Podiatrist in Mira Mesa, CA

SAN DIEGO — Walt Mooromsky is one of 240 condo owners in the Canyon Park Villas in Mira Mesa, who recently had their property insurance not renewed by Farmers Insurance due to wildfire risk.

The condos sit on a canyon ridge, but Mooromsky said the City of San Diego owns the canyon behind their homes.

“We've done some brush mitigation. We don't own very much, basically, at the fence line is the end of our property. We're not allowed to mitigate beyond that,” said Mooromsky.

Because the condos are connected, they require a master, $50 million property insurance policy to cover the entire complex.

The HOA had to go to the secondary insurance market and cobble together replacement insurance, resulting in a $2,500 special assessment on all 240 condo owners, just for this year.

“$2,500, it's not a drop in the bucket. So. There's a little bit of a shock,” said Mooromsky. “The best thing they could do for us was, well, if you can't pay it all at once, we'll set up a payment program for you with a 4% interest rate.”

The Mira Mesa condos are one of three local complexes recently cancelled by Farmers, including 320 condos in Tierrasanta and 338 units in in Rancho Bernardo.

CBS 8 has been working to find a solution. Now, state legislators are responding with a letter to the CA Insurance Commissioner.

Eighteen state senators signed on to the letter, dated February 6, 2023, requesting that the Commissioner immediately raise the maximum amount of coverage allowed under the state's safety-net insurance plan (called the FAIR Plan) “from the current level of $8.4 million to at least $20 million.”

For condo owners in San Diego, those long-term solutions can't come soon enough.

“This can feed homelessness. I mean, there are people who are just making it by owning a condominium. And, if you're going to hike the dues up that much, they can't handle that,” said Mooromsky, the condo owner in Mira Mesa.

Farmers Insurance did not respond to CBS 8’s request for comment.

Toni Atkins, California’s Senate President Pro Tem, emailed the following statement to CBS 8:

“Climate change is taking a toll on our state and now, with the risks to life and property more intense than ever, it’s also impacting California’s insurance market, including here in San Diego. With homeowners struggling to find and maintain home insurance – especially residents of condominiums and HOAs in high fire-risk areas throughout the state – my Senate colleagues and I are urging Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara to use his existing authority to increase coverage limits under the California FAIR Plan as an interim fix to help residents, while we also work on identifying longer-term solutions. A healthy insurance marketplace is essential to protecting our homes and not exacerbating our state’s housing crisis – we will continue to explore every option available.”

The office of the State Insurance Commissioner emailed CBS 8 the following statement:

"Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara appreciates the Legislature’s support of his continued efforts to modernize the FAIR Plan to meet new challenges. The Commissioner has a long history of taking actions to ensure California consumers have greater access to insurance. In November 2021, the Commissioner ordered the FAIR Plan to implement his mandated increases to its decades-old commercial property coverage limits offered to businesses, which increased the combined coverage limits for the FAIR Plan, under its Division I Commercial Property Program, from $4.5 million to $8.4 million and, under its Division II Businessowners Program, from $3.6 million to $7.2 million.

Insurance is about safety and, hearing from homeowners and businesses, we are creating lasting solutions to protect Californians from climate change. Expanded coverage options for HOAs and community associations including a stronger FAIR Plan is a top priority for my new term. Thank you @SenToniAtkins and @CASenateDems for your continued support. We have to hold insurance companies accountable to covering Californians. We want them to be part of the solution, not the problem, and work with us to protect homeowners and businesses.”

Insurance is about safety and, hearing from homeowners and businesses, we are creating lasting solutions to protect Californians from climate change. Expanded coverage options for HOAs and community associations including a stronger FAIR Plan is a top priority for my new term. 1/

— Ricardo Lara (@ICRicardoLara) February 9, 2023

Thank you @SenToniAtkins and @CASenateDems for your continued support. We have to hold insurance companies accountable to covering Californians. We want them to be part of the solution, not the problem, and work with us to protect homeowners and businesses. 2/2

— Ricardo Lara (@ICRicardoLara) February 9, 2023

WATCH RELATED: Farmers cancel insurance for 338 homes in Rancho Bernardo (Feb. 2023).

San Diego|Local Event

18th Annual San Diego Tet Festival 2023: Mira Mesa

Susan C. Schena, Patch Staff

Jan28

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The largest Taiwanese dumpling maker, Bafang Dumpling, has confirmed to Eater that it will be opening its first San Diego restaurant at the Village at Mira Mesa before the end of the year. Its corner storefront will be part of the retail center’s new expansion area (where Crumbl Cookies is already located) near the intersection of Mira Mesa Boulevard and Reagan Road.

After conquering Asia, where it has nearly 1,300 locations in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and China and sells 1.2 billion dumplings each year, Bafang is setting its sights on growing its U.S. market with ambitions to make it bigger than its Hong Kong presence.

Bafang founder Jiayu Lin was a struggling mechanic while his wife was a math teacher who had students coming to their home for tutoring where they made potstickers for the kids, a popular afternoon snack, before buckling down to study. The first Bafang Dumpling restaurant opened in 1998, expanded to Hong Kong in 2008, and launched in China in 2014. Last year, the company went public on the Taiwanese stock market.

Ringing in at 3,000-square-feet, the San Diego restaurant “will be bigger than our City of Industry restaurant with more seating since we’ll have more space,” Stephanie Peng, CEO of Bafang Yunji North America, told Eater over a phone call. The chain made its stateside debut in March 2022 with a restaurant in the San Gabriel Valley and opened a second SoCal store last month in Chino Hills. “Our team is really excited. It’s such a great area and great community. We’re happy that Mira Mesa will be home to our first store in San Diego,” said Peng.

The menu will be the same as the Los Angeles area outposts, featuring specialties like its signature boiled dumplings filled with pork and cabbage, corn and chicken, or kimchi and pork, as well as the Bafang pork chop, a popular Taiwanese breaded pork cutlet. Other favorites include griddle-fried potstickers, Taiwanese beef noodle soup, and old-fashioned noodles, which are bouncy QQ noodles dressed with soy sauce and shallot oil. Drinks range from boba tea to mango soy milk.

There are also combo meals, which include iced lemon black tea or a cup of hot and sour soup, corn chowder soup, or mini wonton soup. “The combinations are easy for the customers to sample what our specialties are,” said Peng.

“We want to be able to offer authentic Taiwanese comfort food, like potstickers, dumplings, and noodles. Our aim is to deliver high-quality food that’s easy and convenient at affordable pricing,” said Peng. “We hope to go in offering a different style of food than burgers, pizzas, and tacos.”

While its North American headquarters and central kitchen will remain based in Irvine, Bafang has set a goal of opening 10 more U.S. stores by the end of 2023. “We’re vigorously expanding, focusing on Southern California because of its diversity,” added Peng.

While 85 percent of their stores in Asia are franchised, the first batch of U.S. Bafang restaurants is all corporate-owned. There will be opportunities for franchisees to expand across the country as Bafang establishes firm footing on this side of the Pacific.

Bafang Dumpling

9690 Reagan Road Suite 104, San Diego, CA 92126

Fans and followers of Richard Blais now have another spot to visit with the opening of California English, where the celeb chef who’s called San Diego home for a decade now is putting his SoCal perspective on some of the UK’s best-known culinary hits.

The new Sorrento Mesa restaurant, which opens Thursday, February 2, is a project that’s been in his back pocket for many years, further encouraged by a honeymoon trip to London and the discovery that he’s more than half genetically British.

The chef’s favorite football club is also based in London, where Blais spent over a month researching his menu, which he says is more grounded in simple, proper cooking than around the high-concept, modernist techniques he’s most known for.

Created in partnership with Longfellow Real Estate Partners and located at Longfellow’s Biovista development at the corner of Mira Mesa Boulevard and Scranton Road, California English will function as an amenity for the life sciences complex, with catering and grab-and-go options for its on-site biotech workers. Still, Blais told Eater over a phone call that he’s fully intending for the 6,000-square-foot space to bring in a dining audience from beyond its campus confines.

The all-day offerings include a mash-up of SoCal staple avocado toast with the British breakfast of beans on toast, as well as a Cornish pasty filled with oxtail and bone marrow, savory scones served with clotted cream and kumquat marmalade, and a salad version of the traditional ploughman’s lunch. Other UK specialties include Blais’ take on the ultimate fish and chips and chicken tikka masala, widely considered Britain’s national dish.

A real-deal roast dinner, typically consumed in British households on Sundays, will be available all weekend here as a pre-ordered family meal featuring prime rib with Yorkshire pudding and all the fixings.

Blais, the co-host of ‘Next Level Chef’ on FOX, will oversee California English while still supervising his Carlsbad steakhouse Ember & Rye. Telling Eater that he’s still interested in creating more restaurants in San Diego, he’s currently planning an ocean-view rooftop restaurant with Longfellow that’ll be opening nearby at the company’s Bioterra campus.

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California English

9276 Scranton Road , San Diego, CA 92121

Modeled after similar venues elsewhere, facility would be first of its kind in Southern California

SAN DIEGO —

San Diego may soon get a new kind of attraction that has been popping up all over the country: a combination driving range, events venue, sports bar and restaurant.

A local developer is proposing a project modeled on the popular Topgolf chain in a relatively undeveloped part of Mira Mesa, just west of the El Camino Memorial Park cemetery and just south of Carroll Canyon Road.

The 55,000-square-foot golf and entertainment complex would feature three stories of driving range bays that would be lighted at night, an events venue large enough for weddings, and a large restaurant with games and TVs showing sports.

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It would be the first such venue in Southern California. The nearest golf and entertainment complex is near Sacramento, and a similar facility has been proposed near Los Angeles International Airport.

Such venues have been popularized in recent years by Topgolf, which operates more than 50 golf and entertainment complexes around the world, including facilities near Seattle and Portland.

The facility planned for Mira Mesa would feature 75 driving range bays. It would replace the Sorrento Canyon Golf Center, which opened on the 18-acre site more than 25 years ago and features a ground-level driving range with limited amenities.

“It’s going to be an awesome project,” said Greg Lansing of Lansing Companies, the local developer pursuing the project. “We think it’s a phenomenal location.”

Games available on site will likely include cornhole, billiards and many others, he said.

The venue will create a new after-work option for the many employees at companies clustered in Mira Mesa and nearby Sorrento Valley and University City, Lansing said. But it may also draw customers from across the region, he said.

The site is more than 2 miles from any residential housing, making the nighttime activities unlikely to disturb anyone. The planned extension of Carroll Canyon Road would absorb any additional traffic generated by the new venue.

Lansing said the venue could open as early as 2022, but many hurdles must be overcome before that can happen.

The San Diego Planning Commission last week approved initiating a community plan amendment — a change to Mira Mesa’s growth blueprint — to allow the project.

Planning Commissioners said the developer also will need approvals from multiple state and federal agencies, because the site is in a flood plain and a wildlife corridor.

In addition, the nets and lighting planned for the driving range may disturb birds and other wildlife in the area.

While commissioners expressed some skepticism, they also praised the project.

“This sounds like, if it actually comes to fruition, it can be a really cool place,” Commissioner Vicki Granowitz said.

While community opposition is also possible, the Mira Mesa Community Planning Group voted 18-0 in favor of the project last month.

“It’s a nice little amenity,” Jeffrey Steven, the group’s chairman, said this week. “And it’s in kind of an isolated spot.”

Lansing said another positive is that the new venue won’t have a larger footprint than the existing golf range on the site, which is located at 5605 Carroll Canyon Road.

The City Council must first approve the community plan amendment. Then Lansing must propose the actual project in much more detail before it can be considered by the planning group, the commission and then the council.