EAST COUNTY ROUNDUP: LOCAL AND STATEWIDE NEWS

November 1, 2017 (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

• Charges For Ambulance Rides To Rise In San Diego (KPBS)
• Amid crackdown, homeless move to the river (Voice of San Diego)
• New Report Shows Military Spending Supported 22 Percent Of San Diego Jobs (KPBS)
• Hundreds Sickened At San Diego Marine Corps Depot, Some With E. Coli KPBS)
• SDG&E proposes customer rebates for San Onofre failure, but it's not much (SD Union-Tribune)
• Sempra takes write-down on 2007 San Diego wildfire costs (SD Union-Tribune)
• Christian College Can’t Explain $20 Million In Expenses; Agency Cites ‘Very Sketchy’ Budget (KPBS)
• La Mesa to start pilot program for 6 p.m. Council meetings in 2018 (San Diego Union-Tribune)
• African life, death shaped remarkable marathon star Keflezhigi (San Diego Union-Tribune)
• Padres name Skip Schumaker first base coach (Gaslamp Ball)

STATE

• Proposed bill would block utilities from passing wildfire costs to customers (SF Chronicle)
• CPUC Postpones SDG&E Fire Settlement Vote For Third Time  (KPBS)
• Proposed initiative would end early release for some crimes, allow more DNA collection (Los Angeles Times)
• Firefighters fully contain deadly Atlas Fire (San Francisco Chronicle)

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

LOCAL

Charges for Ambulance Rides to Rise in San Diego (KPBS)

Patient charges for ambulance rides will rise by 9 percent in San Diego beginning Wednesday and an additional 15 percent on Jan. 1

Amid crackdown, homeless move to the river (Voice of San Diego)

Homeless people don’t cease to exist when they’re forced to move along. They just move elsewhere. And as Ry Rivard found, more homeless San Diegans have moved near the Mission Valley stretch of the San Diego River recently, as police enforcement has ramped up downtown. Rivard reports that the San Diego River Park Foundation found 101 homeless camps during its latest count, more than it’s ever counted …

New Report Shows Military Spending Supported 22 Percent of San Diego Jobs (KPBS)

The military sector accounted for an estimated $25.2 billion in direct spending in San Diego County during the fiscal year that ended June 30, the San Diego Military Advisory Council announced Friday.

Hundreds Sickened At San Diego Marine Corps Depot, Some With E. Coli KPBS)

An outbreak of diarrheal illnesses, including cases of E. coli infection, has sickened about 300 Marines-in-training at Marine Corps Depot San Diego along with some personnel at Camp Pendleton over the last week, base officials announced Tuesday.

SDG&E proposes customer rebates for San Onofre failure, but it's not much (SD Union-Tribune)

The good news for San Diego Gas & Electric customers is the utility recovered more than $12 million from manufacturers of the equipment that knocked the San Onofre nuclear plant offline — and ratepayers get a share. / The bad news is, SDG&E spent almost all of it on litigation and customers will benefit from refunds of less than $400,000, the utility said. That’s not much spread across 1.4 million electric meters.

Sempra takes write-down on 2007 San Diego wildfire costs (SD Union-Tribune)

Sempra Energy — the parent company of San Diego Gas & Electric — disclosed during its third-quarter earnings call Monday it is taking a $208 million after-tax write-down in case the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) rejects SDG&E’s request to pass $379 million in costs from 2007’s deadly…

Christian College Can’t Explain $20 Million in Expenses; Agency Cites ‘Very Sketchy’ Budget (KPBS)

San Diego Christian College, a nearly 50-year-old nonprofit school in Santee, can’t account for more than $20 million in expenses that are supposed to be detailed on its public tax returns.

La Mesa to start pilot program for 6 p.m. Council meetings in 2018 (San Diego Union-Tribune)

Meeting times of the La Mesa City Council have changed several times over the years — and they’re about to change again in 2018.

African life, death shaped remarkable marathon star Keflezhigi (San Diego Union-Tribune)

On the rock where Meb Keflezighi stood, one brother fought for life as an oozing leg wound dried in the sun. Mere meters away, cacti tore at two older brothers while shrouding them from Ethiopian soldiers. Within uncomfortably easy earshot, an explosion shredded a childhood friend. So much to relive, everywhere he looked. Almost too much. When thousands of pistons in sneakers invade Central Park for the New York City Marathon on Nov. 5, a person with a singularly resilient set of legs and lungs who bent the ear of three presidents…and represented the United States in four Olympics will thunder across a finish line three decades in the making.

Padres name Skip Schumaker first base coach (Gaslampball.com)

The former utility man spent the past two seasons in the Padres’ front office.

STATE

Proposed bill would block utilities from passing wildfire costs to customers (SF Chronicle)

Four California legislators on Monday said they plan to introduce a bill that would bar electric utilities from passing on to their customers the costs of wildfires caused by the companies’ negligence. The move comes as investigators are exploring whether Pacific Gas and Electric Co. power lines played a role in starting this month’s Wine Country wildfires, which killed at least 43 people. And San Diego Gas and Electric Co. has asked state regulators for permission to make its customers pay some of the costs of settling lawsuits triggered by a deadly series of fires in 2007.

CPUC Postpones SDG&E Fire Settlement Vote for Third Time  (KPBS)

The California Public Utilities Commission on Thursday postponed for a third time a decision on whether San Diego Gas & Electric can charge ratepayers for costs related to the 2007 wildfires.  

Proposed initiative would end early release for some crimes, allow more DNA collection (Los Angeles Times)

 A coalition including police officers and prosecutors on Monday proposed a California state initiative that would end early release of rapists and child traffickers and expand the number of crimes for which authorities could collect DNA samples from those convicted

Firefighters fully contain deadly Atlas Fire (San Francisco Chronicle)

The Atlas Fire, which burned 51,624 acres in Napa and Solano counties, was fully contained Friday night, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. The Redwood Valley Fire, which killed eight people in Mendocino County and burned an estimated 36,523 acres was 100 percent contained on Thursday.Both the Nuns Fire, which has scored 56,556 acres, and the Tubbs Fire, which has burned 36,807 acres, were 97 percent contained as of Saturday.