Progressive

Bay Area black metal: Ludicra’s gripping new “Tenant”

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It’s hard to believe, but black metal is around 20 years old. During its second decade, the music has been gradually subsumed into the metal mainstream, cannibalized, recombined, and reinvented. Pulled in one direction by the commercialization of bands like Dimmu Borgir, and in the other direction by the hermetic inaccessibility of solo studio acts like San Francisco’s Leviathan, fans and metal taxonomers have circled the wagons around arbitrary criteria, judging bands on whether or not they use a keyboard, or whether or not they’re from Scandinavia.

Thankfully, in the Bay Area, we’ve got a black metal band who couldn’t care less what the guarantors of kvlt (sic) purity have to say. San Francisco’s Ludicra hit stores with their fourth full-length today, and Tenant (Profound Lore Records) showcases an act at the height of their considerable powers, churning out organic-sounding, progressive black metal mixed with affecting, punk-rock humility. In place of frozen Norwegian rivers or blood-soaked Vikings, the album derives its themes from the eerie, uncanny, and horrifying aspects of urban living, as its title eloquently suggests.

Guitarists John Cobbett (also of Hammers of Misfortune) and Christy Cather favor warmer guitar tones of the type that won Wolves in the Throne Room so much critical aplomb, and they’re buttressed in this choice by the throat-shredding vocals of Laurie Sue Shanaman, which give the music a visceral, catharctic potency. Drummer Aesop Dekker is nimble if understated, and brings a welcome humanity to a genre that is generally so chops- and blast-beat-heavy.

The scything 6/8 riff that begins album opener “Stagnant Pond” is a harbinger of things to come, ascending into meditative chaos before giving way to the stately, mid-tempo blast that opens “A Larger Silence.” “In Stable” is the LP’s barn-burner, with its pulsing, black ‘n’ roll verse and massive ending build.

All of the album’s seven tracks are longer than five minutes, and two top nine, so it’s a testament to the Ludicra’s arranging talent that the songs breeze by as fast as they often do. Whether it’s a stop-on-a-dime meter shift or a clever bit of pagan-folk filigree, its hard not to be impressed by the band’s songwriting acumen. “Clean White Void” displays a notable NWOBHM influence, a stark contrast to the relentless blast beats on “Truth Won’t Set You Free” and the meditative chanting in the album-closing title track “Tenant.” Taken as a whole, the album is a gripping evocation of anger, fear, and sadness – what’s more black metal than that?

Downtown’s DCCC slate fizzles

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I’m actually a bit surprised that Gavin Newsom’s allies haven’t made a bigger push to take back control of the San Francisco Democratic Party, which will play a key role in the fall supervisorial races. It looked for a while as if the downtown folks were organizing to put a slate of strong candidates with solid name recognition on the ballot. But when the Department of Elections closed Friday afternoon, and the deadline for filing passed, there weren’t that many new names on the ballot. Here’s the list. (PDF).


Twelve candidates will get elected in each of the two San Francisco Assembly districts. On the east side of town, in AD 13, eight progressive incumbents, including Sups. David Campos and David Chiu, former Sup. (and current DCCC chair) Aaron Peskin are running. So is School Board member Kim-Shree Maufas and former state Sen. Carole Migden. Supervisorial candidates (and incuments ) Rafael Mandelman and Debra Walker are running, as are former supervisorial candidates Eric Quezada and Alix Rosenthal.


Not a lot of star power in the more moderate camp. Other than former Sup. (and incumbent) Leslie Katz and sup. candidate (and incumbent) Scott Wiener, it’s not a powerful crew. So the progressives look to do well — as they usually do — in D 13.


D-12 is a little more conservative in general — and there are lots and lots of candidates, meaning name recognition is even more important. I’d thought maybe somebody would talk Sup. Sean Elsbernd or Sup Carmen Chu into running. But no: the only elected officials on the list are progressives, including Sups. John Avalos and Eric Mar, School Board member Sandy Fewer, and Community College Board member Milton Marks. Then there’s incumbent (and former Sup.) Jake Mcgoldrick.


The moderate, pro-Newsom camp — the folks who would try to shift the Democratic Party endorsements away from progressives in swing supervisorial districts — may be large, but not terribly deep. Incumbents Tom Hsieh and Megan Levitan are, of course, running again, and there’s Bill Fazio, who once ran for district attorney.


Myra Kopp, wife of former state Sen. (and retired judge) Quentin Kopp, is a candidate, and while she may be a little more politically conservative than Avalos and Mar, she’s not going to be in the Newsom camp, either; she’s more of an independent wild card.


Paul Hogart agrees with me that the progressives seem well situated to keep control of the DCCC, although it’s never a sure thing: there are no contribution limits for these races, and since it’s a low-profile office, big money can make a big difference. Let’s see what downtown tries to do to buff up and promote its candidates in the next two months.


 

Gav’s running for (lite) guv!

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It’s not any big surprise that Gavin Newsom is officially running for lieutenant governor; we all knew that was in the cards. Newsom’s downtown allies don’t want him running, because he might win — which would mean a vacancy in the mayor’s office. But it’s really all about Newsom, and he doesn’t want to be termed out with nowhere to go.


Calitics makes the point that


In many ways, this race will showcase the future leadership of California Democrats. The winner of the primary will go on to defeat Abel Maldonado and will be a top contender to be the next governor, whether they succeed Jerry Brown or (god forbid) Meg Whitman. It’s to the benefit of Democrats and progressives that this race be issue-oriented, and free of the unfortunate personal attacks that would undermine all the candidates involved.


And Newsom loves the idea of being showcased as the future leader of California Democrats.


Newsom got a big bounce the moment he announced, when state Sen. Dean Florez, one of two other Democratic candidates for the office, dropped out and endorsed Newsom.


That leaves just Newsom and Janice Hahn, a Los Angeles City Council member who’s got an aggressive campaign (featuring Garry South, the asshole political consultant who used to work for Newsom).


Newsom starts off with a major lead; all the money he spent campaigning for governor gave him significant name recognition, and in a Democratic primary for a low-profile office, that makes a lot of difference. And his likely opponent in November is Abel Maldonado, a not-terribly-appealing Republican.


So the talk in San Francisco is all about who becomes the next mayor if Newsom wins — and already, the Newsom strategists are trying to figure out how to prevent the progressive district-elected board from appointing his replacement. The latest strategy: A Charter amendment establishing that a vacancy in the Mayor’s Office has to be filled in a special election.


Hard to argue against that — except that the special election would be in the spring of 2011, and the general election would be that fall, meaning two expensive elections (one of them guaranteed to have low turnout) in the course of 11 months.


There’s no way Newsom’s getting six votes on this board for his idea, which means he’s going to have to raise the money to gather 47,000 signatures. And if he does, the supervisors ought to respond with their own Charter amendment — establishing that vacancies on the Board of Supervisors (now filled by a mayoral appointment) also require a special election. That’s only fair.


And while Newsom and his allies talk about how unfair it is to have district supervisors, some of whom were elected with as few as 10,000 votes, decide on the next mayor, it’s worth thinking through what a special election for mayor would look like. For starters, a lot of people would probably run — and the results would be utterly unpredictable. Suppose everyone who really wants to be mayor jumped in: Leland Yee, Dennis Herrera, Aaron Peskin, Ross Mirkarimi, Bevan Dufty, maybe Michela Alioto-Pier, maybe Sean Elsbernd, maybe even Mark Leno … and the turnout will be ultra-low, and, well, the next mayor’s going to be elected with a remarkably small number of votes.


Assume a turnout of 100,000 — high for a special election. And assume seven candidates (there would probably be a lot more). That means the winner would be unlikely to have more than 20,000 first-place votes.


If it’s a ranked-choice voting situation, any of the above could pull it off. If it’s a simple plurality, hey: someone like Chris Daly, who has a small but highly devoted constituency, would have as good a chance as anyone.


The bottom line is that a special election doesn’t guarantee anything — in fact, it could turn out to be downtown’s worst nightmare.


Here’s the letter Newsom sent to potential supporters:


I didn’t come to this decision easily, but, after a great deal of consultation with my family, constituents and supporters, I believe that the best way for me to serve is by taking all of the many things that are right about California and applying them to fixing what’s wrong in Sacramento.  


The issues I fought for when I ran for Governor last year haven’t changed: our state still faces a massive budget crisis, painful unemployment, and rising student fees that threaten the stability and accessibility of our University system.  Too many Californians lack access to quality health care and too many schools are overcrowded and underfunded.


But, despite our challenges, I will always believe in California – the dynamism of its past and the promise of its future.  I’m also convinced that those of us who love this state have both an obligation and the capacity now to reform it and make it better. To do that, we need to embrace a new way of doing things in Sacramento and we need new leaders who are willing to stand up and change state government.


I’m proud that I have the support of Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate President Darrell Steinberg, Assembly Speaker John Perez, Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson, United Farm Workers co-founder Delores Huerta and California Nurses and teachers and I hope I can count on your support too.


And here’s some of the press coverage:


LA Times on Newsom run, including information on early fundraising.


Calitics on Florez’s exit from the race, including text of Florez
message and press release.



Newsom announces his candidacy in an interview with reporter Phil
Matier
on CBS 5. (video)

 Chronice on Newsom’s chances.


 Willie Brown on who will succeed Newsom as mayor.
 
Chronicle speculates on who will replace Newsom, specifically on the
possibility of David Chiu becoming mayor.

LA Observed on Gary South vs. Newsom.


LA Times blog on awkward Newsom-Brown pairing.

The Green Party’s nadir

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This should be a great time for the Green Party. Its namesake color is being cited by every corporation and politician who wants to get in good with the environmentally-minded public; voters in San Francisco are more independent than ever; and progressives have been increasingly losing the hope they placed on President Barack Obama.
But the Green Party of San Francisco — which once had an influence on city politics that was disproportionate to its membership numbers — has hit a nadir. The number of Greens has steadily dwindled since its peak in 2003; the party closed its San Francisco office in November; and it has now lost almost all its marquee members.
Former mayoral candidate Matt Gonzalez, school board member Jane Kim, community college board member John Rizzo, and Planning Commissioner Christina Olague have all left the party in the last year or so. Sup. Ross Mirkarimi — a founding member of the Green Party of California and its last elected official in San Francisco — has also been openly struggling with whether to remain with an organization that doesn’t have much to offer him anymore, particularly as he contemplates a bid for higher office.
While a growing progressive movement within the Democratic Party has encouraged some Greens to defect, particularly among those with political ambitions, that doesn’t seem to be the biggest factor. After all, the fastest growing political affiliation is “Decline to State” and San Francisco now has a higher percentage of these independent voters than any other California county: 29.3 percent, according to state figures.
Democratic Party registration in San Francisco stood at 56.7 percent in November, the second-highest percentage in the state after Alameda County, making this essentially a one-party town (at last count, there were 256,233 Democrats, 42,097 Republicans, and 8,776 Greens in SF). Although Republicans in San Francisco have always outnumbered Greens by about 4-1, the only elected San Francisco Republican in more than a decade was BART board member James Fang.
But Republicans could never have made a real bid for power in San Francisco, as Gonzalez did in his electrifying 2003 mayoral run, coming within 5 percentage points of beating Gavin Newsom, who outspent the insurgent campaign 6-1 and had almost the entire Democratic Party establishment behind him.
That race, and the failure of Democrats in Congress to avert the ill-fated invasion of Iraq, caused Green Party membership to swell, reaching its peak in San Francisco and statewide in November 2003. But it’s been a steady downward slide since then, locally and statewide.
So now, as the Green Party of California prepares to mark its 20th anniversary next month in Berkeley, it’s worth exploring what happened to the party and what it means for progressive people’s movements at a time when they seem to be needed more than ever. Mirkarimi was one of about 20 core progressive activists who founded the Green Party of California in 1990, laying the groundwork in the late 1980s when he spent almost two years studying the Green Party in Germany, which was an effective member of a coalition government there and something he thought the United States desperately needed.
“It was in direct response to the right-wing shift of the Democrats during the Reagan and Bush Sr. administrations. It was so obvious that there had been an evacuation of the left-of-center values and policies that needed attention. So the era was just crying out woefully for a third party,” Mirkarimi said of the Green Party of California and its feminist, antiwar, ecological, and social justice belief system.
But he and the other founding Greens have discovered how strongly the American legal, political, and economic structures maintain the two-party system (or what Mirkarimi called “one party with two conservative wings”), locking out rival parties through restrictive electoral laws, control of political debates, and campaign financing mechanisms.
“I’m still very impassioned about the idea of having a Green Party here in the United States and here in California and San Francisco, vibrantly so. But I’m concerned that the Green Party will follow a trend like all third parties, which have proven that this country is absolutely uninviting — and in fact unwelcoming — of third parties and multiparty democracy,” Mirkarimi said.
Unlike some Greens, Mirkarimi has always sought to build coalitions and make common cause with Democrats when there were opportunities to advance the progressive agenda, a lesson he learned in Germany.
When he worked on Ralph Nader’s 2000 presidential campaign — a race that solidified the view of Greens as “spoilers” in the minds of many Democrats — Mirkarimi was involved in high-level negotiations with Democratic nominee Al Gore’s campaign, trying to broker some kind of leftist partnership that would elect Gore while advancing the progressive movement.
“There was great effort to try to make that happen, but unfortunately, everyone defaulted to their own anxieties and insecurities,” Mirkarimi said. “It was uncharted territory. It had never happened before. Everyone who held responsibility had the prospect of promise, and frankly, everybody felt deflated that the conversation did not become actualized into something real between Democrats and Greens. It could have.”
Instead, George W. Bush was narrowly elected president and many Democrats blamed Nader and the Greens, unfairly or not. And Mirkarimi said the Greens never did the post-election soul-searching and retooling that they should have. Instead, they got caught up in local contests, such as the Gonzalez run for mayor — “that beautiful distraction” — a campaign Mirkarimi helped run before succeeding Gonzalez on the board a year later.
Today, as he considers running for mayor himself, Mirkarimi is weighing whether to leave the party he founded. “I’m in a purgatory. I believe in multiparty democracy,” Mirkarimi said. “Yet tactically speaking, I feel like if I’m earnest in my intent to run for higher office, as I’ve shared with Greens, I’m not so sure I can do so as a Green.”
That’s a remarkable statement — in effect, an acknowledgement that despite some success on the local level, the Green Party still can’t compete for bigger prizes, leaving its leaders with nowhere to go. Mirkarimi said he plans to announce his decision — about his party and political plans — soon.
Gonzalez left the Green Party in 2008, changing his registration to DTS when he decided to be the running mate of Nader in an independent presidential campaign. That move was partly necessitated by ballot access rules in some states. But Gonzalez also thought Nader needed to make an independent run and let the Green Party choose its own candidate, which ended up being former Congress member Cynthia McKinney.
“I expressly said to Nader that I would not run with him if he sought the Green Party nomination,” Gonzalez told us. “The question after the campaign was: is there a reason to go back to the Green Party?”
Gonzalez concluded that there wasn’t, that the Greens had ceased to be a viable political party and that it “lacks a certain discipline and maturity.” Among the reasons he cited for the party’s slide were infighting, inadequate party-building work, and the party’s failure to effectively counter criticisms of Nader’s 2000 and 2004 presidential campaigns.
“We were losing the public relations campaign of explaining what the hell happened,” he said.
Gonzalez was also critical of the decision by Mirkarimi and other Greens to endorse the Democratic Party presidential nominees in 2004 and 2008, saying it compromised the Greens’ critique of the two-party system. “It sort of brings that effort to an end.”
But Gonzalez credits the Green Party with invigorating San Francisco politics at an important time. “It was an articulation of an independence from the Democratic Party machine,” Gonzalez said of his decision to go from D to G in 2000, the year he was elected to the Board of Supervisors.
Anger at that machine and its unresponsiveness to progressive issues was running high at the time, and Gonzalez said the Green Party became one of the “four corners of the San Francisco left,” along with the San Francisco Tenants Union, the Harvey Milk LGBT Democratic Club, and the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, which helped set a progressive agenda for the city.
“Those groups helped articulate what issues were important,” Gonzalez said, citing economic, environmental, electoral reform, and social justice issues as examples. “So you saw the rise of candidates who began to articulate our platform.” But the success of the progressive movement in San Francisco also sowed the seeds for the Green Party’s downfall, particularly after progressive Democrats Chris Daly, Tom Ammiano, and Aaron Peskin waged ideological battles with Mayor Gavin Newsom and other so-called “moderate Democrats” last year taking control of the San Francisco Democratic Party County Central Committee.
“Historically, the San Francisco Democratic Party has been a political weapon for whoever was in power. But now, it’s actually a democratic party. And it’s gotten progressive as well,” Peskin, the party chair, told us. “And for a lot of Greens, that’s attractive.”
The opportunity to take part in that intra-party fight was a draw for Rizzo and Kim, both elected office-holders with further political ambitions who recently switched from Green to Democrat.
“I am really concerned about the Democratic Party,” Rizzo, a Green since 1992, told us. “I’ve been working in politics to try to influence things from the outside. Now I’m going to try to influence it from the inside.”
Rizzo said he’s frustrated by the inability of Obama and Congressional Democrats to capitalize on their 2008 electoral gains and he’s worried about the long-term implications of that failure. “What’s going on in Washington is really counterproductive for the Democrats. These people [young, progressive voters] aren’t going to want to vote again.”
Rizzo and Kim both endorsed Obama and both say there needs to be more progressive movement-building to get him back on track with the hopes he offered during his campaign.
“I think it’s important for progressives in San Francisco to try to move the Democratic Party back to the left,” Kim, who is considering running for the District 6 seat on the Board of Supervisors, told us. “I’ve actually been leaning toward doing this for a while.”
Kim was a Democrat who changed her registration to Green in 2004, encouraged to do so by Gonzalez. “For me, joining the Green Party was important because I really believed in third-party politics and I hope we can get beyond the two-party system,” Kim said, noting the dim hopes for that change was also a factor in her decision to switch back.
Another Green protégé of Gonzalez was Olague, whom he appointed to the Planning Commission. Olague said she was frustrated by Green Party infighting and the party’s inability to present any real political alternative.
“We had some strong things happening locally, but I didn’t see any action on the state or national level,” Olague said. “They have integrity and they work hard, but is that enough to stay in a party that doesn’t seem to be going anywhere?”
But many loyal Greens dispute the assertion that their party is on the rocks. “I think the party is going pretty well. It’s always an uphill battle building an alternative party,” said Erika McDonald, spokesperson for the Green Party of San Francisco, noting that the party plans to put the money it saved on its former Howard Street headquarters space into more organizing and outreach. “The biggest problem is money.”
Green Party activist Eric Brooks agrees. “We held onto that office for year and year and didn’t spend the money on party building, like we should have done a long time ago,” he said. “That’s the plan now, to do some crucial party organizing.”
Mirkarimi recalls the early party-building days when he and other “Ironing Board Cowboys” would canvas the city on Muni with voter registration forms and ironing boards to recruit new members, activities that fell away as the party achieved electoral successes and got involved with policy work.
“It distracted us from the basics,” Mirkarimi said. Now the Green Party has to again show that it’s capable of that kind of field work in support of a broad array of campaigns and candidates: “If I want to grow, there has to be a companion strategy that will lift all boats. All of those who have left the Green Party say they still support its values and wish it future success. And the feeling is mostly mutual, although some Greens grumble about how their party is now being hurt by the departure of its biggest names.
“I don’t begrudge an ambitious politician leaving the Green Party,” said Dave Snyder, a member of the Golden Gate Bridge, Highway, and Transportation District Board of Directors, and one of the few remaining Greens in local government.
But Snyder said he won’t abandon the Green Party, which he said best represents his political values. “To join a party means you subscribe to its ideals. But you can’t separate its ideals from its actions. Based on its actions, there’s no way I could be a member of the Democratic Party,” Snyder said.
Current Greens say many of President Obama’s actions — particularly his support for Wall Street, a health reform effort that leaves insurance companies in control, and the escalation of the war in Afghanistan — vindicate their position and illustrate why the Green Party is still relevant.
“The disillusionment with Obama is a very good opportunity for us,” McDonald said, voicing hope they Green can begin to capture more DTS voters and perhaps even a few Democrats. And Brooks said, “The Obama wake-up call should tell Greens that they should stick with the party.”
Snyder also said now is the time for Greens to more assertively make the case for progressive organizing: “The Democrats can’t live up to the hopes that people put on them.”
Even Peskin agrees that Obama’s candidacy was one of several factors that hurt the Green Party. “The liberal to progressive support for the Obama presidency deflated the Greens locally and beyond. In terms of organizing, they didn’t have the organizational support and a handful of folks alienated newcomers.”
In fact, when Mirkarmi and the other Green pioneers were trying to get the party qualified as a legal political party in California — no small task — Democratic Party leaders acted as if the Greens were the end of the world, or at least the end of Democratic control of the state Legislature and the California Congressional delegation. They went to great lengths to block the young party’s efforts.
It turns out that the Greens haven’t harmed the Democrats much at all; Democrats have even larger majorities at every legislative level today.
What has happened is that the Obama campaign, and the progressive inroads into the local party, have made the Greens less relevant. In a sense, it’s a reflection of exactly what Green leaders said years ago: if the Democrats were more progressive, there would be less need for a third party.
But Mirkarimi and other Greens who endorsed Obama see this moment differently, and they don’t share the hope that people disappointed with Obama are going to naturally gravitate toward the Greens. Rizzo and Kim fear these voters, deprived of the hope they once had, will instead just check out of politics. “They need to reorganize for a new time and new reality,” Rizzo said of the Greens.
Part of that new reality involves working with candidates like Obama and trying to pull them to the left through grassroots organizing. Mirkarimi stands by his decision to endorse Obama, for which the Green Party disinvited him to speak at its annual national convention, even though he was one of his party’s founders and top elected officials.
“After a while, we have to take responsibility to try to green the Democrats instead of just throwing barbs at them,” Mirkarimi said. “Our critique of Obama now would be much more effective if we had supported him.”
Yet that’s a claim of some dispute within the Green Party, a party that has often torn itself apart with differences over strategy and ideology, as it did in 2006 when many party activists vocally opposed the gubernatorial campaign of former Socialist Peter Camejo. And old comrades Mirkarimi and Gonzalez still don’t agree on the best Obama strategy, even in retrospect.
But they and other former Greens remain hopeful that the country can expand its political dialogue, and they say they are committed to continuing to work toward that goal. “I think there will be some new third party effort that emerges,” Gonzalez said. “It can’t be enough to not be President Bush. People want to see the implementation of a larger vision.”

Spanjian out in D-8

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Laura Spanjian, a member of the Democratic County Central Committee and candidate for supervisor in District 8, is leaving town for a new job in Houston. That means she’s out of the hotly contested race to replace Sup. Bevan Dufty in the Castro.


Spanjian was one of three leading candidates, and her withdrawal means that Rafael Mandelman and Scott Wiener are going to be slugging it out for the job. Rebecca Prozan, who also has Alice support, is also in the race, but I don’t see her coming in first.


In a press release sent out this morning, Spanjian said she’d taken a job as sustainability director for the city of Houston. “I am overjoyed to have the opportunity to work directly with Mayor Annise Parker and her staff and contribute to a cleaner environment which is, of course, not just a local issue,” Spanjian’s statement read.


Spanjian currently works for the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, and will leave that job in April to move to Houston.


Before we get into the political calculus, let me stop for a moment and congratulate Laura, who’s a good person and will do a great job in Houston (although, Jesus — she’s going to have to live in Houston.)


Now then: With Spanjian out of the race, I think Mandelman is on track to come in first. That doesn’t mean he’s going to win an election decided by ranked-choice voting, but I think he comes in first.


“Clearly it’s a win for Rafael,” Jim Stearns, a political consultant who was working for Spanjian, told me today. “Laura was going to go after the more nonideological folks in the district, but she was also going to make a push with the progressives. And now Rafael has the solid progressive base in that district to himself.”


That base, though, isn’t enough alone to get Mandelman elected. It’s going to come down to the second and third votes. And Wiener and Prozan start off competing for a lot of the same voters, but in the end, Mandelman is going to have to get enough of the more centrist folks to at least put him second to finish in the money.


 


 


 

Psychic Dream Astrology

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March 10-16

ARIES

March 21-April 19

In order to protect your most beloved investments, you’ve got to make some compromises. Put out the same quality that you want to receive in all matters of the heart.

TAURUS

April 20-May 20

Be a straight-shooter, no matter which team you play for. Don’t mince words. Instead, be bold enough to stand up but wise enough not to rush into needless battles.

GEMINI

May 21-June 21

It’s easy to indulge bad feelings, but not very helpful. Instead of focusing on disappointments, concentrate on what you can do to get yourself outta Dodge. Be the Lil’ Gemini that Can.

CANCER

June 22-July 22

Schedule a major check-in with your common sense before your anxieties take control of your smarts. Don’t let worry provoke you to do something rash, or even worse, do nothing at all.

LEO

July 23-Aug. 22

Wanting things to be pleasant is fine, but can get you into a heap of trouble. Don’t avoid real issues that need tending to. Take a mediated approach so you can keep a good attitude while dealing with crap.

VIRGO

Aug. 23-Sept. 22

Be willing to make some radical changes in a way that screams "Virgo!" By refusing to be the maker of change, you will become the target of change’s whims, and that’s no fun.

LIBRA

Sept. 23-Oct. 22

You are coming to the peak of a major cycle of development, and that means things are ending and starting all at once. Adopt a pace you can maintain so you don’t get overwhelmed and drop the ball.

SCORPIO

Oct. 23-Nov. 21

Obsessing and self flagellation are strictly prohibited this week. Find the courage to act in spite of your fears, but don’t act out. Find freedom from drama and trauma through grounded and progressive action.

SAGITTARIUS

Nov. 22-Dec. 21

It’s all fun and games until someone gets hurt and you slip into a shame spiral. Play nice and watch your old foot-in-mouth tendencies ’cause they’re on fire. Take a deep breathe before you blurt and blunder.

CAPRICORN

Dec. 22-Jan. 19

Trust in your perceptions because you have all the answers inside that charming noggin of yours. You are poised to complete some major inner cycle. Trusting your gut is just the way to close the deal.

AQUARIUS

Jan. 20-Feb. 18

Don’t let your impatience spur you to start something you can’t finish. You are on the edge of dealing with more than you can handle, so take a breather.

PISCES

Feb. 19-March 20

You’ve outgrown some of your old ways of dealing with things. Set some boundaries with yourself and stop waiting for a magic bullet to change you.

Jessica Lanyadoo has been a psychic dreamer for 15 years. Check out her Website at www.lovelanyadoo.com or contact her for an astrology or intuitive reading at (415) 336-8354 or dreamyastrology@gmail.com.

Events listings

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Events listings are compiled by Paula Connelly. Submit items for the listings at listings@sfbg.com. For further information on how to submit items for the listings, see Picks.

WEDNESDAY

Women in Publishing Intersection for the Arts, 446 Valencia, SF; (415) 626-2787. 7pm, $5-15 sliding scale. Learn more about the history and current state of feminist publishing at this panel discussion with current and former publishers and editors from the Bay Area.

THURSDAY 11

Claim the Block Contemporary Jewish Museum, 736 Mission, SF; (415) 252-4655. 7pm, free. Attend this reading by young Bay Area writers from Mission High School, Hilltop High School, and the San Francisco Public Library as part of a WritersCorps museum reading series. Visit www.sfartscommission.org/WC for info on other readings.

Original Plumbing Books Inc., 2275 Market, SF; (415) 864-6777. 7:30pm, free. Celebrate the release of the second issue of Original Plumbing magazine, a trans male quarterly that gives trans men the opportunity to express themselves in words and images. Editors Amos Mac and Rocco Kayiatos will be present.

BAY AREA

Celebrate Copwatch Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo, Berk; (510) 548-0425. 7:30pm, $10-20 sliding scale. Celebrate the 20th anniversary of Copwatch, founded by three women in 1990 to monitor police actions, at this Women’s Day event featuring a live performance by Sisters in the Pit, special guests, poets, and speakers.

Paper Politics Pegasus Books Downtown, 2349 Shattuck, Berk.; (510) 649-1320. 7:30pm, free. Attend this book release for Paper Politics: Socially Engaged Printmaking Today with editor Josh Macphee and others discussing politically and socially engaged printmaking and a book that showcases print art that uses themes of social justice and global equality.

Thrillville Forbidden Island, 1304 Lincoln, Alameda; (510) 749-0332. 8pm, free. Watch Forbidden Planet (1956) on Forbidden Island’s indoor drive-in at this retro pop culture cabaret featuring prizes, futuristic cocktails, and a live performance by the Tomorrowmen.

FRIDAY 12

BAY AREA

"State of Public Education" Education Public Library, UC Berkeley, 2600 Tolman Hall, Berk.; stateofeducationsymposium.eventbrite.com, registration requested. 8:15am, free. Take part in this day-long symposium bringing together scholars and policy-makers in education from across California to discuss economic, political, and social issues related to public education today.

SATURDAY 13

Bay Area Anarchist Book Fair San Francisco County Fair Building, Golden Gate Park, Lincoln and 9th Ave., SF; (415) 431-8355. Sat. 10am-6pm, Sun. 11am-5pm; free. Featuring over 55 vendors and author events featuring San Francisco poet laureate Diane di Prima, John Zerzan, Tommi Avicolli Mecca, and many more.

Queericulum Mama Calizo’s Voice Factory, 1519 Mission, SF; www.playajoy.org/queericulum. 10am, $20. Attend this day-long educational , regenerative, homocentric retreat featuring homo-focused workshops, dinner theater cabaret, and a celebratory dance party with DJs Lord Kook, Samnation, and StudlyCaps. Dinner, refreshments, and raffle tickets available for purchase. Suggested attire is "fabulous comfortable pajamas."

St. Patrick’s Day Festival and Parade Festival at Civic Center Plaza, SF. 10am-5pm, free. Parade starts at 2nd St. at Market and proceeds to Civic Center Plaza, SF. 11am, free. Celebrate Irish history and culture with a full day of performances, live music, arts and crafts, food, drinks, and more. Everyone’s Irish on St. Patrick’s Day.

Writers with Drinks Make Out Room, 3225 22nd. St., SF; 7:30pm, $5-10 sliding scale. Enjoy a spoken word variety show that helps raise money for local causes featuring Mary Gaitskill, Jerry Stahl, Michael Shea, Dylan Landis, and Alli Warren.

BAY AREA

"Artist Residencies" Berkeley Art Center, 1275 Walnut, Berk.; (510) 644-6893. 4pm, $5-10 sliding scale. Learn about the different types of artist residencies and how to research, locate, and apply for them at this panel discussion led by artist and CCA lecturer Susan Martin.

Empowering Women of Color Conference MLK Jr Student Union, UC Berkeley, Bancroft at Telegraph, Berk.; ewocc.berkeley.edu. Sat. 9:30am-5:30pm, Sun. 9:30am-2:30pm; $25 one day, $45 both days. Honor the legacy of women of color in the U.S. at this conference titled, "Intergenerational Wisdom: Celebrating Our Past, Present, & Future," dedicated to issues affecting women at every stage of their lives with workshops, speakers, panels, performances, networking, and vendors of interest to all age groups.

SUNDAY 14

Pi Day Exploratorium, 3601 Lyon, SF; (415) EXP-LORE. 1pm, $15. Celebrate Pi, the never ending number, and Einstein’s birthday by creating Pi puns, taking part in activities, rituals, and Pi-related antics, and eating a slice of pie prepared by the museum staff.

Sex Furniture and Bedroom Olympics Good Vibrations Polk Street Gallery, 1620 Polk, SF; (415) 345-0400. 5:30pm, free. Let Dr. Carol Queen, PhD show you how to incorporate sex furniture into the bedroom including instructions on how to use "the Ramp" and "the Wedge" and a contest to win a new "Axis."

The Vegetarian Myth San Francisco Public Library, Main Branch, 100 Larkin, SF; (415) 557-4484. 12:30pm, free. Hear author Lierre Keith discuss her new book, The Vegetarian Myth: Food, Justice, and Sustainability, which examines the destructive history of agriculture, champions eating locally, and reveals the risk of a vegan diet.

MONDAY 15

BAY AREA

Re:Imagining Change Pegasus Books Downtown, 2349 Shattuck, Berk.; (510) 649-1320. 7:30pm, free. Hear author Patrick Reinsborough discuss his new book that provides resources, theories, hand-on tools, and case studies which outline practical methods for amplifying progressive causes in popular culture.

"We Need a Total Revolution" Pacific Film Archive Theater, 2575 Bancroft, Berk.; (510) 848-1196. 4pm, $10-$20. Hear Sunsara Taylor, writer and activist, make the case for why there is no biological, god-given, or man made reason why the oppression of women throughout the world has to remain this way and how we can change things through communist revolution.

TUESDAY 16

Persian New Year Persian Center, 2029 Durant, Berk.; (510) 548-5335. 6pm, free. Welcome spring by taking part in the Persian custom of jumping over a bonfire to welcome spring. Featuring Persian food, music, and dance.

Newsom’s silly trick

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Gavin Newsom’s got a plan: He’s going to stop those damn district-elected progressives from appoining a new mayor even if it takes some wacky legal footwork. According to the Chron’s Matier and Ross:


For the past two weeks, Newsom’s political team has been combing the state Constitution to determine if the mayor, assuming he’s elected statewide, could legally push back his Jan. 3 swearing-in for the new job until after Jan. 8.


If he can, the job of naming his successor would go to the newly elected Board of Supervisors, which is sworn in Jan. 8, instead of the current lineup.


I don’t know where that team is looking in the state Constitution, but the language seems pretty clear to me. Article V, section 2, provides that the “Governor shall be elected every fourth year…and hold office from the Monday after January 1….” In 2011, that’s Jan. 3. It also says (article V, section 11) that “The Lieutenant Governor, Attorney General, Controller, Secretary of State, and Treasurer shall be elected at the same time and places and for the same term as the Governor.”


And since the mayor of San Francisco is, by Charter, a full-time job, Newsom can’t be both mayor and lt. governor. Which means, I think, that he’s got to start the new job Jan. 3, and the new Board of Supervisors doesn’t take office until a week later.


There’s another twist here: The City Charter discusses a “vacancy” in the office of mayor, and authorizes the Board of Supervisors to select someone to fill the remainder of a vacant term. If Newsom wins in November, it will be clear that a vacancy is looming — and there’s no reason why the supervisors can’t pass a motion right away designating the person who they intend to have fill that vacancy. In other words, this current board could select the next mayor even before Newsom officially resigns.


Now, it’s also true that the motion wouldn’t become effective until the mayor actually left office, and could be rescinded at any time up until that moment. But if the supervisors find six votes for a candidate, and designate that person as Newsom’s successor, it’s unlikely the board would decide to change its mind and rescind in just a few weeks.


And even if all that doesn’t fly, there’s a very good chance that progressives will still control the next board. Four progressive supes will carry over — Ross Mirkarimi, John Avalos, Eric Mar and David Campos. If progressive candidates win two of the three swing races — in districts 6, 8 and 10 — then the overall politics of the board won’t change dramatically.


So there’s actually a chance that a progressive mayor could take office next January. Whether Newsom likes it or not


 



 

Protests demand more money for education

17

Images from yesterday’s protests by Charles Russo

Yesterday’s Day of Action to protest deep cuts in public education and other vital services was far larger – and occasionally more militant – than many had expected, sending a strong message to Sacramento that it’s time to pursue new revenue options instead of simply cutting the public sector to the bone.

More than 150 people were arrested (including Guardian intern Jobert Poblete, who is still among at least 80 awaiting booking this morning at the overwhelmed Santa Rita Jail in Dublin) for allegedly climbing onto the freeway at Interstate 880 in Oakland and blocking traffic around 5 p.m., the most confrontational event in an otherwise peaceful yet forceful day of protest.

The biggest Bay Area event was outside San Francisco City Hall, were more than a dozen smaller events and marches converged at 5 p.m. Civic Center Plaza was filled with thousands of people of all ages, backgrounds, and ethnicities, from sign-wielding kindergarteners to United Educators of San Francisco President Dennis Kelly, who served as MC of a program that explicitly excluded elected officials.

“We’re here today because never again should any of us feel helpless,” Kelly boomed, declaring, “The budgets of California will not be built on the backs of our future.”

It was indeed an inspiring, passionate presentation to the largest crowd that has filled the plaza since the start of the Iraq War in 2003. Some speakers even drew on that connection in scoffing at statements by elected officials that the budget cuts – which have results in hundreds of teacher layoffs and steep tuition hikes — are unavoidable.

“When the government wants to wage war, the money is there. When the government wants trillions of dollars to bail out the banks, the money is there,” Chabot College teacher Kip Waldo said.

Susan Solomon, a San Francisco kindergarten teacher, said the budget decisions being made today are incredibly myopic and unjust. “We are here today to address a crime, the crime of stealing education from our kids,” she said, going on to attack the belittling mantra that educators need to simply live within the budgets they’re given. “We are sick and tired of doing more with less. Let’s try something new. Let’s try doing more with more.”

Then she spelled out what she – and the majority of people who were out there, people who don’t usually take to the streets in protest – are advocating: “We want progressive taxation. The people and the corporation who have all the money should pay their fair share.”

Whether this nascent movement can help bring that about is yet to be determined, but its leaders sounded confident yesterday. As California Faculty Association President Lil Taiz said, “We have here the seeds of a movement that can lead this state to the kind of future we believe in.”

Day of Action field reports

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We’re starting to get some field reports from today’s big Strike and Day of Action — which culminates in a 5 p.m. rally in Civic Center Plaza — from some Guardianistas who we have covering various marches. And it sounds like the turnout is big and lively.

Over at SF State, hundreds of protesting students blocked 19th Avenue before being cleared by police. Then, for those students who hadn’t walked out in protest of rising fees and declining class offerings, someone pulled a fire alarm and shut down classes that way.

Meanwhile, in the East Bay, intern Jobert Poblete is with a march that he estimates to be a couple thousand people that has taken Telegraph Avenue and is trying to go all the way from the UC Berkeley campus to downtown Oakland, where they’ll rally in the Frank Ogawa Plaza outside Oakland City Hall this afternoon. So far, they’ve met with little resistance or police activity.

Currently, there are already hundreds of protesters outside Oakland City Hall, which has been locked down, and the crowd is expected to swell to several thousand once the Telegraph protest and other East Bay events converge there. It’s the same story outside San Francisco City Hall, where a rally is now underway with several satellite protests making their way there now.

See Alerts for more on the various marches and check back to this post later for updates and photos.  

2:15 update: Brady Welch reports that around 100 Mission High students have walked off campus together and are now marching up Valencia Streets, banging drums and chanting slogans, with some SFPD squad cars providing an escort. We’ve also heard from various sources through SF and the East Bay that there’s been more than a dozen smaller protests, many of them involving grade school children carrying protest signs. SF Public Press has an interesting report by a former Guardian intern on that phenomenon.

Shot of crowd at East Bay march.

And a couple photos from Brady Welch:

 

This photo (taken from inside Oakland City Hall by my friend, Deputy City Attorney Alix Rosenthal, less than an hour ago) shows a smaller than expected turnout:

Meanwhile, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom has issued a statement of support for the Day of Action that begins, ““I join the thousands of students, parents and teachers across California and here in San Francisco today calling for adequate, equitable education funding for our public schools and universities.”

Newsom also opposed the Iraq War but never took part in any of the peace marches (unlike progressive members of the Board of Supervisors, who marched and gave speeches at the events), but I’m headed to the Civic Center rally soon, so I’ll let you know if he makes an appearance. We’ll have more extensive coverage of today’s events and what they mean tomorrow.

UPDATE: Guardian intern Jobert Poblete was among 150-200 people arrested in the East Bay during the Day of Action protests this evening, a group that he says including several journalists. Details are sketchy in the brief messages that we’ve had from him, but most of the arrests reportedly occurred when the protesters briefly blocked Interstate 880. They’ve been taken to Alameda County Jail in Dublin where jail personnel tell us most of those arrested are likely to be cited and released sometime tonight. Meanwhile, a 5 p.m. rally at Civic Center Plaza in San Francisco was packed with an exhuberant crowd of several thousand, the largest demonstration there in years. We’ll have a full report of the day’s events tomorrow.

Music listings

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Music listings are compiled by Paula Connelly and Cheryl Eddy. Since club life is unpredictable, it’s a good idea to call ahead to confirm bookings and hours. Prices are listed when provided to us. Submit items at listings@sfbg.com.

WEDNESDAY 3

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Backyard Tire Fire, Arcadio Hotel Utah. 9pm, $10.

Jello Biafra and the Guantanamo School of Medicine, Fracas, Abu Ghraib Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $12.

Big John Bates and the Voodoo Dollz, Quarter Mile Combo, Reverend Deadeye Thee Parkside. 8pm, $7.

For Fear the Hearts of Men Are Failing, Cousin Chris Show, Jamie Wong El Rio. 8pm, $5.

Generalissimo, Cartographer, Assistant Cobra Elbo Room. 9pm, $7.

Guitar Shorty Biscuits and Blues. 8pm, $15.

La Corde, Stirling Says, Only Sons Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $6.

Jason Movrich Abbey Tavern, 4100 Geary, SF; (415) 221-7767. 9pm, free.

Phantogram Rickshaw Stop. 8pm, $10.

Snoop Dogg Fillmore. 8pm, $55.

*Alan Toussaint Great American Music Hall. 8pm, $35.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Bluegrass Country Jam Plough and Stars. 9pm.

Faye Blais, Sarah Burton Café Royale, 800 Post, SF; (415) 441-4099. 8pm, free.

DANCE CLUBS

Afreaka! Attic, 3336 24th St; souljazz45@gmail.com. 10pm, free. Psychedelic beats from Brazil, Turkey, India, Africa, and across the globe with MAKossa.

Booty Call Q-Bar, 456 Castro; www.bootycallwednesdays.com. 9pm. Juanita Moore hosts this dance party, featuring DJ Robot Hustle.

Hands Down! Bar on Church. 9pm, free. With DJs Claksaarb, Mykill, and guests spinning indie, electro, house, and bangers.

Hump Night Elbo Room. 9pm, $5. The week’s half over – bump it out at Hump Night!

Jam Wednesday Infusion Lounge. 10pm, free. DJ Slick Dee.

Mary-Go-Round LookOut, 3600 16th St., SF; (415) 431-0306. 10pm, $5. A weekly drag show with hosts Cookie Dough, Pollo Del Mar, and Suppositori Spelling.

RedWine Social Dalva. 9pm-2am, free. DJ TophOne and guests spin outernational funk and get drunk.

Respect Wednesdays End Up. 10pm, $5. Rotating DJs Daddy Rolo, Young Fyah, Irie Dole, I-Vier, Sake One, Serg, and more spinning reggae, dancehall, roots, lovers rock, and mash ups.

Synchronize Il Pirata, 2007 16th St.; (415) 626-2626. 10pm, free. Psychedelic dance music with DJs Helios, Gatto Matto, Psy Lotus, Intergalactoid, and guests.

Yoruba Dance Sessions Bacano! Som., 2925 16th St., SF; (415) 558-8521. 9pm, free. With resident DJ Carlos Mena and guests spinning afro-deep-global-soulful-broken-techhouse.

THURSDAY 4

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Big Light, Everest, Guns for San Sebastian Independent. 8pm, $14.

Chauncey Evans Quintet Coda. 9pm, $7.

Dashing Suns, Sunbeam Rd. Adobe Books, 3166 16th St, SF; http://adobebooksbackroomgallery.blogspot.com. 7pm, free.

Lloyd Gregory Biscuits and Blues. 8pm, $15.

Gun and Doll Show, Pollux Rickshaw Stop. 8pm, $20. Benefit for the George Mark Children’s House.

*Hunx and His Punkettes, Splinters, Magic Bullets Amnesia. 9pm, $7.

Midlake, Matthew and the Arrogant Sea Great American Music Hall. 9pm, $18.

Ash Reiter, Tippy Canoe and Mikie Lee Prasad, Anna Ash Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $6.

*Saviours, Lecherous Gaze, Futur Skullz Eagle Tavern. 10pm, $8.

Rocky Votolato, Adam Stephens, Tin Can Notes Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $14.

Veil Veil Vanish Popscene at 330 Ritch. 10pm.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

"Other Minds Festival of New Music" Kanbar Hall, Jewish Community Center of San Francisco, 3200 California, SF; www.otherminds.org. 8pm, $35.

Poncho Sanchez Band with Nicholas Payton Yoshi’s San Francisco. 8 and 10pm, $16-24.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Circle R Boys Atlas Café. 8pm, free.

Heather Combs, Matthew Hansen, Dave Gleason Hotel Utah. 8pm, $8.

Shana Morrison Café du Nord. 8pm, $15.

Shannon Céilí Band Plough and Stars. 9pm.

Oliver Rajamani Ensemble Swedish American Hall (upstairs from Café du Nord). 8pm, $20.

DANCE CLUBS

Afrolicious Elbo Room. 9:30pm, $5-6. DJs Pleasuremaker and Señor Oz spin Afrobeat, Tropicália, electro, samba, and funk.

Caribbean Connection Little Baobab, 3388 19th St; 643-3558. 10pm, $3. DJ Stevie B and guests spin reggae, soca, zouk, reggaetón, and more.

Club Jammies Edinburgh Castle. 10pm, free. DJs EBERrad and White Mice spinning reggae, punk, dub, and post punk.

Drop the Pressure Underground SF. 6-10pm, free. Electro, house, and datafunk highlight this weekly happy hour.

Electric Feel Lookout. 9pm, $2. With DJs subOctave and Blondie K spinning indie music videos.

Funky Rewind Skylark. 9pm, free. DJ Kung Fu Chris, MAKossa, and rotating guest DJs spin heavy funk breaks, early hip-hop, boogie, and classic Jamaican riddims.

Good Foot Yoruba Dance Sessions Bacano! Som., 2925 16th St., SF; (415) 558-8521. 9pm, free. A James Brown tribute with resident DJs Haylow, A-Ron, and Prince Aries spinning R&B, Hip hop, funk, and soul.

Heat Icon Ultra Lounge. 10pm, free. Hip-hop, R&B, reggae, and soul.

Holy Thursday Underground SF. 10pm, $5. Bay Area electronic hip hop producers showcase their cutting edge styles monthly.

Kick It Bar on Church. 9pm. Hip-hop with DJ Jorge Terez.

Koko Puffs Koko Cocktails, 1060 Geary; 885-4788. 10pm, free. Dubby roots reggae and Jamaican funk from rotating DJs.

Lacquer Beauty Bar. 10pm-2am, free. DJs Mario Muse and Miss Margo bring the electro.

Love Them Phishes DNA Lounge. 8pm, $15-20. Gypsy punk with Alxndr, Bombgoddess, Ra-So, and Globalruckus.

Mestiza Bollywood Café, 3376 19th St., SF; (415) 970-0362. 10pm, free. Showcasing progressive Latin and global beats with DJ Juan Data.

Peaches Skylark, 10pm, free. With an all female DJ line up featuring Deeandroid, Lady Fingaz, That Girl, and Umami spinning hip hop.

Popscene 330 Rich. 10pm, $10. Rotating DJs spinning indie, Britpop, electro, new wave, and post-punk.

Represent Icon Lounge. 10pm, $5. With Resident DJ Ren the Vinyl Archaeologist and guest. Rock Candy Stud. 9pm-2am, $5. Luscious Lucy Lipps hosts this electro-punk-pop party with music by ReXick.

Solid Club Six. 9pm, $5. With resident DJ Daddy Rolo and rotating DJs Mpenzi, Shortkut, Polo Mo’qz and Fuze spinning roots, reggae, and dancehall.

Studio SF Triple Crown. 9pm, $5. Keeping the Disco vibe alive with authentic 70’s, 80’s, and current disco with DJs White Girl Lust, Ken Vulsion, and Sergio.

FRIDAY 5

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Barcelona, Mata Leon, Lia Rose Slim’s. 9pm, $15.

Barn Owl, Carlton Melton, Electric Jellyfish Hemlock Tavern. 9:30pm, $7.

Diego’s Umbrella, Yung Mars, Funky C Café du Nord. 9:30pm, $12.

Flexx Bronco, Corruptors, Spitting Cobras, All Bets on Death Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $10.

Galactic feat. Cyril Neville and Big Freedia Fillmore. 9pm, $29.50.

Joe Henry, Dayna Stephens Great American Music Hall. 9pm, $20.

Hightower, Lozen, Sugar Sugar Sugar Pissed Off Pete’s, 4528 Mission, SF; www.pissedoffpetes.com. 10pm, $5.

*Hillstomp, Luke Franks, Black Crown Stringband Rickshaw Stop. 8:30pm, $12.

*No Bunny, TV Ghost, Outdoorsmen, Mom Thee Parkside. 9pm, $8.

Jackie Payne and Steve Edmonson Band Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $20.

Melonumba, Cloverleaf Drive DNA Lounge. 5:30pm, $12.

Stockholm Syndrome, These United States Independent. 9pm, $25.

Tremor Low, Alright Class, Photons, Grand Atlantic Hotel Utah. 9pm, $6.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Audium 9 1616 Bush, SF; (415) 771-1616. 8:30pm, $15.

Black Market Jazz Orchestra Top of the Mark. 9pm, $10.

Eric Kurtzrock Trio Ana Mandara, Ghirardelli Square, 891 Beach, SF; (415) 771-6800. 8pm, free.

"Other Minds Festival of New Music" Kanbar Hall, Jewish Community Center of San Francisco, 3200 California, SF; www.otherminds.org. 8pm, $35.

Poncho Sanchez Band with Nicholas Payton Yoshi’s San Francisco. 8 and 10pm, $20-28.

Kally Price Revolution Café, 3248 22nd St, SF; (415) 642-0474. 8:45pm, free.

SFJAZZ Collective Palace of Fine Arts Theatre, 3301 Lyon, SF; www.sfjazz.org. 8pm, $25-60.

Shotgun Wedding Symphony Coda. 10pm, $10.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Audiodub, Kapakahi Elbo Room. 10pm, $12.

Jarrod Gorbel Swedish American Hall (upstairs from Café du Nord). 7:30pm, $12.

Prasant Radhakrishnan’s VidyA Red Poppy Art House. 8pm, $15.

Quinn DeVeaux and the Blue Beat Review Plough and Stars. 9pm.

DANCE CLUBS

Activate! Lookout, 3600 16th St; (415) 431-0306. 9pm, $3. Face your demigods and demons at this Red Bull-fueled party.

Bar on Church 9pm. Rotating DJs Zax, Zhaldee, and Nuxx.

Deeper 222 Hyde, 222 Hyde, SF; (415) 345-8222. 9pm, $10. With rotating DJs spinning dubstep and techno.

Dirty Rotten Dance Party Madrone Art Bar. 9pm, $5. With DJs Morale, Kap10 Harris, and Shane King spinning electro, bootybass, crunk, swampy breaks, hyphy, rap, and party classics.

Exhale, Fridays Project One Gallery, 251 Rhode Island; (415) 465-2129. 5pm, $5. Happy hour with art, fine food, and music with Vin Sol, King Most, DJ Centipede, and Shane King.

Fat Stack Fridays Koko Cocktails, 1060 Geary, SF; (415) 885-4788. 10pm, free. With rotating DJs Romanowski, B-Love, Tomas, Toph One, and Vinnie Esparza.

Gay Asian Paradise Club Eight, 1151 Folsom, SF; www.eightsf.com. 9pm, $8. Featuring two dance floors playing dance and hip hop, smoking patio, and 2 for 1 drinks before 10pm.

Good Life Fridays Apartment 24, 440 Broadway, SF; (415) 989-3434. 10pm, $10. With DJ Brian spinning hip hop, mashups, and top 40.

Hot Chocolate Milk. 9pm, $5. With DJs Big Fat Frog, Chardmo, DuseRock, and more spinning old and new school funk.

Look Out Weekend Bambuddha Lounge. 4pm, free. Drink specials, food menu and resident DJs White Girl Lust, Swayzee, Philie Ocean, and more.

M4M Fridays Underground SF. 10pm-2am. Joshua J and Frankie Sharp host this man-tastic party.

Rockabilly Fridays Jay N Bee Club, 2736 20th St., SF; (415) 824-4190. 9pm, free. With DJs Rockin’ Raul, Oakie Oran, Sergio Iglesias, and Tanoa "Samoa Boy" spinning 50s and 60s Doo Wop, Rockabilly, Bop, Jive, and more.

Strangelove Cat Club, 1190 Folsom, SF; (415) 703-8965. 9pm, $6. With DJs Tomas Diablo, Lowlife, Fact50, and Death Boy spinning goth and industrial.

SATURDAY 6

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Appleseed Cast, Dreamend Bottom of the Hill. 10pm, $14.

Badstrip, Pins of Light, Space Vacation Thee Parkside. 9pm, free.

Mike Beck and the Bohemian Saints Riptide. 9pm, free.

Mike Doughty, Christina Courtin Slim’s. 9pm, $22.

Galactic feat. Cyril Neville and Big Freedia Fillmore. 9pm, $29.50.

Little Teeth, Hermit Thrushes, Woom Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $7.

McCabe and Mrs. Miller Makeout Room. 7pm.

Natron Blue, FishBiteFish, Bro Hotel Utah. 9pm, $7.

Elliot Randall and the Deadmen, Famous, Cyndi Harvell Café du Nord. 9pm, $12.

Stockholm Syndrome, These United States Independent. 9pm, $25.

Joe Louis Walker Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $22.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Audium 9 1616 Bush, SF; (415) 771-1616. 8:30pm, $15.

Eric Kurtzrock Trio Ana Mandara, Ghirardelli Square, 891 Beach, SF; (415) 771-6800. 8pm, free.

George Cole Quintet and Fishtank Ensemble Noe Valley Ministry, 1021 Sanchez, SF; www.noevalleymusicseries.com. 8:15pm, $20.

Tim Nunn and Blake McGee Meridian Gallery, 535 Powell, SF; www.meridiangallery.org. 8pm, $10.

"Other Minds Festival of New Music" Kanbar Hall, Jewish Community Center of San Francisco, 3200 California, SF; www.otherminds.org. 8pm, $35.

Poncho Sanchez Band with Nicholas Payton Yoshi’s San Francisco. 8 and 10pm, $28.

Rev Allstars Revolution Café, 3248 22nd St, SF; (415) 642-0474. 8:45pm, free.

Ricardo Scales Top of the Mark. 9pm, $15.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Brent Amaker and the Rodeo, Apache Thunderbolt Amnesia. 9pm, $7.

George Cole and the Fishtank Ensemble Noe Valley Ministry, 1021 Sanchez, SF; (415) 454-5238. 8:15pm, $22.

Dust Bowl Cavaliers vs Misisipi Rider Plough and Stars. 9pm.

Qadim Ensemble Red Poppy Art House. 8pm, $15-$20.

Shackleton, Eskmo, Eprom, Kush Arora Darkroom, Club Six. 10pm, $15. Playing live bass music.

DANCE CLUBS

Bar on Church 9pm. Rotating DJs Foxxee, Joseph Lee, Zhaldee, Mark Andrus, and Niuxx.

Debaser Knockout. 11pm, $5. Wear your flannel and get in free before 11pm to this party, where DJ Jamie Jams and Emdee play alternative hits from the 1990s.

Everlasting Bass 330 Ritch. 10pm, $5-10. Bay Area Sistah Sound presents this party, with DJs Zita and Pam the Funkstress spinning hip-hop, soul, funk, reggae, dancehall, and club classics.

Fire Corner Koko Cocktails, 1060 Geary; 885-4788. 9:30pm, free. Rare and outrageous ska, rocksteady, and reggae vinyl with Revival Sound System and guests.

Gemini Disco Underground SF. 10pm, $5. Disco with DJ Derrick Love and Nicky B. spinning deep disco.

HYP Club Eight, 1151 Folsom, SF; www.eightsf.com. 10pm, free. Gay and lesbian hip hop party, featuring DJs spinning the newest in the top 40s hip hop and hyphy.

*J-Boogie’s Dubtronic Science with Skins and Needles featuring DJ Jeph and Max MacVeety Coda. 10pm, $10.

Kontrol Endup, 401 6th St., SF; (415) 541-9422. 10pm, $20. With resident DJs Alland Byallo, Craig Kuna, Sammy D, and Nikola Baytala spinning minimal techno and avant house.

Leisure Paradise Lounge. 10pm, $7. DJs Omar, Aaron, and Jet Set James spinning classic britpop, mod, 60s soul, and 90s indie.

New Wave City DNA Lounge. 9pm, $7-12. "Ladies of the 80s" dance party with Skip and Shindog.

Pure Behrouz Mighty. 10pm, $15. With DJs Behrouz, Julius Papp, and Rooz spinning house.

Rebel Girl Rickshaw Stop. 10pm, $5. "Electroindierockhiphop" and 80s dance party for dykes, bois, femmes, and queers with DJ China G and guests.

Saturday Night Soul Party Elbo Room. 10pm, $10. Sixties soul with DJs Lucky, Phengren Oswald, and Paul Paul.

So Special Club Six. 9pm, $5. DJ Dans One and guests spinning dancehall, reggae, classics, and remixes.

Social Club LookOut, 3600 16th St., SF; (415) 431-0306. 9pm. Shake your money maker with DJs Lee Decker and Luke Fry.

Soundscape Vortex Room, 1082 Howard, SF. With DJs C3PLOS, Brighton Russ, and Nick Waterhouse spinning Soul jazz, boogaloo, hammond grooves, and more.

Spirit Fingers Sessions 330 Ritch. 9pm, free. With DJ Morse Code and live guest performances.

SUNDAY 7

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Abe Vigoda, Lovvers, High Castle Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $10.

"Battle of the Bands" DNA Lounge. 5:30pm, $10-12. With High Like Five, Sol, Supernaculum, Animojams, and more.

Black Dahlia Murder, Obscura, Augery, Hatesphere Slim’s. 7pm, $15.

Killswitch Engage, Devil Wears Prada, Dark Tranquillity Warfield. 7:30pm, $32.

Lindsay Mac Band, Natalia Zuckerman Hotel Utah. 8pm, $12.

Leslie and the Lys, Christopher the Conquered, Planet Booty Rickshaw Stop. 8pm, $14.

*Shrinebuilder, Harvestmen, A Storm of Light Independent. 8pm, $17.

Two Dollars Out the Door, Birthday Suits, Rank/Xerox Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $5.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Kate McGarry Trio with Keith Granz and Clarence Penn Swedish American Hall (upstairs from Café du Nord). 7pm, $25.

Le Jazz Hot Café Royale, 800 Post, SF; (415) 441-4099. 6pm, free.

Poncho Sanchez Band with Nicholas Payton Yoshi’s San Francisco. 5 and 7pm, $5-28.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Shane Cooley Kimo’s. 6pm, $5.

Frank French Sherman and Clay, 647 Mission, SF; (415) 543-1888. 4pm, free.

Raul Malo Café du Nord. 8:30pm, $20.

"Te Gusto Musical" Coda. 8pm, $10. With Hector Lugo and Mixta Criolla.

Linda Tillery and the Cultural Heritage Choir, Eric Bibb Great American Music Hall. 8pm, $21.

Quin and friends Plough and Stars. 9pm.

Wooden Fish Ensemble Old First Concerts, 1751 Sacramento, SF; (415) 474-1608. 4pm, $14-$17. Celebrating the music of Hyo-shin Na.

DANCE CLUBS

Afterglow Nickies, 466 Haight, SF; (415) 255-0300. An evening of mellow electronics with resident DJs Matt Wilder, Mike Perry, Greg Bird, and guests.

DiscoFunk Mashups Cat Club. 10pm, free. House and 70’s music.

Dub Mission Elbo Room. 9pm, $6. Dub, roots, and classic dancehall with DJ Sep, Vinnie Esparza, and guest Selector Shockman.

Gloss Sundays Trigger, 2344 Market, SF; (415) 551-CLUB. 7pm. With DJ Hawthorne spinning house, funk, soul, retro, and disco.

Good Clean Fun LookOut, 3600 16th St., SF; (415) 431-0306. 3pm, $2. With drink specials, DJs and tasty food.

Honey Soundsystem Paradise Lounge. 8pm-2am. "Dance floor for dancers – sound system for lovers." Got that?

Jock! Lookout, 3600 16th St; 431-0306. 3pm, $2. This high-energy party raises money for LGBT sports teams.

Kick It Bar on Church. 9pm. Hip-hop with DJ Zax.

Lowbrow Sunday Delirium. 1pm, free. DJ Roost Uno and guests spinning club hip hop, indie, and top 40s.

Religion Bar on Church. 3pm. With DJ Nikita.

Stag AsiaSF. 6pm, $5. Gay bachelor parties are the target demo of this weekly erotic tea dance.

MONDAY 8

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Anuhea and the Green Band, Sage Broadway Studios. 8pm, $40.

Blank Tapes, Mystery Lights, Nectarine Pie, Manhattan Murder Mystery Elbo Room. 9pm, $6.

Delta Spirit, We Barbarians, Elephant Micah Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $12.

Dirty Heads, Simpkin Project, Pacific Dub Slim’s. 8pm, $15.

Amber Rubarth, Jim Bianco, Ryan Auffenberg Café du Nord. 9:30pm, $12.

DANCE CLUBS

Bacano! Som., 2925 16th St., SF; (415) 558-8521. 9pm, free. With resident DJs El Kool Kyle and Santero spinning Latin music.

Black Gold Koko Cocktails, 1060 Geary; 885-4788. 10pm-2am, free. Senator Soul spins Detroit soul, Motown, New Orleans R&B, and more — all on 45!

Death Guild DNA Lounge. 9:30pm, $3-5. Gothic, industrial, and synthpop with Decay, Joe Radio, and Melting Girl.

M.O.M. Madrone Art Bar. 6pm, free. With DJ Gordo Cabeza and guests playing all Motown every Monday.

Manic Mondays Bar on Church. 9pm. Drink 80-cent cosmos with Djs Mark Andrus and Dangerous Dan.

Monster Show Underground SF. 10pm, $5. Cookie Dough and DJ MC2 make Mondays worth dancing about, with a killer drag show at 11pm.

Network Mondays Azul Lounge, One Tillman Pl; www.inhousetalent.com. 9pm, $5. Hip-hop, R&B, and spoken word open mic, plus featured performers.

Spliff Sessions Tunnel Top. 10pm, free. DJs MAKossa, Kung Fu Chris, and C. Moore spin funk, soul, reggae, hip-hop, and psychedelia on vinyl.

TUESDAY 9

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Whigs Slim’s. 8pm, $30.

*Cave Singers, Dutchess and the Duke, Moondoggies Independent. 8pm, $14.

Clientele, Wooden Birds Great American Music Hall. 8pm, $15.

Extra Life, Ora Corgan, Chelsea Wolfe, Neighbors Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $7.

Dominique Leone, 3 Leafs, William Winant Amnesia. 7pm, $8.

Fromagique Elbo Room. 9pm, $8. Live band and burlesque show.

Little Boots, Dragonette, Class Actress Fillmore. 8pm, $20.

Jared Mees and the Grown Children, Rock Cookie Bottom Grant and Green. 9pm, free.

Holly Miranda Café du Nord. 9:30pm, $10.

Sevendust, Drowning Pool, Digital Summer, Flood Regency Ballroom. 7:30pm, $27.

*Mike Watt and the Missingmen, Lite, Low Red Land Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $12.

DANCE CLUBS

Eclectic Company Skylark, 9pm, free. DJs Tones and Jaybee spin old school hip hop, bass, dub, glitch, and electro.

La Escuelita Pisco Lounge, 1817 Market, SF; (415) 874-9951. 7pm, free. DJ Juan Data spinning gay-friendly, Latino sing-alongs but no salsa or reggaeton.

Share the Love Trigger, 2344 Market, SF; (415) 551-CLUB. 5pm, free. With DJ Pam Hubbuck spinning house.

Womanizer Bar on Church. 9pm. With DJ Nuxx.

A progressive primary for District 6

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By Supervisor Chris Daly

OPINION Ten years ago, the newly drawn District 6 (which includes the Tenderloin, South of Market, and North Mission) was thought to be politically up for grabs. With an aggressive grassroots campaign and a progressive sweep across the city, we won the seat. Despite small demographic shifts to the right over the years, we’ve built a clear progressive identity for our district. Community stakeholders and all of progressive San Francisco should be proud of this accomplishment.

In 2006, despite downtown’s major effort to unseat me, I held on with a nine point, or 1,600-vote, margin. I would guess that this is generally reflective of the current political dynamics in the district. In other words, District 6 is roughly a progressive +10 district.

But heading into the first open-seat race in the district in 10 years, we have to take care to not become victims of our own success. Already, four serious progressive candidates have declared for the seat and are now raising money, seeking endorsements, formulating campaign strategy, and assembling their teams.

Our system for electing supervisors allows voters to rank their top three choices. In other words, even if all progressive voters ranked three progressive candidates on every ballot, a certain number of those votes would not transfer to the strongest progressive candidate. In District 6, where the political contests have been pretty black and white for a decade, it’s a safe bet we’ll have more than our share of voters who only vote for one candidate. (In 2006, a number of voters even marked me as their first, second, and third choice.)Sensing an unexpected political opportunity, downtown is working to coalesce around a single candidate to steal away the seat and the progressive majority on the Board of Supervisors. We can’t afford to let that happen. Our 10-point margin of error is too small to risk moving forward on our current path.

That’s why I have asked all the major progressive candidates in the race to participate in a progressive primary early this summer. A central polling place will be open to all District 6 voters. We will have a ranked-choice ballot that will include the progressive candidates who have qualified for public financing (raised more than $5,000 in qualifying contributions.) Permanent absentee voters will be able to mail in their ballots. In most respects, the progressive primary will look like an officially sanctioned election.

The primary will give district voters an opportunity to signal their early preference in candidates and will give the progressive campaigns much-needed experience identifying and turning out their supporters. More important, it will give the rest of us a window into what otherwise could become a very confusing progressive cluster.

The winner of the primary will become the beneficiary of my endorsement and campaign support. It also will be a momentum-builder for the campaign that is already strongest within the district and will signal to all progressive voters that, even if they’ve committed to another candidate, they need to make sure they rank the progressive primary winner on their ballot.

As progressives continue to build our politics, we need to keep creating democratic forums and structures. I hope the Progressive Primary becomes a useful component of our political movement.

Supervisor Chris Daly represents District 6.

SF leaders condemn SEIU tactics

104

San Franciscans seem to be turning against Service Employee International Union and its national President Andy Stern this week, first with the vote by SEIU Local 1021 members to oust Stern’s leadership team, and now with a letter signed by a broad array of top political officials condemning SEIU tactics against the National Union of Healthcare Workers.

As the Guardian reported last year, NUHW President Sal Rosselli and his management team broke away from SEIU’s United Healthcare Workers after a protracted conflict that culminated in a hostile SEIU takeover of the local, placing it under a Stern-controlled trusteeship. NUHW had criticized Stern’s autocratic leadership style and undemocratic methods while SEIU accused Rosselli of using union funds to undermine Stern’s decisions.

Since then, a majority of SEIU-UHW workers statewide has filed petitions asking to decertify with SEIU-UHW and affiliate with NUHW, which has won seven of the nine elections that have been held so far. So SEIU filed various complaints with the National Labor Relations Board to try to block those elections, while NUHW has complained of worker harassment and ballot meddling by SEIU.

Earlier today, SEIU-UHW sent out a press release touting an NLRB ruling that clears the way for elections at 51 facilities around the state covering 6,845 voters, blaming NUHW for “violating members’ democratic rights” in opposing those elections.

But NUHW leaders say SEIU-UHW has been “cherry-picking” selected sites where they think their chances of winning are good and keeping their NLRB complaints in place to block other sites, often dividing up bargaining units in the process to raise fears in workers that they might lose bargaining clout if they switch unions. NUHW is a relatively small organization compared to the massive SEIU.

NUHW leaders say they want a fair, up-or-down vote among all of the SEIU-UHW members statewide who have asked for elections, and they’ve asked SEIU to sign a Fair Election Agreement to prevent harassment and intimidation, something that SEIU often asks employers to sign.

Supporting that request is an open letter signed by 116 San Francisco political leaders from across the spectrum, including every member of the Board of Supervisors except Sup. Carmen Chu, Assembly members Tom Ammiano and Fiona Ma, Sen. Mark Leno, Democrat Party chair Aaron Peskin and nine other members of the DCCC, all four major candidates for the Dist. 8 Board of Supervisors seat, United Educators of San Francisco President Dennis Kelly, and representatives from a board array of unions and grassroots organizations, including UNITE-HERE, POWER, Young Workers United, Chinese Progressive Association, Coleman Advocates, and many others.

Interestingly, in addition to his critics on the left within the labor movement, Stern is also being criticized by conservatives right now after President Barack Obama appointed him to his National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform.

The Guardian has forwarded the letter and allegations to SEIU-UHW officials and is awaiting a response, which I’ll post in the comments section when I hear back.

 

The letter reads:

WE, THE UNDERSIGNED community leaders of San Francisco, are deeply troubled by allegations that the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) committed multiple, serious violations of state labor law during the union representation election between SEIU United Healthcare Workers – West (SEIU-UHW) and the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW) for 10,000 Fresno County homecare workers this June.

These allegations, made in sworn testimony before the California Public Employment Relations Board, include that SEIU officials directed staff to open, mark, and alter workers’ ballots; threaten the deportation of immigrants; and tell workers they would suffer the loss of wages, benefits and hours to scare them into voting for SEIU. The complaint alleges further that SEIU organizers physically removed ballots from workers’ mailboxes and homes.

Caregivers in San Francisco have complained of similar intimidation and harassment at the hands of SEIU officials trying to block union representation elections requested by them and tens of thousands of other California healthcare workers who have petitioned to join NUHW.

Over the next year, as thousands of San Francisco homecare workers, private sector nursing home workers, and private sector hospital workers make their choice for union representation between SEIUUHW and NUHW, we are committed to see that these workers can make their decision democratically, without intimidation, harassment, threats or coercion of any kind, from any party.

NUHW officials have communicated to us their willingness to enter into Fair Election Agreements, which are common in California’s healthcare industry, and which SEIU officials have long championed throughout the nation, to govern their campaign conduct and protect caregivers’ freedom of choice in their upcoming union representation elections.

Therefore, we are asking that you and San Francisco’s healthcare employers join NUHW in negotiating Fair Election Agreements to establish ground rules for these elections and guarantee that workers can choose their representatives for themselves. Please know that regardless of your decision, we will stand united to ensure that San Francisco’s healthcare workers have the fair elections they deserve.

Expanding movement

1

rebeccab@sfbg.com

When University of California Berkeley students staged building occupations last fall, their furious, brazen response to startling tuition hikes and staff cutbacks captured the attention of the world, recalling the radical actions of earlier generations.

Yet the thrust behind the March 4 Strike and Day of Action, a mass mobilization for public education and services that is reaching into all corners of the state and spreading nationwide, appears to stem from widespread agitation that extends well beyond the flare-ups on college campuses.

"What’s historic about this is that pre-K through PhD has never walked together," said Lillian Taiz, president of the California Faculty Association, which represents faculty in the California State University system. "We have often been pitted against one another, and I think everyone feels finally, in the end, there is no difference in importance between pre-K and PhD. We need it all."

The historic new alliance faces an uphill climb in an environment characterized by a devastating budget crisis at the state level. California — the world’s eighth-largest economy — hovers around 47th in the nation in terms of per-pupil spending, and the most recent wave of budget rollbacks has cut to the bone.

Students and teachers across the Bay Area argue that with dramatic slashes in funding, the educational system is failing youth. Class sizes are ballooning to claustrophobic levels, students are unable to take their desired courses, fees are going up, bathrooms are getting cleaned less frequently, and staffers are getting stressed by overwhelming workloads. "Classes are jam-packed," Taiz says. "You have kids sitting on the floor. You have students just begging to be allowed in a class."

As University of California students decry a 32 percent hike in fees, the California State University system is suffering from damage inflicted by 2,000 faculty layoffs over the past year. The San Francisco Unified School District, meanwhile, is staring down an estimated $113 million budget deficit over the next two years, and 900 layoff notices recently were issued to teachers, librarians, secretaries, and other school employees to warn them that their jobs could be slashed by the end of the school year.

When San Francisco’s school district faced a gaping budget shortfall during the last budget cycle, it was propped up by a combination of Rainy Day Fund reserve dollars and stimulus funding from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. With no such safety nets in place this time around, anxiety levels are higher and the outlook is uncertain.

March 4 is shaping up to be more than an opportunity to vent frustrations to elected leaders. Instead, organizers describe it as a rallying point for a movement to defend public education that has caught on like wildfire, uniting people from different worlds. Pickets and rallies will be staged throughout the region. Thousands are expected to swarm Civic Center Plaza in San Francisco. Students from a handful of East Bay campuses are organizing marches to Frank Ogawa Plaza in downtown Oakland. Students and faculty from Berkeley will be boarding buses to take the message to Sacramento. The Oakland Unified School district will host a districtwide mock "disaster drill" to call attention to the disastrous budget. Even public transit activists opposed to the latest round of Muni service cuts and fare hikes are joining the protests, hoping to expand the discussion to support vital public services (for details on these and other events, see "Alerts" opposite this page).

"We’ve never gotten this level of activism over anything in SF since I’ve been here," says Matthew Hardy, communications director for United Educators of San Francisco. "There’s a growing movement for progressive taxation and budget reform instead of draconian cuts."

Taiz, who teaches history at Cal State Los Angeles, described March 4 as an opportunity to fill a void in leadership. "Historically, in these moments where ordinary people step up to the plate, you end up leading the leaders," she said. "We are kind of shocked, but in truth, we do know what has to be done." Quality education isn’t just important for young people, but for society as a whole, she argued. "I am a baby boomer, and if the folks coming up behind me don’t have really, really good jobs, I’m going to be eating dog food. Because those are the people who pay Social Security and pay the taxes."

In the week preceding March 4, teachers and students throughout the Bay Area were in a frenzy of preparation.

Carlos Baron, a theater professor at SF State, was wondering whether the grand procession of papier-mâché puppets his theater students will unveil on the March 4 Day of Action should take a V-shape or some other form. "The main puppet is the Draculator," explained Baron, a Chilean who directed plays in the Salvador Allende era before he began teaching at SF State in 1978. "It’s a cross between the Terminator-Governor and Dracula. But also it doubles as a banker and a general."

When asked how funding cutbacks affect students, Baron didn’t hesitate. "It impedes the creation of a positive vision for themselves and this society," he said. It stunts "the development of the imagination," he added. "We are trained as individuals to accept our failure and our smallness because we’re familiar with it. They don’t want an educated population, a sensitive population, a dreaming population. Would we select Schwarzenegger?"

Nicole Abreu Shepard, a first-grade teacher at Buena Vista Elementary in San Francisco’s Mission District, was collecting permission slips from parents to take her students to a rally and march down 24th Street. "The entire school is walking out," Abreu Shepherd said. Buena Vista’s art program exists solely because parents volunteer their time, she explained. More than half the students qualify for free or reduced lunch, and many incoming kindergarteners or preschoolers are new to the English language. Now there are proposals on the table to increase kindergarten class sizes to 25 or possibly even 30 students. "It’s sort of tying their hands behind their back and asking them to teach on one foot," she noted, and worried about the eventual result. "It’s going to be harder and harder to keep parents who could afford private school in a public school system."

Meanwhile, at the UC Berkeley campus, Krystof Cantor was sitting behind a table heaped with piles of radical literature bearing titles such as "After the Fall: Communiques from an Occupied California." Cantor, who earned his PhD in vision science in 2005, was joining student organizers in making one last push to drum up student interest in March 4 events at a multi-faceted event called "Rolling University." Late on the evening of Feb. 26, a dance party on the Berkeley campus morphed into a street riot — replete with ignited Dumpsters — in downtown Berkeley. The incident attracted media attention and drew public criticism from administrative officials.

The radicalized student movement that has erupted on the UC Berkeley campus is "very much about seizing power," Cantor told the Guardian several days before. "It’s been disruptive, it’s been militant, and it’s been creative. That’s very scary," to the administrators the movement is targeting, he added.

That focused pressure on UC administrators sets these students apart from the coalition of UC Berkeley faculty members and student government members and allies who are coordinating bus trips to protest in Sacramento March 4, he explained. "Sacramento’s not innocent, but it’s not like the administrators are just doing what they have to do," he charged, pointing to new construction projects on campus even as workers are hit with layoffs and furloughs, plus an increasing trend of privatizing on-campus jobs and services. "You can save the public sector by pouring money into it. But it won’t work if the people in charge … want to privatize everything."

Jasper Bernes, a graduate student in English who was seated next to Cantor, noted that the occupation tactic is catching on at other campuses. "I have no doubt that March 4 will greet us with news of many occupations," he said.

Baron, the Chilean theater professor, noted that some SF State students had occupied a business school building in protest of budget cuts. "They were pissed," he said. "They wanted to do something radical. They really inconvenienced a lot of people — but they took chances nonetheless. I went there, and I locked arms with them for awhile." At the same time, he wondered about how effective it was, he said.

And for all the months of preparation and visioning, Baron said he also wonders what will ultimately be borne out of the marches, rallies, pickets, and procession of lovingly crafted street puppets he helped breathe life into. For all the hard work and planning, he says, "My problem is not so much March 4. It’s March 5."

Pressure builds to save Muni

5

Widespread frustration with Muni service cuts and fare hikes – passionately expressed by the public on Friday at a San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency meeting that continues tomorrow (Tuesday, March 2, starting at noon in City Hall Room 400) – has prompted a surprisingly diverse backlash.

From angry, street-level progressive activists to the downtown-friendly San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association (SPUR), San Franciscans are criticizing the SFMTA’s budget plan (including the 10 percent service cuts approved on Friday, which could be revisited tomorrow) as short-sighted and unnecessarily divisive, prompting the biggest and most diffuse progressive organizing effort in years.

“I’ve never seen anything like this,” SFMTA spokesperson Judson True told me as he surveyed the huge, passionate crowd assembled for Friday’s meeting, adding, “It’s clear grassroots organizing is alive and well in San Francisco.”

It’s true that grassroots organizing helped with Friday’s massive turnout, with hundreds of people lined up to give almost five hours worth of public testimony, much of it expressing frustration with poor city leadership (particularly by Mayor Gavin Newsom and his appointed SFMTA board and director) and declining public services.

But these weren’t the talking points of a centrally organized effort, which is what’s so remarkable about this movement. While many progressive groups joined forces under the Transit Not Traffic banner (coordinated by MTA Citizens Advisory Board member Sue Vaughn and others), and there’s a new San Francisco transit riders union (coordinated by transportation activist Dave Synder), the huge turnout on Friday came also from disability rights groups, ethnically identified groups from the Mission and Chinatown, the Senior Action Network, San Francisco Tomorrow, the social justice group POWER, the antiwar ANSWER Coalition, and several other groups, with very little coordination among them.

“We are really seeing a diverse group of people arguing for transit justice,” said Marc Caswell of the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, which was part of the Transit Not Traffic coalition.

In fact, with Muni fares increasing and services declining since Newsom became mayor, a wide variety of groups seems to have figured out independently that there’s something seriously wrong with Newsom’s no-new-taxes approach to running the city, particularly given declining transit funding from the state and feds.

“These aren’t solutions. They’re just pitting one group against another,” said Frank Lara of the ANSWER Coalition, which opposes a proposal for extended parking meter hours, much to the chagrin of progressive groups who want motorists to help close the budget gap by giving up their free parking on Sundays.

One SPUR proposal also seeks to eliminate this pitting of groups against each other, listing as its biggest dollar proposal the elimination of work orders from the San Francisco Police Department, which would save $12.2 million per year, which the SFPD charges SFMTA for unspecified services that it has yet to document, despite agreeing to as part of last year’s budget deal.

When asked about the work order proposal, Newsom press secretary Tony Winnicker said doing so would make Muni less safe by discouraging officers from riding buses, saying such work orders were a “good accounting practice” rather than the budgetary shell game that progressive supervisors and SPUR director Gabriel Metcalf have called it.

“The gamesmanship with work orders has got to stop,” Metcalf told the Guardian, criticizing the SFMTA for cutting service across the board and raising fares for express bus service and cable cars. “They don’t have to do that and they shouldn’t do that. They just need some political courage right now.”

The next largest SPUR proposals are to charge $300 per year for disabled placards that allow drivers to park for free (which would raise $10 million per year) and to enforce existing city codes that require garages to charge by the hour rather than all day (which would raise $6.85 million), followed by Muni work rule changes that would need union approval.

Winnicker said Newsom was aware of the big turnout on Friday and the anger voiced by the crowd, telling us, “He understands people are concerned and he shares those concerns.” But rather than accepting that many people blame Newsom, Winnicker blamed Muni’s Transportation Workers Union for voting down about $5 million worth of wage concessions and work rule changes. Yet many speakers criticized Newsom’s finger-pointing on Friday, saying he and the SFMTA were too focused on targeting workers rather than the downtown corporations that Newsom has refused to adequately tax.

“There was already a fare increase last year, so for the low-income popular, this is major,” Wing Hoo Leung, vice president of the Community Tenants Association, told me in Mandarin, translated by Tan Chow, an organizer with Chinatown Community Development Center. “In a bad economy, the low-income people can’t get hit again and again. We need to cut from the top.”

Tax measures will be a big part of tomorrow’s SFMTA discussion of the $100 million budget deficit looming for the next two years – such as a parcel tax, downtown transit assessment district, parking tax increase, or local vehicle license fee — and several SFMTA board members agreed with the statement made Friday by Trustee Malcolm Heinicke that, “We need to look for other sources of revenue.”

Even Winnicker said Newsom acknowledges the need to discuss tax measures, even though he philosophically opposes them: “He understands that many things have to be on the table to close next year’s budget gap.”

But he’s far from advocating for any revenue-side solutions.

“The mayor doesn’t think the tax measures will have much public support,” Winnicker said. Yet progressive groups say that’s because Newsom has undermined people’s faith in local government and actively opposed tax increases rather than trying to make the case to the public that they’re needed to present public transit and other vital services.

“Newsom has to be out there fighting, one at the state level, and he needs to show some leadership here,” said Bob Allen of the group Urban Habitat. “I don’t want to hear Gavin Newsom say again that this is a transit-first city if he’s not going to do anything to support it.”

But Allen said that if Newsom and other city leaders made the case for new taxes to support transit and ran a strong campaign, “This city will support a ballot measure to protect Muni and expand it.”

Yet right now, he said one of the things frustrating low-income San Franciscans is there is a basic inequity between motorists and Muni riders: “If parking is going to be free on Sunday, transit should be free on Sunday. If parking is going to be free in the evenings, transit should be free in the evenings.”  

Newsom has long voiced opposition to extended meter hours, only recently softening that position slightly to possibly allow for a small pilot program for Sundays. But his appointed trustees might be willing to go even further, with Bruce Oka saying on Friday, “I know the mayor doesn’t like it, but it has to be tried.”

SEIU members oust the old guard

0

In a stunning repudiation of the union leadership installed by Service Employees International Union President Andy Stern – whose autocratic style, aggressive expansion, and friendly relationships with big employers has caused a rift in the national labor movement – members of SEIU Local 1021 have voted overwhelmingly for a reform slate of new leaders.

As we wrote recently, the stakes were high here in San Francisco, where the old guard leaders threatened to undermine the union’s progressive tendencies just as Mayor Gavin Newsom is threatening mass layoffs and pay cuts for city employees, and the San Francisco Labor Council’s ideological balance was being tipped by the pro-development push of the building trades.

But the results couldn’t have been more clear in the first local election since Stern installed the Local 1021 after merging 10 union locals together, including the former Local 790, which represents most city employees. Stern’s whole slate was voted out by a substantial margin, including current President Damita Davis-Howard, who had 1445 votes to the 2141 votes garnered by Sin Yee Poon, who now takes over the top spot after having led SF Human Services Agency workers.

Also pushed out was James Bryant, a political ally of Newsom and enabler of Pacific Gas & Electric and other downtown power brokers, who was defeated in his run for Political Action Committee Chair. Alysabeth Alexander, who is in her 20s, beat him by a vote of 2552-1506.

The vote will certainly strengthen the hand of progressives in San Francisco going into what’s expected to be a tough budget fight with Newsom, as well as helping progressive supervisorial candidates in the November election against what is expected to be a strong push by downtown to break the progressive majority on the Board of Supervisors.

In addition, it could roil SEIU’s internal politics after a turbulent year, in which Stern created divisive clashes with his own local health care workers (causing Sal Rosselli to create the rival National Union of Healthcare Workers), UNITE-HERE, and the California Nurses Association.

 

The press release from the winning reform slate follows: 

Reformers Sweep in SEIU 1021 Election; Members Vote for Transparency and Democracy for Northern California’s Largest Public Sector Union 

On Friday, thousands of public sector votes were counted to determine the future leadership of one of the largest unions in Northern California.  This is the first election for SEIU 1021, formed only three years ago after the merging of 10 locals.

The reform slate, Change 1021, swept the elections taking a clear majority of the executive leadership seats. This all-member slate easily defeated the former administration-appointees by the International SEIU.  Some candidates won by a 3 to 1 margin while others enjoyed a comfortable 2 to 1 lead on their opponents. See attached list of election results.

“We are excited about the opportunity to give the leadership of this Union back to the membership,” stated Karen Bishop, the San Francisco County Area Representative Elect.  Former San Francisco Board of Supervisors President and current Chair of the San Francisco Democratic Party  Aaron Peskin agreed, affirming, “It is very heartening to see that real democracy has prevailed.”

Change 1021 campaigned on a platform for reform, seeking a stronger union that would prioritize member representation at work sites; fiscal transparency; and an internal democratic structure. “Members spoke with their votes, sending a clear message about priorities,” said Roxanne Sanchez, President Elect.

The challenges for the new board are daunting-they must reunite and reinvigorate a membership hit hard by the economic downturn, with thousands to receive lay-off notices this week.  The Board Elect is ready to make the budget fight a priority to fight layoffs and preserve important public and non-profit services for our communities.

 “Our members have spoken, loudly and clearly, that business as usual is absolutely no longer tolerable and that a fundamental change in the focus of our union towards the needs and priorities of our members are in prompt order,” says Sin Yee Poon, Chief Elected Officer Elect. For now, there is cause for celebration as the congratulatory calls have been flooding across California from members, elected officials, labor leaders, and community partners.

Newly  elected members will assume office at the next Executive Board meeting, March 9th.   International Union leaders are expected to be in attendance.           

Change 1021 Candidates who were elected are: Chief Elected Officer, Sin Yee Poon; President, Roxanne Sanchez; First Vice President, Gary Jimenez; Second Vice President, Crawford Johnson; Third Vice President, Larry Bradshaw; Secretary, Pamela Morton; Treasurer, Kathy O’Neil; Political Action Comm. Chair, Alysabeth Alexander; Social & Economic Justice Comm. Chair, Gladys Gray; Capital Stewardship Comm. Chair, Harry Baker; Cities Industry Chair, Renita Terry; Counties Industry Chair, Ken Tam; Special Districts Industry Chair, Saul Almanza; Schools Industry Chair, Mynette Theard; Sacramento County Rep, Ken Bloomberg; Registered Nurses Industry Chair, David Fleming; City & County of SF Industry Chair, Kathy Basconcillo; San Francisco Area Reps- Karen Bishop, David Turner, Jacqueline Sowers; Alameda County Area Reps,- Amy Dooha, Eric Stern, Gregory Correa; Sonoma County Area Rep, Nancy Atwell; Budget & Finance Comm Region 3, Michael Tong; and Budget & Finance Comm. Region 4, Mary Jane Logan.

The Chronicle’s dishonest hit on district elections

8

The move to get rid of district elections – which is based entirely on the fact that big business and more conservative voices (including the Chron) don’t like the progressive policy positions of the current board – is now well under way. The Chron devoted its Insight section to the issue Feb. 28, leading with a long editorial that wandered back and forth between points and never really made the case.


An example of the Chron’s logic:


But sitting atop the decision-making tree [in San Francisco] are small-time politicos, some elected with fewer than 10,000 votes in a city with a population of 808,976.


Horrifying! It’s as if the United States Congress – which has to decide issues like war and peace — was made up of local politicos who were elected with as few as 100,000 votes in a nation of 350 million.


Or as if the California Assembly – which has to deal with a $28 billion budget deficit – was made up of local politicos who were elected with as few as 50,000 votes in a state of more than 35 million.


A district supes votes could represent about 1.2 percent of the entire city. A state Assembly member could represent only 0.1 percent of the population of the state. And yet, I don’t hear the Chron calling for the state Assembly to be replaced with an at-large body.


More:


A town with sweeping plans to develop two empty Navy bases at Hunters Point and Treasure Island, fill vacant offices with new jobs, and cut its budget by more than a half billion dollars isn’t getting the thought, expertise – and citywide vision – it needs for these challenges.
This lack of broad leadership obstructs the city’s future. A major cause is the district election system that magnifies neighborhood and tight-knit interest groups to produce officeholders with little stake in citywide questions. If all politics is local, as former House Speaker Tip O’Neill famously declared, then San Francisco has pushed this dictum to the max. It’s all about me and my neighborhood.


That’s absolutely, factually untrue – the district elected board has done more to advance citywide issues – from minimum wage to health care to the rainy day fund to infrastructure planning – than any at-large board in the previous 20 years.


And the Chron’s own editorial contradicts that argument:


Supervisor David Campos (a winner with 9,440 votes) led a move to keep illegal immigrants who are juveniles accused of felonies from being turned over to federal authorities, despite a city legal opinion that the idea wouldn’t fly. Supervisor John Avalos (6,918 votes) dreamed up the “must spend” order directing the mayor to maintain expenditures in a record deficit year. Thankfully, he dropped the idea at the 11th hour


Okay, I get that the Chronicle editorial board doesn’t like the Campos sanctuary bill or the Avalos must-spend legislation – but that are both citywide issues. They have nothing to do with “me and my neighborhood.”


Which is really the entire point here. The Chron doesn’t like the outcome of district elections – because over the past ten years, the progressives have shown they can win district races. There’s a good reason for that; in district races, you don’t need to raise huge amounts of money.


As Assemblymember Tom Ammiano and Supervisor David Chiu point out in an opposing editorial:


Part of that increased accessibility to government is the result of the decrease in the cost of running a district versus a citywide election. In the 1994 citywide elections, the average winning candidate spent $456,000 in today’s dollars. That’s 225 percent greater than the amount spent today: In 2008, the winning candidates spent an average of $204,000. Candidates needing to raise money for a citywide race will inevitably turn to special interests for contributions. If you believe elected representatives should speak up for people, not just the special interests that donated to their campaigns, today’s district system serves you better.



They also note:


Before district elections were passed, under a citywide election system, many neighborhoods – the Excelsior, the Sunset, the Mission and Bayview-Hunters Point – had no supervisor of their own. Today, all residents can pick up the phone and reach an office responsible for their neighborhood and responsive to their concerns – a broken streetlight, a dangerous pothole or a consistently tardy Muni line.


A lot of people don’t like Chris Daly’s personality, and some don’t like his politics, but if you’re a person living on SSI in a grubby little hotel room in the Tenderloin and you need help, you can walk into his office and get a welcome reception and assistance with your needs. You won’t get that from the mayor.


On the other hand, do you think, Don Fisher ever needed to stand in line and try to make a 15-minute appointment to talk to Gavin Newsom? Seriously?


And while we’re on the personality stuff: Yeah, some of Daly’s antics have been over the top. But he’s no worse than some of the others who have served on citywide boards. Former Sup. Bill Maher once accused one of his opponents of having a small penis, and waved around two fingers spread about an inch apart to the press and public.


More important, we had supervisors who did nothing. We had supervisors who did exactly what the mayor said without any question. We had supervisors who were wholly-owned subsidiaries of major local corporations. I’ll take Chris Daly over those folks any day.


By any rational standard, the district board over the past ten years has been more productive, more accountable, more representative and more accessible than any at-large board I’ve seen in my almost 30 years of covering this city.


So the Chron needs to shut up about “citywide perspective”’ and personalities. If the paper wants to oppose district elections, it needs to drop the poll-tested downtown talking points and tell the truth:


The current board is too liberal for the Chron. The moderate candidates the paper prefers can’t win in districts. So they want to change the rules.


That’s the story, beginning, middle and end.


 

Muni cuts spark popular backlash

2

Tomorrow’s big showdown over the latest round of Muni service cuts and fare hikes seems to be galvanizing transit supporters and giving birth to a rejuvenated progressive advocacy effort, including a new transit riders union led by noted alternative transportation advocate Dave Snyder. And that hearing is just a prelude to a taxi medallion privatization plan that will be heard in the afternoon and another big Muni budget blowout on Tuesday.

“We are asking everyone to show up and complain about the mayor and the MTA board’s failure to prepare for this and find alternatives to the drastic cuts they’re proposing,” Snyder told us, referring to the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency’s plans to close a $16.9 million mid-year budget deficit (which is what’s left after the $11 million from the taxi permit selloff, which the MTA has already figured into the budget) almost entirely on the backs of Muni riders, who have already seen their fares double since Gavin Newsom became mayor in 2004.

The hearing is Friday at 9 a.m. in City Hall Room 400. That afternoon, Snyder will meet with a broad-based advisory board that he’s assembled to lead (and to name) the new transit riders union that he’s been working on for months, and his tentative plan is to formally launch it on Monday.

For now, those interested in being part of this fledgling organization can sign up here. The new organization is being launched as the MTA board moves from tomorrow’s controversial meeting into another one on Tuesday, that one to start grappling with the huge budget deficit the agency will still face in the next fiscal year that begins in June, even if it’s successful in closing this year’s.  

Snyder is probably just the right person to lead this effort, having directed the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition in its formative years before founding Transportation for a Livable City (now known as Livable City) and then becoming the transportation policy director for the San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association (SPUR), a post he left last year during a controversy surrounding Snyder’s appointment to the Golden Gate Bridge, Highway, and Transportation District Board of Directors. 

Snyder said Newsom and the MTA board have failed to plan for this foreseeable funding shortfall, saying they should have accelerated plans for extended parking meter hours (particularly ending the free parking on Sundays), a congestion pricing program, a local vehicle license fee, or measures like a gas tax, transit assessment fee, or a parcel tax – all of which the MTA board and mayor could have placed on the ballot for voter approval. Instead, they did nothing and are now pursuing a 10 percent reduction in Muni service, which could start a disastrous downward spiral.

“They need a stable, long-term funding source,” Snyder told us. “The charter actually says they’re supposed to aggressively seek new sources of funding.”

MTA spokesperson Judson True said that neither tax increases nor extended parking meter hours among the proposed solutions for Friday’s discussion, but they’re likely to be raised as part of a longer term strategy during the meeting on Tuesday: “It’s likely that the various tax measures will be part of that discussion.”

That could include reviving the extended parking meter hours proposal, which the MTA board heard last year during a rancorous public meeting, directing staff to do more community outreach on it. As True said, “We did a fair amount of outreach on it so we’ll see where the discussion goes on the two-year budget.”

Snyder is hardly alone in his local advocacy for budget solutions that spare Muni from deep cuts. In fact, the Transit Not Traffic coalition that successfully pushed the 2007 MTA reform measure Prop. A – which includes the Bike Coalition, Livable City, Walk SF, and other progressive groups – has revived itself in advance of tomorrow’s meeting and will be flying outside City Hall starting at 8:30 a.m.

There is broad support on the left for seeking more funding from drivers and the general public, but it’s not unanimous. The anti-war ANSWER Coalition frustrated many of its usual progressive allies last year by organizing against extended meter hours, claiming it was a hidden tax of low-income motorists. And Newsom has stubbornly resisted supporting new revenue measures, even in the face of unprecedented budget shortfalls, which makes the quest to win the support of two-thirds of voters difficult.

But the popular outrage that’s been expressed in recent weeks about how much Muni has been cut, year after year since Newsom became mayor, will likely put pressure on him and the MTA board (all of whom Newsom appointed) to pursue new revenue options.

True sounded weary as we spoke, noting how much anger has been expressed at the recent series of town hall meetings. “We know where people stand on these proposals,” True said. “The board is going to have some tough decisions to make, clearly.”

SF officials tap corporate cash

2

San Francisco’s $500 campaign contribution limit makes it tough for rich individuals and corporations to curry favor with local politicians, right? Well, not really. Actually, politicians can still tap wealthy interests for tens of thousands of dollars for their special events and pet projects, as long as they fill out a form called “Payments Made at the Behest of an Elected Officer” within 30 days.

Traditionally, those forms have been buried in the files of the Ethics Commission, but the agency recently put them online, a rare bit of user-friendly sunshine from this often-toothless watchdog body. A Guardian review of the forms shows it is almost exclusively the city’s most fiscally conservative elected officials who use this tactic, tapping a relatively small pool of downtown power brokers.

When Sup. Michela Alioto-Pier wanted to support a Bizworld Foundation event in December, she had Pacific Gas & Electric donate $5,000 on her behalf. Sup. Sean Elsbernd throws a big annual crab-feed fundraiser in February, with proceeds going to the Laguna Honda Foundation. The form for this year’s event isn’t in yet, but last year he got $5,000 each from all the top anti-progressive funders: Don Fisher, Dede Wilsey, Charles Schwab, Warren Hellman, Platinum Advisors, and the San Francisco Association of Realtors.

But far and away the biggest beneficiary of these kinds of corporate donations is Mayor Gavin Newsom, who submitted more than half the forms on file. For last year’s Sunday Streets events, he tapped the Hellman family for $30,000, Blue Shield for $10,000, his favorite developer Lennar for $10,000, and Lennar subcontractor CH2M Hill for $5,000. The year before, the top Sunday Streets donors (at $20,000 each) were California Pacific Medical Center (which is seeking city approval to build two new hospitals) and Catholic Healthcare West.

For his swearing-in events in 2008, Newsom tapped old family friends Gordon and Ann Getty for $30,000, the Fisher family for $20,000, and Charles Schwab, Dede Wilsey, and Marc Benioff for $15,000 each. And, of course, PG&E gave him $10,000.

When Treasurer Jose Cisneros was starting his Bank on San Francisco program in 2008, he had Wells Fargo donate $20,000. When Sup. Bevan Dufty wanted to create Mission High School scholarships in his name, he called his friends Denise and John York, owners of the 49ers, to cut a check for $19,000.

Only one official from the progressive side of the local political spectrum turned to these big donations for help, and that was then-Sup. Aaron Peskin in 2007, when he wanted to raise $84,000 to buy a Telegraph Hill property to turn into open space. His top donors were the Gerson Bakar Foundation for $34,000 and 1301 Sansome LLC for $15,000.

So if you want to find out how downtown corporations are supporting the politicians they favor, keep your eye on this valuable new online resource.

The progressive communist conspiracy

5

This city’s seen such heated discussions about what the word “progressive” means, it’s fun to watch Glenn Beck proclaim that progressives are a disease facing America, really just Communists who don’t have guns.

Jon Stewart had a lot of fun with this on his show the other night. And it’s worth watching, just to remember what the progressives have done over the years.

The battle for the forgotten district

24

sarah@sfbg.com

This November, when voters in District 10 — the largest, sunniest, and most diverse of the city’s 11 supervisorial districts — replace termed out Sup. Sophie Maxwell, they’ll be making a selection that could have pivotal implications for the entire city.

That’s because the next supervisor from southeast San Francisco inherits a district that is home to some of the city’s biggest environmental and public health challenges, as well as the most potential for development that will determine what kind of city San Francisco becomes.

District 10 is where you’ll find the most polluted and most underdeveloped lands in San Francisco, areas that could either be transformed into models of a sustainability or, in the words of Tony Kelly, the president of Potrero Boosters Neighborhood Association, “be turned into a toxic Foster City.”

District 10 is where the slaughterhouses, tanneries, and glue factories set up shop and used the bay as a dumping ground. It’s where the smokestacks of coal and oil fired power plants polluted the air. It’s where the Navy filled the Bay, built a shipyard at Hunters Point and loaded parts of the first atomic bomb onto the USS Indianapolis in 1945.

District 10 is where the bottom fell out of this industrial economy in 1974, when the Navy left, taking with it people’s jobs, pay, and hopes for a home of their own and a better future, particularly for what was then a predominantly African American population.

And District 10 is ground zero for plans that will triple the population and double the number of homes — homes that likely will only be “affordable” to Google executives and retirees from Marin, forever changing the face of San Francisco’s southeast sector. Critics fear that will accelerate what has been a steady exodus of black residents, replaced by megadeveloper Lennar’s vision for a new D10.

It’s against this dark history and difficult present that a wide open field of more than a dozen candidates are vying to replace Maxwell, who came to power in 2000 and has had a mixed voting record in her decade on the board. Sometimes, Maxwell was the eighth vote that let the progressive majority on the Board override Mayor Gavin Newsom’s veto and pass trailblazing legislation. Other times, she was the swing vote that allowed the moderate minority to carry Newsom’s water.

So, in addition to D10’s many internal challenges, this seat could determine the political balance of power on the Board of Supervisors, placing all the more importance on voters in this long-marginalized part of town.

 

DISTRICT OF DISCONTENT

Eric Smith, a biodiesel activist who has thrown his hat in the D10 ring, says that there is a lot of frustration in the air, and looking at the problems the district is facing, it’s hardly surprising that it has what nearly every candidate agrees is a fractured political culture.

“The Bayview, the Hunters Point Shipyard’s toxic Superfund site, the homicide rate, unemployment, poor public transportation, dwindling services and community resources have made D10 one of the city’s largest melting pots of discontent,” Smith said.

Smith’s words were spoken while the Elections Department was verifying signatures earlier this month on a second failed effort to qualify a petition to recall Maxwell.

Bayview resident and D10 candidate Marie Franklin didn’t support the attempt to recall Maxwell, but she understood it as “a frustration movement.”

“People are sinking in the sand, we’ve already lost so many of them, and they felt Sophie wasn’t doing anything for them,” said Franklin, who praised Maxwell for helping get Franklin’s apartment building complex renovated — a job that was completed 18 months ago, at a cost of $65 million, creating 500 local jobs.

“There are 654 units here, and they were uninhabitable,” Franklin said. “There was black mold, rain falling inside. We had people living worse than Haiti.”

Franklin, who said she is running because she “knows the history,” came here in 1978, when she and her son were living in a car after a fire left them homeless. She said the Bayview was a totally isolated area, barely part of mainstream San Francisco.

“There were no taxis, no services,” she recalled. “Nobody would come here, it was the stigmatized area where no one was accountable to provide services.”

The Bayview — which in some ways is the heart of D-!0 — wasn’t always a black community. But African Americans have been living here for 70 years, dealing with all the racism, denial of services, poverty, and pollution. And it bothers Franklin that 85 percent of the 10,500 homes that Lennar plans to develop won’t be affordable to the elderly, disabled, unemployed and low-income people who currently live in the Bayview.

“We need to preserve the diversity of the community and make sure their issues and information will flow to City Hall,” she said. “You must give the people a handle. If you don’t reach out, they’ll slip. That’s why folks out migrated.

Whoever succeeds Maxwell will be a central player in addressing some very big and dirty issues: the future of the Navy’s radiologically impacted shipyard at Hunters Point, Lennar’s massive redevelopment plan for the Shipyard and Candlestick Point, the polluting power plants, replacement of stinky digesters at the sewage plant, and the SF Hope public lousing rebuild.

There’s also the chance to address violence and crime. James Calloway, a candidate who has long worked in Bay Area schools, told us he believes that education and jobs are part of the keys to rejuvenating the district.

“Job opportunities are not as plentiful in the district,” Calloway said. “When I was a kid, you could walk down Third Street at 2 a.m. Now I wouldn’t walk down it at 9 p.m., and I know the area.”

Calloway is hopeful that the massive redevelopment plan, if done correctly, could start the district’s comeback. “Not a lot of black folks stay here when they have extensive education,” he said. “But it’s not only them. Many were displaced by redevelopment and had no way to go back.”

 

ELECTION UP FOR GRABS

The largest of the city’s 11 electoral districts, D10 is a huge triangular piece of land in the city’s southeast sector that was used as an industrial dumping zone for decades. Today, the district runs from the Giants stadium at AT&T Park to the 49ers stadium at Candlestick Point and encompasses Mission Bay, Potrero Hill, Dogpatch, India Basin, Portola, Little Hollywood, and Visitacion Valley. It’s also crossed by two freeways that isolate it from the rest of the city, and is home to a large number of crumbling housing projects that are in the process of being rebuilt.

Candidate Ed Donaldson grew up in the projects until he was 10 years old, when the Redevelopment Agency kicked his family out in the 1970s. “We landed on our feet, but others weren’t so lucky,” said Donaldson, who works as a housing counseling director at the San Francisco Housing Development Corporation.

“There is a sense that the Bayview and Visitacion Valley have not been included within the San Francisco family,” Donaldson said. “There is a sense of being forgotten.”

In 2007, Donaldson co-founded the Osiris Coalition to tackle the city’s dormant Certificate of Preference program, in which the Redevelopment Agency issued a document to displaced residents and businesses in the 1960s promising that they could return.

He also tried to rescue some 700 foreclosed properties and recycle them as affordable housing stock. And now he is trying to prevent the city from bulldozing seven SF Hope projects without guaranteeing residents that they have right to remain.

In 2007, Mayor Gavin Newsom and Maxwell convened an African American Outmigration Task Force that didn’t get a public hearing about its findings until August 2008. The timing angered some, who questioned why the report’s findings and implications for urban planning weren’t released before June 2008, when the residents of San Francisco voted for the Lennar-led Proposition G, a proposal to build 10,000 market rate homes at one of San Francisco’s last remaining black communities, which Newsom and Maxwell endorsed.

The taskforce didn’t publish its recommendations until the end of 2009, allegedly because of insider squabbling. Meanwhile, gentrification was going on actively, and many blamed Newsom, and by extension Maxwell, for failing to do anything with the group’s findings as D10 residents continued to suffer from high rates of asthma, cancer, unemployment and an ongoing black exodus.

It wasn’t always this way. In the 1940s, the district’s black population exploded when migrants from the south and World War II veterans came to work at the Hunters Point Naval Shipyard. Some moved to Alice Griffith Public Housing complex, or Double Rock, which was built as military housing in 1962. Others relocated to the Bayview when the Redevelopment Agency took over the Fillmore/Western Addition in the ’60s and ’70s as part of a controversial urban renewal effort.

But when the Navy abandoned the shipyard in 1974, unemployment hit the black community hard. Today, hundreds of the city’s lowest income residents live in Alice Griffith’s crumbling units and endure sewage backups, no heat, cloudy drinking water and leaking ceilings, as they wait for the projects to be rebuilt.

“Generations have been trapped in the silo of public housing and cannot get out, because of lack of opportunity and education, so when we legislate, we need to take that into consideration,” said candidate Malia Cohen, whose grandfather came from Texas to work at the shipyard where he met her grandmother, whose family came from New Orleans.

“My grandfather’s father was a longshoreman. He worked with the infamous Leroy King [a commissioner at the city’s Redevelopment Agency] and he has fantastically vivid stories of racism,” said Cohen, who works for the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, previously served on the executive staff of Mayor Gavin Newsom, and has already raised over $18,000 in the D10 race and qualified for public matching funds.

“My family came here to work hard, they lived on Navy road in the projects, and then they bought a house here. My parents were born here, and we were all public schooled,” Cohen recalled as she took me on a tour of D10 that ended up in Visitacion Valley, an increasingly Chinese-American neighborhood that reflects a district-wide trend.

Census data show that by 2000, Asians were the largest racial group in the district (30 percent), followed by blacks (29 percent), whites (26 percent), and Latinos (19 percent). By 2003, according to the California Urban Issues project, the trend continued. Asians were the largest racial group (32 percent), followed by blacks (27 percent), whites (21 percent) and Latinos (17 percent) of the population.

This means that D10 candidates will have to garner support from more than one ethnic group to win. Over a dozen candidates have already filed papers in the race, but so far there is no clear front-runner.

Also frustrating the prognosticators is that fact that D10 has had the lowest voter turnout in the city, so the winner will also depend on who goes to the polls.

D10 candidate Geoffrea Morris, who is the grand daughter of longtime Bayview activist Charlie Walker, has been knocking on doors and participating in voter registration drives.

“We need new blood,” Morris said

Getting elected will be a complicated equation. Although Bayview’s population was 50 percent African American at the time of the 2000 census, it didn’t turn out the vote. In the 2006 election, only 14,000 of the district’s 37,000 registered voters went to the ballot, and 50 percent were from whiter, richer, and more Asian neighborhoods.

“It’s very important to the future of the city that the ethnicity diversity of the board be maintained and that the African American community have representation,” former Board President and current Democratic Party chair Aaron Peskin told the Guardian.

Maxwell recently told the Guardian that she’s not ready to endorse any D10 candidates yet. “I’m waiting for people to have a better understanding of what this community is, what the common thread running through it is, and how to use rank choice voting,” she told us.

The only candidate who currently holds elected office is BART director Lynette Sweet, who had her answers down pat when we reached her by phone, and even used wording that was eerily similar to Maxwell’s words.

“D10 is a pretty diverse district, but there is only one common thread: the need for economic development,” Sweet told me. “That’s true in Potrero Hill, Portola, Dog Patch and the Bayview. It’s the same mantra: a lot of small businesses need help, and the only way to help them is through economic development. In Potrero Hill it’s about land use. In the Bayview, it’s about the shipyard and better transportation and truancies.”

 

THE COMMON THREAD

District 10 is ground zero for the Lennar’s $2.2 billion plan to develop 10,500 market rate condos at the Shipyard and Candlestick Point. The plan will allegedly create thousands of jobs and new parks, deliver on an historic community benefits agreement that labor groups claim is so “lawyered up” that the developer can’t renege on its promises.

The package is framed as the one and only way to revitalize the southeast’s formerly vibrant economic engine. Indeed, any time anyone tries to slow down the process—to take time to thoroughly read the draft EIR and see if it adequately addresses the impacts of this massive urban reengineering project — a chorus of “no delays” starts up, either from residents of the housing projects desperate to see their homes rebuilt, or the labor contractors who hope to get jobs.

“It’s as if the city is playing checkers, while Lennar is playing three-dimensional chess,” Eric Smith observed.

Lennar has stated that it will contribute $711 million to finance this massive project. The remainder will be leveraged by Mello-Roos bonds, state taxes based on the use and size of a property and intended to raise money for needed services, and tax increment financing, which creates funding for projects by borrowing against future property tax revenues.

The conceptual plan won Maxwell’s backing but environmental groups are critical of the draft EIR.

During DEIR hearing, environmentalists questioned the wisdom and the cost of filling the Bay to build a bridge over Yosemite Slough, and building condos on Candlestick Point state recreation area, the only open major open space in the district.

But the city’s Planning Department also has 20,000-30,000 units of housing in its pipeline. This means that if all these plans get approved in the next decade, they’d account for 80 percent of residential development citywide. And D10’s population could triple, further skewing the district’s already shifting demographics.

In other words, D10 as we know it could become nothing more than a historic relic in a few years, and the next supervisor will play a key role in deciding whether that happens. SFHDC’s Ed Donaldson warns that any supervisor who does not understand the complexity of the city’s largest district can expect a similar recall backlash in future.

“There is no one homogenous voice in the community,” Donaldson said. “The grass-roots organizing that brought about the recall effort was a result of a changing political structure in the area, but is not yet on par with other districts in town. We still allow our politics to be controlled from downtown.”

Fellow candidate Eric Smith warns that the issues—and politics—are complex.

“People were emotional, angry, and desperate because they feel no one listens to them,” Smith said. “That’s part of the problem here; they would rather have a supervisor go down swinging for them, rather than watch one seemingly side with Lennar, PG&E and the mayor on issues contrary to their interests. That’s the terrible irony and one of the biggest problems in District 10. Folks are so mad, they’re willing to do whatever it takes to make them feel they have a voice in the outcome, even if it’s potentially worse.”

Smith cited the sequence of events that culminated last year in the Navy dissolving the community-based shipyard Restoration Advisory Board (RAB), which for years has reviewed technical documents and commented on the Navy’s clean-up proposals. But in December, the Navy made its official decision to disband the RAB, citing dysfunctional behavior and off-topic discussions that got in the way.

“Some of the same folks who were frustrated by the process, tried to send a signal to the Navy that they weren’t being heard and for all their well-intentioned efforts got the RAB dissolved,” Smith said. “I truly feel for them, it’s absolutely heartbreaking, but at times, they can be their own worst enemy.”

One of the looming issues about the shipyard is that the land has been polluted and needs to be cleaned. The shipyard contains radioactive debris from ships towed to the shipyard, after a 90-foot wave washed over them during an atomic test gone awry. The Navy burned 610,000 gallons of radioactively contaminated ship fuel at the shipyard, and workers showered on the shipyard, raising concerns that radioactive materials got into the drains and sewers. And questions have been raised about radiological tests on animals at the yard.

 

LEAKS AND FLOODS

It’s not just the shipyard that’s toxic. Even the buildings that were constructed to house workers 50 years ago are a serious mess.

Realtor Diane Wesley Smith, who grew up in public housing projects, took me on a walking tour of Alice Griffith last week to see conditions that tenants will likely have to endure until at least 2014, if the city sticks to its plan to relocate people into a new replacement unit in the same geographical area, if not the exact same site.

What we found was pretty messed up.

“The water sometimes comes out brown and feels like sand. It’s been like that for a year,” one resident said.

“The water is cloudy, the bath tub isn’t working and the sink keeps stopping up,” said another.

A woman named Silvia showed us how the water from the tap in her elderly mother’s kitchen flows out cloudy and then doesn’t settle properly, like foamy beer.

“The roof’s been leaking for years, the sewage backs up, but they just fixed the lights,” Silvia said. A neighbor named Linda was using her oven as a heater.

“The toilet backs up a lot, and my grandson’s been coughing a lot from asthma,” Linda said.

“Roaches is always a problem,” said a woman named Stormi, dressed in black sweats and a black T-shirt that read, “Can’t knock the hustle.”

“They’re trying,” said Stormi, a member of the Alice Griffith Residents Association, as a couple of Housing Authority trucks pulled up to do repairs.

“They promise that you will not have to leave your unit, but if they try to move us down to the waterfront, well, there’s a reason there’s no housing there, and it’s because the land will flood,” Stormi said.

“If we don’t end up at the table, we’ll end up on the menu,” Wesley Smith warned, as she stopped to chat with a group of young men, who were worried they would pushed out of the Alice Griffith rebuild through the criteria being established.

“Fred Blackwell, the executive director of the Redevelopment Agency, assures me that’s not the case, but Alice Griffith is a Housing Authority property, and empty promises have the potential to be great promises provided they are made in writing,” Wesley Smith said as we walked out of the projects and onto the road where a yellow and black sign announced “flooded” next to Candlestick Point park, where Lennar wants to build.

Malia Cohen expressed concern about Hope SF residents, as we drove through the Sunnydale housing project.

“We have to be diligent and mindful that people are not pushed out,” Cohen said, noting the sweeping views at Gleneagles golf course above Sunnydale, and the value of housing for a golf course community. “When public housing gets taken offline, we must work with Redevelopment and the Housing Authority to make sure no one is changing the rules halfway. We have to make sure the talks and walks line up. We need to be equal partners. We cannot be bulldozed by City Hall.”

Geoffrea Morris is a Calworks employee, at the Southeast Community College facility on Oakdale, which was built to mitigate the city’s expansion of the sewage plant in 1987. She cited concerns about the literacy levels of people who live in the 2200 public housing units that cluster D10. “A lot of people in Alice Griffith don’t even know the dates or when it’s going to be reconstructed,” Morris said. “Folks like to be told stuff like that, but the city gives you a stack of papers. Some will read them, but others rely on folks they think are trustworthy. They need stuff in layman’s terms written on one sheet of paper.”

Morris is a fan of the Internet who posted a community survey online, and made sure every housing project got some literature telling people to get informed. She worries about the digital divide in D10:

“A lot of folks don’t have computers and access to important information,” Morris said. “And let’s talk about the way ‘affordable’ is used to trick people.”

Michael Cohen, Newsom’s top economic adviser, recently stated in a memo that over the expected 15-20 year phased build out, Lennar’s Candlestick-Shipyard development would include, “up to 10,500 residential units, about 32 percent of which (3,345) will be offered at below market rates.”

“But 892 units of this ‘affordable category’ will be sold to folks earning $100,000,” Morris said. “So if you subtract 892 units from affordable unit category, you’re back to 25 percent affordable.”

Candidate Kristine Enea, an attorney and a former RAB member, chairs the India Basin Neighborhood Association, which administers a US EPA grant to hire experts to translate the Navy’s cleanup documents into plain English and comment on them She was frustrated by the Navy’s decision to dissolve the RAB.

“The lack of a forum does nothing to bolster the community’s trust in the cleanup or the redevelopment process,” Enea said.

Enea generally supports the Lennar project, but has concerns about whether it will adequately mitigate increased car traffic, or result in commercial development that benefits her neighborhood.

“India basin is a pocket of Hunters Point right along the shoreline,” Enea said. “Right now, we have no shops or restaurants, no ATM, no groceries, nothing beyond one liquor store and a few industrial businesses.

Potrero Boosters president Tony Kelly told us that District 10 residents can think for themselves. “D10 residents don’t need to rely on corporations to solve their problems,” he said.

“Folks in the eastern neighborhoods came up with a better revitalization plan than what the city proposed and community activists managed to close the power plant, after the city said it was impossible,” Kelly recalled.

And there’s no shortage of good ideas.

Kelly suggested that an urban agriculture center could immediately put low-skilled folks to work by erecting greenhouses on unused land. Smith said the industrial zone could be “incredible eco-park made from sustainable sources.

‘D 10 is the dumping ground for everything, including all the city’s waste,” he said. “We could be a shining example, not just for D 10, but the rest of the state.”

The D 10 candidate line up includes Calloway, Cohen, Donaldson, Smith, Enea: civil rights attorney Dewitt Lacy, Morris, Potrero View publisher Steve Moss; District 7 BART director Lynette Sweet, Wesley-Smith. Bill Barnes, who works for Sup. Michela Alioto-Pier, and Linda Richardson, who was appointed to the Human Rights Commission in 2007 by Mayor Newsom, have also expressed interest in the race.

In such a huge field, name identification will play a major role. Sweet is in office, but BART Board is not a high-profile job and won’t give her a huge advantage.

Cohen has a slight edge right now in that she’s raised $18,505, including $500 from former Newsom flak Peter Ragone, making her the first D. 10 candidate to qualify for campaign financing. The oldest of five girls, Cohen recalls how her mother got laid off from her city job as a school-based mental health worker and then rehired, as part of the city’s budget cuts.

“We felt that pinch and the frustrating games that are played out between the leadership and the rank and file,” she said.

Cohen who worked for Newsom in his first term as mayor, but has since left his administration , said she is uncomfortable at being framed as Newsom’s candidate.

“Because I’m not, but I am one of the few candidates who has seen how the mayor and the Board work—and don’t work—together,” she said.

Moss sees the city’s southeast as a “district in transition.” Over coffee at Farley’s in Potrero Hill, he told me that the southeastern neighborhoods could be “launching pads for environmentally sustainable growth.”

“The district’s been in a frozen period for 30 years, But despite the problems, people are deeply committed to and in love with their community.

“This district is the future of San Francisco and its social fabric—the diversity, income –and its problems are leftovers from the city’s industrial age.”

 

 


 

DISTRICT 10, BY THE NUMBERS

Total Acres: 5,650

Average household income: $85,000

Population: 73,000

Registered voters: 37,700

Average housing price: $335,000

Ethnicity (2003 figures): Asian 32%, African American, 27%, white 21%, Hispanic 17%

Development status of land: 18% residential, 38% is commercial, 38% undevelopable

All figures the latest available. Sources: SFGIS, Association of Bay Area Governments, U.S. Census, California Urban Issues Project. Ethnicity and income data is from 2003 and almost certainly has changed.

Music listings

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Music listings are compiled by Paula Connelly and Cheryl Eddy. Since club life is unpredictable, it’s a good idea to call ahead to confirm bookings and hours. Prices are listed when provided to us. Submit items at listings@sfbg.com.

WEDNESDAY 24

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Kasey Anderson, Matthew Ryan, Allen Stone, Andrew Belle Hotel Utah. 8pm, $8.

Foreign Born, Fresh and Onlys, Free Energy, Splinters Rickshaw Stop. 8pm, $14.

Ghost of a Saber Toothed Tiger, Cornelius, If By Yes, Hirotaka Shimizu Independent. 8pm, $20.

Pepi Ginsberg, Pepper Rabbit Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $7.

Harlem, Sandwitches, Young Prisms Café du Nord. 8pm, $12.

Left Alone, Bum City Saints, Hounds and Harlots Thee Parkside. 8pm, $8.

Richard Thompson Band Great American Music Hall. 8pm, $28.

Rogue Wave, Princeton, Man/Miracle, Two Sheds Bottom of the Hill. 8pm, $15.

Sideshow Fiasco, Kajillion, Illness El Rio. 7pm, $5.

Sioux City Kid, Vandella, Landlords Red Devil Lounge. 8pm, $8.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Michael Abraham Jazz Session, Gaucho Amnesia. 8pm, free.

Michael Rose with Dubtronic Kru Rockit Room. 9pm, $25.

DANCE CLUBS

Booty Call Q-Bar, 456 Castro; www.bootycallwednesdays.com. 9pm. Juanita Moore hosts this dance party, featuring DJ Robot Hustle.

Club Shutter Elbo Room. 10pm, $5. Goth with DJs Nako, Omar, and Justin.

Hands Down! Bar on Church. 9pm, free. With DJs Claksaarb, Mykill, and guests spinning indie, electro, house, and bangers.

Jam Wednesday Infusion Lounge. 10pm, free. DJ Slick Dee.

Mary-Go-Round LookOut, 3600 16th St., SF; (415) 431-0306. 10pm, $5. A weekly drag show with hosts Cookie Dough, Pollo Del Mar, and Suppositori Spelling.

RedWine Social Dalva. 9pm-2am, free. DJ TophOne and guests spin outernational funk and get drunk.

Respect Wednesdays End Up. 10pm, $5. Rotating DJs Daddy Rolo, Young Fyah, Irie Dole, I-Vier, Sake One, Serg, and more spinning reggae, dancehall, roots, lovers rock, and mash ups.

Synchronize Il Pirata, 2007 16th St.; (415) 626-2626. 10pm, free. Psychedelic dance music with DJs Helios, Gatto Matto, Psy Lotus, Intergalactoid, and guests.

Yoruba Dance Sessions Bacano! Som., 2925 16th St., SF; (415) 558-8521. 9pm, free. With resident DJ Carlos Mena and guests spinning afro-deep-global-soulful-broken-techhouse.

THURSDAY 25

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Dan Black, Free Energy 330 Ritch. 9pm, $10-13.

Curtis Bumpy Coda. 9pm, $7.

Citay, Scout Niblett, Greg Ashley, Tape Deck Mountain Café du Nord. 8pm, $14.

*Cute Lepers, Clorox Girls, Primitivas, Boats! Thee Parkside. 9pm, $8.

Dodos, Magik*Magik Orchestra Palace of Fine Arts, 3301 Lyon, SF; www.ticketmaster.com. 8pm, $25.

Shane Dwight Biscuits and Blues. 8pm, $15.

Far, Stomacher, Picture Atlantic, Trophy Fire Bottom of the Hill. 8pm, $14.

Robert Grashaw Amnesia. 7pm, free.

Bill Kreutzmann with Oteil Burbridge and Scott Murawski Independent. 9pm, $25.

Moe. Fillmore. 8pm, $37.50.

Richard Thompson Band Great American Music Hall. 8pm, $28.

Slow Children, Wobbly and Preshish Moments, Maleficia, Alexandra Buschman Amnesia. 9pm, $5.

Space Monkey Gangstas, RU36, 5 Days Dirty, Release Slim’s. 8:30pm, $13.

*Toasters, Inciters, Monkey Red Devil Lounge. 8pm, $12.

*"Tribute to Johnny Cash" Knockout. 8pm, $10. With Glen Earl Brown Jr., B Stars, Royal Deuces, Big B and His Snake Oil Saviors, and more.

Zaimph, Vodka Soap, Bill Orcutt, Stellar OM Source Hemlock Tavern. 9pm, $7.

Zee Avi, Hot Toddies, Leslie and the Badgers Rickshaw Stop. 8pm, $14.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Bluegrass and Old Time Jam Atlas Café. 8pm, free.

DANCE CLUBS

Afrolicious Elbo Room. 9:30pm, $5-6. DJs Pleasuremaker and Señor Oz spin Afrobeat, Tropicália, electro, samba, and funk.

Caribbean Connection Little Baobab, 3388 19th St; 643-3558. 10pm, $3. DJ Stevie B and guests spin reggae, soca, zouk, reggaetón, and more.

Drop the Pressure Underground SF. 6-10pm, free. Electro, house, and datafunk highlight this weekly happy hour.

Ejector DNA Lounge. 9pm, $10. Synthpop with Robot Bomb Shelter and DJs Chris Zachos, Dabecy, and Papa Tony.

Funky Rewind Skylark. 9pm, free. DJ Kung Fu Chris, MAKossa, and rotating guest DJs spin heavy funk breaks, early hip-hop, boogie, and classic Jamaican riddims.

Good Foot Yoruba Dance Sessions Bacano! Som., 2925 16th St., SF; (415) 558-8521. 9pm, free. A James Brown tribute with resident DJs Haylow, A-Ron, and Prince Aries spinning R&B, Hip hop, funk, and soul.

Gymnasium Matador, 10 6th St., SF; (415) 863-4629. 9pm, free. With DJ Violent Vickie and guests spinning electro, hip hop, and disco.

Heat Icon Ultra Lounge. 10pm, free. Hip-hop, R&B, reggae, and soul.

Kick It Bar on Church. 9pm. Hip-hop with DJ Jorge Terez.

Koko Puffs Koko Cocktails, 1060 Geary; 885-4788. 10pm, free. Dubby roots reggae and Jamaican funk from rotating DJs.

La Riots Manor West, 750 Harrison, SF; (415) 407-4565. 10pm, $10.

Mestiza Bollywood Café, 3376 19th St., SF; (415) 970-0362. 10pm, free. Showcasing progressive Latin and global beats with DJ Juan Data.

Peaches Skylark, 10pm, free. With an all female DJ line up featuring Deeandroid, Lady Fingaz, That Girl, and Umami spinning hip hop.

Popscene 330 Rich. 10pm, $10. Rotating DJs spinning indie, Britpop, electro, new wave, and post-punk.

Represent Icon Lounge. 10pm, $5. With Resident DJ Ren the Vinyl Archaeologist and guest.

Solid Club Six. 9pm, $5. With resident DJ Daddy Rolo and rotating DJs Mpenzi, Shortkut, Polo Mo’qz and Fuze spinning roots, reggae, and dancehall.

FRIDAY 26

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Atlas Sound, Geographer, Magic Wands, Nice Nice Great American Music Hall. 8pm, $18.

Bikefight, Sopors, Overns, Bobby Joe Ebola Pissed Off Pete’s, 4456 Mission, SF; www.pissedoffpetes.com. 9pm, $5.

Blank Stares, Wild Yaks Hemlock Tavern. 9:30pm, $7.

Rick Estrin and the Night Cats Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $20.

Expendables, Iration, Passafire, Pour Habit, Roots Down Below Fillmore. 9pm, $19.50.

Four Tet, Nathan Fake, Rainbow Arabia, NewVillager Independent. 8pm, $18.

Judgement Day, Scissors for Lefty, Ghost and the City, Glaciers Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $12.

Limousines, Butterfly Bones, Battlehooch Slim’s. 8pm, $14.

*Mumlers, Growlers, Sonny and the Sunsets, Ferocious Few Café du Nord. 8pm, $14.

Notorious, Darkwave Red Devil Lounge. 8pm, $10-20. Benefit for victims of the earthquake in Haiti.

Sons of Doug, Crazy Famous, Scar Pin, West Of Hotel Utah. 9pm, $6.

Thrashers Broadway Studios. 8pm.

John Vanderslice, Nurses, Honeycomb, Conspiracy of Venus Swedish American Hall (upstairs from Café du Nord). 8pm, $15.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Audium 9 1616 Bush, SF; (415) 771-1616. 8:30pm, $15.

David Benoit Yoshi’s San Francisco. 8pm, $28.

Black Market Jazz Orchestra Top of the Mark. 9pm, $10.

Bryan Girard Quartet Cliff House, 1090 Point Lobos, SF; (415) 386-3330. 7pm, free.

Eric Kurtzrock Trio Ana Mandara, Ghirardelli Square, 891 Beach, SF; (415) 771-6800. 8pm, free.

Jim Butler Quartet Savanna Jazz. 8pm, $8.

"Kronos: Music from 4 Fences" Z Space, 450 Florida, SF; www.kronosquartet.org. 8pm, $25.

Joshua Redman Grace Cathedral, 1100 California, SF; www.sfjazz.org. 8pm, $25-50.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Dogman Joe, La Gente, Justin Ancheta Elbo Room. 10pm, $10.

Lucky Road Amnesia. 9pm, $5.

Pellejo Seco Cigar Bar and Grill, 850 Montgomery, SF; www.cigarbarandgrill.com. 9pm, $7.

Pickpocket Ensemble Red Poppy Art House. 8pm, $12-$15.

Rob Reich and Craig Ventresco Amnesia. 7pm, free.

Sila presents Sahara Coda. 10pm, $10.

DANCE CLUBS

Activate! Lookout, 3600 16th St; (415) 431-0306. 9pm, $3. Face your demigods and demons at this Red Bull-fueled party.

Bar on Church 9pm. Rotating DJs Zax, Zhaldee, and Nuxx.

Blow Up Rickshaw Stop. 10pm, $10-15. With guests All Leather and Dan Sena.

Bohemian Carnival DNA Lounge. 9pm, $20. With Vau de Vire Society, Gooferman, Gun and Doll Show, DJ Smoove, and more.

Exhale, Fridays Project One Gallery, 251 Rhode Island; (415) 465-2129. 5pm, $5. Happy hour with art, fine food, and music with Vin Sol, King Most, DJ Centipede, and Shane King.

Fat Stack Fridays Koko Cocktails, 1060 Geary, SF; (415) 885-4788. 10pm, free. With rotating DJs Romanowski, B-Love, Tomas, Toph One, and Vinnie Esparza.

Gay Asian Paradise Club Eight, 1151 Folsom, SF; www.eightsf.com. 9pm, $8. Featuring two dance floors playing dance and hip hop, smoking patio, and 2 for 1 drinks before 10pm.

Good Life Fridays Apartment 24, 440 Broadway, SF; (415) 989-3434. 10pm, $10. With DJ Brian spinning hip hop, mashups, and top 40.

Gymnasium Stud. 10pm, $5. With DJs Violent Vickie and guests spinning electro, disco, rap, and 90s dance and featuring performers, gymnastics, jump rope, drink specials, and more.

Hot Chocolate Milk. 9pm, $5. With DJs Big Fat Frog, Chardmo, DuseRock, and more spinning old and new school funk.

House of Voodoo Medici Lounge, 299 9th St, SF; (415) 501-9162. 9pm, $5. With DJs Voodoo and Purgatory spinning goth, industrial, deathrock, and glam.

Look Out Weekend Bambuddha Lounge. 4pm, free. Drink specials, food menu and resident DJs White Girl Lust, Swayzee, Philie Ocean, and more.

M4M Fridays Underground SF. 10pm-2am. Joshua J and Frankie Sharp host this man-tastic party.

Rockabilly Fridays Jay N Bee Club, 2736 20th St., SF; (415) 824-4190. 9pm, free. With DJs Rockin’ Raul, Oakie Oran, Sergio Iglesias, and Tanoa "Samoa Boy" spinning 50s and 60s Doo Wop, Rockabilly, Bop, Jive, and more.

Suite Jesus 111 Minna. 9pm, $20. Beats, dancehall, reggae and local art.

Teenage Dance Craze Party Knockout. 10pm, $3. Teen beat, twisters, and surf tunes with DJs Sergio Iglesias, Russell Quann, and dX the Funky Gran Paw.

SATURDAY 27

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

!!!, Maus Haus, Sugar and Gold, My First Earthquake Mezzanine. 8pm, $20.

A Band Called Pain, Punk Funk Mob, Sistas in the Pit Pissed Off Pete’s, 4456 Mission, SF; www.pissedoffpetes.com. 9pm, $5.

Black Prairie, Trainwreck Riders, Billy and Dolly Rickshaw Stop. 8pm, $14.

Bitter Mystics, Form of Transport El Rio. 7pm, free.

*Chain and the Gang, Strange Boys, Ty Segall, Nodzzz Elbo Room. 9pm, $10.

Children of the Damned, Hangar 18, Strangers in the Night Red Devil Lounge. 8pm, $10.

Shelby Cobra, Get Dead, Sore Thumbs, New York Ninja Thee Parkside. 9pm, $6.

*Dan the Automator presents Audio Alchemy Yoshi’s San Francisco. 10:30pm, $20. With DJ Qbert, DJ Shortkut, Jazz Mafia All-Stars, and Mars-1.

Dead Souls, Luv ‘n’ Rockets Knockout. 9pm, $8. Joy Division and Love and Rockets tribute bands.

Eyes Speak Treason, Annonimato, Hemorage Thee Parkside. 3pm, free.

*Mark Kozelek, Laura Gibson, Paula Frazer, Fences Great American Music Hall. 8pm, $30.

Memory Tapes, Loquat, Birds and Batteries, Letting Up Despite Great Faults Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $12.

PEE, True Widow, Ovens, Grass Widow Café du Nord. 8pm, $14.

*Shannon and the Clams, Pharmacy, Rantouls, Bebe McPhereson Hemlock Tavern. 9:30pm, $7.

Soundtrack of Our Lives, Nico Vega, Music for Animals, Imaad Wasif Independent. 8pm, $16.

Super Adventure Club, Blammos, Felsen Hotel Utah. 9pm, $8.

Sweedish, Sean Tabor Band, Blue Natron Kimo’s. 9pm, $8. Benefit for the Red Cross’s relief efforts in Haiti.

Earl Thomas unplugged Biscuits and Blues. 8 and 10pm, $22.

Turbonegra, Grannies, Shootin’ Lucy, Sioux City Pete and the Beggars El Rio. 10pm, $7.

We Were Promised Jetpacks, Lonely Forest, Bear Hands, Tempo No Tempo Slim’s. 8pm, $16.

JAZZ/NEW MUSIC

Al Di Meola’s World Sinfonia Palace of Fine Arts Theatre, 3301 Lyon, SF; www.sfjazz.org. 8pm, $25-65.

Audium 9 1616 Bush, SF; (415) 771-1616. 8:30pm, $15.

David Benoit Yoshi’s San Francisco. 8pm, $28.

Eric Kurtzrock Trio Ana Mandara, Ghirardelli Square, 891 Beach, SF; (415) 771-6800. 8pm, free.

Jazz Mafia presents Remix: Live Coda. 10pm, $10.

Josh Jones Cigar Bar and Grill, 850 Montgomery, SF; www.cigarbarandgrill.com. 9pm, $7.

"Kronos: Music from 4 Fences" Z Space, 450 Florida, SF; www.kronosquartet.org. 8pm, $25.

Ricardo Scales Top of the Mark. 9pm, $15.

Marlena Teich and Pete Yellin Savanna Jazz. 8pm, $8.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

California Honeydrops Red Poppy Art House. 7:30pm and 9pm, $10-$15.

Karina Denike, Lauren Cameron Klein, Aaron Novik’s Thorny Brocky Amnesia. 6pm, $5. Part of the Songbird Festival.

Killabossa, Mihaly’s Shimmering Leaves, Peace of Mind Orchestra Amnesia. 9pm, $7.

Quinteto Latino Community Music Center, 544 Capp, SF; (415) 647-6015. 8pm, free.

DANCE CLUBS

Area Codes Etiquette Lounge, 1108 Market, SF; (415) 863-3929. 10pm, $10. Celebrating the birthplace of hop hop, New York, with DJs Blaqwest and White Mike.

Bar on Church 9pm. Rotating DJs Foxxee, Joseph Lee, Zhaldee, Mark Andrus, and Niuxx.

Barracuda 111 Minna. 9pm, $5-10. Eclectic 80s music with Djs Damon, Phillie Ocean, VeeJay Satva, and Javier, plus free 80s hair and make-up by professional stylists.

Bootie DNA Lounge. 9pm, $6-12. Mash-ups with Adrian, Mysterious D, and more.

Dead After Dark Knockout. 6-9pm, free. With DJ Touchy Feely.

Fog City Wrestling DNA Lounge. 1:30pm, $5. Live wrestling show.

Go Bang! Deco SF, 510 Larkin St; (415) 346-2025. 9pm, $5. Recreating the diversity and freedom of the 70’s/ 80’s disco nightlife with DJs Stanley Frank, Steve Fabus, Nicky B., Sergio and more.

HYP Club Eight, 1151 Folsom, SF; www.eightsf.com. 10pm, free. Gay and lesbian hip hop party, featuring DJs spinning the newest in the top 40s hip hop and hyphy.

M.A.N.D.Y. Paradise Lounge. 9pm, $12.

Reggae Gold Club Six. 9pm, $15. With DJs Daddy Rolo, Polo Mo’qz, Tesfa, Serg, and Fuze spinning reggae, dancehall, and remixes.

Social Club LookOut, 3600 16th St., SF; (415) 431-0306. 9pm. Shake your money maker with DJs Lee Decker and Luke Fry.

Spirit Fingers Sessions 330 Ritch. 9pm, free. With DJ Morse Code and live guest performances.

SUNDAY 28

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

*Cannabis Corpse, Stormcrow, Voetsek, Wasteoid, Sorrower Thee Parkside. 8:30pm, $8.

Crack Sparkle El Rio. 5pm, free.

Evan Dando, Milo Jones Café du Nord. 8pm, $16.

Dizzy Balloon, Hounds Below, Visqueen, Laarks Bottom of the Hill. 1pm, $12.

Heel Draggers Thee Parkside. 4pm, free.

Valerie Orth, Theresa Perez, London Street Red Devil Lounge. 8pm, $10. Benefit for Partners in Health’s efforts to aid victims of the earthquake in Haiti.

"School of Rock Alumni Present: Haitian Relief Benefit" Café du Nord. 1pm, $15.

Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, Watson Twins, A B and the Sea, Northern Key Bimbo’s 365 Club. 7:30pm, $22.

Chantelle Tibbs, Emily Bonn, Sirens El Rio. 7pm, $5.

FOLK/WORLD/COUNTRY

Heather Klein’s Inextinguishable Trio Red Poppy Art House. 7pm, $12-$15.

Latin Jazz Youth Ensemble of SF, Sandy Cressman and Sombra y Luz, Ray Obiedo and Mamba Caribe, Bay Area Latin Jazz All-Stars Pier 23. 3pm, $25. Proceeds to benefit Sionfonds for Haiti.

Orchestra Nostalgico, Tango No. 9 Amnesia. 8pm, $8-$10.

DANCE CLUBS

DiscoFunk Mashups Cat Club. 10pm, free. House and 70’s music.

Dub Mission Elbo Room. 9pm, $6. Dub, roots, and classic dancehall with DJ Sep, Maneesh the Twister, and guest Antiserum.

45 Club Knockout. 10pm, free. The funky side of soul with DJs dX the Funky Grandpaw, Dirty Dishes, and English Steve.

Gloss Sundays Trigger, 2344 Market, SF; (415) 551-CLUB. 7pm. With DJ Hawthorne spinning house, funk, soul, retro, and disco.

Good Clean Fun LookOut, 3600 16th St., SF; (415) 431-0306. 3pm, $2. With drink specials, DJs and tasty food.

Honey Soundsystem Paradise Lounge. 8pm-2am. "Dance floor for dancers – sound system for lovers." Got that?

Jock! Lookout, 3600 16th; 431-0306. 3pm, $2. This high-energy party raises money for LGBT sports teams.

Kick It Bar on Church. 9pm. Hip-hop with DJ Zax.

Religion Bar on Church. 3pm. With DJ Nikita.

Stag AsiaSF. 6pm, $5. Gay bachelor parties are the target demo of this weekly erotic tea dance.

MONDAY 1

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

*Magnetic Fields, Mark Eitzel Herbst Theatre, 401 Van Ness, SF; www.ticketmaster.com. 8pm, $32.50.

DANCE CLUBS

Bacano! Som., 2925 16th St., SF; (415) 558-8521. 9pm, free. With resident DJs El Kool Kyle and Santero spinning Latin music.

Black Gold Koko Cocktails, 1060 Geary; 885-4788. 10pm-2am, free. Senator Soul spins Detroit soul, Motown, New Orleans R&B, and more — all on 45!

Death Guild DNA Lounge. 9:30pm, $3-5. Gothic, industrial, and synthpop with Decay, Joe Radio, and Melting Girl.

Dressed in Black Elbo Room. 10pm, $5. Music from the shadows with DJs Deathboy and Fact.50.

King of Beats Tunnel Top. 10pm. DJs J-Roca and Kool Karlo spinning reggae, electro, boogie, funk, 90’s hip hop, and more.

M.O.M. Madrone Art Bar. 6pm, free. With DJ Gordo Cabeza and guests playing all Motown every Monday.

Manic Mondays Bar on Church. 9pm. Drink 80-cent cosmos with Djs Mark Andrus and Dangerous Dan.

Monster Show Underground SF. 10pm, $5. Cookie Dough and DJ MC2 make Mondays worth dancing about, with a killer drag show at 11pm.

Network Mondays Azul Lounge, One Tillman Pl; www.inhousetalent.com. 9pm, $5. Hip-hop, R&B, and spoken word open mic, plus featured performers.

Spliff Sessions Tunnel Top. 10pm, free. DJs MAKossa, Kung Fu Chris, and C. Moore spin funk, soul, reggae, hip-hop, and psychedelia on vinyl.

TUESDAY 2

ROCK/BLUES/HIP-HOP

Fat Tuesday Band Biscuits and Blues. 8pm, $15.

Hold Up, Jhameel, Midnight Sun Bottom of the Hill. 9pm, $8.

Inner Ear Brigade, George Hurd Ensemble, William S. Braintree Elbo Room. 9pm, $6.

Lunar Sway, Selena Garcia, See Green Red Devil Lounge. 8pm, $7.

Taken By Trees, El Perro Del Mar Café du Nord. 9pm, $15.

Unko Atama, Started-Its, Custom Kicks Knockout. 9:30pm, free.

DANCE CLUBS

Alcoholocaust Presents Argus Lounge. 9pm, free. With DJs What’s His Fuck, Taypoleon, and Mackiveli.

Eclectic Company Skylark, 9pm, free. DJs Tones and Jaybee spin old school hip hop, bass, dub, glitch, and electro.

La Escuelita Pisco Lounge, 1817 Market, SF; (415) 874-9951. 7pm, free. DJ Juan Data spinning gay-friendly, Latino sing-alongs but no salsa or reggaeton.

Rock Out Karaoke! Amnesia. 7:30pm. With Glenny Kravitz.

Share the Love Trigger, 2344 Market, SF; (415) 551-CLUB. 5pm, free. With DJ Pam Hubbuck spinning house.

Womanizer Bar on Church. 9pm. With DJ Nuxx.