San Diego musician and family displaced after historic January floods

It’s been almost three weeks since the Jan. 22 storms caused serious flooding and displaced families all over San Diego.

One local musician is among the many San Diegans who lost everything.

“Music motivates me, it fills me with joy, and hope,” Levi Chinchurreta said.

Levi Chinchurreta has been playing his guitar for 20 years. His notes strike a chord with every ear that listens.

“A song echos through your soul and your heart,” Chinchurreta said.

He spent his Sunday with his band singing songs of praise. The guitar he used is the only one he could salvage from the floods three weeks ago.

“His guitars are his way that he serves the Lord, for him to lose his instrument that he praises God with, it’s disheartening, it’s terrible,” Isaac Jacobo, Pastor for Seventh Day Adventist Broadway District said.

In addition to damaging several guitars he owned, the flood waters also displaced his family. He said he never imagined losing everything overnight.

His church isn’t just a place where Levi worships, it has also opened its doors to him and his family to stay while they find out what’s next. The family of three is staying in his pastor’s office.

Levi said the city has provided resources, but the process of getting housed is taking longer than they expected.

That’s the case for more than a thousand San Diegans who were washed out of their homes by repeated floods in January and February. They’ve received help from friends, or city and county government. However, they will need to find somewhere new to live, which isn’t easy in a city already dealing with a housing crisis.

“We still can’t assimilate and know what we direction we’re taking from here,” Levi Chinchurreta said.

He said there is still a lot of uncertainty surrounding their lives.

“More time could go by and we continue in the same situation as many other families without a place to go and who have lost everything, and who still don’t know will happen,” Chinchurreta said.

But he said his faith and his love for music are what’s carrying through him through it all.  

“Being able to worship the Lord and share his word with others through my songs because I know he touches people’s hearts just hearing a song,” Chinchurreta said.

His pastor said they will allow him to stay in his office while they find out what’s next for him and his family.