Morning Report: Endorsement Day Looms for Dems in City Attorney Race

There’s one Republican and four Democrats who’ve thrown their hats into the ring in the race to become San Diego’s next city attorney.

Republican Robert Hickey has things good for now: He’ll have the support of his party and other conservative groups, and the resources those groups bring, on his side. That means the four Dems are locked in a fierce race to marshal the resources of the Democratic Party, which will decide on whether to endorse a candidate next week, Andrew Keatts reports in a new in-depth analysis of the race.

Rafael Castellanos, a port commissioner, and Gil Cabrera, former chairman of the San Diego Ethics Commission, have emerged as the front-runners on the Dem side, raising the most money to help back full city-wide campaigns to get their names in front of potential voters.

Castellanos’ and Cabrera’s campaigns trade a lot of barbs in Keatts’ story, and explain the paths they believe will carry them past the June primary and to a win in November.

“As the vote approaches, it’s become clear that a ‘win’ for Castellanos is getting the endorsement,” writes Keatts.

A “win” for Cabrera and the other Democratic candidates, he says, will be successfully convincing the party not to endorse anyone or to wait to see who makes it through June on their own.

The $1 Million Challenge That Got Swept Under the Rug

In his 2015 State of the City address, Mayor Kevin Faulconer announced a challenge called Innovate San Diego. The winner of said challenge would get $1 million prize for coming up with a clever solution to improve housing, infrastructure or entrepreneurship in the city.

Potential San Diego innovators did not, however, get the chance to clamber to pocket the big-dollar prize. Instead, as VOSD’s Lina Chankar reports, the whole thing just quietly disappeared.

That’s because the challenge was a collaboration between the city, the Union-Tribune and HeroX, a company that specializes in creating prize competitions, and last year when the U-T was sold to its current parent company, Tribune Publishing, the new owners weren’t interested in being part of it. Nobody bothered to tell the public about the challenge’s end, though, and it looks like a few teams even signed up on HeroX’s website in anticipation of winning the money.

Throwing Stones and the Possible Future of Glass Houses for Border Patrol

Throwing rocks at Border Patrol agents might get you shot. That’s according to a new report by a Justice Department official that says Border Patrol officers using firearms to protect themselves from hurled rocks rather than attempting to de-escalate the situation in less deadly ways follows “an astonishing pattern.”

This week’s Border Report includes more about that scathing review and the actual real-world repercussions of Border Patrol agents shooting unarmed immigrants. VOSD contributor Enrique Limón rounds up lots of border-related reads, including one about the local chapter of the National Border Patrol Council who says San Diego Border Patrol agents are pushing management to give them body cameras to help protect them from false accusations.

There’s also stories on why a Justice Department official thinks 3- and 4-year-old kids should be allowed to represent themselves in immigration hearings, a bit about a new Xolos soccer documentary and more.

To Deploy or Not to Deploy Drones

Drones at the beach. Drones doing stunts inside museums. Photographers using drones at weddings. It seems the things are everywhere these days and now the San Diego Sheriff’s Department wants in on the unmanned aerial action.

Sheriff’s Lt. Jason Vickery went on KPBS’s Midday Edition to talk about his department’s desire to deploy drones. He said they could help with wildfires, SWAT standoffs and other dangerous situations.

Privacy advocates are, of course, unhappy, calling the machines “capable of invasive surveillance” and urging the Sheriff’s Department to do more to get the public involved in the process of deciding whether they want local law enforcement officials flying drones.

L.A. Times: Faulconer a ‘Likely’ Gov Candidate

With the 2016 elections in full swing, the Los Angeles Times decided to jump ahead and take a look at the 2018 California governor’s race.

Mayor Kevin Faulconer is one of eight politicians named a likely candidate for the job. While the Times gave ol’ K-Faulc a pat on the back for winning a race in a majority-Democratic city, he also gets rapped for his reputation for playing it safe.

Other News to Consume With Your Coffee

• “Bought by China” may become as ubiquitous as “Made in China” if current trends keep up. The iconic Hotel del Coronado is one of the latest pieces of property swooped up by Chinese investors. The red-roofed hotel was sold as part of a mega $6.5 billion deal between the hotel group that owns it and a Chinese company. (NBC 7 San Diego)

• The New York Times made a trek to Liberty Station in Point Loma and dropped in on the comic book publishers who’ve been running a comic-themed art gallery there.

• Comic-Con could be coming to a TV near you. A partnership between the annual pop-culture event and Lionsgate is supposed to soon result in a new on-demand channel available to subscribers. Gizmodo’s i09 website has more on what sort of content you can expect on the Comic-Con channel.

• The so-called Medicare “reimbursement gap” is narrowing in San Diego. The U-T reports that “Medicare payments to San Diego health providers will rise between 6 percent and 9 percent.” The hope is that more money means eventually more doctors will want to practice in the region and quality of care could ultimately increase.

• ICYMI: “This American Life” discovered the saga of the seals at La Jolla Cove.