EAST COUNTY ROUNDUP: LOCAL AND STATEWIDE NEWS

November 14, 2019 (San Diego) -- East County Roundup highlights top stories of interest to East County and San Diego's inland regions, published in other media.  This week's round-up stories include:  

LOCAL

• Federal agents raid four San Diego homes in money laundering investigation (10 News)
• Detectives Smash Alleged International Cell Phone Theft Ring in El Cajon, Bay Area (NBC 7)
• Prosecutors: Hunter couldn’t afford daughter’s dance lessons, spent campaign funds on trip to competition (San Diego Union-Tribune)
• San Diego officials say they won’t sell private data from smart street lights (San Diego Union-Tribune)
• Joint Powers Authority formed to oversee East County water purification project (San Diego Union-Tribune)
• Morning Report: Hundreds of California Police Officers Have Been Convicted of Crimes (Voice of San Diego)

STATE

• Generators are a hot commodity: Here’s what you need to know about buying one for the next outage (San Jose Mercury News)
• California’s new gig economy law challenged in court by truck drivers (Sacramento Bee)
• Can the long-lost abalone make a comeback in California? (Los Angeles Times)
• ICE may circumvent California’s ban on private immigrant detention centers (Los Angeles Times)
• Fed up with Forest Service cuts, Mammoth Lakes and other towns are plotting a recreation takeover (Los Angeles Times)
• My Neighborhood Was on Fire. My Neighbors Came Together to Save It. (New York Times)

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

LOCAL

Federal agents raid four San Diego homes in money laundering investigation (10 News)

Local and federal authorities raided four San Diego County homes Wednesday as part of a money laundering investigation. Agents served one of those warrants at an El Cajon home at about 7 a.m., according to neighbors.

Detectives Smash Alleged International Cell Phone Theft Ring in El Cajon, Bay Area (NBC 7)

Police say a statewide stolen cell phone ring was run out of storefronts like MJ Wireless in El Cajon. The operation allegedly netted more than a million dollars for its mastermind.

Prosecutors: Hunter couldn’t afford daughter’s dance lessons, spent campaign funds on trip to competition (San Diego Union-Tribune)

Prosecutors argued in court filing that Hunter’s new attorney’s firm represents witnesses who testified before grand jury .

San Diego officials say they won’t sell private data from smart street lights (San Diego Union-Tribune)

Controversy over data generated from San Diego’s 4,200 “smart street lights” continues to brew. City attorney candidate Cory Briggs is alleging at campaign appearances and on his website that City Attorney Mara Elliott was negligent for approving the 2016 contract between the city and General Electric to provide thousands of the street lights, which have video and audio sensors. Briggs is contending that the lights are a violation of people’s privacy and that San Diego’s data has likely been collected and sold off.

Joint Powers Authority formed to oversee East County water purification project (San Diego Union-Tribune)

Padre Dam, El Cajon and the county of San Diego are all partners, with Helix an ex-officio member

Morning Report: Hundreds of California Police Officers Have Been Convicted of Crimes (Voice of San Diego)

More than 80 law enforcement officers working today in California are convicted criminals, with rap sheets that include everything from animal cruelty to manslaughter. At least six continue to work in San Diego County and one in Imperial County. 

STATE

Generators are a hot commodity: Here’s what you need to know about buying one for the next outage (San Jose Mercury News)

Industry professionals say ‘start your research sooner rather than later’

California’s new gig economy law challenged in court by truck drivers (Sacramento Bee)

The California Trucking Association on Tuesday filed a federal lawsuit challenging a new state new that will force businesses to treat more workers as employees entitled to benefits like overtime pay and sick leave.

Can the long-lost abalone make a comeback in California? (Los Angeles Times)

…They’re the unsung canary in the coal mine — their vanishing numbers sounding the alarm of human greed and the perils we face as the land and oceans burn. Abalone once were to California what lobster is to Maine and blue crab to Maryland...Californians held abalone bakes, spun abalone folk tales, sang abalone love songs. They grew large and hardy and fetched extraordinary prices. One diver once said it was like pulling $100 bills from the seafloor. But we loved them almost to death.

ICE may circumvent California’s ban on private immigrant detention centers (Los Angeles Times)

 Last month, California became the first state to kick out privately run immigrant detention centers. A new law that also bans private prisons prohibits new contracts or changes to existing ones after Jan. 1 and phases out existing detention facilities entirely by 2028.

Fed up with Forest Service cuts, Mammoth Lakes and other towns are plotting a recreation takeover (Los Angeles Times)

…Something has to change,” Mammoth Lakes Councilman John Wentworth said. “The Forest Service is overwhelmed,” he said, by 21st century challenges its founders could never have imagined: climate change, budget cuts, electric mountain bikes. Wentworth leads an ambitious and controversial proposal that would allow Eastern Sierra cities and counties to fund, staff and maintain tourism and recreation projects, including some that have lingered for decades in the Forest Service’s deferred maintenance backlog, which totals more than $5.2 billion nationwide.

My Neighborhood Was on Fire. My Neighbors Came Together to Save It. (New York Times)

I spent five days last year fighting the California wildfires in Malibu. It felt like the combat patrols I had been on as a Marine in Afghanistan.