And in perhaps the most striking vindication of all, the buyer is the exact entity we reported was likely more than a year ago: the organization behind the Light of the World Church. At the time, some insisted even mentioning that possibility was irresponsible. Today, it is simply the recorded deed.
Which brings us to Voice of San Diego’s recent blurb - a lazy attempt to recap this saga while slipping in the claim that SanDiegoVille “caught flack (rightly so)” for our reporting. That statement is not analysis; it is narrative convenience. It suggests our reporting was flawed when the facts now align precisely with what we published first. It implies legitimacy only arrived once larger outlets confirmed what we had already documented. And it absolves those who mocked or undermined our reporting by implying their reaction was justified. It wasn’t.
Being early is not being wrong. Being independent is not being amateur. Being doubted does not make something untrue. And being unwilling to wait until the last possible moment to report a story does not make one reckless.
This pattern is familiar. SanDiegoVille has repeatedly been accused of “making things up” - the permanent closure of all Souplantation locations in early 2020, the shuttering of San Diego’s iconic highway-side diner Perry’s Café, the demise of Tip Top Meats, the unraveling of Ballast Point Brewing - only for the same outlets who rolled their eyes to later write stories confirming what we published days, weeks or months prior. That’s not clairvoyance on our part; it’s connections, legwork, and decades of building relationships within San Diego’s hospitality community.
Critics have claimed our initial Las Cuatro Milpas reporting was vague. It was intentionally restrained. We chose not to publish details about tax liens and internal distress out of respect for a family facing a painful transition. And aybe we irresponsibly speculated that the eventual buyer could be the neighboring and controversial Light of the World Church, but that "educated guess" ultimately proved correct.This is not a victory lap. Las Cuatro Milpas is a San Diego landmark and should be afforded historic preservation, and its closure marks the end of an era. But honesty matters - and so does correcting the public record when others attempt to revise it for the sake of a cleaner storyline. What some loudly dismissed as “fake news” has now been validated point by point through documented fact. The criticism of our reporting was never about accuracy; it was about discomfort. It is always easier to attack the messenger than to confront a truth no one wants to hear.
To the readers who stayed with us through the noise, thank you. To those who hurled insults, the receipts remain on the public docket. To the family behind Las Cuatro Milpas, we honor what you built even as we chronicle its final chapter. And to the outlets now attempting to acknowledge the reality of the situation while still portraying our early reporting as misguided, the archive speaks for itself.
San Diego changes. Neighborhoods evolve. Institutions close. The job is to tell the truth, whether people want to hear it or not - and to tell it early when possible, carefully always, and without fear of the backlash that comes from being the first one to say what others would rather not acknowledge. That is not luck; it is not guesswork; it is journalism. And we will continue doing it, with or without permission.
Originally published on November 20, 2025.
