Here’s today’s assumption: When Caltrans tells public safety agencies that roads are going to be closed, they’ll actually be closed.
Here’s today’s lesson: Don’t make assumptions.
An investigation reveals that Caltrans’ nightly lists of closed roads are unreliable. In fact, one fire captain avoids a freeway interchange entirely at night because he can’t depend on Caltrans to accurately tell him whether it will be open or closed.
The response from Caltrans: No one has complained, but an official says “we’ll fix it” if there are problems.
Sadly, we’re fresh out of library puns. (There’s only so many times you can say funding is “overdue” or ask readers to “check out” a story). But the debate over the downtown schoobrary continues to heat up.
For the moment, the schoobrary moves forward: the San Diego school board voted last night to back it, although the decision isn’t binding.
(The board also approved a budget that is painful but not as bad as parents had feared.)
Meanwhile, political columnist Scott Lewis kicks off a series of columns with strong words about library backers: “It’s as if all of these people do not care if the new main library isn’t functioning once it’s built.”
In a second post, Lewis wonders where a “great business person” would locate the heart of the library system. Answer: Somewhere else.
For their part, readers have plethora of perspectives about the library’s proposed design, from “among the best” to flat-out “horrible.”
Now, to two words that strike fear in employees everywhere: “efficiency experts.”
Platinum Equity, new owner of the U-T, has hired a Texas firm to figure out how to make workers work better.
The firm claims to “transform organizations into high-performance, results-oriented teams.”
What were they before? Low-performance slackers who didn’t care about results?
Psst! Wanna buy a condo? Cheap! Only $60,950. “This unit is great!” proclaims an ad.
Great? Maybe. Discounted? Definitely. This Escondido condo sold for $265,000 a year ago.
What happened? Trouble. Lots and lots of trouble, courtesy of the real-estate swindle that we uncovered earlier this year.
In sports, columnist Tom Shanahan follows a local football standout whose last name is Beathard.
No, he’s not one of those Beathards. But this player doesn’t need to rely on his name to get attention.
Elsewhere, the NCT reports the city of Vista is trying to be stimulating. It will give $30 and $200 gift cards to people who make large purchases within the city limits.
An official hopes for a “multiplier effect.” For the moment, there’s just a subtraction effect: a cost to the city of $77,000.
Finally, a familiar company name appears in news coverage of the horrific DC subway accident. The maker of the Metro cars that crashed was Chula Vista-based Rohr Industries, now known as Goodrich Aerostructures Group. The cars were purchased in the 1970s.
This is a new feature sent to subscribers of the Morning Report (formerly known as the Daily News Alert). We’re publishing it here until the end of the month, but you’ll need to sign up to receive it after that.