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The National City Earthquake Safety & Outreach Initiative

Ada Inman — Tue, 06 Jan 2026 16:41:12 +0000

This report contains a series of policy proposals developed by San Diego State University (SDSU) students, in collaboration with National City officials and the SDSU Sage Project, to increase the use of existing earthquake preparedness resources among National City residents. The primary focus of student research was the California Earthquake Brace + Bolt program and encouraging homeowners to engage in seismic retrofitting. Additionally, students developed policy recommendations aimed at increasing general earthquake safety, awareness, and education. Being located in Southern California, earthquake preparedness
is a topic the SDSU community is very familiar with and many students were able to use this as an opportunity to draw upon prior knowledge in their research.
Students worked to create policy suggestions specific to National City, based on methods proven effective in similar municipalities, by researching how the area’s demographics may impact the use of community resources. National City is a heavily Hispanic city, with a large population that does not speak English as a first language. As such, many of the policies in this report focus on bridging that gap in communication and establishing trust between community members and those with access to earthquake preparedness resources. Another major trend among policies developed by students was a focus on finding creative ways to lower the economic burden on residents interested in seismic retrofitting. This led to the creation of several innovative proposals focused on helping residents pay for seismic retrofitting, primarily where other government programs would not suffice. These policies may be more difficult to implement than direct outreach, but they represent an alternate approach the city could take to encourage seismic retrofitting.
The policies presented in this report were chosen for their adaptability as part of a larger earthquake awareness initiative, as well as their ability to function independently. As stressed by National City officials, the city budget does not have any extra funding for extensive earthquake preparedness programs. The purpose behind choosing policies which can operate independently is to work around these constraints and offer solutions that may be more budget-friendly. These policies are categorized based upon the type of actor affected: resident, government group, or external organization.

Using GIS to Assess Seismic Vulnerability in National City

Ada Inman — Tue, 06 Jan 2026 16:38:10 +0000

This report presents a comprehensive assessment of seismic vulnerability in National City, completed by students from San Diego State University’s Geography 584 (GIS Applications) course in collaboration with the Sage Project and the City of National City. Using Geographic Information Systems (GIS), the project combined a parcel-level inventory of residential buildings with geophysical and social data to identify patterns of vulnerability across neighborhoods. Key factors analyzed included soil type, slope, and liquefaction risk, along with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention/Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry’s Social Vulnerability Index. These elements were incorporated into a Weighted Linear Combination model to produce a composite vulnerability score for each parcel in National City. Due to time constraints, the final analysis in this report was conducted for all parcels citywide; however, future work will refine the queries to focus specifically on residential parcels. The results highlight where physical hazards and social vulnerabilities overlap, providing city officials with a data-driven foundation for hazard mitigation planning, infrastructure retrofits, and targeted community outreach.

The City of National City Hazards Preparedness and Mitigation Plan

Ada Inman — Tue, 06 Jan 2026 16:32:39 +0000

“This report, developed through a partnership between the City of National City and San Diego State University’s C P 690 graduate course, presents a comprehensive Hazard Mitigation Plan (HMP) addressing three primary natural threats: earthquakes, floods, and fires. In assessing these threats, the report identifies National City’s intersecting environmental, infrastructural, and social vulnerabilities, including aging housing stock, low-lying, flood-prone terrain, seismic fault proximity, and a high concentration of low-income, elderly, and renter populations.
Each hazard chapter outlines current conditions, risk factors, and targeted mitigation strategies rooted in climate adaptation, environmental justice, and equity-based planning. For earthquakes, the report highlights over 15,000 homes and 892 businesses at risk, calling for seismic retrofitting, soft-story building inventories, and zoning overlays to limit new development in liquefaction zones. The flood section responds to events like the January 2024 Paradise Creek flood with proposals for green infrastructure, upgraded stormwater systems, and protective zoning. Fire mitigation focuses on structure fire risks due to overcrowding and aging infrastructure, recommending public education campaigns, fire-safe building codes, and emergency preparedness programs.
A central theme throughout the report is inclusive, multilingual, and culturally responsive community engagement. The report proposes youth disaster ambassador programs, neighborhood outreach events, resident-led advisory committees, and partnerships with schools and nonprofits to build local resilience capacity. Tools like CalEnviroScreen and the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) National Risk Index guide equitable resource allocation by identifying the most socially vulnerable areas.
The report aligns closely with the City of National City’s General Plan, Climate Action Plan, and Housing Element, ensuring consistency across city policies. It emphasizes the importance of embedding resilience into land use decisions, infrastructure investments, and emergency planning, with particular attention to protecting low-income, elderly, and linguistically isolated populations. By integrating data-driven assessments with community knowledge, the report positions the City of National City to proactively address hazard risks and build a safer, more equitable future for all residents.

Sustainable Transportation in City of National City: A Community Perspective

Ada Inman — Tue, 06 Jan 2026 16:29:40 +0000

In Fall 2024, San Diego State University (SDSU) student researchers enrolled in Dr. Norah Shultz’s Sociology 407 course collaborated with National City and SDSU’s Sage Project to support ongoing efforts aimed at improving transportation access, safety, and sustainability in District 1. This collaboration was part of a larger initiative tied to the City’s Sustainable Mobility Plan, a strategy funded in part by a Caltrans Sustainable Communities Grant. The grant enables planning efforts that center equity, encourage walking, biking, and public transit use, and promote inclusive community participation. Within this framework, the student-led research sought to gather feedback from individuals who live, work, operate businesses, or commute in and around District 1. The goal was to better understand how existing transportation systems influence experiences of mobility, safety, and access in this part of the city, with special consideration to walking, biking, and public transit.
The class organized into four research groups, each focused on a specific topic area: non-car traffic, older adults and their unique mobility needs, drainage infrastructure, and car traffic. Over the course of the data collection period, researchers gathered responses from residents, business owners, and commuters familiar with District 1. While each group explored a different factor impacting transportation, common themes arose. Respondents raised concerns about sidewalk conditions, poor lighting, signage clarity, and localized flooding. Older residents expressed appreciation for services like Free Rides Around National City (FRANC), while also noting limitations in transit stop comfort and accessibility.
Participants in the drainage group emphasized how flooding-related obstacles, notably near Paradise Creek and the San Diego Bay, interfered with safe and routine travel. Across surveys, participants appeared passionate in their desire to contribute to infrastructure planning through meetings or other direct feedback opportunities. This invested interest highlights the importance of maintaining open, accessible channels for community input in future City-orchestrated efforts. The report concludes with several community-informed recommendations, including improvements to sidewalks and crosswalks, transit stop upgrades, clearer signage, drainage investments, and more inclusive outreach strategies. Altogether, these findings offer insight into how community perspectives can support and complement the City’s continuing work to enhance mobility and transportation access throughout District 1.

On the Ground: An Applied Anthropology Study of Community Perspectives on Equitable and Sustainable Mobility in National City

Ada Inman — Tue, 06 Jan 2026 16:21:06 +0000

This report presents the findings of an applied anthropology partnership between students in Anthropology 531: Methods in Applied Anthropology at San Diego State University and the City of National City, conducted through the SDSU Sage Project. The class sought to answer the question:
“According to community members, what are the obstacles to sustainable mobility in National City, and what solutions could help expand its use?”
Through walking ethnographies, interviews, and community engagement in all four city districts, students documented both infrastructural and cultural barriers to sustainable mobility. The key findings include: access and equity gaps in transit coverage and usability; safety and infrastructure concerns across pedestrian, cycling, and transit systems; limited public awareness and trust in existing city initiatives; and persistent car dependency shaped by social and practical considerations.
Residents of National City are very involved with and consistently expressed their commitment to community improvement, paired with frustration over issues such as poor lighting, unsafe crossings, unreliable buses, and lack of awareness about available services like the FRANC shuttle.
Quotations from District 2 such as “Driving is just shorter” and “I’d rather drive than wait in the sun for a bus that might not come” capture the lived realities shaping transportation choices.
The recommendations offered in this report—expanding FRANC coverage, improving pedestrian and cycling infrastructure, enhancing safety and awareness, and prioritizing equity and accessibility—represent practical, community-grounded steps toward a more inclusive and sustainable mobility future for National City.

Mixed-Methods Tools for Program Co-Design, Iteration, and Assessment for a Guaranteed Income Program

Ada Inman — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 22:57:28 +0000

This report is a result of the collaborative partnership between the Black Women’s Resilience Project (BWRP) and the Sage Project at San Diego State University (SDSU). The BWRP, a project sponsored by Jewish Family Service of San Diego (JFSSD), is a guaranteed income (GI) program intended to uplift low-income Black women and their families out of poverty by targeting the challenges they face. Research contained in this report was conducted as part of Dr. Kristen Maher’s Fall 2024 Political Science Seminar in Foundations of Public Policy (POL S 603) class at SDSU. The POL S 603 course focused on the theory and practice of policy-making, which comprises the design, agenda setting, tools, and implementation process. Students who opted to participate were tasked with exploring, researching and evaluating methods for tracking the project’s impact. The aim was gathering participant experiences and assessing the effects of the project. This report provides an overview of mixed-methods research and assessment approaches through a Participatory Action Research (PAR) framework, including a discussion of the affordances and constraints of narrative research, Photovoice, and community mapping methods.

Santa Margarita Ecological Reserve

Victor Manzanilla — Wed, 01 Nov 2023 03:39:08 +0000

Read the final student report delivered to the local gov/community partner. The Sage Project Contact InfoKristofer PatronProgram Administratorkpatron@sdsu.edu(619) 594-0103 University Faculty ContactSweetser Local Government / Community Contact [...]

Wayfinding

Victor Manzanilla — Wed, 01 Nov 2023 03:39:08 +0000

The comuniparques Project is Tijuana’s urban greening program, which aims to renovate several of Tijuana’s degraded city parks and create capacities for sustainable communities through community engagement and installation of green infrastructure. In their first phase of work, the program is focusing on two parks in the Residencial del Bosque and Matamoros neighborhoods.

In collaboration with students from SDSU’s Environmental Conservation Practice course (Geography 570), as well as students from Universidad de las Californias International and Colegio de la Frontera Norte (COLEF), our class will develope signage for these parks. Our class developed plans and park designs created by students in GEO570, and used community demographics gathered by students and the project in Tijuana. The signage must identify and communicate information about the park to residents, and help engage them in the many uses of the park.

The Sage Project Contact Info
Kristofer Patron
Program Administrator
kpatron@sdsu.edu
(619) 594-0103

University Faculty Contact
Chris McCampbell
Art

Local Government / Community Contact

Parks & Recreation

SDSU West Expansion: Site Analysis

Victor Manzanilla — Wed, 01 Nov 2023 03:39:07 +0000

SDSU West is the in-process development site of what is now Qualcomm Stadium in Mission Valley. San Diego State University is looking to expand their campus in order to create higher education opportunities for current and future students, provide mixeduse residential and commercial developments, and establish a new Aztec stadium for multiuse purposes. Public Administration 350 students visited the soon-to be SDSU West site and, using acquired language and field work methods, assessed paths, edges, nodes, and landmarks. Students took photographs of the site and its features and compiled comments, observations, and perceived needs. This report is comprised of student recommendations that detail what they believe will make SDSU West the most feasible place to live, learn, and work.

The Sage Project Contact Info
Kristofer Patron
Program Administrator
kpatron@sdsu.edu
(619) 594-0103

University Faculty Contact
Kim

Local Government / Community Contact

San Diego State University Mission Valley Housing Policy Options

Victor Manzanilla — Wed, 01 Nov 2023 03:39:07 +0000

This report was created through a partnership with the Sage Project at San Diego State University (SDSU) during the spring of 2019. The research contained herein was conducted by students in an upper-division political science course headed by Professor Brian Adams. The given goal was to provide a policy analysis providing options for affordable housing at the future SDSU Mission Valley site. A differentiation between market-rate and non-profit-provided housing was made to divide this research into two main policy areas with multiple subsections within those areas. The data gathered on these topics include definitions, advantages, disadvantages, case studies, and potential feasibility. We acknowledge the fiscal, temporal, and political limitations that could prevent SDSU from pursuing some of the more philanthropic options in delivering housing to its community; bottom lines must be considered, and loans repaid. Market-rate student housing can be delivered through various avenues including the public (university-owned) and private sphere. A confluence between the two parties can allow for public-private partnerships, which have been successfully used to create student-only housing, as seen at The Green, at the University of California, Davis; or mixed-use buildings with retail and commercial spaces that include both student and residential housing, as seen in the University of Central Florida’s Creative Village. Micro units are a growing trend showing favor among student-aged demographics that could be accomplished through both the public and private sector. Non-profits organizations, like the Collegiate Housing Foundation, have financed over $3.1 billion in student housing facilities with multiple examples at the University of California, Irvine. On a smaller scale, student housing cooperatives, such as the Berkeley Student Cooperative, have provided students with low-cost housing for nearly a century—although the model seems limited in scalability. We recognize how contingent SDSU’s decision-making will likely be when considering policy options for its Mission Valley site. Our aim is to allow for informed decision-making given quality information.

The Sage Project Contact Info
Kristofer Patron
Program Administrator
kpatron@sdsu.edu
(619) 594-0103

University Faculty Contact
Brian Adams

Local Government / Community Contact