EAST COUNTY ROUNDUP: LOCAL AND STATEWIDE NEWS

September 26, 2020 (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

• How One District Got Its Students Back Into Classrooms (New York Times)
• Two arrested as feds shut down Kumeyaay border wall occupation camp (San Diego Union-Tribune)
• County approves charter high school (San Diego Union-Tribune)
• San Miguel Fire District figuring out how to fill a seat no one wants (San Diego Union-Tribune)
• Grossmont College president to resign (Pagesuite)
• Duane Pillsbury, rancher, conservationist, husband of Joan Embery, dies at 91 (San Diego Union-Tribune)

STATE

• California’s COVID-19 positivity rate drops below 3% for the first time  (Los Angeles Times)
•  Coronavirus: California’s numbers keep trending in right direction  (San Jose Mercury News)
• California pauses unemployment amid coronavirus pandemic (10 News)
• California passes bill to allow former inmates who served on fire crews to pursue a career in fire (Wildfire Today)

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

LOCAL

How One District Got Its Students Back Into Classrooms (New York Times)

Cajon Valley in California is doing something that many lower-income districts have postponed: offering in-person instruction.

Two arrested as feds shut down Kumeyaay border wall occupation camp (San Diego Union-Tribune)

Activists supporting the Kumeyaay used ceremonial prayer to halt construction near Campo.

County approves charter high school (San Diego Union-Tribune)

… the San Diego County Planning Commission on Friday unanimously approved a plan by a local charter school organization to build a new high school in rural Rancho San Diego.  Literacy First Charter Schools got the go-ahead for a major-use permit to move its Liberty Charter High School…to an undeveloped site at Chase Avenue and Jamacha Road…The project was twice denied earlier this year by the local planning group in Valle de Oro and has received pushback from residents They have vowed to appeal the decision to the county Board of Supervisors.

San Miguel Fire District figuring out how to fill a seat no one wants (San Diego Union-Tribune)

What if they held an election and no one ran for an open seat? That’s the case right now at the San Miguel Consolidated Fire District, the county’s largest… Because no one filed nomination papers for the seat in area 6, Fire Chief Criss Brainard told the governing board at a recent meeting, it may be filled by appointment by the San Diego County Board of Supervisors….historically, the Board of Supervisors looks to the current sitting board for recommendations on a person to fill an empty seat.

Grossmont College president to resign (Pagesuite)

Grossmont College President Nabil Abu-Ghazaleh announced Wednesday that he will be leaving his post effective January 2021…the district will announce plans in the coming weeks for an interim president and the presidential search process.

Duane Pillsbury, rancher, conservationist, husband of Joan Embery, dies at 91 (San Diego Union-Tribune)

Lakeside ranch owner and conservationist Duane Pillsbury sometimes took a back seat to his wife of nearly 42 years, local icon and national celebrity Joan Embery, but he never minded. In fact, he usually laughed about it. Embery, an animal and environmental advocate, captivated the country in the 1970s with her appearances on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, always accompanied by a menagerie of animals. For more than three decades, she was a goodwill ambassador to the San Diego Zoo’s Zoological Society of San Diego, 

STATE

California’s COVID-19 positivity rate drops below 3% for the first time  (Los Angeles Times)

 The share of Californians who tested positive for COVID-19 in the last week dipped below 3% for the first time, a sign that the Golden State is finally starting to beat back the spread of the coronavirus, officials said Monday. 

Coronavirus: California’s numbers keep trending in right direction  (San Jose Mercury News)

Compared to two weeks ago, California’s hospitalizations are down 22%; ICUs down 27%, at lowest point on record. Evan Webeck in the San Jose Mercury$ -- 9/24/20

California pauses unemployment amid coronavirus pandemic (10 News)

Starting Sunday, the California Employment Development Department stopped taking new unemployment applications amid the coronavirus pandemic… “These new changes will not cause payment delays and allows EDD to pay customers sooner by verifying identities in an easier, faster way. Once UI Online is available for new applications on October 5, 2020, claims will be backdated to cover this time period,” according to the department.

California passes bill to allow former inmates who served on fire crews to pursue a career in fire (Wildfire Today)

The California legislature has passed a bill, AB 2147, that would allow former prisoners who worked on inmate fire crews to pursue a career in firefighting. The  bill authored by Assemblywoman Eloise Gomez Reyes will allow nonviolent offenders who have logged time fighting fires on inmate crews while incarcerated, an opportunity to have their records expunged upon release, allowing them to become firefighters. Released inmates who have successfully petitioned a judge to expunge their records and waive parole time, will also have the ability to apply for an emergency medical technician’s license.