For Dave Maass, covering Comic-Con International as a freelancer for the Rolling Stone is an endurance sport. From the Wednesday through Sunday that the event takes over the San Diego Convention Center, the former CityBeat reporter books every hour of every day with events like round-tables with famous folks, parties, panels and gaming and virtual reality demonstrations. Tasked with coming up with a list of the best of the best of Comic-Con for Rolling Stone, Maass told show hosts Andrew Keatts that one of his favorite things so far has been the Mr. Robot virtual reality experience. Virtual reality, Maass said, is everywhere in and around Comic-Con this year. “One of the things that’s interesting this year I think is that Comic-Con has run out of space to a large extent,” he said. “But this year there is so much virtual reality. It seems like every single property has some sort of virtual reality component, and so almost in a way it’s seeing Comic-Con expand into this virtual space.” With Scott Lewis out of town, Keatts is joined on the podcast this week by Sara Libby. They talk about the republican national convention that didn’t come to San Diego and all the related weirdness that eventually ended with San Diego adopting its “Finest City” motto, the continuation of Lincoln High’s leadership conundrum, the latest in the Lilac Hills Ranch development saga and an explainer on the Balboa Park revamp plan and which institutions are on board with it.

Big changes are ahead for San Diego's waterfront. On this week's podcast, VOSD's Sara Libby sits in for Scott Lewis and joins Andrew Keatts for a discussion of the big development decisions under way at the Port of San Diego. Keatts went to this week's public hearing about the proposals to redevelop Seaport Village, and said both the Port and the public clearly favored one proposal. The frontrunner is an idea by Protea Waterfront Development that includes a public beach, a 500-foot observation tower, an aquarium, a micro hotel, a youth hostel and more. Keatts and Libby also discuss an interesting debate that played out between Councilman Chris Cate and Jeff Marston of the Independent Voter Project at a City Council meeting this week. Cate and Marston sparred over a ballot measure that proposes big changes to the way city elections work. "This is obviously rushed," Cate said of the proposal. "Anyone who thinks this is not a political process is either naive or doesn't understand what is happening right now. ... This is politics pure and simple." I also sit in Lewis' seat this week for the second half of the show to talk about VOSD's latest installment of Meeting of the Minds, where we rounded up some of the city's arts leaders for a night of presentations about the work they're doing. Also on the podcast, Libby and Keatts talk about Proposition 57 and Mayor Kevin Faulconer's role leading the charge against the measure that, if adopted, would result in one of the biggest changes to sentencing in decades. Plus, Keatts talks to Nicholas McCann, host of VOSD Podcast Network show "The Kept Faith," about how San Diego handled the All-Star Game. Hero of the Week Dalouge Smith, president and CEO of the San Diego Youth Symphony and Conservancy, gets a nod for his organization's work expanding music education to Chula Vista and other elementary schools in the region. Goat of the Week Former Poway Unified Superintendent John Collins gets goated after he was fired Sunday by the district school board for allegedly taking more than $300,000 in extra pay. Collins' attorney says they'll be fighting the claims.

Data geeks are stoked. That’s because the city of San Diego just launched its new open data portal. The site provides access to 44 different data sets that people can play with, including information about solar panel permits, street sweeping schedules, water-quality testing results, parking meter stats and more. “And this is just the beginning,” said Almis Udrys, the director of performance and analytics for the city of San Diego. Udrys joined hosts Scott Lewis and Andrew Keatts this week to talk about the new portal and the opportunities it affords residents, software developers who might use the data to create useful apps and city staff, which now has a more efficient way to access information and put it to use. Udrys said the site is more accessible than similar municipal portals across the country. “What we want to do that’s a little bit different than some other portals you might see out there is we want to actually understand all the data we’re publishing,” he said. “We don’t just want to take a dump from every department, put it out there and [make it] a free-for-all that could be wrong.” He said his team understands the data and is ready to answer any questions that come up. Also on this week’s podcast, the story behind McKinley Elementary‘s turnaround and the role money and parents have played, what voters seem to want when it comes to cash for the Chargers’ convadium, some thoughts on the revived Balboa Park plan and its relationship to parking and more. Hero of the Week Rep. Scott Peters took the shortest path to our heart by letting his wonk flag fly, and made a recommendation of “The High Cost of Free Parking” by Donald Shoup. It’s always refreshing to see elected officials who are boned up on the latest and greatest in urban planning theory. Goat of the Week VOSD has been doing some work on sea-level rise. The latest story is on Coronado, a city whose leadership acknowledges that rising waters could be a big problem but admits that it’s yet to address the issue.

Scott Lewis and Andy Keatts talk about major developments around ballot measures and the future of Balboa Park plus a discussion with Jeff Marston, from the Independent Voter Project.

Four stories of the week and a talk with two locals who went to the national Yimby conference in Colorado.

Scott Lewis speaks with Dr. Jeff Severinghaus, a professor of geosciences at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, about the realities of climate change. Lewis and Severinghaus also discuss some of the more contentious claims made by ResMed founder Peter Farrell in a previous episode.

Tuesday's primary produced some surprising, and some not-so-surprising results. As expected, Mayor Kevin Faulconer's particular polite brand of politics was validated by voters, but other races slapped political insiders right across the face. Co-hosts Scott Lewis and Andrew Keatts were joined this week by two guests who helped offer some insights into how things parsed out. Laura Fink, who runs a political consulting firm, and Aimee Faucett, who helps run the San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce, agreed that the two contests with the most unexpected results were the races for City Council District 1 and city attorney office. "Those two really stood out in my mind because conventional wisdom was defied," Fink said. Deputy City Attorney Mara Elliott was the underdog in both donations and endorsements, but she shocked everyone Tuesday when she sailed through the primary. And in a crowded race that wasn't expected to produce a clear winner until November, votes are still being counted but businesswoman Barbara Bry is getting very close to the more than 50 percent needed to secure a seat. "That in and of itself seemed to defy political gravity," Fink said of the big turnout for Bry. Faucett told Lewis that if Bry does win, the folks the Chamber of Commerce represents have some questions. "The business community does have concern about how far she will go relating to pension reform," Faucett said. Also on this week's podcast, Keatts and Lewis talk about their late-night election coverage and dive deeper into some of the results. Plus, they reveal the newly organized opposition to the Chargers' plan. Hero of the Week The folks behind a new nonprofit created to save the crumbling Starlight Bowl in Balboa Park get a big thumbs-up this week. Save Starlight is working to revamp the large outdoor amphitheater, which is one of the many assets in Balboa Park in need of some care. Goat of the Week Poway Unified School District is on its way to earning the most goat awards ever. The district is in the news again for its questionable financial dealings. VOSD's Ashly McGlone highlighted some big questions about a contract with the financial firm Dolinka Group. The contract surpassed a not-to-exceed amount by a lot of money, and while district staff are defending it, a few board members are asking for an audit.

Scott Lewis and Andrew Keatts talk about Tuesday's big election and speak with David Loy, from the ACLU, which has questions for police about how far they pushed protestors away after the demonstrations against Donald Trump.

Today, Tribune Publishing announced it would stake its future on artificial intelligence and a new name. In a special quick podcast, Scott Lewis called up futurist Amy Webb to talk "tronc."

Has the historically conservative San Diego Union-Tribune editorial page shifted to the left? Mathew T. Hall, the new editorial and opinion director at the San Diego Union-Tribune, joined the podcast this week to talk about some of the paper's recent surprising political endorsements. But Hall wasn't ready to let co-hosts Scott Lewis and Andrew Keatts paint the U-T's changing editorial page in such black and white terms. "That's just not how we view things," he said. "Right, left, liberal, conservative – those are titles and labels that others use and clearly use a lot, but that's not how we view things and that's not how we're going to be making our decisions." San Diego lawyer Cory Briggs also makes an appearance on the show. Briggs, who's part of the coalition backing the Citizens' Plan, breaks down the initiative that in part rethinks the city’s hotel-room tax system, prevents a waterfront expansion of the Convention Center and paves the way for a new stadium. "One mistake people make is thinking the Citizens' Plan guarantees a stadium," he said. "The only thing the Citizens' Plan did to assist the Chargers is to authorize the use downtown next to Petco Park." Briggs also shares his thoughts on local media, provides insight into the North Park Jack in the Box case and more. Also on the podcast, Lewis and Keatts talk about mayoral candidate Ed Harris' about-face when it comes to building housing near transit. Hero of the Week The San Diego Unified Board of Trustees, which voted to change the name of the Robert E. Lee Elementary, gets credit for finally getting rid of the offensive name. Goat of the Week San Diego Unified School District also gets dinged this week for missing its local hiring goals when it comes to bond-funded construction. District officials adopted a project labor agreement for its bond program and made big promises to hire local workers. There's been some shortcomings.