By Luke Thomas

March 12, 2010

The lure and allure of San Francisco’s oft-neglected Tenderloin District got another boost Wednesday when Mayor Gavin Newsom announced funding for an historic preservation initiative.

The initiative, which includes $15 thousand to fund the design, purchase and installation of historic building plaques, is aimed at revitalizing and restoring the Tenderloin’s historic identity. The program funds will also be used to create a Tenderloin museum of history as well as neighborhood banners and brochures with guides to historic buildings and restaurants in the area.

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By William Chadwick

Editor’s Note: William just returned to San Francisco after a few months back in his home country, England, and is looking to rent a room from a kind soul who would enjoy his company and his penchant for theater, screen and play writing.

March 12, 2010

So I am standing in the pub and some woman comes up to me and starts staring at my chest. Specifically, my left breast. In turn, I stare at her left breast. She doesn’t like what she sees, and without a word, she turns and goes off to look at someone else’s chest.

You might be wondering what’s going on by now. I’m at a roommate meetup. I found it on the really useful Meetup.com website, which has meetups for just about everything from playing sports to listening to music to reading plays.

Most of the people here are ‘Needers’, as in they need a place to live, complete with some roommates. There are not as many ‘Havers’ (those with a place looking to fill an empty room), at least at the start, and the one or two Havers who get there early are mobbed by all of us desperate Needers. Perhaps it’s like speed dating, but I haven’t done that so I wouldn’t know.

It is a lot like chatting someone up in a bar or club though: you check someone out from the front, decide to start talking to them, and ten minutes later you might exchange phone numbers and be seriously thinking about living with them. Actually, it’s worse than chatting someone up, as that doesn’t have to lead to much more than half (or a whole) night together. In this case, you could be living with the person in front of you for God-knows-how-long, unable to get away from their dirty laundry and dreadful taste in music.

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By Ralph E. Stone

March 12, 2010

On March 17th, the Irish, the more than 70 million world-wide who claim Irish heritage, and the Irish-for-a-day, will be lifting a pint of Guinness, or something stronger, to toast Saint Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland. I bet corn beef and cabbage will be on many a menu. And many will be wearin’ the green. Why is it celebrated on March 17th? One theory is that is the day St. Patrick died and is now celebrated as his feast day.

The biggest observance of all will be, of course, in Ireland. With the exception of restaurants and pubs, almost all businesses will close on March 17th. Being a religious holiday as well, many Irish attend mass, where March 17th is the traditional day for offering prayers for missionaries worldwide before the serious celebrating begins.

San Francisco’s 159th Annual St. Patrick’s Day Festival will be held on Saturday, March 13th, 2010 at Civic Center Plaza, from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. The Festival takes place at Civic Center Plaza and on Grove Street, from Polk to Larkin Streets. The Parade will be held on Saturday, March 13th at 11:30 a.m. The Parade begins at the corner of Second & Market Streets, and continues on to City Hall.

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By Sue Vaughan

March 10, 2010

On Friday, February 26, facing yet another in an ongoing series of deficits, the seven members of the Board of Directors of the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) took drastic action: they decided not to raise the cost of monthly bus passes for seniors, disabled, and youth.  That proposal - to charge $30 for those passes starting on May 1 - would have raised $1 million to help fill the $12.1 million Fiscal Year 2010 budget gap.

The day before, Mayor Gavin Newsom, who wields the power of appointment to the SFMTA board, announced the proposal to raise fares for seniors, disabled, and youth would be pulled.  But the momentum was not to be stopped.  Disabled and senior individuals - and groups representing those individuals - organized and turned out by the hundreds for the meeting.

The decision to withdraw that proposal may have allowed a majority of the Board of Directors to quietly vote for something even more drastic: cutting transit service by 10 percent starting May 1.

That’s nearly the equivalent of one month’s worth of bus service, a retired 30-year veteran of the agency pointed out.

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From Global Arts and Education

March 9, 2010

In celebration of International Women’s Day, Global Arts and Education (GAE) honored six outstanding San Francisco women Monday, March 8, at the Civic Center Holiday Inn. International Women’s Day has been celebrated since 1911. In 1975 the United Nations designated March 8 an official holiday.

As many as 200 guests attended the International Women’s Day Awards Breakfast
held at the Civic Center Holiday Inn, March 8.

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March 9, 2010

Groups Request to Examine Dragnet in Muslim American Communities

SAN FRANCISCO - The ACLU of Northern California (ACLU-NC), The Asian Law Caucus (ALC), and the San Francisco Bay Guardian filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request today seeking records relating to federal government activity in connection to the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) investigation of Muslim communities. The groups seek records related to domestic intelligence practices including the use of informants and infiltrators (such as those reportedly used in gyms, community centers and mosques), the FBI Junior Agent Program’s recruitment of Muslim and Arab American children, and investigations of Muslim leaders and imams in northern California.

“According to civil rights organizations, community members, and media reports, the FBI has engaged in a deliberate plan to infiltrate Muslim communities through the use of informants and covert actions. Tensions are especially high between the FBI and Muslim groups following the death of Imam Luqman Ameen Abdullah, a Detroit cleric who was killed under questionable circumstances during an FBI raid in October 2009.

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By Luke Thomas

March 8, 2010

A recently completed mural in the Tenderloin by acclaimed artiste Mona Caron was officially unveiled Saturday with much fanfare, enthusiasm and celebration.

Located on the corner of Golden Gate Ave and Jones streets, Caron’s paneled mural, which many are calling a masterpiece, depicts a utopian vision of neighborhood transformation while celebrating the Tenderloin’s diverse community and history.

“I called it ‘Windows into the Tenderloin,’” Caron told FCJ, “because, really, it is just a series of different panels, different windows, different moments in time in the Tenderloin District. The moments in time include all sorts of different eras, but also the present and a made up vision of the future.”

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March 6, 2010

My request to interview President Hugo Chavez Frias of Venezuela was finally granted March 2nd while we were down in Montevideo, Uruguay with President Chavez for the inauguration of the new left-ish president and freedom fighter, Jose Mujica.

The reasons I went down to Venezuela with my team of two cameramen were two-fold:

First of all, I just got tired of all the misinformation that is spread in the US about President Chavez and the people’s Bolivarian Revolution. In only one example, the National Endowment for Democracy (another Orwellian named agency that receives federal money to supplant democracy) spends millions of dollars every year in Venezuela trying to destabilize Chavez’s democratically elected government.

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From the Office of Mayor Gavin Newsom

Editor’s Note:  We welcome and laud Mayor Newsom’s renewed efforts to close an unprecedented $522 million budget shortfall while preserving jobs and services.  However, we believe more can be done to save all jobs and preserve all services whole.  Missing from his shared sacrifice approach are cuts to all departments, including police and fire. Never in the City’s history has mayoral leadership and personal courage been more necessary to put San Francisco interests before political ambition.

March 6, 2010

Mayor Newsom used his YouTube update this week to discuss the City’s budget and his plan to save thousands of city jobs and services by offering 37.5 hour part time positions to most city employees. This proposal will allow the City to maintain services for residents, while saving the City an estimated $50 million. San Francisco faces a projected $522 million budget deficit for the 2010-11 fiscal year.

“The point is to keep people employed and to keep their benefits,” said Mayor Newsom.

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By Luke Thomas

March 5, 2010

As many as ten thousand students, parents, school faculty and union members took to the streets of San Francisco yesterday as part of a coordinated day of action to protest cuts to education.

Dubbed “The Strike and Day of Action to Defend Public Education,” the largely peaceful statewide rallies were held to protest severe cuts to education resulting in thousands of teacher layoffs, class and course terminations, higher student fees and increased class sizes.

Demonstrators used picket signs, bullhorns, drums and sang slogans to get their collective message across: “We’re mad as hell and we’re not taking it anymore.”

Facing a $20 billion State budget shortfall, public education in California is being decimated by severe cuts impacting all levels of education in many districts and school systems, including San Francisco K-12 schools, CCSF and SFSU.

Protesters held signs indicating their frustration with California and federal budget priorities over public education spending, including prison spending, bank bailouts and war funding.

The San Francisco protest, which began at 24th and Mission streets, ended with a rally at Civic Center where speakers denounced the cuts and called on the State legislature to reexamine its budget priorities.

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March 5, 2010

Rent control was enacted in San Francisco in 1979. Enough time has passed to justify an independent empirical study of the effects of rent control, if any, on the quantity and quality of housing in San Francisco.

All San Francisco properties with a first Certificate of Occupancy issued prior to June 13th, 1979 are subject to rent control. If a rental unit was in regular use prior to June 13th, 1979, but does not have a Certificate of Occupancy — an illegal unit — the San Francisco Rent Board will still find the unit subject to rent control. This means rents can only be raised by certain amounts per year, which is tied to inflation. Landlords can also petition for other increases, e.g., for capital improvements for a maximum of 10 percent or for increased operating and maintenance costs for a maximum of 7 percent. In addition, tenants can petition the Rent Board to decrease their rent if the landlord is failing to provide agreed upon or legally required services. Tenants can only be evicted for one of fifteen “just causes.”

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By Marc Salomon

March 4, 2010

Over the past ten years, the San Francisco Department of City Planning has rezoned much of the east side of San Francisco [0] for greater densities of market rate housing based on the theory of Transit Oriented Development:

TRANSIT ORIENTED DEVELOPMENT is the exciting new fast growing trend in creating vibrant, livable communities. Also known as Transit Oriented Design, or TOD, it is the creation of compact, walkable communities centered around high quality train systems. This makes it possible to live a higher quality life without complete dependence on a car for mobility and survival.
Transit oriented development is a major solution to the serious and growing problems of peak oil and global warming by creating dense, walkable communities connected to a train line that greatly reduce the need for driving and the burning of fossil fuels.[1]

Surely only the antideluvians deny that burning fossil fuels is a leading cause of climate change. And clearly one of the best ways that we can contain emissions is to consume less petroleum. And who but a stick in the mud could be against “Exciting new fast growing trends” or “vibrant, livable communities?” Especially if the residents of those communities are hip, slim and young.

Each of these sections warrants a detailed explication of its own. This piece is intended to serve as a high level sketch of the issues involved and how environmental jargon is used to further developer corruption of the political and planning processes.

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By Hope Johnson and Luke Thomas

March 4, 2010

By now, most of us are aware of the plight of the Washington family.  Until yesterday, native San Franciscan Charles Washington, a U.S. citizen, faced the deportation of his Australian wife and two stepsons, ages 13 and 5 years, by the end of this week.

Following the family’s press conference Monday and the resulting media attention surrounding the case, ICE yesterday granted the Washingtons a 60 day reprieve from deportation, proving immigration laws can be applied judiciously and humanely on a case-by-case basis.

“The Washington family is grateful for the extension of the departure date,” said Asian Law Caucus staff attorney Angela Chan, who is representing the Washingtons. “We will work hard to get their green card application processed as soon as possible. We are very appreciative that federal authorities have been responsive to the family’s situation in this case.”

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By Luke Thomas

March 2, 2010

In a letter addressed to Board President David Chiu, Supervisors David Campos, Ross Mirkarimi and John Avalos, District 6 Supervisor Chris Daly today urged continued support of a June ballot measure proposal that aims to provide tenants most impacted by the recession temporary relief from rent increases.

According to Daly, the measure would “apply only to tenants in rent-controlled units who: 1) are paying more than 33% of their income for rent; 2) have little or no assets; and 3) are unemployed, had at least a 20% decrease in wages in the past year, or receive only government benefits with no cost of living increase.”

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From the Harvey Milk LGBT Democratic Club

March 2, 2010

Tonight, Northern California public officials and clean energy advocates will hold the first public education forum on San Francisco’s CleanPowerSF project, which is planned to bring the City 50% clean renewable electricity within the next decade, at the same or lower cost than rates currently charged by PG&E. The City is now negotiating with energy service provider Power Choice LLC, on the final contract for the roll-out of the project; with negotiations likely to be completed by the end of this month. Once underway, CleanPowerSF will become the largest municipal renewable energy program in the United States.

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By Chris Hedges

March 2, 2010

We owe Ralph Nader and Cynthia McKinney an apology. They were right about Barack Obama. They were right about the corporate state. They had the courage of their convictions and they stood fast despite wholesale defections and ridicule by liberals and progressives.

Obama lies as cravenly, if not as crudely, as George W. Bush. He promised us that the transfer of $12.8 trillion in taxpayer money to Wall Street would open up credit and lending to the average consumer. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC), however, admitted last week that banks have reduced lending at the sharpest pace since 1942. As a senator, Obama promised he would filibuster amendments to the FISA Reform Act that retroactively made legal the wiretapping and monitoring of millions of American citizens without warrant; instead he supported passage of the loathsome legislation. He told us he would withdraw American troops from Iraq, close the detention facility at Guantánamo, end torture, restore civil liberties such as habeas corpus and create new jobs. None of this has happened.

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By Greg Kamin

March 2, 2010

San Francisco Supervisors David Chiu, Ross Mirkarimi, and Bevan Dufty held a hearing yesterday on a proposed sit-lie ordinance during a meeting of the Public Safety Committee. For me, the most powerful moment in over four hours of testimony was one that probably passed almost unnoticed for most people. Representatives from the police and the district attorney’s office had just finished over 100 minutes of testimony during which time they got all the time they wanted to tell the supervisors how they all thought this would be the greatest thing since sliced bread. SFPD Chief George Gascón was a no-show, but Assistant Chief Kevin Cashman was ready with a slick PowerPoint presentation (more on that later), followed by a parade of captains in full regalia whose sole purpose seemed to be to show solidarity across the SFPD, as if this was ever in doubt.

Mister and Missus SFPD Chief George Gascón.

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By Sue Vaughan

February 28, 2010

San Francisco Chronicle columnist C.W. Nevius jumped onto the “blame the drivers for Muni’s woes” bandwagon, Thursday, writing, “Riders have already seen fare hikes and service cuts and they may face them again thanks to Muni operators who rejected a proposal for a package of concessions that would have saved the agency $15 million over two years.”

Thanks to Muni operators?

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By Joel S. Hirschhorn

February 24, 2010

Business ethics has become an oxymoron. Wall Street bonuses were up 17 percent to over $20 billion in 2009, the year taxpayers bailed out the financial sector after its meltdown. So, everyone has many reasons to hate the banking and financial sectors that dumped our economy, and the general corruption of American politics by corporate interests.

There are good reasons to detest the pharmaceutical industry. Besides raping people with onerous prices for prescription drugs, corporate greed, coupled with ineffective government regulation and oversight, is actually killing Americans through unsafe drugs.

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By Hope Johnson

February 23, 2010

Its firm, round length held motionless, sleek and pulsing with ready heat.  Long, powerful and primed, its sliding forward thrust was frustratingly denied.

A case for a little pay-per-view action?

No!  It’s the fate of the Comet in Atlas Shrugged as Taggart Transcontinental’s train is stopped dead in its tracks when her crew abandons their jobs.  Even the company’s fancy executive aboard the stalled train is stranded.  She can schedule trains, set policy, and make demands, but she still can’t make the trains go.

All public transit, like the Comet, is dependent on those trained to operate our planes, trains, and automobiles.  That means Muni operators are the boom-boom-pow groovin’ your daily bus commute.

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