It's Rat Season
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n o . 6 2 $1.4 billion plan PUBLISHED CENTRAL CITY BY THE SAN FRANCISCO for Van Ness STUDY CENTER NOVEMBER hospital complex 2006 Cal Pacific first to use city’s health 33 impact report MILLIONTH MEAL MAN BY M ARJORIE B EGGS St. Anthony SAN FRANCISCO ALPH Marchese was upbeat as he told the October Tender- serves up R loin Futures Collaborative about California Pacific Medical a milestone Center’s $1.45 billion plan for a new ‘WORST’ INFESTATION hospital at the site of the Cathedral PAGE 3 Hill Hotel, formerly the Jack Tar. His Marchese Co. is the consulting real estate developer. But he didn’t say anything about organized opposition to the plan, brewing since early last year among Cathedral Hill neighbors, or about all the legal and policy hoops CMPC has yet to negotiate — from amend- ments to height limitations to partic- ipation in the city’s first-ever use of a Healthcare Impact Report (HIR). CPMC, Marchese explained, wants to raze the 10-story hotel, which fills the square block bound- ed by Van Ness, Geary, Franklin and Post, and build a 20-story, 490- to 650-bed hospital that would become ALMOST the primary acute care and inpatient treatment facility for the four-hospi- LIKE A tal California Pacific system. And directly across Van Ness it WOMAN plans to demolish five two- and three-story build- ‘My Glamourous ings, on properties it’s already pur- Life as a “(The HIR) isn’t chased, and erect a P HOTO BY L ENNY L IMJOCO nine-story medical Broadway Tenderloin Playground Director Kay Rodrigues shows the garbage door’s steel plate and on anyone’s office. black box trap that are used to fight the rat infestation. The hospital Hostess’ desk yet. … No and office build- one knows how ing, with a total PAGE 4 1.9 million square it will work.” feet, would be connected by a Eileen Shields It’s rat season tunnel under Van DPH INFORMATION Ness. A thousand OFFICER underground park- Berrios notified Rec and Park headquar- ing spaces are part FAMED BUT Tenderloin parks, ters and its pest control officers came out, of the plan. set traps and caught two. But the problem, “CPMC is the largest health DECREPIT the worst infestation in the park’s 11-year provider in San Francisco,” playground staff history, he said, isn’t over. Marchese said. “It has 1,500 physi- 6TH ST. Two blocks away, Boeddeker Park cians, 47,000 ER visits, 5,904 births, shocked at numbers Director Al Wimberly announced at the Oct. 415,643 outpatient cases and 19,000 HOTEL 12 Friends of Boeddeker Park meeting that ambulatory surgery cases.” he had found five dead black rats in traps It operates four hospitals here — BY T OM C ARTER set inside the clubhouse. in Pacific Heights, Presidio Heights, Redevelopment Rec and Park had set the large spring- Duboce Triangle and the Mission — operated traps in the corners and a few Agency HEN Rec and Park custodian but all, he added, are out of date Hugo Berrios returned to black box traps with poison outside. The and must be seismically upgraded to negotiating Tenderloin Children’s Play- very next day he had a record catch. In his meet state mandates. ground from a three-week five years at the park, there have never been ® CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 for Hugo vacation in August he was this many rats, he said. shockedW to discover four large rats jumping “We had a few in January and I spent my own money to buy traps,” Wimberly Illustration of how CPMC’s PAGE 6 around the garbage cans in the back. Among the 100 children who visit the playground said. “But this is the worst I’ve seen it.” proposed hospital would sit on The Extra reported the park’s rat prob- the site, courtesy of Cathedral Hill daily, some had seen rats in the grass outside or traveling along the top of the fence. lem in October, but the story was based on Neighborhood Association. sightings outside the building by next-door residents at Presentation Senior Community. Rats that journeyed across the Presentation patio for a drink from the fountain were thought to be nesting in the grass and weeds near the park’s locked gate on Ellis Street, and fed by food tossed over the fence from sidewalk encampments. There’s that, plus it’s rat season. Fall is a time that appeals to the roof rat that lives above ground and the sewer rat that cavorts below it. Both types, going where their hunger takes them, are in abundance in San Francisco. “Roof rats are more visible in autumn,” said Helen Zverina, environmentalist with the Department of Public Health. “They are fattening up for winter with fruits and ® CONTINUED ON PAGE 4 FUTURES COLLABORATIVE $1.4 billion complex evokes GOOD ‘complete outrage’ from neighbors ® CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 of the residential hotel ordinance Morgan, the group’s vice presi- (one of the buildings to be dent. for...for... “Senate Bill 1953 from 1994 demolished is a six-unit SRO); “A year ago, Ralph Marchese NEWS and this year’s SB 1661 are at the and an encroachment permit presented the CPMC plan to four GREENING THE TL St. Francis Memorial Hospi- heart of CPMC’s plans,” agreement with Caltrans and homeowner groups. It helped us tal wants more trees in its neighborhood and the Board of Supes approval for the coordinate our feelings about North of Market/Tenderloin Community Benefit Marchese said. The legislation gives acute care hospitals in tunnel under Van Ness. the proposal and that’s when we District does, too. In a match made in heaven, the Worse, perhaps, for CPMC, is formed our association,” Morgan hospital gave Friends of the Urban Forest a dona- California until 2013 to make their buildings safe in earth- that it will be the test case for a told The Extra. tion and asked that money go to the CBD to plant city-mandated Healthcare Im- She says the group repre- up to 40 new trees. “The hospital has always quakes and other natural disas- ters. “The work to be done is so pact Report. sents 45,000 residents in a 36- been very supportive of us,” said CBD Manager square-block area, Polk to Elaine Zamora. “They also want to be communi- complex that [to comply], CPMC will have to off-load some serv- ROOTS OF IMPACT Fillmore and Eddy to ty participants and help with the planting, sched- In 2004, the Board of Sacramento. Morgan has lived in uled for Dec. 9.” There’s no charge for property ices from the other campuses to the new Cathedral Hill campus.” Supervisors passed an amend- a high-rise on Cathedral Hill for owners who want to green their sidewalks with a ment to the city’s Administrative 12 years. new tree; the hospital donation pays for the tree, CPMC acquired the option to buy the hotel site in 2003, select- Code that requires “larger non- “We started out being sur- concrete breaking, stakes and netting. FUF will government health care pro- prised by the mass of the pro- provide the expertise and help organize volun- ing it, he said, because it’s on major transit corridors and is viders” that want to “add or posed buildings, and our goal teers. “The owners are ultimately responsible for replace more than 200 hospital was to get them more in scale maintenance and liability of their tree,” Zamora near enough to its other hospital complexes to allow movement beds” to supply the Department with the city’s plans for the Van said, “but the CBD is debating whether it can of Public Health with extensive Ness corridor,” she said. “Then, help the owners and take on the liability in per- of staff and patients between them. data. DPH then analyzes how as we got more familiar with petuity for the trees.” There’s a tree-planting plan- the proposal affects “availability” health care issues citywide, it ning meeting Nov. 8, 5 p.m., at 118 Jones. To sign QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS and “accessibility” of services in seems that CPMC needs a real up for a tree, contact Zamora at 440-7570 x21 or the neighborhoods slated for the campus elsewhere — not here in e-mail her, [email protected]. “We also believe that it can be an economic stimulator to new construction, and prepares the middle of a residential area this area,” Marchese added. an HIR. “Larger” is defined as a and a traffic corridor.” GREEN IS BEAUTIFUL The mayor’s Neighbor- hospital or part of a hospital sys- The group’s most recent hood Beautification Fund has morphed into the Employees, patients and hospital visitors always need restaurants tem that provides more than 40% action was to ask the Board of Community Challenge Grant Program, but the of the city’s nongovernmental Supervisors to look at acute care aim’s the same: Get residents and businesses and sometimes overnight accom- modations, plus many other hospital beds. That’s tailor-made planning for the city. “How involved in greening public spaces, such as medi- for health care giant CMPC. many beds are really needed in ans, sidewalks and community gardens, and use services. Chaplain Earl Rogers of the Health Department Pubic In- the city and where,” she said. the projects to get neighborhoods working togeth- formation Officer Eileen Shields “We think the city is overbed- er on common issues. Groups can apply for San Francisco Rescue Mission asked if CPMC has a timeline.