Leaders gathered at what was once a county assessor’s office Thursday to break ground on East County’s first stand-alone crisis stabilization unit designed to provide up to 24 hours of respite for those with urgent mental health care needs.

When complete in 2025, the 14,000-square-foot, $28 million facility will be the county’s seventh such location. Existing units are already operating in Vista, Oceanside, Escondido, Chula Vista, Hillcrest and at the San Diego County Psychiatric Hospital.

Though their particulars vary slightly, all follow the same general model, offering multiple recliners in quiet rooms where people coping with severe symptoms of psychiatric distress can be evaluated by medical professionals for up to 24 hours.

The key feature of crisis-stabilization centers is their ability to divert patients, often picked up on “5150” holds, from the region’s busy emergency departments where they would otherwise be taken for evaluation. These holds are often performed by law enforcement officers when a person is thought to possibly be a danger to themselves or others or gravely disabled.

Thursday, and in other recent presentations, county officials have said that the two newest crisis centers in Vista and Oceanside have reduced local emergency visits for mental health care by 40 percent since 2022.

Supervisor Joel Anderson said during Thursday’s ground-breaking event that the El Cajon unit is expected to relieve pressure on the very-busy emergency department of Sharp Grossmont Hospital in La Mesa.

“I believe this is going to allow them to provide better care by not clogging their emergency room with things that we can do at this crisis stabilization unit,” Anderson said.

With an opening day anticipated in the fall of 2025, the new facility will include 16 recliners for patients. Services provided will include patient assessment, medication assistance, peer support and referral to outside services.

Originally Published: July 18, 2024 at 6:37 p.m.

When Marvel Studios announced the next Avengers movies at the San Diego Comic-Con in 2022, the plan was for them to both be released in the same year, with the first instalment titled The Kang Dynasty and the Multiverse Saga’s finale dubbed Secret Wars. 

A lot has changed since then, including a major mishandling of Kang in Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania and Jonathan Majors’ legal issues which resulted in him being fired from the role.

As a result, Avengers: The Kang Dynasty has lost its title and original writer Jeff Loveness and, while Michael Waldron was then thought to be penning both movies, we’ve since learned he may no longer be involved either. 

Now, as rumours swirl about the Russo Brothers returning to Marvel Studios to helm both instalments, The Cosmic Circus’ Alex Perez has dropped some pretty strong hints on social media that Avengers vs. X-Men will be announced next Saturday at the San Diego Comic-Con.

We’ve heard that the idea is to pivot away from Kang with Avengers 5, so why not take this opportunity to pit Earth-616’s Mightiest Heroes against the Fox-verse’s X-Men for a must-see battle as their worlds collide during an incursion?

The Russos are keen to adapt Secret Wars, so we’d imagine that will stay the same and likely borrow elements from both the original comic and the 2015 version. 

“You know, we haven’t had conversations with those guys about anything that they are up to because we’ve been intensely busy with our own schedule,” Joe said in a 2022 interview. “We just always answer truthfully when we’re asked, ‘Would you work with them?’ Of course we would. We adore them.”

“‘What would you like to do?’ Secret Wars was our favorite series growing up, you know? And then I think it always gets turned into a bigger story. But to be clear, there is no story,” the filmmaker concluded.

Something has changed since then and, as we reported earlier today, Marvel Studios may have struggled to find directors willing to take on a high-pressure project like an Avengers movie given the recent struggles faced by the genre. As for the Russos, they’re in desperate need of a hit after Cherry, Citadel, and The Gray Man struggled to live up to expectations. 

Are you hoping Avengers vs. X-Men is announced at the San Diego Comic-Con next week? Let us know in the comments section below.

MILWAUKEE (AP) — Donald Trump takes the stage Thursday at the Republican National Convention to accept his party’s nomination again and give his first speech since he was cut off mid-sentence by a flurry of gunfire in an assassination attempt at a rally in Pennsylvania.

Trump’s address will conclude the four-day convention in Milwaukee. He appeared each of the first three days with a white bandage on his ear, covering a wound he sustained in the Saturday shooting.

His moment of survival has shaped the week, even as convention organizers insisted they would continue with their program as planned less than 48 hours after the shooting. Speakers and delegates have repeatedly chanted “Fight, fight, fight!” in homage to Trump’s words as he got to his feet and pumped his fist after Secret Service agents killed the gunman. And some of his supporters have started sporting their own makeshift bandages on the convention floor.

Speakers attributed Trump’s survival to divine intervention and paid tribute to victim Corey Comperatore, who died after shielding his wife and daughter from gunfire at the rally.

“Instead of a day of celebration, this could have been a day of heartache and mourning,” Trump’s vice presidential pick, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, said in his speech to the convention on Wednesday.

In his first prime-time speech since becoming the nominee for vice president, Vance spoke of growing up poor in Kentucky and Ohio, his mother addicted to drugs and his father absent, and of how he later joined the military and went on to the highest levels of U.S. politics.

Donald Trump Jr. spoke movingly Wednesday about his father’s bravery, saying he showed “for all the world” that “the next American president has the heart of a lion.” But he toggled back and forth between talking about his father as a symbol of national unity and slamming his enemies.

“When he stood up with blood on his face and the flag at his back the world saw a spirit that could never be broken,” Trump Jr. said.

The convention has tried to give voice to the fear and frustration of conservatives while also trying to promote the former president as a symbol of hope for all voters.

The convention has showcased a Republican Party reshaped by Trump since he shocked the GOP establishment and won the hearts of the party’s grassroots on his way to the party’s 2016 nomination. Rivals Trump has vanquished — including Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Marco Rubio of Florida, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis — put aside their past criticisms and gave him their unqualified support.

Even Vance, Trump’s pick to carry his movement into the next generation, was once a fierce critic who suggested in a private message since made public that Trump could be “America’s Hitler.”

Trump has not spoken in public since the shooting, though he’s given interviews off camera. But he referenced it during a private fundraiser on Wednesday, according to a clip of his remarks recorded on a cellphone and obtained by PBS News.

“I got lucky,” he said. “God was with me.”

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Follow the AP’s coverage of the 2024 election at https://apnews.com/hub/election-2024.