The Padres did far more than change the narrative for a team and a city when news leaked about the drying contract ink on infielder Manny Machado’s reported $300 million deal.

The 26-year-old Machado agreed to that deal Tuesday and Wednesday in San Diego was to meet Fowler and Seidler for the first time and undergo a physical. His signing, which has not been officially acknowledged by the Padres, is expected to be announced Friday.

https://goo.gl/ShWQhR

The Iipay Nation of Santa Ysabel last month opened a marijuana dispensary inside what once was the tribe’s casino off state Route 79 south of Lake Henshaw.

It was the first tribe in the county to enter the lucrative marijuana business. Other local tribes are expected to follow suit, potentially setting up a confrontation with county officials, who have banned the operations in the unincorporated areas, though they have no control over the reservations.

And the tribes have reached out to the state asking to join the larger licensed cannabis network, but so far have been rebuffed.

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/communities/north-county/sd-no-ysabel-marijuana-20190214-story.html

The Dream House Raffle will actually give away a dream house this year.

Ronald McDonald House Charities of San Diego’s annual contest guarantees that the winner will receive a Scripps Ranch mansion, or a cash prize instead, unlike past years in which no one actually won the house.

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/business/real-estate/sd-fi-dream-house-20190218-story.html

Through a technology that is more than 50 years old, natural gas is cooled to minus-260 degrees Fahrenheit. The liquefied gas looks like mineral water and its volume is reduced by about 600 percent. LNG experts use an analogy that the same amount of natural gas that would fill a beach ball can, after being liquefied, fit into a golf ball.

The LNG goes into large storage tanks and then can be loaded directly onto what are called “membrane cargo tanks” on double-hull ships that can the send the LNG to import facilities around the world. Once at its destination, the LNG is warmed and regasified so it can be used just like existing natural gas.

For years, the LNG export market has been dominated by Australia and the Middle Eastern nation of Qatar.

But about 10 years ago, what’s called the shale revolution upended the oil and gas industry in the U.S.

Every February for years, Carrie Cave — formerly Carrie McGonigle — would drive to a remote spot north of Escondido, where her daughter Amber Dubois died, to decorate a large tree with ribbons and lights.

This year, a decade after Amber disappeared — which shook Escondido, then gripped the region a year later with the discovery she had been murdered by a stranger— Cave said she will do something different.

She plans to visit a friend in the hospital and decorate there, a quiet celebration of her daughter’s memory.

Cave, 50, said she has forgiven the killer so she can move forward. But she never forgets Amber, who would be 24 now. She and Amber’s father, Maurice “Moe” Dubois — they divorced several years before Amber was taken — each say they are finding peace.

Wednesday marks 10 years since the 14-year-old freshman vanished while walking to Escondido High School on Feb. 13, 2009. The man who abducted her, registered sex offender John Albert Gardner III, cornered Amber on a quiet street and forced her into his car.

He drove the girl to a secluded spot, raped and stabbed her.

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/public-safety/sd-me-amber-anniversary-20190211-story.html

With fundraising efforts officially suspended, the city of San Diego’s years-long — and hotly contested — effort to replace roads in Balboa Park with pedestrian-friendly parkland is now a no-go.

The Plaza de Panama project, as it’s called, sought to divert car traffic from the Cabrillo Bridge and create an underground parking garage with a landscaped rooftop. But project leaders in recent weeks decided to pause all forward progress after millions in construction cost overruns made it financially untenable.

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/business/growth-development/sd-fi-plaza-de-panama-no-money-20190212-story.html

A group of activists, volunteers and journalists have had a hard time crossing into Mexico recently.

Many have found their passports flagged, and are sent to secondary screening, where many have been interrogated about what is going on with the members of the migrant caravan that still remain.

Also, more caravans of migrants are coming north, although it’s unclear where they will end up traveling, as now more people have chosen the eastern route to Piedras Negras, on the Texas border.

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/immigration/sd-me-secondary-searches-migrant-caravan-20190211-story.html

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/migrant-caravan/sd-me-caravan-trend-20190209-story.html

In the past decade, the number of international students has soared by almost 7,200 and now accounts for almost 25 percent of the school’s enrollment. The figure was 6 percent in 2008.

Reeling from reduced state funding, UC San Diego decided to heavily recruit international students, primarily because they pay at least twice as much as California residents in tuition and fees.

The university says the money helps subsidize the cost of educating Californians, bolsters research and eases the need for tuition increases. The influx of foreign students also broadens everyone’s cultural experience.

UC San Diego also has added more California residents. But their overall share of the student body has dropped by 20 percent in 10 years.

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/education/sd-me-ucsd-foreignstudents-20190207-story.html

Poway’s leadership has decided to explore a concept proposed by its mayor that could lead to the city building and paying for granny flats in the backyards of residents.

Under the proposal, offered as a small solution to the affordable housing crisis, homeowners who agree to have a stand-alone structure put in their yards would also agree to rent the granny flat, through a third party, to qualified low-income tenants for a set amount of time.

Mayor Steve Vaus came up with the idea — he calls it HOMES (Homes On My Extra Space) — and the City Council agreed Tuesday to move the process forward. They directed city staff to come up with a plan and agreed to form a subcommittee to explore all the pitfalls that could arise. They said they hoped a plan could be ready later this year.

In a surprise move, the $5.1 million judgment and jury finding that blamed Adam Shacknai for the death of Rebecca Zahau in a Coronado mansion eight years ago was wiped out and the entire case dismissed after the family of the deceased woman reached a settlement with Shacknai’s insurance company.

The announcement by lawyer C. Keith Greer came at the start of a scheduled hearing to argue post-trial motions. It took Shacknai by surprise, as well as his lawyer — and added yet another twist to the controversial death of Zahau, which has now been investigated twice by the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department and was the subject of a captivating civil trial last year.

Story: https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/public-safety/sd-me-zahau-trial-settlement-20190206-story.html

Listen to our podcast series about last year's trial: https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/podcasts/sd-under-the-gavel-zahau-20180315-htmlstory.html