Government

Bernal Neighbor Named Director of City’s New Homelessness Office

/ Todd_Lappin / 12 Comments

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While Bernal residents keep an eye on efforts to address the homeless encampment underneath the Cesar Chavez/101 interchange, one Bernal Heights neighbor will soon be paying particularly close attention: Yesterday, neighbor Jeff Kositsky of Precitaville was introduced as the first director of the City’s new Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing.

Heather Knight from the San Francisco Chronicle covered Neighbor Jeff’s appointment:

San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee’s plan for a new department of homelessness — an idea bandied about at City Hall for at least 14 years — is taking shape, with a budget of at least $160 million, nearly 200 workers and a new director, who was announced Wednesday.

He’s Jeff Kositsky, a well-known figure in the city’s homeless service system. Since 2013, he has worked as executive director of Hamilton Family Center, which provides emergency shelter and other services to homeless families. He led the Community Housing Partnership, which manages housing for 1,300 formerly homeless adults, for nine years before that.

“The city has all of these amazing programs that are really world-class,” Kositsky said. “To be able to bring all of those under the same department under a unified strategy to help really amplify Mayor Lee’s vision for addressing homelessness in San Francisco is an honor and an amazing opportunity.”

In his new role, Neighbor Jeff will oversee a department with 110 employees and an annual budget of more than $160 million. His top priorities in the big new job will include opening more Navigation Centers to provide interim shelter for the homeless and deploying a new information system to improve management and coordination of homeless cases and services. The new Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing will launch on July 1.

PHOTO: Neighbor Jeff Kositsky photographed by Connor Radnovich for The San Francisco Chronicle

City Dismantles Cesar Chavez Street Homeless Encampment

/ Todd_Lappin / 32 Comments

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Yesterday, workers from the San Francisco Department of Public Works removed the homeless encampment along Cesar Chavez Street under the US101 freeway. The camp had reportedly become the largest in the city.

The San Francisco Chronicle was there:

Street cleaners, police and outreach counselors descended upon the camp about 6 a.m. and spent the morning methodically bagging up trash and flopping tents onto flatbed trucks. The counselors’ goal was to get the campers into homeless shelters or other poverty services, but the cleaners’ goal was purely to clear out what has become a smelly, messy eyesore to passersby and neighbors in recent weeks.

Camps have dotted the maze of trails, bushes, freeway-ramp ledges and dirt lots at that part of Cesar Chavez for decades. But ever since a giant encampment along Division Street was finally swept out in March the Cesar Chavez population has mushroomed into the largest street settlement in the city.  […]

“Thirty years ago you saw older people and vets with bad luck,” David Johnwell, foreman of the hotspot cleanup crew for the Department of Public Works, said as he directed the dismantlement operation under Highway 101. “Now you see a lot more younger people, women and dogs and needles.

“It’s not for us to say where they should sleep… They’ll move back in, but we did our job. Nobody has the answer. But at least when we leave here it’ll smell good.”

He said officials have been contemplating erecting fencing to keep campers out, but nothing was imminent. Fencing successfully reduced camps at a similarly longtime homeless haunt near the Caltrain station at Interstate 280 after tents were swept away from there in 2013. At that time, it was the biggest camp in the city.

That was yesterday. As of this morning, some of the tents have already been re-established.

PHOTO: Encampment under US101, February 24, 2016 by Telstar Logistics

Ballot Measure Would Make City Responsible for Public Tree Care

/ Todd_Lappin / 22 Comments

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A few months ago, Bernalwood told you the sad tale of Neighbor Laura from Lundys Lane, a schoolteacher who had just been told she had to foot the bill to pay for the astronomical cost of maintaining a tree that sits on City property next to her house.

That’s standard procedure under the Tree Maintenance Transfer Plan, which puts San Francisco homeowners on the hook to pay for required maintenance on the tens of thousands of streetside trees that used to be maintained by the City.

Now  San Francisco Chronicle reports that D8 Supervisor Scott Wiener plans to introduce a ballot measure that would eliminate costly tree-care bills for homeowners by making the City responsible for sidewalk trees again. The Chronicle says:

It’s the same old story: too many street trees and not enough money to take care of them all.

The city couldn’t afford the maintenance and upkeep for its 105,000 trees, so in 2011 it began transferring ownership to homeowners. Residents often didn’t have the cash for costly pruning and associated sidewalk repairs either. But a new piece of legislation could soon bring relief to those neighbors and infuse about $18 million into the city’s tree maintenance budget.

At Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting, Supervisor Scott Wiener will introduce a November ballot measure that would mandate that the city take back ownership, maintenance and liability of all street trees. It would be funded by a combination of a progressive parcel tax — one that increases with the property’s size — and an $8 million annual budget set-aside, the average of what has been spent on urban forestry over the past 10 years.

“This has been a festering problem for decades,” Wiener said. “Trees are getting dumped on adjacent property owners who don’t want them, and that’s an unfair burden. For most property owners, they are going to save money. They will pay a $30 or $40 tax, and they will no longer have to hire an arborist or a contractor or insurance.”

All properties must pay the property tax. Properties with less than 25 feet of street frontage would pay $29.50, while those between 25 to 150 feet would pay $1.42 per frontage foot, and properties with more than 150 feet would pay $2 per frontage foot. The average resident or business would pay about $35 annually.

PHOTO: The tree assigned to Neighbor Laura, by Neighbor Laura

Undo: Two-Lane San Jose Ave. Freeway Exit Will Be Restored

/ Todd_Lappin / 19 Comments

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Well, the great San Jose Avenue Traffic Calming Experiment has officially been declared an abject failure. The effort to slow traffic along San Jose Avenue by reducing the exit to San Jose Avenue from I-280 northbound from two lanes to one instead succeeded mainly in causing epic traffic backups along I-280 and  more motor vehicle accidents. Oopsie!

In addition, the scheme created additional sadness and delay in South Bernal and St. Mary’s, so now the exit will return to its original two-lane configuration. The Glen Park Association reports:

The 280 freeway offramp to San Jose Avenue will return to a two-lane configuration, owing to a high number of accidents following an experiment to slow traffic by narrowing it.

Seven accidents were recorded on the offramp between June and November, 2015, after engineers reconfigured the two exit lanes to merge into one lane just before the Monterey Street underpass. The offramp reconfiguration was the second phase of the Northbound San Jose Avenue & I-280 Off-Ramp Road Diet Pilot Project, which was intended to slow traffic on San Jose Avenue south of Randall.

In Phase I of that project, San Jose Avenue itself was reduced from three lanes to two. When that measure did not slow traffic, Phase II was implemented, and the offramp was reduced from two lanes to two lanes merging to one.

Since Phase II also failed to reduce speeds and reduce traffic volumes but did increase the number of accidents, Caltrans has decided to return the offramp to its original state. The road is scheduled to be re-paved in May, then re-striped.

If the goal is to reduce speeds along San Jose Avenue, some armchair traffic engineers in Bernal-Glen have a few good ideas about how to accomplish that.

Coleridge Mini-Park Neighbors Exasperated by City Inaction on Safety Lighting

/ Todd_Lappin / 26 Comments

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For a year and a half, a group of neighbors who live near the Coleridge Mini-Park have been in contact with city officials and representatives from Supervisor Campos’s office to upgrade the street lighting in the area and make it safer at night. So far, however there has been a lot of talk, but little action. Neighbor Valerie summarizes what’s happened — and not happened — so far:

We wanted to tell you about the efforts that have been made by neighbors here to get better lighting in the Coleridge Mini Park. Our effort has involved multiple calls to 311, SFPD, and Carolyn at Supervisor Campos’ office to follow up.

The initial meeting with representatives from Supervisor Campos’s office was October(ish) of 2014. By early February 2015, they essentially gave us the classic City response of “we hear you, but we can’t do anything about it.” We were basically told that they couldn’t help us because there were too many obstacles and bureaucratic hurdles to overcome, but we could either purchase solar lights or find someone to donate them and only at that point, would they try to help — and by help, they meant figure out IF said lights could actually be installed. All of the work and effort to increase the lighting was kicked to us with no confirmation that it would actually lead to a change. The only thing they keep offering us is to cut back the trees in the park, which we’ve told them multiple times are NOT the problem.

Unfortunately, the only time we’ve heard any follow up to this is after the assault occurred on the Esmeralda Stairway last January. Since that time, Carolyn [Goossen, a legislative aide in Sup. Campos’s office] has reached out again, with a promise that “this was a good season to request grant money.”

However, if Campos and his office have a plan to secure said funds, we haven’t heard about it. The lights on the stairway were replaced with LED bulbs which are *slightly* better, but that doesn’t change the issue IN the park. We are constantly calling SFPD to come out and patrol and/or deal with the drug dealers, meth users, parties, etc. There was another arrest in front of the park on March 14.

We, and our neighbors, have done everything we can do to help improve the safety in this area, including adding additional lights to private homes and installing cameras which did help to catch the guy who assaulted our neighbor at knife-point.

Enough is enough though. I don’t think it’s our responsibility to seek out private funding to pay for lighting in a City maintained park. We, and most of our neighbors, are very frustrated by the lack of response from our Supervisor’s office and as I’ve said previously, it’s insulting that I’m good enough to ask for a vote during election season but he can’t move the needle on a persistent public safety issue.

PHOTO: Police arresting a suspect near the Coleridge Mini-Park on March 14, 2016. Photo by Neighbor Valerie

Jury Decides Excessive Force Not Used Against Alex Nieto on Bernal Hill

/ Todd_Lappin / 10 Comments

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After eight hours of deliberation, the jury in the  wrongful death lawsuit filed on behalf of Bernal neighbor Alex Nieto decided yesterday that the San Francisco Police officers involved in the March 2014 incident were justified when they shot Nieto on Bernal Hill.

From the San Francisco Chronicle:

Four San Francisco police officers did not use excessive force in 2014 when they shot and killed a man who allegedly pointed a stun gun at them that they mistook for a pistol, a federal jury found Thursday in a lawsuit filed by the man’s family.

The eight-member jury decided that the officers had not violated the constitutional rights of Alejandro “Alex” Nieto, a 27-year-old City College of San Francisco student and security guard, when they fired multiple shots at him in Bernal Heights Park.

Officers Richard Schiff, Nathan Chew and Roger Morse and Lt. Jason Sawyer fired at least 48 shots after they said Nieto pointed what they believed was a handgun at them, but which later turned out to be a Taser stun gun.

The legal team representing the Nieto family relied heavily upon testimony from their star witness, Antonio Theodore, to undermine the narrative provided by the officers involved in the incident. But in the end, Theodore’s testimony was itself undermined by inconsistencies and concerns about his reliability, as MissionLocal explained:

Much of the plaintiff’s case rested on the testimony of one man, Antonio Theodore, who said he saw Nieto with his hands in his pockets during the shooting. He was the only known non-police eyewitness to the shooting, and also testified that the shooting occurred dozens of yards from where police testimony — and physical evidence — indicates it did.

Theodore’s testimony was corroborated by the physical evidence, Pointer said. The safety on Nieto’s taser was on in photographs after the shooting — which would have prevented it from firing — and a bone fragment was found in Nieto’s jacket pocket.

All of that, [paintiff’s attorney Adante] Pointer argued, backed up Theodore’s claim that officers fired on a man with his hands in his pockets and never drew his taser.

“Alex Nieto was just another notch on the SFPD’s belt,” Pointer said on Thursday.

But under cross-examination from the defense, Theodore admitted that he is an alcoholic with trouble recalling specific details and that he has a mild astigmatism.

Still, even if the trial had the ultimate effect of reinforcing the official narrative of what happened on Bernal Hill during the evening of March 21, 2014, it also highlighted the magnitude of the Nieto family’s loss. Examiner reporter Jonah Owen Lamb described some of that :

Friends of Nieto as well as his family lawyers called the verdict one more example of the impunity police have when they use violence against people of color.

“SFPD can shoot 59 bullets and get away with it,” said Oscar Salinas, one of a handful of angry Nieto supporters outside the courthouse Thursday.

Adante Pointer, who led the team of lawyers for the Nieto family, said in a comment to the San Francisco Examiner that this is a “sad day for the Nietos, [and a] worse day for San Francisco.”

After the verdict he said that this is just one of several cases in which the San Francisco police have allegedly used excessive force.

“This is not the only case I think they have killed someone unlawfully,” he said. “SFPD is on the map.”

Ely Flores, a friend of Nieto, said he was angry, nervous and sad when he heard the verdict. But he said the trial was also a kind of vindication. Telling his late friend’s story in court was a victory in itself. Now, he said, it’s up to the public to decide on whether it was right or not.

In a blog post called “A Letter to Privileged People” published in the early hours of this morning, activist Ben Bac Sierra captured the sentiment of Nieto’s surviving family and friends:

The jury decided against Alex Nieto and for the San Francisco Police Officers.

We, the people, did not lose.

Education lost: your fairy tale books about the way intelligence works were proven to be a farce. We argued better than you, with stronger evidence and more compelling logic. Does the stupidity of the verdict answer to you why we refuse to value your schools and teachers and puppet administrators?

We, the people, did not lose.

Your justice system lost: your sham is simply a tool to make-believe everything is fair and just and that we should accept your verdict like good players in a fixed game, where the odds are totally stacked against us.

We, the people, did not lose.

Your morality lost: you, with your white smile and perfect teeth, you were proven to be cowards who could not stand up for the right principle, for a real human being who was unlawfully killed. You feared going back to your villas in Clayton and Danville and telling your friends and family that you voted for a brown person and not the white, clean-cut poster officers.

We, the people, did not lose.

Your United States of America Constitution lost. It lost. You lost. Your lie of equality and freedom lost.

And it is only your naked conscience now that remains, your own personal empty humanity, stripped of predilections, fantasies, and superior justifications. Now, standing there exposed in your own soul, how will you respond?

If you are offended, it is not my fault. You made up the rules.

If you are challenged, it is your chance to do right and spread the news. Fight your father, your uncle, your sister, your privileged community.

We, the people, did not lose, for we continue with the truth, la pura neta: not forward, but upward, we march, we fly.

 

Thursday: City Hall Hearing to Review PG&E Safety in Bernal

/ Todd_Lappin / 5 Comments

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There have been several electrical transformer explosions in Bernal Heights recently, and PG&E’s equipment has been responsible for the accidents.

In 2013, a transformer exploded on Coleridge. Last September, another transformer exploded on Heyman Avenue, leaving two people with serious injuries. Throw in a disheartening series of blackouts, and confidence in PG&E’s Bernal Heights infrastructure is at a low ebb.

On Thursday afternoon, Dec 3, 2015 , District 9 Supervisor David Campos will hold a hearing in City Hall to investigate the safety of PG&E’s systems. His legislative aide, Sheila Chung Hagen, tells Bernalwood:

In response to the September PG&E transformer explosion in Bernal Heights that injured two people, Supervisor Campos called for a public hearing to understand what happened in Bernal Heights and what is happening across the city with PG&E’s transformers. Through the hearing, we want to learn what happened, and what safety measures will be put in place to ensure no harm comes to the public again.

What: A hearing on measures to ensure public safety around Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) Company Transformers citywide
Date: Thursday, December 3, 2015
Time: 2:00pm
Location: Public Safety and Neighborhood Services Committee (Room 250, City Hall
Agenda: Here (See Item 2)

PHOTOS: The SFFD responds to the scene of a Dec. 8, 2013 PG&E transformer explosion on Bocana that left a PG&E employee badly burned. Photos courtesy of a Bernal Heights neighbor.

City Outsources Lundys Landing Tree Problem to Irate Bernal Neighbor

/ Todd_Lappin / 41 Comments

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This year, San Francisco’s Department of Public Works has been pursuing a euphemistically-named Tree Maintenance Transfer Plan that makes San Francisco homeowners responsible for tens of thousands of streetside trees that were, until recently, maintained by the city.

DPW says the crux of the plan is to “standardize maintenance responsibility such that, in general, fronting property owners will be responsible for the maintenance of street trees in the public right of way.” In plainspeak, DPW is basically outsourcing its tree problem to taxpayers, under force of law.

That’s how Neighbor Laura Gold of Lundys Lane, a schoolteacher at Buena Vista Horace Mann, ended up getting hit with a massive tree-maintenance bill recently.  Neighbor Laura tells Bernalwood:

We are fighting the city’s unfair assignment of tree care to the neighbors on Lundy’s Landing.

We all want a green city with an appropriate canopy. That is one of the many reasons we promptly pay our city taxes and support new ones when they are designed to beautify or improve our city. However, this shifting of responsibilities to citizens puts an unfair burden on already strained wallets. It also makes public spaces unsafe as homeowners scrape to come up with piecemeal solutions for city streets, easements and open spaces. Our budget is already strained by having to pay for the costs of replacing the sidewalk in front of our house and by caring for the street tree near our front door. We, in no way, can afford to take on the city’s responsibility nor its liability for a large shared public area that falls between our house and several of our neighbors.

I am a public school teacher in the Mission. I work 10-12 hour days. I make less than $3800 a month; my husband and I have put thousands of dollars of our own money and countless hours of our free time into providing materials (books, school supplies, snacks) for my classroom, since despite the fact that I work with kids whose families lack the basics to survive in this city, San Francisco has decided that it doesn’t want to take responsibility for them.

Now, it seems like city government has also abdicated its responsibility to the homeowners. A year ago, it was reported that due to high tax revenues, San Francisco was running a budget surplus of $22 million dollars — where is the money in this city going? It’s not helping the kids, and it’s not providing basic services to homeowners that other cities take for granted. Is it to further subsidize Google buses at the expense of the neighborhoods? I don’t teach math, but I know when things don’t add up.

Here is what my husband and I have done so far:

1) We have emailed and called Director Mohammed Nuru of DPW and requested a meeting and had no reply or return of our calls. Instead we have received yet another computer generated letter saying the trees are our problem. (see email below and feel free to quote as needed),

2) We have also contacted Supervisor Campos’s office, and while we have had responses, we have no evidence that anything is in the works, and the clock is ticking. (we were informed in a letter dated 10/30 we had 30 days to deal with the issue), and finally we have contacted people at the SF Chronicle, and are hoping they, too, can raise awareness about the issue.

Apparently both Supervisors Avalos and Weiner are taking up the cause,  The issue may end up on the ballot next year.

At what point does city government stop existing to benefit the citizens, and instead exist to provide a steady source of income for a few powerful people? What does that make the rest of us who thought we were participating in the San Francisco community, not working for San Francisco, Inc.?

This is the letter I sent to Director Nuru:

From: lauragold
To: “Mohammed Nuru”
Cc: “David Campos”
Sent: Sunday, November 8, 2015 2:14:40 PM
Subject: Trees on Lundy’s Landing Public Space

Dear Director Nuru –

I am writing to request an immediate meeting with you at Lundy’s Landing (DPW property at Lundy’s Lane and Esmeralda) with regard to our ongoing request for the city to maintain its trees on its land, and the patently false posting of signs designating that the owners have “requested to remove” the trees in 30 days from city land.

As I have indicated in my 311 request, we are asking the City of San Francisco to honor their responsibilities. As I indicated in my 311 response:

1) This is not our property. It is the City of San Francisco’s property. It is listed as a street and therefore the City of San Francisco’s obligation.
2) We did not plant these trees, put in stairs, etc. It belongs to the city.
3) We pay taxes for the care of public space. This is public space and therefore not our responsibility as homeowners.
4) Finally, and perhaps most insultingly, the city is asking us to request and pay for a permit to do work on THEIR land. We do not plan to request this permit.

I am also a city employee. A public school teacher that can barely afford to live here and pay taxes. I cannot afford to take on the city’s multi thousand dollar obligation.

I look forward to hearing from your office in the next 48 hours in order to arrange a meeting.

Yours,

Laura Belfiglio Gold
Buena Vista Horace Mann K-8
Teacher, 7th grade, National Board Certified Teacher

PHOTO: The tree assigned to Neighbor Laura, by Neighbor Laura

Why Mayor Lee’s Pre-Election Tour of Holly Courts Still Matters

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A few days before the recent election, Mayor Lee toured Holly Courts, the public housing located just west of Holly Park. (Historical Fun Facts: Holly Courts was San Francisco’s very first public housing project, and it was designed by Arthur Brown Jr., the same architect who created City Hall and Coit Tower.)

At the time, the mayor came to Holly Courts to build support for Prop A, the $310 million affordable housing bond that ultimately passed by a comfortable margin. Yet now that Prop A was approved, Joshua Arce, a Mission-based civil rights attorney who works with the Holly Courts Resident Board, tells Bernalwood why the mayor’s pre-election visit matters even more:

Days before last week’s election, Mayor Ed Lee made a surprise visit to Bernal’s Holly Courts public housing community to help build support for an increased investment in affordable housing across all San Francisco neighborhoods.

Lee came to tour one of the City’s oldest, but most resilient, public housing sites alongside Holly Courts Resident Board President Deborah Gibson and me. (I serve as pro bono counsel for the Holly Courts Board.)

Gibson and Holly Courts residents Gail Love and Herman Travis used the opportunity to show the Mayor several housing units and outdoor gathering areas in need of repair, and to discuss concerns that other residents have shared with them. In return the Mayor expressed his desire to work more closely with residents of Holly Courts and other public housing communities as the City applies federal funding to make much needed repairs at properties formerly managed by the Housing Authority.

Mayor Lee grew up in public housing in Seattle and decided to make the stop as part of a final push to build support for the Prop. A Housing Bond led by public housing resident-volunteers from the A. Philip Randolph Institute.

Mayor Lee thanked President Gibson at the end of the hour-long tour and asked the residents to stay in communication as his office works through the lists of Holly Courts concerns that were raised. With the bond approved by an overwhelming number of San Franciscans, the Mayor’s Office now has additional resources to help make good on these commitments, and the residents themselves are highly engaged in the process of holding the City accountable.

PHOTOS: Courtesy of Larry Wong

Citizens! It’s Election Day! Get Thee to a Polling Place!

/ Todd_Lappin / 15 Comments

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Citizens of Bernalwood! Today is Election Day, 2015! Don’t forget to vote. If you’re a registered voter, here’s some last-minute guidance from the San Francisco Department of Elections:

All San Francisco polling places citywide are open for voters from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.

The Department urges San Franciscans to confirm the locations of their polling places at sfelections.org/pollsite or by calling (415) 554-4375 before they go to vote.

Voters may also vote at the City Hall Voting Center. Located on the ground floor of City Hall, the Voting Center is open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.

Vote-by-mail voters may drop their ballots off from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. at any polling place in San Francisco, at the Department’s Ballot Drop-off Stations outside two City Hall entrances–the main entrance at Dr. Carlton B. Goodlett Place (Polk Street) and the Grove Street entrance– or at the Department’s office.

Ballots returned by mail must be postmarked with today’s date and received by the Department of Elections no later than Friday, November 6. Anyone uncertain about whether his or her mailed ballot would reach the Department in time to be counted is encouraged to instead bring the ballot to any San Francisco polling place, the City Hall Voting Center, or the Department’s Ballot Drop-Off Stations before 8 p.m.

Still on the fence about how to vote? The Bernalwood Slate Card looks at the 2015 ballot from a YIMBY/urbanist point-of-view, and it’s been getting a lot of traffic lately. Otherwise, our friends at Hoodline have put together a rather spiffy interactive reference guide to all the other election guides around town, so you can browse, compare, and contrast. Viva democracy!

PHOTO: Election Day on Precita Avenue, 2011 by Telstar Logistics

Tuesday: The SFPD Ingleside Community Meeting Comes to Bernal Heights

/ Todd_Lappin / 2 Comments

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Each month, Capt. Joseph McFadden from SFPD’s Ingleside Station holds a community meeting to give precinct residents the chance to ask questions about crime and public safety in our neighborhood. The meetings are very useful, but they’re not always convenient, because they usually happen at Ingleside Station in Balboa Park.

This month, instead of going to see Capt. McFadden, Capt. McFadden will come see us. Tomorrow night, Tuesday, Oct. 20, the SFPD’s Ingleside Community Meeting will come to the Bernal Heights Neighborhood Center on Cortland. If there’s a Bernal Heights crime issue that’s got you on edge, this is an excellent opportunity to talk about it with our local top cop.

Neighbor Sarah, Bernalwood’s ad hoc liaison to SFPD Ingleside, tells us:

Meet Captain McFadden at the Bernal Heights Neighborhood Center on Tues., Oct. 20, at 7pm

The monthly Ingleside Police Station community meeting for October will be held at the Bernal Heights Neighborhood Center, 515 Cortland Ave. This is a great opportunity to meet Captain McFadden in person, ask questions, and share any concerns you have about safety in the neighborhood. Captain McFadden has been taking the community meetings out into the neighborhoods in the district so that more people can attend.

Community Boards will also be presenting at the meeting. Founded in 1976, Community Boards is the oldest public conflict resolution/mediation center in the US. Community Boards volunteer mediators can help you navigate problems with neighbors, landlords, roommates, family, vendors, etc. More info is available here.

And here’s the official annoucement:

PHOTO: Capt. McFadden, by Telstar Logistics

Don’t Panic, But Two Trees Were Removed from Bernal Hill Yesterday

/ Todd_Lappin / 24 Comments

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Yesterday Bernalwood received an alarming news flash via our Twitter red phone: A work crew was hard at work on the top of Bernal Hill near Sutrito Tower,  chopping down some of the trees.

WHAT???!!!

We dispatched the Bernalwood Action News Satellite Uplink Miata to rush to the scene. When we arrived, the work crew was already gone, but two freshly cut stumps were all that remained of the former trees.

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Sadness! Confusion! Anxiety!

Bernal Hill is public parkland, so Bernalwood reached out to San Francisco Rec and Park see if they could explain what the f*&^$#*ck had just happened. Connie Chan, Rec and Park’s Deputy Director of Public Affairs, responded with this statement:

As we have already mentioned earlier in September, the Department has been in the construction planning process to renovate and improve the Bernal Heights Trails. In the meantime, we are working with a contractor to complete abatement work for a few trees that were assessed as potential hazards.

Two dead trees near the top of the hill are expected to be removed (their branches were already removed by our staff to minimize hazardous conditions), and one Evergreen Ash tree on the west slope of the hill is planned to be pruned to remove or reduce the length of the stem with decay.

As you can see on the map shown via the web link, the red circles are the the two removals, and the tree still to be pruned is the yellow circle.

Bernal_Tree Work map.pdf

Okay, that’s good to know. Rec and Park didn’t exactly do a great job of proactive outreach beforehand, so our collective panic was perhaps to be expected. Nevertheless, we’re glad to know the tree removals atop Bernal Hill are now complete, so we trust there will be no more unpleasant surprises in the days and weeks ahead.

Oh yeah, and PS: All this is happening as part of the Bernal Hill Trail Improvement Plan we told you about waaaaaaaaaaay back in 2012.

PHOTOS: Top, @BernalJournal. Stumps by Telstar Logistics

Petition Process Underway to Create Residential Parking Permit Area for North Bernal

/ Todd_Lappin / 133 Comments

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Though opinions on the wisdom of implementing Residential Parking Permit (RPP) in North Bernal appear to be polarized, a process is nevertheless underway to implement an RPP district in Precitaville and Santana Rancho.

SFMTA recently set up a dedicated page for North Bernal RPP planning.  It explains:

Residents of North Bernal, generally defined as the blocks south of Cesar Chavez Street and east of Mission Street, organized two widely advertised community meetings to educate the public about the residential permit process. Both were held at the Precita Neighborhood Center. The SFMTA presented information at both meetings describing the residential permit program so residents could make an informed decision on whether to support permit parking.

The next step in the RPP process is collecting signatures for the North Bernal Residential Permit Parking Petition.  SFMTA says the petition allows residents to express support or opposition to residential permit parking for their block.  To succeed, “the petition requires signatures from at least 250 households (or 50 percent of total households, whichever is less), and must contain a minimum of one mile of street frontage.”

How would the program would be implemented if the petition indicates that support for the proposed RPP is uneven from one North Bernal block to the next? That’s not entirely clear, though SFMTA says “the boundaries of the new resident permit parking area will include those blocks with a majority of households in support of permit parking.  This suggests that the initial rollout of a North Bernal RPP could be irregular from street to street and block to block, depending on how many households on each block signed the petition. (Academic question: Doesn’t this seem like a RPP version of the Prisoner’s Dilemma, on a block-by-block basis?)

To learn more about the proposal, visit the SFMTA’s North Bernal Residential Parking Petition site, or email questions or concerns to InfoRPP@sfmta.com.

MAP: Existing RPP areas near North Bernal, via SFTMA