The Morning Report
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I have come across a few interesting statistics that you may have missed.
- Did you see this little tidbit my colleague Andrew Donohue put up the other day? I knew there would probably be a few Chargers season ticket holders who lived outside the county but not that many.
- Then there’s this, from our intrepid reporter Kelly Bennett, who writes and maintains the unbeatable Survival in San Diego blog. I think it’s a big deal.
Obviously, I have a particular interest in the local housing market. We are all witnessing a fascinating economic phenomenon, I think.
San Diego’s real estate construction industry will experience a “slowdown mode” this year, the economist for the state Building Industry Association said in a report released today. (San Diego data begins on page six.)
The economist, Alan Nevin of MarketPointe Realty Advisors, said the peak for building permits issued — multi-family and single-family combined — was 18,300 units in 2003. Three years later in 2006, that number was one-third lower, at 12,000 permits.
Read the rest. The best part was Nevin’s theory as to why the number of permits is going down: us dang journalists.
If builders are really going to be constructing that many fewer homes in the near future, local governments better should give this advice a second look.
- Following up on my MonDiego Tube showing that geyser after a water main broke in Vista, we’ve learned a little bit. Remember, I decided I really wanted to look into our situation in San Diego and see if we did have an inordinate amount of breaks. That would be really bad given that we live in such a parched landscape and have to import nearly all of our water. We wouldn’t want to waste it flooding streets, parking garages and restaurants.
San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders has been drawing attention to local water main breaks as evidence and justification for his proposed water and sewer rate increases.
He said today that there were 24 water main breaks in the city in December.
I will try to find out if that’s bad or what.
The San Diego County Water Authority doesn’t keep track of local water main breaks. The authority serves as a wholesaler of water to agencies like the city of San Diego. But the authority did give me some helpful hints on where to hunt down the information and I’ll be following up.
I know you’re on the edge of your seat.
- This is a good article with an illustrative graph (thanks to our new web monkey, Vladimir Kogan, we’ll be a lot more illustrative these days). The city is doing all it can, it seems, to miss this historical period of low interest rates. It’s as if the government and financial markets have given the city all the chances it possible could to refinance some of its debt in this environment of low interest rates.
And the city still can’t get it done.