• No categories

Politics Blog

The Phil Ting for Assembly campaign is under way

Zelda Bronstein
-
11
The Phil Ting for Assembly campaign is under way

Just a few days after the race for mayor of San Francisco ended, Assessor-Recorder (and mayoral candidate) Phil Ting began his next campaign — for state Assembly.

The Westside district now represented by Fiona Ma opens up in 2012, when Ma will be termed out. And Ting was moving to set himself up as the frontrunner almost as soon as the ink had dried on on the final results from the mayoral election (where he finished a disappointing 11th, behind even Green Party candidate Terry Baum). Philting.com, which had been the official website for Phil Ting for Mayor, has been switched over to Phil Ting for state Assembly. I got an email Dec. 7 inviting me to a reception for his Assembly campaign; several prominent local politicians told me Ting had called even earlier than that to ask for support.

And he’s getting it — both state Sen. Mark Leno and Assemblymember Tom Ammiano are on his already-impressive list of endorsments.

Which is no surprise: The 12th District (which will become the 19th under the new redistricting) is the more conservative side of San Francisco, and by the standards of the state Assembly, Ting would be a pretty solid progressive. He actually understands tax policy, and he’s made a huge issue of removing the commercial property loophole from Prop. 13.

So now comes the interesting part: Who’s going to run against him?

Ting has a relatively cordial relationship with Mayor Ed Lee, and didn’t spend much time in the campaign attacking the appointed incumbent. He’s a former executive director of the Asian Law Caucus, where Lee worked in his early days as a tenant and civil-rights lawyer. There shouldn’t be any reason for the mayor or his pals to try to drum up a candidate to take on Ting … or should there?

Ting is not an enemy of the Willie Brown-Rose Pak folks. But he’s not a loyal ally, either. The most obvious conservative/pro-downtown candidate, one the mayor and his big-business pals could count on, would be Sup. Carmen Chu. I couldn’t get her on the phone, but in the past she’s been only lukewarm about running. The other strong potential candidate would be Sup Sean Elsbernd, but he told me he’s absolutely not running. “I was very interested during my first few years on the Board, but since my son was born, there’s no way I would consider it,” he said. “I am not a candidate and shouldn’t be talked about as a candidate.”

So will we see a “Run, Carmen, Run” campaign? Or will Brown and Pak think about it and realize that giving the mayor an appointment to Ting’s office might be a real advantage? Would they rather control a state Assemblymember — of the county assessor?

Stayed tuned to this one.

 

ILWU attitudes toward port blockade aren’t so simple

Sasha Cuttler And Mary Magee
-
3
ILWU attitudes toward port blockade aren’t so simple

The Chronicle’s Andrew Ross describes Occupy organizers as “brilliant” in a sarcastic tone for vowing to move ahead with the Dec. 12 West Coast port blockade, despite public statements from the longshore union’s president criticizing the plan. But Ross’ article misses the mark, and seems to ignore alliances that have been forged between various sectors of labor and the Occupy movement in recent months.

“Trouble is, the folks they purport to be in solidarity with don’t seem hot on the idea to ‘effectively shutdown the hubs of commerce’ at all,” Ross writes. The Chronicle’s narrative is clear: Here you have some everyday working people trying to do their jobs, make ends meet, and put food on the table. They don’t want to see business as usual disrupted by a bunch of out-of-touch radicals who claim to speak for them.

But in reality, workers’ attitudes toward the port shutdown are far more nuanced. After all, longshore and warehouse workers are feeling the pinch as advances in technology reduce the number of jobs to be filled along waterfront shipping facilities, and many truck drivers who haul cargo to and from West Coast ports are barely able to make ends meet since they’re employed as independent contractors and paid low hourly wages without union representation.

The president of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU), Robert McEllrath, issued a statement Dec. 6 in which he criticized the plan for a west coast port blockade, which occupiers in Oakland, Los Angeles, Seattle, Portland, Vancouver, and Anchorage have all vowed to participate in on Dec. 12.

The official aim of the Occupy port shutdown is to demonstrate solidarity with longshore workers engaged in a labor dispute against EGT in Longview, Wash., and to stand with port truckers in Los Angeles whose attempts to unionize have been thwarted. The action is also meant as payback for raids against Occupy encampments in Portland, Oakland, Los Angeles, and other major cities, which were carried out in the wake of coordinated teleconferences between metropolitan mayors and a powerful organization of former police chiefs engaged in shaping law enforcement practices.

“Support is one thing,” wrote McEllrath, the ILWU president. “Organization from outside groups attempting to co-opt our struggle in order to advance a broader agenda is quite another and one that is destructive to our democratic process and jeopardizes our over two year struggle in Longview.”

ILWU spokesperson Craig Merrilees echoed McEllrath’s statement, telling the Guardian, “The Occupy Oakland group failed to respect the ILWU’s democratic decision-making structure. It’s unfortunate — it could’ve been handled differently.”

Dan Coffman, president of ILWU Local 21 in Longview, Washington, had just gotten out of a court hearing with grain terminal operator EGT when the Guardian caught up with him by phone. His union has been locked in an ongoing struggle against EGT, stemming from the multinational corporation’s attempts hire non-union workers and erode standard worker benefits such as overtime pay at a new grain terminal built on Port of Longview property.

“The ILWU has no involvement in [the port blockade] whatsoever,” Coffman explained. “We are not organizing this, and we are not promoting it.”

Yet he emphasized that, speaking as individual, “I’m a 99 percenter. Things have got to change. We’ve got to get some sanity back in this country. It’s obscene what they’re doing to working people and poor people in this country.”

Some rank and file members of ILWU said they agreed with the principles of the Occupy movement.

“Longshoremen had a good response to the [Nov. 2 general strike and port blockade],” Anthony, a longshoreman who’s worked at the Port of Oakland for more than a decade, told the Guardian in a phone interview. “It was empowering to a lot of people that so many people came out.” He added, “The rank and file do support the principles of the community and Occupy.”

The Port of Oakland ran full-page ads in major newspapers last week condemning plans for a port blockade, yet incorporating a key phrase of the Occupy movement into its message. “Port of Oakland is where the 99% work,” the ad proclaimed. “Occupy groups have called for a ‘total west coast ports shutdown’ on December 12th. Port of Oakland maritime operations were partially shut down on November 2nd. What did that accomplish? Lost work hours, lost shifts, and lost wages for workers and their families.”

Asked about the ad, Anthony called it “a lot of propaganda.”

Tremaine Waters, another longshoreman at the Port of Oakland, told the Guardian, “The majority of ILWU workers are supportive of what’s going on. They understand the situation occurring in America right now.” He added that if community members organize a picket line on Dec. 12, “I would say, yes, the ILWU members will respect it.”

Clarence Thomas, a third generation Oakland longshoreman, discussed the planned port shutdown in an interview with Worker’s World. Thomas emphasized that ILWU traditions and practices dictate that union members do not cross community picket lines.

“A picket line is a public demonstration — whether called by organized labor or not,” Thomas said in the interview. “It is legitimate. There are established protocols in these situations. To suggest to longshoremen that they shouldn’t follow them demands clarification. It is one thing to state for the record that the union is not involved, but another thing to erase the historical memory of ILWU’s traditions and practices included in the Ten Guiding Principles of the ILWU adopted at the 1953 biennial convention in San Francisco,” Thomas said. He added, “Labor is now officially part of the Occupy movement. That has happened.”

Occupy movement targets foreclosed homes

Sasha Cuttler
-
14

Throughout the Bay Area on Tuesday (Dec. 6), Occupy activists and housing advocates launched what they said will be an ongoing effort to place families back into their foreclosed homes, seizing bank-owned homes to put pressure on the banking industry to cooperate with homeowners in loan trouble.

In San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland, activists highlighted the nation’s foreclosure crisis by occupying foreclosed homes as part of the Occupy movement’s national day of action against foreclosures. Occupy Oakland activists said the tents are gone in downtown Oakland, but the move toward house occupations represents a new phase for the movement.

“I am here fighting for my home,” said Margarita Ramirez, addressing a crowd of 150 supporters at the West Oakland BART station. Ramirez said her family fell behind on their mortgage payments after her husband was laid off at the onset of the recession. The Ramirez family applied for a loan modification under the federally subsidized Home Affordable Modification Program(HAMP) hoping for some relief, but their lender, Bank of America, denied their request. Though HAMP is a federal program, it is administered though individual mortgage lenders.

According to Ramirez, with time left before her foreclosure, Bank of America urged them to explore other options to save their home. Then, inexplicably, Bank of America sold her home to Fannie Mae, leaving her family out of options despite what Ramirez says is Bank of America’s later admission to the error and willingness to work with the family. Fannie Mae however has held firm that the sale was valid, leaving the Ramirez family in an uncomfortable comprise of renting their own home.

In order to pressure Fannie Mae on behalf of the Ramirez family, activists with Occupy Oakland and Just Cause seized a vacant Fannie Mae owned foreclosure at 1417 Tenth street in West Oakland.

“This house is owned by the federal government, who we pay taxes to,” said Occupy Oakland activist Thaddeus Guidry, who said that he had struggled hard to get by during the recession. As he stood over a grill cooking hotdogs for the crowd gathered in the yard of the newly occupied house, he said he had found new inspiration and hope after becoming part of Occupy Oakland.

“Tonight will be the first night here in the house,” said Guidry. “This is my home now. We hope to house eight people here.”

Fannie Mae, which was effectively foreclosed on by the U.S. Treasury in 2008 under a process know as conservatorship, has received $169 billion in federal bailout money and remains under federal control.

The house on Tenth street is modest but spacious, with electricity and water. Downstairs, Just Cause is getting ready to start an eviction defense clinic. Just Cause organizer Maria Zamudio told the Bay Guardian that the group holds regular eviction defense clinics in San Francisco and Oakland, but the freshly occupied house in West Oakland would serve as a community space that people can drop into to learn their rights.

“We have been doing eviction defense for a long time. Since the recession, we have seen a change to tenants being pressured to leave by banks after landlords lose a house to foreclosure,” said Zamudio. “It is important for tenants to know that they do not need to leave a foreclosed property. The tenant has more rights in these situations then the homeowner.”

Only blocks away, Gayla Newsome stood in front of her house at 1536 Adeline St with another crowd of supporters from Occupy Oakland, and housing advocates from the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment(ACCE). She has been out of the house for six months after the foreclosure, leaving her and her children to stay with family in an overcrowded situation as the house sat vacant.

“This is the moment I take my house back. I’m a little scared, a little nervous, but I have to do this for my kids and grandkids. I have to do this for the other people who are going through this,” said Newsome.

Newsome said Chase Bank repeatedly denied receiving her HAMP loan modification paperwork. When she finally sent a copy by certified mail, they acknowledged the application and denied her eligibility in the program.

The eviction came swiftly. Unaware of the looming eviction, and believing she still had time to save her house even though Chase was outside the HAMP program, Newsome was called by her children while at work the morning of July 19.

“The kids were given 10 minutes to grab what they could before they were put on the sidewalk in their pajamas by the bank representative and the sheriff. They called me frantic,” recalled Newsome.

The recession has been hard on West Oakland. One out of 236 houses in West Oakland are in foreclosure, with many more families hard-pressed to hang on. Housing advocates say that foreclosures destabilize entire neighborhoods, as surrounding property values plummet and blight spreads.

“I’m not just here personally to reclaim my house, I’m here to say it is time to reclaim this neighborhood,” said Newsome, who laid the blame for the neighborhood’s sharp decline at the feet of the banks.

Residents of the neighborhood gathered for the rally shared stories of realtors cruising the neighborhood stopping to photograph even properties that are not in foreclosure or for sale.

“This was not an accident, this is redlining,” said Nell Myhand of Just Cause about West Oakland’s housing troubles.

“It’s time to take this to the politicians,” said ACCE organizer Shirley Burnell. “If they are not willing to help us, then they got to go. We will take them to the streets.”

Outside, activists signed up for shifts to help defend Newsome’s home from eviction, and started an emergency phone tree in case of trouble.

“The tents are gone but we are still here!” yelled an Occupy activist from the crowd as home defense clipboards circulated.

“I appreciate everyone doing this with me,” said Newsome. “That’s what Occupy is all about. We will take our homes back one at a time – no, five at a time.”

CPMC provides little charity care despite huge profits

Sasha Cuttler
-
30
CPMC provides little charity care despite huge profits

A new study has found that the California Pacific Medical Center (CPMC), an affiliate of nonprofit Sutter Health, provides far less charity care per paying patient than other hospitals in San Francisco even as it makes by far the most in profits, highlighting an issue that many city officials have raised as CPMC seeks permission to build a high-end new hospital on Cathedral Hill.

The study by UC Hastings College of Law is called “Profits & Patients: the Financial Strength and Charitable Contributions of San Francisco Hospitals,” and the Guardian reviewed an advance copy before its official release this Thursday. It compares CPMC’s hospitals with St. Francis Memorial Hospital, St. Mary’s Medical Center (both are Catholic Healthcare West facilities), and Chinese Hospital.

“Mainly due to Sutter Health’s plan to alter its current hospital structure within San Francisco, the provision of community health benefits by San Francisco hospitals is now a major issue before the Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors,” the report reads.

Even before that project, CPMC/Sutter is the dominant health provider in town, and by far the most profitable. Between 2006-2010, the report says the company made $743.9 million in profits from its San Francisco operations, compared to St. Mary’s $22.6 million in profits and the $14.8 million loss by St. Francis.

CPMC runs four of the largest hospitals in the city – St. Luke’s Hospital and CPMC’s Davies, California, and Pacific campuses – behind only San Francisco General Hospital, the city-run facility that does by far the most charity care. But while the other hospitals in the study are smaller, with much less staffed bed counts, they still manage to see the same or more charity care patients than CPMC.

For example, from the report, Saint Francis has 150 staffed beds and sees approximately 31 charity care patients per bed per year. CPMC has 514 staffed beds and sees only 14 patients per bed per year. “In 2010, CPMC’s three oldest campuses (Davies, California, and Pacific campuses) saw charity care patients at a patients per bed rate less than half that of Saint Francis, despite being more than 3 times the size of Saint Francis and having significantly greater financial stability,” read the report.

St. Mary’s and Chinese Hospital also see approximately 13 charity care patients per year per staffed bed, and their staffed beds are 160 for St. Mary’s and 31 for Chinese Hospital. If CPMC has so many more staffed beds, why aren’t their charity counts any higher than a hospital with only 31 beds to their 514 beds?

Hastings Professor Mark Aaronson, who put together the study, said that charity care is supposed to be at least 3 percent, the minimum expectation for the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. CPMC’s is closer to 1 percent.

Why is it so low? If you ask CPMC, it’s not. “It depends on how you calculate it,” said CPMC spokesperson Kevin McCormack. “As a dollar amount, we give more in charity care than any other hospital expect for General Hospital.”

Well, obviously. CPMC is a massive conglomerate that has four campuses to maintain and put money into to have the beds and staff available. Having so much more space than any other hospital, they would have to put in more as a dollar amount just to sustain those campuses.

Given that CPMC is a non-profit organization, where does that extra few tens of millions of dollars go? Well, some of it goes to hire the huge team of consultants and lobbyists who are now trying to win approval for the Cathedral Hill project. But McCormack said it also gets absorbed into CPMC operations.

“It goes back into the system itself,” said McCormack. “It goes back into the hospital, into salaries, building new facilities, repairing old ones.”

Even so, the report shows CPMC to be in a different category than other hospitals when it comes to supporting San Francisco’s full population. It also found that the profits extracted from San Francisco’s hospital subsidize the whole chain, a situation that will only become more pronounced as it builds a hospital at Cathedral Hill that seeks to draw patients from around the country.

“CPMC-St. Luke’s is not only the most profitable hospital in San Francisco, but it is also the most profitable hospital in the Sutter Health statewide network. Out of twenty-one hospital groups within the Sutter Health network, CPMC/St.Luke’s brought in nearly one quarter of Sutter Health’s average net income over the last five years,” the report reads.

The report was prepared for the Good Neighbor Coalition, Coalition for Health Planning — San Francisco, and Jobs with Justice. The official public release of “Profits & Patients” will be at 11 am on Thursday, Dec. 8, at the UC Hastings College of the Law, 100 McAllister St., Room 300, San Francisco.

Steven T. Jones contributed to this report.

A new name in District 5

Zelda Bronstein
-
73
A new name in District 5

There’s a new name popping up in the cattle call that is the District Five supervisorial appointment. He’s not terribly well known in city political circles (his chief claim to local fame is serving on the Library Commission), but he’s got a powerful patron: U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein.

His name is Michael Breyer. Yes, from that Breyer family.

In a Nov 30 letter to Mayor Ed Lee, Feinstein lauds Breyer and says he has her endorsement for the job. You can read the letter here (pdf).

Feinstein notes that Breyer’s grandfather, Irving, was chief counsel for the San Francisco Unified School District and that his aunt was a president of SEIU. She doesn’t mention his closer, and better-known, political connections. Nor does she mention that his uncle was a partner in a law firm that was once among the most politically connected in the city, run by William Coblentz, who when Feinstein was mayor was routinely considered one of the two or three most powerful people in San Francisco.

Among the great qualities the senator sees in Michael Breyer? He can raise money. “He can count on financial support from the high tech community and others,” Feinstein notes.

Would Ed Lee seriously consider someone who has this little local political experience and no real history of activism in the district — but really, really strong family political ties? I can’t imagine it. But Senator Feinstein isn’t doing this just for fun.

Bank of America frets about Occupy

Sasha Cuttler And Mary Magee
-
7

An internal Bank of America email has surfaced, making it clear that the megabank is concerned about the national day of action against evictions and foreclosures being carried out today, Dec. 6, by the Occupy Wall Street movement. The leaked internal memo suggests BofA is taking Occupy housing actions very seriously.

According to the email, which was sent to BofA’s third-party Field Services suppliers, the nationwide protests “could impact our industry.”

“We believe protests will likely take place tomorrow at auction sites, homes that are being foreclosed, homes in the eviction stage, and vacant homes,” the BofA memo notes. “We want to make sure that we are all prepared.”

It goes on to emphasize three points: do not engage with the protesters, ensure that vacant homes are secured, and report “media incidents” to 800-796-8448. I called that number to verify that the email was real, and sure enough, a spokesperson confirmed that it was.

The memo concludes with proof that the Bank of America has been paying close attention to activist websites. “The website occupyourhomes.org has a story posted of a Bank customer we are researching,” the email notes. “The web site has an event finder that can help identify upcoming protests.”

After the Guardian called the BoFA to determine whether the email was real, media relations representative Jumana Bauwens followed up with this statement:

“As a matter of normal course of business, when we are alerted to activities that may affect our real estate owned properties, we inform our third party contractors. This is standard operating procedure. The safety of our associates and third party contractors is our first priority. It is the bank’s policy to protect and secure our properties for the investors who own them. Bank of America is committed to helping our customers with home retention solutions and other foreclosure avoidance programs. Foreclosure is always our last resort.”

Homeless families still waiting for a meeting … and housing

Sasha Cuttler And Mary Magee
-
2
Homeless families still waiting for a meeting … and housing

San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee still has not met with homeless parents organized by the Coalition on Homelessness to discuss their proposed solutions to combat the growing problem of youth homelessness. Nor has the mayor’s office responded to multiple Guardian phone calls inquiring why a meeting hasn’t been scheduled.

Homeless parents organized by the Coalition entered City Hall last Wednesday to raise awareness about a growing problem of San Francisco families lacking a permanent home, and to request a meeting with mayor, whom advocates first contacted Oct. 26.

Coalition on Homeless executive director Jennifer Friedenbach said the mayor’s office had offered to schedule a meeting with a mayoral representative, but not with Lee. “Why would we meet with a representative?” she asked. “We want a meeting with the mayor himself. It should be important for the mayor to meet with parents in a crisis.”

As the Guardian reported last week, the number of homeless families on shelter waitlists citywide has risen to an unprecedented high of 267, while the number of homeless students in public schools identified by San Francisco Unified School District stands at a high of 2,167. Both figures suggest homelessness is on the rise in a city where rents are well above average and the recession has given rise to job loss, evictions, and foreclosures. A nationwide Occupy Our Homes day of action scheduled for today, Dec. 6, is meant to draw attention to tenant evictions and homeowners losing their properties to bank foreclosure.

Part of the problem facing newly homeless families in San Francisco is the lack of availability in public housing and other housing assistance programs such as Section 8 rental assistance vouchers. The waitlist for public housing units in San Francisco stands at between 24,000 and 25,000 — enough would-be tenants to fill the roughly 6,500 units in the city’s public housing system nearly four times over. The San Francisco Housing Authority closed its waitlist for public housing several years ago. The waitlist for Section 8, a separate program administered by the federal government, is also closed.

“Why do waiting lists close? The demand for low-income housing so far outweighs the available vacancy,” said San Francisco Housing Authority (SFHA) spokesperson Rose Dennis. “A number of housing authorities have had to close their waitlists, because we cannot serve the people who are not on the waitlist right now. This is not unique to San Francisco.”

Nevertheless, advocates with the Coalition on Homelessness say part of their strategy is to pressure the mayor to revamp units sitting empty in housing authority properties so they can be used for housing.

Asked about this, Dennis responded that there are relatively few vacancies, and that all vacant units are already in the process of being prepared for new tenants — some of whom have already been identified and promised a unit, and others who are part of a pool of applicants undergoing a screening and selection process.

Housing Rights Committee executive director Sara Shortt, however, told the Guardian public housing tenants she’s worked with have long observed boarded-up units on SFHA properties. She added that they’ve raised concerns about the tendency for empty units to attract rodents, graffiti, or squatters engaged in drug sales or use, which can lead to violence.

Friedenbach said she’d heard from multiple people seeking public housing units who said they’d been promised a unit only to experience delay after delay, for weeks on end. Dennis said it takes SFHA between one and 45 days to move a tenant into a unit once the housing has become available, depending on the status of the tenant.

In addition to the conflicting accounts, another complicating factor is that the actual number of vacancies in housing authority property seems difficult to pin down. Dennis told the Guardian that the occupancy rate in SFHA property typically stands at around 93 percent. Since there are roughly 6,500 units total, this would imply that there are about 450 vacant units. Yet Dennis also stressed that the number of vacant units is always around 225, give or take, and has hovered consistently around that level without any dramatic spikes in vacancy.

A SFHA report to its federal parent agency, the Housing and Urban Development (HUD), which housing advocates received as part of a Freedom of Information request, listed a total of 847 vacant public housing units as of May 2011. That’s nearly twice as high as a 7 percent vacancy rate, and almost four times as high as the 225 vacant units Dennis said the authority consistently has in its system.

“That’s not a vacancy rate,” Dennis explained after we sent her a copy of the document. “That’s a cumulative, historic count that HUD has that is different from day-to-day management. These are not numbers that accurately represent what you would go out and see on a site. These numbers have a lot of other aspects to them.” She added, “The numbers that I gave you are accurate and true.”

The Guardian has placed a call to the Human Services Agency, as well, in hopes of sorting out some of these issues. We’ll update this post if we hear back.

The always amazing John Burton

Zelda Bronstein
-
1
The always amazing John Burton

John Burton, former member of Congress, the state Assembly and the state Senate and now the chair of the state Democratic Party, has represented PG&E and real-estate developers and helped build a political machine that stifled local politics for years. But I have to say: The guy is a great interview. Deep down, he really thinks like the 99 percent and every other word out of his mouth is “fuck.”

Oh, and he’s always an example of sartorial splendor. Everyone in Sacramento politics wears fancy suits; John dresses like he just came from the Occupy campground. On a good day.

Check out this outstanding interview on The Daily Show (thanks, Calitics).

My favorite line:

“My daughter bought me a Kindle for my birthday and I won’t use it because of those goddam people at Amazon. I go to the book store and buy a goddam book and I read it. I can read it while I’m taking a crap.”

Oh, and when the Daily Show interviewer tells Burton “you cuss more than a West Coast rapper,” he says:

“I who?”

There’s nobody else like him in politics.

Castro residents clash over proposed restrictions in public spaces

Sasha Cuttler
-
37
Castro residents clash over proposed restrictions in public spaces

UPDATE: This article has been changed to include three corrections.

Community activists in the Castro District of San Francisco have been riled up by recent legislation proposed to limit public use of the Harvey Milk and Jane Warner plazas.

The ordinance proposes to ban “wheeled equipment” and prevent people from sleeping, camping, or selling merchandise. Further, the ordinance limits the time that seating will be available to 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. 

“Poor people and low income people can’t live in the neighborhood anymore,” said community activist and Housing Rights Committee member Tommi Avicolli Mecca. “This ordinance is a response to people’s discomfort with people who look homeless in the plaza.”

Mecca believes that this legislation was pushed forward by the Castro/Upper Market Community Benefit District and the Merchants of Upper Market and Castro (MUMC) as a way to privatize the public spaces and, in effect, prevent homeless people from occupying them.

“(The legislation) talks about sleeping and camping. Who is doing that other than homeless people and what printed materials are being distributed other than the Street Sheets?” said Bob Offer-Westort human rights organizer for the Coalition for Homelessness. “All of this really clearly targets homeless people.”

Other community activists, such as blogger Mike Petrelis, believe that this legislation is a preemptive act against the Occupy movement and that meetings discussing the ordinance intentionally excluded activists like himself. “This new legislation is part of a downtown agenda to prevent an Occupy encampment set up,” said Petrelis.

Petrelis wrote about the legislation on his blog, and among his arguments he states that preventing tents to be present in Harvey Milk and Jane Warner plazas expresses direct disapproval of the movement.

“I read this and hear fear on the part of [Sup. Scott] Wiener, MUMC and the CBD that an Occupy the Castro encampment could take root at the top of Market Street,” he said.

Wiener, who is sponsoring the legislation, says that it was drafted under the Pavement to Parks effort to transform the space into park land and that the provisions are standard for that use. 

“We’re trying to have usable vibrant public space and this legislation will help us have it,” Wiener told us. “This legislation provides what we already have in our parks. It’s pretty basic provisions.”

Wiener says that many local merchants and advocates, such as the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, have been involved in discussions around of this legislation, but the Sisters have not taken a stand on the measure.

“The Sisters, as far as I know, have not made a collective effort one way or another on the legislation at this time,” said Sister Barbi Mitzvah in an email. “The Sisters individually can comment, but coming from the organization takes a majority vote as we are a 501c3 non profit.”

Whether this legislation addresses homelessness, an attempt to prevent an Occupy Castro movement, or if it is to create a “usable vibrant public space,” the community is demanding participation in this decision.

“Both plazas play a vital role in the Castro community,” Petrelis said. “So why won’t he hold a public meeting?”

 

Government jobs are jobs, too

Zelda Bronstein
-
81
Government jobs are jobs, too

The New York Times weighed in Dec. 4 on an economic fact of life that I’ve been harping about for years now: Jobs in the public sector are … jobs. In many cases, they’re good jobs. And when conservatives and business leaders talk about reducing the size of government — and then complain about the unemployment rate — they’re stuck in doublespeak.

I know the Times has a paywall now, so if you can’t get in from that link I’ll give you the main points of the editorial:

While the private sector has been adding jobs since the end of 2009, more than half a million government positions have been lost since the recession. … The cutbacks hurt more than just services. As Timothy Williams of The Times reported last week, they hit black workers particularly hard. Millions of African-Americans — one in five who are employed — have entered the middle class through government employment, and they tend to make 25 percent more than other black workers. Now tens of thousands are leaving both their jobs and the middle class. Chicago, for example, is laying off 212 employees in the upcoming fiscal year, two-thirds of whom are black.

That’s one reason the black unemployment rate went up last month, to 15.5 percent from 15.1. The effect is severe, destabilizing black neighborhoods and making it harder for young people to replicate their parents’ climb up the economic ladder. …

Many Republicans, however, don’t regard government jobs as actual jobs, and are eager to see them disappear. Republican governors around the Midwest have aggressively tried to break the power of public unions while slashing their work forces, and Congressional Republicans have proposed paying for a payroll tax cut by reducing federal employment rolls by 10 percent through attrition. That’s 200,000 jobs, many of which would be filled by blacks and Hispanics and others who tend to vote Democratic, and thus are considered politically superfluous.

But every layoff, whether public or private, is a life, and a livelihood, and a family. And too many of them are getting battered by the economic storm.

Something to think about as city officials try to eliminate the latest defict and negotiate new union contracts. Because Repbulicans aren’t the only ones who don’t regard government jobs as actual jobs; a lot of Democratic officials and business leaders in liberal San Francisco seem to feel the same way.J

 

BART adopts policy on cutting cell phone service

Sasha Cuttler
-
1
BART adopts policy on cutting cell phone service

 The Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) Board of Directors has adopted the nation’s first policy outlining the circumstances under which cell phone service can be suspended. The policy comes in the wake of BART’s disruption of cell service in a bid to preempt an August 11 anti-police brutality protest that was called to highlight the July 4 police slaying of Charles Hill by BART police at San Francisco’s Civic Center station.

That cell service cut thrust BART into the middle of a national debate over if and when it is appropriate for government agencies to cut cell service to the public. The fallout included multiple rush hour protests against BART this summer led by activists with No Justice, No BART and supporters of the hacker group Anonymous. In the wake of the controversy, BART directors set out to create a policy outlining the circumstances under which BART would cut cell service in the future.

“The intent of this cell phone interruption policy is to balance free speech rights with legitimate public safety concerns,” BART Board President Bob Franklin said. “This policy, with input from the Federal Communications Commission and the American Civil Liberties Union, will serve as a pioneering model for our nation, as a reference to other public agencies that will inevitably face similar dilemmas in the future.”

The policy was quickly adopted yesterday at the BART board’s regular meeting by a vote of 7-0, with directors Lynette Sweet and Joel Keller absent for the vote. The policy states cell service will be “interrupted only in the most extraordinary circumstances that threaten the safety of District passengers, employees and other members of public, the destruction of District property, or the substantial disruption of public transit service.”

What remains unclear is if BART’s controversial decision to cut cellphone service in order to prevent protest would have been justified under the new policy. In the lead up to the policy, BART directors said their aim was to craft a policy to be used in the most extreme emergencies, and not against the free speech rights.

“If we were faced with the exact same situation, we would not shut off cell phone service,” Franklin said, “we would arrest people.”

However, in the wake of the action, BART asserted in an official statement that, “Organizers planning to disrupt BART service on August 11, 2011 stated they would use mobile devices to coordinate their disruptive activities and communicate about the location and number of BART Police. A civil disturbance during commute times at busy downtown San Francisco stations could lead to platform overcrowding and unsafe conditions.”

BART would seemingly be justified in a disruption cell service in these circumstances under the new policy, as the planned protest represented in the eyes of BART officials both a perceived risk to safety and a potential for service disruption – the stated strategy in the announcement of the August 11 anti-police brutality protest.

The judgment call on where to draw the line in emergency circumstances will rest with predesignated top BART officials. Those officials will be obligated to immediately inform BART’s directors of any disruption of cell service.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski said BART’s policy was an important step towards responding to the incident, but he cautioned, “the legal and policy issues raised by the type of wireless service interruption at issue here are significant and complex.”

He said that the FCC will be undertaking a review of the issue and will “consider the constraints that the Communications Act, First Amendment, and other laws and policies place upon potential service interruptions.”

The FCC regulates cellphone service as part of its broader regulation of the nation’s airwaves. BART’s new policy outlining when to cut cellphone service will take effect immediately.

A link to download the new policy can be found here. http://www.bart.gov/news/articles/2011/news20111201.aspx.

 

The women who love Herman Cain

Zelda Bronstein
-
4
The women who love Herman Cain

Sexual harassment is serious, and Herman Cain ought to be held to account for the sizable number of allegations against him. (Really, whatever Cain says, most women don’t make this stuff up; going public is painful enough). The charges that he had an affair? Whatever — that’s none of my business or anyone else’s. But in the GOP world, being “unfaithful” is a pretty serious sin (unless, of course, your name is Newt Gingrich).

Still, it’s pretty creepy that he’s set up a “women for Cain” website, with some truly bizarre testimonials:

**Sir, I firmly believe that you were sent to our nation through Divine Providence and I believe that you are the man to preserve our Republic for our children.

**”I first saw Mr Cain on the day he announced his presidency! I absolutely loved his upbeat attitude about my country! Then he smiled … how long has it been since we have seen a sincere smile from a political candidate!

**I am with you all the way Sir!!!!!!!! We need someone that believes in GOD, life and liberty

**Mrs. Cain, Joshua 1:6 says, “”Be strong and courageous, because you will lead these people to inherit the land I swore to their forefathers to give them.” I am praying for you and Mr. Cain…that God would protect you and give you courage to be obedient to Him…whatever He asks.

**Dear Mr Cain many years ago I find this not so unique for christians I knew a man Charles in died at 54 i knew him and and his wife and they were beautiful from the heart christians. at one point in my live i was going to lose my home and well he heard about it, so me at Maass and told me Adrinne I want you to go down to the bank Monday and there wil be a check for 40.000 dollars. I told him I dont know how in the world i would pay it back and he just said don.t worry you are young and you have your whole live to pass a blessing on to someone else, At any rate he died at 54 of a heart attack and when I went to the funeral I was not surprised to see at least 500 or more people at his funeral and I went up to his wife and she told me has helped so many people his whole life and I looked in those green eyes with flowing tears and I said I was one of those people!

Whoa. These are the supporters of Herman Cain. I wonder what Women for Gingrich would look like.

More evidence that Occupy is working

Zelda Bronstein
-
19
More evidence that Occupy is working

The Occupy movement has already had an impact on poltics in Washington, DC, and it’s having an impact in California, too. The Chron’s front-page banner headline today reads “Tax measures target wealthy.” By time time the story made it to sfgate, it was buried and carried the downer of a head “Tax-the-rich measures may cancel each other out.” Still, the lead sentence says it all:

The tax-the-rich sentiment behind the Occupy Wall Street movement – and the cash-starved state budget – are reshaping California politics.

I still think at some point Occupy will need to move into the electoral arena (I’d love to see the tent city residents register to vote at Justin Herman Plaza — perfectly legal — and show up to weigh in on the city budget in the spring). But all this talk of the lack of a “clear message” continues to miss the point: Occupy has brought economic injustice back into the mainstream of the political dialogue, and that’s changing the level of discussions from City Hall to Congress.

I’m not saying that Obama and the GOP will suddenly agree to start taxing big corporations and wealthy individuals at the sort of rate they should; it’s not that easy. It won’t be easy to pass a tax measure on the November ballot, either. But just think about the progress we’ve made in a few short months.

 

UC’s pick of Bratton to investigate pepper spray incident isn’t reassuring

Sasha Cuttler
-
12
UC’s pick of Bratton to investigate pepper spray incident isn’t reassuring

The video images are already iconic, a line of young students sit cross legged, arms linked, at the front edge of an Occupy UC Davis protest, nonviolently protesting the impacts of the economic crisis on the University of California and beyond. As police step forward students begin to chant “the whole world is watching,” and officers disperse fire extinguisher size canisters of pepper spray into the faces of the seated students.

As is turns out the students were right, the whole world was watching, leaving UC Davis with a public relations nightmare that has left the campus police chief and two officers on administrative leave. In the wake of the incident, UC President Mark G. Yudof established an independent review to be conducted within the next 30 days, naming former Los Angeles Police Chief, Bill Bratton, now chairman of Kroll Security, to lead the investigation.

“My intent,” Yudof said, “is to provide the chancellor and the entire University of California community with an independent, unvarnished report about what happened at Davis.”

While UC Davis touts Bratton as “a renowned expert in progressive community policing,” deep questions surround the choice of Bratton. The Council of University of California Faculty Associations (CUCFA) was quick to question the independence of the investigation of police violence at UC Davis, pointing out that Bratton, through Kroll, already holds contracts with the UC system.

“We already know that Kroll has provided security services to at least three UC campuses for the past several years. This in itself would disqualify Mr. Bratton from participating in the investigation,”said CUCFA president Robert Meister. “You would be illustrating the kinds of connection between public higher education and Wall Street that the Occupy UC movement is protesting.”

Bratton also served as president of the Police Executive Research Forum, the police non-profit that facilitated controversial phone discussions between major metropolitan police chiefs in the lead up to the crackdown on the Occupy movement across the nation, raising questions about his ability to lead the UC Davis investigation.

Bratton’s offical bio from the LAPD shows the depth of his involvement in PERF when it states, “He is also the only chief executive to serve two terms as the elected President of the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF).” Bratton was instrumental in the creation of PERF’s hardline 2006 report Police Management of Mass Demonstrations http://www.policeforum.org/library/critical-issues-in-policing-series/MassDemonstrations.pdf for which he receives special recognition in the acknowledgments section of.

“PERF gathered more than 100 invited practitioners and stakeholders at an international forum in San Diego in December 2004 to highlight issues related to mass demonstrations and use-of-force. At this event, Los Angeles Police Chief William J. Bratton set the scene for a lively interaction as he discussed the changing nature of protests and mass demonstration events. He recalled that in the 1960s the issues leading to demonstration events tended to be more community-centered and that the police focus was largely tactical. He noted that today, demonstrations are sometimes orchestrated by far-reaching national and international organizations, coalitions and informal groups subscribing to anarchistic methods,” reads the report.

The manual pays special attention to managing media messaging, devoting a section to media in the wake of a major demonstration: “An integrated media strategy seeks to manage and harness the media attention in order to help achieve the overall policing objectives. By partnering with the media, the potential increases for all parties to win, public confidence to be maintained and the reputation of the law enforcement agencies to be enhanced.”

Though Bratton has moved on as PERF’s president, he keeps close ties with the organization. In April , Bratton was the keynote speaker at a PERF conference on technology and policing held in Washington, DC, a subject Bratton is an expert on due to his role in developing the controversial CompStat system used to “predicatively model” crime in some metropolitan areas.

Bratton is widely recognized as the leading proponent of the “broken windows theory” of policing, which advocates a zero tolerance approach to petty crime. Speaking to the Telegraph(UK) this summer about the historically large youth riots in the UK, he said youth were “emboldened” by over-cautious policing.

“To be effective, a police force should have ‘a lot of arrows in the quiver,’ said Mr Bratton, advocating a doctrine of ‘escalating force’ where weapons including rubber bullets, Tasers, pepper spray and water cannon were all available to commanders,” the paper wrote on August, 12 2011.

 

Lt. Gov. Press Release

Zelda Bronstein
-
2
Lt. Gov. Press Release

We used to call Gavin Newsom Mayor Press Release because he was always ready to go before the cameras and announce some bold plan that never amounted to anything. And now he’s at it again.

Newsom — to his credit, I must admit — was the only member of the Board of Regents who didn’t flee when the protesters arrived. Instead, he sat down with some of them and announced that “you have my support.”

In fact, he’s happy to denounce the cuts to higher education:

In an interview Thursday, Newsom said he was deeply alarmed by what he called the dismantling of the UC and CSU systems and gently criticized the budget deal struck by Gov. Jerry Brown last year that included steep cuts to financing for both institutions.

“You can’t cut $650 million from both systems and tell me you value the system,” he said. “I believe we could’ve avoided a substantial portion of these cuts.”

Yes: you could have avoided those cuts by raising taxes. But that’s something Newsom refused to do as mayor. He mentions nothing on his website about tax increases on the rich. He said nothing in his campaign about taxes. And unless I’ve missed something, he hasn’t endorsed any of the possible tax measures that might be headed for the November ballot.

So he’s going to go after the student vote in his next campaign — but without alienating big corporate supporters who don’t want to pay more taxes. And with that approach, nothing will happen to improve higher education in the state.

California, meet Lt. Gov. Press Release.

PS: I called and emailed Newsom’s media person, Francisco Castillo, to see if the Lite Gov was going to support any of the November tax measures. If they get back to me, I’ll let you know.

More backroom policy talks with the California Public Utilities Commission

Sasha Cuttler And Mary Magee
-
1

On Dec. 8 and 9, high-ranking state government officials will attend a private conference with executives from Pacific Gas & Electric Co. (PG&E), Chevron, AECOM, and other major energy industry players at Cavallo Point, a luxury resort in Marin County to talk about distributed generation, a decentralized system for renewable power. It’s a gathering of top governmental officials and industry leaders to talk about policy issues with far-reaching effects on California’s energy future, but members of the general public are not invited.

As officials pack their bags for the conference at the plush resort, California Sen. Leland Yee is preparing two separate pieces of legislation designed to promote transparency within the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) and to make it harder for energy company executives to transition seamlessly into posts at the CPUC, the governing body that regulates utilities.

The conference is being organized by the California Foundation for the Environment and the Economy (CFEE), a nonprofit funded by investor-owned utilities and other corporations that wield tremendous influence in the Bay Area.

The Guardian spotlighted CFEE in an article about California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) President Michael Peevey, who regularly participates in educational travel excursions funded indirectly by the companies his commission oversees.

When CFEE spokesperson PJ Johnston was interviewed for that article, he justified CFEE events by saying, “The idea for us was that it made sense to have someplace where it was nonconfrontational to engage in policy, work-type discussions,” and added they’re “all about policy, on the 30,000-foot level.”

Peevey will be attending this conference, according to a list of participants posted on CFEE’s website. So will PUC commissioners Mark Ferron, Michael Florio, and Nancy Ryan. By press time, the CPUC had not returned calls seeking comment about why commissioners are participating.

More than a dozen California senators and assembly members are listed as conference participants, as are the director and deputy director of Gov. Jerry Brown’s Office of Planning and Research, Ken Alex and Wade Crowfoot. (Crowfoot previously served in former Mayor Gavin Newsom’s administration as an environmental advisor. Newsom now serves at the state’s lieutenant governor.) Executives from Shell Energy North America, the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, Southern California Edison, and other heavy hitters in the industry will attend the conference too.

The conference agenda features educational sessions on distributed generation and state renewable energy goals. Several environmental and consumer advocacy groups will be present as well.

Mark Toney, executive director of The Utility Reform Network (TURN), a consumer advocacy group, also plans to attend. “Events like this give the utility industry and energy regulators an opportunity to have policy discussions and to influence policy decisions outside of the political process. It’s a privileged space,” Toney acknowledged. “We don’t think this is a good way to make policy.”

Yet he said advocacy groups like his own face a dilemma when deciding whether to participate in such events. “On one hand, we could decide we want to have nothing to do with it. But if TURN isn’t represented, then the view of ratepayers and consumers won’t be represented by anybody.” He stressed that while TURN attends daylong conferences hosted by CFEE in order to gain access and hopefully have a positive influence within that priveleged space, the group does not participate in travel excursions organized by the organization, which have drawn controversy in the past. “It’s kind of a judgment call,” he added.

Closed-door, backroom policy discussions aren’t the only CPUC transparency problem drawing scrutiny lately. Recent press reports have spotlighted instances of the CPUC denying public access to safety reports, a highly sensitive issue given the fatal pipeline explosion that destroyed a neighborhood in San Bruno last year.

On Nov. 29, Sen. Yee announced he would introduce legislation in early 2012 to subject the CPUC to the California Public Records Act, by stripping away provisions that allow the commission to block the release of information. It would place the body on the same footing as other state agencies with regards to information sharing.

“If you want anything out of the PUC, it takes an affirmative vote of the commission,” explained Adam Keigwin, Yee’s legislative aide. Secretary of State and former Assembly Member Debra Bowen initiated a similar push for transparency at the CPUC in 2006, but the effort did not go anywhere. On Nov. 30, Yee sent a letter to Peevey, the CPUC president, asking for the results of a study on transparency issues that the commission was supposed to undertake nearly six years ago when Bowen was pushing for the bill.

Keigwin added that Yee is also looking at legislation that would bar utility executives from serving on the PUC for a certain length of time, so as to prevent undue influence.

Occupy the Mission?

Sasha Cuttler And Mary Magee
-
0
Occupy the Mission?

Photo taken by Geoff King outside 1950 Mission Street on May 1, 2010.

As the Guardian reported yesterday, protesters camped out at Occupy SF rejected the city’s offer to grant use of 1950 Mission Street, the fenced-in site of a shuttered school near 16th and Mission streets, in exchange for clearing out of Justin Herman Plaza.

Occupiers ultimately opted not to sign a facility license agreement prepared by the city that would have granted them use of the empty lot and some structures — with about 17 strings attached, including rules banning minors or pets from the site. However, some occupiers noted at a meeting yesterday that they saw potential in the space and liked the idea of relocating to the Mission.

It’s worth noting that this offer isn’t the first time the site, which formerly housed the Phoenix Continuation School, has been linked with economic justice activism. On the evening of May 1, 2010, around 100 activists — many of them clad in black with bandanas covering their faces — participated in a May Day march that culminated with a takeover of this very same abandoned lot.

While it was more common to hear rallying cries of “reclaim” than “occupy” at that point in time, the action was meant to draw attention to the fact that the abandoned school could be put to better use. After people broke into the property and mingled around within the fenced-in area, announcing they wished to hold the space and ultimately turn it into a free school, police wound up cutting off access to the street and making arrests.

UPDATE: Meanwhile, a raid at Occupy SF seems imminent. According to a text update from the Guardian’s Yael Chanoff, who has been closely following Occupy SF since its inception, about 80 officers were on the scene as of 6 p.m. Dec. 1, and police barricades were already beginning to surround the camp.


The impact of Occupy

Zelda Bronstein
-
8
The impact of Occupy

With the city getting ready to crack down on OccupySF, and Occupy encampments around the country under attack, it’s easy to get discouraged. And I know that a lot of the Occupiers aren’t thinking about specific legislation or how the movement translates into action in Washington.

But it does — it does:

In the world where Occupy had never happened, Republicans would’ve held these tax cuts hostage without suffering any ill repercussions. Why would they? The chattering class and Beltway media would be droning on endlessly about deficits and other things that didn’t matter.

In this world, Occupy has thrust income inequality to the forefront of the political debate — so much so that typically immovable Republicans are afraid to feed that narrative.

In other words, a ragtag bunch of hippies with supposedly no demands have done what Democrats have never been able to do — get Republicans to cry “uncle”

And this is just the beginning.

OccupySF awaits police raid after rejecting city ultimatum

Sasha Cuttler
-
5
OccupySF awaits police raid after rejecting city ultimatum

A police raid that could wipe out OccupySF, one of the country’s largest remaining Occupy camps, now seems imminent after the protest group rejected the city’s ultimatum to either voluntarily move to school district property at 1950 Mission Street or face forced eviction.

OccupySF received a written document laying out the terms of this potential agreement yesterday. After a long day of discussion, including a General Assembly meeting last night, OccupySF is refusing to sign the agreement, largely because of concerns about autonomy, as well as visibility and livability at the new site.

This marks the end of almost a week of talks with the city during which no raids were threatened on the camp. Now that OccupySF has rejected the ultimatum, police are expected to enter the camp and attempt to clear it out tonight or tomorrow night. That could destroy the longest continuous large Occupy encampment in the country. Protesters have been sleeping in public spaces in the Financial District under the name OccupySF since Sept. 17, enduring two previous police raids that only increased support for the group.

After last night’s General Assembly, a working group is meeting to form a defense plan in case of a raid, and it’s still unclear how the standoff will unfold.

The rejection of the offer comes after days of debate at the camp, including a session that took place after the city made clear the exact terms of their proposed contract yesterday afternoon. Around 3:30 p.m., OccupySF liaisons to the city handed out photocopies of a document entitled “Facility License Agreement: 1950 Mission Street.”

If signed, the agreement would have allowed the group to use the former school site until May 31, 2012. There were 17 expectations listed, including no animals or pets, no minors, “no sound/noise greater than 45dBA between 10:00pm and 7:00am,” “no panhandling or loitering,” and “no stoves, flammable liquids, wood storage or gases, open flames allowed on the site.”

What the city called an “agreement” and an “offer,” protesters saw as an ultimatum and, for some, a “veiled threat.” Katt Hobin, one of OccupySF’s key organizers, told the group, “We are operating under violent coercion. They are threatening violence if we don’t evacuate this space.”

Under the agreement, the city would have been the tenants, renting the space from the school board for $2500 per month. The space is a lot surrounded by a 15-foot chain link fence and has several portable buildings. Protesters would have had access to toilets, electricity, and indoor space at the site.

At the current camp at Justin Herman Plaza, which they renamed Bradley Manning Plaza, protesters debated how accepting the agreement would affect their branch of the Occupy movement in terms of autonomy, ability to expand and grow, inclusivity, and long-term viability.

Around 4 pm, hundreds paced camp, talking to each other about how to move forward. Some were interested in the possibility of a deal with the city but felt they could not accept the terms, especially prohibitions on minors and animals.

There seemed to be an understanding that the police would attempt to clear out the current camp in the coming days. Yet many seemed assured that the OccupySF network would stick together even after such a raid. One organizer invoked George Washington, saying, “He knew his army didn’t have to win battles, they just had to stick together. They would lose and they would retreat to a new place, but everyone would know that revolutionary army is still out there.”

Others saw the group’s place in revolutionary history differently. One protester reflected, “I think this is history being made right now. We can take the space and do so much with it. There are inside spaces for the sick and the elderly.”

Dozens of protesters had made up their minds to take the space. They waited with their belongings on the Steuart St and Don Chee Way corner of the plaza. “Jerry the Medic” Selness, who had been acting as OccupySF liaison to the city and speaking with Director of Public Works Mohammed Nuru, had relayed the message that DPW trucks would be coming to pick up those who wanted to move to the new site that afternoon.

One protester said that he and about 30 others had signed a symbolic petition stating that they wanted to accept the space. “We don’t need to sign it as OccupySF,” he said. “We’re Occupy Mission.”

Some had been waiting since the early morning. Around 5 pm, Selness got a call that no trucks would be coming that day because the city was awaiting the General Assembly’s response to its offer. About 100 people convened for the daily General Assembly at 6 pm. Around 9 pm, it was clear that OccupySF would not be signing the agreement as it stood.

The assembly did not object to any individuals or autonomous groups who might want to sign the document. They planned to write a response letter detailing their reasons for the rejection, the text of which will be discussed in a General Assembly tonight (Wed/30) at 6 pm.

Many came and went during the General Assembly, including dozens of people who were coming through OccupySF for the first time. Many organizers and supporters who had been there since the beginning but who not attended for days or weeks came back to discuss this issue, which many believed was important “for Occupy movements across the country.” Representatives from Occupy San Rafael, Occupy Santa Rosa, Occupy Berkeley, Occupy Oakland, Occupy USF, and Occupy Gainesville, FL spoke up, expressing solidarity, requesting support, and giving advice.

One homeless woman who had been living in the camp but had never spoken in GA expressed the opinion that to move would be to get out of the public eye and to concede to the city’s attempts to contain the movement, a much-expressed sentiment at the meeting. She cried, “You can’t move and live limited with their rules and regulations. You’re an eyesore, that’s why they want you to move. It’s political.”

Another woman agreed, declaring, “They can’t tell us how to protest or where to protest.”

Others cautioned against accepting the offer for different reasons. One man who spoke up at GA said that he was a teacher at Civic Center Secondary, formerly Phoenix Continuation School, the previous tenants of the offered space. He warned that the school had moved because of instability and health issues surrounding the flow of Mission Creek underground. Another worker familiar with the area recounted a tale of power-washing the sidewalk on the proposed site only to be confronted with “thousands of rats who poured up from the streets”; an OccupySF member who had surveyed the site earlier that day confirmed that the buildings had several holes in the walls, seeming to indicate a rat infestation.

One of the attendees, a young child, expressed the opinion that “we should stay strong and stay here,” amplified by the Peoples Mic. She also helped keep the meeting’s energy high and going in the right direction, showing aggressive “downward twinkle fingers” that signal disagreement at the proposed prohibition of minors on the site, and yelling “there are children present!” when adults used curse words in their impassioned statements.

Many agreed with Diamond Dave Whitaker, local celebrity in the poetry and radical communities and OccupySF organizer, when he stated: “OccupySF is citywide. We’re an autonomous entity as part of a worldwide network. We’re going to see a number of autonomous occupations arising.”

Whitaker mentioned a planned Occupy USF action to take place Dec. 1, as well as the small contingent that is currently “occupying” outside of Wells Fargo at 1 California Street, across from the former occupation site at 101 Market Street. That site is still blocked off by police barricades.

Occupy LA issued a similar rejection letter November 23, which might form the basis of OccupySF’s letter (Link: http://losangelesga.net/2011/11/assembly-authored-city-response/ ). That camp was raided and disbanded last night.

OccupySF plans to put out a formal response to the proposal and explanation of their decisions tonight.

SFBG Radio: Censoring the Internet

Zelda Bronstein
-
0
SFBG Radio: Censoring the Internet

Some observers are saying that new Congressional legislation could destroy the Internet as we know it. Johnny and Tim discuss the threats to free speech, what can be done — and why it will never work — after the jump.

SOPASucks by endorsements2011

Millionaires eyeing Potrero Hill

Zelda Bronstein
-
60
Millionaires eyeing Potrero Hill

I hate to harp on this (well, no I don’t) but when people tell me that we don’t have to worry so much about gentrification these days, that we’re living in a different world than the days of the dot-com boom, I have to wonder: Am I the only one reading the business pages?

Because in the real world of San Francisco business, the real-estate boom is on and housing prices — particularly in the southeast part of the city — are about to start soaring again.

In fact, according to the Chron, the market is already flying high — and dealing with the influx of new wealth and the continuing change in the demographics of the city will be very much a serious issue for Mayor Lee over the next year:

ZipRealty just completed a study on the millennial home buyer, pointing out that this generation, born after 1982,  is the largest in American history, larger even than the Baby Boomer generation. To these buyers, walkability and a vibrant urban community are huge draws in a home purchase. The ZipRealty study seems confirmed by this recent mini-boom in neighborhoods close to SoMa’s flourishing tech industry: newly minted millionaires in their 20s and 30s have the buying power to drive prices up.

Want proof? We’ve got it. The median price of a single-family home in San Francisco County was $745,000 in October, up $10K from October of 2010. In the neighborhoods in question though, the increase is more striking. In Noe Valley this October, the average price-per-square-foot was up 5% from last year for the third month in a row; in SoMa, up 11%; in eastern Potrero Hill, up 16%.

So: When Zynga goes public in a few months, a whole lot of young millionaires will want to buy houses in Potrero Hill. Dogpatch, and the southern end of SOMA. Oh, and the Mission. Rents will go way up. Housing prices will go even further beyond the level that ordinary, non-millionaire working people can afford.

I’m happy for all the Zyngites, and I’m glad the company is here in SF and generating economic activity. But one of the lessons of the dot-com boom is that the city, as a matter of policy, has to protect existing neighborhoods and residents (and existing industrial blue-collar businesses and jobs) from displacement. Otherwise the horrors of the late 1990s will start creeping back.

 

Occupy standoffs continue as poll finds public support for the movement

Sasha Cuttler
-
11
Occupy standoffs continue as poll finds public support for the movement

As OccupyOakland moves to reoccupy Frank Ogawa/Oscar Grant Plaza today and the burgeoning OccupySF encampment braces for another long-threatened raid by police, a new Field Poll finds that about half of registered California voters identify with the Occupy movement and support its goals, which include taxing the rich and limiting the ability of large corporations to corrupt the political and economic systems.

As the San Francisco Chronicle reports, 46 percent of respondants said they identified with the Occupy movement and 58 percent agree with the cause that prompted it, compared with 32 percent who say they disagree with it. Unsurprisingly, those on the left were more likely to support Occupy while those on the right were more likely to oppose it. A previous Field Poll at the height of the right-wing Tea Party movement found it had only about half as much support as Occupy now enjoys.

Still, as it enters its third month and winter descends on the encampments, Occupy faces myriad challenges. In San Francisco, the mainstream media — particularly curdmugeonly Chronicle columnist CW Nevius — has regularly highlighted conflicts and other conditions in the camps and pushed Mayor Ed Lee to follow-through on his threats to clear the tents from Justin Herman/Bradley Manning Plaza. Rumors abound that a raid could come on Wednesday night, when SFPD beefs up its staffing for training exercises.

In Oakland, the site of some of the most violent police crackdowns on Occupy encampments, OccupyOakland members are right now (noon, Tues/29) marching back into their former home and pledging to set up a 24/7 protest in defiance of city officials. While they seem to be stopping short of a full-blown occupation and tent city, they claim to be setting up a model for the next phase of the Occupy movement.

The group’s press release follows:

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Contact:

Phil Horne, Esq., Occupy Oakland Vigil Committee

415-874-9800; occupylaw@riseup.net

www.occupyoakland.org

OCCUPY OAKLAND— RE-OCCUPYING OSCAR GRANT a.k.a. FRANK OGAWA PLAZA

On Tuesday, November 29, 2011 at noon, Occupy Oakland activists will retake Frank Ogawa a.k.a. Oscar Grant Plaza in downtown Oakland with a 24-hour, 7 day-a-week vigil.  Occupiers hope to create a model for a new wave of “Occupation” protest throughout the United States. With the vigil, Occupiers will continue asserting rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution to assemble, speak, and petition government for redress of grievances.  The vigil is not the product of a bargain with Mayor Quan, nor is it negotiated with law enforcement–permission from the city is not required to exercise these constitutionally guaranteed rights.

The structures in the plaza will be symbolic and part of the vigil protest. A teepee will remind the public of the former Occupy camp and historic struggles of the Sioux Indians on the Plains of the U.S.; homeless workers in Hoovervilles during the Great Depression; the “Bonus March” to Washington D.C. by unpaid and unemployed veterans in 1932; Resurrection City following the assassination of Martin Luther King; the AIDS vigil of 1980s San Francisco; and the redwood occupations of Judi Bari and Running Wolf.

Occupy Oakland continues its occupation because residents of Oakland and across the US are still fighting for food, shelter, medical care, school, childcare, and other necessities.  The 1% enjoy 40% of U.S. wealth and 50% ownership of Wall Street stocks and bonds.  The bottom 80% split 7% of the former and just 5% of the latter.  The average 35-year-old in the 99% has a net worth less than $3,000.00.  Occupiers ask the public to consider, “How long does it take an unemployed member of the 99% to go through $3,000.00 and become homeless.” In Oakland, the unemployment rate is nearly double that of the national average. These are issues of crucial relevance to our city.

Occupy Oakland’s vigil declares, “If the 1% won’t share voluntarily through a sense of morality and concern for the well-being of all, then through protest and direct action, we will force change!  Occupy the Plaza!  De-colonize the 99%!”

Occupy Oakland will have sign-up sheets starting Tuesday at 11 am. at the Plaza, but sign up is not a prerequisite for participation in the vigil. Supporters are encouraged to come out day or night to participate.  The Plaza is fully accessible to the differently-abled.

About OccupyOakland:

Occupy Oakland is an emerging social movement without leaders or spokespeople. It is one of 1,570 occupations currently occurring around the world in solidarity with Occupy Wall St. For more information about the other occupations, see: http://www.occupytogether.org/

An up-to-date calendar announcing Oakland actions, and more information can be found at:

http://www.occupyoakland.org/

 

 

 

 

 

1...767778...258Page 77 of 258

48hills.org is the official publication of the non-profit San Francisco Progressive Media Center.
Contact us: info@48hills.org