Category: News

Posted on

Farmworkers fight shaped California attorney general nominee

By Adam Beam AP : startribune – excerpt

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — In 1977, Cynthia Bonta was among 3,000 people who locked arms and tried in vain to prevent 400 riot police from evicting the mostly Asian tenants of a hotel near San Francisco’s Financial District so developers could build a parking garage.

More than four decades later, her son Rob Bonta stood near that spot — now an apartment building for low-income seniors — to hear the governor of California nominate him to become the first Filipino-American attorney general of the nation’s most populous state.

Rob Bonta is a considered a shoo-in for confirmation from the Legislature. His likely ascension to one of the most powerful law enforcement posts in the country comes after more than than 50 years of community activism by his parents.

Bonta was first elected to the Assembly in 2012 and quickly carved out a reputation as a criminal justice reformer. He has called for ending the death penalty and championed legislation that outlawed for-profit prisons and ended cash bail until it was overturned by voters in November.

His father, Warren Bonta, who is white and a native Californian, marched with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Selma, Alabama. His mother, Cynthia, began her activism after coming to the U.S. in 1965 from her native Philippines on a scholarship.

Their son’s nomination is a galvanizing moment for the state’s Filipino community, a group that advocates say is often a forgotten segment of California’s Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, who account for about 16% of the state’s nearly 40 million residents...(more)

Posted on

SF Creates New Office Tasked With Relocating Homeless Hotel Residents

: sfpublicpress – excerpt

A new city agency, founded in the wake of rising concerns about the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing’s ability to house the city’s homeless population, aims to bring 2,000 people into permanent shelter by the end of the year.

The Office of Housing Opportunities will be a division of the COVID Command Center, shifting responsibilities away from the homelessness department. Of particular focus will be housing the 1,880 residents of the shelter-in-place hotels, a program launched in 2020 to bring indoors vulnerable homeless people during the pandemic. Directing the effort is Chris Block, formerly the director of the chronic homelessness division at Tipping Point, a nonprofit focused on battling poverty and homelessness.

It’s unclear how the office will be funded, or if it will receive any portion of the Department of Homelessness’s $562 million annual budget. Through the city’s communications hub at the Department of Emergency Management, a spokesperson who would not divulge their name declined to answer questions about either agency’s budget or staffing…(more)

Read the whole article and see what you think about this new change. Whatever it takes to keep the affordable units full. The is no excuse to have 10% empty while people are living on the streets.

RELATED:

Renters Are Still Being Displaced, Tenant Advocate Say

By Laura Wenus : sfpublicpress – excerpt (includes audio )

At the beginning of the year, a tenant attorney warned of an “avalanche” of evictions unless California legislators reached a deal to extend tenant protections. They did, and applications recently opened for a support program designed to help both low-income tenants and their landlords with growing rent debt. Shanti Singh, legislative and communications director for Tenants Together, a coalition of 50 renters rights organizations in California, talked with “Civic” about the legislation…

Debt will continue to be a concern, Singh said. Applications opened March 15 for the State Rental Assistance Program, through which. landlords of qualifying tenants, who agree to forgive 20% of back rent owed, can get a subsidy from the state to cover the remaining 80% of that back rent… (more)

 

 

Posted on

Analysis links 12 groups and gangs to most of SF’s gun violence

By Michael Barba : sfexaminer – excerpt (includes maps and graphics)

A new analysis of crime in San Francisco has found just a dozen groups of high-risk individuals are responsible for a majority of gun violence citywide.

The analysis, presented to the Police Commission by a nonprofit consultant Wednesday, shows that 12 groups or gangs in the Bayview and other police districts were involved in most of the gun homicides that occurred between 2017 and mid-2020 and non-fatal shootings from 2019.

At least 58 of the 162 homicides reported in San Francisco from January 2017 to June 2020 involved either a victim or suspect, or both, associated with a group or gang, according to the analysis. Of those group-involved homicides, 36 were motivated by an ongoing group conflict or a personal dispute…(more)

Posted on

Lawrence Ferlinghetti, poet and titan of the Beat era, dies at 101

By Elaine Woo, Los Angeles Times : sfexaminer – excerpt

Lawrence Ferlinghetti, the San Francisco poet, publisher and bookseller who played a leading role in West Coast literary history as a champion of Beat writer Allen Ginsberg and co-founder of the legendary City Lights bookstore, died in San Francisco.

Ferlinghetti died Monday evening, according to Starr Sutherland, a friend who is working on a documentary on the fabled bookstore. The cause was interstitial lung disease, his son Lorenzo told The Washington Post. Ferlinghetti was 101…(more)

Posted on

SF Police Commission rejects police budget and layoffs. Will it matter?

By Julian Mark : missionlocal – excerpt

The San Francisco Police Commission on Wednesday night unanimously rejected the police department’s budget proposal, which would lay off 167 police officers, cut technology to aid reform efforts, and reduce the department’s overtime funds.

But the commission’s vote against moving the budget forward was a largely symbolic action that will signal to Mayor London Breed and the Board of Supervisors that the commission was unhappy with the proposal as currently drafted.

In other words, the mayor and the supes will receive the budget no matter what — with a somewhat negative recommendation from the commissioners.

It seemed everyone agreed that such dramatic reductions to the police budget were unacceptable and at least needed deeper consideration. In urging the Police Commission to reject the budget, Chief Bill Scott repeatedly called the cuts “devastating.” …(more)

Did we just hear that  a police chief complained when a citizen took a dangerous situation  in hand by firing a handgun at an intruder? This is not going to end well.

 

Posted on

California Utilities Will Buy More Energy, Hike Rates to Avoid Blackouts: CPUC

By Olga R. Rodriguez  : nbcbayarea – excerpt (video)

Utilities will be allowed to buy extra energy and pass on the costs to customers in order to avoid a repeat of rolling blackouts that kicked in last summer when demand outpaced supply, California regulators said Thursday.

The California Public Utilities Commission voted unanimously to authorize Pacific Gas and Electric, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric Company to purchase additional power in the next three months.

“Customers deserve a reliable grid, and they deserve a regulatory body that will be mobilized to do everything in its power to ensure that we have one,” commission President Marybel Batjer said…(more)

All the more reason for people to switch to solar power, but, will the CPUC make that more difficult? Find out what California does for and against solar power users how the utilities exert constant pressure on net metering. https://solarrights.org

RELATED:

Utility bosses: If you make us look bad, there’s gonna be trouble

 

Posted on

Some San Francisco Affordable Housing Units Renting For More Than Market-Rate Units

By Susie Steimle : cbslocal – excerpt

SAN FRANCISCO (KPIX 5) — Tenants living in so-called affordable housing units are now in many cases paying more than their market-rate neighbors.

These affordable units are not tied to the traditional real estate market fluctuations and hopeful tenants like Christine McDow say they should be…

According to Apartment List rents in San Francisco are down 27% since the start of the pandemic. A one-bedroom used to average $3,500 a month; now it’s down to $1,983.

Below Market Rate (BMR) units haven’t seen rent drops; in fact, in Dave Osgood’s building, they’re seeing rent increases…

“The so-called below market and market-rate seem to be merging,” Osgood said.

There are 76 below-market-rate units at The Towers at Rincon Apartments, Osgood says all year he’s seen people move out as cheaper market-rate units become available.

“There may be as many as 20% of them empty,” Osgood said…(more)

Unbelievable until you look at the city codes that have been heavily crafted by developer friendly lawyers and there are more layers than most people are aware of until someone files a lawsuit and starts looking for excuses to support their side. With luck, some of these can be fixed as they are exposed.

 

Posted on

Clint Reilly shares how his media group reimagines the future of local media

by Clinton Riley Holdings Inc. : bizjournals – excerpt (includes video interview)

In a one-on-one conversation, Mary Huss, publisher of the San Francisco Business Times, talks with Clint Reilly, local real estate, politics and media magnate. Tune in to hear them discuss how the San Francisco Examiner and SF Weekly will revitalize coverage of the city…(more)

They intend to “grow” the paper, hiring journalists instead of firing them. This should  create opportunities for writers and investigative journalists. How will he pay for it? He has some deep pocket of his own, but, he must also have investors. He could merge the SF Weekly and SF Examiner, or turn SF Weekly into a weekend paper to promote entertainment when it returns.

It they really want to compete with the Chronicle they have a lot of hiring to do. Will they delve heavily nto electronic media? I don’t think they know yet. Following this story will be a story in itself. Has anyone seen any changes at the Marinatimes yet?

We should keep an open mind for now, especially if they increase federal and state coverage. That gives them a lot of new ground to cover,  and we are not lacking in subject matter these days.
Posted on

California First Appellate District Court of Appeal publishes its opinion in LC/CVP v ABAG

Posted by Bob Silvestri : marinpost – excerpt

On January 6, 2021, the First Appellate District Court of Appeal issued an Order Granting Publication of its opinion in the case of New LivableCA/Community Venture Partners v ABAG, stating that

“For good cause, the request for publication is granted. Pursuant to rule 8.1105(c) of the California Rules of Court, the opinion in the above-entitled matter is ordered certified for publication in the Official Reports.”

That means the opinion of the Court of Appeal is now case law. This opinion will have broad applicability and impacts throughout the state’s legal system. To put it plainly, this is a very big deal.

The significance of this reversal of the decision by the San Francisco Superior Court, to dismiss this case, and its publication cannot be over-stated. The Appeal Court’s opinion has now become case law and as such is the law of the land in California that will impact future Brown Act petitioners for years to come.

To read the appellate court’s opinion CLICK HERE…(more)

 

Posted on

Gavin Newsom could be ‘undermined’ by Democrats in recall efforts, report says

By Eric Ting : sfgate – excerpt

The sixth attempt to recall California Gov. Gavin Newsom is rapidly gaining steam amid the worsening pandemic, a controversial new stay-at-home order and an unemployment fraud scandal.

It was previously reported by Politico’s Carla Marinucci that those close to the governor were growing “increasingly worried” about the recall efforts, and Marinucci’s latest report on the recall adds another twist.

After detailing the new Republican fundraising efforts behind the recall — while noting the challenges the GOP will face in a heavily Democratic state — Marinucci quotes a “Sacramento insider aligned with a major special interest group” who says, “We’ve gotten calls from Democrats who are already kicking the tires” on getting on the ballot in a potential recall election in 2021….(more)