UPDATED: Weeks After Tragedy, Rec and Park Vehicles Still Drive in Holly Park; No Charges Filed Against Deadly Driver

/ Todd_Lappin / 19 Comments

parkvehicle3

parkvehicle1

PicsArt_1380570256508

As you know, there’s a vigil tonight at 5 pm for Christy Svanemyr, the victim in the Holly Park hit-and-run tragedy.

Please attend if you can — not just because it’s a fitting way to remember Christy, but also because the violations of Rec and Park policy that triggered the accident apparently continue in Holly Park to this day.

Neighbor Rebecca sent this to Bernalwood earlier this week:

Perhaps I’m simply being hypersensitive.

I was there when tragedy struck earlier this month. Ever since, as solo dog walker, I’ve noticed the amount of vehicles that inhabit local SF parks. When I can I try to take photos and report inappropriate actions.

On Sept 29 at around 2:30p I witnessed a SF Rec and Park vehicle drive, yes slowly, towards the restroom in Holly Park to carry a single box from the truck to the restrooms.

parkvehicle2

Is it really necessary to drive through a park so small? Regardless of weather, he remained on park roads.  There was no spotter, and all equipment he carried to or from the truck did not appear to be extraordinarily heavy. Also, the distance he parked from the restrooms seemed almost equidistant to parking on the actual street and carrying needed supplies.

I’m just a concerned Bernalite, who witnessed a tragedy and questioning all I see in regards to it.

That’s exactly what we all should do.

Tonight’s vigil will be an excellent opportunity to share those questions and concerns — to ensure that nothing like this ever happens ever again.

UPDATE: Also today, our friends at SFist report that no charges have yet been filed against Thomas Burnoski, the Rec & Park employee who was driving the vehicle that killed Christy Svanemyr:

A month after 35-year-old Christine Svanemyr was struck and killed by a Rec and Parks Department truck as she lay on the grass in Holly Park with her infant daughter and family dog, and the District Attorney’s office has yet to file charges in the case. The driver of truck, 57-year-old gardener Thomas Burnoski, has said he was unaware that he struck the woman after he turned off an asphalt path in the park.

Burnoski was released on $25,000 bail after the incident on September 5th and prosecutors original claimed they would decide whether to press charges by the end of September. According to the District Attorney’s office, they actually have up to three years to file charges

PHOTOS: Neighbor Rebecca

Bernal Heights Once Had Its Very Own Doggie Diner, and It Looked Fabulous

/ Todd_Lappin / 27 Comments

doggiedinerbernal1

Doggie Diner was a chain of fast food restaurants scattered around the Bay Area. The franchise enjoyed its heyday during a mid-1960s expansion, during which it installed rotating doggie-head mascots above each of its 30 or so restaurants. The doggie-heads became iconic in San Francisco, even after the Doggie Diner chain shut down for good in 1986.

The restaurants are gone, but a few of the giant fiberglass doggie mascots remain. There’s a lonely, restored one on a pole in the Sunset near the zoo, and there are three happy doggy diner heads mounted on a trailer that are often seen parked outside strange subculture spectacles around town:

trailerdoggies

But did you know that Bernal Heights once had its very own Doggie Diner? With its very own fiberglass doggie diner head? With its very own polkadot bow tie and chef’s hat?

We did. Our Doggie Diner stood at 3100 Mission, at the southwest corner of Army (Cesar Chavez). Here’s a zoom and enhance of the image from 1975 shown up above:

doggiedinerbernal.detail

Here’s a closeup of Bernal’s Doggie as it looked in 1981:

doggiediner.1981

Frankly, that just looks ridiculously awesome.

In fact, it’s so great that Bernal native and t-shirt design celebrity Amos Goldbaum gave the Bernal Doggie a cameo in his sexy new Bernal Hill shirt graphic:

bernalgoldbaumdog

Even better, Neighbor Amos also immortalized Bernal’s Lost Doggie Head in a special tribute illustration, which we are very pleased to debut for all Citizen of Bernalwood here:

amos.doggiehead

PHOTOS: Top, Doggie Diner 1975 via Amos Goldblum. Middle: Doggies on trailer by Tony Huerta. Doggie Diner 1981 via Jim Hair

Thursday: Celebrate the Bernal Heights Neighborhood Center’s 35th Birthday

/ Todd_Lappin / 4 Comments

BHNCgraphic

Here’s something worth celebrating: The invaluable Bernal Heights Neighborhood Center is having a 35th birthday party on Thursday night, October 3, from 6-8 pm:

Since 1978, BHNC has worked to preserve and enhance ethnic, cultural, and economic diversity. And with your help, we will be a part of the community for years to come.

Come join us at LEGACY: 35 YEARS OF BUILDING COMMUNITY, Thursday, October 3rd, 6-8 pm, @ BHNC’s 515 Cortland Ave. building. This will be an evening of good friends, good food, music, and stories from people who have been key to BHNC’s success SINCE 1978!

Even if you can’t attend the party, you can still donate to help BHNC continue it’s mission.

PHOTO: The original BHNC crew from 1978, via BHNC.

Bernal Neighbor Tim Redmond Will Launch New Progressive News Site

/ Todd_Lappin / 7 Comments

RedmondBernal2

Though he rarely brags about it, progressive journalist Tim Redmond and Bay Area media celebrity lives in Bernal Heights. For 31 years, Neighbor Tim edited the stalwart San Francisco Bay Guardian — until last June, when he parted ways with the Guardian’s new owners under rather unpleasant circumstances.

Since leaving the Guardian, Neighbor Tim has been conspiring to launch a new media project, which he finally revealed last week.

It’s called 48 Hills, and it has a mission statement:

Bernal. Potrero. San Miguel. Telegraph. There are 47 named hills in San Francisco – and as those of us who have spent their lives fighting for social and economic justice know, there’s always one more hill to climb.

That’s the genesis of 48hills, a new online publication that will report on, expose, and explore the ups and downs of a great city – the stories that don’t make the MSM, the adventures you’ve never heard of, the secrets of making this your home.

48hills will be a new kind of newspaper – the progressive daily that San Francisco has always needed. Not a blog, not a content aggregator, but a place where you can read original work by reporters and critics who know the city. Breaking news, analysis, investigative reporting, cutting-edge arts and culture … that’s 48hills.

We are a nonprofit venture, under the auspices of the San Francisco Progressive Media Center, with a community-based board and a mission to serve a city battered by evictions, displacement, and economic inequality. We are unafraid of controversy, proud of our politics, owned by no investors, driven not by profit but by a passion for journalism that matters.

According to the countdown timer on the site, 48 Hills plans to launch sometime around the end of October.

ILLUSTRATION: Tim Redmond Is Watching Downtown, via Bernalwood

Thursday: Vigil for Christy Svanemyr, Victim in Holly Park Death

/ Todd_Lappin / 2 Comments

flowermemorial

A group of Bernal neighbors have organized to hold a vigil for Christy Svanemyr, the wife, mother, and Zen monk who died on on Sept. 5 after she was was run over by a Recreation and Park vehicle in Holly Park.

The vigil will happen on Thursday, October 3rd at 5 pm, in Holly Park near Highland Ave.  Here are the complete details, from the announcement:

vigil.svanmeyer

 

PHOTO: Top, flowers placed at the site where Christy Svanemyr was killed, photographed on Saturday, Sept 7 by Telstar Logistics.

Beautiful Bhangra Photos from the Elsie Street Block Party

/ Todd_Lappin / 1 Comment

elsiebhangrajpg

At this point, I think we can all agree that the organizers of the amazing Elsie Street Block Party are fit to lead the Greater Bernalwood Social Committee.

Courtney Quirin from MissionLocal attended the famously fabulous Elsie block party last weekend, in time to snap some glamorous photos of the Duniya Dance and Drum Company working their Bhangra groove thang on the streets of Bernal Heights.

Check out all her pics.

PHOTO: MissionLocal

Awesomeness: Todd Berman’s Bernal Hill Paintings Now Showing at Mission Pie

/ Todd_Lappin / 1 Comment

yondereast.berman

bernal.berman

bernman.missionpie

Neighbor Todd Berman is a moved to Bernal Heights not too long ago, and to this day he maintains good relations with his former neighbors in the Mission flatlands north of Cesar Chavez. As proof of this, Neighbor Todd has a show of his paintings on display at Mission Pie, on the corner of Mission and 25th Streeet.

Many of Neighbor Todd’s paintings depict Bernal Heights. Plus, his website contains this awesomely awesome artist statement:

Through painting and collaborative art, Todd Berman has pursued an inquiry into the awesomeness of San Francisco. The result is a series of paintings now on the wall at Mission Pie. Come to view the paintings and to share your ideas about what best represents the awesomeness of our city.

Awesome! But hurry up to check it out: Neighbor Todd’s show at Mission Pie will only be up until October 5. Also: PIE!! Enough said.

BONUS! Over on the Twitter, Neighbor Todd also shared this ridiculously awesome portrait of the Precita Park satellite spinner, to commemorate its return to service:

bermanspinner

ALL IMAGES: Todd Berman

Beloved Precita Playground Satellite Spinner Back in Action After Emergency Gyro-Stabilization Repairs

/ Todd_Lappin / 10 Comments

spinner.shane.e

spinner.done.e1

Astute observers and nearly all north slope children have long grumbled about the failing condition of Precita Playground’s much-loved (but very old) penultimate satellite spinner.

Fortunately, an emergency effort was undertaken to repair the satellite spinner and return it to service. This required the complete removal of the iconic spinner hull, however, which was upsetting to many Bernal Heights observers. Bad enough that the spinner was broken; Scenes of the spinner resting pathetically on the back of a crane truck were heartbreaking.

spinner.Paul

Once the spinner was gone, would it ever come back?? In a note to Bernalwood, Neighbor Victor summarized these anxieties well:

I suppose other neighbors have perhaps written to the blog directorship about the spinner’s recent disappearance from the playground in Precita Park, replaced by two city cones of purgatory orange. I wonder if anyone knows if this is a permanent loss, the first step (years in the making in the hearts of the least sentimental?) to make way for something quite different. Or will it remain a vacant mini lot of sand? Or will the spinner rise again like a phoenix from the dust?

These were not trivial questions.

Luckily, Neighbor Demece, Lead Warrior Princess of Precita Valley Neighbors, was on the case. Through her contacts deep inside the Recreation and Park bureaucracy, Neighbor Demece determined that the beloved satellite spinner was receiving a complete refit in preparation for a return to service.

Today she brought some very good news:

The spinner should be delivered today! Joe Padilla, Paint Supervisor at SF Recs and Park, personally painted the spinner and had it fixed. I have been told by SF Rec and Park staff that it is BEAUTIFUL!!!

Of course, it’s the spinner, and by definition a thing of beauty.

Yes yes, the spinner is now, officially back. Neighbor Gleeco immediately recognized the momentousness of its return:

The freshly repainted (Rasta edition?) and overhualed saucer is back. Been too long. Hopefully it’ll be good for a few more generations of kids!

Hopefully, indeed. And fair point about the paint job; it does seem rather rasta:

newspinner

Irie, mon! Nevertheless, when Bernalwood’s Cub Reporter visited the spinner after its return, she declared her fondness for the new livery.

“I like it,” she said.

“Those are awesome colors.”

So the critics are pleased. The most important thing, of course, is that the satellite spinner is back, and working, and right where it belongs. To infinity… and beyond!

PHOTOS: From Top, Then, by Neighbor Shane. Now, by Telstar Logistics. Spinner on truck, by Neighbor Paul.

This Saturday: Duelling Block Parties in Bernal Heights!!

/ Todd_Lappin / 12 Comments

blockparties.e

As you know, those extremely well-organized neighbors on Elsie Street are having their big, blow-out block party this weekend, on Saturday, September 28.

Yet as destiny would have it, some nearby neighbors on Folsom (also at Eugenia) inadvertently conspired to organize their block party on the very same day! Neighbor Rebecca from Team Folsom writes:

Just to add to the block party drama, Folsom St (at Eugenia) is holding our first ever block party on this Saturday the 28th as well!

In direct competition to the Elsie St block party, we would like to offer . . .

The Folsom Street Almost-a-Real Block Party!

– A meager selection of store-bought desserts
– Spastic toddler dancers
– A boom box playing music
– Assorted chairs and tables
– Potentially a grill!
– A sign
– A real, approved permit!
– OK, actually, we do have a bouncy house too
– The physical site where the “Folson” sidewalk square resides – one-of-a-kind!

If real entertainment, home-cooked food and energetic volunteers is all too intimidating for you, mosey on over to our almost-party and say hello!

Truth be told, both block parties are just a short, professorial stroll apart along the Eugenia axis, so this scheduling quirk is actually a clustering win for all of Cortlandia. Why choose between Elsie and Folsom? Why not just go to both???

New Video Documents “The Great Bernal Heights Renegade Piano Recital”

/ Todd_Lappin / 6 Comments

pianohts3

pianohts2

Pianohts

Something magical happened on June 28, after a few clever people got the clever idea to haul a piano to the top of Bernal Hill and stage an ad hoc hilltop recital on a (blessedly) warm and welcoming evening.

The event was entered into the history books as “The Great Bernal Heights Renegade Piano Recital,” and now director Darryl Kirchner has released “Piano Heights,” a lovely little documentary that captures the recital as it unfolded at sunset. Enjoy:

Your Bernal Heights Crime Report for September 2013: Robberies Down, Burglaries Up, and Lock Your Upper Doors and Windows

/ Todd_Lappin / 2 Comments

precitasfpd

Neighbor Sarah, your vigilant volunteer Bernal Heights crime reporter, attended the SFPD Ingleside Community meeting last week, and she filed these terrific summary notes on the latest Bernal Heights crime trends. Read on, be wiser, and stay safe:

Ingleside Station Community Meeting – 9/17/13

Captain Tim Falvey presided. He has now been captain for one year and 24 days.

CRIME STATS AND TRENDS

See attached handout (below) for Compstat summary.

Homicide — 1 in August in Sunnydale; 6 YTD vs. 14 last year at this time.

Robberies – lower by 22% in August vs. August 2012. Arrested 18 people for robberies this August (vs. 1 last August). Half of robberies occurred in the “5-car” sector – roughly City College to Crocker-Amazon Park. Robbers may be following people farther away from Balboa Park BART after the police focused on that area for some time. Ingleside has also been getting help from the Violence Reduction Team (plainclothes officers deployed from downtown) – they have 4-5 officers, 2 days a week this month.

Burglaries – up 37% this August vs. August 2012. Arrests are up 63% YTD.

LOCK YOUR WINDOWS AND DOORS – even on the 2nd or 3rd floors! One-third of the 41 burglaries were at houses where doors were unlocked or windows were left open.

Another trend is that homes being remodeled or homes under construction are being targeted – there were 6 of these last month. Thieves took appliances, tools.

The police made one arrest when a neighbor got up to use the bathroom at 3:15am and decided to look at the crescent moon. He saw some guys with hoodies and flashlights in the house under construction next door. He didn’t call 911 (but should have – call 911 for any crimes in progress, even property crimes) but did get a license plate number. He reported it the next day, and the police located a van with $4600 in stolen appliances in it. If you’re in doubt about calling the police, ask yourself: if it was your house, would you want someone to call the police? And if you’re remodeling, have your contractor put tools in a proper, lockable storage container. And if construction is happening around you, you should know this is a trend – so call the police if you see people at “off-hours” in a house under construction.

Auto theft – pre-2001 Hondas and Acuras are 59% of the vehicles stolen and recovered in the District. On average, 88 cars stolen a month in the Ingleside. Last month, 122. Use a club-like device if you have an old Honda or Acura. Better yet, get the ignition re-keyed at the Honda or Acura dealership (should be $150-200).

Violent crime – up 7% YTD, but all driven by robberies. If robberies weren’t up, violent crime would be down 5%. Property crimes are up 15%, driven by theft from auto. Do not leave bags, computers in your car!

Side note by captain: If you’re a victim in a crime, please testify! Can’t put criminals in jail if no one will testify.

Ingleside held traffic education/enforcement operations around SFUSD schools when school started up again. Wrote more than 1000 tickets.

Q&A:

I asked about speeding on Stoneman and Folsom. Traffic enforcement operation will happen soon.

Someone asked about shots fired in Vis Valley – the captain said they haven’t had any shots fired over there since August 27; it may have been on the Bayview side. Sunnydale now has security cameras – the Housing Authority got a grant.

Someone else asked about pot-smoking in public – do police care? It’s illegal, but the police won’t do a lot of proactive enforcement. If you call in a complaint, they will investigate. For example, businesses complain when people go to dispensary and then smoke outside, with smoke blowing into other businesses.

GUEST SPEAKER:

Lucia Casaravilla, Community Boards, 920-3820

Community Boards offers conflict resolution services for neighbor disputes & other conflicts. Founded in 1976, longest-running public mediation group in US.

They offer mediation and facilitation services – ‘agency of first resort’ for disputes. Safe, neutral, impartial space – all info is confidential and cannot be used in litigation. They provide a panel of three trained mediators – are all volunteers who have had 40+ hours of training.

Process – there is a one-time fee of $40 to open a case, but the mediation is free.

They’ll contact the neighbor, set up mediation, do follow-up. Completely voluntary, so neighbor does not have to participate. Mediation is 3 hours – most of the time, you will get a resolution. If needed, they will schedule a second mediation.

GUEST SPEAKER:

Cyrus, Rebuilding Together SF, 905-1611

Group does free home repairs for qualifying residents on the last Sat. of October and April each year.

Mostly does work for seniors, but open to all homeowners who live in SF and make under $62,200 a year (one person). They also do some safety modifications for renters.

Always looking for volunteers, especially those with trade skills.

Website currently under construction, so call the number above to ask for an application or to volunteer.

NEXT MEETING: Tuesday, October 15, 7pm, Ingleside Station.

IMAGE: Telstar Logistics

Lost: Young Aviator Seeks Assistance in Aircraft Recovery Effort

/ Todd_Lappin / 5 Comments

loststratos

nasencrashsite

Well, independent of anything else that may be going on in the world right now, I think we can all agree that this is no fun: Neighbor Nasen got his remote-controlled airplane stuck in a tree over the weekend:

Hello. This is Neighbor Nasen. I’m eight years old and I live in Bernal. I just got a new remote controlled airplane called the Firebird Stratos. I accidentally flew it into a tree at St. Mary’s Park on Sunday morning. This was it’s first-ever flight. If you see it on the ground or if it’s possible to get it down, please contact me. Here’s a video of how it happened:

Rats. As the young aviator is heard to say on the video, “That stinks.”

Totally. Please keep your eyes out for Neighbor Nasen’s spiffy airplane if you happen to be near that tree in St. Mary’s. As an added incentive, Bernalwood and BASA will gladly offer a grateful reward to anyone who recovers Nasen’s lost aircraft.

PHOTOS: via Neighbor Nasen