Progressive

Ma’s JROTC bill needs to die

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EDITORIAL With California in a cataclysmic budget crisis and a long list of problems on the agenda of the state Legislature, Assemblymember Fiona Ma has announced a bill that would force the San Francisco school district to bring back a military recruitment program. It’s an unusual tactic, and one with questionable legal grounds. It’s also inappropriate and bad public policy.

The school board has been debating the Junior Reserve Officers Training Program for years. Supporters promote the program, which costs the district $1 million a year, as a leadership training opportunity; for a lot of district kids, it was an alternative way to meet a physical education requirement. In reality, though, JROTC is, and always has been, part of the Pentagon’s effort to convince young people to join the military.

High school students, the target of the program, have always been vulnerable to recruiters. That’s why the military brass love anything that gets them into high schools. JROTC cadets are besieged with recruitment calls, and those efforts continue even after the kids have left the program.

The local queer community has been pushing hard to end JROTC in San Francisco, in part because of the Pentagon’s ridiculous don’t-ask, don’t-tell policy on gay service members. But even after that policy ends (and under President Barack Obama, it’s likely gay people will be serving openly in the military soon), JROTC is a terrible program for the San Francisco schools. If the best leadership training this progressive city can offer is through a model based on the values of the Army, something is very wrong.

And that’s what the school board ultimately decided. The board has voted to discontinue JROTC, as of this summer, and is moving to adopt an alternative leadership program.

But a few JROTC supporters, with the assistance of the local Republican Party, placed an advisory measure on the November 2008 ballot calling for the program’s continuation. With most activist energy going to support the Obama campaign and the efforts to elect progressive supervisors, the measure passed. But it contained no legal mandate, and the school board members, even those who support JROTC, have generally agreed that it would be a bad idea to revisit the issue. A clear majority of the board is prepared to let JROTC die and replace it with something better.

We can’t figure out why Ma has suddenly decided to make this a state issue. She told us that "the voters of San Francisco have spoken, and all I am doing is upholding the will of the voters." But the voters also elected school board members who think it’s best to eliminate JROTC.

More important, this simply isn’t Sacramento’s business. The Ma bill needs a two-thirds vote to pass, which means it depends on Republican support — and as Assemblymember Tom Ammiano says, "Do we really want the Republicans in the state Legislature to tell San Francisco what to do?" Even School Board member Hydra Mendoza, who supports JROTC, is opposing the bill: "It’s not appropriate," she told us, "for the state Legislature to overturn a decision of the San Francisco school board."

This would set a horrible precedent: every time the city schools took a progressive stand on some program, someone in Sacramento could come along and try to undo it.

Mayor Gavin Newsom should speak out against this bill, and Ma should withdraw it. If she doesn’t, the Legislature should reject it. *

Live wires: the Gourds set for Slim’s showdown

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By Danica Li

If you know the Gourds, you know them prolific Texan folk don’t take things lying down – especially when there’s a frenetic album-a-year quota to be maxed out around these parts. Alternative country, progressive bluegrass, or whatever you want to call it, the Austin, Texas, honky-tonk veterans have been making sweet music since the dawn of the ’90s, when multi-instrumentalists Kevin “Shinyribs” Russell and Jimmy Smith formed the group alongside drummer Charlie Llewellin and accordionist Claude Bernard. A bit of member reshuffling later, the band emerged with a new drummer and Max Johnston of Wilco fame manning the banjos, and has kept that rotation ever since.

American Apparel denied store on Valencia

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American Apparel, which is known for sexy ads and fairly progressive labor practices, failed to convince San Franciscans to let them open a fourth store here.
By Ben Terrall

Yesterday, after a long afternoon of statements from a few supporters and many opponents of American Apparel opening a new store at 988 Valencia Street, the San Francisco Planning Commission voted 7-0 to deny the Los Angeles-based chain the permit they needed to open.

The Commission Chambers at City Hall were packed to capacity as the Planning Commission began its regular meeting. The extra attendees, many of them organized by the hastily-formed “Stop American Apparel” campaign, were moved to two rooms with video monitors which broadcast the meeting.

It was strong show of force by grassroots organizers, one that forced a vote that few thought would be so decisive.

Tailpipe turnaround

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› news@sfbg.com

GREEN CITY Word that automobile emissions standards may soon improve was good news, but Bay Area leaders and communities are demanding even more to offset the harm that comes from tailpipes.

President Barack Obama last month called for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to allow California and as many as 13 other states to employ their own emissions restrictions. "Our goal," said Obama at the White House, "is not to further burden an already struggling industry. It is to help America’s automakers prepare for the future."

A review of the request is now underway and manufacturers were reassured they would have enough time to rework their 2011 lines. By then, cars and trucks should have improved efficiency and better mileage, outpacing three-year-old national standards that have been in place since the EPA refused to grant a waiver from the federal Clean Air Act.

Locally, the city’s Transportation Authority is reworking the local Climate Action Plan to emphasize emissions reductions. But the problem is expected to get worse before it gets better. Researchers at the Bay Area Air Quality Management District expect greenhouse gas emissions from transportation to increase dramatically from 42.4 million metric tons of carbon dioxide this year to 65.4 million in 2029 under "business as usual conditions."

That may be why Mayor Gavin Newsom and San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed released a letter Jan. 23 opposing federal plans for an auto industry bailout unless there are more strings attached to the money and more progressive programs to develop low-emission vehicles regionally. The two mayors called for an auto bailout that would "not divert funds from innovative emerging transportation technologies."

Jan Lundberg, a former oil industry analyst turned activist and a former member of the San Francisco Peak Oil Preparedness Task Force, calls for even bolder steps: "The kinds of amelioration being talked about and offered are woefully inadequate. We should just get rid of car dependency. Most of the pollution involved — into the air, from the car — is not from the tailpipe. It’s from the mining and the manufacturing associated with the car."

The real challenge for local governments is not in adapting their vehicles, but adapting policy to reflect progressive approaches like San Francisco’s "Precautionary Principle," adopted in 2003. The policy puts the burden of proof on advocates of new technology to show it is safe. Debbie Raphael, the Green Building Program Manager with San Francisco’s Department of the Environment, has been pushing for a change in how environmental codes are implemented. "Taxpayers have every right to know the risks," she said. "The burden then falls on industry to study possible negative consequences and to investigate safer alternatives."

Writer and activist Bill McKibben addressed the issue last fall when he spoke at Herbst Theatre, recognizing San Francisco as an environmental leader among cities. "This is clearly a community that is doing so many of the things right that need to be done. One community at a time is a very noble way to proceed. But in the end, it’s only half the battle. We’ve got to get the political movement going that allows us to do this everywhere, not just in the places that already understand it."

Without a net

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› news@sfbg.com

The Board of Supervisors heard more than four hours of public comment at its Jan. 27 meeting, as hundreds of labor representatives, public-health workers, homeless advocates, hospital staffers, and others crowded into the board chambers to sound off on the deep budget cuts that many charged would leave they city’s critical-services safety net in shreds.

The message was chilling.

On the ground, the budget cuts Mayor Gavin Newsom is proposing translate into staggering losses in services that segments of the city’s most disadvantaged populations rely on. Among those who will lose their jobs: some San Francisco General Hospital staffers who are trained to watch the cardiac monitors. "They are the first responders when someone goes into cardiac arrest," nurse Leslie Harrison told the board during public comment. "This is a life and death job — literally."

The Huckleberry House, which was established in 1967 and provides assistance to more than 7,000 homeless youth each year, may face closure.

Homeless shelters are already being forced to turn away two out of three clients seeking a bed due to lack of space, according to Coalition on Homelessness Executive Director Jennifer Friedenbach.

Demand for hot meals from the St. James Infirmary, a clinic for uninsured sex workers, has tripled since the onset of the recession, Executive Director Naomi Akres told the Guardian. As a result of the cuts, the clinic will lose its ability to continue either the food program or an outreach program that aims to get people off the streets.

Other areas that face funding reductions, according to a tally of midyear reductions issued by the mayor’s office, include some programs that administer STD testing and HIV prevention services, the Adult Day Health programs at Laguna Honda Hospital, aid for foster care, and the Single Room Occupancy Collaborative (which assists low-income tenants living in dilapidated hotel rooms across the city). San Francisco’s Human Services Agency will lay off 67 staffers.

Of the $118 million in midyear cuts rolled out by the mayor’s office last December, some $46 million will be shed from health, human welfare, and neighborhood-development services.

The midyear reductions, which will begin to take effect Feb. 20, are aimed at addressing a steep drop-off in revenue for the 2008–09 fiscal year. Now, health and human services providers and others across the board are anxiously looking ahead to the next round of blows, which will be dealt to address a projected $576 million deficit for the 2009–10 fiscal year, which begins in July. That figure could be reduced to $461 million after budget cuts, according to Deputy Controller Monique Zmuda.

Newsom has known about the gravity of the current budget problem since late October, when City Controller Ben Rosenfield issued a memo projecting fiscal disaster. "Since the adoption of the budget in July, the City’s economic outlook has significantly worsened, particularly since the onset of the global financial market upheavals that began in September," the memo states. It goes on to predict a worst-case scenario of $125 million in tax-revenue shortfalls for the 2008–09 fiscal year.

Cuts in frontline services don’t have to be the only answer. Supervisor Chris Daly has introduced an alternative budget proposal, which includes reductions in funding for management positions, cuts in the city’s subsidy to the symphony, and a reduction in the size of the mayor’s press office in an effort to free up funds that could then be diverted back to critical services. "I don’t think any of the choices are good. There’s really only the lesser of the evil," Daly noted at the meeting.

The choices the city faces were described in clear terms. "I’m sorry to say it, but you have some tough decisions in front of you," Friedenbach told supervisors when it was her turn at the podium during public comment. "You have to choose between abused children, or the symphony. You have to choose whether you want to decimate the mental-health treatment system — or do you want to get rid of the newly hired managers since the hiring freeze? You have to decide whether you want to cut half of the substance-abuse treatment system — or do you want to create a new community justice center that will have nowhere to refer its defendants?" Rather than choose, however, supervisors voted 6–5 to send Daly’s alternative package back to the Budget and Finance Committee for further consideration. The swing vote was Board President David Chiu, who was elected president with the support of the progressive bloc.

Had Chiu voted for Daly’s alternative, it wouldn’t have mattered much — the mayor would almost certainly have vetoed it.

Eight supervisors — enough to override a veto — did demonstrate a willingness to move forward with a June special election. With Supervisors Sean Elsbernd, Michela Alioto-Pier, and Carmen Chu dissenting, the board voted to waive deadlines that would have prevented new tax measures from being placed on a June 2 ballot.

Several different tax ideas are under discussion. According to a list of preliminary estimates calculated by the Office of the Controller, slight increases over the current rates of taxes levied on business registration, payroll, sales, hotel-room stays, commercial utility users, parking, property transfers, and Access Line fees together could bring the city an estimated $121.6 million per year.

Other proposals include creating parcel taxes for both residential and industrial property, gross-receipts taxes on rental income for commercial and residential properties, a local vehicle license fee, and a residential utility users tax. If all of those proposed new taxes were voted into effect, the city would have the potential to raise an additional $112.9 million.

The problem: under state law, unless the mayor and supervisors unanimously declare an emergency, any tax increase would require a two-thirds vote to pass.

Supervisor John Avalos voiced strong support for the special election. "I think that the people of this city are still grappling with the meaning of the crisis that we’re in," Avalos told his colleagues.

Avalos amended out the possible new parcel tax, increased parking tax, and utility-users taxes, and instead proposed two new revenue measures that could be added to the ballot: a vehicle-impact fee, and "a possible new tax to discourage the consumption of energy that produces a large carbon footprint."

It won’t be easy to pass any of these proposals. Business interests are mobilizing against the very idea of a special election. In an e-mail newsletter distributed by the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce, a "call to action" urged supporters to contact Supervisors and voice opposition to the emergency election.

The language in the Chamber of Commerce message closely resembled that of Small Business California, which put out a message to the small-business community warning that higher taxes "would be the straw that breaks the already strained back of our local businesses, resulting in more layoffs and acceleration of our downward spiral."

Labor organizer Robert Haaland asked supervisors why they would be afraid of allowing voters to decide on the tax-revenue measures. A poll commissioned by his union, SEIU Local 1021, demonstrated that a significant portion of voters would rather raise revenues than allow vital services to disintegrate.

Even if new revenue is raised, Haaland told us, no one is under the illusion that there won’t be painful cuts. "Everyone’s going to feel some pain," he said. "It’s a question of how much pain."

American Apparel battle heads for Planning Commission

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Early Saturday morning, Jan. 31, about 40 protesters stood on the sidewalk near the corner of Valencia and 21st streets — the site of a proposed American Apparel store — holding up signs that read, "Your Mission — Not Theirs." An endless stream of honks — even one from a cop car — echoed support for the anti–American Apparel cause. The next day, protesters met at Ritual Roasters for a letter-writing party and on Feb. 2, they rallied and wrote letters at an anti–A.A. event hosted at Amnesia. The movement to block the chain store is gaining momentum in advance of a Feb. 5 Planning Commission hearing.

The overwhelming majority of independent businesses in the neighborhood — including Ritual Roasters, Modern Times Bookstore, Borderlands Books, and Aquarius Records — have taken a stand against the chain, which boasts 200 outlets in 19 countries worldwide. There are three AA stores in San Francisco, including one on nearby Haight Street.

A.A. spokesperson Ryan Holiday says the sentiment is misplaced. "People think we’re a big-box retailer, but that’s not true," he told the Guardian.

The company has been pushing a different image: "We don’t like the mall-ification of America any more than you," reads a sign on the empty storefront. "But that has never been what American Apparel is about."

Many store opponents claim the campaign is not a crusade against American Apparel, a Los Angeles company that has a progressive record on labor and immigration issues. It’s about formula retail, which is already banned in several San Francisco commercial districts.

"I’m wearing American apparel underwear right now," said Kent Howie, a longtime staffer for Artists’ Television Access, which is housed in the storefront next to the proposed clothing outlet. "Our street just doesn’t want chain stores. It’s about survival."

Supervisor Bevan Dufty, who represents the district where A.A. would be located, has not taken a public position. But several months back, he met with American Apparel representatives and suggested a number of ways to do outreach in the neighborhood.

"I have seen no such evidence," Dufty told us. "Major retailers often don’t make an active contribution to the neighborhood."

Holiday insists that it’s the community’s decision, although A.A. has signed a multiyear lease for the space. "We don’t need to dictate the conversation and we don’t need to trick the people into thinking they want an American Apparel."

>>View more of our American Apparel controversy coverage here.

Valentine’s Day events

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Click here to see all Valentine’s Day listings on one page


PARTIES, EVENTS, AND BENEFITS

Black Valentine Masquerade Club Mighty, 119 Utah; www.mighty119.com. Feb. 13, 10pm-3am, $15. Sunset Promotions and Blasthaus present this all-out party extravaganza, featuring UNKLE’s leading man James Lavelle, Evil Nine, and revelers dressed in dastardly dark costumes.

Bootie — A Special Valentine’s Party DNA Lounge, 375 11th St.; www.bootiesf.com. Feb. 14, 10pm, $12. Celebrate the holiday mash-up style with DJ Freddy, King of Pants, twisted love songs by house band Smash-Up Derby, and a midnight mashup show by Valentine.

CockBlock Rickshaw Stop, 155 Fell; 861-2011, cockblocksf.com. Feb. 14, 10pm, $7 . Get your Valentine’s groove on at this queer dance party for lezzies, queers, lovers, and friends, featuring DJ Nuxx.

Date and Dash Noc Noc, 557 Haight; www.dateanddash.com. Feb. 14, 8pm, $35 (free to first 20 people). Speed-dating with a Lower Haight twist. RSVP for red drinks, trendy beats, and a faux auction.

I Heart the Utah Hotel Utah Saloon, 500 Fourth St.; 546-6300, www.thehotelutahsaloon.com. Feb. 14, 9pm, $8. Celebrate the kind of love that lasts — that between a bar and 100 years’ worth of patrons — with oyster shooters, champagne, a costume contest, and live music by El Capitan and Let’s Make Something.

Love on Wheels Dating Game Rickshaw Stop, 155 Fell; 861-2011, www.rickshawstop.com. Feb. 13, 6-9pm, free for SFBC members. Join this dating game exclusively for two-wheelers, where bike bachelors and bachelorettes quiz a panel of three cyclists to select their date — and then roll to hip local spots.

Milonga de Amor Ferry Building; 990-8135. Feb. 13, 5:30-8pm, free. Celebrate V-Day, sensuous tango, and slow food.

Sexy Tour of SF Strip Clubs for Singles or Couples (510) 291-9779, www.slinkyproductions.com. Feb. 13, 6-10pm, $99/person or $190/couple, includes entry to all clubs, two drinks, and full-course dinner. Peek into a world of fantasy, glamour, and intrigue with the safety of a fun group and a guide whose expertise is leading women and couples.

Shindig 69 Rickshaw Stop, 155 Fell; 861-2011, www.rickshawstop.com. Thurs/12, 8:30pm, $10. Start your weekend off with a tribute to the sexy ’60s, featuring The Devil-Ettes, Kitten on the Keys, and DJs from Bardot a Go Go and Teenage Dance Craze — all to benefit the Keep a Breast Foundation.

Supperclub Suicide Girls Afterparty Supperclub, 657 Harrison; 348-0900, supperclub.com. Feb. 14, 7:30pm, $100 for dinner and party. Have someone you’re trying to get in bed? Invite them to share a four course menu, bottle of champagne, and special afterparty with Suicide Girls.

Thousand Faces Misera-Ball OmniCircus, 550 Natoma; 701-0686, omnicircus.com. Feb. 14, 8pm, $10. Celebrate the lovelorn with a multifaceted performance and afterparty. Special discounts for the lonely.

Valentine Art and Wine Tasting Party for Singles The Artists Alley, 863 Mission; winesocials.com. Feb. 13, 7:30pm, $20–$30. Sample appetizers and a fabulous selection of wines from California and around the world at one of SF’s premier art galleries, co-sponsored by the Society of Single Professionals.

Valentine’s Day BikeAbout San Francisco Zoo, Sloat at 47th St.; 753-7236, www.sfzoo.org. Feb. 14, 8:30-11am, $25–$30. Woo at the Zoo too rich for your blood? Bring your bike and your sweetie for a leisurely, guided pedal around the zoo followed by a continental breakfast. Discount for tandem cyclists!

Valentine’s Day Poetry Luchadores Sub-mission, 2183 Mission; 863-6303, www.poormagazine.org. Feb. 14, 7pm, $20 to fight, $10 to watch. Your favorite revolutionary poets, poverty scholars, mediamakers, and cultural workers at POOR Magazine mash up poetry, gender, and wrestling for their second annual Battle of ALL of the sexes.

Valentine’s Eve for Singles Orson, 508 Fourth St.; 777-1508, www.orsonsf.com. Feb. 13, 5:45pm-closing, price varies. Choose your own adventure (and price range) at Orson by attending either the Cupid’s Arrow Dinner Party four-course meal or Aphrodisiac Dessert After Party, with dancing for all starting at 10pm.

Woo at the Zoo San Francisco Zoo, Sloat at 47th St.; 753-7236, www.sfzoo.org. Sat/7, 6pm; Sun/8, 12pm; Feb. 14, 12pm & 6pm; $75. Enjoy the 20th annual zoo sex tour with Jane Tollini, featuring new animals, new positions, and new kinky information — plus brunch or dinner.

BAY AREA

Charles Chocolates Tasting J Vineyards and Winery, 11447 Old Redwood Hwy, Healdsburg; (707) 431-3646, www.jwine.com. Sat/7, 12:30-3pm, $20. Join the premium artisan chocolatier for a special Valentine’s Day-themed chocolate and wine tasting at J Vineyards.

Family Valentine’s Play Party River of Light Massage & Healing Arts, 256 Shoreline, Mill Valley; (415) 846-8181, laughplayhug.com. Feb. 14, 10am-12pm, $10–<\d>$20. Enjoy heartfelt family fun, sensory games, movement, laughter, and drama with your extended family.

Progressive Dinner for Single Women and Men Ristorante Don Giovanni, 235 Castro, Mt. View; (510) 233-9700, www.meetinggame.com. Sat/7, 7pm, free for newcomers. Find your Valentine among the 20 other singles enjoying a three-course meal.

Sweetheart of the Year Dinner Point San Pablo Yacht Club, 700 W. Cutting, Richmond; (510) 232-1102, www.pointrichmond.com/methodist. Feb. 12, 6:30pm, $35. Honor Pat Dornan at the First United Methodist Church of Richmond’s fun-filled evening of memories and laughter.

Valentine’s Dance 707 W. Hornet, Pier 3, Alameda; (510) 521-8448, www.uss-hornet.org. Feb. 14, 8pm, $40–$75. Don your best ’40s or ’50s attire and dance to jazz and big-band classics aboard the aircraft carrier USS Hornet.

FILM, MUSIC, AND PERFORMANCE

Dating, Marriage, Dating Farley’s, 1315 18th St.; www.farleyscoffee.com. Feb. 14, 7:30pm, donations welcome. Get hopped up on coffee while previewing Liz Grant’s new love-and-romance themed stand-up comedy show.

Love Bites Pop Rocks: LGCSF Sings Top-40 Hits of Bitterness and Betrayal Women’s Building, 3543 18th St.; 1-800-838-3006, www.womensbuilding.org. Fri/6, Sat/7, adults-only show Feb. 13, 8pm, $15–$30. Cupid takes a well-deserved beating when the Lesbian/Gay Chorus of San Francisco presents its sixth annual Valentine’s Day cabaret and musical extravaganza.

Mortified: Doomed Valentine’s Show Make-Out Room, 3225 22nd St.; www.makeoutroom.com, www.getmortified.com. Feb. 12, Feb. 13, 8pm, $12–$15. Share the pain, awkwardness, and bad poetry associated with love as performers read from their teen-angst artifacts.

Origins of Love with John Cameron Mitchell Victoria Theatre, 2961 16th St.; 863-0611, www.victoriatheatre.org. Fri/13-Sun/15, times vary, $25. Shortbus and Hedwig and the Angry Inch creator John Cameron presents a romantic potpourri of song, prose, poetry, and film, including a rare chance to hear Mitchell sing selections from Hedwig.

Sexy Valentine’s Erotica Reading Good Vibrations Polk Street Gallery, 1620 Polk; 345-0400, events.goodvibes.com. Fri/6, 6:30pm, free. Enjoy a glass of wine while talented group of local writers read their sexy short stories, frisky flash fiction, passionate poems, and hot haikus.

Spookshow A Go-Go Kimo’s, 1351 Polk; 885-1535, www.kimosbarsf.com. It’s a Valentine’s Day massacre with performances by Dottie Lux, Alotta Boutte, Kitten on the Keys, Lady Satan, Ruby White, and DJ Miz Margo, and films by Val Killmore and Shadow Circus.

Sweet Cookbook Reading and Eating Red Hill Books, 401 Cortland; www.dogearedbooks/redhill. Feb. 13, 7pm, free. Red Hill welcomes chef Mani Niall to read from his new book Sweet!: From Agave Nectar to Turbinado, as well as share some of his treats.

BAY AREA

Hearts Gathering King Middle School Auditorium, 1781 Rose, Berk.; Feb. 14, 8pm, $15–$20. Enjoy an evening of poetry and music with Diane di Prima, Michael McClure, California Poet Laureate Carol Muske-Dukes, U.S. Poet Laureate Kay Ryan, and former Poet Laureate Al Young performing with bassist Dan Robbins.

ART/FASHION EVENTS

I Love You Because … Design Guild Gallery, 427 Bryant; www.ilyb.org. Feb. 14, 8pm, $10. Celebrate V-Day at the closing party for photographer and TransportedSF visionary Alexander Warnow’s collaborative photo project exploring why people love who they do. (You can also view the photos at the gallery Wed.-Sat., 12-6pm, starting Feb. 5.)

Love Sick II Muse Studios, 224 Sixth St.; www.lovesickfashion.com. Feb. 14, 7pm, $15–$20. Find flirty fashions and lascivious lingerie at this trunk-and-runway show featuring Hide & Seek Lingerie, Ape’ritif Lingerie, Miss Velvet Cream, and more. A portion of proceeds from tickets and kissing booth benefit The Riley Center, a local domestic violence shelter.

CLASSES, LECTURES, AND WORKSHOPS

Cooking Crush for Singles Crushpad Winery, 2573 Third St.; 1-888-907-2665, www.partiesthatcook.com. Feb. 12, 6:30-9pm, $95. Singles in their 30s and 40s are invited to mix and mingle as they tour the winery, share a nibble and a glass of wine, and pair up for cooking lessons.

The Origins of Love and Love’s Expression Exploratorium, 3601 Lyon; 561-0360, www.exploratorium.edu. Feb. 14, 2pm, with museum admission. Dr. Thomas Lewis offers a Darwinian twist on modern romance, exploring the psychobiology behind human intimacy.

Valentine’s Aphrodisiac Chef Joe’s Culinary Salon, 16 a/b Sanchez; 626-4379, www.theculinarysalon.com. Feb. 14, 11am-1:30pm, $75. Join expert (and hilarious) Chef Joe for a course in cooking food that’ll get you in the mood, including oyster’s mignonette, asparagus in puff pastry, and chocolate fondue.

BAY AREA

Sound Healing for Relationships and Interpersonal Communication Tian Gong International Foundation, 830 Bancroft, Lotus Room 114, Berk.; (510) 883-1920, www.tiangong.org. Feb. 13, 7-8:30pm, $5–$10. Get ready for reutf8g at this qigong practice dedicated to energetically healing relationships, including Celestial Song and Love Activations for soul-to-soul communication.

Revolutionary Love Martin Luther King Jr. Student Union, UC Berkeley campus, Berk.; ewocc.berkeley.edu. Explore the foundations of self-love with workshops, music, dancing, discussion, and a keynote address by Cherrie Moraga during the 24th Empowering Women of Color Conference.

Valentine’s Day at Habitot Children’s Museum 2065 Kittredge, Berk.; (510) 647-1111, www.habitot.org. Mon/9-Feb. 14, regular admission. Young children can create heart-themed art for loved ones. Visitors who bring craft supplies get free adult admission.

Wholeness Thru Relationship Center for Transformative Change, 2584 Martin Luther King Jr., Berk.; (510) 549-3733, transformativechange.org. Feb. 14, 7am-4pm, $35–$50. Invite a friend, ally, or someone with whom you’re having a hard time to this daylong workshop about developing relationships with yourself, your loved ones, and your community.

Check out more Valentine’s Day events listings on our SEX SF blog.


>>More G-Spot: The Guardian Guide to love and lust

Why newspapers won’t die

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By Tim Redmond

But before I get into that:

Doesn’t the Chronicle’s new design look awful? I mean, it’s cluttered and backward-looking and I don’t think it’s going to save THAT newspaper from its financial problems. Why doesn’t the Chron just take local news seriously, cover San Francisco, and hire just one, just one progressive urban political columnist to balance the suburban Chuck Nevius?

Okay: But newspapers aren’t going to die. I try to explain this to people all the time. I tell students that journalism is going to be around forever, even if we stop killing trees to make paper and the internet morphs into a consensual hallucination or people screw sockets into their brains to learn things or whatever. There will still be communication, and some of it will still involve journalists.

I don’t always agree with Bill Keller, the editor of the NY Times, but in a recent column answering readers’ questions, he got this one just right:

First, there is a diminishing supply of quality journalism, and a growing demand. By quality journalism I mean the kind that involves experienced reporters going places, bearing witness, digging into records, developing sources, checking and double-checking, backed by editors who try to enforce high standards. I mean journalism that, however imperfect, labors hard to be trustworthy, to supply you with the information you need to be an engaged citizen. The supply of this kind of journalism is declining because it is hard, expensive, sometimes dangerous work. The traditional practitioners of this craft — mainly newspapers — have been downsizing or declaring bankruptcy. The wonderful florescence of communication ignited by the Internet contains countless voices riffing on the journalism of others but not so many that do serious reporting of their own. Hence the dwindling supply. The best evidence of the soaring demand is the phenomenal traffic to the Web sites that do dependable news reporting — nearly 20 million unique monthly visitors to the site you are currently reading, and that number excludes the burgeoning international audience. The law of supply and demand suggests that the market will find a way to make the demand pay for the supply.

And it doesn’t take that much money to create a news operation on the web. The giants in the industry (and some of the not-so-giants, like the SF Chronicle) may fall by the wayside, and we may see much more web-based local reporting from a larger number of smaller and more diffuse news outlets (already happening in SF) and that won’t be such a bad thing.

But newspapers, in the traditional sense of organizations that pay staffers to report and deliver news and charge people (in our case, by showing them ads) to access it … that’s not going anywhere.

mills college music

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Because the Bay Guardian is the go-to source for Bay Area audiences, I thought your readers would be interested to know about the latest happenings at Mills College with the opening of its new concert hall and exciting all-star contemporary music festival.

From February 21-April 5 Mills will celebrate their rich music legacy with a six-concert festival, Giving Free Play to the Imagination. An elite group of musicians who have helped shape contemporary music around the world, Pauline Oliveros, Terry Riley, Roscoe Mitchell, Joan Jeanrenaud, Muhal Richard Abrams, the Arditti Quartet, and Fred Frith, among others, will perform pieces of their own design, including several world-premiere pieces, and of Mills composers past and present. At this time Mills will also celebrate the reopening of the Mills Concert Hall, a venue that has inspired audiences for more than 80 years. Oliveros will play the first sounds in the Hall on February 21.

Mills College is the international leader in contemporary music, which is why musicians from around the world come to Mills, and how Mills has become an incubator for the evolution of contemporary music, with the likes of Dave Brubeck, John Cage, Pauline Oliveros, Burt Bacharach, Darius Milhaud and Phil Lesh among students and faculty. As the Bay Guardian has covered Mills’ music in the past, I think your readers would be interested to know about this exciting festival, the Bay Area’s latest greatest concert venue, and what’s new in the world of Mills as its musicians inspire communities in the Bay Area and around the world.

Please let me know if we can arrange an interview with Mills music leadership or the performers to help you build your story. A summary of the Festival program is below, with further details available at www.mills.edu/musicfestival.

Best regards,

Victoria Terheyden

Victoria Terheyden

MacKenzie Communications, Inc.

600 California Street, Suite 1590

San Francisco, CA 94108

Tel: 415.403.0800 ext. 30
Fax: 415.403.0801

www.mackenziesf.com

Media Contacts:

Quynh Tran, Mills College

Media Relations Manager

510.430.2300

qtran@mills.edu

Victoria Terheyden

MacKenzie Communications, Inc.

415.867.2516

vterheyden@mackenziesf.com

Mills College Celebrates 80 Years of Musical Innovation with

Giving Free Play to the Imagination Music Festival

OAKLAND, CA—Feb. 3, 2009. Mills College celebrates 80 years of musical innovation as it reopens the historic Mills Concert Hall after an extensive 18-month renovation with a music festival featuring some of the world’s leading contemporary musicians. The six-concert series, Giving Free Play to the Imagination, runs from February 21 through April 5, 2009.

Musical innovators such as Pauline Oliveros, Terry Riley, Joan Jeanrenaud, Roscoe Mitchell, Muhal Richard Abrams, the Arditti Quartet, and Fred Frith, among many others, will celebrate Mills College’s leadership in defining contemporary music.

At the heart of the aesthetic and educational mission of music at Mills is a tradition of experimentalism. Breaking free from preconceived notions about music, Mills composers and performers embrace new sounds and musical forms while pursuing creative, exploratory, and individual approaches to music. It is this unique approach that has made Mills College the destination for sonic pioneers. And it is why some of the top names in contemporary music—Darius Milhaud, Dave Brubeck, Joëlle Léandre, Phil Lesh, John Cage, Anthony Braxton, and Pauline Oliveros, to name just a few—have been part of the faculty and student population at Mills.

“Because of our long history of support for an experimentalist tradition across barriers of genre, cultural identity, or perceived hierarchy, Mills is uniquely placed to cultivate, appreciate, and celebrate musical pioneers,” said Fred Frith, head of the Music Department and internationally known composer, multi-instrumentalist, and improviser.

Mills music faculty, students, and visiting artists from varied musical traditions come from as far away as Argentina, China, France, and Turkey to study musical forms from electronic music to classical performance to jazz improvisation.

“Ever since renowned French classical composer and Mills’ professor Darius Milhaud encouraged soon-to-be-renowned jazz pianist composer and Mills’ student Dave Brubeck to ‘be himself,’ our students have been discovering how to ‘be themselves’ with single-handed determination,” said Frith. “As a Music Department that encourages experimentation while respecting tradition, we are second to none.”

“We are continually inspired by the influence and impact of our music graduates in their artistic pursuits,” said Janet L. Holmgren, president of Mills College. “Whether they are composers, performers, professors, or music producers or whether they are working in the film, video game, or music industries, or in leading technology and digital media companies, our graduates reflect the College’s mission to encourage creativity and experimentation, all within a global context.”

Giving Free Play to the Imagination also marks the completion of the $11 million renovation of the Mills College Concert Hall, to be renamed for well-known Bay Area philanthropist and Mills alumna Jeannik Méquet Littlefield, MA ‘42. Designed by noted California architect Walter Ratcliff Jr., the Mills Music Building has received widespread acclaim since its opening in 1928.

Improvements to the Concert Hall include new acoustic panels for enhanced sound quality, an expanded stage area for larger performances, installation of a dedicated mixing station, soundproofing for performance and recording quality, new seating and improved layout for a better audience experience. The multicolored frescoes and murals created by California painter Raymond Boynton were restored by two teams of art conservators to return them to their original vibrant colors.

The festival’s name, in fact, derives from Boynton’s vision for his murals, “to produce a scheme of decoration that would give free play to the imagination.”

Mills Music Festival Honorary Committee:

Charles Amirkhanian* – composer, percussionist, sound poet, radio producer

Laurie Anderson* – performance and visual artist, composer, vocalist, musician

Dave Brubeck*+ – jazz and classical musician, pianist, composer

Robert Cole – director of Cal Performances

Merce Cunningham – choreographer and founder of Merce Cunningham Dance Company

Evelyn Glennie – percussionist, composer, motivational speaker

David Harrington – violinist and founding member of the Kronos Quartet

Phil Lesh* – musician and founding member of the Grateful Dead

George Lewis – improviser-trombonist, composer, computer/installation artist

Jeannik Méquet Littlefield* – philanthropist and patroness of the arts

Annea Lockwood – composer, professor emeritus at Vassar College

Rebeca Mauleón* – Latin and world music pianist, composer, educator

Meredith Monk – composer, singer, director/choreographer

Michael Morgan – music director of the Oakland East Bay Symphony, pianist, educator

Pauline Oliveros+ – composer, performer, first director of the Center for Contemporary Music (formerly the Tape Music Center)

Lauren Speeth* – CEO of the Elfenworks Foundation, member of the Mills Board of Trustees, violinist, recording artist

Roselyne Swig+ – philanthropist, activist, and patroness of the arts

Michael Tilson Thomas – music director of the San Francisco Symphony, composer, recording artist

* Mills alumnae/i

+ Mills honorary degree recipient

Program

Saturday, February 21, 2009 8:00 pm

OPENING NIGHT: Pauline Oliveros with Tony Martin; Terry Riley; Joseph Kubera performs Roscoe Mitchell; Joan Jeanrenaud

Solo performances of works by pioneers in the experimentalist tradition. Oliveros will play the first musical sounds in the renovated Concert Hall. A champagne reception follows.

Sunday, February 22, 2009 3:00 pm

A CELEBRATION OF THE CENTER FOR CONTEMPORARY MUSIC

More than 40 years of electronic innovation featuring Pauline Oliveros, Tony Martin, Maggi Payne, Chris Brown, William Winant, Joan Jeanrenaud, James Fei, and John Bischoff. Pre-concert talk with performers at 2:00 pm.

Friday, February 27, 2009 8:00 pm

LEGENDARY COMPOSER AND IMPROVISER MUHAL RICHARD ABRAMS with special guest Roscoe Mitchell

Saturday, February 28, 2009 8:00 pm

DARIUS MILHAUD’S BRAZILIAN CONNECTION

Dazzling orchestral works conducted by Nicole Paiement. A celebration of the renaming of the Concert Hall in honor of Mills alumna Jeannik Méquet Littlefield follows.

Sunday, March 8, 2009 3:00 pm

ARDITTI QUARTET

The world-renowned string quartet plays works by Mills composers past and present

Sunday, April 5, 2009 3:00 pm

THE MUSIC OF FRED FRITH

A rocking birthday concert of new music with Fred Frith and Cosa Brava (Carla Kihlstedt, Matthias Bossi, Zeena Parkins, The Norman Conquest), Liz Albee, Minna Choi, Beth Custer, Joan Jeanrenaud, Myra Melford, Roscoe Mitchell, Ikue Mori, Larry Ochs, Bob Ostertag, and William Winant.

TICKETS / PUBLIC INFO:

General admission: $20/concert; $100/series

Seniors: $12/concert; $60/series

For more information or to purchase tickets, please visit http://www.mills.edu/musicfestival

Nestled in the foothills of Oakland, California, Mills College is a nationally renowned, independent liberal arts college offering a dynamic progressive education that fosters leadership, social responsibility, and creativity to approximately 950 undergraduate women and 500 graduate women and men. Since 2000, applications to Mills College have more than doubled. The College is named one of the top colleges in the West by U.S. News & World Report, one of the Best 368 Colleges by the Princeton Review, and ranks 75th among America’s best colleges by Forbes.com. Visit us at www.mills.edu.

American Apparel battle heats up

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editors note: updated information at the end

By Andrea de Brito

When local author Stephen Elliot saw a sign reading “American Apparel: Coming Soon” in a vacant storefront window near 21st and Valencia two weeks ago, he told himself: “What? No way!”

Within 24 hours, he had whipped up a Stop American Apparel website and spent $750 – money that he didn’t really have — to print thousands of posters reading “Your Mission—Not Theirs” (though that side of Valencia Street technically belongs to the Castro).

You can see the simply designed posters in many storefront windows along Valencia Street, where the overwhelming majority of independent businesses—including Ritual Roasters, Modern Times Bookstore, Dog-Eared Books, Aquarius Records, and Borderlands Books— have taken a strong stand against the mega-chain, which boasts 200 outlets in 19 countries worldwide and is known for its ads featuring skinny teenage girls in skimpy cotton rags.

The issue has generated considerable discussion on the neighborhood blog MissionMission and in our past coverage.

“I do not want to live in a shopping mall,” said Elliot, claiming residents he’s interviewed were largely unaware of the imminent prospect of the chain’s grand opening. Though the company’s progressive position on fair labor practices and immigrant rights may blur the lines between good and evil, most opponents claim the campaign is not a crusade against American Apparel. It’s a crusade against formula retail, already completely banned in several affluent commercial districts of San Francisco.

The District Six dance begins

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Walker, Kim

By Tim Redmond

Chris Daly will be the district six supervisor for the next two years (minus a couple of weeks), but already the dance to replace him is underway — with some surprising names floating around.

It’s no secret that Debra Walker is running, and with her long record on land-use and planning issues and her LGBT community leadership, she starts out as the leading progressive in the race. SOMA activist Jim Meko has joined the fray, too.

And the rumor mill is abuzzin with talk that School Board member Jane Kim, who by all accounts has a bright political future, is considering the race. Kim recently moved to D6, and we’ve heard from a number of people who’ve been contacted by Kim supporters about a possible supervisorial bid. Kim herself is a bit more coy: “I’m not announcing a campaign,” she told me. But she didn’t entirely rule it out: “Right now, I’m not a candidate. I haven’t decided what I’m going to do in 2010; everything’s on the table.”

And then there’s Michael Yarne, who last year left Martin Builders to take a job with the Mayor’s Office of Economic Development. Mayor Newsom doesn’t have a clear horse in that race yet (Rob Black, who works for the Chamber of Commerce, may run again, but he lost last time and is clearly a Chamber toadie, so his hopes in the liberal district aren’t that good). Yarne told us that he’s been contacted by people who think he’d be a good candidate, and he hasn’t entirely ruled it out, but “there’s no way I could run right now because I don’t live in the district.” Yarne rents in D9.

For my money, Kim is one of the brighest young stars in local politics, and she ought to stay on the school board, where she’s doing a great job, for another term, then start looking at other offices.

Budget woes show new political calculus

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By Rebecca Bowe

About 150 labor representatives and health-service providers turned out at last night’s Board of Supervisors meeting to sound off on drastic budget cuts that many said would weaken an already-strained safety net for populations who are most in need. For more than four hours, representatives from homeless-advocacy groups; clinics serving the uninsured, sex workers or other disenfranchised populations; youth organizations that strive to keep kids off the street; labor-union representatives; stressed-out hospital staffers and many others gave the board an earful. The overwhelming majority urged the Board of Supervisors to approve a special election for June 2, which would give voters an opportunity to decide whether to establish new taxes as a way of generating revenue, rather than relying solely on deep cuts to solve the city’s budget woes.

The city is facing a budgetary crisis of unprecedented scale, with a daunting $576 million deficit. When Mayor Gavin Newsom appeared before the supervisors last December to ask for their cooperation in tackling the budget shortfall, he described it as arguably the most daunting crisis the city has seen since the Great Depression. (Newsom was attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland yesterday.)

While the members of the board put off the decision as to whether or not to actually hold a special election, they did pass a measure allowing for the option to stay open. With Supervisors Alioto-Pier, Chu and Elsbernd voting no, the board approved an emergency measure to waive regular election procedures that would have prevented the tax measure from being placed on a June 2 ballot.

Nor did the board vote on an amended budget package, which was introduced by Supervisor Chris Daly to counter Mayor Gavin Newsom’s mid-year budget cuts. Daly’s list of alternative cuts targeted management-level positions, mayoral communications staff and funding for the opera, ballet and symphony in an effort to free up funds that could then be diverted to sectors such as public health.

Instead of adopting Daly’s amended list of cuts, supervisors voted 6-5 on a motion — called by Supervisor Sean Elsbernd — to send the whole thing back to the Budget & Finance Committee for a closer look. “All of this needs to be analyzed,” Elsbernd said after questioning a few management-level cuts included in the list. “To push this forward today without total understanding of the impact of each and every one of these — and these are just the ones I’ve caught while sitting here! — God knows what else is in there. I’m just saying, let’s have this fully vetted.” Supervisors Alioto-Pier, Chiu, Chu, Dufty, Elsburnd and Maxwell supported the motion.

That left an interesting and somewhat mixed message about the politics of the new board. Supervisors Dufty and Maxwell, who will be the swing votes on anything that requires a supermajority (to override a mayoral veto) stayed with the progressives on the vote for a June election. But Chiu – elected board president entirely with progressive support – sided with the mayor’s allies and the moderates on the budget re-allocation vote.

We’ll have to see how this new calculus plays out in the next few weeks.

Sun/Slam dance-off

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By Jesse Hawthorne Ficks

Midnites for Maniacs programmer and Academy of Art University film history teacher Ficks tallies up his favorites from Sundance and Slamdance 2009.

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(1) Push: Based on the Novel by Sapphire – directed by Lee Daniels
Not to be confused with the upcoming Dakota Fanning film of the same name, this gut-wrenching adaptation of the struggles of Precious, an overweight, illiterate 16-year-old, (performed with utter grace by new-comer Gabourey “Gabby” Sidibe) has the power to take the country by storm if and when it’s released (the film has yet to be picked up by a distributor even though it won Sundance’s Grand Jury and Audience Award prizes). Mo’Nique as Precious’ abusive mother delivers one of the most authentic performances of our time (she won a Special Jury Prize for Acting), while Mariah Carey is brilliantly understated as a caring social counselor. But what’s so special about this Dancer in the Dark-esque film are Damien Paul’s screenplay and director Lee Daniels’ choices to always take the more difficult road with the characters. This is powerhouse filmmaking at its finest.

(2) Humpday – directed by Lynn Shelton
So straight they’re gay! If you took the two straight-male archetypes from Kelly Reichardt’s Old Joy (2006) — the adventurous, wandering beardo and the settling-down, sensitive progressive — got them drunk at a party, and had them challenge one another to have sex with each other, you have the setup for hands-down the funniest bromance mumblecore film of the year. As the two friends (Joshua Leonard and Mark Duplass of 2005’s The Puffy Chair) try and prove who’s living life to the fullest and man-liest, director Lynn Shelton showcases the “awkward moment” and thoroughly explores straight men’s confused sexuality. (If the premise sounds uncomfortable, think of how baffled the Utah audiences were of the concept of two straight guys fucking one another. Magnolia picked the film up so keep your eyes open for the limited release.) This is classic indie cinema of the golden 1990s type.

(3) We Live in Public – directed by Ondi Timoner
Following-up Timoner’s 2004 Documentary Grand Jury Prize-winning Dig!, this jaw-dropping doc follows the bipolar exploits of Josh Harris, a man who predicted every single step of the internet. The hypnotic footage has the power to warp the viewer into Harris’ Orwellian vision of the future. It’s as fascinatingly addictive as it is horrifyingly revealing of where our current society is headed.

Union showdown

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› steve@sfbg.com

The Oakland-based United Healthcare Workers is bracing for an imminent takeover by its parent, Service Employees International Union, after defying an SEIU ultimatum to support the transfer of 65,000 UHW nursing home and homecare workers to a new local — without a member vote and with leadership appointed by SEIU.

The power struggle between SEIU President Andy Stern and UHW head Sal Rosselli and their respective boards, which has been escautf8g for the last year (see "A less perfect union," 4/9/08), came to a head Jan. 22 when SEIU’s International Executive Board approved findings of fiscal shenanigans and insubordination by UHW leaders and threatened to oust them and institute a trusteeship if six conditions were not met within five days.

To determine its response over the weekend, UHW organized meetings with about 5,000 of its members in San Francisco and four other cities, announcing the response during a raucous press conference at the Oakland headquarters the morning of Jan. 26, a day before the SEIU deadline.

"You ready everybody?" began Rosselli, flanked by a rainbow of 30 members and signs like "Hands off our UHW" and "Don’t Silence our Voices." The energized crowd of about 100 supporters answered with an enthusiastic, "Yeah!"

At that 11 a.m. rally, and in a teleconference an hour later with reporters from across the country, including from the Los Angeles Times and The Washington Post, Rosselli began by describing the UHW (which began with San Francisco General Hospital workers about 75 years ago) as perhaps the most effective, democratic, politicized, and oldest health care union in the country.

"We have an ideology that there’s no limit to empowering workers," Rosselli told reporters, announcing that UHW has unanimously approved a response letter to Stern that he characterized as "a compromise to avoid a civil war and get to the path of reconciliation."

But SEIU spokesperson Michelle Ringuette, while noting that her union’s leadership had not yet decided how to respond by Guardian press time, said the findings and conditions by special hearing officer Ray Marshall (who was the labor secretary under President Jimmy Carter) "was not a negotiation."

Marshall’s 105-page report concluded that "Leaders of the UHW did engage in financial malpractice and undermined democratic procedures when they transferred UHW funds to a nonprofit organization to be used in contests with the International Union." It set out conditions to avoid trusteeship that included supporting the transfer of long-term care workers, greater fiscal oversight by SEIU, purging the UHW database of names pilfered from SEIU, and publicizing the Marshall report to its members.

"Given that Sal Rosselli and his leadership team were just found guilty by Secretary Marshall of financial wrongdoing and trying to subvert the democratic processes of this union, there’s nothing surprising about this letter," Ringuette told the Guardian.

Yet an insistence on democratic processes was at the heart of the UHW stance against SEIU, which UHW leaders accuse of sacrificing the autonomy of locals in its drive for more national power, appointing leadership based on loyalty to Stern, colluding with large corporate employers, and turning a blind eye to corruption by Stern loyalists that was far more serious than any accusations against UHW.

UHW agreed to some of SEIU’s conditions, but insisted that its members be allowed to vote on the merger and elect their own leaders, and that SEIU work with UHW to craft a union that best represents member interests. In addition, it called for a mediated reconciliation process with SEIU that could culminate in a vote to create a single union representing all health care workers in California.

UHW members are fiercely loyal to that organization. To illustrate UHW’s effectiveness, Rosselli noted that SEIU locals representing nursing home workers recently negotiated contracts with wages $4 per hour less than UHW contracts and without UHW’s strong patient advocacy provisions. He also said that while UHW represents about 20 percent of statewide SEIU workers, the union filled 55 percent of the volunteer shifts in state and local elections.

"We’re a very democratic organization, and that’s what we believe is the key to our success," Rosselli said. "Workers want a strong voice in dealing with their employers, not just another boss in Washington, D.C."

All sides of the conflict express a desire to move forward. As Marshall wrote, "The UHW-SEIU conflict is hurting both organizations at a critical time in the development of the labor movement and progressive policies in the country." But it could be that the two sides have staked out intractable positions.

Rosselli was realistic about whether SEIU will accept the UHW counteroffer, telling reporters, "I don’t think it’s likely, but we hope that they will."

And what if they don’t?

Rosselli was careful to avoid threatening to lead an effort to disaffiliate UHW from SEIU if the trusteeship happens, noting that such advocacy is against SEIU rules and refusing to answer questions from reporters pushing the issue. But he made that possibility clear with statements such as "Our members have instructed us to resist this undemocratic transfer."

As to how UHW leaders will respond if and when SEIU takes over UHW and ousts them, Rosselli read from a prepared statement that said, "We would convene a meeting of our currently elected leaders and decide what to do next."

During the Oakland rally, Rosselli went a little further, reminding UHW members that they always retain the right to form a new union. The crowd applauded for 40 seconds and chanted, "Can we? Yes we can! Will we? Yes we will!"

As the conference concluded and attendees trickled away, homecare worker Tena Robinson grabbed a Guardian reporter and said she had a message to convey: "Andy Stern, we will never surrender!"

As she said it, Rosselli came over to hug her, as if embracing a family member. And then she told Rosselli that if he goes, "I’m going with you!"

Joe Sciarrillo contributed to this report.

Editor’s Notes

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› tredmond@sfbg.com

Just about every progressive economist agrees that the federal bailout bill should include money to help state and local government. I agree. Forcing government to lay off public sector workers and cut services is the worst thing you can do in a recession.

But in a strange way, some sick, contrary part of me almost hopes the Obama administration doesn’t bail out California. Federal money would let us off easy. It would let us do what just about everyone in Sacramento desperately wants to do right now: figure out a way to get out of this mess for another year. Then we can all hope things will get better again.

But they won’t, is the thing. As the San Francisco Chronicle reported Jan. 25, the weak economy is leading to a lot of home sales, and a lot of those sales are at prices below the level of the property’s current tax assessment. So property tax revenue will be dropping this year – but they’ll stay low next year, and the year after, and the year after that. Because under Proposition 13, property taxes can’t go up by more than 2 percent a year. So even as the economy recovers and property values rise, those houses and commercial properties sold at bargain basement levels today will continue to enjoy nice tax cuts for the foreseeable future.

Meanwhile, the state already owes billions from previous one-time borrowing to cover previous one-time budget solutions. And since most of the money comes from taxes that are highly unstable and move with the economy (sales taxes, for example), the budget hole is going to get worse before it gets better.

This is no way to run the world’s eighth-largest economy.

And I keep thinking: could this finally be our chance to do something about it? Might things get so bad this year that people start asking about actual radical change?

And when I talk about radical change, I’m not talking about a tax here or there. I’m talking about somebody in the Legislature standing up and saying, if we were going to create from scratch a system to fund the state of California, what would it look like? And I can tell you, it would look nothing like the Winchester Mystery House of tax laws that we have today.

I won’t be the one called on to draft the blueprint for a new California revenue system, which is probably a good thing. But I can make a few observations and offer a few proposals that almost everyone with any sense agrees ought to be on the table.

First, California may be broke right now, but many of its residents are not. Generally speaking, the fairest types of taxes are income taxes, and the state doesn’t charge the people with very high earnings anywhere near enough. And since the rich don’t tend to suffer as much as the rest of us in recessions, that’s a fairly stable resource.

We don’t do enough to capture our share of the money companies make off California’s resources, either. This is an oil-producing state, yet we have no tax on oil at the wellhead; even Louisiana has that. And we don’t do nearly enough to charge consumers for the damage they do to the environment (the car tax being the most obvious example).

But beyond that, we tax goods and manufacturing, which is no longer the base of our economy, and let services go free. Some services are necessary and should be exempt (medical care, for example). But are the people who pay for, say, personal trainers or cosmetic surgery by and large better off financially than the rest of us? I suspect they are. Should they be taxed on what is by almost any standard a luxury service?

The point is, we need to stop looking at this as a one-time problem. This year’s deficit is the canary in the financial coal mine. Maybe instead of a ballot measure on one tax plan, we should have an election to reconsider Prop. 13, the tax code, and the entire way we finance the state. The system is about to collapse. Maybe we should start again, and get it right this time.

So what are Newsom’s budget plans?

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EDITORIAL In Washington, Rep. Nancy Pelosi — who has never been known as a radical leftist — is proposing that Congress repeal the Bush tax cuts, now, two years before they expire. That would bring $226 billion into the federal till, enough to fund a good part of the stimulus package.

In Sacramento, Democrats are moving toward a special election this spring to allow the voters to approve a tax increase — a move that would prevent disastrous service cuts in this horrible economic climate. Even the Republicans in the state Legislature — about as intransigent a group of people as you’re going to find in public service in America — are actually discussing the possibility that they might accept a tax increase as part of a budget deal.

Political writer David Sirota, blogging on Open Left, argues that a tectonic shift is taking place, that budget fights are "tilting the terms of debate away from Reaganism and toward progressive policy goals."

But not in San Francisco, where Mayor Gavin Newsom refuses to support any sort of new revenue measures this spring. In fact, while the supervisors, labor, and others are working to try to figure out a solution to the budget crisis, Newsom has been out of town, campaigning for governor or galavanting off to Paris and Davos.

We can’t quite figure out what the mayor plans to do about a budget deficit that could reach $500 million. So far we know he thinks the city can get some money by privatizing cab medallions (a dumb idea). We also hear he’s talking about vastly increasing the number of condo conversion permits (an even worse idea that will lead to massive evictions and the end of rent control). Beyond that, he hasn’t offered anything.

We recognize the problems with a spring special election. Passing a tax measure would require a two-thirds majority, a tough threshold under the best of circumstances. The state may call its own special election in May, preempting the city’s chances. The deadlines are tight, and city officials would need to move very quickly to come up with a workable plan in time.

But there are also serious problems with abandoning the idea, or even waiting until November. We’re talking cataclysmic budget cuts here — maybe as many as 1,500 layoffs, massive cutbacks in public health, parks and recreation centers closed, fire stations shut down, police cut back, Muni backsliding into dysfunction, programs for the homeless and needy vanishing as more and more desperate people fill the streets … it won’t be pretty.

We’ve consistently argued that a June special election to raise new tax money is a reasonable option, and the supervisors need to keep it on the table. That means voting on several technical issues Jan. 27 and then moving at full speed to draft the ballot proposals. If circumstances change, the city can always back off and cancel the election.

But the mayor needs to come back to town and start getting engaged with this problem. Before he simply dismisses the June election, he needs to tell us his plan. What alternatives is he offering? What is he proposing to cut? What jobs, what services, will be eliminated?

The same goes for downtown, small business leaders, and the supervisors who oppose tax increases. Tell us — now, in public — what you propose to do about this once-in-a-lifetime crisis. The progressives are at least putting forward plans, imperfect as they may be. Anyone who refuses to support those plans should be required to offer something else.

The Mission vs. American Apparel?

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By Juliette Tang

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The Mission District is gathering its forces in a fight against American Apparel. Yes, native Missionites are rebelling against skinny jeans, hoodies with white zippers, and colorful tights. (Irony! — Ed.).

American Apparel is trying to build a store at 988 Valencia Street, right next to the Artist Television Access, an artist-run, non-profit experimental media arts gallery that has been around since 1984, on an extremely vibrant corner of the Mission that includes independent, locally-owned gems like Dosa, the Sidewalk Juice Cafe, Herbivore, and Minnie Wilde.

“Oh, hell no!” says local writer Stephen Elliott of the Progressive Reading Series and other actively opposed Mission denizens. .

The truth about Community Choice Aggregation

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By Amanda Witherell and Tim Redmond

It would be easy to just ignore last week’s SF Weekly story on
San Francisco’s energy policy.

The piece was exactly what we’ve come to expect from the Weekly – a direct attack on progressive San Francisco. It used all the buzzwords – “risky,” “radical,” “scheme.” It selectively chose facts and presented them without context.

But stuff like this sticks around, and people read it, so somebody has to set the record straight.

The running theme of the piece, by Peter Jamison, is that Community Choice Aggregation, an energy plan that would allow the city to be the wholesale buyer and provider of power to residents, comes with a high risk. In an effort to get greener power, the article charges, the city may wind up raising electric rates – “which could have a crippling impact on the city’s poorest residents.”

Of course, PG&E is going to raise electricity rates every year for the foreseeable future, and high PG&E rates are already having a crippling impact on poor people, small businesses and the local economy. But that’s not addressed in the story.

The truth is, CCA is only “risky” if you (a) assume that PG&E, which has been in and out of bankruptcy and continues to seek rate hikes, will somehow be a risk-free source of energy in the future and (b) assume that there’s no risk whatsoever to continuing to rely almost entirely on nuclear power and fossil fuels for our energy needs.

BOS committee assignments

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By Tim Redmond

Board President David Chiu has released the list of committee assignments, which look good — there are three solid progressive votes on the Budget Committee. The winners: David Campos and Ross Mirkarimi both have three good committee assigments. The losers: Sean Elsbernd, who gets only one job. Not sure I would have put him in charge of the school district committee (I’d have put him on budget instead of Carmen Chu), but overall, I don’t think the progressives will have a lot to complain about.

(UPDATE: Elsbernd just called me to say that he had requested not to be on budget because his first child is due in June and he wants to have enough time to spend with his family. “And the biggest issue I hear about these days is education,” he said. He is thrilled with the assignment he got.)

Here’s the rundown:

Budget & Finance
John Avalos, Chair
Ross Mirkarimi, Vice Chair
Carmen Chu, Member
David Campos, Temporary Member
Bevan Dufty, Temporary Member

City Operations & Neighborhood Services
Bevan Dufty, Chair
Chris Daly, Vice Chair
Michela Alioto-Pier, Member

City & School District
Sean Elsbernd, Chair
Bevan Dufty, Vice Chair
John Avalos, Member

Government Audits & Oversight
Ross Mirkarimi, Chair
Eric Mar, Vice Chair
Sophie Maxwell, Member

Land Use & Economic Development
Sophie Maxwell, Chair
Eric Mar, Vice Chair
David Chiu, Member

Public Safety
David Campos, Chair
Ross Mirkarimi, Vice Chair
Michela Alioto-Pier, Member

Rules Committee
Chris Daly, Chair
Carmen Chu, Vice Chair
David Campos, Member

Dufty swings to the right

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Text by Sarah Phelan

Yesterday was the new Board’s first test on two key issues and in both cases, Sup. Bevan Dufty provided Mayor Gavin Newsom with the swing vote he needed.

Dufty’s votes were further evidence that he will likely be swinging increasingly to the right, as the next mayoral race looms on the not too distant horizon.

First, Dufty joined Sups Michela Alioto-Pier, Carmen Chu and Sean Elsbernd, in voting not to override Mayor Gavin Newsom’s veto of legislation that would have required conditional use permits and hearings when housing units are being eliminated.

Then, he joined the mayor’s usual trio of allies to block an appeal by opponents of a mixed-use project at the corner of Valencia and 14th streets. The project includes 36 homes and three stores and is the first big test case of the new Market Octavia Plan. So, even though CU proponents pitched it as being only a case of seven parking spaces, everyone knew it was about a lot more than that.

At issue was the fact that the Planning Commission had decided to waive the plan’s limitation on construction of parking spaces to one space for every two units.

Opponents of the project argued that decreasing automobile dependency and associated harms, including global warming and traffic congestion, require the political will to stick to progressive policies developed over many years.

But Dufty argued that he did not believe this project is “precedent setting” as he went along with the Newsom administration’s top allies on the Board.

To her credit, Sup. Sophie Maxwell joined the progressive voting block on both these issues, despite having lost the Battle for Board President at the hands of the progressive faction. For a moment, we thought she wasn’t going to: Maxwell initially voted not to override Newsom’s veto. But then she rescinded her vote and voted against Newsom. So double kudos go to Maxwell.

It will be interesting to see if planning staff recommend conditional use permits for the Whole Foods on Market and Dolores and a new proposed condo on Market and Buchanan. If they do, then Dufty, who to his credit gave the project sponsor’s attorney David Silverman a hard time for his divide and conquer-style tactics, may find himself having to eat his “not precedent setting” comment.

And despite Dufty’s very public push back against Silverman, Jason Henderson, Vice President of the Hayes Valley Neighborhood Association, feels the D 8 Supervisor ultimately didn’t listen to his own constituents enough.

“Bevan’s giving too much weight to some very loud people who constantly pester him, Henderson said.

Hang on, Ramsey

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Venerable jazz pianist Ramsey Lewis will be 74 in May, but you’d hardly know it from his packed tour schedule and mounting awards. The Chicago native and 2007 NEA Jazz Master honoree hosts a nationally syndicated radio show, has recorded nearly an album a year since 1956 plus tours with his trio, does regular duets with Dave Brubeck, and moonlights as a member of smooth jazz supergroup Urban Knights. But perhaps Lewis’ greatest accomplishment was bringing jazz and pop together in soulful harmony.

Sample libraries and hip-hop production would be diminished were it not for Lewis’ funky covers ("Dear Prudence," "Soul Man," "People Make the World Go Round," "Slipping into Darkness"). Likewise Lewis, whose been playing since age four, has a sense of history: he studied Bach, Beethoven, Hayden, Duke Ellington, and Art Tatum before forming the Cleffs with Eldee Young on bass and Redd Holt on drums, his first of many trio configurations.

As the Ramsey Lewis Trio he scored hits in the mid-1960s on Chess-Cadet label releases like "Wade in the Water," "The In Crowd," and Motown cover "Hang on Sloopy." Lewis did for the piano what Stevie Wonder did for the harmonica, made the instrument swing. He also managed to evolve with the times, switching to Fender electric piano and writing originals like "Uhuru" and "Bold and Black" on 1969’s Another Voyage (Cadet) produced by studio great Charles Stepney. Sun Goddess (Columbia, 1974), which showcases enduring Lewis collaborator Maurice White of Earth, Wind and Fire on drums and vocals, was rediscovered by DJs decades later and ushered in the early-’90s acid jazz movement.

His most recent recording, 2005’s With One Voice (Narada) includes gospel standard "Oh Happy Day," redone with a house groove, and soulful reggae number "Keep the Spirit." These days bassist Larry Gray and drummer Leon Joyce fill out the trio, and the group makes an extended stop at Yoshi’s SF, a great prelude to the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday and Barack Obama’s inauguration.

In 1967 Columbia Records president Clive J. Davis said: "In the next century or so, we may very well no longer draw distinctions between what is ‘jazz,’ what is ‘classical,’ what is ‘progressive,’ ‘rock,’ or ‘soul.’ It may all just be called music, and let it go at that. For it’s all here, in the music that Ramsey makes." Davis’ hope for an end to genre distinctions may not have come to pass yet, but he was right about Lewis, it is all in him.

RAMSEY LEWIS TRIO

Thurs/15–Fri/16, 8 p.m., Sat/17, 8 and 10 p.m., Sun/18, 7 p.m.; $65

Yoshi’s SF

1330 Fillmore, SF

(415) 655-5600

sf.yoshis.com

Editor’s Notes

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› tredmond@sfbg.com

I guess Mayor Gavin Newsom really wants to cut the budget. He wants to force city employees (and not just the cops) to accept pay cuts. He wants to lay people off and eliminate services. He wants to solve the budget crisis entirely on his terms — and honestly, it baffles me.

Anyone who runs a public or private enterprise has to make tough decisions and tough choices in tough times. I know that. I’ve had to cut spending and lay people off — and I can tell you, it sucked. It didn’t make me feel like a strong leader or a hard-nosed manager, it just made me sad.

In politics, I guess, there’s some advantage to looking like you can stand up to organized labor and the left. Maybe Newsom thinks he can run for governor as the mayor who refused to raise taxes during a budget crisis. Maybe he, like Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, thinks taxes are for girlie men.

But does he really want to preside over the decline of his own signature health care plan? Does he want to be mayor of a city that recovers more slowly from the recession? Does he want to be the environmental leader who cut public transportation funding?

He doesn’t have to do that. There’s another alternative. He can work with the supervisors — and labor, and business, and community activists — and look at ways to bring in some more money. It shouldn’t be that hard a sell, really. The budget gap is huge — Aaron Peskin, who served on the Board of Supervisors for eight years, said before he left office that he’s having a hard time even getting his mind around the monstrosity of the necessary cuts. I’ve been watching local politics for 25 years, and I’ve having a hard time too. We could be looking at eliminating half the discretionary spending in the general fund.

Do people who live and work in this city (including business owners) want to see public health cut by 25 percent? Do they want to see libraries closed, and neighborhood fire stations eliminated, and police stations shut down, and recreation programs that keep kids off the streets eliminated, and the Small Business Assistance Center defunded, and more mentally ill people wandering the streets, and longer waits for more crowded Muni buses? Is this the city we all want to live in?

Or are the wealthier residents and bigger businesses willing to pay just a little bit more each year to keep basic services in place?

If Mayor Newsom, who is still quite popular in town, asked that question, in that fashion, and presented budget cuts that everyone knows are necessary and better oversight and good government programs to let us all know that the money isn’t being wasted, and then promoted a couple of fair and progressive new revenue measures in a June special election, the worst of the bloodbath could be avoided.

I can’t understand why he wants this to be so hard.

The challenges for President Chiu

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EDITORIAL The ascension of Sup. David Chiu to the presidency of the Board of Supervisors gives a relative political newcomer considerable power. It also puts Chiu in position to carry on the legacy of Aaron Peskin and lead the opposition to Mayor Gavin Newsom’s pro-downtown, pro-Pacific Gas and Electric Co. agenda. Chiu, obviously, lacks the experience Peskin brought to the job, so he needs to move carefully at first. But he also needs to show that he’s more than a compromise candidate and that he has the ability to lead the board and promote the progressive agenda.

Let’s remember: Chiu was elected president entirely by the six progressive supervisors. The way the vote went down, five people, including Newsom’s closest allies, stuck together as a solid bloc and repeatedly voted for Sup. Sophie Maxwell. Maxwell had come down to the Guardian office a few days earlier to tell us that she was a solid progressive, but we saw the future of the board playing out when the votes were counted. Maxwell and Sup. Sean Elsbernd, who both have voiced concerns about the prospect of an inexperienced person taking the top job, could have broken with their bloc and voted for Sup. Ross Mirkarimi — that would have put him over the top. But through seven votes, as the progressives moved around trying to find a candidates all six could support, the Newsom Five stuck together. (Of course, if it hadn’t been for Sup. Chris Daly’s ill-conceived antics, Mirkarimi would have been able to get six votes, and we would have had an experienced leader in place).

Although Chiu talks (as he should) about bringing everyone together, he needs to keep in mind from day one that he is now the most visible member of a six-person board majority that can control the agenda and the set the tone for the city — if none of the six starts to drift toward the squishy center.

It’s going to be a rough, brutal year. The mayor has already made clear through his comments that he doesn’t even want to look at new revenue measures; he intends to solve the city’s half-billion-dollar budget crisis with cuts — deep, bloody cuts — alone. Chiu will have to stand up to him, publicly and privately, and make clear that a cuts-only budget isn’t going to fly in San Francisco.

And while Chiu will need some time to develop a leadership style and become familiar with the often-complex workings of the board, he should do a few things right away to show that he’s prepared to take on the difficult tasks ahead:

Support Peskin’s proposal for a special election in June. The proposal to allow the voters to consider raising taxes instead of just cutting is going to need a lot of help and support. The mayor opposes it, and some of his allies may oppose it too. But it’s absolutely crucial that San Francisco refuse to follow the lead of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. It’s crucial that the progressives, while acknowledging that cuts will have to happen, also insist on looking at fair revenue ideas. Chiu needs to take the point on this.

In fact, now that the mayor and his allies on the board have made this a central battleground — and in effect have made this a litmus test for Chiu’s new presidency — it’s even more important that every one of the six progressive supervisors stands up to this challenge.

We’re not sure which of the dozen-odd tax proposals floating around is the right one. But it would be the worst kind of foolishness to take the whole idea off the table.

Put good people on the key committees. The Budget Committee at this point looks good, with Mirkarimi, Sup. John Avalos, and Elsbernd. When that panel expands to five members (and it should, soon) Chiu should make sure that either David Campos or Eric Mar joins the committee, keeping a progressive majority. The Land Use committee will be crucial as the Eastern Neighborhoods plan is implemented; Chiu needs to appoint a progressive chair and majority.

Save LAFCO. The Local Agency Formation Commission is the only board committee that has public power and energy policy as its primary agenda. Budget-cutters (spurred by PG&E, which more than any other company is responsible for the budget crisis) have made LAFCO a target; Chiu needs to make it clear immediately that LAFCO will remain in place, with strong appointments and a chair committed to making community choice aggregation work and pursuing public power as the largest potential new revenue source for the city.

Chiu has promised to work with the mayor, which is fine. But first he needs to show the progressives who elected him that he’s also ready to do battle.

Six aren’t enough

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› news@sfbg.com

The historic Jan. 8 vote electing Sup. David Chiu as president of the Board of Supervisors — rare for its elevation of a freshman to the post and unprecedented for a Chinese American — clearly illustrates the ideological breakdown of the new board.

The six supervisors who claim membership in the progressive movement (Chris Daly, Ross Mirkarimi, David Campos, John Avalos, Eric Mar, and Chiu) gave Chiu the presidency after their efforts to give it to Mirkarimi or Avalos fell short, while the other five supervisors voted for Sup. Sophie Maxwell in each of the seven rounds, refusing to support any of the progressive picks.

But there are limits to what a bare majority of supervisors can do in San Francisco, particularly when the mayor is threatening vetoes and the city is wrestling with a budget deficit of gargantuan proportions. Overriding a mayoral veto or approving some emergency measures requires eight votes.

So the first question is whether Mirkarimi and Daly can come together after their split divided progressives and led to Chiu as a compromise candidate. But the second, more important, question for progressives is whether they can attract swing votes such as Maxwell and Bevan Dufty when the need arises.

The answers to those questions could start coming immediately as supervisors consider proposals to close a looming $575 million budget gap, including the proposal for a special election on revenue measures in June. Mayor Gavin Newsom opposes that election, so the board would have to muster eight votes in the next month to move forward with it.

They might even need more than that. A confidential memo to supervisors and the mayor by the City Attorney’s Office that was obtained by the Guardian sorts out the complex requirements needed to approve new taxes, including the requirement of unanimous board approval to place tax measures that can be passed with a simple majority vote on the ballot this year.

So President Chiu, who pledges to bring his colleagues together, certainly has his work cut out for him.

 

POLITICS AND POLICY

Achieving a unanimous vote on anything significant or controversial seems impossible right now. Mirkarimi is unhappy with Daly for thwarting his presidential ambitions; Maxwell and Dufty are unhappy with progressives for keeping her out of their club; and Chiu must quickly learn his new job during a time of unprecedented turmoil.

Chiu told his colleagues that he was “incredibly humbled” by an election that he didn’t think he’d win, and said that he is “acutely aware that I am new to the institution and the body.” But observers say Chiu’s temperament, intelligence, and connections to both the business community and the progressive movement could serve the city well right now.

“I think Chiu is a great choice. He has the humility that will help him,” outgoing Sup. Jake McGoldrick told the Guardian.

This compromise pick for president was praised by all sides, from the progressive coalition that feted him after the vote at a party at the SoMa club Temple. Rob Black, government affairs director for the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce, told reporters that “David seems to be someone who is very willing to listen and willing to ask questions.”

“We have a progressive supervisor running the board,” Mirkarimi told the Guardian as he walked back to his office following the vote. Or, as Daly told us, “In the end, the progressive coalition stuck together and I’m happy about that.”

Walking back to Room 200 after the vote, Newsom told reporters that Chiu was “an outstanding choice” who represents “a fresh air of progress.” Asked whether he expects to have a better working relationship with Chiu than with outgoing president Aaron Peskin, Newsom replied, “That’s a gross understatement.”

“We’re looking forward to working with the new Board of Supervisors,” Newsom spokesperson Nathan Ballard told the Guardian after the vote. “The mayor has a long relationship with David Chiu. In fact, he was on our short list to be named assessor just a few years ago.”

Yet at the progressive party that night, Chiu sounded like a rock-solid member of that group, promising to help Mirkarimi with police reform, Campos with protecting undocumented city residents, Mar with strengthening city ties to the schools, and Avalos with safeguarding progressive budget priorities.

“I think this is the best outcome we could have,” Mirkarimi told the Guardian shortly after Chiu was elected. “I was the deciding vote that delivered Sup. David Chiu, the first Asian American president of the board. That doesn’t mean that the seasoned experience of Maxwell and myself wasn’t hard to pass by.”

In fact, both Dufty and Maxwell groused about the progressive bloc’s opposition to Maxwell, noting her positions on issues such as public power, affordable housing, and transportation issues. “The people that voted for me did so because they felt I would at least listen to them,” Maxwell told us, expressing frustration at not being accepted “by the board’s progressive clique” which, she noted, “are all males.”

“I think David will be great,” Dufty told the Guardian. “Obviously there was a desire to have someone strongly aligned with the progressive movement. I think it’s a mystery that Sophie isn’t considered part of the progressive movement.”

Progressives are going to have to work at resolving those differences if they are going to play a leadership role in the midyear budget cuts and prevent an expansion of the bloc of five supervisors who stuck with Maxwell and often align with the mayor.

“There has been tension between Ross and myself, but also between Sophie and Ross,” Daly told us. “Sophie is feeling that she might be a progressive, too. And some of the things we do on the board need eight votes. The rift between Ross and I is little. The real question is, when do we get Bevan and Sophie back?”

After fending off a progressive challenger in his reelection bid two years ago, Dufty seemed to move to the left, only to return to Newsom’s centrist faction — which mixes social liberalism with fiscal conservatism — in the last year. He prevented progressives from being able to override a mayoral veto of their decision to cancel $1 million in funding to Newsom’s Community Justice Center. And on Jan. 6, the old board delayed a vote on a mayoral veto of an ordinance that amends the Planning Code to require Conditional Use hearings and permits for any elimination of existing dwelling units through mergers, conversions, or demolitions of residential units, something sought by the tenant groups that are an important part of the progressive coalition.

Those issues, and the thicket that is the budget debate, illustrate what Daly admitted to us last week: “We can’t run this city with six votes.”

 

THE BUDGET MESS

The most pressing problem facing the new board is the budget, which requires $125 million in midyear cuts for the current fiscal year and will be an estimated $575 million out of balance for the fiscal year that begins in June. Chiu’s first move to deal with it — one lauded by progressives — was to name Avalos as budget chair.

“John Avalos has more experience on budget issues than me,” Daly, who chaired the Budget Committee for two years, said of his former board aide. But even Avalos was awestruck by the tsunami of bad budget news hitting the city, telling us, “I was visibly shaken.”

Mirkarimi and Elsbernd, the Budget Committee’s two other current members, also admit they face a daunting task.

“We can’t put a Band-Aid on the problem,” Elsbernd told the board last week. “This is not just about San Francisco now, but about San Francisco 20 years from now. We need to think about the next generation.”

Mirkarimi agrees with Elsbernd, at least in terms of the enormity of the problem.

“We cannot be incrementalist. We can’t dance around the edges,” Mirkarimi told his colleagues, shortly after making the surprise announcement that he’s expecting a child in April with Venezuelan soap opera star Eliana López, who he’s dated since meeting her last year at a Green Party conference in Brazil. Elsbernd and his wife are also expecting their first child.

Progressives strongly argue that such a large budget deficit can’t be closed with spending cuts alone, so one of Peskin’s final acts was to create legislation calling a special election for June 2 and having supervisors hold hearings over the next month to choose from a variety of revenue measures, but Newsom and the business community opposed the move.

“Basically, it’s not fully baked. It will take a citywide coalition (à la Prop. A) to win something like this and the coalition just hasn’t been built yet,” Ballard told the Guardian. Even Mirarimi echoed the sentiment, telling the Guardian, “I’m not opposed to a June election, but you can’t put something on the June ballot that’s half-baked because I doubt we could win in November if we put something half-baked on in June. My preference is that we work harder to create alliances to assure a healthy chance of getting something on the ballot and delivering a victory.”

Yet many progressives and labor leaders say it’s important to bring in new revenue as soon as possible, particularly because the cuts required by the current budget deficit would slash about half the city’s discretionary spending and devastate important initiatives like offering health coverage to all San Franciscans.

“For Healthy San Francisco to survive, the Department of Public Health has to have a minimum level of funding,” said Robert Haaland, a labor representative with the public employee union SEIU Local 1021. “Given the cuts that have been proposed, it’s not going to survive.”

While Peskin was criticized for acting prematurely, the City Attorney’s Office memo indicated that he couldn’t have waited and still allowed supervisors to play the lead role in determining what ended up on the June ballot. The memo was requested by Daly.

“In response to your specific inquiry about maximizing the amount of time a committee could deliberate the underlying measures and ensuring that the Board would have enough time to override a Mayoral veto, the emergency ordinance and the resolution calling for the special election should be introduced today,” the City Attorney’s Office wrote Jan. 6, the day Peskin introduced his revenue package.

Even then, supervisors would need to vote to waive certain election procedures, such as the 30-day hold for proposed ballot measures, and to move expeditiously forward with hearings, selection of the tax measures, and preparation of findings related to the special election and declaration of fiscal emergency.

The City Attorney’s Office wrote that the package needs final approval by Feb. 17. “We recommend that to meet this deadline, the Board adopt the resolution at its January 27 meeting and that the Mayor sign the resolution no earlier than February 2,” they wrote.

But Newsom has indicated that he would veto it, thus requiring eight supervisors to override. “Aaron had the right to do what he did, but in some ways he rushed the discussion, so it’s been a bit rockier than it otherwise might have been,” Dufty told us, noting that he’s still open to supporting a June ballot measure. “There is no way to avoid spending cuts, and we need more revenues and more givebacks from public employees … I think labor is spending a significant amount of time with the mayor, and he’s making a strong effort to work with the board. I’m trying to encourage us all to work together to the maximum extent possible.”

In fact, San Francisco Labor Council director Tim Paulson told the Guardian he couldn’t talk about the tax measures yet because of intense ongoing discussions. Ballard said Newsom might be open to tax measures in November, telling the Guardian, “Ideally we could do it all by streamlining government, reducing spending, etc. But the mayor lives in the real world and so he is open to the possibility of a revenue measure with a broad base of support.”

So, can the new board president help coalesce the broad base of support that he’ll need to avoid cuts that would especially hurt the progressive base of unions, tenants, social service providers, affordable housing activists, and others who believe that government plays an important role in addressing social problems and inequities?

“In light of the global meltdown, national slowdown, local crisis, and largest budget deficit in history, I believe this board understands the importance of unity and working together,” Chiu told his colleagues. “We don’t have time for the politics of personality when we have the highest murder rate in 10 years, when businesses are failing, and the budget deficit grows exponentially.”

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