At 2 a.m. Monday morning, the De la Mora’s were outside in the rain cleaning a city storm drain with a rake. 

That drain clogged the morning of New Year’s Day sending neighbors into a panic as a lake began to form where Birch and Beta streets meet in Shelltown. They partly blame this shallow drain for the Jan. 22 floods of 2024 which affected thousands living near the flood-prone Chollas Creek channel. The city has plans to fix it, but it’ll cost around $111 million, money the city doesn’t have.  

Ramon and Brenda De la Mora invited me into their newly remodeled kitchen hours after the rain stopped and daylight took over. The couple was lucky they had flood insurance in 2024. Their $150,000 coverage limit allowed them to fix up their basement and main floor. Floodwaters had reached halfway up the wall, completely consuming everything they owned.  

It took nine months to complete the remodel, Ramon said. He purchased a trailer so the couple could live out the rest of the construction in the backyard after months of sleeping in hotels or in friends’ homes.  

Brenda is sad about losing baby photos of her now grown daughters. She said she kept a scrapbook of each year of their lives. The couple tried to salvage these memories from the water but they began to decompose within a few days.  

Now the couple pays triple for just a little bit more coverage under their new flood insurance provider, American Bankers Insurance Company of Florida. Their previous provider, Lloyd’s of London, dropped them after the last payout, Ramon said.  

“If we lost it all again, I don’t care,” Ramon said. “After something like this you learn that material things aren’t worth that much. The most important thing we lost is our tranquility.”  

Other neighbors aren’t so lucky. Many living along Chollas Creek own their homes, which means there’s no mortgage lender pressuring owners to buy flood insurance. Those that didn’t have insurance in 2024 were stuck trying to get some relief from the Federal Emergency Management Agency or rebuild themselves, which many in this working class neighborhood have the skills to do. 

Brenda said that when it rains, she doesn’t sleep. She chats with neighbors on a What’s App group. Monday night, she was texting with someone who lives in a second-floor apartment along Beta Street whether they can see the height of Chollas Creek – like a sentry in a tower.  

“I worry too much,” she said.  

Up the road at the South 38th Street bridge, a worker crew split large pipes above a huge freshly-dug ditch next to Chollas Creek. A crew member told me they were building a water retention basin so rain rushing down Acacia Grove Way would slow down before hitting the channel.  

• ICYMI, here’s four climate promises on the chopping block when San Diego’s pressed for cash. (Voice of San Diego) 
• Inewsource’s Philip Salata spent a month talking to residents exposed to the pollution of the Tijuana River.  
• This is a big deal: San Diego City Council adopted a new fire safety rule called “zone zero.” It means combustible materials will be banned within a five-foot radius surrounding a structure. The state Bureau of Forestry is expected to finalize precise regulations in the coming months. The rules take effect in February for new construction and February of next year, 2027, for existing homes.  (KPBS) I wrote about what kinds of things around a home might be considered combustible last year in this piece entitled, “How to Keep Your House From Burning Down.” The list might surprise you. 
• A bunch of dead lobsters washed up on San Onofre State Beach earlier this month. Officials haven’t determined why. Beachgoers wonder if it’s related to the release of wastewater from the San Onofre nuclear power plant. (Union-Tribune)