Is the Sunset Becoming an RV Park? Recognize
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Quentin Kopp Civil Disobedience Columnist Jack Kaye Quentin takes on State Senator Wie- Civil service unions flex their muscles His columns in the Westside Observer ner and the Cow Palace issue ...........3 at City Hall against inequality ...........2 had an uncanny appeal ......................5 Central Council Water War Nears Tipping Point Rental Housing Deceit? West of Twin Peaks Central Council Steve Lawrence keeps an eye on Monette-Shaw’s questions frazzle takes on the issues ..........................3 negotiations with the state ...........4 the Mayor’s yes men ......................6 Northern California Society of Professional Journalists’ 2019 James Madison Freedom of Information Award Volume 32 • Number 4 Celebrating Our 32nd Year www.westsideobserver.com May 2019 Is San Francisco Dying? by John Farrell f you have an hour to spare I highly recommend a YouTube video called I“Seattle is Dying.” It asks the question “What if Seattle is dying and we don’t even know it.” It is about people who are compassionate but no longer feel safe in their City, no longer feel they are being heard. It is about lost souls who wander the streets with no home or reality chasing a drug that, in turn, chases them. It is about the damage they instill on themselves and the fabric of their City. There is a seething, simmering anger that is boiling over into outrage. Property crimes are out of control. This story is about a beautiful jewel that was violated and in current crisis, and of people falling out of love for their home. Sound familiar? Seattle is a place where people who grew up in it don’t Is the Sunset Becoming an RV Park? recognize. Numerous residents, business owners, and by Lou Barberini, CPA city employees talk about their disgust. Seattle police fear irca 2003: As we departed Cha Cha Cha, Jennifer was there with her hand out. Not your retaliation that could cost them their jobs and pensions typical angry, grunge Haight Street panhandler, but more of a Summer of Love flower child. if they speak out. One officer said “Yes, I am frustrated CPretty, but tired. I creased a few singles and tried out a new line, “Can you hook me up with because I am … told NOT to enforce the law.” Another some chiba?” (San Francisco urban language for “heroin.”) Jennifer responded, “Lets go.” Since I was officer noted, “People come here because it’s called Free- off-duty, I had to tap the brakes: “Here’s my number. Hit me up tomorrow. I’m going away and want attle and, if they come here, they will get free food, medi- to re-up first.” cal treatment, mental health treatment, a free tent, free For several days, panhandling and homeless com- Chronicle column, Heather Knight clothes and be free of prosecution for just about every- Jennifer led me to her hookups. Non- munities. For the next several years, wrote: “A reader emailed me a photo thing, and they are right.” Another noted, “…it started descript cars that circled the Panhan- many times my partner and I were the other day of a homeless man with the legislature decriminalizing felonies and dumping dle, dropped off slumped in a Muni bus convicts onto the streets.” Sound familiar? balloons, and then shelter next to an ad A concerned resident said Seattle is a different place were off to service Recently, there has been an for the San Francisco from the one he grew up in and it is really sad. He is so other customers. increasing flotilla of people resid- Giants’ home opener embarrassed that he doesn’t want friends to visit. While it And coincidently, with the slogan ‘It is one of the most beautiful regions in the world but looks for a few days, each ing in RV’s and vans on the west doesn’t get more S.F.’ like sh—. He even started a Facebook site called, “Seattle deliverer picked up side of the city. Living in vehicles These days, it seems it Looks Like Sh--.” It’s not meant to be funny, it’s meant to an unmarked car has become most prevalent on doesn’t get more S.F. be sad. Check it out. trailing them until then stark displays of There is a disconnect between City of Seattle officials an eventual traffic Sunset Boulevard near SF State.” the rich and the very and the frustrations of residents and businesses. It’s not stop was made by a poor as the middle legal to live on the sidewalk but it is allowed. How bad is black and white. able turn requests for money into class gets squeezed out entirely.” the property crime rate in Seattle? It was ranked second Jennifer confirmed my belief heroin purchases and arrests. Homelessness is a complex per capita in our nation in 2017. Only one other City was in the prevalence of heroin in the In her April 7, 2019 San Francisco issue, yet Heather Knight’s column higher, and that was our home, San Francisco. Cont. p. 2 I listen to friends and neighbors complaining about people shooting up on our streets, even shooting each other up. I have called the police numerous times on peo- ple sleeping on our City streets. Once a man was totally Time Is Running Out for out cold and the officer on the phone asked me to go up to him to see if he was still alive. Youth Guidance Center My daughter called me when she came home to her by George Wooding apartment in the Castro and found a disturbed man on Do not close down SF’s Youth Guidance Center (YGC). her stairs. She told a policeman on Market Street about an Francisco Supervisors Hillary Ronen, Sha- him, but he said it was not his jurisdiction. I came over mann Walton, and Matt Haney are drafting leg- and we waited for him to leave. Sislation that would close the YGC by the end of I went to Safeway on Taraval Street and parked in the 2021. It has 150 beds but typically has fewer than 50 upper lot. There was a homeless man in a sleeping bag youths held inside. next to the stairs and elevator. When my wife drives up Santiago Street, she sees the same homeless woman there. I do not want juveniles who com- with you com- mit violent crimes to be placed in pletely that there must be a fully- mandatory detention or at least the I read on Nextdoor that a neighbor’s car was broken into possibility of detention in the interest or a package taken. As I write this a neighbor’s car was halfway houses, nor do I want them informed and thoughtful development to be placed in adult prisons where of alternatives. It’s very easy to simply of public safety. Without a brick-and- stolen last night. You never heard of anything like this on mortar facility in the city and county, our side of town 5 years ago. I can go on. they will learn to become better — or call for tearing something down – it’s I am rooting for our new mayor since she has her hands worse — criminals. much more difficult to do the work we would be forced to send youth full and is trying to figure out who she can trust. We have San Francisco should keep charged with certain crimes an $11 billion dollar budget but still MUNI is a mess, the YGC, and repurpose it out of county. That’s not an streets are congested and continuously being worked on by offering services to non- Although the United ideal outcome preventing and we need affordable housing. Further, the City con- violent youth offenders while States still leads the industrial- recidivism… It is likely to be tinues to dump bond initiatives on our tax payers but it is continuing to incarcerate both more expensive as well as never enough. ized world in the rate at which less effective...” How do we protect our society at the same time show- separated violent juveniles. The relatively small num- we lock up young people, the A change is underway in ing compassion to those sick and struggling? That is the San Francisco’s approach to big question. We cannot ignore or arrest our way out of ber of youths for whom con- youth confinement rate in the finement is justified need dealing with young people this. People are dying and there is something we can do. United States is rapidly declining.” who get in trouble with the Seattle, like San Francisco, struggles with the same facilities that can provide a problems, but an answer may have come from Provi- humane and developmen- law. Although the United dence, Rhode Island. It is called the “Medication Assisted tally-appropriate setting in which of examining the issue from all sides, States still leads the industri- Treatment (MAT)” program. First thing they do is enforce their delinquent behaviors can be determining what is in the best inter- alized world in the rate at which we their laws. Drug dealers and people who steal and commit treated effectively. est of both the youth in custody as well lock up young people, the youth con- finement rate in the United States is crimes to get their drugs end up in a correction facility. Margaret Lemus, a concerned as the best interest of true public safety Every day at the facility they line up to get their medi- rapidly declining. Miraloma Park resident, received improvements, and then coming up cine. There are three opioid blockers (Methadone, Subox- In every year for which data are this response from Supervisor Nor- with a concrete plan of action to exe- one and Vivitrol) that are FDA approved and work to get available, the overwhelming majority man Yee’s Legislative Aide Ivy Lee cute an alternative.” people off heroin and save lives.