Balboa Park visitors can forget about free parking.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The San Diego City Council on Monday OK\u2019d parking fees for Balboa Park. They agreed to delay charging for parking until city staff develop frequent visitor passes, but that move could cost the city millions.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Councilmembers dropped some parking rates for residents and increased rates for tourists and non-residents. The Union-Tribune has more on the rates.<\/a> City staff also plan to release a resident portal in January.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Councilmembers Vivian Moreno and Stephen Whitburn voted no and Raul Campillo was absent.\u00a0<\/p>\n As our City Hall reporter Mariana Mart\u00ednez Barba explained last month, a lot was hanging <\/a>on yesterday\u2019s vote. If the City Council didn\u2019t OK parking rates at the park, it could be forced to do significant mid-year budget cuts.\u00a0<\/p>\n We could still see some cuts. The Independent Budget Analyst\u2019s Office said the Council\u2019s adjustments could have \u201cseveral million dollars impact.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n That\u2019s because the City Council in June passed a budget that relies on a bunch of parking reforms<\/a>, including charging for parking at Balboa Park and the San Diego Zoo. The city reached a deal with the zoo last week.\u00a0<\/p>\n Related: <\/strong>Business leaders in San Diego\u2019s Gaslamp Quarter are fighting the city\u2019s $10 an hour special event parking rates with the internet\u2019s best tool: memes<\/a>. CBS 8 reported that the higher rates <\/a>are hurting workers and scaring off customers.\u00a0<\/p>\n Environment Report: Tijuana River Sewage Updates Are Now Noticeably Less Frequent<\/strong><\/p>\n Before the Trump Administration replaced the commissioner in charge of the Tijuana cross-border and sewage management agency, the public used to get more frequent, and more detailed, updates about the sewage crisis.<\/p>\n Those updates included alerts every time a sewage pump or pipe broke on either side of the border, information on when any repairs would be completed, updates on positive progress and more.<\/p>\n But many of those updates are now harder to find, writes our MacKenzie Elmer.<\/p>\n A spokesperson for Chad McIntosh, the new commissioner of the International Boundary and Water Commission, or IBWC, told Elmer that the public can now find updates on X, formerly Twitter.<\/p>\n But those X updates aren\u2019t quite as thorough as previous alerts used to be, Elmer writes.<\/p>\n Speaking of elusive: <\/strong>Commissioner McIntosh has refused Elmer\u2019s multiple attempts to set up an interview to learn about his vision for the agency.<\/p>\n Read the Environment Report here.<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n Strengthening Audits on the Heels of SD Charter Scandal<\/strong><\/p>\n San Diego became the epicenter of one of the most brazen charter school frauds in California history in 2019. A3 Education and its two founders managed to enroll thousands of students, who never attended a single day of school \u2014 and rake in millions of dollars in the process.\u00a0<\/p>\n The only problem? Understanding the scam was near impossible, until we wrote a series of stories<\/a> explaining it. The grift centered on enrolling athletes, who never actually took any classes. It happened right under regulators\u2019 noses and, as we were the first to report, it exposed massive flaws in the auditing process<\/a>.<\/p>\n As one auditor said during a Grand Jury hearing<\/a>: \u201cI\u2019ve had experiences where, you know, clients have stolen money from the organization through an elaborate scheme that we could not uncover because the client didn\u2019t give all the documents necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n What\u2019s happening now<\/strong>: Legislators have now passed a bill, partly because of what happened with A3, that would expand auditors\u2019 ability to understand the financial dealings at charter schools, as EdSource reported<\/a>. If the bill becomes law, auditors will have to be trained in auditing charter schools and they will have greater power to access charter schools\u2019 records.\u00a0<\/p>\n In Other News<\/strong><\/p>\n The Morning Report was written by Mariana Mart\u00ednez Barba, Will Huntsberry and Tigist Layne. It was edited by Andrea Sanchez-Villafa\u00f1a.\u00a0<\/p>\n \t\n