San Diego Padres

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The family of late owner Peter Seidler formally announced the deal Saturday. The sale must still be approved by Major League Baseball.

The deal with private equity billionaire Feliciano and his wife took shape last month at an MLB-record valuation of $3.9 billion. The Padres’ announcement of the deal didn’t give specifics on the members of the investor group or the purchase price.

“The Padres are more than a baseball team; they are a unifying force in San Diego, rooted in community, connection and belonging,” Jones and Feliciano said in a joint statement. “As life and business partners, and as a family, we are honored to lead this next chapter together. We have worked hard for everything we have achieved, and we have built it together. We see that same spirit in this team and its fans, and we know what it takes to win. We are committed to showing up, listening and earning the trust of this community while building on the strong foundation established by the Seidler family.

“This is about more than baseball — it’s about boosting the pride, energy, and connection that define the Padres, investing in community, deepening belonging and ensuring this team remains accessible and endures for generations. We are all in — with the goal of bringing a World Series championship to San Diego.”

Seidler’s family began to explore a sale of the Padres last November, two years after the death of the popular Peter Seidler, who became the Padres’ primary owner in 2020. His brother, John Seidler, has served as the Padres’ chairman since his death.

“When I became control person, my goal was to continue building on our recent success in pursuit of a World Series championship for the city of San Diego and our faithful fans,” John Seidler said in a statement. “As I pass the baton to Kwanza and José, I do so with full confidence that they share that vision as well as the Padres’ deep commitment to San Diego. It’s what the team, our fans and the community deserve. Our family loves this team.”

Peter Seidler joined the Padres’ ownership group in 2012 when John Moores sold the team for $800 million to a group headed by Ron Fowler. Seidler took over and immediately endeared himself to San Diego’s fans with his aggressive financial backing of general manager A.J. Preller, who built a team that has reached the playoffs in four of the past six years.

The Padres have been a hot ticket for several years as San Diego’s only team in the four biggest North American sports leagues, ranking second in the majors in attendance last season. Preller’s roster is off to another strong start this season, sitting second in the NL West at 19-12 heading into a home game against the Chicago White Sox on Saturday night.

Jones and Feliciano already got a start on their new endeavor last month when they traveled to Mexico City to watch the Padres’ international series against the Arizona Diamondbacks. The couple was spotted sitting with Padres CEO Erik Greupner.

Feliciano will become the second Latino owner in baseball, joining Los Angeles Angels owner Arte Moreno. Latino and Hispanic players comprise roughly 30% of major league rosters.

SAN DIEGO (KGTV) — A new report from the City of San Diego Auditor details how the City has addressed the clearing of homeless encampments since the passage of the Unsafe Camping Ordinance.

The audit looked to address five main questions:

• Did the unsheltered population decrease in the City of San Diego since the implementation of the Unsafe Camping Ordinance?
• Did the unsheltered population move from downtown to other areas of the City of San Diego after the implementation of the Unsafe Camping Ordinance?
• Did the number of citations, arrests, and prosecutions for encampments increase after the Unsafe Camping Ordinance?
• Did City departments work and coordinate in their response to encampments after the implementation of the Ordinance, in accordance with the goals in the preamble of the Ordinance?
• Does the City equitably store personal items from abatements?

It also showed that the overall unsheltered population in the City hasn’t declined by much since the ordinance went into effect, even though it appears that fewer people are living on the streets.

“What we did see was at the same time that this ordinance went through, that our safe sleeping went online, and that was an opportunity to get hundreds of people into our safe sleeping,” Franklin Coopersmith, Deputy Dir. of Environmental Services Department, City of San Diego, said.

Coopersmith’s department is tasked with clearing homeless encampments.

ABC 10News spoke with him about the audit and the five questions that it aimed to answer.

Coopersmith and the audit explain that those safe sleeping sites are still technically considered unsheltered, according to the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

“Our safe sleeping is not considered an official shelter, so it is still considered unsheltered,” Coopersmith said. “Though when the public looks, they don’t see as many people on the street is because they’re in these places where we designate that they can go in. We have shelter there. We have resources, we have beds for them.” 

When it comes to the movement out of Downtown San Diego, the audit said there’s not enough data to show that reports of encampments in other areas, but are not ruling it out. The report found that arrests and citations increased.

The report also found that Get It Done request times for encampments from both the San Diego Police Department and Environmental Services went down since the ordinance.

“With this ordinance, we work closely with the neighborhood policing, which has the HOT team, the homeless outreach team,” Coopersmith said. “I mean, that was a great tool in addition to homeless outreach workers, you have this hot team that’s out there that’s able to make contact and get people into shelter just as easily as an outreach worker is.”

The audit says the city could do a better job at storing personal items found in encampments. Coopersmith’s department agrees with and plans to make things more accessible and review how other cities store those items.

“I think we did a really good job pointing out that homelessness is extremely complicated. There are many needs out there and a single ordinance is not what’s going to solve it,” Coopersmith said.

Homelessness service provider People Assistance The Homeless, also known as PATH San Diego, sent ABC 10News the following statement after the release of the audit:

The report also states that as shelter referrals increased, including safe sleeping, with the ordinance going into effect, space was limited, so most of those requests couldn’t be met.

Paul Armstrong from the San Diego Rescue Mission said that more beds would be more helpful.

“But also, I think we need to look at the relationship between outreach and the shelter system. And as our shelter system turns into long-term housing, how much turnover is happening in our shelter system?” Armstrong said. Because that’s part of it is we need a high-functioning shelter system that’s integrated with outreach.”