Category: News

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SF Superior Court Strikes Down Residential Vacancy Tax

insidesf – excerpt

The San Francisco Superior Court has struck down a residential vacancy tax slated to take effect in 2025, ruling that the tax is unconstitutional.

Voters approved the Empty Homes Tax in 2022, which required owners of apartments or condos in structures with three or more units to pay a tax on units vacant for 182 or more days in a calendar year. Filing and fees were scheduled to begin in 2025.

However, the San Francisco Apartment Association, Small Property Owners of San Francisco Institute, San Francisco Association of Realtors and four individual landlords filed a lawsuit in San Francisco Superior Court in February 2023 to challenge the constitutionality of the law. And the San Francisco Superior Court ruled yesterday morning that the tax violated the Constitution and imposed an unlawful burden on privacy interests, while also being pre-empted by the state’s Ellis Act.

As it stands now, the residential vacancy tax is no longer in effect. The city will appeal the decision and debate will continue. (Here’s a link to the court decision.)

Owners in this property category now don’t need to file or pay any fees to the city. I’ll keep you updated on any future developments…(more)

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Peskin helps cops catch attacker while driving to work

By Joe Burn, Sam Mondros, and David Sjostedt : sfstandard – excrrpt

Board of Supervisors President Aaron Peskin went above and beyond in his civic duties Thursday morning. As he drove toward City Hall along Van Ness Avenue, he spotted what appeared to be a homeless man being beaten and robbed.

Acting fast, Peskin called 911 at 11:02 a.m., he told The Standard in a phone call, and began following the suspect in his car, remaining on the line for eight minutes.

“At which point, I was told he had been apprehended, and I drove back around and found him and identified him, and he is now under arrest,” Peskin said.

Peskin said the victim looked as if he was in his 60s and “maybe homeless.”…

Peskin’s longtime political consultant, Jim Stearns, wasted no time seizing the opportunity to promote the mayoral candidate’s good deed for the day.

“He not only swims from Alcatraz, he single-handedly apprehends dangerous criminals. I mean, of course, he should be mayor,” he told The Standard by phone…(more)

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Prior to her resignation, Dream Keeper Initiative director Sheryl Davis threw a party at one of D.C.’s swankiest hotels

By Susan Dyer Reynolds – via email (excerpt)

She also took two trips to Martha’s Vineyard in 2023 and 2024, where she and other Dream Keeper recipients were event sponsors…
Mayor Breed, right, appointed Mawuli Tugbenyoh to serve as acting replacement for Human Rights Commission head Sheryl Davis…
 
To nobody’s surprise this close to an election where Mayor London Breed, her dear friend, is battling to keep her job, Sheryl Davis, head of the Human Rights Commission where she also ran the Dream Keeper Initiative, has resigned (on Friday the 13th, no less). As I pointed in last week’s GBTB, when London Breed was District 5 supervisor, she asked Mayor Ed Lee to allow Davis to run programming at the Ella Hill Hutch Community Center. After a few years there, Davis was asked to be interim director of the Human Rights Commission, and soon after that she became the director. In November 2023, I called out the Dream Keeper Initiative, which took $120 million from law enforcement and created a citywide plan for “reinvesting” those millions in San Francisco’s African American community, as a pet project of Mayor Breed and Supervisor Shamann Walton ripe for grift. “A quick glance at the beneficiaries brings up numerous ‘nonprofits’ with ties to Breed and Walton, including organizations involved with the SFPUC Community Benefits pay-to-play scheme,” I wrote. A year later, my predictions came true, with many of the nonprofits I referenced caught misusing those funds on everything from cigars and bourbon to $700,000 for two Juneteenth parties.
On Sept. 12, Davis took a paid leave of absence, but she phoned it in. The day before, on Sept. 11, she presided over the Dreaming Forward “fireside chat” and reception at the luxury five-star Riggs Hotel in Washington, D.C. The event was hosted by the San Francisco Human Rights Commission, as was a seminar held from 11 a.m. to noon that same day called “Dreaming Forward: Investing in Black Culture to Advance Academic Excellence,” featuring Davis and Dream Keeper Initiative director Dr. Saidah Leatutufu-Burch.
It turns out Burch has big City Family ties as well, to District 10 supervisor Shamann Walton, co-sponsor of the Dream Keeper Initiative. Walton officiated the wedding of Leattutufu to his aide and longtime associate Percy Burch. In his opening comments, Walton made light of the fact they met “while one was the boss of the other” but said (with a “wink-wink”) that both swear the relationship started outside of work. And where did they work? At the infamous Young Community Developers while Walton was director. Not surprisingly, YCD got a nice grant from the Dream Keeper Initiative…(more)
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If you live on Social Security and Medicare, read this article before you vote

by Carol Harvey : sfbayview – excerpt

Produced over 12 years ago, this video never gets old…
Hey kiddos, Mom and Dad here. Let’s talk turkey – specifically about those turkeys who want to cut Social Security benefits. What’s up with that?

Read the article before you view the videos. Watch the entire one and one-half hour event by clicking this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRITuQhUO3g&list=PLHrKWOo7hlZBqhGnknzClH3RqOO_sR4Lz.
Watch a 14-minute video summary by clicking this link: https://youtu.be/KlcWvBFn36Q.
Watch an eight-minute summary by clicking this link: https://youtu.be/zbHBfGQjK3Y.

If you live on Social Security and Medicare, you and I are not alone.

It has now become too expensive for 65 million Americans to live in the United States of Money. People need food, shelter, healthcare and a basic income. Social Security and Medicare are our safety nets…

On July 30, 2024, with flare and a sense of fun, the California Alliance of Retired Americans (CARA) threw Social Security and Medicare a birthday party. I videoed the event, which took place at the Speaker Nancy Pelosi Federal Building in San Francesco. I swear I gained weight just looking at the red, white and blue frosted birthday cake held up by Hene Kelly, CARA vice president, and Kory Powell-McCoy, Nancy Pelosi’s district director…

13scrap-the-cap-1400x875, If you live on Social Security and Medicare, read this article before you vote, Featured News & Views

“Scrap the Cap” signs were everywhere. So what’s the cap?

…(more)

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Investor who bought up buildings to ‘improve’ ritzy S.F. neighborhood is uprooting legacy businesses

By Laura Waxman : sfchronicle – excerpt

The first thing that Pacific Heights resident Gabriel Wolf recalls when asked about his mid-pandemic move to Upper Fillmore Street is discovering signs of a friendly and engaged community that he found comforting during a time of great uncertainty.

He points out a ginkgo tree dubbed “Bartholome” that the owner of Cielo lobbied the city to have planted on the sidewalk in front of her clothing boutique, and the string lights that a customer of adjacent Ten-Ichi installed outside the 46-year-old sushi restaurant. Across the street, 45-year-old La Mediterranee restaurant refurbished its parklet with a mural depicting a serene sunset…

“These businesses obviously care about this neighborhood and the people in it,” Wolf said.

Now the future for some of these businesses is uncertain.

When a mysterious web of connected limited liability companies started buying up building after building on a three-block stretch of Fillmore, small business owners and residents in the area were hopeful that the infusion of capital could help buoy and revive the close-knit retail community that had been struggling since the pandemic.

But, months after the properties traded hands, the vision of Upper Fillmore’s newest investor is coming into focus, and one thing appears certain: It does not include several of the mom and pop businesses that have anchored the street for decades.

Earlier this year, stealthy entities spent upwards of $40 million on acquiring more than half a dozen aging buildings on Fillmore between Clay and Pine streets, including the defunct Clay Theater at 2261 Fillmore. For now, they’re adding to the street’s shuttered storefronts by displacing a handful of long-time small businesses in an apparent bid to ultimately bring more high-end retailers into the area… (more)

RELATED:
VC Neil Mehta, who’s quietly nabbing prized SF property, plans a “Y Combinator for restaurants”: 
What does Neil know about the restaurants he is kicking out? Not much evidently. They are some of the most popular eating establishments in town. How jaded are his tastebuds?

You better keep your car because you are going to need it when they drive you out of town!

 

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Aaron Peskin, in Mission, delivers six-point plan to fix homelessness

By H. R. Smith : missionlocal – excerpt

There are, unsurprisingly, so many more points than six 

Supervisor Aaron Peskin gathered with supporters at Buena Vista Horace Mann K-8 school on Tuesday to announce his six-point Crisis to Care plan, saying if elected mayor he would address homelessness with housing, conservatorships, and cash payments to avoid evictions…

Peskin said he would be hands-on in the plan’s implementation.

“I will be the person that convenes the department heads,” says Peskin, in the tone of someone ascending to the emotional high point of a speech. “I will be the person who calls for and reads the audits and implements the results, and I will be the person who implements the systemic management reforms. I am the person who, from the legislative branch, has seen the tangled web and knows how to untangle it.”

It is this enthusiasm for the boringness of civic governance and budgeting (which even people who disagree with Peskin cite as a defining characteristic) that has raised the hopes of many of those assembled here that homelessness could be managed more like a public health problem than a referendum on an official’s political career. Though in this case, it could be both…

Proposition 1, which passed at the state level earlier this year after heavy campaigning from Gov. Gavin Newsom, requires every county in California to spend more of its tax revenue from the Mental Health Services Act on housing and treatment for people with drug and alcohol problems. It also requires money be set aside money for expanding residential facilities for people with mental health or substance abuse problems.

Some of the most practical sites for this kind of housing, says Agnos, are state mental hospitals that were defunded back when Ronald Reagan was governor of California. Local governments could literally work together and begin to un-Reagan decades of California mental health policy…(more)

 

 

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Lurie Announces Plan To Create New Police District

For Immediate Release : via email

New Police District Would Cover Hospitality Zone to Better Deter Crime Targeting Businesses and Tourists Downtown

SAN FRANCISCO– Today, Daniel Lurie announced a plan to create a new police district that covers San Francisco’s hospitality zone, from Moscone Center to Union Square. The new police district would encompass the Convention Center, San Francisco Centre, Yerba Buena Gardens, and Union Square, with a station located in the district once Lurie’s plans to fully staff the police department are implemented. Currently, the hospitality district is split between three police districts, dividing already limited police resources across an area with unique public safety needs.

“The Union Square shopping area is ground zero for retail theft,” said Daniel Lurie, a longtime non-profit executive, father of two, and lifelong Democrat. “From deterring crime in our shopping corridors to ensuring tourists feel safe in an iconic San Francisco neighborhood, this area has unique needs that require dedicated and specialized resources. Revitalizing this area is key to San Francisco’s economic recovery. The current and former interim mayors caused a morale crisis in our police department which has spurred an exodus of officers, but I’m confident we can turn this around with new accountable leadership.” 

Union Square, historically the region’s premier shopping area and the most important city-center shopping district west of Chicago, has been hit hard by retail theft, threatening businesses and deterring foot traffic, putting the economic vitality of downtown San Francisco at risk. This specialized police district would focus on protecting the heart of San Francisco’s economy, which contributes 75% of the city’s GDP and 40% of the city’s jobs. The plan for a new police district is coupled with Lurie’s existing plans to increase police staffing numbers citywide, create a downtown climate innovation hub, ensure certainty in zoning and permitting, and transform downtown into a 24/7 vibrant urban core.

Lurie’s plan for fully staffing the police department includes: building workforce housing for first responders, offering rent subsidies so officers can live in the communities where they work, providing child care and transportation incentives, and increasing diversity in our ranks so officers reflect the communities they serve.

In contrast, both Farrell and Breed have a track record of defunding the police. Specifically, Farrell claims to have increased police funding as budget chair, but during his tenure from 2013 to 2017, his Budget Committee actually reduced the police department’s budget by nearly $6 million over three years—$600,000 less in 2013, $1 million less in 2014, and $4 million less in 2015. Moreover, as interim Mayor, the San Francisco Police Officers Association criticized him as obstructionist on officer pay. Since Breed became Mayor in 2018, SFPD has lost 300 officers creating both a staffing and morale crisis that has further exacerbated a sense of lawlessness while stretching 911 call response times to dangerous levels.

 

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Mayor London Breed Issues Executive Directive for Comprehensive Charter Reform

News: sf.gov – excerpt

Thirty years since last major charter reform effort, Mayor Breed initiates process to improve efficiency of government with a goal of setting major reform on November 2026 ballot – August 20, 2024

San Francisco, CA — Today, Mayor London N. Breed issued an Executive Directive to initiate comprehensive Charter Reform in San Francisco. The current version of the San Francisco Charter was adopted by voters in 1995, and this would be the first comprehensive reform effort in 30 years.

“The current charter, with its layers of bureaucracy added over the years, has created inefficiency and diffused accountability across our governance structures,” said Mayor London Breed. “The good news is that we can fix this by stepping back and reconsidering the Charter as a whole. That time is now.”

The Executive Directive asks the City Controller and City Administrator to work with good government experts and City officials to identify key areas of improvements, and to establish a public outreach and education process with City leadership, residents, businesses, and labor partners to consider changes to the Charter.

The goal of this Executive Directive will be to develop, draft and pass a Charter Reform measure at the Board of Supervisors to be placed on the November 2026 ballot…(more)

Isn’t she jumping the gun? What happens if she is not re-elected? Is she planning to hang on I some capacity that will allow her to push this through?

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SB 610: Senator Wiener attacks Fire Hazard Maps as impediments to housing.

By Amy Kalish : marinpost -excerpt

Fire truck got stuck in a tight turn. Had to get another. Use a different approach. Hydrant was 300 feet away Here’s something fresh!

There is a new and dangerous assault on local control. Senator Wiener is not content to merely wrest zoning from cities. He is now targeting Fire Hazard Severity Zone Maps as “impediments” to housing.

SB 610 upends local considerations — and would eliminate the State Fire Hazard Severity Zone maps and familiar terms — most noticeably “ember resistant zones.” A whole new system would instead declare portions of the state “Wildfire Mitigation Areas.” There would be no comparative maps to see where changes were made.

Wiener introduced SB-610 “Fire prevention: wildfire mitigation area: defensible space: State Fire Marshal” as a “gut and amend” bill, meaning the contents were completely changed after it had already passed the Senate in an innocuous form (a proposed annual report by the chair of the State Energy Resources Commission).

The Assembly had no time to digest the language or its ramifications and it has sailed through.

Wiener bluntly states the reasons to ditch a functioning system in his SB 610 Fact Sheet:

  • “to keep localities from weaponizing the fire hazard mapping as anti-housing/development tools.”
  • “LRA (Local Responsibility Area) maps can functionally result in restrictions on growth in those areas through imposing costly building standards, increased disaster planning and mitigation requirements, or increasing home insurance premiums.”
  • “Local jurisdictions have the ability to misuse this process and make the majority of their community a high or very high FHSZ (Fire Hazard Severity Zone) map that could impact housing development.”
  • In other words, the Maps must go in order to keep cities and counties from cheating their way out of “fair share housing.”…(more)

How can anybody be so callous about human lives?

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Breed’s allegiance to the Yimby movement is hurting her political future

By Calvin Welch : 48hills – excerpt

Some of her Big Tech allies have abandoned her—and now the neighborhoods are unhappy too…

Hammett’s 1920s cynicism of fictional San Francisco has been superseded by the 2020s reality facing voters this November: the simultaneous buying and taking of the city by a handful of billionaires. These billionaires’ intent is not only controlling the city’s politics, but also in replacing most of its current residents with folks more like them—wealthy and conservative.

This assault on the current residents of San Francisco is based, in part, on Yimby lies about housing policy, lies endorsed by the Breed administration. And the irony of ironies is that it is her “loyalty” to this agenda that has so weakened her among San Francisco voters that some of her wealthy backers have dropped her like a stone.

Breed has now been officially discarded by the very “moderates” she has courted with her pro-Yimby density/displacement plans and her hard right turn on crime and police. Parts of the big tech/real estate coalition have now formally endorsed Mark Farrell, saying that Breed has not “demonstrated an ability to govern with the degree of persistence and consistency necessary to solve San Francisco’s problems.”…(more)