But when water pollution levels in the Tijuana River Valley rose significantly during the COVID-19 pandemic, the two stopped going to the beach altogether.<\/p>\n
From the Documenters<\/p>\n
This story came by way of a news tip by inewsource\u2019s San Diego Documenters program, which trains and pays community members to document what happens at public meetings.<\/p>\n
He didn\u2019t return until last month, when he took part in a youth cleanup at La Jolla Shores.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have grown up with these conditions,\u201d Camberos said. \u201cWe have noticed that these are what we have been born into, and we know that this has to change.\u201d<\/p>\n
The high school junior is part of a recently formed coalition called the Youth Circle. At the Imperial Beach Library this week, the group moderated a discussion on the decades-long Tijuana River sewage crisis with Camberos, county Supervisor Paloma Aguirre and Tijuana Estuary Foundation researcher Jeff Crooks.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe degree to which they\u2019re engaged is wonderful and it\u2019s horrifying,\u201d Crooks said of the students. \u201cIt is this double-edged sword of, we need this, but they shouldn\u2019t have to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Youth Circle is supported by the Institute for Public Strategies and the Tijuana River Coalition. It brings together high school and college students across the county who are leading efforts on addressing the sewage.<\/p>\n
Border sewage. Young voices. Help us fund vital community reporting for San Diego. Eleventh grader Vivian Zhang, who conducts research on air quality through the UCSD Youth Climate Advisors<\/a> program, said it is important for young people to join these conversations so they can better support the community in the future.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201dWe all know there\u2019s a big sewage crisis at the border, but we don\u2019t know the specifics of the politics and the ecological side,\u201d Zhang said, \u201cso just bringing in those perspectives is really important to dive deeper into the issue.\u201d<\/p>\n Some Youth Circle members will travel to Sacramento next week for California Ocean Day<\/a> to lobby for state legislation that would update air quality standards for hydrogen sulfide, commonly known as sewer gas. The group will also push for the Saturn Boulevard hotspot to receive Proposition 4 funding<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Camberos and his family ultimately left Imperial Beach after his grandmother\u2019s health worsened. They believe the pollution was exacerbating her respiratory issues. Now living in Otay Mesa, he said his grandmother is doing better.<\/p>\n \u201cA lot of the lawmakers that I\u2019ve spoken to in Sacramento, they either don\u2019t know about the issue or they don\u2019t understand the extent of the issue,\u201d Camberos said. \u201cWe\u2019ve had people that almost, I want to say, brush it off because Sacramento is so many miles away from San Diego.\u201d<\/p>\n Next week will mark Coronado senior Sean Wilbur\u2019s fourth trip to the state Capitol. He helped found his school\u2019s Stop the Sewage Club in 2023, which leads advocacy trips to Sacramento, after the Coronado Junior Lifeguards program he was part of was canceled because of unsafe water pollution levels.\u00a0<\/p>\n Wilbur said while there\u2019s a long way to go, they are excited to already have some support from the highest levels of government in addition to local recognition of the issue.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIf we pull a hundred levers and maybe one of those is just half of the solution, and then another one is just a quarter of the solution, at some point they\u2019re all going to compile and we\u2019re going to see some real change,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n As they consider their next steps after high school, the students\u2019 motivations are largely drawn from growing up with the Tijuana River on their doorstep.\u00a0<\/p>\n Wilbur plans to study mechanical engineering and political science in college, carrying on advocacy work in Sacramento. Zhang wants to continue studying and conducting research on environmental issues. Camberos said he is interested in politics and government and hopes to work more with the Institute for Public Strategies, inspired by relationships he formed through local advocacy.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cAs devastating as it is, this issue does allow us to come together,\u201d Camberos said. \u201cIt allows us to build community, and that\u2019s something that in spite of the crisis, I have really grown to appreciate.\u201d<\/p>\n Brisa Karow is an independent journalist living in San Diego. Previously, she lived in Flagstaff, Arizona, and ran the Northern Arizona University student newspaper. She is part of inewsource\u2019s San Diego Documenters program and regularly reports on local government throughout the county.<\/p>\n \t\t\tType of Content<\/p>\n News: Based on facts, either observed and verified directly by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Why this matters For decades, billions of gallons of untreated sewage has poured into the Tijuana River Valley,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":283745,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[10037,643,121810,929,74,76,75],"class_list":{"0":"post-283744","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-documenters","9":"tag-environment","10":"tag-freelance-network","11":"tag-imperial-beach","12":"tag-san-diego","13":"tag-san-diego-headlines","14":"tag-san-diego-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283744","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283744"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283744\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/283745"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n Give $10<\/a><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/karow_youth_forum_4.jpg\")
Attendees listen to a discussion on the Tijuana River sewage crisis, put on by a recently formed coalition of local students known as Youth Circle, at the Imperial Beach Library, April 20, 2026. (Brisa Karow for inewsource)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/karow_youth_forum_1.jpg\")
High school student and Youth Circles member Sean Wilbur helps lead a discussion about the Tijuana River sewage crisis at the Imperial Beach Library, April 20, 2026. (Bris Karow for inewsource)<\/p>\n