Major funding for Kpbs Evening Edition has been made possible in part by Bill Howe, family of companies providing San Diego with plumbing, heating, air restoration and flood services for over 45 years.

Call one 800 Bill Howe or visit Bill Howe.com.

And by the Conrad Prebys Foundation.

Darlene Marcos Shiley.

And by the following.

And by viewers like you.

Thank you.

Thank you for joining us.

I'm Maya Trabulsi.

we begin tonight with an update on a story that we have been following.

The Navy Reserve inspector general says a San Diego congressional candidate violated Pentagon rules on political campaigns.

Kpbs military reporter Andrew Dyer says the IG found violations on the campaign website and social media.

An email obtained by Kpbs from the inspector general says Lieutenant Junior grade Ammar Campa-najjar fixed portions of his website.

They run afoul of regulations after his chain of command intervenes.

The IG email was addressed to a local man who had filed a complaint.

Pentagon regulations allow reservists like Campa-najjar to run for office, but restrict how they use their military title and uniform photos.

Until late last month, Campa-najjar's campaign website repeatedly referred to him as a, quote, Navy officer and admitted his status in the Navy Reserve.

It also prominently featured photos of him in uniform.

The Inspector General also found further violations on Campa- najjar's campaign Facebook page.

The IG said they forwarded those issues to the Navy Reserve Wednesday before closing the complaint Campa-najjar says he just wants to get things right.

And as of Thursday afternoon, hasn't heard anything further from the Navy Reserve.

Andrew Dyer, Kpbs news.

We have some cooler air out there now, but we're going to be dealing with a much cooler time this weekend with some showers of rain returning to the area.

In the meantime, tonight mid 40s Escondido.

Upper 40s, Oceanside, upper 50s into San Diego, mid 50s Chula Vista.

Get down to around the low 40s into Mount Laguna and Kepa only 36.

There's moisture on its way this weekend.

We will see some scattered showers out there.

There we are early Saturday and during the day some more will follow.

We'll take a look at that complete five day forecast coming up.

Wildfires in the southeast are burning tens of thousands of acres and destroying dozens of homes.

Firefighters are struggling to contain the flames, fueled by the worst U.S.

spring drought on record.

Brian Abel has the latest from Washington.

Everything's on fire down there.

An outbreak of wildfires across Georgia, the two biggest now scorching more than 34,000 acres across the state in the last month.

It's really sad, like everybody that has worked so hard for everything they have, and we're just all going to lose it.

It just doesn't feel real.

Dramatic images like this along highway 82, prompting Georgia's governor to declare a state of emergency for more than half of the counties in the state.

In these tight conditions, which is as severe we've ever faced any kind of spark.

Wind blowing embers can start new fires as much as a mile away.

Some of the worst devastation in Brantley County.

Yeah, all their stuff gone.

Apocalyptic scenes as the fire here has destroyed more than 50 homes and thousands of structures.

My house is gone.

The flames moving so fast.

Some families having little time to evacuate.

It wasn't a panic until we seen.

Well, still, we seen the fire over the tree line.

I mean, it it changed in a matter of 20 minutes.

Roughly a thousand more homes still in danger with this fire alone.

Only about 15% contained by Thursday afternoon.

Fire officials warning people in the state to exercise caution.

I will be very honest with you and say it's a miracle that we have not had any lives lost.

The widespread wildfires fueled by a historic drought.

Firefighters not expected to get any help from Mother Nature until significant rain returns forecasted for next week.

In Washington, Brian Abel, Kpbs news.

San Diego Gas and Electric is giving customers another way to save when it comes time to pay their bill.

A super off peak rate was applied to SDG&E customers on time of use plans from 10 a.m.

to 2 p.m.

in March and April, but starting May 1st, that rate will be applied year round.

It will cost customers $0.34 per kilowatt hour, compared to $0.43 per hour.

SDG&E told our media partner KGTV they were able to make this change due to an influx of renewable energy sources.

Now there is an influx of solar and battery storage technology on the grid that allows the grid energy from 10 a.m.

to 2 p.m.

be sourced really inexpensively.

There's still a lot of San Diegans that actually still work from home, and we wanted those customers to be able to save, to be in control of their electrical usage.

SDG&E says that if you're not on a plan with super peak off hours, you can find that out.

Review your plan, compare prices, and see what works best for you.

Making energy efficient choices at home is good for the environment as well as your wallet.

Jen Sullivan has tips on easy, energy efficient ways to lower your utility bills ahead of the more costly summer season.

Utility bills have skyrocketed in recent years.

Real estate company Ruby Home estimates American households are paying an average of $610 a month on utilities.

Winter electric calls have jumped 35% in the last five years, according to the National Energy Assistance Directors Association.

So what's causing prices to increase?

Our electricity system in this country is old, and there's a lot more demand on that old system.

Kate Collarulli with clean choice.

Energy says extreme weather patterns are also a factor in rising utility prices.

Weather experts are predicting record heat this summer, which means cranking up your AC and putting more pressure on your wallet.

When the demand for air conditioning spikes, prices follow, Collarulli says small changes can have a big impact on your bills.

This summer.

She suggests raising your thermostat by a few degrees at night.

Keep blinds and shades down during the day to block out sunlight.

Run your dishwasher in washing machine early in the morning and keep your water heater at 120 degrees.

More expensive changes include upgrading appliances to energy efficient models or switching to a clean source of energy, like installing solar panels.

But it's a big upfront cost over the long haul.

As we look ahead five, ten, 15 years.

That is the source of fuel that is absolutely free.

And that's really setting our country up for cheaper electricity over time.

Collarulli suggests shopping around for the best deals.

Some companies will allow you to lease solar panels.

Federal government and even many states and cities offer tax credits and incentives for clean energy upgrades to your home.

For consumer watch, I'm Jenn Sullivan.

I'm Amna Nawaz tonight on the NewsHour.

President Trump threatens to shoot any Iranian boat putting mines in the Strait of Hormuz.

That's coming up at seven after Evening Edition on Kpbs.

U.S.

Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr completed a two week marathon of congressional hearings this week, where he clashed with some lawmakers.

He testified before the Senate Finance Committee Wednesday morning in the Senate Health, education, Labor and Pensions Committee in the afternoon.

Cheryl Hubbard has details on the explosive exchanges HHS Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr grilled on Capitol Hill.

Does the president know there is a historic measles surge occurring nationwide?

You want me to answer the question?

It's just a very simple question.

Yes, I understand you're going to get your opportunity.

Congressional hearings focused on the proposed HHS budget for fiscal year 2027, forced the health secretary to defend his views on the measles outbreak, misinformation and more.

I think it's safe to say the trust gap has worsened over the last year due to false statements about safety and efficacy of vaccines for preventable diseases like measles.

The secretary capping two weeks of back to back congressional hearings Wednesday with fiery back and forths.

You have a lot more power to negotiate that way.

The stakes.

Well, they got the lowest prices in history by health care costs.

And you and Donald Trump are actually making the problem worse.

The American public deserves better.

Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren pushed back on Kennedy's claim that Trump RX the administration's direct to consumer portal that launched in February, offers the lowest prices for brand name drugs, with Republican Senator Tom Tillis noting China's growing role in drug development and medical research.

China gets the manufacturing.

America gets lower prices on drugs we didn't invent, produced in facilities that we don't own.

And you've already alluded to the unacceptable circumstances in China.

I'm Cherelle Hubbard reporting.

It is an issue that San Diego has grappled with for decades.

The homeless crisis took center stage during last night's governors debate.

The moderators asked each candidate to give the current governor, Gavin Newsom, a letter grade on how he's handling homelessness.

Our media partner, KGTV asked some local nonprofits the same question.

They say while they feel the crisis is getting better, more should be done.

We have not.

Still, to this point, provided enough funding to get everyone off the street, and we're too focused on coercive techniques.

So nobody talked about disabilities.

And the reality is, the majority of people that have been on our streets over a year are disabled just from the impact of being there.

And John Brady adds that hearing things like prevention, funding and temporary housing from the candidates was encouraging a popular influencer made headlines this month after he suffered an apparent overdose while live streaming.

Braden Peters has gone viral for promoting the concept of maximizing your appearance through extreme means.

Leigh Waldman explains why experts warn many aspects of this looks maxxing trend are going dangerously far.

It's exactly what it sounds like maximizing your outward appearance to be the best version of yourself.

In theory, it sounds fine, but in practice, some of these looks maxxing influencers are promoting an unrealistic, harmful standard for pediatric psychologist doctor Erin McTiernan.

The looks maxxing trend has spread from social media to her clinic.

Whether it's labeled looks maxing or not, but a lot of content focused on self-improvement.

Looks Maxxing, like most trends, has a light in a dark side.

What doctor McTiernan described as soft maxxing incorporates healthy habits like skincare routines, eating a balanced diet, and regular exercise.

Unfortunately, sometimes looks maxxing takes it into a more rigid, regimented, extreme category, and that's when we get more concerned.

Looks Maxxing influencer Clavicular, whose real name is Braden Peters, has made waves promoting illicit drug use to stay thin and has even said on social media.

He uses a hammer to smash bones in his face to make them appear more prominent.

These are harmful and risky behaviors that they can cause severe physical and psychological damage.

Rachel Rodgers and her colleagues are conducting research into the trend.

So far, they're finding it is more targeted toward influencing young men.

It could be that given that for men, typically appearance is not framed as a main concern.

It has to be put within that no pain, no gain framework.

While looks maxxing is framed as a way to improve your life by changing your physical appearance, both McTiernan and Rodgers worry about the effects it's having on mental health.

The effects on what people are really looking for that is their lives, their social lives, their self-esteem, their mental health are short lived.

Both of these experts that we spoke to feel it's important to note that although it seems like looks maxxing content is widespread, in reality, this trend just lives in small pockets of the internet.

In New York, I'm Leigh Waldman A recent study by the California Commission on the State of Hate shows teens are more than twice as likely to experience hate than adults.

Today, the Museum of Tolerance brought its mobile experience to West View High School to help students learn how to combat hate and bias.

Kpbs North County reporter Alexander Nguyen says students saw firsthand how propaganda caused ordinary people to do horrible things.

As students file into this mobile classroom, they are greeted by Ewa Geisler.

Welcome to the Mobile Museum of Tolerance.

My name is Ewa.

She's a workshop facilitator for the Mobile Museum of Tolerance.

It's a classroom on wheels for the L.A.

based museum.

Today's topic the power of ordinary people, especially when they're influenced to do horrible things.

This is a Holocaust workshop.

Geisler showed the students various propaganda that was used to sell hate during Nazi Germany, and the effects it had on people were now perceived as an evil, separate race.

Geisler says students come out of the experience with a better understanding of how things like the Holocaust could happen, and how easy it is for history to repeat itself.

It's important for these students to understand that we all, or ordinary and we all, can affect others with the choices that we make today.

10th grader Gabe Lee says seeing how the Holocaust started was eye opening for him is that it was all entirely made up of ordinary people.

They weren't crazy or anything.

Fallon Allshire sees a lot of parallels between what happened nearly a century ago and now, especially with the rise of social media misinformation.

It's very prevalent with a lot of high school students, especially with the rise of social media and how, things can be skewed.

The mobile museum experience started in 2020 during the pandemic and now goes to different schools throughout the state to present its various workshops on how to identify and combat hatred in today's world.

Because of the internet, information spread so quickly and it's very easy to like, just believe what you see.

So I think it's really important for people to fact check the information that they hear.

I think having this kind of thing and like having it shown in schools, more people will realize, like, not everything they see is real.

And as the students head back to the classroom, learning to think critically about the information shared online may be the most important lesson learned today.

Alexander Nguyen, Kpbs news.

For many people, libraries are more than just places to check out books.

They offer computer access, study spaces, kids activities, and a place for people to find help and community.

Well, it is National Library Week.

Kpbs reporter Katie Anastas takes us to the Logan Heights Library, where a staff member is retiring after nearly 40 years.

A lot of people say libraries are obsolete.

Who checks out books anymore?

It's not just.

It's not just about the books.

You know, it's a community hub.

My name is Alina Rosas.

I have been working at the San Diego Public Library Logan Heights branch since 1988.

I think this was in 1989.

That's me.

There's just so much.

So much that the library does for the community.

We have, educational programs for all ages.

How to get a bank account, how to get an ID, how to fix your car.

We have the hotspots that we loan out.

There's people that say, you know, I can't get anything done at home.

I need to study here.

It's everything.

This place is everything.

A lot of the branches have small, little sections for Spanish books.

And that's just part of it.

There's more Spanish.

This other shelf is also all Spanish.

I actually went to TJ a couple of times to pick up books.

Went shopping, brought books back in my little station wagon.

Covid.

Was interesting.

We were one of the first branches that were that, was able to get.

We got a Wi-Fi extender, and we would set up on the side of the library.

We had Chromebooks that people could use, and we had people coming in and filling out job applications, unemployment applications.

The librarians then would make little to go packs with, bundles of books, and people would check out the whole bundle and they would tell us what they were looking for, what genre or whatever, and then we would check them out to them, put them on a table, close the door, and they would pick it up.

People wanted it after we opened, normally they said, well, what happened to your book bundles?

I said, oh, well, now you know the stacks are open so you can look for things.

Oh, that.

I liked your book bundles.

I love the community room.

We've had magicians, storytellers, science programs, animal shows.

We've had graduations in there, baby showers.

My 50th birthday party was there.

It was a surprise.

The piano was donated by one of the friends of the library.

And with the stipulation that it be available to the community when they wanted to use it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm going to miss this.

Yeah.

That's lovely, and that story was produced by Kpbs education reporter Katie Anastas and video journalist Carlos Castillo.

Elena retires from the library in August.

But we do have a few moving parts right now, weather wise.

Cooler air showers returning this weekend.

That's a big headline here.

Late in this.

Maybe not late spring, but late in the month of April.

A lot of the time we typically transition to the dry season around now, but right now we have really two more opportunities for showers in the next week.

One, this weekend and another one around the middle of next week.

So we're not yet into dry mode.

We have an onshore breeze and clouds that will bring us some cool air this weekend as well.

What a difference compared to back in March, where maybe it felt like the dry season was already here.

Well, we're back into a cooler time.

58 tonight.

Partly cloudy and overnight tonight you can see low 40s and Ramona 58 into San Diego, 52 Borrego Springs.

But a delightful day for Friday.

A little rain and snow way up into Wyoming.

None of that around here.

We're dry.

It looks good and will be in the 70s in most areas.

Chula Vista may struggle in the upper 60s, but delightful weather there.

El Cajon 74, San Diego 70, Borrego Springs 85.

It will be around 53 up into Mount Laguna.

So moisture will be approaching and we will see a few brief showers around the more sustained rain shower activity will be a little farther north, but we will see some out there.

Here's future radar and satellite and you can see that onshore breeze here.

A couple of clouds through Friday.

Saturday, spotty showers out there early in the day.

A few more later.

Saturday, a few gusty little showers may move through into the mountains there.

So this is a decent onshore flow this weekend and it will keep us cool as well.

There's some snow in the Sierra again, but cool and a little unsettled on Sunday with some lingering showers here and there.

So here we go with the best chance for showers mainly Saturday.

A brief shower or two.

There could be a sprinkle early Sunday and temps will be down a little bit for coastal areas.

And then we bounce back into the low 70s on a delightful Monday.

Inland areas again.

The best chance for showers will be Saturday.

Mostly cloudy until Sunday.

A little bit of a rise in temperature but not a big one into early next week in the mountains.

We'll have rain showers and cool air this weekend.

Best chance for showers Saturday.

Still a sprinkle or two on Sunday.

Only 42 for your high on Sunday and in the deserts here.

Breezy and a big drop in temperature.

We probably won't see much rain, but there could be a sprinkle or two on Saturday.

Mostly sunny Sunday back into the low 80s but not too warm for Monday and Tuesday.

I'm AccuWeather meteorologist Geoff Cornish for Kpbs news.

Go ahead and check out the latest from the Kpbs Arts and Culture podcast, the finest on this week's episode, rugs, Rituals and Resilience how artists are expanding the story of Iran beyond conflict.

You can listen now at kpbs.org.

Slash the finest or wherever you get your podcasts.

There was a time in San Diego when developers thought less about cars and more about pedestrians.

They connected up communities by building stairways and walkways.

And as Ken Kremer shows us, many of those links between streets and neighborhoods are still around.

If you know where to look and are willing to do a little climbing.

Yeah, it's an old motivational saying there's no elevator to success.

You have to take the stairs.

And since successful people, I mean truly successful people are willing to do what unsuccessful people are not willing to do in order to be successful.

Let's climb some stairs.

These are stairs in the Mount Nebo neighborhood in la mesa.

A successful people say if you're not successful, there are a couple of stairways connecting different streets.

This one goes from the intersection of Windsor Drive and Canterbury Drive up to Summit Drive.

245 steps.

Nice.

And there are a lot of climbing opportunities in San Diego.

Staircases in Balboa Park, like the 98 Juniper stairs built by the California Conservation Corps.

In Tierra Santa.

Claremont, Mesa and Antigua.

A little over 100 steps.

A popular workout spot for those more successful souls than I. What's at the top?

There's sometimes entrance to ball fields and a public park and a really nice open view.

But for me, it's not the workout stairs like the ones at Mesa College or San Diego State, or even the grand staircase at the convention center.

It's back when people walked from place to place, and they built these public stairways to connect up neighborhoods, like in Rolando village 80 years ago when developers were putting in sidewalks.

They added what people living here call catwalks.

Mostly they are walkways that go behind and between houses, leading to eight stairways offering a total of 256 stairs.

Sure.

Let's say you had a friend just one block up the hill.

Instead of hiking around winding streets, you could take the stairs.

A built in shortcut.

Right.

Thus, streets and neighborhoods were connected together through a whole system of public stairways.

Maybe that's part of the charm of it not being so car dependent and having something that's unique to your community.

What a great thing that modern suburban developers probably wouldn't think to do today.

A welcoming permission to pass behind backyards and in the morning or the afternoon to walk along.

Breathe it in.

Take in the smell of citrus trees.

Or enjoy the poppies along the walks and secret stairs of Valencia Park.

Connecting Los Alturas Terrace and Trinidad Way, and extending on to church, word and Dream streets.

They had become overgrown and tended to flood in the rains, but then the Urban Collaboration Project, along with community and corporate donations, helped get the brush cleared away and the stairways open again.

And back in January of 2022 four local artists began painting poppies.

Christina Kim and Kpbs were there that day and learned that the poppy has some possible history.

Story is back when this neighborhood was being built, there were still open lots, and the developer is said to have added these walkways and stairs because his wife loved to go out and pick nearby wildflowers.

I love that.

And if it's true.

Thank you for public stairways are a real asset that create a sense of connection and community.

They add beauty and a sense of local history, and sometimes a view too they elevate step by step.

And if you take them up on the offer, it can add up to a personal sense of something too.

That's quite nice.

In the end, that feeling of what was it again?

Success, You can see more of Ken Kramer stories on his half hour show about San Diego.

It airs tonight and every Thursday night at 8:00, right here on Kpbs.

And here is a look at what we're working on for tomorrow in the Kpbs newsroom on NPR's Morning Edition.

A new project highlights music recorded in American prisons.

Some of it's surprisingly light and catchy.

And Kpbs roundtable is discussing National Poetry Month and the return of San Diego Book Crawl this weekend.

You can find tonight's stories on our website, kpbs.org.

Thanks for joining us.

I'm Maya Trabulsi, good night.

Major funding for Kpbs Evening Edition has been made possible in part by Bill Howe, family of companies providing San Diego with plumbing, heating, air restoration and flood services for over 45 years.

Call one 800 Bill Howe or visit Bill howe.com.

And by the Conrad Prebys Foundation.

Darlene Marcos Shiley.

And by the following.

And by viewers like you.

Thank you.