Coalition for San Francisco Neighborhoods
Advocating for a healthy city
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Now Accepting Applications: 2021-2022 Civil Grand jury The Superior Court of California, County of San Francisco is accepting applications from qualified citizens interested in serving as civil grand jurors for the time period July 1, 2021 through June 30, 2022.
civilgrandjury.sfgov.org
One of a series of articles on the history of the Balboa Reservoir.
As San Francisco city government currently works through the planning process for a housing project on the last remaining seventeen acres of the original Balboa Reservoir land, a review of the dramatic fate of the first housing plan for that land is in order…
This opposition to housing on the reservoir was largely fueled by support from advocates for City College’s future use of the land, who came from both inside and outside of the institution. The ballot referendums framed the issue as City College-versus-housing. In a show of support for the storied and esteemed college, the electorate picked the former; the City College coalition won. That victory ultimately led to an important result for the college’s future: in 1991 Mayor Art Agnos gave half of the reservoir property to the institution…
The empty basins
After evicting City College from the numerous WWII Navy-built structures on the 28-acre Balboa Reservoir site in December 1955–after ten years of college use–the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) demolished the buildings and had it excavated and paved as a two-basin reservoir in the late 1950s.[1]…(more)
via email from Public Banking Institute
Public banks of one form or another are emerging like Spring flowers. Across the USA a score of new public interest banking initiatives aim to fill service and credit voids that private finance won’t or can’t provide. Today we discuss three emerging applications of public bank principles: serving the substantial number of un- and underbanked people in California through the proposed new BankCAL program, creating a multi-trillion-dollar public infrastructure bank for the US, and clear evidence that public banks have excelled over private banks in responding to the global pandemic crisis. Our guests are Trinity Tran of the CA Public Bank Alliance, Alphecca Muttardy of the National Infrastructure Bank Coalition, and Thomas Marois, a leading expert on public banks globally.
[listen to the podcast]
The Sonoma County DA’s office filed criminal charges against PG&E this past week, the latest entry on the utility’s criminal rapsheet that seems longer than a California power line. PG&E stated that the company disagreed with the criminal charges and is “committed to making it right.”
The Reclaim Our Power grassroots organization responded with an emotional press conference Thursday, demanding that the California Public Utility Commission make things right by denying PG&E’s “safety certificate” on April 15th, a drastic step that would bring PG&E one step closer to having its entire business license revoked…(more)
By Heather Knight : sfchronicle – excerpt
San Francisco’s leaders love arguing vociferously over pretty minor issues, but 54 years of fighting over how often cars should be restricted from one stretch of one road in one park must be some kind of record.
John F. Kennedy Drive in Golden Gate Park first went car-free — the eastern stretch of it, anyway — on Sundays in 1967. Supporters have wanted the closure expanded ever since and did get some Saturdays added to the mix, but they have repeatedly run into arguments from museum officials and others that a full closure would prevent people in cars from reaching their destinations.
There are hundreds of miles of bike paths and pedestrians paths in the park where cars do not drive. The roads are for the cars. The park is a family place for groups to visit and cars are the way most groups travel, especially now, when hate crimes are prevalent.People who do not drive should not design streets for cars. Their “calming efforts” are creating angry drivers and angry drivers are not safe drivers. They angry and confused. If there is an uptick in accidents, that is an indication that the pilot projects are flawed.My personal rant for the week: When SFMTA gets around to figuring out how to run a Muni system that does not involve bunching 5 Muni 22’s along a 3rd street lightrail served street, we may expect them to start figuring out how to return service that they removed to serve the Chase Center.
Log in and comment or write a letter to the editor if you feel strongly about this. Or, call or comment on one of the many “live” meetings that will not doubt be reviewing this for a while. Not keeping up the Cancalendar lately, but, links to some of the meeting agendas are here: https://cancalendar.wordpress.com/agendas/
By Tim Redmond : 48hills – excerpt
Records show the recall effort is backed by Big Tech, Finance, and Real-Estate (and someone who says ‘VC Lives Matter.’)
The right-wing campaign to recall District Attorney Chesa Boudin is a long way from qualifying for the ballot, but a coalition of community leaders and activists is already organizing to oppose it.
They argue that this campaign is part of an emerging trend to attack progressives and their positions in the city at a time when the left has had tremendous electoral successes…(more)
It is surprising to see where the money is coming from big tech, finance and real estate industries since most complaints about crime on the streets are coming from frustrated citizens complaining about the lack of police support. This a complicated situation and perceptions will probably outweigh the facts regardless of how much money or support is applied to either side.
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)
by
City Adopts New Strategy, Leadership
Last week brought some very welcome news to San Francisco’s roughly 6000 unhoused people living in tents, shelters and on the street.
First, a new referral strategy for filling vacancies in the city’s master leased SRO hotels has finally begun. Nonprofits began raising alarms about excessive vacancies and inadequate referrals in fall 2019. I described this as part of San Francisco’s “failed homeless strategy;” yet until very recently HSH made no material changes to the process.
The new referral process has already increased the number of unhoused who the city is allowing to move into permanent housing…
Starting April 1 a block rental system will sharply increase placements. Sending groups a large block of unhoused applicants as opposed to a few at a time is not rocket science; it gives the nonprofit provider the chance to offer options to potential tenants and ensures units do not sit vacant due to declines.
Hundreds of vacancies in city-funded, nonprofit master leased hotels will soon be filled. The new referral program will not end homelessness in San Francisco but it will maximize the use of city funds for reducing the numbers…
“It takes time for the city to purchase hotels as many agencies are involved…” This is a problem that needs streamlining. Which agencies can be cut out of the process? There is no end to streamlining for developers. Let’s see some of the focus shift from building new expensive “affordable” housing to purchasing existing affordable housing and keeping it permanently affordable. One might even consider offering permanently affordable units as rent-to-own to help the tenants move into the middle class rather than remain on the public dole. That would allow the city to purchase more permanently affordable housing and extend the offer to more families of a secure future.