ENCINITAS, Calif. — Dr. Pat Davis joined Rep. Mike Levin and two local elected officials on Friday as he returns to the place where a sandstone bluff collapsed and killed three of Davis' family members last August.
At the media conference, Dr. Davis said that with new federal funds, he hopes to prevent another tragedy.
Davis' family was enjoying a day at Grandview Beach in Encinitas on Aug. 2 last year when a 30-by-25-foot chunk of sandstone collapsed on top of his wife, daughter, and sister-in-law.
"I lost my wife Julie, my youngest daughter Annie, a mother of two young children, and my wife's sister Elizabeth, a mother of two teenage children in a bluff collapse at Grandview on August second," Davis told the Encinitas City Council later that month. "There will be a new normal in my life without these three gifted women."
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers allocated $400,000 in federal funding last week for the planning, engineering and design phase of the Encinitas- Solana Beach Coastal Storm Damage Reduction Project. They allocated $505,000 for a similar design phase of the San Clemente Shoreline Project. These projects are the first step in preventing more tragedies like the one that befell Davis' family.
Levin hosted Davis as his guest at the State of the Union address. Solana Beach Mayor Jewel Edson and Encinitas Deputy Mayor Kellie Hinze will join Levin and Davis at the news conference.