Conservative

Downtown massively outspends progressives

Mary Magee
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17
Downtown massively outspends progressives

With only three weeks until the election, downtown interests are massively outspending progressive groups.(Conservative estimates suggest a 5:1 ratio, based on an analysis of campaign finance disclosures at the Ethics Commission.) And these downtown interests have plenty in reserve, as cash is funneled into a bunch of improbably-named political action committees that hope to influence the outcome of district elections and local measures on the fall ballot.

The Alliance for Jobs and Sustainable Growth, which is backed by the Chamber of Commerce, the SF Police Officers Association, and United Health Care Workers, recently got an infusion of cash from the conservative-minded Building Owners and Managers Association and Golden Gate Restaurant Association. And the alliance is already spending gobs of money in support of Theresa Sparks in D6, Scott Wiener in D8 and Steve Moss in D10.

The Coalition for Sensible Government, which recently received a $100,000 injection of cash from the SF Association of Realtors, is spending in support of Sparks in D6, Wiener and Rebecca Prozan in D8, and Lynette Sweet and Moss in D10. The coalition is also spending in support of Proposition G (transit operator wages) and Prop. L (Newsom’s sit-lie legislation)  and in opposition to Prop. M (community policing/ foot patrols) and Prop N (property transfer tax).

And a PAC consisting of the Coalition for Responsible Growth, Plan C, San Franciscans for a Better Muni, SF Forward (sponsored by the SF Chamber of Commerce and SPUR) received $85,000 from the Committee on Jobs, $60,000 from the SF Association of Realtors, and $35,000 from SF Forward.

This PAC, which has already spent $466,000 this year, recently plunked down $1,000 to produce a voter guide for Plan C–a group that focuses on condo conversions and is endorsing Sparks in D6, Wiener in D8, and Sweet (as its first ranked choice) and Moss (as its second ranked choice) in D10.

It isn’t surprising that downtown PACs have deep pockets and almost identical slates. But it is a bit of a shocker that their slates are apparently almost identical to the Small Business Advocates, a group that has somewhat differing values and only a couple hundred members.

Reached by phone, SBA director Scott Hauge said the group has a couple hundred members–and claimed that SBA’s Board supports Sparks in D6, Moss in D10, and supports Measures G, K, L and opposes Measures J, M & N.

Hauge acknowledged that these positions are identical to those of downtown interests.
“We have been working with large companies,” Hauge said, claiming that small and big business’ interests are “the same” in this particular election cycle.

To date, neither the Chamber’s Steve Falk nor UHW’s Leon Chow have replied to the Guardian’s calls about the genesis of their so-called Alliance for Jobs and Sustainable Growth (Chow posted a comment on our politics blog and that is really not the same as a live conversation.)

But Tim Paulson, executive director of the San Francisco Labor Council wasn’t afraid to go on record in opposition to the Alliance and its 2010 slate.

“We’re really disappointed that there are labor organizations that feel they have to team up with Golden Gate Restaurant Association, which is against healthcare, and with CPMC [California Pacific Medical Center], which is working to keep nurses from joining a union,” Paulson said. “This alliance does not reflect what the San Francisco labor movement is about.”

A door hanger that the Labor Council distributed in conjunction with the SF Democratic Party confirms that both organizations support Debra Walker in D6 and Rafael Mandelman in D8. But while the Dem Party supports DeWitt Lacy, Malia Cohen and Eric Smith (in that order) in D10, the Labor Council only supports Cohen and Chris Jackson (in that order) in D10.

But despite their differing D10 candidate slate, both these progressive groups support Measures J, M and N, and oppose Measures B, K and L.

“When we see the Hotel Council stoop to attack Mike Casey, one of the greatest labor leaders in SF history, for fighting hotels who want to take away healthcare and diminish the retirement benefits for workers who make $25K to $30K a year, that’s really disturbing,” Paulson said, referring to a recent op-ed in the SF Examiner that was written by Patricia Breslin, executive director of the Hotel Council.

“And any union that makes an alignment with groups that don’t share the values of the San Francisco Labor Council, that’s really disturbing to me and the Labor Council,” Paulson said.

Noting that downtown is spending buckets of money on the election, Paulson observed that the Labor Council’s values are about “sharing the wealth.”

“So we don’t want Measure B [Jeff Adachi’s pension reform] or K (Newsom’s hotel tax) or L (Newsom’s sit-lie legislation),” Paulson concluded. “And we have three solid weeks to do this.”

Big Oil’s false choice

Andrew Lam
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0
Big Oil’s false choice

rebeccab@sfbg.com

Tapping into voters’ economic insecurities at a time of record high unemployment rates, out-of-state oil interests say addressing global warming will cost California more jobs. But a broad coalition that includes environmentalists and top business groups argue that just the opposite is true, saying the economy will suffer if we suddenly kill the incentives now driving the clean energy industry, one business sector that actually grew during the recession.

Proposition 23 would indefinitely suspend Assembly Bill 32, California’s Global Warming Solutions Act. Texas oil companies are bankrolling the initiative, spending millions of dollars to convince voters that they must choose between saving jobs and saving the environment. Since jobs are more important right now, they argue, the environment will have to wait.

But the other side — which includes groups such as the Chamber of Commerce, whose top priority is always job creation — is promoting the compelling idea that the path to economic recovery lies in rising to the challenge of climate change. They argue that addressing global warming now isn’t just about avoiding more out-of-control wildfires, diminishing crop yields, prolonged intense droughts, coastal flooding, and other calamities that climate scientists say global warming will bring to California. It’s also about creating jobs now and trying to lower California’s 12.4 percent unemployment rate, the third highest nationwide.

The push to defeat Prop. 23 has brought together prominent business people, public-health advocates like the American Lung Association, big green organizations such as the Sierra Club, and environmental-justice advocates who are pushing for green jobs as a way to fend off poverty and tackle air quality problems in disadvantaged neighborhoods. If the coalition of unlikely allies is successful, Big Oil’s comfortable lock on the energy market could be thrown off balance by California’s emerging green economy.

“Ultimately, we think it’s going to be a David vs. Goliath battle, because they have very deep pockets,” said No on 23 campaign spokesperson Steve Maviglio. “The proponents are playing to the fears of those most affected by the economy.”

When voters decide on this one, it will signify a choice to proceed down one of two paths at an important crossroads. A global climate summit in Copenhagen late last year failed to produce an effective response to climate change. A push for a federal cap-and-trade system to combat global warming yielded similarly disappointing results. AB32 presents a third chance to set a new standard, and a precedent, for curbing greenhouse gas emissions. But if Prop. 23 passes, environmentalists will have struck out.

A report issued in July by the National Academy of Sciences lays bare the far-reaching implications of policy decisions around climate change. “Emissions reductions choices made today matter in determining impacts experienced not just over the next few decades,” the report notes, “but in coming centuries and millennia.”

 

CLOSE RACE

In 2006, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed AB32, mandating a statewide reduction of greenhouse gases to 1990 levels by the year 2020. The law is slated to go into full effect in January 2012, when a cap-and-trade system will make it more costly and burdensome for major polluters to continue burning high quantities of fossil fuels, among other strategies.

The law helps alternative energy companies and creates incentives for large and small businesses to green their operations. Prop. 23, deceptively titled the “California Jobs Initiative,” would suspend AB32 until the state’s unemployment rate drops to 5.5 percent for four consecutive quarters. A decade could pass before such a market condition is in place — in the past 40 years, it’s occurred just three times.

Speaking at the Commonwealth Club in Santa Clara in September, Schwarzenegger blasted Texas-based oil companies Tesoro Corporation and Valero Energy Corporation, which have contributed a combined $5.6 million to the Prop. 23 campaign, for trying to deceive California voters. “They are creating a shell argument that this is about saving jobs,” Schwarzenegger said. “Does anybody really believe that these companies, out of the goodness of their black oil hearts, are spending millions and millions of dollars to protect jobs? It’s not about jobs at all, ladies and gentlemen. It is about their ability to pollute and thus protect their profits.”

Prop. 23 has been unpopular even among many traditional right-wing and business interests. Oil giants Chevron and BP have remained neutral on it. Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman also renounced it, but straddled the fence by vowing to suspend AB32 for a year anyway.

According to a breakdown of campaign spending issued by opponents, oil interests contributed 97 percent of the funding for Prop. 23, while out-of-state interests were responsible for 89 percent. Kansas-based Koch Industries, run by billionaire siblings David and Charles Koch, dropped $1 million into the effort. The Koch brothers have been singled out as the financial backbone of the Tea Party.

Yet despite bipartisan opposition in Sacramento, polls suggest Prop. 23 could be a close race. A recent Los Angeles Times poll showed a dead heat among California voters, with 40 percent in favor, 38 percent opposed, and about one-fifth of likely voters undecided. The television commercials advocating Yes on 23 drive home a simple yet misleading message: “Save jobs. Stop the energy tax.” A spokesperson from the Yes on 23 campaign did not return the Guardian’s calls seeking comment.

Ironically, jobs are also the cornerstone of the No on 23 campaign’s arguments. “We have very heavy hitters who see this as a job killer,” Maviglio said. The campaign is highlighting the fact that the only economic area that has experienced growth amid the recession is green tech.

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jerry Brown referenced green jobs as a bright hope for economic recovery in a televised debate against Whitman, and the prospect of green job creation as a way to alleviate poverty is clearly articulated in The Green Collar Economy, a widely influential book by Green for All founder Van Jones. Green for All has joined the Greenlining Institute and a host of 80 organizations statewide in a united front against Prop. 23, called Communities United Against Prop. 23, which is part of the larger opposition campaign dubbed Communities United Against the Dirty Energy Prop.

Low-income communities and communities of color will be disproportionately affected if Prop. 23 wins, said Orson Aguilar, executive director of the Greenlining Institute. “The communities we represent are feeling a double impact,” Aguilar noted. “They’re suffering from pollution,” since power plants and polluting industries tend to be sited in low-income communities, “and they’re suffering from unemployment and the economic crisis. There definitely is a double-whammy.”

 

LOCAL MOMENTUM

At a recent green business symposium hosted by Urban Solutions, a nonprofit that aids small businesses and seeks to create job opportunities in low-income communities, a Castro District merchant explained her decision to enter green-business certification process. “I’m dedicated to going green because, No. 1, it’s the right thing to do,” said Elaine Jennings, who runs Small Potatoes Catering & Events. “No. 2, it’s the right thing to do. And No. 3, it’s the right thing to do.”

But the moderator of the panel, a business reporter, wasn’t as interested in the moral rationale — instead, she followed up by asking whether going green was a wise financial move. Anthony Tsai, green business program manager at Urban Solutions, made the case that it is. Water bills have gone up 40 percent since 2000, Tsai said. Electricity costs have gone up 60 percent and waste disposal fees have increased 250 percent. By conserving energy and water and reducing waste, small businesses can save money during tough economic times.

Aguilar sees energy-efficiency building retrofits as an opportunity to create jobs for disadvantaged populations. In order to comply with the climate regulations under AB32, energy-efficiency retrofits would have to be completed to hit conservation targets. “We have thousands, if not millions, of buildings in California that need to be retrofitted,” he said. “A lot of people who are out of work are in the construction industry. Latinos and African Americans were hit hard when construction fell.” With energy retrofits and solar-panel installations on the agenda, AB32 could be good news for electricians, too, Aguilar said.

There are signs that AB32 is already giving green business a lift. A manufacturer of electric delivery trucks, for example, relocated from Mexico to California’s Central Valley late last year. A wind-energy company recently relocated to San Diego from Spain. The solar industry is growing faster in California, particularly in the Bay Area, than anywhere else nationwide. And in the past five years, roughly $9 billion in venture capital investment has gone into clean tech industries, with more going to California than any other state.

“Prop. 23 would essentially pull the rug out from under this explosive growth, which we’re experiencing during a recession,” Maviglio noted.

Jeanine Cotter, CEO of Luminalt, an independently owned San Francisco solar and installation company, is active in the campaign to defeat Prop. 23. “There is an entire ecosystem that feeds off of good policy,” Cotter said. If Prop. 23 passes, “we will lose the spark that we have and we will go backward.”

Despite the economic downturn, Luminalt experienced its best year in 2009 in the six-year history of the company, and if AB32 goes into effect in 2012 as planned, the demand for new solar installations will only grow. But with less than a month to go before the election, Cotter said she was alarmed by the lack of awareness about Prop. 23, even among environmentalists.

“We were at West Coast Green with No on 23 literature,” she said, referencing a widely attended green-business conference, “and I was shocked at how many people didn’t know what it is.”

 

RISKING IT

Small business owners and conscience-driven activists aren’t the only ones touting this theory of a new energy economy. The San Francisco Chamber of Commerce, a fiscally conservative business association that is often at odds with environmentalists and progressives, is actively campaigning against Prop. 23 — and it’s not out of any sense of moral duty.

If Prop. 23 succeeds, explained Chamber spokesperson Rob Black, it will scare off the venture capitalists. “For them, water’s like money,” he explained. “It will flow to the easiest place to invest.” Regulation like AB32 guarantees a return on investment for climate-friendly technology, he added. But if that regulatory structure is thrown into question, investors may flee overseas because investing would be too risky. “If we walk away from clean tech, the next Microsoft will be a Chinese company,” Black said.

Donnie Fowler, a political consultant who has worked for Al Gore and other top Democrats, is a senior adviser to the Clean Economy Network and a leader in the effort to defeat Prop. 23. Oil companies “went to Washington and spent hundreds of millions” lobbying against climate change regulations, Fowler pointed out. “Now they’ve opened up a second front. If California goes backward, all of those senators and Congressional representatives will say, ‘No way … I’m surely not taking a political risk. If they went backward, there’s no reason we should go forward.'”

Fowler said that for environmentalists, voting No on 23 could be seen as an affirmation of statewide efforts to address climate change in a meaningful way. “This is a real opportunity,” he said, “for Californians to stand up and say we’ve had enough. We are going to take a stand — right now.”

www.stopdirtyenergyprop.com

www.communitiesagainstprop23.com

East Bay endorsements 2010

Andrew Lam
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31
East Bay endorsements 2010

BART BOARD DISTRICT 4

ROBERT RABURN

Incumbent Carole Ward Allen has been a disappointment, part of the moribund BART establishment that wastes money on pointless extensions, ignores urban cores, and can’t control its own police force. Robert Raburn, a bicycle activist with a PhD in transportation and urban geography, would be a great replacement. If he’s elected, and Bert Hill wins in San Francisco, BART will have two more progressive transit activists to join Tom Radulovich. Vote for Raburn.

 

BERKELEY CITY AUDITOR

ANN-MARIE HOGAN

Hogan’s running unopposed and we see no reason not to support her for another term.

 

BERKELEY CITY COUNCIL

DISTRICT 1

LINDA MAIO

Maio in the past has had a decent progressive track record, but lately she’s been something of a call-up vote for Mayor Tom Bates. We’re not thrilled with her more recent positions years (against raising condo conversion fees and for new high-rises downtown), but she has no strong credible opponents. Green Party Jasper Kingeter has never run for elective office before and needs more seasoning.

DISTRICT 4

JESSE ARREGUIN

Arreguin and Kriss Worthington hold down the progressive wing on the City Council. He’s pushed the Berkeley police to stop impounding the cars of undocumented immigrants and is a foe of the development-at-all costs mentality of the mayor.

DISTRICT 7

KRISS WORTHINGTON

It’s disappointing that Mayor Tom Bates and his allies are trying to get rid of Worthington, who by our estimation is the best, hardest-working, and most progressive member of the City Council. He’s been willing to stand up to the mayor when he’s wrong — and has managed to force developers to build more affordable housing. He’s against the mayor’s downtown plan, but sees a way forward to a compromise that includes all the positive elements without big high-rises. Vote for Worthington.

DISTRICT 8

STEWART JONES

Gordon Wozniak, the incumbent, is the most conservative member of the City Council and has been a bad vote on almost everything. He’s going to be tough to beat in this district, but we’re giving the nod to Jones, a teacher, Green Party member, and neighborhood activist. He lacks experience, but almost anyone would be better than Wozniak.

 

BERKELEY RENT BOARD

ASA DODWORTH

LISA STEPHENS

JESSE TOWNLEY

PAM WEBSTER

DAVE BLAKE

KATHERINE HARR

There’s a six-person tenant slate running, with endorsements from Worthington, Arreguin, and other progressive leaders. The members couldn’t find an easy mnemonic, so they’ve used the last letters of their last names, which, in the right order, add up to SHERRY. We’ve listed them in the order they’ll appear on the ballot.

 

OAKLAND CITY AUDITOR

COURTNEY RUBY

Ruby’s moved the office forward a bit, and we don’t see any argument to replace her.

 

OAKLAND MAYOR

1. REBECCA KAPLAN

2. JEAN QUAN

The danger in this race is Don Perata, the former state Senate president, longtime power broker, and friend of developers who has, at the very least, a checkered ethical record that led at one point to a five-year federal corruption investigation (the investigation ended with no charges filed). Perata wants to use the mayor’s office to continue his role as a regional kingpin, and he has the support of Pacific Gas and Electric Co. and the big developers. No thanks.

Two strong progressive challengers are taking him on. Our first choice is Rebecca Kaplan, an at-large City Council member who is full of great, innovative ideas for Oakland. She wants to enforce an Oakland-first hiring law, work on transit-oriented development, and encourage small businesses that can attract some of the $2 billion a year Oakland loses in retail sales from local residents who shop out of town.

Kaplan told us she thinks that if Proposition 19 passes and local government has the right to regulate legal marijuana, Oakland is perfectly situated to take advantage of the new law. By combining pot sales and possibly on-site consumption with new restaurants, bike lanes, and street-level amenities, the city could revitalize neighborhoods and bring in significant new tax revenue.

She’s a big bicycle advocate, would consider a progressive city income tax, and is a strong supporter of public power. She also has a practical sense of how to solve problems.

Jean Quan has been active in Oakland politics for decades. She served 12 years on the school board, eight on the City Council, and has the experience, skills, and vision to run the city. She’s also almost tied in the polls with Perata, despite being outspent dramatically (and being the subject of some nasty, inaccurate Perata hit pieces). She told us she wants to be a cheerleader for the public schools, to work with local businesses, expand the high school internship program, and add city wrap-around services to public schools. She’s had a long, impressive record on environmental issues (she worked with San Francisco on a plastic bag ban and wrote Oakland’s Styrofoam ban). She recognizes that much of the city’s budget problem comes from the police department and police pensions. But she’s a little less aggressive than Kaplan about raising new revenue, and while she fully supports Prop. 19 and the Oakland plan for allowing commercial marijuana operations, she is, in her own words, “relatively conservative” on how far Oakland should go to allow sales and use in the city.

Kaplan’s got more of the cutting-edge progressive vision. Quan’s got more experience and a longer track record. They’re the two choices to beat Perata and save Oakland’s future, and we’re happy that ranked-choice voting allows us to endorse them both.

 

OAKLAND CITY COUNCIL

DISTRICT 2

JENNIFER PAE

Patricia Kernighan is among the most conservative votes on the council. She’s also representing a wealthy, conservative hills district and will be hard to beat. We’re endorsing Jennifer Pae, community outreach director for the East Bay Voter Education Consortium. She has the backing of progressives like Supervisor Keith Carson and Berkeley City Council Member Kriss Worthington (as well as the Alameda County Green Party). She’s a long shot, but better than the incumbent.

DISTRICT 4

DANIEL SWAFFORD

The front-runners in this race are probably Libby Schaaf, a former aide to Ignacio de la Fuente; Melanie Shelby, a small business owner; and Daniel Swafford, a business consultant. Schaaf is too close to her old boss. We liked Shelby, but she’s awfully vague on solutions to Oakland’s problems — and she voted for Prop. 8. She now says her position on same-sex marriage is “evolving,” and she supports equal rights for all couples. But that’s an awfully big issue to have taken an awfully wrong stand on just two years ago.

This leaves Swafford, a neighborhood activist who grew up in Oakland and was City Council Member Jean Quan’s appointee to the Neighborhood Crime Prevention Council and is a strong advocate of community policing. He gets the nod.

DISTRICT 6

JOSE DORADO

Conventional wisdom says Desley Brooks is almost certain to get reelected to this seat. Her only competition comes from Nancy Sidebotham, whose platform is all cops all the time, and Jose Dorado, a bookkeeper with little political experience. Brooks is a fierce advocate for her district and has been tough on banks and good on pushing local hiring, but has too many ethical problems to merit our endorsement. She has never denied that she kept her boyfriend’s daughter on as a $5,000-a-month aide while the young woman was a full-time student at Syracuse University in New York. When San Francisco Chronicle columnist Chip Johnson challenged some of her ethical lapses, she sued him for libel (the case was dismissed).

Dorado is a neighborhood activist who is running a grassroots campaign and, while he needs more experience, he’s raising good issues (like public financing of elections). And unlike Sidebotham, he’s supporting the revenue measures on the ballot.

 

East Bay Ballot Measures

BERKELEY MEASURE H

SCHOOL FACILITIES TAX

YES

The East Bay cities have done a much better job than San Francisco at using parcel taxes — a poor substitute for property taxes but still a relatively progressive form of revenue — to support schools and other public services. Measure H would continue an existing tax on residential and commercial buildings — 6.3 cents per square foot on residences and 9.4 cents on businesses — to pay for maintenance on public school buildings. Vote yes.

 

BERKELEY MEASURE I

SCHOOL BONDS

YES

Measure I is a $210 million bond act to expand and upgrade the public schools. Vote yes.

 

BERKELEY MEASURE T

CANNABIS PERMITS

YES

Measure T is on the ballot as part of Berkeley’s effort to implement Prop. 19, the statewide pot-legalization measure. Berkeley and Oakland are both ahead of San Francisco in planning for legal marijuana. Prop. T would allow six medical cannabis clinics with cultivation permits, but restrict future industrial pot uses to industrial districts. Vote yes.

 

OAKLAND MEASURE L

SCHOOL TAX

YES

Another parcel tax for schools, this one $195 a year for 10 years, essentially to offset state cuts. There’s an exemption for low-income taxpayers. Vote yes.

 

OAKLAND MEASURE V

CANNABIS TAXES

YES

If Oakland goes ahead with its plans to allow large-scale cultivation and passes this tax hike on pot sales (to $50 per $1,000 of gross revenue for medical pot and $100 per $1,000 for recreational pot) the city could take in as much as $30 million a year — almost enough to offset the budget deficit. Vote yes.

 

OAKLAND MEASURE W

PHONE LINE TAX

YES

Another creative — if imperfect — way to raise some revenue, Measure W puts a modest $1.99 a month tax on phone lines to raise money for the general fund. Vote yes.

 

OAKLAND MEASURE X

POLICE PARCEL TAX

NO

We typically support any reasonable tax on property to pay for public services, but we can’t back this one. Measure X would impose a fairly high ($360 a year) parcel tax on single-family homes — entirely to pay for cops. The police union has been intractable, refusing to give back any of its generous pension benefits to help solve the budget deficit. We can’t see raising taxes for that department alone when so much of Oakland is hurting for money.

 

OAKLAND MEASURE BB

POLICE FUNDING

YES

Measure BB would allow Oakland to continue collecting violence-prevention money under a previous ballot measure even if the police department falls below a mandated staffing level. It would give the City Council more flexibility in addressing public safety. Vote yes.

 

>>VIEW OUR COMPLETE ENDORSEMENTS FOR THE 2010 ELECTION

DADT ruling gives Obama an opportunity to lead

Sasha Cuttler
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2
DADT ruling gives Obama an opportunity to lead

Now that a federal judge has ruled the U.S. military’s “don’t ask don’t tell” policy unconstitutional, President Barack Obama and the Democrats have an opportunity to demonstrate their stated commitment to equal rights for gays and lesbians – and, more generally, their willingness to boldly lead the country. And all they have to do is…nothing.

Actually, if Obama really wants to show some courage on the issue, he would announce that he’s doing nothing – that is, choosing not to appeal the ruling and to simply let it stand – now, before the mid-term elections next month. Sure, that might involve some political risk in conservative districts, but it would also demonstrate to voters on the left that this administration is actually willing to take a stand on an issue that is important to progressives and other believers in social justice.

Part of the problem that Democrats are facing in this election is that the Republican base, all those crazy teabaggers and ill-informed believers that Obama is a dangerous socialist, are fired up, but those in the Democratic Party base – workers, liberals, anti-war activists, and representatives of marginalized communities – don’t have much to cling to these days.

They’ve watched Obama escalate the so-called “war on terror,” do little to challenge Wall Street’s casino capitalism, prop up health insurance companies and call it “reform,” and let conservatives set the agenda while the Democrats dither on issues ranging from raising taxes on the rich to rebuilding the country’s infrastructure and social safety net.

Obama opposes same-sex marriage, and when the Democrat’s made a showy legislative move last month to end DADT, they quickly caved in the face of a Republican filibuster, making the whole gesture seem like a meaningless election year gimmick rather than an honest effort to end a policy that has always been unconstitutional, as this judge has now ruled.

So now, it’s gut check time. Obama needs to show what kind of president he wants to be. Will he do the right thing and finally provide the bold progressive leadership this country needs right now, or will he follow Bill Clinton’s lead and cave in to his conservative critics, maintaining his popularity and winning a second term by triangulating between the left and right, but leaving the country dangerously adrift in treacherous waters.

Endorsements 2010: San Francisco candidates

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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53
Endorsements 2010: San Francisco candidates

SUPERVISOR, DISTRICT 2


JANET REILLY


Frankly, we were a little surprised by the Janet Reilly who came in to give us her pitch as a District 2 supervisorial candidate. The last time we met with her, she was a strong progressive running for state Assembly as an advocate of single-payer health care. She was challenging Fiona Ma from the left, and easily won our endorsement.


Now she’s become a fiscal conservative — somewhat more in synch with her district, perhaps, but not an encouraging sign. Reilly seems to realize that there’s a $500 million budget deficit looming, but she won’t support any of the tax measures on the ballot. She’s against the hotel tax. She’s against the real estate transfer tax on high-end properties. She’s against the local car tax. She opposed Sup. David Chiu’s business tax plan that would have shifted the burden from small to larger businesses (even though it was clear from our interview that she didn’t understand it).


She talked about merging some of the nonprofits that get city money, about consolidating departments, and better management — solutions that might stem a tiny fraction of the red ink. But she wouldn’t even admit that the limited tax burden on the very rich was part of San Francisco’s budget problem.


Her main proposal for creating jobs is more tax credits for biotech, life sciences, and digital media and more public-private partnerships.


It’s too bad, because Reilly’s smart, and she’s far, far better than Mark Farrell, the candidate that the current incumbent, Michela Alioto-Pier, is backing. We wish she’d be realistic about the fiscal nightmare she would inherit as a supervisor.


On the positive side, she’s a strong supporter of public power and she has good connections to the progressive community. Unlike Alioto-Pier, she’d be accessible, open-minded, and willing to work with the progressive majority on the board. That would be a dramatic change, so we’ll give her the nod.


We were also impressed with Abraham Simmons, a federal prosecutor who has spent time researching city finance on the Civil Grand Jury. But he supports sit-lie, Prop. B and Prop. S, and opposes most new tax proposals and needs more political seasoning.


 


DISTRICT 4


NO ENDORSEMENT


We’ve always wanted to like Carmen Chu. She’s friendly, personable, intelligent, and well-spoken. But on the issues, she’s just awful. Indeed, we can’t think of a single significant vote on which she’s been anything but a call-up loyalist for Mayor Newsom. She even opposed the public power measure, Prop. H, that had the support of just about everyone in town except hardcore PG&E allies.


She’s running unopposed, and will be reelected. But we can’t endorse her.


 


DISTRICT 6


1. DEBRA WALKER


2. JANE KIM


3. GLENDON “ANNA CONDA” HYDE


CORRECTION: In our original version of this endorsement, we said that Jim Meko supports the sit-lie ordinance. That was an error, and it’s corrected below.


A year ago, this race was artist and activist Debra Walker’s to lose. Most of the progressive community was united behind her candidacy; she’d been working on district issues for a couple of decades, fighting the loft developers during the dot-com boom years and serving on the Building Inspection Commission. Then School Board member Jane Kim decided to enter the race, leaving the left divided, splitting resources that might have gone to other critical district races — and potentially helping to put the most pro-business downtown candidate, Theresa Sparks, in a better position to win.


Now we’ve got something of a mess — a fragmented and sometimes needlessly divisive progressive base in a district that’s key to holding progressive control of the board. And while neither of the two top progressive candidates is actively pursuing a credible ranked-choice voting strategy (Kim has, unbelievably, endorsed James Keys instead of Walker, and Walker has declined to endorse anyone else), we’re setting aside our concern over Kim’s ill-advised move and suggesting a strategy that is most likely to keep the seat Chris Daly has held for the past 10 years from falling to downtown control.


Walker is far and away our first choice. She understands land use and housing — the clear central issues in the district — and has well thought-out positions and proposals. She says that the current system of inclusionary housing — pressing market-rate developers to include a few units of below-market-rate housing with their high-end condos — simply doesn’t work. She supports an immediate affordable housing bond act and a long-term real estate transfer tax high enough to fund a steady supply of housing for the city’s workforce. She told us the city ought to be looking at planning issues from the perspective of what San Francisco needs, not what developers want to build. She’s in favor of progressive taxes and a push for local hiring. We’re happy to give her our first-place ranking.


Jane Kim has been a great SF School Board member and has always been part of the progressive community. But she only moved into District 6 a year and a half ago — about when she started talking about running for supervisor (and she told us in her endorsement interview that “D6 is a district you can run in without having lived there a long time.”) She still hasn’t been able to explain why she parachuted in to challenge an experienced progressive leader she has no substantive policy disagreements with.


That said, on the issues, Kim is consistently good. She is in favor of indexing affordable housing to market-rate housing and halting new condo development if the mix gets out of line. She’s for an affordable housing bond. She supports all the tax measures on this ballot. She’s a little softer on congestion pricing and extending parking-meter hours, but she’s open to the ideas. She supports police foot patrols not just as a law-enforcement strategy, but to encourage small businesses. She’d be a fine vote on the board. And while we’re sympathetic to the Walker supporters who would prefer that we not give Kim the credibility and exposure of an endorsement, the reality is that she’s one of two leading progressives and would be better on the board than the remaining candidates.


Hyde, a dynamic young drag queen performer, isn’t going to win. But he’s offered some great ideas and injected some fun and energy into the race. Hyde talks about creating safe injection sites for IV drug users to reduce the risk of overdoses and the spread of disease. He points out that a lot of young people age out of the foster-care system and wind up on the streets, and he’s for continuum housing that would let these young people transition to jobs or higher education. He talks about starting a co-op grocery in the Tenderloin. He proposes bus-only lanes throughout the district and wants to charge large vehicles a fee to come into the city. He’s a big advocate of nightlife and the arts. He lacks experience and needs more political seasoning, but we’re giving him the third-place nod to encourage his future involvement.


Progressives are concerned about Theresa Sparks, a transgender activist and former business executive who now runs the city’s Human Rights Commission. She did a (mostly) good job on the Police Commission. She’s experienced in city government and has good financial sense. But she’s just too conservative for what remains a very progressive district. Sparks isn’t a big fan of seeking new revenue for the city telling us that “I disagree that we’ve made all the cuts that we can” — even after four years of brutal, bloody, all-cuts budgets. She doesn’t support the hotel tax and said she couldn’t support Sup. David Chiu’s progressive business tax because it would lead to “replacing private sector jobs with public sector jobs” — even though the city’s own economic analysis shows that’s just not true. She supports Newsom’s sit-lie law.


Sparks is the candidate of the mayor and downtown, and would substantially shift the balance of power on the board. She’s also going to have huge amounts of money behind her. It’s important she be defeated.


Jim Meko, a longtime neighborhood and community activist, has good credentials and some solid ideas. He was a key player in the western SoMa planning project and helped come up with a truly progressive land-use program for the neighborhood. But he supports Prop. B and is awfully cranky about local bars and nightlife.


James Keys, who has the support of Sup. Chris Daly and was an intern in Daly’s office, has some intriguing (if not terribly practical) ideas, like combining the Sheriff’s Department and the Police Department and making Muni free). But in his interview, he demonstrated a lack of understanding of the issues facing the district and the city.


So we’re going with a ranked-choice strategy: Walker first, Kim second, Hyde third. And we hope Kim’s supporters ignore their candidate’s endorsement of Keys, put Walker as their second choice, and ensure that they don’t help elect Sparks.


 


DISTRICT 8


RAFAEL MANDELMAN


This is by far the clearest and most obvious choice on the local ballot. And it’s a critical one, a chance for progressives to reclaim the seat that once belonged to Harvey Milk and Harry Britt.


Mandelman, a former president of the Milk Club, is running as more than a queer candidate. He’s a supporter of tenants rights, immigrants’ rights, and economic and social justice. He also told us he believes “local government matters” — and that there are a lot of problems San Francisco can (and has to) solve on its own, without simply ducking and blaming Sacramento and Washington.


Mandelman argues that the public sector has been starved for years and needs more money. He agrees that there’s still a fair amount of bloat in the city budget — particularly management positions — but that even after cleaning out the waste, the city will still be far short of the money it needs to continue providing pubic services. He’s calling for a top-to-bottom review of how the city gets revenue, with the idea of creating a more progressive tax structure.


He’s an opponent of sit-lie and a supporter of the sanctuary city ordinance. He supports tenants rights and eviction protection. He’s had considerable experience (as a member of the Building Inspection Commission and Board of Appeals and as a lawyer who advises local government agencies) and would make an excellent supervisor.


Neither of the other two contenders make our endorsement cut. Rebecca Prozan is a deputy city attorney who told us she would be able to bring the warring factions on the board together. She has some interesting ideas — she’d like to see the city take over foreclosed properties and turn them into housing for teachers, cops, and firefighters — and she’s opposed to sit-lie. But she’s weak on tenant issues (she told us there’s nothing anyone can do to stop the conversion of rental housing into tenancies-in-common), doesn’t seem to grasp the need for substantial new revenues to prevent service cuts, and doesn’t support splitting the appointments to key commissions between the mayor and the supervisors.


Scott Wiener, a deputy city attorney, is a personable guy who always takes our phone calls and is honest and responsive. He’s done a lot of good work in the district. But he’s on the wrong side of many issues, and on some things would be to the right of the incumbent, Sup. Bevan Dufty.


He doesn’t support public power (which Dufty does). He says that a lot of the city’s budget problems can’t be solved until the state gets its own house in order (“we can’t tax our way out of this”) and favors a budget balanced largely by further cuts. In direct contrast to Mandelman, Wiener said San Franciscans “need to lower our expectations for government.” He wants broad-based reductions in almost all city agencies except Muni, “core” public health services, and public safety. He doesn’t support any further restrictions on condo conversions or TICs. And he has the support of the Small Property Owners Association — perhaps the most virulently anti-tenant and anti-rent control group in town.


This district once gave rise to queer political leaders who saw themselves and their struggles as part of a larger progressive movement. That’s drifted away of late — and with Mandelman, there’s a chance to bring it back.


 


DISTRICT 10


1. TONY KELLY


2. DEWITT LACY


3. CHRIS JACKSON


District 10 is the epicenter of new development in San Francisco, the place where city planners want to site as many as 40,000 new housing units, most of them high-end condos, at a cost of thousands of blue-collar jobs. The developers are salivating at the land-rush opportunities here — and the next supervisor not only needs to be an expert in land-use and development politics, but someone with the background and experience to thwart the bad ideas and direct and encourage the good ones.


There’s no shortage of candidates — 22 people are on the ballot, and at least half a dozen are serious contenders. Two — Steve Moss and Lynette Sweet — are very bad news. And one of the key priorities for progressives is defeating the big-money effort that downtown, the police, and the forces behind the Van Ness Avenue megahospital proposal are dumping into the district to elect Moss.


Our first choice is Tony Kelly, who operates Thick Description Theater and who for more than a decade has been directly involved in all the major neighborhood issues. He has a deep understanding of what the district is facing: 4,100 of the 5,300 acres in D10 have been rezoned or put under the Redevelopment Agency in the past 10 years. Planners envision as many as 100,000 new residents in the next 10 years. And the fees paid by developers will not even begin to cover the cost of the infrastructure and services needed to handle that growth.


And Kelly has solutions: The public sector will have to play a huge role in affordable housing and infrastructure, and that money should come from higher development fees — and from places like the University of California, which has a huge operation in the district and pays no property taxes. Kelly wants to set up a trigger so that if goals for affordable housing aren’t met by a set date, the market-rate development stops. He supports the revenue measures on the ballot but thinks we should go further. He opposes the pension-reform measure, Prop. B, but notes that 75 percent of the city’s pension problems come from police, fire, and management employees. He wants the supervisors to take over the Redevelopment Agency. He’s calling for a major expansion of open space and parkland in the district. And he thinks the city should direct some of the $3 billion in short-term accounts (now all with the Bank of America) to local credit unions or new municipal bank that could invest in affordable housing and small business. He’s a perfect fit for the job.


DeWitt Lacy is a civil-rights lawyer and a relative newcomer to neighborhood politics. He speaks passionately about the need for D10 to get its fair share of the city’s services and about a commitment to working-class people.


Lacy is calling for an immediate pilot program with police foot patrols in the high-crime areas of the district. He’s for increasing the requirements for developers to build affordable housing and wants to cut the payroll tax for local businesses that hire district residents.


Lacy’s vision for the future includes development that has mixed-use commuter hubs with shopping and grocery stores as well as housing. He supports the tax measures on the ballot and would be willing to extend parking meter hours — but not parking fines, which he calls an undue burden on low-income people.


He’s an outspoken foe of sit-lie and of gang injunctions, and with his background handling police abuse lawsuits, he would have a clear understanding of how to approach better law-enforcement without intimidating the community. He lacks Kelly’s history, experience, and knowledge in neighborhood issues, but he’s eminently qualified and would make a fine supervisor.


Chris Jackson, who worked at the San Francisco Labor Council and serves on the Community College Board, is our third choice. While it’s a bit unfortunate that Jackson is running for higher office only two years after getting elected to the college board, he’s got a track record and good positions on the issues. He talks of making sure that blue-collar jobs don’t get pushed out by housing, and suggested that the shipyard be used for ship repair. He wants to see the city mandate that landlords rent to people with Section 8 housing vouchers. He supports the tax measures on the ballot, but also argues that the city has 60 percent more managers than it had in 2000 and wants to bring that number down. He thinks the supervisors should take over Redevelopment, which should become “just a financing agency for affordable housing.” He wants to relocate the stinky sewage treatment plant near Third Street and Evans Avenue onto one of the piers and use the area for a transit hub. He’s still relatively unseasoned, but he has a bright political future.


Eric Smith, a biodiesel activist, is an impressive candidate too. But while his environmental credentials are good, he lacks the breadth of knowledge that our top three choices offer. But we’re glad he’s in the race and hope he stays active in community politics.


Malia Cohen has raised a lot of money and (to our astonishment) was endorsed No. 2 by the Democratic Party, but she’s by no means a progressive, particularly on tenant issues — she told us that limiting condo conversions is an infringement of property rights. And she’s way too vague on other issues.


Moss is the candidate of the big developers and the landlords, and the Chamber of Commerce is dumping tens of thousands of dollars into getting him elected. He’s got some good environmental and energy ideas — he argues that all major new developments should have their own energy distribution systems — but on the major issues, he’s either on the wrong side or (more often) can’t seem to take a stand. He said he is “still mulling over” his stand on sit-lie. He supports Sanctuary City in theory, but not the actual measure Sup. David Campos was pushing to make the policy work. He’s not sure if he likes gang injunctions or not. He only moved back to the district when he decided to run for supervisor. He’s way too conservative for the district and would be terrible on the board.


Lynette Sweet, a BART Board member, has tax problems (and problems explaining them) and wouldn’t even come to our office for an endorsement interview. The last thing D10 needs is a supervisor who’s not accountable and unwilling to talk to constituents and the press.


So we’re going with Kelly, Lacy, and Jackson as the best hope to keep D10 from becoming a district represented by a downtown landlord candidate.


 


SAN FRANCISCO BOARD OF EDUCATION


MARGARET BRODKIN


KIM-SHREE MAUFAS


HYDRA MENDOZA


Three seats are up on the School Board, and three people will get elected. And it’s a contested race, and in situations like that, we always try to endorse a full slate.


This fall, it was, to put it mildly, a challenge.


It’s disturbing that we don’t have three strong progressive candidates with experience and qualifications to oversee the San Francisco Unified School District. But it seems to be increasingly difficult to find people who want to — and can afford to — devote the time to what’s really a 40-hour-a-week position that pays $500 a month. The part-time school board is an anachronism, a creature of a very different economic and social era. With the future of the next generation of San Franciscans at stake, it’s time to make the School Board a full-time job and pay the members a decent salary so that more parents and progressive education advocates can get involved in one of the most important political jobs in the city.


That said, we’ve chosen the best of the available candidates. It’s a mixed group, made up of people who don’t support each other and aren’t part of anyone’s slate. But on balance, they offer the best choices for the job.


This is not a time when the board needs radical change. Under Superintendent Carlos Garcia, the local public schools are making huge strides. Test scores are up, enrollment is increasing, and San Francisco is, by any rational measure, the best big-city public school district in California. We give considerable credit for that to the progressives on the board who got rid of the irascible, secretive, and hostile former Superintendent Arlene Ackerman and replaced her with Garcia. He’s brought stability and improvement to the district, and is implementing a long-term plan to bring all the schools up to the highest levels and go after the stubborn achievement gap.


Yet any superintendent and any public agency needs effective oversight. One of the problems with the district under Ackerman was the blind support she got from school board members who hired her; it was almost as if her allies on the board were unable to see the damage she was doing and unable to hold her accountable.


Our choices reflect the need for stability — and independence. We are under no illusions — none of our candidates are perfect. But as a group, we believe they can work to preserve what the district is doing right and improve on policies that aren’t working.


Kim-Shree Maufas has been a staunch progressive on the board. She got into a little trouble last year when the San Francisco Chronicle reported that she’d been using a school district credit card for personal expenses. That’s not a great move, but she never actually took public money since she paid back the district. Maufas said she thought she could use the card as long as she reimbursed the district for her own expenses; the rules are now clear and she’s had no problems since. We don’t consider this a significant enough failure in judgment to prevent her from continuing to do what she’s been doing: serving as an advocate on the board for low-income kids and teachers.


Maufas is a big supporter of restorative justice and is working for ways to reduce suspensions and expulsions. She wants to make sure advanced placement and honors classes are open to anyone who can handle the coursework. She supports the new school assignment process (as do all the major candidates), although she acknowledges that there are some potential problems. She told us she thinks the district should go back to the voters for a parcel tax to supplement existing funding for the schools.


Margaret Brodkin is a lightening rod. In fact, much of the discussion around this election seems to focus on Brodkin. Since she entered the race, she’s eclipsed all the other issues, and there’s been a nasty whisper campaign designed to keep her off the board.


We’ve had our issues with Brodkin. When she worked for Mayor Newsom, she was part of a project that brought private nonprofits into city recreation centers to provide services — at a time when unionized public employees of the Recreation and Parks Department were losing their jobs. It struck us as a clear privatization effort by the Newsom administration, and it raised a flag that’s going to become increasingly important in the school district: there’s a coming clash between people who think private nonprofits can provide more services to the schools and union leaders who fear that low-paid nonprofit workers will wind up doing jobs now performed by unionized district staff. And Brodkin’s role in the Newsom administration — and her background in the nonprofit world — is certainly ground for some concern.


But Brodkin is also by far the most qualified person to run for San Francisco school board in years, maybe decades. She’s a political legend in the city, the person who is most responsible for making issues of children and youth a centerpiece of the progressive agenda. In her years as director of Coleman Advocates for Children and Youth, she tirelessly worked to make sure children weren’t overlooked in the budget process and was one of the authors of the initiative that created the Children’s Fund. She’s run a nonprofit, run a city department, and is now working on education issues.


She’s a feisty person who can be brusque and isn’t always conciliatory — but those characteristics aren’t always bad. Sup. Chris Daly used his anger and passion to push for social justice on the Board of Supervisors and, despite some drawbacks, he’s been an effective public official.


And Brodkin is full of good ideas. She talks about framing what a 21st century education looks like, about creating community schools, about aligning after-school and summer programs with the academic curriculum. She wants the next school bond act to include a central kitchen, so local kids can get locally produced meals (the current lunch fare is shipped in frozen from out of state).


Brodkin needs to remember that there’s a difference between being a bare-knuckles advocate and a member of a functioning school board. But given her skills, experience, and lifetime in progressive causes, we’re willing to give her a chance.


We also struggled over endorsing Hydra Mendoza. She works for Mayor Newsom as an education advisor — and that’s an out-front conflict of interest. She’s a fan of Obama’s Education Secretary, Arne Duncan, whose policies are regressive and dangerous.


On the other hand, she cares deeply about kids and public education. She’s not a big supporter of charter schools (“I’ve yet to see a charter school that offers anything we can’t do ourselves,” she told us) and while she was on the wrong side of a lot of issues (like JROTC) early in her tenure, over the past two years she’s been a good School Board member.


There are several other candidates worth mentioning. Bill Barnes, an aide to Michela Alioto-Pier, is a good guy, a decent progressive — but has no experience in or direct connection to the public schools. Natasha Hoehn is in the education nonprofit world and speaks with all the jargon of the educrat, but her proposals and her stands on issues are vague. Emily Murase is a strong parent advocate with some good ideas, but she struck us as a bit too conservative (particularly on JROTC and charter schools.) Jamie Wolfe teaches at a private school but lacks any real constituency or experience in local politics and the education community.


So given a weak field with limited alternatives, we’re going with Maufas, Brodkin and Mendoza.


 


SAN FRANCISCO COMMUNITY COLLEGE BOARD


JOHN RIZZO


The San Francisco Community College District has been a mess for years, and it’s only now starting to get back on track. That’s the result of the election of a few progressive reformers — Milton Marks, Chris Jackson, and John Rizzo, who now have enough clout on the seven-member board to drag along a fourth vote when they need it.


But the litany of disasters they’ve had to clean up is almost endless. A chancellor (who other incumbent board members supported until the end) is now under indictment. Public money that was supposed to go to the district wound up in a political campaign. An out-of-control semiprivate college foundation has been hiding its finances from the public. The college shifted bond money earmarked for an arts center into a gigantic, expensive gym with a pool that the college can’t even pay to operate, so it’s leased out to a private high school across the street.


And the tragedy is that all three incumbents — two of whom should have stepped down years ago — are running unopposed.


With all the attention on the School Board and district elections, not one progressive — in fact, not one candidate of any sort — has stepped forward to challenge Anita Grier and Lawrence Wong. So they’ll get another term, and the reformers will have to continue to struggle.


We’re endorsing only Rizzo, a Sierra Club staffer who has been in the lead in the reform bloc. He needs to end up as the top vote-getter, which would put him in position to be the board president. Rizzo has worked to get the district’s finances and foundation under control and he richly deserves reelection.


 


BART BOARD OF DIRECTORS, DISTRICT 8


BERT HILL


It’s about time somebody mounted a serious challenge to James Fang, the only elected Republican in San Francisco and a member of one of the most dysfunctional public agencies in California. The BART Board is a mess, spending a fortune on lines that are hardly ever used and unable to work effectively with other transit agencies or control a police force that has a history of brutality and senseless killing.


Fang supports the suburban extensions and Oakland Airport connector, which make no fiscal or transportation sense. He’s ignored problems with the BART Police for 20 years. It’s time for him to leave office.


Bert Hill is a strong challenger. A professional cost-management executive, he understands that BART is operating on an old paradigm of carrying people from the suburbs into the city. “Before we go on building any more extensions,” he told us, “we should take care of San Francisco.” He wants the agency to work closely with Muni and agrees there’s a need for a BART sunshine policy to make the notoriously secretive agency more open to public scrutiny. We strongly endorse him.


 


ASSESSOR-RECORDER


PHIL TING


San Francisco needs an aggressive assessor who looks for every last penny that big corporations are trying to duck paying — but this is also a job that presents an opportunity for challenging the current property tax laws. Phil Ting’s doing pretty well with the first part — and unlike past assessors, is actually stepping up to the plate on the second. He’s been pushing a statewide coalition to reform Prop. 13 — and while it’s an uphill battle, it’s good to see a tax assessor taking it on. Ting has little opposition and will be reelected easily.


 


PUBLIC DEFENDER


JEFF ADACHI


Adachi’s done a great job of running the office that represents indigent criminal defendants. He’s been outspoken on criminal justice issues. Until this year, he was often mentioned as a potential progressive candidate for mayor.


That’s over now. Because Adachi decided (for reasons we still can’t comprehend) to join the national attack on public employees and put Prop. B on the ballot, he’s lost any hope of getting support for higher office from the left. And since the moderate and conservative forces will never be comfortable with a public defender moving up in the political world, Adachi’s not going anywhere anytime soon.


Which is fine. He’s doing well at his day job. We wish he’d stuck to it and not taken on a divisive, expensive, and ill-conceived crusade to cut health care benefits for city employees.


 


SAN FRANCISCO SUPERIOR COURT


SEAT 15


MICHAEL NAVA


To hear some of the brahmins of the local bench and bar tell it, the stakes in this election are immense — the independence of the judiciary hangs in the balance. If a sitting judge who is considered eminently qualified for the job and has committed no ethical or legal breaches can be challenged by an outsider who is seeking more diversity on the bench, it will open the floodgates to partisan hacks taking on good judges — and force judicial candidates to raise money from lawyers and special interests, thus undermining the credibility of the judiciary.


We are well aware of the problems of judicial elections around the country. In some states, big corporations that want to influence judges raise and spend vast sums on trial and appellate court races — and typically get their way. In Iowa, three judges who were willing to stand on principle and Constitutional law and declare same-sex marriage legal are facing what amounts to a well-funded recall effort. California is not immune — in more conservative counties, liberal judges face getting knocked off the bench by law-and-order types.


It’s a serious issue. It’s worth a series of hearings in the state Legislature, and it might be worth Constitutional change. Maybe trial-court elections should be eliminated. Maybe all judicial elections should have public campaign financing. But right now, it’s an elected office — at least in theory.


In practice, the vast majority of the judicial slots in California are filled by appointment. Judges serve for four-year terms but tend to retire or step down in midterm, allowing the governor to fill the vacancy. Unless someone files specifically to challenge an incumbent, typically appointed judge, that race never even appears on the ballot.


The electoral process is messy and political, and raising money is unseemly for a judicial officer. But the appointment process is hardly pure, either — and governors in California have, over the past 30 years, appointed the vast majority of the judges from the ranks of big corporate law firms and district attorney’s offices.


There are, of course, exceptions, and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has been better than his predecessor, Democrat Gray Davis. But overall, public interest lawyers, public defenders, and people with small community practices (and, of course, people who have no political strings to pull in Sacramento) have been frustrated. And it’s no surprise that some have sought to run against incumbents.


That’s what’s happening here. Michael Nava, a gay Latino who has been working as a research attorney for California Supreme Court Justice Carlos Moreno, was going to run for a rare open seat this year, but the field quickly got crowded. So Nava challenged Richard Ulmer, a corporate lawyer appointed by Schwarzenegger who has been on the bench a little more than a year.


We will stipulate, as the lawyers say: Ulmer has done nothing wrong. From all accounts, he’s a fine judge (and before taking the bench, he did some stellar pro bono work fighting for reforms in the juvenile detention system). So there are two questions here: Should Nava have even filed to run against Ulmer? And since he did, who is the better candidate?


It’s important to understand this isn’t a case of special interests and that big money wanting to oust a judge because of his politics or rulings. Nava isn’t backed by any wealthy interest. There’s no clear parallel to the situations in other areas and other states where the judiciary is being compromised by electoral politics. Nava had every right to run — and has mounted an honest campaign that discusses the need for diversity on the bench.


Ulmer’s supporters note — correctly — that the San Francisco courts have more ethnic and gender diversity than any county in the state. And we’re not going to try to come to a conclusion here about how much diversity is enough.


But we will say that life experience matters, and judges bring to the bench what they’ve lived. Nava, who is the grandson of Mexican immigrants and the first person in his family to go to college, may have a different perspective on how low-income people of color are treated in the courts than a former Republican who spent his professional career in big law firms.


We were impressed by Nava’s background and knowledge — and by his interest in opening up the courts. He supports cameras in the courtrooms and allowing reporters to record court proceedings. He told us the meetings judges hold on court administration should be open to the public.


We’re willing to discuss whether judicial elections make sense. Meanwhile, judges who don’t like the idea of challenges should encourage their colleagues not to retire in midterm. If all the judges left at the end of a four-year term, there would be plenty of open seats and fewer challenges. But for now, there’s nothing in this particular election that makes us fear for the independence of the courts. Vote for Nava.


 


>>BACK TO ENDORSEMENTS 2010

Endorsements 2010: State races

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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Endorsements 2010: State races

GOVERNOR

EDMUND G. BROWN

We have issues with Jerry Brown. The one-time environmental leader who left an admirable progressive legacy his first time in the governor’s office (including the Agricultural Labor Relations Board, the California Conservation Corps, and the liberal Rose Bird Supreme Court) and who is willing to stand up and oppose the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant has become a centrist, tough-on-crime, no-new-taxes candidate. And his only solution to the state budget problems is to bring all the players together early and start talking.

But at least since he’s started to debate Republican Meg Whitman face to face, he’s showing some signs of life — and flashes of the old Jerry. He’s strongly denouncing Whitman’s proposal to wipe out capital gains taxes, reminding voters of the huge hole that would blow in the state budget — and the $5 billion windfall it would give to the rich. He’s talking about suing Wall Street financial firms that cheated Californians. He’s promoting green jobs and standing firm in support of the state’s greenhouse-gas emissions limits.

For all his drawbacks (his insistence, for example, that the Legislature shouldn’t raise any taxes without a statewide vote of the people), Brown is at least part of the reality-based community. He understands that further tax cuts for the rich won’t solve California’s problems. He knows that climate change is real. He’s not great on immigration issues, but at least he’s cognizant that 2 million undocumented immigrants live in California — and the state can’t just arrest and deport them all.

Whitman is more than a conservative Republican. She’s scary. The centerpiece of her economic platform calls for laying off 40,000 state employees — thereby greatly increasing the state’s unemployment rate. Her tax plan would increase the state’s deficit by another $5 billion just so that a tiny number of the richest taxpayers (including her) can keep more of their money. She’s part of the nativist movement that wants to close the borders.

She’s also one of the growing number of candidates who think personal wealth and private-sector business success translate to an ability to run a complex state government. That’s a dangerous trend — Whitman has no political experience or background (until recently she didn’t even vote) and will be overcome by the lobbyists in Sacramento.

This is a critically important election for California. Vote for Jerry Brown.

 

LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR

 

GAVIN NEWSOM

Why is the mayor of San Francisco running for a job he once dismissed as worthless? Simple: he couldn’t get elected governor, and he wants a place to perch for a while until he figures out what higher office he can seek. It’s almost embarrassing in its cold political calculus, but that’s something we’ve come to expect from Newsom.

We endorsed Newsom’s opponent, Janice Hahn, in the Democratic primary. It was hard to make a case for advancing the political career of someone who has taken what amounts to a Republican approach to running the city’s finances — he’s addressed every budget problem entirely with cuts, pushed a “no-new-taxes” line, and given the wealthy everything they wanted. His immigration policies have broken up families and promoted deporting kids. He’s done Pacific Gas and Electric Co. a nice favor by doing nothing to help the community choice aggregation program move forward.

Nevertheless, we’re endorsing Newsom over his Republican opponent, Abel Maldonado, because there really isn’t any choice. Maldonado is a big supporter of the death penalty (which Newsom opposes). He’s pledged never to raise taxes (and Newsom is at least open to discussion on the issue). He used budget blackmail to force the awful open-primaries law onto the ballot. He’s a supporter of big water projects like the peripheral canal. In the Legislature, he earned a 100 percent rating from the California Chamber of Commerce.

Newsom’s a supporter of more funding for higher education (and the lieutenant governor sits on the University of California Board of Regents). He’d be at least a moderate environmentalist on the state Lands Commission. And he, like Brown, is devoting a lot of attention to improving the state’s economy with green jobs.

We could do much worse than Newsom in the lieutenant governor’s office. We could have Maldonado. Vote for Newsom.

 

SECRETARY OF STATE

 

DEBRA BOWEN

California has had some problems with the office that runs elections and keeps corporate filings. Kevin Shelley had to resign from the job in 2005 in the face of allegations that a state grant of $125,000 was illegally diverted into his campaign account. But Bowen, by all accounts, has run a clean office. Her Republican opponent, Damon Dunn, a former professional football player and real estate agent, doesn’t even have much support within his own party and is calling for mandatory ID checks at the ballot. This one’s easy; vote for Bowen.

 

CONTROLLER

 

JOHN CHIANG

Chiang’s been a perfectly decent controller, and at times has shown some political courage: When Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger tried to cut the pay of state employees to minimum-wage level, Chiang refused to go along — and forced the governor to back down. His opponent, state Sen. Tony Strickland (R-Los Angeles), wants to use to office to promote cuts in government spending. Vote for Chiang.

 

TREASURER

 

BILL LOCKYER

Lockyer’s almost certain to win reelection as treasurer against a weak Republican, Mimi Walters. He’s done an adequate job and pushed a few progressive things like using state bonds to promote alternative energy. Mostly, though, he seems to be waiting for his chance to run for governor — and if Jerry Brown loses, or wins and decides not to seek a second term, look for Lockyer to step up.

 

ATTORNEY GENERAL

 

KAMALA HARRIS

This is going to be close, and it’s another clear choice. We’ve had our differences with Harris — she’s trying too hard to be a tough-on-crime type, pushing some really dumb bills in Sacramento (like a measure that would bar sex offenders from ever using social networking sites on the Internet). And while she shouldn’t take all the blame for the problems in the San Francisco crime lab, she should have known about the situation earlier and made more of a fuss. She’s also been slow to respond to serious problem of prosecutors and the cops hiding information about police misconduct from defense lawyers that could be relevant to a case.

But her opponent, Los Angeles D.A. Steve Cooley, is bad news. He’s a big proponent of the death penalty, and the ACLU last year described L.A. as the leading “killer county in the country.” Cooley has proudly sent 50 people to death row since he became district attorney in 2001, and he vows to make it easier and more efficient for the state to kill people.

He’s also a friend of big business who has vowed, even as attorney general, to make the state more friendly to employers — presumably by slowing prosecutions of corporate wrongdoing.

Harris, to her credit, has refused to seek the death penalty in San Francisco, and would bring the perspective of a woman of color to the AG’s office. For all her flaws, she would be far better in the AG’s office than Cooley. Vote for Harris.

 

INSURANCE COMMISSIONER

 

DAVE JONES

Jones, currently a state Assemblymember from Sacramento, won a contested primary against his Los Angeles colleague Hector de la Torre and is now fighting Republican Mike Villines of Fresno, also a member of the Assembly. Jones is widely known as a consumer advocate and was a foe of Prop. 17, the insurance industry scam on the June ballot. A former Legal Aid lawyer, he has extensive experience in health-care reform, supports single-payer health coverage, and would make an excellent insurance commissioner.

Villines pretty much follows right-wing orthodoxy down the line. He wants to replace employer-based insurance with health savings accounts. He argues that the solution to the cost of health insurance is to limit malpractice lawsuits. He wants to limit workers compensation claims. And he supports “alternatives to litigation,” which means eliminating the rights of consumers to sue insurance companies.

Not much question here. Vote for Jones.

 

BOARD OF EQUALIZATION, DISTRICT 1

 

BETTY YEE

The Board of Equalization isn’t well known, but it plays a sizable role in setting and enforcing California tax policy. Yee’s a strong progressive who has done well in the office, supporting progressive financial measures. She’s spoken out — as a top tax official — in favor of legalizing and taxing marijuana. We’re happy to endorse her for another term.

 

SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION

 

TOM TORLAKSON

We fully expected a November runoff between Torlakson and state Sen. Gloria Romero. Both Democrats had strong fundraising and political bases — and very different philosophies. Romero’s a big charter school and privatization fan; Torlakson has the support of the teachers unions. But to the surprise of nearly everyone, a wild-card candidate, retired Los Angeles educator Larry Aceves, came in first, with Torlakson second and Romero third. Now Aceves and Torlakson are in the runoff for this nonpartisan post.

Aceves is an interesting candidate, a former principal and school superintendent who has the endorsement of the San Francisco Chronicle and the San Francisco Green Party. But he’s too quick to take the easy line that the teachers’ unions are the biggest problem in public education, and he wants the unilateral right to suspend labor contracts.

Torlakson wants more charter-school accountability and more funding for primary education. He’s the far better candidate.

 

STATE SENATE

 

DISTRICT 8

Leland Yee

Yee’s got no opposition to speak of, and will easily be re-elected. So why is he spending money on a series of slick television ads that have been airing all over San Francisco, talking about education and sending people to his website? It’s pretty obvious: The Yee for state Senate campaign is the opening act of the Yee for San Francisco mayor campaign, which should kick into high gear sometime next spring. In other words, if Yee has his way, he’ll serve only a year of his next four-year term.

Yee infuriates his colleagues at times, particularly when he refuses to vote for a budget that nobody likes but everyone knows is necessary to keep the state afloat. He’s done some ridiculous things, like pushing to sell the Cow Palace as surplus state property and turn the land over to private real estate developers. But he’s always good on open-government issues, is pushing for greater accountability for companies that take tax breaks and then send jobs out of state, has pushed for accountability at the University of California, and made great progress in opening the records at semiprivate university foundations when he busted Stanislaus State University for its secret speaking-fees deal with Sarah Palin.

With a few strong reservations, we’ll endorse Yee for another term.

 

STATE ASSEMBLY, DISTRICT 12

 

FIONA MA

A clear hold-your-nose endorsement. Ma has done some truly bad things in Sacramento, like pushing a bill that would force the San Francisco Unified School District to allow military recruiters in the high schools and fronting for landlords on a bill to limit rent control in trailer parks. But she’s good on public power and highly critical of PG&E, and she has no opposition to speak of.

 

STATE ASSEMBLY, DISTRICT 13

 

TOM AMMIANO

Ammiano’s a part of San Francisco history, and without his leadership as a supervisor, we might not have a progressive majority on the Board of Supervisors. Ammiano was one of the architects of the return to district elections, and his 1999 mayoral campaign (against Willie Brown) marked a turning point in the organization, sophistication, and ultimate success of the city’s left. He was the author of the rainy day fund (which has kept the public schools from massive layoffs over the past couple of years) and the Healthy San Francisco plan.

In Sacramento, he’s been a leader in the effort to legalize (and tax) marijuana and to demand accountability for the BART Police. He’s taken on the unpleasant but critical task of chairing the Public Safety Committee and killing the worst of the right-wing crime bills before they get to the floor. He has four more years in Sacramento, and we expect to see a lot more solid progressive legislation coming out of his office. We enthusiastically endorse him for reelection.

 

STATE ASSEMBLY, DISTRICT 14

 

NANCY SKINNER

Skinner’s a good progressive, a good ally for Ammiano on the Public Safety Committee, and a friend of small business and fair taxation. Her efforts to make out-of-state companies that sell products in California pay state sales tax would not only bring millions into the state coffers but protect local merchants from the likes of Amazon. We don’t get why she’s joined with Berkeley Mayor Tom Bates to try to get rid of Kriss Worthington, the most progressive member of the Berkeley City Council, but we’ll endorse her for re-election.

 

STATE ASSEMBLY, DISTRICT 16

 

SANDRE SWANSON

Swanson’s a good vote most of the time in Sacramento, but he’s not yet the leader he could be — particularly on police accountability. The BART Police murdered Oscar Grant in Swanson’s district, yet it fell to a San Franciscan, Tom Ammiano, to introduce strong state legislation to force BART to have civilian oversight of the transit cops. Still, he’s done some positive things (like protecting state workers who blow the whistle on fraud) and deserves another term.

 

>>BACK TO ENDORSEMENTS 2010

Nevius pushes for another crackdown, but it’s not an agenda

Sasha Cuttler
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28
Nevius pushes for another crackdown, but it’s not an agenda

At last week’s California Music and Culture Association forum on San Francisco’s war on fun, I was on a media panel with San Francisco Chronicle columnist CW Nevius that answered questions posed by the audience, and Nevius steadfastly denied that he has any kind of agenda in writing so regularly about the need to crackdown on nightlife and streetlife. But his column today is yet another example proactively pushing that very agenda.

Nevius (who didn’t respond to my inquiry on the issue this morning or a follow-up this afternoon) was a Chronicle sportswriter for 20 years before being given a Metro news column that consistently has a reactionary, politically unsophisticated take on San Francisco life, following in the mold of predecessor Ken Garcia. His recent crusades include calling for crackdowns on the homeless in Golden Gate Park, on young people on the streets of the Haight and downtown, and on nightclubs whose patrons have engaged in violence, trumpeting “public safety” as the political priority that trumps everything else.

On Sept. 19, Nevius published yet another column promoting the sit-lie ordinance that he has championed since even before its official inception, which Mayor Gavin Newsom placed on the November ballot as Measure L. In that column, “City citations show need for sit-lie,” Nevius detailed how those cited for quality-of-life infractions such a blocking sidewalks or public drinking or urination – mostly poor vagrants on the margins of society – rarely get significantly punished by the courts. Using painfully tortured logic that I still don’t understand, he used that situation as an argument for creating a new quality-of-life infraction – sitting or lying on sidewalks – that would probably be similarly ignored by both its targets and the courts.

“Only the most stubborn sidewalk sitter stays in place, daring the officer to write a citation. Sit/lie, by encouraging that kind of common sense compliance, should actually cut down on the number of cases coming through the court system, a system that is demonstrably ineffective,” Nevius wrote, making the argument that a new category of crimes will somehow lower the number of people headed into the court system. Again, I don’t understand the logic either, and Nevius hasn’t responded to my inquiries.

But today, Nevius follows up that column with the “news” that some city officials are now considering developing a pilot program for socking it to the top 40 “sidewalk scofflaws,” as Nevius labels them. Both columns feature the same cop, Officer Gary Buckner, who writes a lot of these quality-of-life tickets, and the same officials who share Nevius’ public safety priorities and love to score political points with conservatives and moderates by scapegoating the poor and homeless.

During the CMAC forum, I copped to the Guardian’s perspective and the fact that we do promote an agenda that seeks to make San Francisco a more progressive and tolerant place, acknowledging and sometimes celebrating urban realities, even when they are sometimes loud, stinky, and perhaps a little scary. Hey, that’s life the big city.

But Nevius and the Chronicle pretend that they aren’t pushing back with an agenda of their own, one that seeks to impose on this great city the conservative values of Walnut Creek, where Nevius lived until earlier this year, where everything is well-scrubbed and the poor are effectively policed into the shadows or edges of town. Nevius says that he’s just an objective journalist covering the news, something that most San Franciscans see as laughably dishonest.

Of course they’re pushing an agenda in collaboration with the cops, Mayor Gavin Newsom and reactionary politicians of his ilk, and the downtown interests who value tourist dollars more than the lives and rights of the poorest San Franciscans. And if they were more honest about that intention, and willing to publicly debate our respective positions in good faith, I’m confident that most San Franciscans would share the Guardian’s agenda for the city.

C’mon, Chuck, what do you say?

Endorsement interviews: Janet Reilly

Zelda Bronstein
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3
Endorsement interviews: Janet Reilly

District 2 supervisorial candidate Janet Reilly is running to represent San Francisco’s most conservative political district, and even though she has the support of many progressive groups and the local Democratic Party, she’s running on a platform of mostly conservative positions. She opposes all the revenue measures on the November ballot and argues that closing the big budget deficits the city faces in coming years should involve “more fiscal discipline” and making cuts to wasteful city programs and the city money going to nonprofit groups.

But when asked how she’d be an improvement on incumbent Sup. Michela Alioto-Pier, an uncompromising conservative who consistently votes against the board’s progressive majority, Reilly says that she has good relationships with local leaders off all political stripes and will therefore be able to play a key role in facilitating good policy discussions and compromises.

Reilly, who ran for the California Assembly on a platform of health care reform a couple years ago, also touted her recent efforts working with the Volunteers in Medicine Institute to open a free health clinic in the Excelsior District, which will open soon and offer no-cost health services to residents of that district and Daly City, two local region’s with the greatest need.

“It activates a potentially powerful group of volunteers in the city,” she said of the program’s volunteer doctors and nurses, many of whom have retired.

Reilly also emphasized the need to stimulate the local economy with business tax breaks and other mechanisms. You can listen to our full interview here:

 

 

WS reilly by endorsements2010

The District 8 dilemma

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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13
The District 8 dilemma

tredmond@sfbg.com

Gabriel Haaland, a longtime queer labor activist, was talking to a friend from District 8 the other day, chatting about the race for a supervisor to fill the shoes of Harvey Milk, Harry Britt, Mark Leno, and Bevan Dufty. “She told me that she didn’t know who to vote for,” Haaland said, “because she didn’t know who the progressive was in the race.”

For supporters of Rafael Mandelman, that’s a serious challenge. “The polls are very consistent,” Haaland said. “Most of the voters in D-8 would prefer a progressive over a moderate, and when they know who the progressive is, they support that candidate.”

But oddly enough, although District 8 — the Castro, Noe Valley, and parts of the Mission — is one of the most politically active parts of the city, where voter turnout is consistently high, the supervisorial race is getting only limited media attention. The neighborhood and queer papers are doing a good job of covering the race, but for the rest of the media, it’s as if nothing’s happening. And that’s left voters confused about what ought to be a very clear choice.

The San Francisco Chronicle featured the District 6 race on the front page Sept. 19, with a long story about how demographic changes in the South of Market area would affect the successor to Sup. Chris Daly. District 10, with the mad political scrum of 22 candidates, no clear front runner and endorsements all over the map, has received considerable media attention.

Yet D–8 — which offers by far the most striking distinctions between candidates and the sharpest divisions over issues — has been flying under the radar.

Three major candidates are in the race, two gay men and a lesbian. All of them, for what it’s worth, are lawyers. Rafael Mandelman, who works for a firm that advises cities and counties, has the support of the vast majority of progressive leaders and organizations. Rebecca Prozan, a deputy district attorney, and Scott Wiener, a deputy city attorney, are very much on the moderate-centrist (some would say, by San Francisco standards, conservative) side of the political spectrum.

“As Barbara Boxer has said in her ads, the choice is clear,” Aaron Peskin, chair of the local Democratic Party and a Mandelman backer, told us. “Not to exaggerate, but this is like Boxer v. Carly Fiornia, and Rafael is our Boxer.”

Yet by almost all accounts, Wiener is ahead in the race.

 

ON THE ISSUES

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors has been roughly divided in the past decade between the progressive camp and moderate camp. And while those labels are hard to define (the Chronicle won’t even use the term “progressive,” preferring “ultraliberal”), most observers have a basic grip on the differences.

The moderates, who tend to support Mayor Gavin Newsom, are social liberals but fiscal conservatives. They talk about the city surviving budget red ink without major tax increases. They talk about controlling government spending and increasing public safety. The progressives generally see local government as underfunded after four years of brutal cuts and support the idea of raising new revenue to fill the gap. They support tenants over landlords, seek stronger protections for affordable housing, support Sanctuary City, and oppose sit-lie.

Certainly with Wiener and Mandelman, it’s abundantly clear where the candidates fall. The two agree on some things (they both oppose Prop. B, the pension-reform measure that would reduce health care payments for the children of city employees) and they both support nightlife. But overall, they take very different political stands.

Wiener told us, for example, that the city’s structural budget problems won’t be solved without cuts. “We’re not going to able to tax our way out of this,” he said in an endorsement interview. “We have to lower our expectations for government.”

Other than Muni, public safety, and core public health services, cuts “will have to be across the board,” he said. “What are the things we really can’t do without?”

Wiener supports the sit-lie proposal, saying that he doesn’t think the local police have the tools they need to get poorly behaving people off the streets. He doesn’t support Sup. Ross Mirkarimi’s measure mandating foot patrols because, he told us, he doesn’t think the supervisors should micromanage the Police Department.

Sup. Bevan Dufty, who currently holds the D–8 seat, has voted with the progressives occasionally — but almost never on tenant issues. And Wiener, who has the support of the rabidly anti-tenant Small Property Owners of San Francisco, is likely to follow that approach. Although he told us he supports rent control (which just about everyone in local politics agrees on at this point), he’s not a fan of additional protections against evictions and condo conversions. “I’m not prepared to go beyond what we have now” on eviction protections, he said. He supported Newsom’s plan to allow people to buy their way out of the waiting list and lottery for condo conversions.

And when it comes to public power, he’s to the right of the incumbent: Dufty has said repeatedly that he supports the city taking over Pacific Gas and Electric Co.’s infrastructure and putting the city in control of a full-scale public power system. Wiener says he supports community choice aggregation (CCA), but not full-scale public power.

Mandelman is a big supporter of local government and says, without hesitation, that the city needs more revenue. “The public sector is dramatically underfunded,” he told us in a recent interview. “There’s great wealth in the city and it needs to be tapped to preserve public services.” Mandelman said he’s not “tax happy,” but told us that the structure of how the city raises revenue is a mess. He supports a top-to-bottom review of the city’s revenue base with the goal of making taxation more progressive — and bringing in enough money to fund crucial services.

Mandelman is a foe of sit-lie, which he sees as punitive and ineffective. He opposes gang injunctions and supports Sanctuary City. And he’s a strong advocate for tenants, supporting stronger eviction protections and limits on condo conversions that take away affordable rental stock.

“You have to look at the candidates and ask what their priorities are,” he said. “Are the displacement of long-time residents critically important or something that’s not on the top of the list? Do you believe we need to rebuild the safety net? Or is queer politics all about property values?”

Prozan told us that she’s the one who can “bring the two sides together” and said that, like Dufty, she is “right up the middle.” She supports the hotel tax and the vehicle license fee and opposes sit-lie, but also thinks gang injunctions are a useful tool for law enforcement. She doesn’t see any reason to split appointments between the mayor and the supervisors for the board that oversees Muni or the Redevelopment Agency. She doesn’t think the city can or should do anything more about the conversion of rental property to tenancies in common, but supports the idea of taking over foreclosed properties to create housing for teachers, cops, and firefighters. So it’s safe to say the Prozan would probably be similar to the incumbent — with the progressives on a few things, against them on others.

 

UNDER THE RADAR?

Wiener and Mandelman agree on two basic points: there are stark differences between the candidates — and the city’s major media outlets aren’t paying enough attention. That’s probably because the relatively tame politics doesn’t compare to the sort of wild excitement you see in Districts 6 and 10.

“There’s less chaos than some of the other districts,” Wiener said. “The three major candidates are all hard-working, respected people who have all lived in the district a while.”

He also agreed that he and Mandelman have “very different visions” for the district and the city, and that there are sharp contrasts and divisions between the two candidates.

Prozan also argued that the political differences on issues aren’t going to be the only — or even the deciding — factor for many voters. “I think they’re looking for who’s got the courage and independence to do what’s right,” she told us.

But Mandelman told us there’s a crucial story here that needs to be told: “It’s a definitional fight about what the queer community is about in 2010. As goes D–8, so goes San Francisco.”

Editor’s Notes

David Talbot
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0
Editor’s Notes

Tredmond@sfbg.com

On Sept. 16, supporters of Proposition B, the pension reform measure that would also reduce health care benefits for the children of city workers, held a fundraiser at Le Méridien Hotel — which is one of the hotels on the union boycott list. That was a bad idea, and it put Public Defender Jeff Adachi, the sponsor of Prop. B, in a difficult bind. His proposition, his fundraiser — and he had to cross a picket line to get in the door. So did former mayor Willie Brown, who was one of the fundraiser’s feature guests.

Labor people were furious about the two Democrats crossing the line. Labor Council Executive Director Tim Paulson told Guardian City Editor Steven T. Jones that the move was "outrageous." At the very least, it’s highly unusual in this labor town.

And I thought of something else unusual: Brown, who among other things is a San Francisco Chronicle columnist, was helping host a political fundraiser. That’s interesting because just a few weeks earlier, the conservative San Francisco Coalition for Responsible Growth invited the Chron’s C.W. Nevius to speak at a fundraising event — and when the SF Appeal reported on it, Chron management told Nevius that wasn’t allowed.

What’s the difference? One columnist can do fundraisers and one can’t? When I asked Chron Editor Ward Bushee, he referred me to a Matier and Ross column, which included a quote on the matter from Managing Editor Steve Proctor:

"When we gave him a column, we never had any illusion he would cease to be involved in politics. I think the readers of the Chronicle understand that."
So it’s one standard for Willie, another for everyone else. Just like old times.

Adachi crosses the line

Sasha Cuttler
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87

Former Mayor Willie Brown and Public Defender Jeff Adachi – author of Prop. B, which would require city employees to pay more for their pension and health care costs – yesterday crossed a union picket line at Le Méridien, which is being boycotted by hotel workers with Unite-Here Local 2, to attend a fundraiser for the measure.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6K8FkTt7pM

San Francisco Labor Council President Tim Paulson called it “such an outrageous thing in San Francisco.” Even Sup. Sean Elsbernd, perhaps the most conservative member of the Board of Supervisor, was shocked today when told of Adachi’s crossing the line, saying he would have never done so. Local 2 spokesperson Riddhi Mehta told us, “It shows their true colors. By no means are they for working families.”

Adachi has been public enemy number one of local labor leaders since he authored the measure with little input from unions or other public officials, and Paulson said this action was emblematic of Adachi’s hostility to unions, adding that it was even more surprising to see Brown, a longtime ally of unions, supporting the measure and crossing the line.

“It was not unexpected for Jeff Adachi, with the way he’s been acting lately, not caring about labor, but it was a little surprising for Willie Brown considering his career and record,” Paulson said.

Adachi told the Guardian that he was unaware at the time that it was a Local 2 picket line. “The honest truth is that when I got there, I thought it was a protest against Prop. B,” Adachi said. Yet he also that even if he had know, “I still would have went to the event.”

“I completely support the workers’ right to strike, but at the same time, I am on a mission to save the city $120 million a year,” Adachi told us. “The resources that the opponents are pouring into this are completely unreal.”

La Merdien has been on the Local 2 boycott list for several months, and both Paulson and Mehta said the picket was independent of Prop. B, although some SEIU members did show up with signs criticizing the measure. As for scheduling future fundraisers at other boycotted hotels, Adachi told us, “I’ll be more mindful of that.”

Five things you should know about Steve Moss

David Talbot
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29
Five things you should know about Steve Moss

Sarah@sfbg.com

In August 2010, Steve Moss, who is running for District 10 supervisor, took out an ad in the Potrero View, which he owns, titled “Five things you need to know about Steve Moss.”

The ad, paid for by Moss’ political campaign, stated that Moss “edits and publishes this very paper (but got its endorsement on his own merits).” A year earlier, when Moss filed for the D–10 race, he promised in the View that “the paper will not endorse any of the contenders.” Reached by phone, Moss said that part of the ad was intended as a joke.

The other four bullet points seemed to be factual statements about Moss’ accomplishments. But Moss’ misleading ad got the Guardian taking a closer look, and, along the way, we found a lot of other things you probably didn’t know about Moss.

As far as we know, none of these things are illegal, and Moss can certainly argue that none of them are wrong. But since this is a progressive district, we thought voters would want to know a little more before the November election.

1. He’s a carpetbagger

Moss portrays himself as a District 10 resident who spent the last decade raising his family on Potrero Hill. In fact, during 2008 and 2009, Moss wasn’t living on Potrero Hill at all. When he filed his intent to run in the D–10 race in 2009, he was living near Dolores Park in a four-floor, four-unit, $1.6 million apartment building he owns. And shortly before he filed his intent to seek office, Moss’ wife told friends that the family was only moving to District 10 so Moss could run for supervisor, and that if he lost, they would be moving back to the Dolores Park area.

In his declaration of intent to run, a legal document he signed under penalty of perjury Aug. 4, 2009, Moss listed his address as 2325 Third St. That address is where the View; Moss’ nonprofit San Francisco Community Power; and M.Cubed, Moss’ private consulting company, share space. It’s also where where the Moss campaign asked supporters to send checks. It’s not where Moss was living with his family.

Indeed, evidence that came to light in a lawsuit between Moss and his wife, Debbie Findling, and a couple who co-own the property where Moss used to reside on Kansas Street, indicate that he moved out of D-10 in November 2007 and was living at 296 Liberty Street, in District 8, until February 2010.

In a July 8, 2009 e-mail to friends, filed in court in this lawsuit, Moss’ wife noted: “Steven has decided to run for city supervisor in District 10!!! (Sophie Maxwell’s term ends in November 2010) so we’ll be moving back to the hill in early spring! If you hear of any lovely rentals let us know. Or — I know it’s a crazy idea — but if you’re interested in swapping houses with us for a year as an even trade, you can move into our place on Dolores Park! (We’re hedging our bets in case he doesn’t win, we’d be moving back to Dolores Park after the elections. If he does win, we’ll find a long-term place to live … ).”

Reached by phone, Moss told us that it was only his candidate intention statement — a form that allows a candidate to start to raise money — that he filed while living at Liberty Street in 2009, not his official declaration of candidacy form. The language on the two forms is slightly different; the intent form only asks for a “street address” while the actual declaration of candidacy asks for a “residence” address.

Moss said he filed his declaration of candidacy a few days before the deadline, this summer. That form requires candidates to have resided in the district for not less than 30 days immediately preceding the date they file.

Moss insisted that he currently lives in a rental house at 2145 18th Street. “I’m planning to win,” Moss told us. “And we’re very much enjoying the house on Potrero Hill and hoping to stay there.”

2. He managed to avoid the condo lottery.

Moss and his wife bought a two-unit house on Kansas Street in May 2000 for $648,000 and filed for a condo conversion permit in 2002. San Francisco only allows only 200 condo conversions a year. It’s tough to get a permit, it’s very lucrative if you do, and most applicants — including two-unit buildings with a single owner — have to enter a lottery. But thanks to a strange short-term loophole in the law, Moss managed to get away without doing that.

The application, which got tentative approval in March 2004, notes that Moss and his wife — single owners of a two-unit building — did not win the lottery or qualify for a bypass. Asked how he managed this, Moss pointed to a loophole in legislation that former Sup. Jake McGoldrick passed in 2001. “The McGoldrick clause allowed us to directly convert it,” Moss said.

McGoldrick’s law tightened the conversion rules, but allowed two-unit buildings that, like Moss’, had only one owner-occupant, to slip through. The odd thing is that Andrew Zacks, a lawyer who represents landlords, and the Small Property Owners of San Francisco sued to overturn the McGoldrick legislation (not because of the loophole but because of the new restrictions) and the Superior Court ruled in January 2003 that the law was “unconstitutional on its face” and ordered that the city “shall not enforce this ordinance.” That should have ended the loophole, too.

Records show that Moss’ condo application was signed Feb. 10, 2003 by Planning’s Larry Badiner and received tentative mapping approval March 2004.

Department of Public Works Surveyor Bruce Storrs told us he thinks Moss’ case fell through the cracks. “It doesn’t say it was a McTIC,” Storrs said, using the nickname for McGoldrick’s condo conversion loophole, as he reviewed Moss’ file. “But it’s the only thing that makes any sense.”

There’s no indication that Moss did anything wrong, but he sure got a sweet deal. Records show that after he got his conversion permit, he sold the upper unit of Kansas Street in 2007 for more than he paid for the entire building in 2000.

3. He has the support of some very anti-tenant folks.

Attorney Zacks, who specializes in evictions and TICs, gave Moss $500, and the candidate claimed it was because his wife knows Zacks from the playground of the school where their kids both go. Pressed, Moss confirmed that Zacks is his attorney in a court case against the co-owners of the Kansas Street property and in another action he filed against a tenant in his Liberty Steet building in May 2009.

Moss also has the support of the Small Property Owners group, which opposes almost all tenants rights and is among the most conservative, pro-property rights groups in the city. He told us he made a mistake in seeking that endorsement.

And on Aug. 24, conservative campaign finance consultant Jim Sutton, who typically represents big business interests, filed papers representing “The Alliance For Jobs And Sustainable Growth,” which is financing three independent expenditure committees, one supporting Moss; another supporting Scott Weiner in D-8; and the third supporting Theresa Sparks in D–6.

4. He’s involved in a nasty lawsuit with his former neighbor.

Records show that after Moss and Findling subdivided their property on Kansas Street, they sold the upper unit to Edward Penrose and Heather Gibbons in 2007 and moved near Dolores Park.

Court filings suggest the couples remained friendly until March 2010, when Moss and Findling tried to sell the Kansas Street lower unit for $600,000 and ran into problems.

After the deal fell through, Moss and Findling turned around and sued Penrose and Gibbons, claiming that their behavior “constitutes a nuisance.”

In their complaint, Moss and Findling claim they suffered emotional distress, loss of sale, and diminution of the value of their lower unit on Kansas Street “due to the need, going forward, to disclose to buyers that [Penrose and Gibbons] have a propensity to engage in malicious and antisocial behavior.”

On July 30, Gibbons and Penrose countersued. They claim that when they offered to purchase 673 Kansas Street, Moss and Findling never disclosed that there was a boundary line dispute or prior instances of flooding, drainage, and grading problems that had damaged an abutting property.

Now Penrose and Gibbons are asking the court to rescind the purchase agreement whereby they obtained ownership of their Kansas Street condo.

Findling and Moss responded Aug. 31, claiming that “cross-complainants have unclean hands in that, beginning in the spring of 2010, they undertook efforts to interfere with the sale of the lower unit 673 1/2 Kansas] by making unfounded noise complaints and did discourage the buyer from consummating the transaction.”

Asked about this messy legal dispute, Moss said, “We were unhappy with the outcome of a sale in escrow that they disturbed.”

5. His nonprofit pays a bunch of money to his private consulting firm.

In 2001, Moss and two partners founded a private consulting company called M.Cubed. A few months later, Moss and his partners also founded SF Community Power, a nonprofit that started using M.Cubed as a consultant. “M.Cubed was subsequently awarded a contract from SF Community Power. I’m paid directly from SF Community Power, and I’m paid a consulting fee at M.Cubed, depending how much I work,” Moss told us.

Records show that as SFCP’s director, Moss made $48,000 in 2009 and $50,000 in 2008. But more than $1 million has moved from Moss’ nonprofit into Moss’ private consulting firm since 2001.

Moss confirms that SF Power has received $350,000, some of it from Pacific Gas and Electric Co. through the California Public Utilities Commission in 2010; $440,000 in 2009; and $500,000 in 2008 — and that some of those dollars went to M.Cubed.

“I intervene in regulatory cases on behalf of SF Community Power,” Moss said, “And then, if you win a case, you get compensation after the case.”

The Potrero View shares office space with the nonprofit and the consulting firm. Last year, SFCP paid $22,000 in rent, and the View paid SFCP $5,000 toward that rent.

Alhough Moss’ campaign asked supporters to mail contributions to the office that all three of Moss’ business entities share, his campaign finance records show that as of June 30, he had paid no rent for campaign headquarters. “I haven’t had a campaign headquarters,” Moss said. “It’s pretty much been at my house.”

Endorsement Interviews: Malia Cohen

Zelda Bronstein
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7
Endorsement Interviews: Malia Cohen

Malia Cohen has three priorities: She wants to keep District 10 residents working, healthy and safe.

Healthy means expanding open space in the district, creating more pocket parks and turning McLaren Park into more of a destination. Safe means more community policing and using nonprofits like TURF to help monitor streets and buses. “I’m a believer in the broken windows theory,” she said, arguing for brighter lights on Third Stree and San Bruno Ave. She’s also calling for community clean-up days to “change the culture of Third Street.” But she opposes the city attorney’s gang injunctions. Working means more jobs for local people from development and better educational opportunities, particularly for people who might not go on to college.

Cohen took some strong progressive stands — she’s against Sit-Lie, and for public power (although she wasn’t too familiar with Community Choice Aggregation.) She supports the hotel tax, the real estate transfer tax and the vehicle license fee.

But she has a decidedly conservative streak, too: She wouldn’t support any further limits on condo conversions, Ellis Act evictions, or TICs, saying those regulations would infringe on the rights of property owners. You can listen to our interview here:

 

 

mcohen by endorsements2010

Hands off social security!

David Talbot
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2

Dick Meister, former labor editor of the SF Chronicle and KQED-TV Newsroom, has covered labor and politics for a half-century. Contact him through his website, www.dickmeister.com, which includes more than 250 of his recent columns.

Republican leaders in Congress would have us believe that most Americans support cutting Social Security and Medicare payments as a way to cut the federal budget deficit. But don’t you believe it.

As the AFL-CIO and other labor sources have discovered, that’s at best a figment of the Republican imagination. Or, as is most likely, it’s a bald-faced political lie.

The proof came in a poll marking the 75th anniversary of Social Security this year. It was conducted by a prominent research organization, Greenberg Quilan Rosner, and commissioned by the nation’s leading public employee unions, the Service Employees International and American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, joined by MoveOn.org and the Campaign for America’s Future.

The poll was in response to Republican House leader John Boehner’s call for reducing the federal budget deficit by raising the Social Security retirement age to 70, while continuing President Bush’s massive tax breaks for multi-billion-dollar corporations and wealthy individuals.

Boehner, that is, wants to lower the Republicans’ rich friends’ taxes at the expense of Americans who must rely on Social Security payments, averaging less than $14,000 a year, to meet their basic living expenses.

It would make much more sense, of course, to reduce the deficit by increasing taxes on the wealthy at least to the level they were before Bush’s tax cuts, rather than do it by raising the retirement age and making other financial cutbacks that hurt low and middle income Americans.

So, what did the poll show?

Most Democrats and independents responding wanted to end the Bush tax cuts that, if not repealed, will increase the deficit by an estimated $3.1 trillion over the next decade and reduce government revenue by more than $650 billion. That obviously would greatly curtail Social Security and other government programs for poor and middle class Americans.

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that most of the Republicans polled did not want to repeal the tax cuts and thus help government provide more services to those who need them, often badly need them.

Nevertheless, nearly 70 percent of the probable voters polled, whatever their political party, opposed cutting Social Security and Medicare to reduce the deficit.
What’s more, two-thirds of the Republicans also opposed raising the retirement age, despite their general dislike of the Social Security system. Raising the retirement age from 67 to 70 obviously would greatly curtail Social Security and other government programs designed to help poor and middle class Americans. But that apparently didn’t disturb many of the Republicans polled. Most of them did not want to repeal the tax cuts under any circumstance.

The AFL-CIO concluded – and quite accurately, I think – that “those conservative politicians who want to use concern about deficits as an opening to go after Social Security or Medicare risk a backlash” from voters.

The poll made clear that relatively few people are buying the Republican claims that Social Security and Medicare outlays are a major cause of the continuing federal budget deficit. Too many people have too much sense to believe that.

But what did sensible voters see as the main causes of the deficit?

Nearly half of those polled blamed the costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
About a third blamed the bailouts of big banks and the auto industry.

Nearly a third blamed lobbyists and special interests for getting unnecessary spending put into the budget.

Almost as many placed the major blame on President Obama’s economic recovery or stimulus plan.

About one-fourth blamed the Bush tax cuts.  A relative few blamed the economic recession that reduced tax revenue and required costly government support for the unemployed. A relatively few others blamed the deficit on the cost of Medicare prescription drug benefits.

What it boils down to is this, as the AFL-CIO’s James Parks said in a bit of public advice to GOP Congressman Boehner:  “The public doesn’t like your plan to cut their Social Security so your rich friends can get another tax break.”

Anyone doubting the popularity and importance of Social Security need only consider a recent AARP survey that showed  “exceedingly high” support for the program.

” Clearly,” said AARP researcher Colette Thayer, ” most Americans rely on Social Security and expect it to be a source of income in their retirement. In fact, it is the most commonly cited source of retirement income.”

    Whatever their ages, whether over 30 or under, the poll – just as others like taken on the program’s anniversary dates five, 15 and 25 years ago – shows that Social Security is one of the government’s most important programs in that it provides essential retirement income to millions of Americans who would otherwise have little or no income.

The Campaign for America’s Future and MoveOn.org, will be jointly campaigning for candidates in the coming midterm elections who’ll pledge to block cuts in Social Security and Medicare and otherwise back the organizations’ liberal agendas. The unions that helped them sponsor the poll will also be waging major campaigns, as will other AFL-CIO affiliates.

They’re backing the kind of political candidates we should all back – and as strongly as we can. Our social security depends on it.

Dick Meister, former labor editor of the SF Chronicle and KQED-TV Newsroom, has covered labor and politics for a half-century. Contact him through his website, www.dickmeister.com, which includes more than 250 of his recent columns.

Endorsement interview: Jim Meko

Zelda Bronstein
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5
Endorsement interview: Jim Meko

Editors note: The Guardian is interviewing candidates for the fall elections, and to give everyone the broadest possible understanding of the issues and our endorsement process, we’re posting the sound files of all the interviews on the politics blog. Our endorsements will be coming out Oct. 6th.

Jim Meko’s been part of western SOMA for decades. He founded the SOMA Leadership Council, played a key role in Western SOMA planning, helped create the Entertainment Commission and now sits on that panel. He probably knows the details of land-use policy better than half the professional planners in the city and has all sorts of ideas about using zoning and traffic engineering to improve the neighborhood (two-way traffic on Folsom, for example). He’s pushing to be sure that market-rate housing development not skew the existing ration of affordable to expensive housing. He’s a small business owner and a supporter of the entertainment industry.

He’s got a bit of a fiscal conservative side, too: He told us he supports Jeff Adachi’s pension-reform measure and wants to get rid of many of the set-asides in the city budget. You can listen to his views here:

 

jimmeko by janwend

Legislators behaving badly

Zelda Bronstein
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Legislators behaving badly

There’s only one country in the world that allows children to be sentenced to life without parole. Only one place on Earth where a 16-year-old can be sent to prison for life, without any chance at redemption. Only one place that doesn’t recognize that brain development, including judgment, isn’t complete until a person reaches his or her 20s.


And that’s the United States.


State Sen. Leland Yee, a child psychologist, had a very moderate bill in the Legislature this year that would have given juveniles sentenced to LWOP a chance after 15 years to be reconsidered for parole. That would put California somewhere close to the rest of the civilized world.


“SB 399 is not a get-out-of-jail-free card; it is an incredibly modest proposal that respects victims, international law, and the fact that children have a greater capacity for rehabilitation than adults,” Yee noted.


It cleared the state Senate, and should have cleared the Assembly Aug 24. But even with the Democrats firmly in control of that body, Yee failed to get enough votes for SB 399. And one of the people who refused to vote for it was San Francisco Assembly member Fiona Ma.


You expect this sort of shit from Republicans and from some conservative law-ond-order Democrats. But it’s inconceivable that a San Francisco Democrat would be against a bill like this. 


What on Earth was Ma thinking? I couldn’t get her on the phone, but her communications aide, Cataline Hayes-Bautista, sent the following Ma statement:


 “I did not come to my decision on SB 399 easily – it’s legislation that I have carefully reviewed and considered for months. While I acknowledge that some juveniles in the correctional system may have the capacity to be rehabilitated after decades of being incarcerated, I feel that we cannot reset a defendant’s clock 25 years later expecting a victim’s family will reset their hearts.


I know our District Attorneys do not take life sentences lightly. These crimes are limited to first and second degree murder offenses with a special circumstance which include the most troublesome crimes: murdering a peace officer, murdering to achieve a hate crime, committing a murder that’s especially heinous, murdering for financial gain, and murdering while escaping lawful custody.


All of these sentences were handed down after murder victims’ families had the chance to speak out and address the court on the impact of these murders. To re-open these closed cases to new sentencing hearings would re-open the wounds already suffered by murder victims’ families, forcing these victims to re-visit and re-live cases they were told had been closed forever. I think it would be unfair to these victims’ families to have to re-live these horrific crimes and for that reason I felt compelled to oppose this legislation.


There are already deliberative checks in place throughout the system where prosecutors, defense attorneys, jurors, and particularly our judges, have the ultimate discretion to choose a lesser juvenile sentence when sentencing a juvenile murderer. In addition, the Governor has the power to grant pardons and commute sentences. This already provides an avenue for juveniles to seek extraordinary relief if justice calls for it.


 While I appreciate Senator Yee’s intent to create opportunities to rehabilitate juvenile criminals, these particular crimes rise to a standard in which we need to hold those responsible accountable for their actions.”


Sorry, but that’s just terrible. To say that the victims’ families are better off if juveniles — people who were too young to be fully responsible for what they did, and who in some cases didn’t even kill anyone (just being present when someone kills someone can be a life sentence) are locked up until they die is just kind of sick. I don’t know what else to say. Except to give an example of who is serving life without parole (from Yee’s press release):


One such case involves Anthony C., who was 16 and had never before been in trouble with the law. Anthony belonged to a “tagging crew” that paints graffiti.  One day Anthony and his friend James went down to a wash (a cement-sided stream bed) to graffiti.  James revealed to Anthony that he had a gun in his backpack and when another group of kids came down to the wash, James decided to rob them. James pulled out the gun, and the victim told him, “If you don’t kill me, I’ll kill you.” At that point, Anthony thought the bluff had been called, and turned to pick up his bike. James shot the other kid.


 The police told Anthony’s parents that he did not need a lawyer. He was interviewed by the police and released, but later re-arrested on robbery and murder charges. Anthony was offered a 16-to-life sentence before trial if he pled, but he refused, believing he was innocent. Anthony was found guilty of first degree murder and sentenced to life in prison without parole. Charged with aiding and abetting, he was held responsible for the actions of James.


 Okay, this kid doesn’t belong in prison for life, without any chance of parole. Thanks, Fiona.


Meanwhile, without the support of Yee, Assemblymember Tom Ammiano’s bill that would allow a traffic camera at Market and Octavis narrowly squeaked by the state Senate Aug. 24 and will now head for the governor’s desk. The bill has generated a lot of commentary on this blog; bicyclists and pedestrians think it will save lives in a crazy intersection, and privacy types worry about the creeping police state.


Adam Keigwin, Yee’s chief of staff, insists that Yee didn’t do anything to block the bill:


FYI: Senator Yee did not block the bill.  In fact, he told his colleagues who were looking for his input on a San Francisco specific bill that it was ok for them to vote for it, even though he voted no.  The bill passed today.  Again, the Senator has opposed all camera enforcement bills for several reasons: such cameras create a police state; law enforcement could use the film to enforce other laws; we should use actual officers, have better traffic improvements – like we have done on 19th avenue where we have gone from several deaths a year to zero; open government problem – film (government document) is allowed to be destroyed without the public ever gaining access to it; and finally other privacy concerns.


Still, he didn’t vote for it, forcing Ammiano and Sen. Mark Leno to scramble around trying to find another vote to put it over the top.

Herrera’s gang injunction becomes part of D. 10 dialogue

Mary Magee
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0

As stated in this week’s article about City Attorney Dennis Herrera’s Viz Valley gang injunction, Herrera’s move gives D. 10 candidates an opportunity to show they are tracking all the issues in a district that is home to the city’s largest public housing site.

As C.L.A.E.R. Project director Sharen Hewitt put it at a debriefing session about the injunction, “D. 10 has been reduced to the Lennar issue, and that’s what’s criminal.”

And the injunction is becoming part of the dialogue in the D. 10 race, with eleven candidates in that race sounding off on the injunction, many of them critiquing Dennis Herrera’s approach and/or advocating for legal representation for those named in the suit, and more services in this historically neglected district.

Candidates Isaac Bowers, Kristine Enea, Chris Jackson, Nyese Joshua, Steve Moss and Marlene Tran attended Hewitt’s August 12 gang injunction debriefing.

And by meeting’s end, Bowers and Enea said they would help community members get legal representation.
“A lot of people being served, don’t know what an injunction is, or don’t show up at the hearing and then they become subject to the injunction,”  Bowers said.

Enea said she was glad that City Attorney Yvonne Mere clarified at the debriefing that the 41 young men named in Herrera’s filing could not be included in the actual injunction until they have been served.

“It was important to clarify the notice process,” Enea said.

Jackson said he’s committed to helping these men access job and education opportunities.
“If you i.d. folks as low-income gang members, there is a lot more you can do than simply hand over their names to law enforcement,” Jackson said.
“Before the City Attorney puts in a gang injunction, that office should talk about it with the community.” Jackson continued. “Ultimately this is about land use.”

“For the City Attorney to have a top down approach to gang injunctions is unfortunate,” Jackson said, noting that Herrera’s injunctions have been in predominantly
African American and Latino neighborhoods.

“And in terms of taking away people’s civil rights, it’s unacceptable, “ Jackson added, noting that the City Attorney’s list of targeted individuals is public information.

Reached by phone, Moss says he’d like to see a time limit imposed on gang injunctions. Currently, injunctions are indefinite, once they have been granted.

“I haven’t studied the precise details,” Moss said, noting that he went to Hewitt’s debriefing and has leaved through materials the City Attorney’s Office provided.
“Generally, no one likes gang injunctions because they potentially threaten civil liberties and sometimes the city gets it wrong,” Moss said, referring to cases where folks have been wrongly named in previous injunctions. “But in places where injunctions have been brought, they do seem to have reduced the violence and calmed down the district. I’d like there to be a time limit, a sunset clause.”

D. 10 candidate Marlene Tran said she thinks the injunction could help reduce violence in the neighborhood.
“I was trying to listen to the different input at the debriefing session,” Tran said. “But on TV, I heard that when Herrera talked to the Chinese press, he cited some 200 incidents in the proposed safety zone. About 100 of those incidents involved guns, and there have been ten homicides in three years. Those are really glaring statistics. And this morning I read that there is another injunction in Oakland, and they talked about success with gang injunctions in Salinas, where the homicide rate dropped from 50 to 5, compared to 2008/2009.”

Tran, who sits on the Community Advisory Board for the Police Department’s Ingleside Station, said she heard from Ingleside Captain Louis Cassenego that he wants to serve all 41 respondents named in the injunction peacefully.
“If this is done without any casualties to the district and the community, and if it prevents any further violence, then this is the way to go,” Tran said.

Tran expressed some due process concerns.
“If they spend that much personnel and time [on putting the injunction together], it should be done with due process,” Tran said.

But she feels the current level of violence in Viz Valley is unacceptable.
“I’ve lived here for twenty something years, and if you talk to residents and children, who wants to hear gun fire,” Tran said. “So I think we have to work for a peaceful community to prevent these problems. That’s why we call ourselves the emergent district.”

D. 10 candidate Ed Donaldson believes the injunctions are a product of neglect.
“It comes back to a question of overall neglect in the district,” Donaldson explained.  When you have that level of social and economic neglect, gang injunctions become “necessary’. But when you look at the resources coming into the district through local non-profits, which comes, I believe to $110 million a year, 80 percent of which is city money, paid mostly to non-profits that may not be based in the district, you have to ask, Are we getting what we paid for? And do these non-profits have enough integrity to make sure there is a level of impact to transform people’s lives? “

Donaldson says that, given the overall level of neglect in public housing, it’s not surprising the district has challenges.

“So, are we willing to invest in the neighborhood in a very transformative way, or are we going to continue to give money to police and prisons?” Donaldson asked.
He notes that every year, 1,600 men and women return to the southeast side of San Francisco, and there is a 71 percent recidivism rate among these folks.

“Why is this rate so high in a progressive city like San Francisco?” Donaldson said. “Part of the answer lies with our public housing policy: if you can’t get public housing, you can’t apply for a job, you can’t go to school to better yourself.”

Donaldson says there is a direct connection between the district’s homicide rate and the people getting out of prison, returning to the district and re-offending.
“So, what’s so hard about getting our arms around 1,600 people a year and stabilizing them? Because then a lot of stuff about public safety will go away.”

D. 10 candidate Tony Kelly believes that if there were gangs in Viz Valley, then Herrera’s injunction would be valid.
 “There is gang-like activity, but it’s small scale turf wars, shootings and retaliations, and it’s not organized,” Kelly said. “ Instead, you’ve got unorganized young black men with no other options, doing whatever it takes to get ahead. But instead of doing something constructive, the City Attorney calls them gangs.”

Kelly notes that the City Attorney claims that most of the individuals named in the Viz Valley injunction don’t live in the proposed safety zone.
“But according to what I’m hearing on the ground, a bunch of them do live here and/or grew up here,” Kelly said. “So, we want their families to get involved. They need safe havens. But combined with last year’s budget cuts, all this does is criminalize young people and pushes the problem around. As long as we have 40-50 percent unemployment, we are not going to solve our crime problem.”

DeWitt Lacy, also a D. 10 candidate, said he is concerned that gang injunctions are circumventing people’s due process rights.
“In a criminal case, you have the right to an attorney, but that’s not so in a civil action,” Lacy said.

Lacy worries that gang injunctions lend themselves to racial profiling.
“Folks have to stay in their house or quickly go to and fro because they can’t hang out in the neighborhood,” Lacy said. “A smarter approach would be to do community policy that Sup. Ross Mirkarimi introduced in the Western Addition. It’s been shown to have a positive impact on criminal activity. We should have officers walking around in troubled areas. The more we change a foot patrol pilot into citywide policy, the more we actually address serious issues and problems. Everyone understands the value that police bring and everyone wants to be able to rely on them. When we only use police to bring a punitive action it reinforces the notion that they are evil enforcers.”

D. 10 candidate Malia Cohen said she was concerned by Herrera’s approach.
“I think we need a more comprehensive approach, otherwise, we’ll simply be moving crime two blocks over,” Cohen said. “We need long-term, not short-term solutions.”

Cohen noted that there are Chinese and Russian gangs in town, as well as African American ones, and Latino gangs like the Nortenos and Sudenos.
“But the style of how each gang manifests is different, which makes African Americans an easy target. We need to have a uniform approach to how we deal with this.”

The 41 men identified in Herrera’s latest injunction all appear to be African American, and many have family ties and roots in Sunnydale, meaning the injunction impacts a much larger circle of folks than those simply named in Herrera’s filings.
“The impact on families caught up in this can’t be overstated,” Cohen said.  “Either they’ll have to take bus down to court, or drag down and pay hella money for parking, and for food, and even take a day off from work if they are employed. And then there’s the emotional effect. We could be using our resources in a more productive way. I understand that Dennis Herrera is ambitious, but this is playing on people’s racism. It’s tantamount to ethnic cleansing. Maybe Herrera wants to be seen as tough on crime, but ut how about being seen as big on compassion? Or big on fair? This is not going to help people get jobs and housing. And it prevents American citizens from being able to travel.”

Eric Smith, also a D. 10 candidate, says it’s right to question the injunctions.
“David Campos and Eric Quezada both expressed concerns about Herrera’s injunction against the Nortenos, when they were running in the 2008 race for D. 9,” Smith observed.
“They talked about the unintended consequences of that injunction in terms of deporting folks who then train the next generation in the ways of gangs.”

Smith questions how effective gang injunctions are in the long-term.
“They are a band-aid,” Smith said. “This is like putting a finger in the dike, or using a hammer to kill a flea. Because the root causes are not addressed. If you don’t deal with young people’s lack of education and joblessness, their hopelessness, their choicelessness, the gang becomes their family. So, if the city did community policing and had great youth programs, it would help.”

Smith, who is a professional jazz musician, wants to see more music, poetry and spoken word programs and activities in the neighborhood.
“There’s a lot of untapped talent,” he said. “When you have arts, music and theater, those are life-saving opportunities.”

Also a bio-diesel advocate, Smith wants to see people who are returning to the community after a stint inside, being able to access green jobs, instead of doing more of the same stuff, only better, than the activities that landed them inside in the first place.

“I care about everyone in the district, but most of all about those who have been kicked to the curb and end up in gangs, on drugs, or dead.”

And D. 10 candidate Diane Wesley Smith believes there are better solutions than gang injunctions

“African American culture is almost opposite in terms of physical mannerisms and gestures and tone of voice, and that can be scary to someone who is used to being conservative,” Wesley Smith said, speaking to the rising tensions between some black and Asian residents in the district.

“I believe these things could be solved with town hall meetings, where there is food and translators so folks could talk things out, “ she said. “It’s never going to be worked out through the police. Only law enforcement benefits from these kinds of proceedings. We need to reach out and touch each other, so that the Chinese community knows that the black community has the same goals as they do, which are employment, housing and safety.”

“When we talk about violating people’s civil rights, posting people’s pictures on websites, preying on people’s fears, well, that’s how we got into the war,” Wesley-Smith said. “Unemployment. Lack of access to opportunity. Lack of education. No money for our schools, but an increase in spending on our jails. These all send the same message: You are not wanted.”

Wesley Smith is concerned that the gang injunctions will accelerate the mass exodus of blacks and people of color from San Francisco.
“We all want a safe San Francisco,” she observed. “The solution is more jobs, not war. People are just going to go more underground in face of these injunctions. Meanwhile, the kids in my district don’t have toilet paper or computer paper in their schools.”

“I understand that Dennis Herrera is a career politician, and time will tell what his true aspirations are, but this is not legislation we propose in a caring society,” Wesley-Smith concluded. “We’re not showing any of these kids any love. All we need to do is partner with business and government and work this out. Te thought that four men standing on a corner drinking an energy drink could be considered gang members is shocking. That’s how they perpetuated slavery, and that’s why blacks have problems today. All my nephews dress similarly. So, are we going to consider them gang members? The good and the bad kids dress the same. We need people and parents to understand that none of us can be safe, until we take care of those who have the least in our community. I’d venture that everyone who is a safety concern has not pursued their education, has not been assisted in pursuing education, and has not been assisted in pursuing employment.”

D. 10 candidate Lynette Sweet promised to call me back to talk about the gang injunction, and if and when she does, I’ll be sure to include her comments here. The same goes for Nyese Joshua, Geoffrea Morris and Steve Weber  who had not returned my calls as of blog time, and for any other D. 10 candidates that I was unable to reach for this article. So, stay tuned…

SFBG Radio: Conservative stupidity

Zelda Bronstein
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6
SFBG Radio: Conservative stupidity

Remember John Stuart Mill? Is it still true that, while all conservatives aren’t stupid, most stupid people are conservatives? Johnny and Tim discuss the relevance of the 19th Century philosopher’s wisdom to today’s Republican Party. You can listen after the jump.

sfbgradio8232010 by jangellw

PG&E CEO paints a rosy picture for CPUC

Sasha Cuttler
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2
PG&E CEO paints a rosy picture for CPUC

Pacific Gas & Electric CEO Peter Darbee’s address to the California Public Utilities Commission yesterday focused on his company’s national reputation as a corporate advocate for addressing climate change, largely ignoring PG&E’s $46 million waste of ratepayer money supporting June’s failed Proposition 16, which was designed to expand the utility’s monopoly in California and thwart local renewable power projects.

CPUC President Michael Peevey warmly introduced Darbee to the crowd, calling the CEO an upfront thought leader on climate change — a very different message from the same man who harshly criticized PG&E’s spearheading of Proposition 16 before its defeat in June.

“There is something fundamentally wrong with the idea that one company, spending $35 million can, by majority vote of the electorate, seek and obtain a two-thirds vote protection in our State Constitution,” Peevey wrote in an opinion published in the San Jose Mercury News in May. “The purpose of the Constitution is to protect our sacred rights as citizens. It is not to protect the narrow private interests of a particular utility company.”

Darbee’s only comment on Proposition 16 came near the end of his speech, when he attempted to justify PG&E’s spending on failed campaign that some have said should have cost Darbee his job. Referring to the company’s regular opposition to public power campaigns, he said, “$45 million versus $15 million a year – financially it made sense.” But it wasn’t news to anyone that PG&E had an economic interest in essentially killing public power start-ups.

Instead, the CEO chose to focus PG&E efforts in Washington D.C. to nationally address climate change and his company’s support of AB 32, a 2006 law that requires California to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, and PG&E’s opposition to Proposition 23, a November ballot initiative that would freeze AB 32 until California’s unemployment levels drop below 5.5 percent and stay there for at least one year – a rare occurrence in modern economies.

Local environmental activists call PG&E’s purported concern over climate change greenwashing and hypocrisy. “That’s complete crap,” San Francisco Green Party Sustainability Chair Eric Brooks told the Guardian. “For them to claim that they’re a green company is a joke. They do the same thing that tobacco companies used to do; they spread a little money around supporting renewables that aren’t even part of their energy portfolio.”

Brooks said that AB 32’s mandates were flexible enough not to really harm PG&E’s profit margins, so the company can oppose Proposition 23 without impacting its bottom line. Steven Maviglio, spokesman for No on 23 — Stop the Dirty Energy Proposition told the Guardian PG&E had reported no contributions opposing Proposition 23, a far cry from the more than $46 million the company spent championing Proposition 16 in June.

“Thing about Prop. 23 is [that] AB 32 doesn’t really box them in,” Brooks told us. “If we switch to localized, renewable energy, that puts PG&E out of business. Prop 16 would have been much more effective at eliminating green energy in California than anything else like Prop 23.”

Yet the main controversy aired at the CPUC meeting wasn’t about greenwashing or Prop. 16, but smart meters. About a dozen protesters gathered at the steps of the California Public Utilities Commission before Darbee started speaking. The group is concerned about PG&E’s construction of a “smart grid” of wirelessly transmitting electronic meters critics say can cause cancer due to electromagnetic radiation as well as immediate discomfort for those who are electrically sensitive.

Joshua Hart of Scotts Valley Neighbors Against Smart Meters interrupted Darbee near the beginning of his speech. “Mr. Darbee, your smart meter program is a false solution to climate change,” Hart shouted as he presented Darbee with a “dumb meter,” a cardboard box with photos of smart meters pasted to it in which the word “smart” was replaced with the word “dumb,” Hart told the Guardian.

Hart was escorted out by a CHP officer, but he was not arrested or cited. Darbee finished his opening remarks before addressing first concerns about false billing information that had been transmitted by a small percentage of the more than 6 million smart meters already installed in California, then radiation generated by the devices.

Darbee said residents of Bakersfield were confused about rate tiers in July 2009, which had more days with temperatures exceeding 100 degrees than the year before, but he insisted the meters were not to blame for high energy bills.

However, PG&E has acknowledged that some of its new smart meters malfunctioned and were broadcasting energy usage reports that resulted in higher bills for consumers. But the company insists that less than 1 percent of installed smart meters have malfunctioned.

San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera petitioned the CPUC in June to immediately halt installation of smart meters until state regulators conclude an investigation into whether the meters are accurate. The CPUC has not stopped PG&E from installing the devices.

“This is Peevey’s legacy,” Hart told the Guardian referring to CPUC President Michael Peevey, “a ‘smart grid’ in California.”

Darbee next addressed the electromagnetic radiation generated by the smart meters’ wireless transmissions by describing a comparison PG&E did between the new meters and cell phones.

“Let’s be conservative,” he told the crowd. “Let’s assume the smart meter is 10 feet away, and there are no walls between you and the smart meter, which of course there are. And let’s assume the person is only on the cell phone 10 minutes per day … If you live in a home with a smart meter, you have to live in that home for 13,000 years before it compares to your use of a cell phone for one year.”

But Hart rejected PG&E’s study and said he didn’t believe the Federal Communication Commission’s limits on electromagnetic radiation were actually safe. “The FCC regulations on EMF [electromagnetic field] safety were written by the telecommunications industry,” Hart told the Guardian. “If the smart meters were being installed in Russia, they would be illegal.”

Sebastopol resident Janhavi Hubert attended the protest and speech as a representative of people who are “electronically sensitive.” “When they put a smart meter on my neighbor’s house 25 feet away, I didn’t expect to feel anything,” Hubert told the Guardian. “I had heart palpitations, which I’ve never had before, heart arrhythmia, and headaches, and when I go away from the house, it goes away.”

Rebecca Bowe contributed to this report.

Veterans of discrimination

Andrew Lam
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0

So you’re a gung-ho Hawaiian high schooler who wants to protect your country back in the early ’40s. You join the ROTC, which leads to a spin through the Territorial Guard. You’re then kicked out of service, because of where your family’s from. In fact, you’re now considered an enemy alien! Fancy. Such was the plight of the protagonists of Junichi Suzuki’s 442: Live With Honor, Die With Dignity (which starts Fri/13 at Viz Cinema), Japanese-Americans who went on to become one of the most decorated squadrons in U.S. military history.

How would you react in a similar situation? In anger, disgust, maybe by sewing a maple leaf on your rucksack and thumbing for passage to points north on passing ocean liners? Oddly, the young men from the film did the opposite. They reinvested in their home, forming a club that reflected the closest thing to service in the military they could still rope down and jumping in flat bed trucks to help their peers still in the armed forces out with construction projects around Honolulu (in Hawaii, it was deemed “not practicable” to export the vast Japanese immigrant to internment camps and instead strict curfew laws and energy blackouts were enacted). The Varsity Victory Volunteers, they called themselves. 

Junichi Suzuki’s 442: Live With Honor, Die With Dignity

Eventually, the army realized the guys weren’t terrorists and put them to work, stationing them on the front lines of WWII’s most dangerous conflicts. They done real good in battles – but paid for it, suffering 93% casulty rates by the military’s conservative counts (9,486 Purple Hearts were awarded and the company started out with only 3,000 soldiers!), all while many of their family members on the mainland were imprisoned in massive U.S. detention centers. 

It’s a compelling story about racism in our country, and I’m glad Suzuki tracked it down. But at its heart, 442 is still a war movie: grainy original footage and those slow zoom-ins on photos that the History Channel so dearly wishes was an appropriate stand-in for action. The most vivid scenes are those of the surviving members of the company that the filmmaker tracked down for an interview. They’re men who move slow, play golf, farm plots of land with their families. Veterans, dig? Doing what they wanted to do all along: be a legitimate, unconditional citizen of our country. 

The film is being shown as part of Viz Cinema’s multi-movie look at the work of Junichi Suzuki, whose been kicking around in director’s chairs forI over 27 years. Previously, the theater showed Suziki’s Toyo’s Camera, which includes footage from a camera that Toyo Miyatake snuck into the internment camp where he was sent during the war. From whence does Suzuki’s motivation spring to make such exhaustively well-researched looks at our country’s past and the history of his people? You can as him yourself — he’ll be at every screening of 442 on Fri/13 and Sat/14 at Viz.

 

442: Live With Honor, Die With Dignity

opens Fri/13 (through Thurs/19) 2:50, 7 p.m., $10

Viz Cinema

New People

1746 Post, SF

(415) 525-8600

www.newpeopleworld.com

 

The politics of unity and division

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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7
The politics of unity and division

steve@sfbg.com

These are strange days for the San Francisco Democratic Party, which is seeking to overcome bitter divisions on the local level and come together around candidates for statewide office that include Mayor Gavin Newsom, whose fiscal conservatism and petulant political style are the main sources of that local division.

The tension has played out recently around the Board of Supervisors deliberations on the new city budget and November ballot measures and in dramas surrounding the newly elected Democratic County Central Committee, where the battles during its July 28 inaugural meeting previewed a more significant fight over local endorsements coming up Aug. 11.

Almost every elected official in San Francisco is a Democrat. Newsom, the Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor, has been the main obstacle to new taxes that progressives and labor leaders say are desperately needed to preserve public services, deal with massive projected deficits in the next two years, and quit balancing budgets on the backs of workers.

“We balanced the budget without raising taxes. I don’t believe in raising taxes. We don’t need to raise taxes,” Newsom said proudly at his July 29 budget signing ceremony, during which he also effusively praised the labor unions whose support he needs this fall: “Labor has been under attack in this state and country. They’ve become a convenient excuse for our lack of leadership in Sacramento and around the country.”

That hypocritical brand of politics has been frustrating to his fellow Democrats, particularly progressive supervisors and DCCC members. At the July 27 board meeting, Sup. Ross Mirkarimi and Board President David Chiu reluctantly dropped their pair of revenue measures that would have raised $50 million, bowing to opposition by Newsom and the business community.

The San Francisco Chamber of Commerce has become such a vehicle for antitax and antigovernment vitriol that the DCCC on July 29 approved a resolution calling for the organization — which hosted a speech by Republican National Chair Michael Steele in June — to renounce the platform of the Republican National Committee.

“The Chamber is not a knee-jerk right-wing organization,” Chamber President Steve Falk felt compelled to clarify in a July 28 letter to DCCC Chair Aaron Peskin, closing with, “Anything you can do to avoid painting the Chamber as a pawn of the GOP would be greatly appreciated — because it just isn’t true.”

Yet Rafael Mandelman, who sponsored the resolution and is a progressive supervisorial candidate in District 8, told us the Chamber’s fiscal policies are indistinguishable from those pushed by Republicans. “They’re the leading force pushing the Republican agenda in San Francisco,” Mandelman said, calling the stance short-sighted. “It’s not in the long-term interests of the business community for our public sector to fall apart.”

Chiu’s business tax reform measure is a good example of how conservative ideology seems to be trumping progressive policy, even among Democrats. Only 10 percent of businesses in the city pay any local business tax, and the measure would increase taxes on large corporations, lower them on small businesses, create private sector jobs, bring $25 million per year into the city, and expand the tax burden to 25 percent of businesses, including the large banks, insurance companies, and financial institutions that are now exempt. But even the Small Business Commission refused to support the plan, prompting Chiu to drop the proposal and tell his colleagues, “There is still not consensus about whether this should move forward.”

Sup. Chris Daly, the lone vote against the budget compromise with Newsom and the removal of revenue measures from the November ballot, noted at the July 27 board meeting how the business community has sabotaged city finances, citing its 2002 lawsuit challenging the gross receipt taxes, which the board settled on a controversial 8-3 vote. “This is a large part of our structural budget deficit,” Daly said.

But antitax sentiment has only gotten worse with the current recession and political dysfunction, causing Democrats like Newsom to parrot Republicans’ no-new-taxes mantra, much to the chagrin of progressives.

“A lot of this is being driven by statewide politics. [Newsom] needs to not have taxes go up but he also needs the support of the labor unions, so we get weird stuff happening in San Francisco,” Mandelman said.

The situation has also fed Newsom’s animus toward progressives, who have enjoyed more local electoral success than the mayor. Newsom responded in June to the progressive slate winning a majority on the DCCC by placing a measure on the November ballot that would ban local elected officeholders from serving on that body, which includes four progressive supervisors and three supervisorial candidates.

Nonetheless, Newsom then unexpectedly sought a seat on the DCCC, arguing that his lieutenant governor nomination entitled him to an ex officio seat (those held by state and federal elected Democrats) even though the DCCC’s legal counsel disagreed. While noting the hypocrisy of the request, Party Chair Aaron Peskin took the high road and proposed to change the bylaws to seat Newsom.

Some progressives privately groused about giving a seat to someone who, as DCCC member Carole Migden said at the meeting, was “picking a fight” with progressives by pushing a measure she called “disrespectful and unconstitutional.” But in practice, the episode seems to have hurt Newsom’s relations with progressives without really strengthening his political hand.

Newsom ally Scott Wiener — a DCCC member and District 8 supervisorial candidate (who told us he opposes the mayor’s DCCC ballot measure) — proposed to amend Peskin’s motion to change the bylaws in order to seat Newsom with language that would allow Newsom to continue serving even if he loses his race in November.

That amendment was defeated on a 17-13 vote that illustrated a clear dividing line between the progressive majority and the minority faction of moderates and ex officio members. Even with Newsom and District Attorney Kamala Harris (who was seated as the Democratic nominee for attorney general) being seated — and counting the one absent vote, Sen. Leland Yee, who is expected to sometimes vote with progressives and sometimes with moderates — progressives still hold the majority going into the process of endorsing local candidates and allocating party resources for the fall campaign.

“Presuming that 17 people of that 33-member body all agree on something, then the presence of Mayor Newsom doesn’t change anything,” Peskin said. He also noted that even if Newsom’s measure passed and the progressive supervisors were removed, “the irony is that the chair of the party [Peskin] would appoint their successors.”

Also ironic is the political reality that it is Newsom who most needs his party’s support right now, while it is progressives who are adopting the most conciliatory tone.

“We should all be working to turn out the vote and help Democrats win,” Peskin told us. “I implore our mayor and lieutenant gubernatorial candidate to work with us and get that done.”

Yet after Newsom gave a budget-signing speech that included the line, “At the end of the day, it comes down to leadership, stewardship, collaboration, partnership,” he told the Guardian that he has no intention of removing or explaining his DCCC ballot measure, saying only, “If the voters support it, then it would be the right thing to do.”

Chiu responded to the news by telling us, “I hope the mayor can move beyond the politics of personality and build a party vehicle that is about unity.”

“Growing Up Twisted:” take it … or leave it

Sue Vaughan
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2
“Growing Up Twisted:” take it … or leave it

For every awesome reality show (Real Housewives of New Jersey), there are dozens that feel forced and pointless (keeping it within Bravo, the Housewives network, anyone else seen that Work of Art show? Can you explain the point, or the appeal?) Into the “I’m already famous” sub-genre of reality shows (as opposed to the “I’ll do anything to be famous” sub-genre) tumbles Growing Up Twisted, a new seven-part series that debuted this week on A&E. It’s unclear if we have the success of Gene Simmons Family Jewels (also an A&E production) to thank for this, or if this is some kind of attempt to reclaim the glory that once was MTV’s The Osbournes. If it’s the latter, the world needs to realize that there’s only one Ozzy (and only one Sharon, for that matter), and there will never be another Osbournes.

That said, Dee Snider — fright-wigged leader of Twisted Sister and enemy-for-life of Tipper Gore’s Parents Music Resource Center — was entertaining in the 80s, and appears to have aged with far less slurring side effects than Osbournes-era Ozzy. If there’s no discernable reason we should be watching his brood stomp around their Long Island mansion, at least there are some genuinely funny moments along the way. Filling the Sharon role is Dee’s wife Suzette; they met when she was 15 and he was 21, and have been together ever since (one of the first episodes highlights their 34th anniversary). A busty blonde who considers a skin-tight leopard-print dress to be a “conservative” look, the boisterous Suzette wears the pants in the marriage — I could see her fitting into a Real Housewives scenario, no problem. She’s be the one who gets into fistfights and doesn’t apologize.

Other Sniders include aspiring rocker Jesse (his ability to rock remains unconfirmed as of episode two, for all we see him croon is a sappy ballad to his infant daughter; in addition, he wears his hair in a most unfortunate mohawk, with designs shaved into the sides of his head); stand-up comedian Shane (initially, I thought he was the most normal of the crew, until I realized he was periodically wearing a cape around the house); Cody (described as “a filmmaker,” he’s probably more accurately tagged “a shit-starter); and baby of the family Cheyenne (a Hot Topic-clad young teen who throws a toddler-style tantrum when her beloved trampoline is removed from the family’s backyard).

So, to quickly recap: the kids are named Jesse, Shane, Cody, and Cheyenne. Wild West theme much?

Anyway, A&E aired the first two 30-minute episodes back-to-back on Tues/27; according to A&E’s website, they’ll repeat before the new eps air Tues/3. The first episode, “Baptism By Snider,” follows the frantic efforts of the family to put together a backyard christening for Jesse’s baby (hence, the need to move Cheyenne’s trampoline: “It meeeeeans something to me!” she wails in protest, taking a stand like only a 13-year-old kid who’s been showered with expensive toys all her life can). There’s also a side bit about Jesse’s music career (he’s written a song about how he won’t leave his daughter at home while he goes on tour, like Dee did to him — burn), and a family outing to a comedy club to see Shane perform (do I need to tell you he includes a “We’re Not Gonna Take It” joke?)

Episode two, “Carpet and Drapes,” goes for a slightly raunchier theme; there’s no baby business in this one. Instead, it’s Dee and Suzette’s anniversary. Tender tributes to their love include Suzette’s decision to shave her pubic hair into a heart shape and dye it hot pink (Shane and Cody are either overly offended by this notion, or a little too excited by it; you be the judge). In a scene that’s as close as Growing Up Twisted will ever come to O. Henry, Dee takes Suzette out for a romantic dinner to reveal he’s touched up the fading “Suzette” tattoo on his arm — only to discover that she’s just had her “Dee” tattoo lasered off. This is played for high drama; Dee’s deep Wound of Body Art Betrayal is healed only when Suzette decides she’ll get a big new tattoo where only he can see it (even though she admits that her wardrobe doesn’t leave many places the sun don’t shine).

What’s ahead for this kooky, ooky family? Episode three involves Shane shooting a video for his improv class (and with his brothers, taking revenge on a store clerk who insults his mother’s deliberately cultivated MILF aesthetic); Episode 4 focuses on Suzette’s empty nest syndrome (should they adopt another kid? Especially when Child Protective Services is paying calls regarding other matters?) Hmm. The theme song for Growing Up Twisted insists “Once you get a taste, you’re forever addicted!” Dunno. Perhaps they can loan out that ditty to the Housewives.

Check out the first two episodes of Growing Up Twisted on A&E.com. And, just for fun: Twisted Sister’s video for “I Wanna Rock.” Classic.

City Hall standoff

David Talbot
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0
City Hall standoff

steve@sfbg.com

Backroom politics, vote-trading, threats, and tricky legislative maneuvering marked — some would say marred — the approval of the city’s 2010-11 budget and a package of fall ballot measures.

For weeks, Mayor Gavin Newsom had been threatening to simply not spend the roughly $42 million in budgetary add-backs the supervisors had approved July 1, mostly for public health and social services, unless they agreed to withdraw unrelated November ballot measures that Newsom opposes (see "Bad faith," July 14).

The board’s July 20 meeting included a flurry of last-minute maneuvers interrupted by an hours-long recess during which Newsom, Board President David Chiu, and their representatives negotiated a deal that was bristled at by progressive supervisors and fiscal conservative Sup. Sean Elsbernd.

Ideological opposites Elsbernd and Sup. Chris Daly voted against motions to delay consideration of several measures — including splitting appointments to the Rent, Recreation and Park, and Municipal Transportation Authority boards; revenue measures; and requiring police foot patrols — until after approval of the city budget.

"What is the connection between [seismic retrofit] bonds and the budget?" Elsbernd asked as Budget Committee chair John Avalos made the motion to delay consideration of the $46 million general obligation bond Newsom proposed for the November ballot.

Avalos made an oblique reference to "other meetings" that were happening down the hall. Daly then criticized the maneuver, noting that "vote trading is illegal," later citing a 2006 City Attorney’s Office memo stating that supervisors may not condition their votes on unrelated items.

But that didn’t stop supervisors from engaging in a complex, private dance with the Mayor’s Office and other constituencies that day. In the end, the board approved the budget on a 10-1 vote, with Daly in dissent. Then Chiu provided the swing vote to kill the progressive proposal to split with the mayor appointments to the Recreation and Park Commission, with Sups. Daly, Avalos, Ross Mirkarimi, David Campos, and Eric Mar on the losing end of a 5-6 vote to place the measure on the fall ballot.

A measure to split appointments to the Rent Board was defeated on a 10-1 vote, with Daly dissenting, although that seems to be tactical concession by progressives. Campos, who sponsored the measure, said landlord groups were threatening an aggressive campaign against the measure that would also seek to tarnish progressive supervisorial candidates.

Removal of an MTA reform measure from the ballot, another mayoral demand, was also likely at the July 27 meeting (held after Guardian press time). Chiu told his colleagues July 20 that he was still negotiating with the mayor on implementing some of its provisions without going to the ballot this year.

Chiu rejected the notion that he cut an inappropriate budget deal, saying he was concerned the split appointment measures would be portrayed as a board power grab, noting that community groups need the funding that Newsom was threatening to withhold, and saying the board’s threats not to fund Newsom’s Project Homeless Connect facility and Kids2College Savings program were also factors in the deal.

"We were engaged with a number of conversations, they all took time, and we didn’t finish until very late," Chiu told us.

Even Daly acknowledged supervisors had few options to counter Newsom’s threats, but told us, "It’s just not the way we should be doing things."

The decision on three revenue measures (a parking tax increase, property transfer tax, and business tax reform) was set for July 27, with sources telling the Guardian that only one or perhaps two would make it onto the ballot. Newsom opposes all of them. Also hanging in the balance was Mirkarimi’s ballot measure requiring police to do more foot patrols, as well as another version in which Chiu added a provision that would invalidate the Newsom-backed ordinance banning sitting or lying on sidewalks, a retaliation for Newsom inserting a similar poison pill in his hotel tax loophole measure that would invalidate the hotel tax increase that labor put on the ballot if it gets more votes.

But most of the action was on July 20. The Transportation Authority (comprised of all 11 supervisors) voted 8-3 (with Chiu, Avalos, and Mar opposed) to place a $10 local vehicle license fee surcharge on the ballot, which would raise about $5 million a year for Muni. A Daly-proposed ballot measure to create an affordable housing fund and plan failed on 4-7 vote, with only Campos, Mar, and Chiu joining Daly.

There were some progressive victories as well. A charter amendment by Mirkarimi to allow voters to register on election day was approved 9-2, with Elsbernd and Alioto-Pier in dissent. A Chiu-proposed measure to allow non-citizens to vote in school board elections was approved 9-2, with Elsbernd and Carmen Chu voting no. And a Daly-proposed charter amendment to require the mayor to engage in public policy discussions with the board once a month was approved 6-5, opposed by Dufty, Alioto-Pier, Elsbernd, Maxwell, and Chu.

But the busy day left some progressives feeling unsettled. "How do you do this and not be trading votes?" Campos told us. "In the end, we’re saving programs, but what does it say about the institution of the board?"

Newsom spokesperson Tony Winnicker denied that the mayor made inappropriate threats, but confirmed that a deal was cut and told us, "Yes, the Mayor made his concerns about the budget clear. Yes, the mayor made his concerns about the charter amendments clear."

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