News

By readers: sfrichmondreview. – excerpt

Have I just been living under a rock? What’s going on in Golden Gate Park at the Polo Field?

Are you aware that the promoters and owners of Outside Lands (I assume) have somehow convinced the city of San Francisco to pour a permanent concrete slab on a huge portion of the western end of the Polo Field in Golden Gate Park? I mean, ACTUALLY ON THE FIELD. It also looks like they are fixing to install a concrete path around the inside of the fence. Go have a look sometime, or see the attached photo. This is fixing to be a real eyesore. When did the city decide it was in the best interest of the taxpayers of this city to pour a huge unsightly slab of concrete on the beautiful (and historical) green of the Polo fields?…

From the Editor:

Here is the reply we received from the City:

“This is a renovation intended to prevent damage to the far western areas of our Polo Fields following the annual Outside Lands festival and avoid delaying the field’s reopening for athletics while we repair things like broken irrigation valves. Per the agreement, Another Planet is replacing these far western turf areas with decomposed granite (and reinforced concrete in select areas particularly prone to damage). The areas being replaced are outside the area of active field use and will not impact play.”…(more)

And no doubt some contractor needs a job.

From Tim Redmond : 48hills – excerpt

The Board of Supes has two more meetings to finalize the fall ballot, and while some measures are clearly going to be approved, at least one critical vote is still up in the air…

Sups. Ahsha Safai, Aaron Peskin, Shamann Walton and Rafael Mandelman want to create a commission to oversee the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing, which sounds like a fine idea—but in committee, Sup. Connie Chan dissented because, she pointed out, the commission would be dominated by mayoral appointees.

Like a lot of activists who spoke on the measure, Chan said there’s not much point in creating a commission run by the same person who is already in charge of HSH (and who, a lot of folks say, isn’t being held accountable for its failures).

Longtime activist Jordan Davis, who lives in supportive housing, noted:When a majority of commissioners are appointed by the mayor, it leads to an untenable situation where a majority of the commission serves at the pleasure of one singular person. While all commissioners serve at the pleasure of their appointed bodies, having the HSH commission be majority board appointee means that commissioners can’t be removed because one person didn’t like their decisions…(more)

By Tim Redmond : 48hills – excerpt

A series of grassroots ballot initiatives for the fall will test the direction of San Francisco politics on a much greater level than the recall of District Attorney Chesa Boudin—and will force Mayor London Breed to make clear political choices a year before she (maybe) has to run for re-election.

Breed has already made clear that she opposes the move by Sup. Dean Preston to shift local elections to even-numbered years—a plan that would give her an extra year in office but would force her to run in the highest-turnout year of the four-year cycle…

I suspect Breed with side with the Yimbys against the supes on the competing affordable housing measures.

But two other progressive measures are almost certain to qualify, and they will force the mayor and other city officials and organizations to decide whether they are with Big Tech and the landlord lobby—or with some very reasonable reforms that are, polls show, immensely popular…(more)

Via email

Dear CRS and Friends:

Today the petitions were filed successfully, and because of you and others, we are in great shape to qualify for the ballot in November. We needed 8,974 petition signers, and we turned in 18,571! Huzzah!!! This was a huge undertaking in a short period of time, and thanks also to the museum who spearheaded this project and were able to make it happen, with the hard work, energy and commitment of co-sponsor OTGH Alliance, along with support from Concerned Residents of the Sunset and everyone else who took the time to sign the petition.

Watch Channel 7 ABC local news at 6 tonight. J.R. Stone will have a report on this from the tennis courts at GGP!

by Chris Roberts :sfstandard – excerpt

Tenderloin Housing Clinic, one of the city’s most prominent city-funded nonprofit housing providers, is heading toward a historic moment: its workforce could be the first in San Francisco that primarily serves the formerly homeless to go on strike.

The city funnels $1.2 billion annually to 643 nonprofits, 70% of which is spent on homeless outreach, permanent supportive housing, healthcare, and other key services for the city’s indigent population, according to the San Francisco Controller’s Office.

Considered a vital tool in the city’s struggle against homelessness, the sector employs workers who are nonetheless “among the lowest paid workforce in San Francisco,” according to a June 8 Controller’s report. Average hourly wages range between $20 and $25 an hour, the report said.

At THC, roughly 300 people work in roles including front-desk clerks and janitors at its 24 single-room occupancy hotels and apartment complexes, and as caseworkers who manage the sometimes-intensive services at city-funded supportive housing. Organized with the Service Employees International Union Local 1021, their last contract expired in June 2020…(more)

By Sam Lew : 48hills – excerpt

Developer wants luxury housing in Western Addition; residents fear displacement

McCormack Baron Salazar (MBS), which developed the apartments in 2001, plans to replace the public housing complex with 260 luxury units alongside 193 units of public housing in a 19-story tower.

The tenants demanded that the St.Louis-based developer present an alternative set of redevelopment plans with transparency and tenant input; they want to ban any market rate housing and instead ensure that there are units for public and affordable units…(more)

We know the law will probably evict the tenants thanks to our state legislators who removed all protections for tenants and removed local citizens and our government from development decisions, but, we would like to know how our supervisors would handle this if they could. This is also a good reminder that all elections have consequences and we can only vote for people who run. If no on runs to replace those state representatives we are stuck with them.

This is a cut and dried issue. I would like to ask each supervisor to explain to us not what the law says, but how they feel this project. Do they support evicting tenants from a 193-unit pubic apartment complex in order to add 260 luxury units? No additional affordable units will be built and the new “so-called affordable” units will not be as affordable as the current units when they are built. This project will literally remove 193 units of affordable housing and probably throw some people onto the street who can not afford higher “affordable housing” elsewhere.

How much is a person’s life worth? Is it worth disrupting 193 people their fillies and partners, to build 260 luxury units?

By Jonah Owen Lamb : sfstandard – excerpt

Inmates languishing in their cells, cases not being reviewed or charged, warrants gone missing.

These are just some of the problems caused by the bungled replacement of a decades-old software San Francisco’s criminal justice system uses to communicate, according to documents obtained by The Standard and sources familiar with the situation.

The new network was supposed to bring a system that relied on an antiquated Atari-era program into the 21st century. Instead, it has caused chaos and could lead to the violation of constitutional rights—and potentially endanger police officers, according to people with knowledge of the issue.

“This new system is a mess,” San Francisco prosecutor Ryan Khojasteh said. “It’s a complete upending [of] how we do our job.”

The biggest issue, he said, is getting timely access to information prosecutors need to handle cases and manage their workload…(more)

How is it that San Francisco cannot find a competent computer system that functions in Silicon Valley. Perhaps we should look at a city that has a functioning system and hire that contractor. There must be an existing system somewhere they works.

By Bob Silvestri : marinij – excerpt

The State’s unrealistic, dysfunctional housing regulations demand that cities and counties “build” more housing, even though 98% of California’s cities and counties don’t build any housing: never have/never will. But, for all the anti-NIMBY, gavel pounding, and stomping of feet the state’s “trickle-down-the market will solve everything” approach has been an utter failure.

Let me repeat that. The state’s approach to increasing affordable housing has been an utter failure.

New ideas have been suggested but the state continues to double down on failure. A day of reckoning is approaching.

Over the past 15 years that the state has added regulations on top of regulations, penalties on top of penalties, and even resorted to having a special task force suing municipalities for Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) compliance, California housing production today (about 1 new house for every 656 people with a population of 39.4 million) is worse, on a per capita basis, than it was when all this started with the passage of SB 375 in 2008 (about 1 new home built for every 610 people in 2008 with a population of 36.3 million). And it’s a lot less than we were building 40 years ago (about 1 new home per 265 people with a population 23.8 million).

In other words, we’re building less housing today than 40 years ago…(more)

By Mike Ege : sfstandard – excerpt

This week, the Board of Supervisors has a return engagement with two controversial housing bills, and is set to clear financing for three importantaffordable housing projects. They will also likely vote to expand a funding scheme for further promoting tourism, and declare certification of theJune 7 election results. (As always, wonks looking for the full kit and caboodle can check out the complete agenda.)

Housing Bills: Will Gridlock Continue?

The Board is set to again consider two bills on housing that caused considerable headaches for housing advocates: one, to legalize more dwelling units in single-family neighborhoods, and another to stop development of certain “micro-unit” housing projects. The two bills have been paired together as part of a compromise, but at the board’s June 14 meeting, District 8 Supervisor Rafael Mandelman asked that the bills be continued due to advice from the City Attorney.

The Mandelman bill, originally drafted to allow some fourplexes and other multi-unit buildings in districts zoned for single-family homes, was received with some optimism from housing advocates. But it was plunged into development hell at the board’s Land Use and Transportation Committee, who tacked on several caveats…

The companion bill, sponsored by District 3 Supervisor Aaron Peskin, bans “micro-unit” efficiency studio housing in the Tenderloin and Chinatown, with the intention of preventing the gentrification of those neighborhoods’ existing stock of single room occupancy hotels…(more)

They might as well quit building micro units since most are empty due to the lack of takers.