One of the places in town where the sixth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks were remembered was at Chicago Title and Valley Center Insurance where they displayed a very large flag on Tuesday.
The Sept. 1 Palomar Mountain Volunteer Fire Dept. barbecue was probably the biggest ever, even though it was interrupted mid-afternoon by a torrential downpour.
The rains made some vendors and some visitors leave, thinking the event was over.
The event included barbecue beef and chicken, demonstrations, a drawing and lots of booths.
Early estimates are that the event raised between $9,000–$10,000 with not all of the receipts in.
The fund-raiser is the main source of income for the volunteer fire department, which, in addition to guarding against fires, also rescues and treats car and motorcycle accident victims.
Illegal aliens cost San Diego $255 million annually, according to a study just released.
The lion’s share, $155 million, is what area hospitals spend to treat illegals annually, although that is actually not part of the County budget.
The study was done at the urging of Supervisor Bill Horn, who wanted the amount quantified so that the County can go after the federal government to be reimbursed.
The study, “Estimating the Cost to the County of San Diego, California, of Services Delivered to Undocumented Immigrants During FY 2006-07” was prepared by John R. Weeks, Ph.D. and David M. Eisenberg, Ph.D.
According to the study the total “estimated impact” of illegals on County government was $101,494,401 for fiscal year 2006-07.
Of this, about $75 million were costs associated with the impact of illegals on criminal justice. The rest was due to health and human service and environmental impacts.
According to the report, “The total impact of $101 million can be divided by the estimated number of undocumented immigrants in 2006 to produce a per undocumented immigrant impact of $527 per year. Looked at from the taxpayer cost perspective, the cost per legal resident of San Diego County in 2006 was $35.31.”
The study notes that illegal aliens as a percentage of the population have doubled since 1990 but their cost per capita to the County has tripled.
Horn is NOT considering introducing a law that would deprive illegals of county services, as has been done by a county in Virginia.
“But what I do want is to be paid for services,” he said. “I want to find out what it is actually costing my taxpayers, and it’s not being used because the money is being sucked away.”
Horn commissioned the report last year when he was board chairman.
“In 2006 when I gave the State of the County address I got frustrated because I was looking for actual hard costs,” Horn told The Roadrunner, adding, “It’s a very difficult number to get from anybody. So in May of 2006 I asked to commission a study to get the hard costs.”
The study estimates that there are 270,000 illegals in the county, a number Horn calls, “very conservative. It’s nowhere near what I think it is. But even based on those numbers this is pretty astronomical.”
The study estimates that illegal aliens account for 6.5% or $7.7 million of the $119 million budget of the district attorney.
It accounts for $43 million of the Sheriff’s $540.4 million budget.
“These are people who have committed a crime, are on probation but are in the country illegally,” he said.
Horn added that just looking at the impact on local hospitals the cost to serve illegals is $804 per person.
Horn is working with Representative Brian Bilbray (R-50th District) to make the federal government aware of the impact illegal immigration has on local government.
He wants Congress to address laws such as the Older Americans Act, which forbids asking legal status before grant-ing services.
“There’s a number of those laws on the the books that prevent us from asking those questions,” said Horn.
“The failed border controls have an impact on my taxpayers. I could be going after gangs to make streets safer for legal residents if I had that money.”
The supervisor would like to see a system in place where if a person is arrested and convicted of a crime, and then later deported to Mexico, that person would be on a national data base. That way if deputies in San Diego encounter him they will know that they can deport him again.
Horn concluded, “This is the first time anyone has gotten a handle on this. I got a lot of resistance on people not wanting to give out the numbers.”
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One of two professors who conducted the study, John R. Weeks, of the Department of Geography at San Diego State University, has written college texts on demography as well as 60 articles and book chapters and 40 research reports during his 30-year career.
Enrollment at the VC-Pauma school district is down for the sixth year in a row.
At Thursday’s board meeting Supt. Lou Obermeyer reported that the district has lost 72 students from what it had last year during the first week of school.
Student enrollment for all of the campuses is around 4,392.
This decline doesn’t make Valley Center-Pauma unique by any means. More than half of the school districts in the county are losing students.
Ramona is down 61 students; Fallbrook is down 30-50 students; Vista Unified has lost 95; Escondido Union District lost 232 students from last year.
Districts in decline represent 62% of the student population in the state.
“Our district isn’t at the level of statewide decline,” said Dr. Obermeyer.
There is some good news. There are more students transferring into the district from other districts than are transferring out of the district. One hundred and thirteen students transferred out and 154 transferred in.
So far the decline has caused the district not to replace six regular teachers who were lost by attrition, including three at the primary school, two at Lilac Elementary and one at the high school.
Low enrollment at Palomar
Enrollment is at seven students for the Palomar Mountain School, where it had been anticipated, and the mountain community had promised, that 11 students would be enrolled.
The district is waiting for word from Sacramento whether the legislation that has been passed that would provide funding for the mountain school that would allow the district to run it at a loss.
Dr. Obermeyer told The Roadrunner this week: “Seven students at Palomar is down from the 11 that was anticipated and the state funding will be critical as we make decisions about what we are going to do about the school.”
Those seven students include three eighth graders who will be graduating at the end of this year.
Hampered by low attendance that required unanimous consent, the VC planning group Monday failed to act to allow the Northern Village Town Center to proceed.
Only eight of the normal 15 member board were present. By its bylaws any decision must be by eight votes, even if only eight are present.
The developers, Jerry Gaughan and Napoleon Zervas, are seeking a PPA (Permission to Plan Amendment) from the County to allow them to apply for the GPA (General Plan Amendment) to develop 45 acres bounded by VC Road and Cole Grade Road, adjacent to land owned by Herb Schaeffer.
In other words, they need permission from the County in order to apply for a GPA. They asked the planning group to endorse them going forward with the process. The County gave them 45 days to complete this PPA process, with a Sept. 15 deadline.
The County is requiring Guaghan and Zervas to work in tandem with the Schaeffer shopping center project. They are required to produce common elements, particularly sewage treatment plants, water reclamation and roads.
Monday Gaughan said that the County is concentrating to meld traffic flows of the two projects. He and members of the planning group’s North Village subcommittee have been meeting regularly working out these details.
The subcommittee has reservations about some aspects of the project, and made no recommendation to the group on whether to support the PPA.
One reason they did so, according to subcommittee Chairman Deborah Hofler is that, while they liked the design, “We have absolutely no guarantee that you [Guaghan] won’t sell it tomorrow to someone who will increase the density.”
She added, “There are still a lot of questions of how it will interact with Schaeffer's property. There were a lot of half-answered questions. That’s why the subcommittee wanted more time to get those questions answered.”
Gaughan explained his company’s reasoning behind seeking the GPA instead of waiting for the County’s General Plan 2020 to be completed.
“GP 2020 has been ‘next year, next year,’ for so long,” he said. If they don’t move along, Schaeffer's project will already have built a sewer plant on its own. “There won’t have any hook-ups for anybody,” he said. He would prefer to build the plant in conjunction with Schaeffer's project.
In asking the planning group to vote for the PPA, Gaughan explained, “This in no way is approval. All this is is allowing us to start submitting. This is an 18-month process,” he said.
Some planners were reluctant to vote on the issue.
John Coulombe commented: “Am I alone in thinking that I don’t have enough information to cast a vote.”
“I feel the same way,” said Leon Schwartz.
“You’re not alone,” added Terry Van Koughnett.
The problem for Gaughan’s group is that the PPA requires a decision by the County by Sept. 15. The deadline could possibly be extended, but the County wants comments from concerned parties, including the planning group, before then.
Hofler noted that the PPA was not approving anything other than granting permission to proceed.
She said she was for voting for the PPA, and including the points the group wants addressed in coming months.
“It puts the planning department on notice that this is the kind of development we want for everything,” said Hofler. She said that the plan includes natural trails and preserves many of the oaks on the property.
“They are doing what we have been asking other developers to do without beating their heads against the wall. They are trying to keep the natural landscape as much as possible,” she said.
Schwartz dug in his heels. “I don’t feel comfortable voting for this at all,” he said. “I’ve got a real problem with it. We’ve been burned several times in the past when we rushed into something. There’s a lot here. There’s an awful lot here. Every time we short the process we get burned.”
Gaughan added, “We either start the application or nothing happens.”
Van Koughnett asked: “Can’t we just send a letter say that we are not ready and ask them to extend the deadline?”
“I feel like it would be nice for the County to be aware of what our concerns are so that they can be addressed at day one,” said Dr. Hofler.
The group voted on one motion: to write a letter to the Board of Supervisors and Dept. of Planning & Land Use saying that they are not ready, they would like to continue it and listing 11 objections that they want addressed. However, the motion failed with a 7-0-1 vote with Leon Schwartz abstaining.
The San Pasqual Band of Mission Indians was recently recognized by the VC Lacrosse Foundation for their support of youth lacrosse. Morgan Rogers, president of the Foundation, and several players, presented President/CEO Joe Navarro and Vice President Al Cope of the San Pasqual Casino Development Group, Inc., with a special custom wooden lacrosse stick signed by some of the youth players for their contributions to the Foundation the past three years.
The Valley Roadrunner
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