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Shelia Jackson, a member of the San Diego school board, represents southeastern San Diego and is legally supposed to live there while she’s in office. But our reporting raises questions about whether she actually resides elsewhere.
Several times, our reporters observed her leaving a Kearny Mesa apartment in the morning, which she says is her daughter’s. “I don’t live here,” she said this week at the complex, saying she actually lives on a street in southeastern San Diego where she owned a home that she lost to foreclosure in 2007.
Then she changed her story, saying she lives on another street in southeastern San Diego. Later, she explained that she has financial problems and stays part-time with her daughter and part-time with a San Diego school administrator. (Last year, Jackson and other board members approved a temporary principal position for the administrator.)
Jackson doesn’t pay rent at the administrator’s home but hasn’t reported getting a gift either.
City Out $500K in Road Rage Case
Remember 2008’s bizarre road-rage incident in Oceanside? It ended with an off-duty San Diego cop shooting the drunk driver of another car and her young son. The high-profile case featured plenty of accusations and loads of drama, becoming one of North County’s biggest stories of the year. Both the cop and the mother went on trial; the officer was acquitted, while the mother pleaded guilty to a felony charge and was placed on probation.
Now, the city of San Diego, which still employs the cop, has agreed to pay $500,000 out of its general fund to the father of the boy. (NCT) The City Council approved the settlement yesterday.
A False Claim on Redevelopment
It’s a claim that’s gotten plenty of currency: according to the mayor, San Diego can’t join a lawsuit against the state over the partial demise of redevelopment without losing the ability to take part in redevelopment at all. “If you’re named then you simply can’t be in redevelopment no matter what,” he said. Media organizations have picked up on the claim, as has a councilwoman’s spokesperson.
The problem is that the claim is false.
• The state’s redevelopment changes and delays caused by the NFL lockout may prevent the city from holding a 2012 vote on a new downtown football stadium, the public voice of the Chargers said.
How Local Asians Failed to Score Big
Local Asian groups, who have long had trouble gaining much political power in city affairs, wanted to get major influence in a new City Council district. But the proposed map of new council districts doesn’t give them the power base they wanted. Why? They faced opposition from some of the communities they wanted in their geographical corner, and they had few allies.
Teenaged Hit Man Convicted in Mexico
A Mexican judge has convicted the 15-year-old boy who gained fame because of accusations that he served as a hitman for a drug cartel and helped to behead four men, the U-T reports. He’ll serve three years in juvenile detention.
The U-T told the sad story of the American-born boy’s life in a series of stories published earlier this month.
• San Diego’s police chief has delayed a public discussion of alleged misconduct by officers. But he has followed through on other promises regarding how to fix things in the department.
Questioning our Reporting on High-Cost Homes for the Poor
A political consultant writes in a commentary that our coverage of the high cost of construction of local affordable homes — it cost almost $600 million to build about 2,100 units — is too distracted by certain numbers to see the big picture. “Measuring the impact — and thus return on investment — of any redevelopment project is incredibly complex and far from an exact science,” he writes.
Not a Strong Showing for Home Prices
The Case-Shiller index showed an increase in home prices in May, but prices would have actually fallen absent the typical springtime bounce.
More Post Offices on Chopping Block
The Postal Service is thinking about closing more than 3,600 post offices, including two in San Diego County: one in Vista, about two miles north of City Hall on East Vista Way, and the other at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot, also known as MCRD. (NYT)
From Clean Needle Exchange to Syringes for Sale
The LAT is editorializing in favor of a proposed state law that would add California to the list of 47 states that allow over-the-counter sale of syringes. The paper says non-prescription sales of syringes could help prevent hundreds of cases of HIV and hepatitis caused by infected needles.
San Diego has a clean-needle exchange program that operates — at least as of 2009 — out of a white camper van in downtown and the North Park neighborhood, as KPBS reported. The city supports the program, but the county board of supervisors has been a vocal opponent.
Please contact Randy Dotinga directly at randydotinga@gmail.com and follow him on Twitter: twitter.com/rdotinga.