May 15, 2025 • 44 mins
Imperial Beach Mayor Paloma Aguirre shares her inspirational bi-national journey from surfing college student to passionate environmentalist to elected official. Paloma is currently running for San Diego County Board of Supervisors District 1 (special election will take place July 1, 2025).
On X: @paloma4D1
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the Hangout Podcast.
I'm your host, david Shredda.
On this show, we haveconversations with interesting
and inspiring people, and theguest for today's episode,
paloma Aguirre, is no exception.
Paloma is currently the mayorof Imperial Beach, california,
(00:24):
and a candidate for the countysupervisor seat for District 1
here in San Diego County.
As mayor of Imperial Beach, shehas led the fight to clean up
the Tijuana River sewage crisis,securing over $600 million in
federal funds to stop toxicpollution from flowing into the
(00:44):
South County of San Diego.
We talk in great depth anddetail about the sewage crisis,
what the roots are and how itrequires true and authentic
binational cooperation andcollaboration in terms of coming
up with effective, long-lastingsolutions.
(01:06):
Paloma, prior to becoming mayor,was a community organizer and
an environmentalist, and in 2014, was named Woman of the Year
for her relentless fight to getgovernment to act on the Tijuana
River sewage crisis.
Paloma is up for the electionon July 1st, so anyone living
(01:29):
within San Diego County who iseligible to vote please jot that
down on your calendar and makeyour voices heard on that
important day.
And as part of this importantprocess, paloma is engaging,
passionate and clearly committedto the residents of Imperial
(01:50):
Beach and of the county and,rather than seeing herself as a
career politician, she seesherself as a career servant of
the people.
I hope you enjoy thisconversation as much as I did.
Welcome Mayor Aguirre.
Thank you so much for joiningus this afternoon.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
It's a pleasure to be with you.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
I was wondering if we could start with your origin
story, a little bit about yourbackground, where you grew up,
and then what brought you to SanDiego County and then Imperial
Beach specifically.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Sure.
So I was born to Mexicanimmigrants in San Francisco my
parents waited tables for aliving.
I lived there until I was aboutseven and a half eight and they
decided to move us back to growup among our extended family.
So we moved back to TepicNayarit for a bit and most of my
(02:51):
formative years I spent inPuerto Vallarta, jalisco, where
my mom and my grandma were from,and I always wanted to come
back to college because I havecitizenship.
But my parents weren't reallyexcited about that idea, so they
encouraged me to go to collegethere.
There was only one campusuniversity campus in Puerto
Vallarta that had four majors.
(03:12):
None of them I liked.
So I was working, trying tofigure out what to do with my
life and then psychology opened.
So I found that veryinteresting.
So I decided to go for thatmajor.
And I was two years in when acouple of my friends from Puerto
Vallarta were competing inbodyboarding here in California,
(03:34):
specifically in San Diego, andgoing to college.
They're like you should justmove in with us, you can crash
on our couch.
So I think it was.
Yeah, it was early September2001.
I just packed a carry-onsuitcase, I had $500 to my name
and I took a one-way flight toTijuana under the promise that
they'd come pick me up and theydid, thankfully and I had never
(03:58):
visited the area, so I surfed inPearl Beach for the first time
without a wetsuit.
I remember it was very cold andI just fell in love with it and
9-11 happened a few days later.
That's right, and that waspretty scary.
So my parents were like youneed to move back, and I'm like,
no, I'm going to tough it out.
So I did and I got a jobapplied to USD because USD has a
(04:21):
partnership with Universidad deGuadalajara, because USD has a
partnership with Universidad deGuadalajara.
And I got in and they took inall my credits that I had
acquired to that point and, yeah, the rest is history.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
So I imagine your parents were.
I'm sure they were proud of youbut also a bit trepidatious
about being so far away fromhome.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
Yeah, yeah, I actually got a job at Chula
Vista Mall, a retail store thatwas opening.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
On H Street.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
So everybody was being let go because everything
went into chaos.
But that store was alreadyslated to open, so they gave me
a job and that's how I was ableto work full-time, while going
full-time to USD, and I decidedto not live on campus because I
wanted to be able to wake upevery day and surf.
Speaker 1 (05:10):
ID.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
So that was challenging.
I'm not going to lie, but Igraduated with a degree in
psychology and then I rememberbeing walking the beach and in
Pearl Beach and this guy that healways dropped in on me, by the
way, so he wasn't my favoriteso if you're the guy out there
listening, shame on you.
(05:32):
No, no, no but he, uh, he wasputting up signs that said clean
water now oh very red and blackand I'm like what is that?
Speaker 1 (05:40):
so he was a good.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
He was the good guy well, it turned out to be the
good guy because, uh, this guysaid don't?
You know, you surf the mostpolluted beach in America and I
had been surfing for years.
This was like four years later.
I had no idea.
So that guy turned out to beSerge Dadina, the founder of
Wild Coast.
So he's like you need to comeand volunteer for us if you want
(06:02):
to get involved.
So the very next Monday I wentand started volunteering for
Wild Coast.
That's how I became involved inthe sewage crisis back in 2005.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
He's the former mayor .
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Correct.
He was the founder of WildCoast and my predecessor.
He was mayor of Imperial Beachfor eight years.
For eight years, and everythingwe've been able to accomplish
in these last two to four yearshas really been because he
really ramped the efforts up weused to be confronted with.
This was before he was mayor.
(06:34):
When we would talk about thesewage crisis, leaders, local
leaders would be like you needto stop, you're going to ruin
our businesses.
You know they would try toquiet us down and we understood
that that's exactly the oppositeof what we needed to do,
because people didn't reallyunderstand back then and even
today how severe and how much ofa not just public health
(06:59):
emergency this is, but anexistential threat to the South
County.
It is Public health emergency.
This is but an existentialthreat to the South County.
It is.
Speaker 1 (07:05):
What an opportunity to have subsequent or
consecutive administrations thatdovetail and allow one to build
on the other right, as opposedto often what we see is it's
like either going in differentdirections or somewhat the same,
(07:26):
but then over here and it's notright, like there's not a lot
of building on what comes before.
Yeah, so that's a prettyinteresting the waves brought
you the two of you together yeah, and, and you know our passion
for coastal protection.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
So I I stayed at wild coast, I think, since 2005, and
then I worked my way up tocoastal and marine director and
then I always felt the need togo and become more educated in
the quote unquote environmentalfield, right?
So in 2014, I applied to go tothe master's program at Scripps
(08:00):
Institution of Oceanography.
It's an advanced studiesprogram, so it's an accelerated
one year program and you know,serge gave me a leave of absence
to go do that.
So I did that and that's how Igot my master's.
And then, through that master'sprogram, I applied to the NOAA
Sea Grant Canals Fellowship.
(08:20):
So I was selected one of 12nationwide to go work in
Congress in 2015.
So that's how I became SenatorCory Booker's first NOAA Sea
Grant Fellow, so I had theopportunity to draft bills for
him and work on environmentaland ocean issues.
(08:42):
And then my fellowship endedright around the time Trump got
elected the first time and thencoincided with one of the
biggest sewage spills we haveever had here in the region,
where there was a huge die-offof leopard sharks in the river
mouth, and it was really bad.
So I decided to move back anddo what I could here locally,
(09:03):
and because I had seen whatSerge was able to do, I said,
well, if he can do it, I can doit.
So I ran for the first timenever been involved in politics
and the party and labor nothingI just did.
I'm going to go knock oneverybody's door and tell them I
want to fight for them aroundthe sewage crisis, housing and
(09:24):
quality of life.
And I got first place againstthe incumbent.
And I got first place againstthe incumbent.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
I remember when Cory Booker was mayor of Newark, when
he would do these things.
When you just made that commentbefore about I just go out and
I kind of take things on beforewe hit record, I think that's
really inspiring because itsounds like your transition into
(09:53):
formal politics was not really.
Perhaps this consciouslyplanned thing is like, okay, I
have a 10-year plan and I'mgoing to get elected.
It was like there's a need, I'mgoing to see the need, I'm
going to advocate, like and tryto affect a change in the world.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
That's exactly it and that's what I expect of any
government.
Truly, I know that not everyelected official has that as a
central priority or is the ethosof why they run, but that's for
sure the reason why I have.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
So let's talk a little bit about this sewage
crisis.
For those people who may notknow really what we're talking
about, it's obviously somethingthat has had a century or more
of trajectory.
There's a burgeoning growth inTijuana.
There's changes to the climate.
There's infrastructure that hasdeteriorated.
(10:50):
Can you paint a picture forlisteners about what you're
facing in your city and whatwork has been done to date at
your end?
Speaker 2 (11:02):
Yeah, so the reason why we have an issue is because
we share a watershed.
It's 1,800 square miles in size, three quarters of it are in
Mexico, one quarter in the US,and most of the city of Tijuana
sits, on average, 300 feet abovesea level.
So the way that everythingdrains into the river and then
(11:22):
across the border is just thegeographical nature of it.
The challenge is, as you said,even though we've had this issue
for decades, it's reallyworsened in the last few years
because, ironically, our housingcrisis is having unintended
consequences on the pressuresthat are being put on top of an
(11:43):
insufficient system.
Mexico has well Tijuanaspecifically has a stormwater
slash sewage combinedinfrastructure system.
So anytime it rains, all thatpressure causes a lot of these
outdated pipelines that are madeof clay to break and collapse,
so all of that sewage washesinto the river, across the
(12:05):
border, into our region.
Now the city, as you mentioned,has been continuously growing.
That infrastructure hasn't.
And then, on top of that, youhave a very concerning layer of
all of the assembly plants thathave been established in Tijuana
, especially after the firstNAFTA trade agreement.
(12:26):
Even though the environmentallaws do exist in Mexico, the
capacity for them to enforcethem isn't as robust as ours.
So, even if there are many ofthem being US-owned,
japanese-owned, mexican-ownedassembly plants, a lot of legal
(12:48):
discharges of industrial wasteis taking place into the river
and that is not being treated byany plant, neither on the
Mexican side or on our side.
So where it's really becomeconcerning has been since 2023.
We had a massive storm event.
(13:09):
I remember it was 23 or 24.
Tropical Storm Hillary.
I don't know if you recall.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
I do.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
When there was the flooding here in South Carson,
Shelltown.
Speaker 1 (13:20):
For us it was 24.
24.
Yeah, January February.
Right, that's right, February24th.
Yeah, I remember I was out oftown and, yeah, I think it was
February 24th.
Yes, Cars were floating down,Correct, I mean, it was right.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
So for us what happened is the river was
flowing massively, at almost 7billion gallons per day.
Usually it maxes out around 1billion.
So suddenly we started to seean uptick in people reporting
gastrointestinal illnesses, anuptick at our local health
clinic of people falling ill.
(13:52):
We later found out there was asmall outbreak of Shigella in
one of the areas closest to theestuary.
So in the past it had been anissue of if you go surf or swim
you get ill.
But now we're having peoplefall ill without even remotely
getting close to the beach, justfrom the air.
(14:15):
Mm-hmm.
So that piqued the interest ofseveral different institutions.
So Dr Kim Prather, one of theleading atmospheric chemists in
the world, who actually advisedDr Fauci that COVID was airborne
before they understood it to beshe's from Scripps she had done
a study where she haddiscovered that these pollutants
(14:40):
can become aerosolized andtravel long distances.
So, based on that study,several different institutions
later that summer it was UCSD,sdsu, ut Austin and UC Riverside
spent weeks and weeks and weeksin Imperial Beach and the River
Valley collecting samples, airsamples, water samples, soil
(15:00):
samples and it turned out thatjust one toxic gas alone, which
is hydrogen sulfide, which isthe rotten egg-smelling gas, we
were seeing levels 160-plusabove state standards overnight.
And that was consistent with,anecdotally, what we were
(15:22):
experiencing in Imperio Beachand the adjacent area of the
Tijuana River Valley, and Nestaand San Isidro, where overnight
we couldn't even open ourwindows because we were choking
on the smell.
So they found empiricalevidence that those levels were
incredibly high, along othertoxic gases that you can't
(15:43):
really smell.
So that's when we sounded thealarm and did a press conference
announcing those results andthat we needed a lot more help.
And sadly, um, the county helda press conference a day later
saying, no, this isn't true andthe results aren't there.
Is that and I'm just, I'm justbeing straightforward because
(16:03):
I've read about it we have tobecause you know what would be
the?
Speaker 1 (16:07):
the motivation just to try to not have that kind of
negative check against somethingrelated to the region.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
It could be At the time I just found it to be very
strange because we had gone tothe CDC in DC by that time I
think I had gone already twiceto DC to ask for help to declare
a state of emergency fromPresident Biden.
We had sent letters to GovernorNewsom.
(16:35):
Every single mayor in thecounty sent a letter to Governor
Newsom asking him to declare astate of emergency.
The CDC eventually came thatfall and did the CASPER study,
which is a community assessmenttype of study, and what they
found was exactly consistentwith what we had been feeling
(16:55):
and experiencing.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
What you've been living right.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
And anecdotally, yes, it was even worse in the sense
of the mental health of ourcommunities in South Bay.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
How so Just being stuck indoors?
Speaker 2 (17:09):
More than 70% reported either anxiety,
depression, some even suicidaltendencies or ideation because
you can't even live your life.
You can't go outdoors, youdon't know if you're jogging, if
you're going to get sick.
The worry is constant.
The worry about your childrenis constant.
(17:30):
So people I can't tell you howmany people have emailed me,
especially elderly on fixedincome that are ready to move,
but there's no way or they justcan't because they don't have
the means.
So that's what we've beendealing with in South County.
This is beyond Imperial Beach.
(17:50):
I mean, this is somethingthat's impacting all the way to
the 805.
So that's, you know, prettyinland South.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Chula Vista and those communities.
So I noticed that.
I saw on the news that recentlythe top administrator of the
EPA his name is escaping me LeeZildin yeah.
That he came and I think youguys did a well.
Why don't you tell us aboutthat visit and kind of what the
(18:25):
upshot of that whole process was?
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Sure, the upshot of that whole process was Sure, so
I and I do.
Before we go into thatconversation, I do want to be
very clear that, despite usasking the governor and our past
president for help, they didsend letters to Congress asking
for $300 million.
To your point about progress, Iforgot to mention that we did
(18:50):
secure $600 million to upgradethe international wastewater
treatment plant.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
On the US side, which is based in the US and treats
100% sewage from Mexico.
Okay, so that's essentiallythat treats the sewage that's
coming south to north, for lackof a better term.
Speaker 2 (19:10):
It treats residential wastewater only, and it was
built to treat up to 25 milliongallons per day.
When we started advocating todouble its capacity to 50, it
was discovered that it was in atotal state of disrepair and not
even functioning.
So that's when we had to secureall that funding to fix it, to
(19:35):
maintain it and to double itscapacity.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
And is that also the facility where, in the beginning
, it was difficult to getaccurate?
Oh yeah, even just.
I think there were freedom ofinformation requests, even just
to figure out the document papertrail connected to it, and it
seemed like and I'm not anexpert at all, but I'm reading
it and I'm going it sounds likesomething out of the 50s, like
(19:59):
pieces of paper lying around andjust there was no internal
systems, there was not even aprogram where all the
information was being integratedinto.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
I mean, and this is both sides of the aisle have
been responsible for that,because that's a government
pardon, that's a president'sappointee who leads the
commission.
The commission is not.
The International Boundary andWater Commission is parallel to
the Department of State, isfunded by the Department of
State, but it's not under theorg chart, if you will, of the
(20:37):
department.
It's appointed by the president.
So all these past commissionershave really just let it fall
into a really bad state.
The past commissioner,marielena Ginert, was fantastic
because she tried to do as muchas she could with what she had,
but she was dealing with over 10years of deferred maintenance.
So, that being said, thatprogress has taken place on the
(21:01):
Mexican side after years, Ithink, three different governor
administrations us begging themto fix another plant that's on
the coast.
That plant hasn't been workingfor over 10 years.
San Antonio de los Buenos hasbeen now completely rehabbed and
is coming online, if notalready, but that only is going
(21:23):
to treat 18 million gallons perday.
So there's between 20 and 40million gallons of flow in the
river right now as we speak.
That include not justresidential sewage but
industrial waste that is stillgoing into our communities and
the coast and permeating our air, our soil and our water.
(21:44):
So that's the major area ofconcern.
So, even though the pastpresident and the governor asked
for funding, they just neverreached the point of declaring a
state of emergency, which couldhave really helped facilitate
and accelerate fixes and helpfor us.
(22:06):
So when the new administrationcame in, I reached out to
administrator Lee Zeldin evenbefore his confirmation hearing,
asking him to come visit andfor help.
Once he was confirmed, Ireached out again, sent him a
letter.
Uh, he acknowledged receipt ofit, but that was about it.
And then next thing I know Isaw a tweet that he was coming
(22:28):
to San Diego.
I'm like, okay, great, I don'twhether it was me or not.
I don a tweet that he wascoming to San Diego.
I'm like, okay, great, whetherit was me or not, I don't care,
he's coming to San Diego.
So funny.
I'll tell you the story becausewhy not?
It's the truth.
He scheduled a visit to theplant, he scheduled a roundtable
and he scheduled a pressconference, and I was not
(22:49):
invited.
Oh, but I invited myself, oh.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
That's that part where you're like I'm just going
to take it on.
I had to Look I am the mayor.
You're the mayor of the city.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
The people have entrusted me to fight for them.
I represent the 26,000-plusresidents that are the most
affected by this crisis.
I was going to make sure Ishowed up and at least told the
administrator exactly what mycommunity is suffering.
So I had heard that I was goingto be at the plant and I'm over
there all the time.
So I just went and it wasreally funny because I arrived
(23:24):
exactly at the same time he wasarriving.
So we got out of the car and Iwas the first hand.
He shook and I thanked him forcoming and I said you know, this
is what my community andelderly, you know,
immunocompromised the childrenthey can't sleep at night.
This is what's happening.
Our economy is really beingimpacted, not to mention the
(23:45):
environment.
So he was very open and afterthat initial conversation you
know we had several differentconversations at each of the
four stops that the tourincluded and I felt that he
understood the issue and theimportance of taking action.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
So it sounds like there's progress.
There has been progress.
The capacity is still not there.
So this is a 5, 10, 15, 20 ormore year process, right Like if
you had the magic wand that yougot all the money, or that this
(24:28):
region got all the money thatneeded and all the attention
right now on both sides of theborder I know the Mexican
president, I think at the end ofAmilo's term, I'm not sure, but
the Guardia Nacional took overrunning one of the plants and so
there was some attention.
If all that worked out, howlong does it take until the
residents of Imperial Beach, forexample, have the ocean and the
(24:51):
experience that they deserve?
Speaker 2 (24:53):
So that's a good point that you just reminded me
about the president.
Past president Omel turned thekeys over to their equivalent of
the Army Corps to expedite thefix of their plant.
Had that not happened, we wouldstill be waiting for them to
fix it.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
Okay, so that was a positive step.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
That was a positive, absolutely and truly.
There's a lack of politicalwill here, and I'm just going to
be straightforward about that.
If I were president, we couldhave done the exact same thing
that President Amlo did andturned the keys over to Army
Corps of Engineers said you knowthis procurement and
(25:31):
contracting, procurementprocesses, environmental
regulations and laws, nepareview, other types of laws can
be waived if we want them to,and I'll give you a perfect
example.
I think two or three years ago,I can't remember when they were
talking about completing thewall, they built a wall over the
(25:55):
river floodplain because theriver was the only area that was
not secured by a wall.
It was a big open space,because that's where the water
has to flow through.
That project was done in lessthan a year I think it was nine
months with zero environmentalreview and unlimited resources
in the name of national security.
So the president has thoseexact same powers at their hand
(26:20):
to do the same.
So if this president were tosay I am going to issue an
executive order to divert andtreat the river and expedite
construction of that, so itcould be whatever's already
being built at the plant andjust an additional piece of
infrastructure that couldpre-treat industrial waste and
(26:43):
not just wastewater anddischarge that three miles
offshore, then we wouldimmediately start seeing relief
at our coast and in the regionand that could be done in a year
or two.
And we have a trillion-dollarbudget in this nation.
There's no reason why a couplebillion dollars can't be spent
(27:04):
on protecting people's lives andwell-being.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
Yeah, not to mention the experience of the people who
go to the beach and play theTijuana.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Right, I mean, that kind of sometimes gets lost in
the dialogue.
But I mean, I've been to thebeach on both sides and it
smells bad and I'm sure thatit's hazardous just all around.
Do you think that yourbackground and experience as
being binational, bicultural,bilingual has helped in
(27:43):
collaborating with officials inTijuana?
I think so.
Can you talk about that alittle bit?
Speaker 2 (27:47):
Yeah.
So I have a pretty strongworking relationship with the
governor of Baja, marina ElPilar.
I credit her because when wefirst came into office I think
we came into office around thesame time we did a meet and
greet, acknowledged the issueand talked about how important
(28:11):
it was for us to collaborate andwork on this, which was very
different from my experiencewith her predecessor the one
before who didn't evenacknowledge that this issue
existed.
So this was prioritized at thehighest level of their
government and there was seriousfunding put into it and, as we
talked earlier, the project waseven expedited.
So, I think also at the locallevel, I've met with the mayor
(28:35):
of Tijuana stormwaters, undercity's jurisdiction in.
Tijuana.
So the importance of that ismaintenance of their culverts
and sediment capture basins,which help collect trash and
sediment, which, by preventingthat, we prevent all of that
from clogging our infrastructureon our side and causing these
(28:59):
spills to happen on our side, ormalfunctions, if you will.
So there has to becollaboration.
This whole rhetoric around Imean I've heard it all build a
dam to close the border, which Ioppose because that's the
equivalent, it's equivalent toshooting yourself in the foot.
(29:20):
Our economies areinterdependent.
Do we need more help fromMexico?
Absolutely, but do we need morehelp from our own federal and
state government and countygovernment?
Absolutely.
The county is our health andhuman services, is the health
and human services agency forthe entire county.
(29:43):
Every single jurisdiction hasto receive support from the
county.
As far as health and there'snobody at the wheel right now
when it comes to that we haven'thad any comprehensive systemic
epidemiological study to betterunderstand everything that we
talked about earlier theanecdotal reports, reports and
(30:11):
then the perception reports fromCDC we need actual medical
interventions to see how far andhow severe people's bodies are
being affected.
That's one.
Two, we need to remove some ofthe sources of pollutants
immediately.
They can be removed at theriver.
In the river valley there'ssome areas that have riprap
along the river that areactually facilitating
(30:31):
aerosolization of thesepollutants, Just because it's
like rapids kind of.
Yes, exactly it's a cascade andrapids.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Like mini waterfalls, yes, interesting.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Which is exactly the process that is used at
treatment plants to remove someof the bacteria through their
treatment.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
They're these tanks that use air bubblers, kind of
like bubblers.
Yes, so you have naturallyoccurring ones out there in the
field, is what you're saying?
Speaker 2 (31:00):
Yeah, but that are flowing in the air and traveling
long distances.
We have urban areas that are asclose as two blocks to those
hot spots where people actuallylive and go to school, so that's
concerning.
Speaker 1 (31:17):
So you bring up the county.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
And you're currently in a campaign and running for
the District 1.
Running for the District 1.
What will you bring to thatseat?
Related to this, but then alsothe myriad other important
(31:50):
issues that this region facesfrom well, you mentioned cost of
living.
That's somewhat tied tohomelessness connected to mental
health, connected to fentanyllots Budget decisions, like
reserves at the county.
Do we tap them, do we not?
How much?
Why not?
Why yes?
Can you kind of paint a pictureof you know what your plan is
(32:14):
and your vision going forward inthat way.
Speaker 2 (32:16):
Yeah, it's all interconnected, by the way,
everything you just mentionedand I think it's important.
You know we were talkingearlier about what government is
and should be to the people.
It should serve the people andit's their taxpayer dollars that
are at the county and we havethis very bloated reserve
(32:38):
account that is well above thestandards and guidelines that
fiscal entities recommend having.
And especially District 1hasn't had its fair share.
It has not had the resourcesthat we need to tackle
affordable housing, to tacklehomelessness.
There has been almost a vacuumof leadership between the county
(33:04):
and the jurisdictions that needto work on this right.
I am Pearl Beach, san DiegoNational City, chula Vista.
I think that I'm going to bringthe same energy that I bring as
mayor in Pearl Beach to theseproblems, because I don't
(33:24):
consider myself a politician.
To me, I'm a public servant andI want to make sure that the
government is working for thepeople.
And we have the lowest medianhousehold income in the entire
county.
In the district we have thehighest rate of people that
don't have health coverage.
We have the highest rate ofhouseholds that are overburdened
(33:46):
, meaning more than half oftheir income is going to keep a
roof over their head.
So how are we talking about?
Oh, we're going to fix ourhousing issues by building more
luxury and market rate housing.
Well, that's one of the prongsthat we need to tackle this
challenge, but we also need tobuild housing that people can
(34:10):
actually afford.
So that's one.
Two, we need the wages to be onpar with the costs of living.
City of San Diego is one of the, if not the most expensive city
in the nation, so we need tomake sure that people get paid
fairly, that they have goodpaying jobs, that they have good
benefits so that they can havea high quality of life.
(34:33):
So we need somebody who's goingto fight for that at the county
, because we've been neglectedfor many, many, many years, well
before my predecessor.
So my opponent has been talkingabout cutting programs,
aligning themselves with whatthe Trump administration is
(34:55):
proposing.
We know very well.
The Trump administration isproposing cuts to Medicare and
Medicaid.
We have over 140,000 people whodepend on these programs in
District 1, not to mention kids.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
So 140 out of like 650, right yeah.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
It's a very large number Like.
I said we have the lowesthousehold income in the county,
we have the highest need.
Let's just say it simply right,we have the highest need in our
district.
And this whole conversation ofthe structural deficit at the
county I think what we need todo is look at what programs are
(35:35):
functioning correctly, look atwhat isn't.
But I would not be supportiveof cutting social safety net
programs, because that's thelast line of defense that many
of these people have and we needto make sure that that
continues and we have theresources to do that.
We have a reserve of almost$2.4 billion.
(35:59):
We almost have enough to buy LACounty if we wanted to.
So as long as we remain withinthe you know we do it in a
responsible way and we staywithin the guidelines that are
recommended to have reserves,we'll be okay.
Speaker 1 (36:17):
So those reserves?
That's just a result of,depending on who you ask either
responsible conservative fiscalmanagement or conservative
fiscal management, that who'swhich, where the goal is just to
accumulate more and more forwhatever rainy day may or may
not come.
What do you think's behind that?
Speaker 2 (36:36):
Well, the conservative policies of our
past board of supervisors.
We've had the board ofsupervisors under Republican
control since its inceptionuntil not even six years ago.
Speaker 1 (36:48):
Until what First it was Fletcher right.
Speaker 2 (36:50):
Fletcher came in and, you know, whatever one may
think of him, I credit him forstarting to change the direction
of the county.
And then we had, you know, therest of the supervisors come on
board and it takes time.
I think that that's going to bethe push, the push to
(37:14):
prioritize the working class andthe underserved, not just
externally, in in the socialpolitics, if you will, of the
conversation, but in the actualtangible programs and funding.
And how do we prioritize thatadministratively at the county?
So that's the energy I plan tobring at the county.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
Now your, you know, District 1 obviously abuts the
international border and soimmigration, immigration
enforcement, philosophies aroundimmigration enforcement, the
general mood I could tell you inthe school leadership world.
We've been, we've been anyschool leader will tell you that
(38:00):
we've been strategizing andholding information evenings
with our parents and trying toassuage fears.
I think it seems that most ofthe fears have not yet, and
hopefully never, come tofruition.
But there's definitely outthere in the community.
Is there anything that youcould see doing in that District
(38:25):
1 seat that would help kind ofaddress that?
Doing in that district one seatthat would help kind of address
that?
It's a, it's obviouslyimmigration enforcement's a
federal, uh, responsibility.
Speaker 2 (38:34):
But there's this interface right, yeah, the
county there is, there is andand there is a role for us to
either be leaders on it, um, andand you know, not rubber stamp
these awful policies coming outof the White House.
I mean unconstitutionalpolicies coming out of the White
(38:57):
House we're talking about.
We're seeing maybe not in ourregion yet, but we're seeing US
citizens get deported.
We're seeing elected officialsbeing arrested for protesting
ICE practices.
I have not witnessed thismyself, but I have talked to
community leaders that havewitnessed ICE agents without any
(39:23):
identifiable badges or in masks, pick up people and take them
without any due process, and nowwe know some of them are being
sent off to awful prisons in ElSalvador with no hope of
returning.
So I don't agree with any ofthat.
(39:46):
I don't agree with massdeportations we were talking
about.
We are an interconnected,interdependent region
economically, culturally,socially.
You know statutorily requiredpractices of not using our local
(40:11):
resources to do the federalgovernment's work.
There's been the point oftension when it came to the
county sanctuary policy and therelease of violent offenders.
I don't agree with releasingviolent offenders onto the
street.
That is, at the discretion ofthe sheriff.
I have a good relationship withSheriff Martinez.
(40:33):
I trust what she's doing,because nobody wants to see
violent offenders put back intothe community.
But that's a very fine linethat we need to continue to
monitor because we're seeing thesuspension of our laws really
(40:53):
in the way that this is beinghandled.
I mean even what?
A couple of days ago there wasconversations about suspending
habeas corpus.
Yeah, so I think in me whatpeople will find as a leader of
representative of the mostdiverse district in the county
is we're not going to allowthose types of policies and
(41:15):
practices to take hold in adistrict that is incredibly
diverse and interdependent withour neighbors to the south.
Speaker 1 (41:24):
Well, you've been very generous with your time and
I want to honor your time.
Is there anything that we havenot yet touched on that you were
hoping we were going to cover?
I know July, what is it?
July, july 1st, july 1st.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
Yes, well, yes, thank you for reminding me.
Ballots are dropping in themail the week of June 1st.
So it's a very tricky schedulescheduled this special election
because the week of july firstpeople are going to be out on
vacation for the fourth of july.
Our kids are going out ofschool in the summer, so and
(41:59):
it's not a.
Speaker 1 (42:00):
It's not a.
Speaker 2 (42:01):
I think turnout in general is what we're trying to
push for whichever side peopleyes, and that's what I was going
to say.
Our district has this primary.
We barely I think it was 18%turnout.
That's extremely low.
So I encourage your listenersto go out and vote.
I mean, vote for whoever youthink is the best candidate, but
(42:25):
vote because that's the onlyway we make our voices heard.
One of the most important ones,yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:30):
Yeah, thank you so much for for being gracious with
your time and your expertiseand um, as I told you before we
hit record that I've longadmired your tenacity as an
advocate for um tackling a hugeissue.
There are a few issues that arebigger than this.
(42:51):
You've got an issue betweencountries.
You've got an issue wherethere's this kind of decades of
neglect on both sides of theborder, like federal policies on
both sides.
It couldn't get morecomplicated.
Yeah, that's true, and you'regoing to be upgrading Should you
prevail in July.
You're upgrading from thisregion right at the border to
(43:14):
the whole chunk of the county.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
So best of luck with that.
Thank you so much.
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (43:22):
I hope you enjoyed this episode with Paloma Aguirre
.
With Paloma Aguirre, if you areso inclined, please give us a
five-star rating on whicheverplatform you're listening to
this on, and consider supportingthe show with a contribution.
No amount is too small and allamounts matter.
(43:43):
Thanks again for coming on into hang out.
Welcome to the Hangout Podcast.
I'm your host, david Shredda.
On this show, we haveconversations with interesting
and inspiring people, and theguest for today's episode,
paloma Aguirre, is no exception.
Paloma is currently the mayorof Imperial Beach, california,
(00:24):
and a candidate for the countysupervisor seat for District 1
here in San Diego County.
As mayor of Imperial Beach, shehas led the fight to clean up
the Tijuana River sewage crisis,securing over $600 million in
federal funds to stop toxicpollution from flowing into the
(00:44):
South County of San Diego.
We talk in great depth anddetail about the sewage crisis,
what the roots are and how itrequires true and authentic
binational cooperation andcollaboration in terms of coming
up with effective, long-lastingsolutions.
(01:06):
Paloma, prior to becoming mayor,was a community organizer and
an environmentalist, and in 2014, was named Woman of the Year
for her relentless fight to getgovernment to act on the Tijuana
River sewage crisis.
Paloma is up for the electionon July 1st, so anyone living
(01:29):
within San Diego County who iseligible to vote please jot that
down on your calendar and makeyour voices heard on that
important day.
And as part of this importantprocess, paloma is engaging,
passionate and clearly committedto the residents of Imperial
(01:50):
Beach and of the county and,rather than seeing herself as a
career politician, she seesherself as a career servant of
the people.
I hope you enjoy thisconversation as much as I did.
Welcome Mayor Aguirre.
Thank you so much for joiningus this afternoon.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
It's a pleasure to be with you.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
I was wondering if we could start with your origin
story, a little bit about yourbackground, where you grew up,
and then what brought you to SanDiego County and then Imperial
Beach specifically.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Sure.
So I was born to Mexicanimmigrants in San Francisco my
parents waited tables for aliving.
I lived there until I was aboutseven and a half eight and they
decided to move us back to growup among our extended family.
So we moved back to TepicNayarit for a bit and most of my
(02:51):
formative years I spent inPuerto Vallarta, jalisco, where
my mom and my grandma were from,and I always wanted to come
back to college because I havecitizenship.
But my parents weren't reallyexcited about that idea, so they
encouraged me to go to collegethere.
There was only one campusuniversity campus in Puerto
Vallarta that had four majors.
(03:12):
None of them I liked.
So I was working, trying tofigure out what to do with my
life and then psychology opened.
So I found that veryinteresting.
So I decided to go for thatmajor.
And I was two years in when acouple of my friends from Puerto
Vallarta were competing inbodyboarding here in California,
(03:34):
specifically in San Diego, andgoing to college.
They're like you should justmove in with us, you can crash
on our couch.
So I think it was.
Yeah, it was early September2001.
I just packed a carry-onsuitcase, I had $500 to my name
and I took a one-way flight toTijuana under the promise that
they'd come pick me up and theydid, thankfully and I had never
(03:58):
visited the area, so I surfed inPearl Beach for the first time
without a wetsuit.
I remember it was very cold andI just fell in love with it and
9-11 happened a few days later.
That's right, and that waspretty scary.
So my parents were like youneed to move back, and I'm like,
no, I'm going to tough it out.
So I did and I got a jobapplied to USD because USD has a
(04:21):
partnership with Universidad deGuadalajara, because USD has a
partnership with Universidad deGuadalajara.
And I got in and they took inall my credits that I had
acquired to that point and, yeah, the rest is history.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
So I imagine your parents were.
I'm sure they were proud of youbut also a bit trepidatious
about being so far away fromhome.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
Yeah, yeah, I actually got a job at Chula
Vista Mall, a retail store thatwas opening.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
On H Street.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
So everybody was being let go because everything
went into chaos.
But that store was alreadyslated to open, so they gave me
a job and that's how I was ableto work full-time, while going
full-time to USD, and I decidedto not live on campus because I
wanted to be able to wake upevery day and surf.
Speaker 1 (05:10):
ID.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
So that was challenging.
I'm not going to lie, but Igraduated with a degree in
psychology and then I rememberbeing walking the beach and in
Pearl Beach and this guy that healways dropped in on me, by the
way, so he wasn't my favoriteso if you're the guy out there
listening, shame on you.
(05:32):
No, no, no but he, uh, he wasputting up signs that said clean
water now oh very red and blackand I'm like what is that?
Speaker 1 (05:40):
so he was a good.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
He was the good guy well, it turned out to be the
good guy because, uh, this guysaid don't?
You know, you surf the mostpolluted beach in America and I
had been surfing for years.
This was like four years later.
I had no idea.
So that guy turned out to beSerge Dadina, the founder of
Wild Coast.
So he's like you need to comeand volunteer for us if you want
(06:02):
to get involved.
So the very next Monday I wentand started volunteering for
Wild Coast.
That's how I became involved inthe sewage crisis back in 2005.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
He's the former mayor .
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Correct.
He was the founder of WildCoast and my predecessor.
He was mayor of Imperial Beachfor eight years.
For eight years, and everythingwe've been able to accomplish
in these last two to four yearshas really been because he
really ramped the efforts up weused to be confronted with.
This was before he was mayor.
(06:34):
When we would talk about thesewage crisis, leaders, local
leaders would be like you needto stop, you're going to ruin
our businesses.
You know they would try toquiet us down and we understood
that that's exactly the oppositeof what we needed to do,
because people didn't reallyunderstand back then and even
today how severe and how much ofa not just public health
(06:59):
emergency this is, but anexistential threat to the South
County.
It is Public health emergency.
This is but an existentialthreat to the South County.
It is.
Speaker 1 (07:05):
What an opportunity to have subsequent or
consecutive administrations thatdovetail and allow one to build
on the other right, as opposedto often what we see is it's
like either going in differentdirections or somewhat the same,
(07:26):
but then over here and it's notright, like there's not a lot
of building on what comes before.
Yeah, so that's a prettyinteresting the waves brought
you the two of you together yeah, and, and you know our passion
for coastal protection.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
So I I stayed at wild coast, I think, since 2005, and
then I worked my way up tocoastal and marine director and
then I always felt the need togo and become more educated in
the quote unquote environmentalfield, right?
So in 2014, I applied to go tothe master's program at Scripps
(08:00):
Institution of Oceanography.
It's an advanced studiesprogram, so it's an accelerated
one year program and you know,serge gave me a leave of absence
to go do that.
So I did that and that's how Igot my master's.
And then, through that master'sprogram, I applied to the NOAA
Sea Grant Canals Fellowship.
(08:20):
So I was selected one of 12nationwide to go work in
Congress in 2015.
So that's how I became SenatorCory Booker's first NOAA Sea
Grant Fellow, so I had theopportunity to draft bills for
him and work on environmentaland ocean issues.
(08:42):
And then my fellowship endedright around the time Trump got
elected the first time and thencoincided with one of the
biggest sewage spills we haveever had here in the region,
where there was a huge die-offof leopard sharks in the river
mouth, and it was really bad.
So I decided to move back anddo what I could here locally,
(09:03):
and because I had seen whatSerge was able to do, I said,
well, if he can do it, I can doit.
So I ran for the first timenever been involved in politics
and the party and labor nothingI just did.
I'm going to go knock oneverybody's door and tell them I
want to fight for them aroundthe sewage crisis, housing and
(09:24):
quality of life.
And I got first place againstthe incumbent.
And I got first place againstthe incumbent.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
I remember when Cory Booker was mayor of Newark, when
he would do these things.
When you just made that commentbefore about I just go out and
I kind of take things on beforewe hit record, I think that's
really inspiring because itsounds like your transition into
(09:53):
formal politics was not really.
Perhaps this consciouslyplanned thing is like, okay, I
have a 10-year plan and I'mgoing to get elected.
It was like there's a need, I'mgoing to see the need, I'm
going to advocate, like and tryto affect a change in the world.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
That's exactly it and that's what I expect of any
government.
Truly, I know that not everyelected official has that as a
central priority or is the ethosof why they run, but that's for
sure the reason why I have.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
So let's talk a little bit about this sewage
crisis.
For those people who may notknow really what we're talking
about, it's obviously somethingthat has had a century or more
of trajectory.
There's a burgeoning growth inTijuana.
There's changes to the climate.
There's infrastructure that hasdeteriorated.
(10:50):
Can you paint a picture forlisteners about what you're
facing in your city and whatwork has been done to date at
your end?
Speaker 2 (11:02):
Yeah, so the reason why we have an issue is because
we share a watershed.
It's 1,800 square miles in size, three quarters of it are in
Mexico, one quarter in the US,and most of the city of Tijuana
sits, on average, 300 feet abovesea level.
So the way that everythingdrains into the river and then
(11:22):
across the border is just thegeographical nature of it.
The challenge is, as you said,even though we've had this issue
for decades, it's reallyworsened in the last few years
because, ironically, our housingcrisis is having unintended
consequences on the pressuresthat are being put on top of an
(11:43):
insufficient system.
Mexico has well Tijuanaspecifically has a stormwater
slash sewage combinedinfrastructure system.
So anytime it rains, all thatpressure causes a lot of these
outdated pipelines that are madeof clay to break and collapse,
so all of that sewage washesinto the river, across the
(12:05):
border, into our region.
Now the city, as you mentioned,has been continuously growing.
That infrastructure hasn't.
And then, on top of that, youhave a very concerning layer of
all of the assembly plants thathave been established in Tijuana
, especially after the firstNAFTA trade agreement.
(12:26):
Even though the environmentallaws do exist in Mexico, the
capacity for them to enforcethem isn't as robust as ours.
So, even if there are many ofthem being US-owned,
japanese-owned, mexican-ownedassembly plants, a lot of legal
(12:48):
discharges of industrial wasteis taking place into the river
and that is not being treated byany plant, neither on the
Mexican side or on our side.
So where it's really becomeconcerning has been since 2023.
We had a massive storm event.
(13:09):
I remember it was 23 or 24.
Tropical Storm Hillary.
I don't know if you recall.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
I do.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
When there was the flooding here in South Carson,
Shelltown.
Speaker 1 (13:20):
For us it was 24.
24.
Yeah, January February.
Right, that's right, February24th.
Yeah, I remember I was out oftown and, yeah, I think it was
February 24th.
Yes, Cars were floating down,Correct, I mean, it was right.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
So for us what happened is the river was
flowing massively, at almost 7billion gallons per day.
Usually it maxes out around 1billion.
So suddenly we started to seean uptick in people reporting
gastrointestinal illnesses, anuptick at our local health
clinic of people falling ill.
(13:52):
We later found out there was asmall outbreak of Shigella in
one of the areas closest to theestuary.
So in the past it had been anissue of if you go surf or swim
you get ill.
But now we're having peoplefall ill without even remotely
getting close to the beach, justfrom the air.
(14:15):
Mm-hmm.
So that piqued the interest ofseveral different institutions.
So Dr Kim Prather, one of theleading atmospheric chemists in
the world, who actually advisedDr Fauci that COVID was airborne
before they understood it to beshe's from Scripps she had done
a study where she haddiscovered that these pollutants
(14:40):
can become aerosolized andtravel long distances.
So, based on that study,several different institutions
later that summer it was UCSD,sdsu, ut Austin and UC Riverside
spent weeks and weeks and weeksin Imperial Beach and the River
Valley collecting samples, airsamples, water samples, soil
(15:00):
samples and it turned out thatjust one toxic gas alone, which
is hydrogen sulfide, which isthe rotten egg-smelling gas, we
were seeing levels 160-plusabove state standards overnight.
And that was consistent with,anecdotally, what we were
(15:22):
experiencing in Imperio Beachand the adjacent area of the
Tijuana River Valley, and Nestaand San Isidro, where overnight
we couldn't even open ourwindows because we were choking
on the smell.
So they found empiricalevidence that those levels were
incredibly high, along othertoxic gases that you can't
(15:43):
really smell.
So that's when we sounded thealarm and did a press conference
announcing those results andthat we needed a lot more help.
And sadly, um, the county helda press conference a day later
saying, no, this isn't true andthe results aren't there.
Is that and I'm just, I'm justbeing straightforward because
(16:03):
I've read about it we have tobecause you know what would be
the?
Speaker 1 (16:07):
the motivation just to try to not have that kind of
negative check against somethingrelated to the region.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
It could be At the time I just found it to be very
strange because we had gone tothe CDC in DC by that time I
think I had gone already twiceto DC to ask for help to declare
a state of emergency fromPresident Biden.
We had sent letters to GovernorNewsom.
(16:35):
Every single mayor in thecounty sent a letter to Governor
Newsom asking him to declare astate of emergency.
The CDC eventually came thatfall and did the CASPER study,
which is a community assessmenttype of study, and what they
found was exactly consistentwith what we had been feeling
(16:55):
and experiencing.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
What you've been living right.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
And anecdotally, yes, it was even worse in the sense
of the mental health of ourcommunities in South Bay.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
How so Just being stuck indoors?
Speaker 2 (17:09):
More than 70% reported either anxiety,
depression, some even suicidaltendencies or ideation because
you can't even live your life.
You can't go outdoors, youdon't know if you're jogging, if
you're going to get sick.
The worry is constant.
The worry about your childrenis constant.
(17:30):
So people I can't tell you howmany people have emailed me,
especially elderly on fixedincome that are ready to move,
but there's no way or they justcan't because they don't have
the means.
So that's what we've beendealing with in South County.
This is beyond Imperial Beach.
(17:50):
I mean, this is somethingthat's impacting all the way to
the 805.
So that's, you know, prettyinland South.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Chula Vista and those communities.
So I noticed that.
I saw on the news that recentlythe top administrator of the
EPA his name is escaping me LeeZildin yeah.
That he came and I think youguys did a well.
Why don't you tell us aboutthat visit and kind of what the
(18:25):
upshot of that whole process was?
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Sure, the upshot of that whole process was Sure, so
I and I do.
Before we go into thatconversation, I do want to be
very clear that, despite usasking the governor and our past
president for help, they didsend letters to Congress asking
for $300 million.
To your point about progress, Iforgot to mention that we did
(18:50):
secure $600 million to upgradethe international wastewater
treatment plant.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
On the US side, which is based in the US and treats
100% sewage from Mexico.
Okay, so that's essentiallythat treats the sewage that's
coming south to north, for lackof a better term.
Speaker 2 (19:10):
It treats residential wastewater only, and it was
built to treat up to 25 milliongallons per day.
When we started advocating todouble its capacity to 50, it
was discovered that it was in atotal state of disrepair and not
even functioning.
So that's when we had to secureall that funding to fix it, to
(19:35):
maintain it and to double itscapacity.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
And is that also the facility where, in the beginning
, it was difficult to getaccurate?
Oh yeah, even just.
I think there were freedom ofinformation requests, even just
to figure out the document papertrail connected to it, and it
seemed like and I'm not anexpert at all, but I'm reading
it and I'm going it sounds likesomething out of the 50s, like
(19:59):
pieces of paper lying around andjust there was no internal
systems, there was not even aprogram where all the
information was being integratedinto.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
I mean, and this is both sides of the aisle have
been responsible for that,because that's a government
pardon, that's a president'sappointee who leads the
commission.
The commission is not.
The International Boundary andWater Commission is parallel to
the Department of State, isfunded by the Department of
State, but it's not under theorg chart, if you will, of the
(20:37):
department.
It's appointed by the president.
So all these past commissionershave really just let it fall
into a really bad state.
The past commissioner,marielena Ginert, was fantastic
because she tried to do as muchas she could with what she had,
but she was dealing with over 10years of deferred maintenance.
So, that being said, thatprogress has taken place on the
(21:01):
Mexican side after years, Ithink, three different governor
administrations us begging themto fix another plant that's on
the coast.
That plant hasn't been workingfor over 10 years.
San Antonio de los Buenos hasbeen now completely rehabbed and
is coming online, if notalready, but that only is going
(21:23):
to treat 18 million gallons perday.
So there's between 20 and 40million gallons of flow in the
river right now as we speak.
That include not justresidential sewage but
industrial waste that is stillgoing into our communities and
the coast and permeating our air, our soil and our water.
(21:44):
So that's the major area ofconcern.
So, even though the pastpresident and the governor asked
for funding, they just neverreached the point of declaring a
state of emergency, which couldhave really helped facilitate
and accelerate fixes and helpfor us.
(22:06):
So when the new administrationcame in, I reached out to
administrator Lee Zeldin evenbefore his confirmation hearing,
asking him to come visit andfor help.
Once he was confirmed, Ireached out again, sent him a
letter.
Uh, he acknowledged receipt ofit, but that was about it.
And then next thing I know Isaw a tweet that he was coming
(22:28):
to San Diego.
I'm like, okay, great, I don'twhether it was me or not.
I don a tweet that he wascoming to San Diego.
I'm like, okay, great, whetherit was me or not, I don't care,
he's coming to San Diego.
So funny.
I'll tell you the story becausewhy not?
It's the truth.
He scheduled a visit to theplant, he scheduled a roundtable
and he scheduled a pressconference, and I was not
(22:49):
invited.
Oh, but I invited myself, oh.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
That's that part where you're like I'm just going
to take it on.
I had to Look I am the mayor.
You're the mayor of the city.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
The people have entrusted me to fight for them.
I represent the 26,000-plusresidents that are the most
affected by this crisis.
I was going to make sure Ishowed up and at least told the
administrator exactly what mycommunity is suffering.
So I had heard that I was goingto be at the plant and I'm over
there all the time.
So I just went and it wasreally funny because I arrived
(23:24):
exactly at the same time he wasarriving.
So we got out of the car and Iwas the first hand.
He shook and I thanked him forcoming and I said you know, this
is what my community andelderly, you know,
immunocompromised the childrenthey can't sleep at night.
This is what's happening.
Our economy is really beingimpacted, not to mention the
(23:45):
environment.
So he was very open and afterthat initial conversation you
know we had several differentconversations at each of the
four stops that the tourincluded and I felt that he
understood the issue and theimportance of taking action.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
So it sounds like there's progress.
There has been progress.
The capacity is still not there.
So this is a 5, 10, 15, 20 ormore year process, right Like if
you had the magic wand that yougot all the money, or that this
(24:28):
region got all the money thatneeded and all the attention
right now on both sides of theborder I know the Mexican
president, I think at the end ofAmilo's term, I'm not sure, but
the Guardia Nacional took overrunning one of the plants and so
there was some attention.
If all that worked out, howlong does it take until the
residents of Imperial Beach, forexample, have the ocean and the
(24:51):
experience that they deserve?
Speaker 2 (24:53):
So that's a good point that you just reminded me
about the president.
Past president Omel turned thekeys over to their equivalent of
the Army Corps to expedite thefix of their plant.
Had that not happened, we wouldstill be waiting for them to
fix it.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
Okay, so that was a positive step.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
That was a positive, absolutely and truly.
There's a lack of politicalwill here, and I'm just going to
be straightforward about that.
If I were president, we couldhave done the exact same thing
that President Amlo did andturned the keys over to Army
Corps of Engineers said you knowthis procurement and
(25:31):
contracting, procurementprocesses, environmental
regulations and laws, nepareview, other types of laws can
be waived if we want them to,and I'll give you a perfect
example.
I think two or three years ago,I can't remember when they were
talking about completing thewall, they built a wall over the
(25:55):
river floodplain because theriver was the only area that was
not secured by a wall.
It was a big open space,because that's where the water
has to flow through.
That project was done in lessthan a year I think it was nine
months with zero environmentalreview and unlimited resources
in the name of national security.
So the president has thoseexact same powers at their hand
(26:20):
to do the same.
So if this president were tosay I am going to issue an
executive order to divert andtreat the river and expedite
construction of that, so itcould be whatever's already
being built at the plant andjust an additional piece of
infrastructure that couldpre-treat industrial waste and
(26:43):
not just wastewater anddischarge that three miles
offshore, then we wouldimmediately start seeing relief
at our coast and in the regionand that could be done in a year
or two.
And we have a trillion-dollarbudget in this nation.
There's no reason why a couplebillion dollars can't be spent
(27:04):
on protecting people's lives andwell-being.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
Yeah, not to mention the experience of the people who
go to the beach and play theTijuana.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Right, I mean, that kind of sometimes gets lost in
the dialogue.
But I mean, I've been to thebeach on both sides and it
smells bad and I'm sure thatit's hazardous just all around.
Do you think that yourbackground and experience as
being binational, bicultural,bilingual has helped in
(27:43):
collaborating with officials inTijuana?
I think so.
Can you talk about that alittle bit?
Speaker 2 (27:47):
Yeah.
So I have a pretty strongworking relationship with the
governor of Baja, marina ElPilar.
I credit her because when wefirst came into office I think
we came into office around thesame time we did a meet and
greet, acknowledged the issueand talked about how important
(28:11):
it was for us to collaborate andwork on this, which was very
different from my experiencewith her predecessor the one
before who didn't evenacknowledge that this issue
existed.
So this was prioritized at thehighest level of their
government and there was seriousfunding put into it and, as we
talked earlier, the project waseven expedited.
So, I think also at the locallevel, I've met with the mayor
(28:35):
of Tijuana stormwaters, undercity's jurisdiction in.
Tijuana.
So the importance of that ismaintenance of their culverts
and sediment capture basins,which help collect trash and
sediment, which, by preventingthat, we prevent all of that
from clogging our infrastructureon our side and causing these
(28:59):
spills to happen on our side, ormalfunctions, if you will.
So there has to becollaboration.
This whole rhetoric around Imean I've heard it all build a
dam to close the border, which Ioppose because that's the
equivalent, it's equivalent toshooting yourself in the foot.
(29:20):
Our economies areinterdependent.
Do we need more help fromMexico?
Absolutely, but do we need morehelp from our own federal and
state government and countygovernment?
Absolutely.
The county is our health andhuman services, is the health
and human services agency forthe entire county.
(29:43):
Every single jurisdiction hasto receive support from the
county.
As far as health and there'snobody at the wheel right now
when it comes to that we haven'thad any comprehensive systemic
epidemiological study to betterunderstand everything that we
talked about earlier theanecdotal reports, reports and
(30:11):
then the perception reports fromCDC we need actual medical
interventions to see how far andhow severe people's bodies are
being affected.
That's one.
Two, we need to remove some ofthe sources of pollutants
immediately.
They can be removed at theriver.
In the river valley there'ssome areas that have riprap
along the river that areactually facilitating
(30:31):
aerosolization of thesepollutants, Just because it's
like rapids kind of.
Yes, exactly it's a cascade andrapids.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Like mini waterfalls, yes, interesting.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Which is exactly the process that is used at
treatment plants to remove someof the bacteria through their
treatment.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
They're these tanks that use air bubblers, kind of
like bubblers.
Yes, so you have naturallyoccurring ones out there in the
field, is what you're saying?
Speaker 2 (31:00):
Yeah, but that are flowing in the air and traveling
long distances.
We have urban areas that are asclose as two blocks to those
hot spots where people actuallylive and go to school, so that's
concerning.
Speaker 1 (31:17):
So you bring up the county.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
And you're currently in a campaign and running for
the District 1.
Running for the District 1.
What will you bring to thatseat?
Related to this, but then alsothe myriad other important
(31:50):
issues that this region facesfrom well, you mentioned cost of
living.
That's somewhat tied tohomelessness connected to mental
health, connected to fentanyllots Budget decisions, like
reserves at the county.
Do we tap them, do we not?
How much?
Why not?
Why yes?
Can you kind of paint a pictureof you know what your plan is
(32:14):
and your vision going forward inthat way.
Speaker 2 (32:16):
Yeah, it's all interconnected, by the way,
everything you just mentionedand I think it's important.
You know we were talkingearlier about what government is
and should be to the people.
It should serve the people andit's their taxpayer dollars that
are at the county and we havethis very bloated reserve
(32:38):
account that is well above thestandards and guidelines that
fiscal entities recommend having.
And especially District 1hasn't had its fair share.
It has not had the resourcesthat we need to tackle
affordable housing, to tacklehomelessness.
There has been almost a vacuumof leadership between the county
(33:04):
and the jurisdictions that needto work on this right.
I am Pearl Beach, san DiegoNational City, chula Vista.
I think that I'm going to bringthe same energy that I bring as
mayor in Pearl Beach to theseproblems, because I don't
(33:24):
consider myself a politician.
To me, I'm a public servant andI want to make sure that the
government is working for thepeople.
And we have the lowest medianhousehold income in the entire
county.
In the district we have thehighest rate of people that
don't have health coverage.
We have the highest rate ofhouseholds that are overburdened
(33:46):
, meaning more than half oftheir income is going to keep a
roof over their head.
So how are we talking about?
Oh, we're going to fix ourhousing issues by building more
luxury and market rate housing.
Well, that's one of the prongsthat we need to tackle this
challenge, but we also need tobuild housing that people can
(34:10):
actually afford.
So that's one.
Two, we need the wages to be onpar with the costs of living.
City of San Diego is one of the, if not the most expensive city
in the nation, so we need tomake sure that people get paid
fairly, that they have goodpaying jobs, that they have good
benefits so that they can havea high quality of life.
(34:33):
So we need somebody who's goingto fight for that at the county
, because we've been neglectedfor many, many, many years, well
before my predecessor.
So my opponent has been talkingabout cutting programs,
aligning themselves with whatthe Trump administration is
(34:55):
proposing.
We know very well.
The Trump administration isproposing cuts to Medicare and
Medicaid.
We have over 140,000 people whodepend on these programs in
District 1, not to mention kids.
Speaker 1 (35:10):
So 140 out of like 650, right yeah.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
It's a very large number Like.
I said we have the lowesthousehold income in the county,
we have the highest need.
Let's just say it simply right,we have the highest need in our
district.
And this whole conversation ofthe structural deficit at the
county I think what we need todo is look at what programs are
(35:35):
functioning correctly, look atwhat isn't.
But I would not be supportiveof cutting social safety net
programs, because that's thelast line of defense that many
of these people have and we needto make sure that that
continues and we have theresources to do that.
We have a reserve of almost$2.4 billion.
(35:59):
We almost have enough to buy LACounty if we wanted to.
So as long as we remain withinthe you know we do it in a
responsible way and we staywithin the guidelines that are
recommended to have reserves,we'll be okay.
Speaker 1 (36:17):
So those reserves?
That's just a result of,depending on who you ask either
responsible conservative fiscalmanagement or conservative
fiscal management, that who'swhich, where the goal is just to
accumulate more and more forwhatever rainy day may or may
not come.
What do you think's behind that?
Speaker 2 (36:36):
Well, the conservative policies of our
past board of supervisors.
We've had the board ofsupervisors under Republican
control since its inceptionuntil not even six years ago.
Speaker 1 (36:48):
Until what First it was Fletcher right.
Speaker 2 (36:50):
Fletcher came in and, you know, whatever one may
think of him, I credit him forstarting to change the direction
of the county.
And then we had, you know, therest of the supervisors come on
board and it takes time.
I think that that's going to bethe push, the push to
(37:14):
prioritize the working class andthe underserved, not just
externally, in in the socialpolitics, if you will, of the
conversation, but in the actualtangible programs and funding.
And how do we prioritize thatadministratively at the county?
So that's the energy I plan tobring at the county.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
Now your, you know, District 1 obviously abuts the
international border and soimmigration, immigration
enforcement, philosophies aroundimmigration enforcement, the
general mood I could tell you inthe school leadership world.
We've been, we've been anyschool leader will tell you that
(38:00):
we've been strategizing andholding information evenings
with our parents and trying toassuage fears.
I think it seems that most ofthe fears have not yet, and
hopefully never, come tofruition.
But there's definitely outthere in the community.
Is there anything that youcould see doing in that District
(38:25):
1 seat that would help kind ofaddress that?
Doing in that district one seatthat would help kind of address
that?
It's a, it's obviouslyimmigration enforcement's a
federal, uh, responsibility.
Speaker 2 (38:34):
But there's this interface right, yeah, the
county there is, there is andand there is a role for us to
either be leaders on it, um, andand you know, not rubber stamp
these awful policies coming outof the White House.
I mean unconstitutionalpolicies coming out of the White
(38:57):
House we're talking about.
We're seeing maybe not in ourregion yet, but we're seeing US
citizens get deported.
We're seeing elected officialsbeing arrested for protesting
ICE practices.
I have not witnessed thismyself, but I have talked to
community leaders that havewitnessed ICE agents without any
(39:23):
identifiable badges or in masks, pick up people and take them
without any due process, and nowwe know some of them are being
sent off to awful prisons in ElSalvador with no hope of
returning.
So I don't agree with any ofthat.
(39:46):
I don't agree with massdeportations we were talking
about.
We are an interconnected,interdependent region
economically, culturally,socially.
You know statutorily requiredpractices of not using our local
(40:11):
resources to do the federalgovernment's work.
There's been the point oftension when it came to the
county sanctuary policy and therelease of violent offenders.
I don't agree with releasingviolent offenders onto the
street.
That is, at the discretion ofthe sheriff.
I have a good relationship withSheriff Martinez.
(40:33):
I trust what she's doing,because nobody wants to see
violent offenders put back intothe community.
But that's a very fine linethat we need to continue to
monitor because we're seeing thesuspension of our laws really
(40:53):
in the way that this is beinghandled.
I mean even what?
A couple of days ago there wasconversations about suspending
habeas corpus.
Yeah, so I think in me whatpeople will find as a leader of
representative of the mostdiverse district in the county
is we're not going to allowthose types of policies and
(41:15):
practices to take hold in adistrict that is incredibly
diverse and interdependent withour neighbors to the south.
Speaker 1 (41:24):
Well, you've been very generous with your time and
I want to honor your time.
Is there anything that we havenot yet touched on that you were
hoping we were going to cover?
I know July, what is it?
July, july 1st, july 1st.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
Yes, well, yes, thank you for reminding me.
Ballots are dropping in themail the week of June 1st.
So it's a very tricky schedulescheduled this special election
because the week of july firstpeople are going to be out on
vacation for the fourth of july.
Our kids are going out ofschool in the summer, so and
(41:59):
it's not a.
Speaker 1 (42:00):
It's not a.
Speaker 2 (42:01):
I think turnout in general is what we're trying to
push for whichever side peopleyes, and that's what I was going
to say.
Our district has this primary.
We barely I think it was 18%turnout.
That's extremely low.
So I encourage your listenersto go out and vote.
I mean, vote for whoever youthink is the best candidate, but
(42:25):
vote because that's the onlyway we make our voices heard.
One of the most important ones,yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:30):
Yeah, thank you so much for for being gracious with
your time and your expertiseand um, as I told you before we
hit record that I've longadmired your tenacity as an
advocate for um tackling a hugeissue.
There are a few issues that arebigger than this.
(42:51):
You've got an issue betweencountries.
You've got an issue wherethere's this kind of decades of
neglect on both sides of theborder, like federal policies on
both sides.
It couldn't get morecomplicated.
Yeah, that's true, and you'regoing to be upgrading Should you
prevail in July.
You're upgrading from thisregion right at the border to
(43:14):
the whole chunk of the county.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
So best of luck with that.
Thank you so much.
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (43:22):
I hope you enjoyed this episode with Paloma Aguirre
.
With Paloma Aguirre, if you areso inclined, please give us a
five-star rating on whicheverplatform you're listening to
this on, and consider supportingthe show with a contribution.
No amount is too small and allamounts matter.
(43:43):
Thanks again for coming on into hang out.
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