Daily Business Report-Jan. 19, 2017
Mayor Kevin Faulconer with the city seal and flag in the background. (Photo by Chris Jennewein)
Mayor Faulconer Skips Washington
Meeting and Inauguration
By Ken Stone
San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer is one of the most prominent Republicans in California, but he has something in common with dozens of Democrats in Congress.
He’s not attending Friday’s inauguration of Donald Trump as the 45th president.
In response to a Times of San Diego query, Faulconer spokesman Craig Gustafson said Tuesday: “He is not going.”
Faulconer is listed among 314 mayors registered as attending the 85th Winter Meeting of the U.S. Conference of Mayors through Thursday, but he’s in San Diego now, Gustafson said.
Faulconer didn’t attend Trump’s late-May rally in San Diego either, and he wrote in House Speaker Paul Ryan for president (after being an early endorser of Sen. Marco Rubio and later Ohio Gov. John Kasich in the primaries).
Last September, Faulconer staked out a position at odds with Trump’s stances on Mexico.
“On the national scale . . . we’re seeing conversation that doesn’t reflect the reality of what’s happening here,” Faulconer told South County Economic Development Council’s 25th annual economic summit. “Our proximity to Mexico is not a liability but an advantage that we embrace. It’s not about city boundaries or international boundaries; it’s about how we work together.”
Even so, Faulconer was criticized for failing to condemn Trump during the primaries. “The most prominent and powerful Republican leaders in our community have refused to speak out,” said Councilwoman Georgette Gomez six months before the November election. “These leaders are remaining on the sidelines, allowing Trump and his hate-filled campaign to gain momentum.”
Rep. Juan Vargas, D-San Diego, announced Tuesday that he would join at least 15 other Democratic members of California’s congressional delegation in skipping the inauguration.
“Instead, I will be praying for our country and for our community with the people of my district,” Vargas said in a statement posted on his Twitter account.
However, the other Democrats in San Diego’s five-member congressional delegation, Susan Davis and Scott Peters, plan to attend the inauguration, according to reports.
All California Republicans in Congress will attend.
— Times of San Diego report
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Gift by Jack McGrory
Supports Student Veterans
By Tobin Vaughn | SDSU NewsCenter
A $250,000 donation to The Campaign for SDSU by alumnus Jack McGrory (’76) will provide scholarships for the university’s student veterans. This latest in a series of gifts by the Campanile Foundation’s immediate past chair brings his total campaign donations to almost $3 million.
McGrory is a U.S. Marine Corps veteran. As a result of his gift, a popular gathering space known as The Bunker in San Diego State University’s Joan and Art Barron Veterans Center will be named in his honor.
Along with his recent gift to provide scholarship support to student veterans, McGrory has supported many areas at SDSU, said Mary Ruth Carleton, SDSU vice president for University Relations and Development. Carleton is also president and CEO of the Campanile Foundation. “Jack has made gifts to our Departments of Classics and Public Affairs as well as to our athletic programs, and he knows how important this support is to public higher education,” she said.
McGrory, the CEO of La Jolla MJ Management, Inc., earned a master’s degree in public administration from SDSU, where he also taught courses for 27 years. In addition to a stint as San Diego’s city manager, his résumé includes serving as chairman and CEO of Price Legacy Corporation, chief operating officer of the San Diego Padres, manager of the Price Group and executive vice president and director of Price Charities.
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Astrophysicist Steven Boggs Named Dean
Of Division of Physical Sciences at UCSD
Steven E. Boggs, chair of the top-ranked physics department at UC Berkeley, has been appointed dean of UC San Diego’s Division of Physical Sciences.
An experimental astrophysicist, he officially began his tenure as dean and as a professor of physics in UC San Diego’s Center for Astrophysics and Space Sciences, known as CASS, on Jan. 1. He also holds the Chancellor’s Associates Endowed Chair in Physics.
Boggs is the second permanent dean of the division, which includes a Nobel Laureate and Fields Medalist among its current faculty and which has experienced substantial growth in its research and education programs since its founding in 2000.
He follows Mark Thiemens, a chemistry and biochemistry professor who served for 16 years as the division’s founding dean. Jeffrey Remmel, a mathematics professor and associate dean, served as interim dean from July 2016 until the end of last year.
Boggs was recruited following a yearlong national search after Thiemens announced his decision to step down to spend more time on his research. Boggs has since 2013 headed UC Berkeley’s Department of Physics, which ranked No. 1 in the world in the 2014 and 2015 Shanghai Academic Ranking of World Universities and No. 2 in the 2016 U.S. News Best Global Universities ranking. He also served from 2001 to 2013 as associate director of the university’s Space Sciences Laboratory and from 2001 to 2006 as associate director of Berkeley’s California Space Institute.
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New TSRI Method Could Turbocharge
Drug Discovery, Protein Research
A team led by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute has developed a versatile new method that should enhance the discovery of new drugs and the study of proteins.
The new method enables researchers to quickly find small molecules that bind to hundreds of thousands of proteins in their native cellular environment. Such molecules, called ligands, can be developed into important tools for studying how proteins work in cells, which may lead to the development of new drugs. The method can be used even without prior knowledge of protein targets to discover ligand molecules that disrupt a biological process of interest—and to quickly identify the proteins to which they bind.
“This new platform should be useful not only for discovering new drugs but also for discovering new biology,” said co-lead author Christopher G. Parker, a research associate in the laboratory of TSRI Professor Benjamin F. Cravatt, chairman of the Department of Chemical Biology.
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Urban Translations Partners
With Samsung Electronics
San Diego-based Urban Translations, a digital menu software provider, announced a partnership with Samsung Electronics that will enable guests to easily order menu items and amenities in any language on Samsung tablets in-room, at restaurants, and other entertainment venues.
“By leveraging Samsung’s Knox platform, we enhanced our system’s security and capabilities,” said Samantha Urban, Urban Translations CEO. “We combined this with the analytics we capture from what guests care about most, and it results in our clients’ being more efficient and profitable.”
Urban Translations is using the Samsung Knox platform to enable more customization and a better guest experience, as well as ensuring the devices are more secure than off-the-shelf tablets and iPads. To date, Urban Translations is being utilized at resorts, casinos and entertainment venues because of the ability to seamlessly integrate their solution throughout the clients’ entire property, the company said.
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Too Much Sitting, Too Little Exercise
May Accelerate Biological Aging
Researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine report that elderly women who sit for more than 10 hours a day with low physical activity have cells that are biologically older by eight years compared to women who are less sedentary.
The study, publishing online January 18 in the American Journal of Epidemiology, found elderly women with less than 40 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity per day and who remain sedentary for more than 10 hours per day have shorter telomeres — tiny caps found on the ends of DNA strands, like the plastic tips of shoelaces, that protect chromosomes from deterioration and progressively shorten with age.
“Our study found cells age faster with a sedentary lifestyle. Chronological age doesn’t always match biological age,” said Aladdin Shadyab, lead author of the study with the Department of Family Medicine and Public Health at UC San Diego School of Medicine.
Shadyab and his research team believe they are the first to objectively measure how the combination of sedentary time and exercise can impact the aging biomarker.
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Personnel Announcements
Crosbie Gliner Adds 3 Attorneys
To Commercial Real Estate Practice
Crosbie Gliner Schiffman Southard & Swanson LLP announced the addition of three attorneys to its commercial real estate practice: Michael Cato as partner and Jamie Altman Buggy and Collin Waring as associate attorneys.
Cato, Buggy and Waring join 17 other attorneys and six paralegals at the San Diego law firm.
Cato is a San Diego real estate and finance attorney who represents both local and national real estate developers, owners and investors. Previously a partner at Solomon Ward Seidenwurm & Smith LLP, he specializes in the buying, selling, leasing and financing of commercial properties in the office, industrial, retail and multi-family sectors. Prior to joining Solomon Ward, he was an associate at Latham & Watkins and Sheppard Mullin.
Buggy was most recently with Procopio, Cory, Hargreaves & Savitch LLP. She is in the real estate litigation and distressed assets practice group and represents business owners and individuals in all areas of real estate disputes, including breach of contract, fraud, insurance coverage, partnership disputes and breach of fiduciary duty. Buggy has served both creditors and debtors in the bankruptcy process.
Waring, formerly an associate at Troutman Sanders in Del Mar, has built a real estate law practice in a relatively short time, with experience in retail, industrial, office and multi-family properties. His expertise includes the full range of commercial real estate transactions, and he advises clients on variety of operational and corporate agreements including licensing agreements, operating agreements, subscription agreements and private placement memorandums.
