EAST COUNTY ROUNDUP: LOCAL AND STATEWIDE NEWS

December 13, 2018 (San Diego's East County) -- East County Roundup highlights top stories of interest to East County and San Diego’s inland regions, published in other media. This week’s top “Roundup” headlines include:

LOCAL

• Congressman  Hunter’s fraud trial begins next year (The Alpine Sun)
• 32 faith leaders arrested in border demonstration (San Diego Union-Tribune)
• Troops begin to draw down from Trump border assignment (CBS)
• Del Mar cliff collapse forces stoppage of train services (10 News)
• Amazon team delivers, then steals package in El Cajon (10 News)
• Helix Water District looking to add events center at Lake Jennings (SDUT)
• San Diego Leads State in Whooping Cough Cases (NBC)
• Caravan family needing medical care allowed to enter U.S. (10 News)
• MTS’s Old Board Is Rushing to Adopt a New Fare Payment System  (Voice of San Diego)
• Data Shows San Diego Officials Misled the Public on Potential Source of Lead in Water (Voice of SD)
• San Diego Is a City of Transplants – But That’s Changing (Voice of SD)
• Domestic slayings: Brutal and foreseeable (Washington Post)

STATE

• Sacramento Report: Redevelopment and a Controversial Housing Bill Are Poised for Comebacks (Voice of San Diego)
• Trump administration poised to strip protections from up to 80% of California waters, millions of acres nationwide (Los Angeles Times)
• California's deadliest wildfire is blamed in lawsuit on faulty utility transmission tower (NBC News)
• Former California GOP officials call on state Republicans to renounce Trump's rhetoric and 'nationalism metastasizing in the party'  (Los Angeles Times)

For excerpts and links to full stories, click “read more” and scroll down.

LOCAL

Congressman  Hunter’s fraud trial begins next year (The Alpine Sun)

A judge on Monday set a Sept. 10, 2019 trial date for Congress­man Duncan Hunter and his wife who are accused of unlaw­fully using campaign funds for personal expenses. Both Duncan D. Hunter, 41, and his estranged wife, Mar­garet Hunter, 43, waived their right to have a speedy trial be­fore U.S. District Court Judge Thomas Whelan.

32 faith leaders arrested in border demonstration (San Diego Union-Tribune)

More than 30 people, mostly faith leaders, were arrested Monday as part of a peaceful demonstration in which some participants purposefully resisted officials' orders to move away from the border barrier. Between 300 and 400 people, many faith and community leaders from across the country, marched down the beach to the southwest corner of the U.S. in Border Field State Park to call for protection for migrants and the right to seek asylum.

Troops begin to draw down from Trump border assignment (CBS)

The U.S. this week will begin withdrawing many of the active duty troops sent to the border with Mexico by President Trump just before the midterm election in response to a caravan of Central American migrants, U.S. officials said Monday. About 2,200 of the active duty troops will be pulled out before the holidays…

Del Mar cliff collapse forces stoppage of train services (10 News)

Train service in the North County was temporarily stopped after a portion of a cliff collapsed in Del Mar Monday morning.

Amazon team delivers, then steals package in El Cajon (10 News)

An El Cajon woman watched in disbelief Sunday night as her Amazon package was stolen by the very people who delivered it.

Helix Water District looking to add events center at Lake Jennings (San Diego Union-Tribune)

Looking for a scenic site to hold your next business convention, school event, family reunion or fancy soiree? How about Lake Jennings?

San Diego Leads State in Whooping Cough Cases (NBC)

For the past three years, San Diego County has had the highest occurrence of whooping cough, or pertussis, than any other county in the state, according to data from the California Department of Public Health.

Caravan family needing medical care allowed to enter U.S. (!0 News)

… Juan Alberto and his daughter, Leslie, are now in the U.S. where she can receive medical care that was not available to her in the shelters south of the border. The pair were temporarily paroled into the United States before they make their asylum claim. Seven-year-old Leslie has cerebral palsy and ran out of medication shortly after her father began the journey from Honduras…. Juan joined the caravan in Central America and pushed his daughter thousands of miles in a stroller to Tijuana…”I’ve never seen anything like it,” said Mark Lane with the Minority Humanitarian Foundation.

MTS’s Old Board Is Rushing to Adopt a New Fare Payment System  (Voice of San Diego)

If the 10-year, $37 million contract is approved, it would represent a major decision being made in the board’s last meeting of the year, just weeks before as much of a third of its board members will be replaced because they lost elections or were termed out of office.

Data Shows San Diego Officials Misled the Public on Potential Source of Lead in Water (Voice of SD)

The city isn’t sure what 192,000 of its water lines are made of. No other major California cities have such a massive gap in recordkeeping – one that could cost the city between $192 million and $960 million if it doesn’t take drastic steps to account for the make of those lines in the next 18 months.

San Diego Is a City of Transplants – But That’s Changing (Voice of SD)

Only about 46 percent of people living in San Diego were born in San Diego, according to 2017 Census data. That’s a bit lower than the 55 percent in California as a whole who’ve remained in their home state, or the 58 percent who’ve remained in their home states nationwide.

Domestic slayings: Brutal and foreseeable (Washington Post)

….In San Diego, 51 percent of women killed in the city during the past decade were murdered by an intimate partner, the highest of 47 major cities in a Washington Post analysis of solved murder cases. The analysis also found that in five of those cities, including San Diego, one-third of all men who killed a current or former intimate partner were publicly known to be a potential threat to their loved one ahead of the attack….

STATE

Sacramento Report: Redevelopment and a Controversial Housing Bill Are Poised for Comebacks (Voice of San Diego)

The Legislature will officially reconvene early next year, but this week offered a glimpse at the big priorities and fights to come … including the most high-profile bill from last session, a measure by Sen. Scott Weiner to make it far easier to build housing near transit. The new version of the bill attempts to address various groups’ concerns that killed it last time….San Diego leaders including Mayor Kevin Faulconer and Assemblyman Todd Gloria have for years, decried the loss of redevelopment dollars that were once a major funding source for low-income housing….Now Gloria is one of many state legislators rallying behind a revised version of the program.

Trump administration poised to strip protections from up to 80% of California waters, millions of acres nationwide (Los Angeles Times)

At stake are billions of dollars in potential development rights, the quality of drinking water and rules that affect farming in much of the country, as well as wildlife habitat for most of the nation’s migratory birds and many other species.

California's deadliest wildfire is blamed in lawsuit on faulty utility transmission tower (NBC News)

 A lawsuit claims the Camp Fire, which killed at least 88 people, was started by a faulty transmission tower that brought dangerous live wires crashing down.

Former California GOP officials call on state Republicans to renounce Trump's rhetoric and 'nationalism metastasizing in the party'  (Los Angeles Times)

 Five former political directors of the California Republican Party have called on state GOP leadership to renounce nationalist speech used by President Trump as well as candidates who embrace “messages of hatred, division and rhetoric that divides us by race.”