm, announced the purchase of Dylan Point Loma Apartments, a massive piece of property that opened in 2016 consisting of one-, two- and three-bedroom floor plans. The colorful announcement states that the project is “complemented by a resort-style saltwater pool, a fitness center, community club house, a conference room, game lounge, demonstration kitchen, dog park and a volleyball court.”

It’s “colorful” because although the announcement claims the project is in “Point Loma,” it’s actually situated in the more problematic neighborhood of the Midway District, which is beset with a large homeless population, fast-food joints, malls and shopping centers, often described in negative terms by urban planners, police and developers. In contrast, the announcement asserts “Dylan Point Loma is situated in one of San Diego’s most desirable coastal submarkets, offering residents convenient access to major employment centers, beaches, dining, and entertainment.”

The purchase price was undisclosed. MG Properties bought the site which has a formal address as 2930 Barnard St, San Diego, CA 92110, from JLL Income Property Trust.

Marimar Martinez is the Chicago woman who was shot 5 times by an ICE agent back in October 2025 and who lived to testify about it before a Congressional committee last week.

Because her testimony was edited by every news network and effectively back paged for lack of a better term, we here quote verbatim Marimar Martinez’ testimony before Congress in it’s entirety, just weeks after getting shot 5 times and leaving 7 bullet holes by ICE. This is the testimony that should have been heard by every American and heard around the world. Marimar Martinez testimony should have dominated the news cycle last week:

To the Rag reader who sent us the following, “Marimar is strength and love personified. This is what courage looks like, and she is an example for us all.”

[00:00:00:30 – 00:00:01:57]

Thank you for having me here.

[00:00:02:57 – 00:00:13:55]

Before I begin, I would like to take a moment to express my gratitude. Thank you, Chairman, for giving me the opportunity to be here today, for taking the time to hear my testimony.

City News Service – Times of SD /  Feb. 6, 2026

A San Diego federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to return three families that he ruled were deported unlawfully.

U.S. District Judge Dana Sabraw wrote in a Thursday, Feb.5, ruling that the deportations “clearly violated the spirit” of a 2023 settlement agreement that he approved, which sought to reunite and provide services for families separated at the southern border.

“Each of the removals was unlawful, and absent the removals, these families would still be in the United States and have access to the benefits and resources they are entitled to under the Settlement Agreement,” the judge wrote.

Sabraw, who has in previous rulings found that the Trump administration has violated the terms of the settlement, wrote that the family members were removed despite legally being in the U.S. on parole.

By Arturo Castañares – Editor-at-Large / La Prensa / Jan. 29, 2026

A member of the San Diego County Board of Supervisors has launched a campaign for County Treasurer-Tax Collector against the person a majority of the Supervisors just recently appointed to the position, while his own Party is considering supporting another candidate to run against him.

Supervisor Joel Anderson, a longtime elected Republican, just entered the second year of his second four-term on the County Board of Supervisors, but recently filed to run for County Treasurer in this year’s election cycle.

Joel Anderson

If Anderson were to win the election in November, he would vacate his Supervisor seat halfway through his term and create a vacancy his Democratic colleagues could fill.

The race for a usually low-profile position comes after longtime Treasurer-Tax Collector Dan McAllister announced his unexpected resignation on August 2nd after having been elected to the post six times over the past 24 years. McAllister’s current term expires in January 2027.

By Donna Frye / Op-Ed SD Union-Tribune / Feb. 8, 2026

On Jan. 5, the city of San Diego began charging residents and nonresidents to park at Balboa Park. To say that the rollout went badly is a gross understatement; the only way it could have been worse is if the city made everyone parallel park before paying.

There was extensive news coverage both before and after the paid parking was enacted showing widespread opposition to the parking fees for residents and nonresidents alike.

On Jan. 27, three City Council members who had voted in support of paid parking in Balboa Park held a press conference inside City Hall.

At that press conference, Council President Joe LaCava, Council President Pro Tem Kent Lee and Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera jointly announced their proposal to suspend paid parking fees for residents, but keep the parking fees for nonresidents.

LaCava said he was docketing their proposal for the council meeting that would be held on Monday, Feb. 9. There was no mention of a ballot measure as part of their proposal.

On Jan. 28, the Rules Committee had a meeting. LaCava, Lee and Elo-Rivera are three of the five members who serve on the Rules Committee; LaCava is the chair and Lee is the vice chair.

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 and other city public meetings.

Monday, February 9: City Council, 10:00 a.m.

Agenda:

Non-Agenda Public Comment:  The Mayor and the Council just cut a ragtag deal to “reform” paid parking at Balboa Park (but still charge for the closest lots). So the topic won’t be on this week’s Council docket. But San Diegans can still express their views on the issue in person or virtually during non-agenda public comment. On Monday, non-agenda comment is scheduled early in the meeting at about 10:15 a.m. On Tuesday, the comment period is near the end at about 12 noon.

by Michael J. Stepner and Mary Lydon / Times of San Diego / Feb. 4, 2026

For decades Paris, Barcelona and Brooklyn have been held up as models for humanely scaled, mid-rise housing neighborhoods.

This density is created by four-to-six story residential buildings. These communities have high rises and retail woven throughout, with pleasant walkable, tree-lined streets.

Here in San Diego, the award winning, 230-acre Civita urban village in Mission Valley stands in as our local model.

Mid-rise housing is part of Mayor Todd Gloria’s “Neighborhood Homes for All of Us” initiative. This type of housing is both necessary and appropriate — but it must be in the right location and provide the type of housing that affordable to those who need it.

The city’s 1979 General Plan stated in its urban design section that “the quality of the community is of overriding importance to the individual, since the most basic human needs must be satisfied close to home.” This is as true today as then.

Currently there is a lot of mid-rise housing being built. It is being built along commercial corridors and in the older neighborhoods.

By Shane Harris / Times of San Diego / Feb. 5, 2026

I live near Balboa Park, and I want to be clear about something from the start: my opposition to paid parking has nothing to do with convenience — mine or anyone else’s. This isn’t about saving a few dollars at a meter for me.

It’s about who gets pushed out when we turn one of the last truly public spaces in San Diego into a revenue stream. It’s about foster youth on group trips, families stretching every dollar, seniors on fixed incomes, volunteers who give thousands of hours to the museums, and working people whose livelihoods depend on foot traffic in the park.

Balboa Park was never meant to be City Hall’s cash register. For more than a century, it has served as San Diego’s shared civic commons — a place intentionally gifted to the people with the understanding that access would be open, equitable and free. That promise is now under threat, not because the park failed, but because the city chose to use it as a shortcut to address a budget problem it created for itself.

On Feb. 9, the City Council will once again take up the issue of parking fees in Balboa Park.

By Sue Taylor

Dear San Diego City Council Members:

I was born in the City of San Diego and graduated from Point Loma High School. I worked for the City of San Diego for 41 years, and I am also a volunteer with the San Diego Police Department. I now live just outside the City limits, about two and a half miles from Council District 9.

I want to directly challenge the claim that only City residents “pay for” Balboa Park. That claim may be convenient, but it is not how the City’s finances actually work.

Yes, only City residents pay property tax to the City. But what is consistently left out of this discussion is that most of any property tax bill does not go to the City at all. It goes to schools and the county. For a typical City household, only a few hundred dollars a year from their property tax actually ends up in the City’s General Fund. At the same time, a very large share of the City’s General Fund comes from sales tax and the hotel tax. Those taxes are paid heavily by non-City residents and by visitors.

The former Rite Aid property in Ocean Beach has been sold for a cool $12.6 Millions. The 1.66 acre site at 4840 Niagara Avenue has been a tempting plum to pluck for months since Rite Aid closed and now it has happened. The retail building — which used to be a Mayfair market before Rite Aid — is 20,155-square-feet.

One of the largest  commercial real estate and investment firms in the country — if not the world — CBRE — facilitated the sale, with agents from CBRE (Chase Bank Real Estate) representing both the seller and the buyer in the transaction.

At this moment, we don’t know who the buyer is, but we do have a call into the CBRE media agent listed in the recent announcement dated Jan. 28, 2026.

A senior vice-president of CBRE, Reg Kobzi, was quoted in the announcement:

“This transaction underscores the enduring appeal and scarcity of well-located, parking-rich retail assets in San Diego’s coastal communities. Big-box retail opportunities like this former Rite Aid with on-site parking in Ocean Beach are extremely rare, reflecting strong investor confidence in the area’s fundamentals and tenant demand.”

There were at least three consecutive days of protests in San Diego County against ICE and in solidarity with Minneapolis over this past weekend.

On Friday, Jan. 30, nearly 1,000 people gathered at a large rally at Teralta Park in City Heights, followed by a march. Initially protesters met at the park between Orange and Polk avenues around 2 p.m. on Friday, calling for an end to the Trump administration’s federal immigration crackdown across the country.

The day before on Thursday, people of faith rallied at the Federal Building in downtown San Diego.

The nationwide rallies, called a “National Shutdown” by organizers, called for people to not go to school, work or businesses to demand Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents out of communities. It came after federal actions in Minnesota that led to the deaths of Alex Pretti and Renee Good, both 37 years old.

By Marina Dunbar  / The Guardian / Feb. 1, 2026

Government documents have identified the two federal officers who fatally shot Alex Pretti in Minneapolis as Jesus Ochoa, a border patrol agent, and Raymundo Gutierrez, an officer with Customs and Border Protection (CBP), according to ProPublica.

According to those records, Ochoa, 43, and Gutierrez, 35, were the agents who fired their weapons during the confrontation last weekend that resulted in Pretti’s death. The shooting sparked widespread demonstrations and renewed demands for criminal inquiries into federal immigration enforcement actions. Immediately following Pretti’s killing, the Trump administration repeatedly pushed false claims about the shooting.

At the time of the incident, both agents were participating in Operation Metro Surge, a large-scale immigration enforcement initiative that launched in December. The operation deployed numerous armed, masked agents throughout Minneapolis as part of a citywide sweep.