What We Learned This Week

Over the last couple weeks, several people – some of them journalists – have reached out to me wanting to talk about my time working in Washington D.C.

They all said something along the lines of “I remember when X happened to you … ” and wondered whether I wanted to talk about it. Here’s the thing, though: They all were inquiring about different incidents. And none of them were the one that I remember as being the most traumatic and disruptive to my life.

I share this not because of how surprising it might seem – look at how much I’ve been harassed! – I share this because of how unsurprising, commonplace and routine it truly is.

A few days after one of those emails came in, I found myself waiting for a journalist’s call while simultaneously offering feedback to one of my own reporters who’s investigating one of many tips about sexual harassment or abuse that have rolled in over the last several weeks.

That is to say, if you’re a woman, harassment is often everywhere, and it doesn’t stay neatly tucked into one corner of your life. (Men, keep this in mind when your initial reaction to hearing a woman’s story or allegations against a man is to profess shock.)

I don’t have any unique insights beyond that, except to say that I’ve been on both sides of it: experiencing harassment in many weird, different ways and also as a journalist investigating other people’s stories. If you’ve got a story you’re ready to tell and would like to talk with someone about it, email me at sara.libby@voiceofsandiego.org.

What VOSD Learned This Week

The anti-vacation rental crowd has started focusing its fire on one of the City Council members who tried to craft a compromise proposal, Councilman Chris Ward.

Lost track of where we’re even at in the never-ending debate about Airbnb and other short-term rentals? Lisa Halverstadt created this FAQ to get you caught up.

The process of regulating rentals got held up because of a surprising memo from City Attorney Mara Elliott.

Elliott has been full of surprises over the last year. The latest one: She believes the city’s recreation councils, the obscure groups that run programs and collect money for local rec centers, are improperly empowered to spend city funds – and that the whole system needs reworking.

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A survey of San Diego Unified principals and other administrators reveals chaos at local schools: Because of budget cuts, clerical jobs go unfilled, tech problems go unresolved and principals are forced to do janitorial work like cleaning up vomit.

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Back in February, Kelly Davis reported that SDPD has managed to circumvent state law on collecting DNA samples from juveniles. The young man at the center of that case sued the department after a judge found officers violated his rights. Not long after he filed the lawsuit, SDPD officers placed the young man into the state CALGang database.

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Mexico’s consul general in San Diego, Marcela Celorio, tells Maya Srikrishnan in a Q-and-A that working here has made her rethink the nature of citizenship and identity.

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In case you need a GIF of a gushing poop river in order to understand how local sewage spills play out in real life, Ry Rivard has you covered.

What I’m Reading

• When word got out a married couple in Montana – one a Republican, one a Democrat – was running against each other for a U.S. Senate seat, tons of media outlets raced to cover them. Turns out, there’s a lot more to the story. (Billings Gazette)
• Whoa: “More than a dozen travelers from across the country have said TripAdvisor muzzled their first-hand stories of blackouts, rapes and other ways they were injured while vacationing in Mexico.” (Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel)
• Michelin-starred chef Jose Andres, American hero, is feeding more Puerto Ricans than the Red Cross and the Salvation Army. (New York Times)
• George Papadopoulos is a very common Greek name, so it’s been pretty awkward for all the George Papadopoulouses who weren’t ensnared in the Russia investigation this week. (Wall Street Journal)
• You know that fist-pumping feeling you get when an article *perfectly* captures and articulates something that’s been frustrating you? I got that from this piece on the overuse of the word “allegedly” amid the explosion of sexual harassment and abuse scandals. (Deadspin)

Line of the Week

“It’s pizza that tastes the way long-distance bus travel feels.” – A simple and perfect description of Papa John’s.