Thursday Eve: Community Crime and Public Safety Meeting at BHNC

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mcfaddenbhnc

As you might have heard, we’ve been addressing property crime and robberies in Bernal Heights lately, as burglaries, auto thefts, and thefts-from-autos have been taking a wearisome toll on Bernal neighbors. And sometimes, things get violent.

Following up on last week’s meeting with the Northeast Bernal Neighbor’s Alliance, and as part of an ongoing series of efforts to address crime and public safety concerns in Bernal Heights, Supervisor David Campos and the Bernal Heights Neighborhood Center are hosting a community meeting on Thursday, January 28 at 6 pm.

Neighbor Ryan from the Northeast Bernal Neighbor’s Alliance says:

Supervisor Campos and Hillary Ronen are holding a separate meeting this week to address broader Bernal safety. If you didn’t make it to last week’s meeting, would like to continue the discussion with the other city agencies noted there, or don’t live in NE Bernal, I think it’s worth showing up!

Here’s their description of the event:

Supervisor David Campos is hosting a meeting to discuss the rampant car break-ins in Bernal Heights. Captain McFadden will present on how the community can work together to guard against and effectively report these crimes. Representatives from the Department of Public Works and the Public Utilities Commission will be there to discuss areas where additional street light is needed in the neighborhood. A representative from the District Attorney’s Office will be there to explain the office’s work to address this problem. Supervisor Campos would like to hear resident ideas to address the problem and will propose a plan to start addressing the issue.

Details
What: Crime & Safety Meeting
When: Thursday, January 28th at 6:00pm
Where: Bernal Heights Neighborhood Center, 515 Cortland Ave

Feel free to contact Hillary Ronen, from Supervisor Campos’ Office, with any questions or comments prior to the meeting. Hillary.ronen@sfgov.org; 415-554-7739.

01-28 Community PS Mtg Flyer

PHOTO: Capt. Joseph McFadden at BHNC, Oct. 20, 2015 by Telstar Logistics

That Awkward Time Supervisor Campos Crashed a Community Crime Safety Meeting to Give a Campaign Speech

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camposnecrimemap

Opinion Disclosure Warning: The post that follows describes a recent unpleasant encounter with our District 9 Supervisor. It is strongly opinionated. If that’s a turn-off, I apologize, and I recommend you skip this post. Thanks for your understanding. — Todd Lappin

 

Now that the notes from last week’s Northeast Bernal Community Meeting have been posted, I also wanted to describe an incident that happened during the meeting, involving David Campos, our D9 Supervisor.

Supervisor Campos was not involved in the planning and organization of last Thursday’s community meeting. (More on that below.) Refreshingly, however, he showed up at the meeting along with his aide (and D9 Supervisor candidate), Hilary Ronen. That was a good thing, because the crime problem in northeast Bernal is such that residents there need all the official attention they can get. But halfway through the meeting, Supervisor Campos kind of went off the rails.

During a Q&A period, Campos raised his hand. The moderator called on him to speak, and Campos stood up. He started in with a pronouncement that there was “an elephant in the room.” He repeated this a few times. It left people scratching their heads, because until that moment the meeting had generally been constructive and elephant-free.

After a pause, Supervisor Campos pivoted to a speech about how the reason a representative from the Mayor’s office (Jason Elliott) was standing in the front of the room was because of his friendship with Joshua Arce (the 2016 D9 Supervisor candidate who had helped facilitate the meeting). Campos began building up a head of steam around the idea that the Mayor sent his deputy chief of staff to the meeting only because the mayor something something something something something and then…

Then I stood up, and told Supervisor Campos he was way out of line.

Actually, I said a bit more than that, and in a much more emphatic way. Basically I urged Supervisor Campos to discontinue the theatrics, in no small part because the very community meeting he was attending had been necessitated by the fact that Supervisor Campos’s office has done a poor job of responding to Bernal constituents concerns about crime problems in Bernal Heights.

Here’s some backstory: The Northeast Bernal Neighbors Alliance was formed in no small part because many Bernal neighbors in that section of our neighborhood have been unable to get a response from Supervisor Campos’s office about their crime problems. Many emails to his office have gone unanswered. Many many. I know this because when Campos’s office ignores emails about crime problems from Bernal neighbors, many of those neighbors write to me instead. I receive a lot of these emails. Many many.  Bottom line: Last week’s community meeting happened because  a neighborhood that had been neglected by David Campos’s office organized a new neighborhood group to get some help without having to rely on David Campos.

Hilary Ronen was sitting next to her boss as things got heated, and she looked stricken. I felt bad for her, because it was mortifying.

It was mortifying because Campos showed everyone in the room that he was looking at the meeting through the cheap lens of political gamesmanship, instead of listening to what Bernal residents were telling him about the crime problem in their community.

Fortunately, just before things got too hot, Buck Bagot intervened to redirect the conversation. (Note to History: Buck is a Bernal treasure.) Then the meeting resumed. There was no further speechifying from Supervisor Campos, although he did often try to politicize the issues discussed in the room by blaming others for this or that.

Look, it’s great that Campos’s office has finally decided to engage with his northeast Bernal constituents. But his effort to turn a grassroots community meeting into political spectacle was inappropriate. The most important take-away from last week’s meeting was that our Bernal neighbors need all the help they can get. It’ll take a lot of on-the-ground organization, and a lot of interagency coordination, and a lot of hard work to make northeast Bernal a safer community.

Last week, David Campos signaled that he’s more interested in scoring political points than he is in doing the real work required to be part of the solution. Yet hope springs eternal: There’s another community meeting about crime and public safety this Thursday, Jan. 28, 6 pm, at the Bernal Heights Neighborhood Center, and David Campos helped organize this one. Bernalwood will provide full details about that meeting tomorrow.

GRAPHIC: Northeast Bernal  Crime Incident Map, May 2015 to January 2016, via SFOpenData. David Campos photo via Wikipedia.

Bernal’s Coco Ramen Leads List of “15 Best Ramen Spots in the Bay Area”

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cocoramen

This is a tasty surprise: Coco’s Ramen, the cozy new ramen joint on Mission near 30th Street in Bernal’s NanoTokyo District, made the cut for SFist’s roundup of the 15 Best Ramen Spots in the Bay Area.

They say:

Coco’s Ramen
To get to Coco’s on the Mission strip in Bernal Heights, a spot indicated loosely with a paper sign for “Ramen,” duck inside the more clearly designated Crazy Sushi and hang a left. The two are separate but symbiotically related businesses. In a warm red room, made warmer with a little sake and some steaming broth, snag one of a few tables or a seat at the bar and ask for your old friend tonkotsu [sic] — though the shoyu and curry based options are reason to stray.

Cheaty Bonus Glory: SFist’s list is alphabetically sorted, so Coco’s Ramen appears in the lead position. Yesssssss!

Sounds like Coco’s is finding its groove. Since Bernalwood’s original Coco Ramen taste-test, the restaurant now enjoys four stars and even more gushing reviews on the Yelp.

PHOTO: Tonkatsu ramen from Coco’s Ramen, by Kaitlyn D. on Yelp

Notes from Last Night’s Northeast Bernal Community Meeting

/ Todd_Lappin / 13 Comments

nebernalmeeting

Here are my notes from last night’s full-house community meeting about crime problems in northeast Bernal, held at the Precita Center:

Community Meeting on Crime and Public Safety
Organized by the Northeast Bernal Neighbors Association (NBNA)
January 21, 2016

Speakers:

  • Terry Milne – Northeast Bernal Neigbors Alliance
  • Capt. Joseph McFadden, Captain, SFPD Ingleside Station
  • Jason Elliott, deputy chief of staff to Mayor Ed Lee

Bernal Neighbor Terry Milne kicked off the meeting by explaining that NBNA was formed to solve some of the crime problems that aren’t being addressed by city officials. The goal of NBNA is to increase political representation in this part of Bernal, to provide a cohesive message in City Hall, and to make sure neighbors in northeast Bernal get their issues addressed. Want to get involved? Join the network.

NBNA thanked Joshua Arce for helping to organize the meeting.

D9 Supervisor David Campos was present, along with his aide, Hilary Ronen.

Comments from Capt. McFadden

Ingleside 2d biggest geographical district in SF

Why does crime happen in NE Bernal?

  • Lots of criminals come here from out of town
  • Gang activity
  • Easy freeway access

Northeast Bernal has coverage from a radio car, as well as some coverage from undercover units.

McFadden showed a map of burglaries (homes robbed) that illustrated a strong cluster of crime in the far northwest corner of Bernal, right around the Peralta/Holladay corner.

McFadden noted that it is hard to secure a felony conviction for a car break in. To do that, prosecutors in San Francisco require a witness who saw

  1. someone break a window
  2. the person take something
  3. the person left the scene.

Missing any one of those and the crime is likely just a misdemeanor. The San Francisco district attorney (who is independently elected) does not make it easy to secure prosecutions.

Recent example: Ingleside recently arrested 3 recidivists who are responsible for at least a dozen car break-ins. They will likely get misdemeanors or probation.

Obvious reminder that nevertheless bears repeating: Don’t leave anything in your car. “Not leaving anything in your car” means don’t leave anything at all in your car. Period. Remove your phone charger and charging cable when you park, because they signal to a criminal that they should break into the car to see if there’s a phone is there. Smartphones can fetch $100 or more, and are easily fenced.

Video evidence is a godsend: Video recordings are hugely helpful, both for catching criminals and facilitating prosecution. “Gigantic,” McFadden says. Security cameras are a great investment, and the SFPD has very good systems for managing and distributing video footage to officers on the beat. (NOTE: If you have an exterior-facing camera, you can register it with the SF district attorney’s office here so they can collect more evidence after crimes take place.)

McFadden showed a recent home security camera video of an auto break-in on Coleridge Bocana in Bernal Heights. The perp began by casing a few cars on the street. Then he began shining a flashlight into a few car windows. (NOTE: That demonstrates clear intent to commit a crime, and thus would warrant a 911/urgent call to SFPD) Then he called his friend in a getaway car, who showed up in moments. Then he smashed a window, grabbed something from the car, and drove off with his friend. Total elapsed time: About 2 minutes.

Reminder: Don’t call 911 from you cell phone, because mobile 911 calls go to CHP dispatch, far, far away. Add these numbers to your mobile phone address book:

  • SFPD emergency landline (for crimes in progress): (415) 553-8090
  • SFPD non-emergency: (415) 553-0123
  • SFPD Ingleside station number: (415) 404-4000

SFPD dispatch pro tips Part 1: If you’re not getting the help you need from an SFPD dispatcher, call back and try a different dispatcher. If you’re still not getting enough help, demand to speak to a supervisor. Or the supervisor’s supervisor. Still not getting a response? Call Ingleside station, and ask to speak to the platoon commander. Don’t cry wolf, but do act VERY persistent.

SFPD dispatch pro tips Part 2: When you report suspicious activity or a crime in progress, try to provide some specific details that make it easier to identify the subject. Don’t say “4 door white car,” say “4 door white car with a spoiler on the rear deck and small round taillights.” Or, “he was wearing a shirt with a Nike swoosh.” Ignore jackets and hoodies; those are easily shed. Look for details about pieces of clothing that are hard to remove: Pants, shoes, base-layer shirts, etc.

In response to a question about SFPD jurisdictional issues, McFadden said that Mission Station and Ingleside will soon (do already?) share a radio channel. Previously, Mission and Ingleside used separate frequencies. Being on the same channel will help improve coordination.

Jason Elliot – Mayor’s deputy chief of staff

Big Picture: Violent crime is down, property crime is up

Thanks to Prop 47, big policy questions are being asked.

More police officers will help with quality lot life crimes. Plan in place and funded to get SFPD up to 2000 officers, or the full complement as determined by a study that was conducted in 1970 (That’s not a typo. There was much eye-rolling over this.) SFPD should hit 2000 officers next year, and that will mean more officers in radio cars to focus on property crime.

The Mayor’s office hopes to pilot some new approaches, perhaps in Bernal Heights:

  • Received for a grant to assist with vehicle crime abatement
  • Gang task force grant
  • One potential program might make it possible to increase police presence at times when data shows peak crime activity

Hopefully there will be more detail on this, TBD.

Also:

Ailed Quijano Paningbatan-Swan from the Bernal Heights Neighborhood Center added some helpful comments.

Good lighting reduces crime. BHNC helped instal lighting around Holly Park, and it helped.

She encouraged NE Bernal neighbors to organize Hotspot walks, in which neighbors go for neighborhood walks with SFPD and city officials to highlight areas of concern. That helps build community while also making city departments and leaders accountable for making improvements. Contact Ailed at BHNC for details.

Other Ideas:
Neighbors expressed interest in closing the steep stairway from the 101 interchange up to Peralta and Holladay. Also want to close the overpass across Bayshore. The City officials present did not provide clear guidance if this was even possible.

Many neighbors (and Ailed from BHNC) emphasized this key idea:

GET TO KNOW YOUR NEIGHBORS!! Communities are stronger when people have face to face relationships. Say hello. Exchange phone numbers. There is a common perception that some new Bernal neighbors keep to themselves. (Editorial Note :This may be true, or it may be bullshit, and/or the demonization of new residents by the Old Guard certainly doesn’t do much to encourage community participation, but nevertheless: If you’re new here, take the time to say hello. It’s a gesture that matters.)

One final comments came from a Bernal neighbor who grew up in Bernal. A former gang member, he settled down once he started a family. He said: “If you don’t know your neighbors, they won’t look out for you.”

Reminder: If you want to participate in the Northeast Bernal Neighbors Alliance, sign up here.

There will be another community meeting about public safety next Thursday, Jan 28 at 6 pm at the Bernal Heights Neighborhood Center.  Look for additional details on that soon.

PHOTO: Northeast Bernal Community Meeting, photo by @ywxwy

Data Visualization Reveals Parking Availability Trends in Bernal Heights

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Street parking  —and anxiety about street parking — is an evergreen topic for the Citizens of Bernalwood. And no wonder; for better or worse, parking is one of those daily chores that directly impact perceptions of quality of life. But how hard is it to park in Bernal Heights, really?

We all know the answer to that question varies from street-to-street and block-to-block. But a new data-visualization from Trulia and Parknav allows us to identify the streets in Bernal Heights with the best and worst parking. Here’s Trulia’s explanation of the methodology:

We created parking scores for neighborhoods, streets and actual Trulia rental listings using Parknav’s proprietary street parking availability data. We did this by looking at how difficult or easy it is to park on five typical days including weekdays and a Saturday, during evening and morning times, on a street-by-street level. Parking scores ranged from 0 to 100, where 0 means parking is impossible and 100 means parking is easy.

We calculated street parking scores by averaging all of the parking probability samples assigned to a given street within a city.

We then calculated listing parking scores by averaging the street parking score of each street that was within a mile distance from actual homes for rent on Trulia between January 2015 and October 2015

On the bright side, Bernal didn’t make the list of the 10 worst San Francisco neighborhoods for street parking. But we didn’t crack the Top 10 list for abundant street parking either. Generally, parking seems to be hardest in central and northwest Bernal, but it’s relatively easy in the southeast part of our dominion.

Since context is king, here’s a San Francisco map to give you a sense of how (somewhat favorably) Bernal compares to our neighbors in other parts of town:

Trulia Parking Map SF

MAPS: via Trulia

Coming Soonish: The San Francisco Cafe and Creamery on Cortland

/ Todd_Lappin / 11 Comments

creamerydoors

Among the many questions brought to us by Bernalwood readers, one of the most frequent we hear these days is: “What’s going on with the creamery that’s supposed to go in to the former Bernal Heights Market at 800 Cortland, on the corner of Ellsworth?”

Indeed. As previously reported, the creamery on Cortland is a new project from by the family that created the [transformative] Harvest Hills Market on the Folsom end of Precita Park. It will be called the San Francisco Organic Cafe & Creamery.

Bernalwood has learned about an additional component to the plan: In parallel with the  San Francisco Organic Cafe & Creamery, the team also plans to launch a fleet of vintage trucks that have been painstakingly restored and converted into mobile ice cream stands. The Creamery will be a restaurant, but it will also function as a supply depot for the ice cream trucks. Here’s what the first truck looks like:

OceanGMC Truck

So when will the Creamery open? What’s the hold up? The wait for opening day has been long.  Your Bernalwood editor has been asking the Creamery team about this for quite some time. Yet whenever we ask, we’re greeted with a fatalistic shrug and a cryptic grin that we’ve also seen on the face of just about every would-be entrepreneur who has tried to open a new food business in Bernal Heights. Over time, Bernalwood has come to understand the meaning of this gesture. It signifies: “I’m basically ready, but I am powerless in the face of a vast and indifferent bureaucracy, so I have no idea when my business will open.”

In the case of the Creamery on Cortland, that challenge is magnified, because there are lots of special statewide regulations that apply to dairy-based businesses. As Michael from Harvest Hills sarcastically explained,  “We’ve learned that getting a milk plant license in California is almost as hard as opening a nuclear power plant.”

Despite all that, opening day is getting closer, hopefully, and there are new signs in the windows of the creamery that explain what’s to come:

creameryquestions

Bernalwood also received some additional detail from Hannah and Gina on the Creamery team:

We are expecting late February or March for partial opening of the cafe and creamery. They’ll put up the awning next week and then the big yellow truck will start to be up there more often for a little retail time in the afternoons. The yellow truck has won the bid to be in the city parks, along with five other trucks like her that will have organic items from the cafe. We are not sure how soon the final legal leases will be finished and of course El Nino has to run his course. None of our trucks are box trucks; all of them are open-platform diner trucks – you can see more at dinertrucks.com

Seating and some decoration will hold us up another few weeks from opening the cafe to the public. We still have to get the big 80 quart mixer in and its really heavy. The pizza oven and baking oven fired up this week along with other new ovens. We’ve been making ice cream there and hope to start the bread for the store soon, along with organic cookies, cupcakes and pies .. These items will also make it to our stores and others in the Bay area in 2016.

We’ve tried to focus on organic items that we don’t see made in San Francisco. So it’s simple San Francisco Organic… The retail side of the company is the Cafe and Creamery. We hope you get a chance to come up once we are fully operational.

So there you have it. Pretty soon, hopefully, the San Francisco Organic Cafe and Creamery will open for business, serving homemade ice cream and food in a diner-style atmosphere. And if for any reason that doesn’t happen, we can take comfort in the knowledge that 800 Cortland may prove to be a more promising site for a nuclear reactor instead.

PHOTOS: Storefont by Telstar Logistics. Truck courtesy of San Francisco Organic Cafe and Creamery

Vote Now to Bring Bike-Sharing to Bernal Heights

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Where_do_you_want_bike_share_

Neighbor Matte encourages all bike-loving Bernalese to select some Bernal Heights sites for San Francisco’s expanding bike-sharing program. He writes:

SF is getting 4,500 new shared bikes in the next couple years, but right now our closest bike sharing station is at 7th and Townsend.  Far away! SFBike is taking proposals for new locations, and I think either end of Precita Park would be ideal. You can vote for these locations here:

There are also many other Bernal locations that have been proposed, and you can vote for them at the same site.

If you want to find out more, SF Bike is now holding workshops to determine exact locations. District 9’s workshops are on Thursday, January 21st, 6 PM – 7 PM and 7 PM – 8 PM at the Mission Neighborhood Center (362 Capp St).

Then and Now: Cortland at Nevada, 1931

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cortland.nevada.1931

cortland.nevada.2016

Here’s fun comparison showing the view from Cortland Ave. looking east from Nevada St. That’s July 31, 1931 up above, and January 18, 2016 below.

The most surprising thing about the two photos is that (apart from the sepia-tone coloring and more modern cars) the streetscape from this location hasn’t changed a whole lot in the last 85 years. The buildings on all four corners of the Nevada intersection are still in place and mostly unchanged.

Look a little more closely, and there’s one charming detail from way-back-when: There’s a young girl near the northwest corner riding a scooter down the hill toward Bayshore. Without a helmet! <Insert horrified parental gasp>

nevadascooter

But in a more substantive way, the view from this angle is somewhat misleading. Yes, the view looks similar today when you look down the hill, but when you’re at the bottom of the hill looking up, the changes are far more dramatic.

Here’s what that looked like. This is the view from Cortland at Bayshore, looking up the hill toward Nevada. There’s no date on this photo, but the cars on Cortland tell us it’s from roughly the same era as the older photo above; circa mid-1920s or early 1930s:

bayshorecortland

Different! That first left turn is Hilton Street, and the embankment behind it now supports the highway 101 overpass. But most noteworthy is the big row of greenhouses visible just up the hill on the north side of Cortland. And, of course, no houses!

IMAGES: 1931 view, via UC Berkeley Bancroft Library. 2016 view by Telstar Logistics. View from Bayshore courtesy of the Bernal Heights History Project. 

Thursday: Northeast Bernal Crime and Safety Meeting with SFPD Capt. McFadden

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As Bernalwood has previously reported, the residents of northeast Bernal are experiencing a particularly intense spike in crime. Meanwhile, the geography is such that our northeastern Bernalese neighbors live on the edge of two SFPD precincts, two supervisorial districts, and US101 (which is managed by Caltrans).  The net result is that their situation hasn’t gotten much attention from local officials.

To change that, an ad hoc group of local residents recently formed the Northeast Bernal Neighbors Alliance and scheduled a community meeting with SFPD Ingleside’s Capt. McFadden for Thursday evening, January 21,  to discuss what can be done.

Neighbor Ryan writes:

Northeast Bernal folk, as you’ve likely heard (and probably noticed), our neighborhood has become victim to a growing amount of crime. Car break-ins, burglaries, and now even violent crime are on the rise.

We’ve set up a community meeting and invited Capt. McFadden from SFPD Ingleside to learn about some new crime-fighting proposals for our neighborhood.

What: Crime & Safety Meeting
When: Thursday., January 21, 2016, 7pm
Where: Precita Center (Upstairs Classroom), 534 Precita Ave.

Hope to see you there!

The Northeast Bernal Neighbor’s Alliance is a new community group being formed to improve the quality of life and reduce crime in our neighborhood. Join us! Even if you can’t attend the meeting, please sign up here.

NBNAFlyer.A

IMAGE: Top, Bernal Heights crime heat map for the period from November 18, 2015 to January 18, 2016

Tuesday: Important Meeting to Advocate for the Defreewaytization of San Jose Avenue

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SJBhack

Remember that fabulously ambitious idea to rethink the speedway portion of San Jose Avenue through the Bernal Cut? The visionary set of ideas that focused on ways to reintegrate San Jose Boulevard into the Bernal-Glen streetscape?

That was some mind-expanding stuff, but it wasn’t just fantasy. Tomorrow, Tuesday, January 19 at 6:30 pm, there will be a community meeting with the SFMTA to discuss some down-to-earth proposals to re-unite Bernal Heights with our ancestral kin in Bernal-Glen. Mike Schiraldi from Bernal-Glen has been leading the charge to make this happen, and he explains why you should attend:

Tomorrow night is the MTA’s big community meeting for the SJA Road Diet. It’s very important to let them know how many San Franciscans share a vision of San Jose Avenue that’s less like a freeway and more like a boulevard.

sjbstickers​

The “I ♥ SJB” refers to the San Jose Boulevard slideshow that brought you all to this mailing list. “Fund the study!” refers to one of the declared goals of the Glen Park Community Plan, created and endorsed by the SF Planning Department and the Glen Park Association in February 2012. It called for a study to be conducted by February 2017 to investigate the feasibility of reconnecting San Jose Avenue to the local street grid, adding a new J-Church stop, and, effectively, de-freeway-izing it. The problem is, we haven’t heard peep about the study in years. Let’s get it back on track!

Please come if you can make it; a single in-person appearance at an event like this is volumes more effective than, say, 50 snarky comments on NextDoor and Facebook. Here are the details:

Tuesday January 19th, 6:30-8:30pm
Glen Park School Auditorium
151 Lippard Avenue

There’s decent parking availability after school hours, and the address is also very transit-accessible.

Your Bernal Heights Crime Update for January 2016

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sfpdtaurus

It’s a new year, with new data on local crime patterns. So for that, let’s go to Bernal’s valiant SFPD liaisons, Neighbors Edie and Sarah, who attended the most recent Ingleside Police District Monthly Community Meeting, held just before the holiday break. Over to you, Neighbor Edie…

Ingleside Police District Monthly Community Meeting
December 15, 2015

Captain’s Report by Captain Joseph McFadden: joseph.mcfadden@sfgov.org
(Notes taken by volunteer Edie Williams, who is entirely responsible for any errors)

  • SF SAFE and the SFPD have published a handy brochure on personal and property safety, preventing pick-pocketing and identity theft. There are copies in the Bernal Library and the Bernal Heights Community Center, or download one here.You can find more safety information from SF SAFE.

Recent Local Police Activity:

Bernal Heights has been seeing a lot of nefarious activity, due to the city’s attempt to push homeless residents away from the area of the Super Bowl, and thanks our easy access on and off the freeways at Bayshore / Cesar Chavez or Bayshore / Alemany.

Large encampments of homeless people are located at Highland Bridge and under the freeway at Cesar Chavez, with tents, bikes, and cardboard packaging (which police believe may have originally been packages stolen off neighbors’ porches.) There’s a SPFD lieutenant in charge of homelessness, and police are issuing citations for homelessness, but the courts are not putting them in the system, and there’s no place to put people in treatment if they were in the system–no treatment beds available, and way too many people waiting for them already.

Teens have been hanging out and partying in the area near the encampments, and in December there was a gang-related shooting on Holladay at Peralta. This may have been a setup, since the Norteño gang seems to be fighting even among themselves. What to do: The Captain asks that if you see any teen party or gang activity, call police dispatch immediately and ask for them to come check it out. If there’s no response, call the Ingleside station main number, (415) 404-4000, ask to speak to the PC-Platoon Commander, and tell them you’re still waiting for a police response.

Shooting of Mario Woods in the Bayview has generated a great deal of controversy, especially after the publication of video taken at the time of his death. The Captain believes that tasers would enable police to escalate force without killing the person involved, although tasers don’t always work, as they have to make contact with two points of skin to have impact. While the use of tasers is being discussed, the police have been issued shields for self protection.

Body cameras are coming, though not at the beginning of 2016. Police are currently developing protocols and policies for the circumstances police will wear the cameras, whether filming will include audio and visual or just visual, and how and where the data will be stored and used. They will then set up a pilot program in the BayView, Ingleside, Tenderloin, and the Mission. They must evaluate cameras, select a vendor, and then plan for ongoing future expenses for data storage and updating, etc.

The Ingleside has license plate readers on two patrol cars, which they’ve used to identify several stolen cars and arrest the drivers.

McLaren Park has seen a crowd of neighborhood motorcross bike riders ride through the park. There’s also a large group from Oakland that comes to SF and rides around the neighborhoods. Many are juveniles, they don’t wear helmets, and police believe it might be more dangerous to chase them and have them get hurt than not. Leaders in Viz Valley are identifying kids with bikes, and police will be notifying the families that if the kids are caught they’ll take away the bikes. What to do? Call the police if you see them start up, so the police can stop them before they’re out of control.

The “Wig bandit,” known for wandering through the upper Noe casing houses, was caught within a few hours once videos of him were on the news. Unfortunately, one resident chased him out of their house, but never called the police. He did report it on NextDoor, however. Please remember, Police are not monitoring NextDoor for calls for assistance. If you are the victim of or witness to a crime or potential crime, call the police directly before you post to social media. Contact phone numbers are below (and in the Bernalwood sidebar)

Videos are used frequently now as tools to help victims, witnesses, and the police. If you have installed a video camera, you can register it online with the SF District Attorney. The DA’s office will map the addresses into a database, so that when a crime is committed, the police can check the map, ask camera owners for a copy of their video, and possibly use the video as evidence in a trial. If you’re thinking of buying a video camera, the Captain recommends that you buy one that has a high enough resolution to convince a jury. Many cameras come with a 7-day loop, so have extra CDs and learn how to download the video.

Problems Neighbors Are Reporting:

Neighbors report groups are gathering and lighting bonfires behind Pacific Super off Alemany. Police will investigate.

If you notice daily repeat traffic problems, email a description of them to the Captain. He’ll set up enforcement campaigns.

Monthly meetings are held the third Thursday of the month in the Ingleside Police Station meeting room, then the following month at a changing neighborhood site. If you have any suggestions for meeting areas (with some parking) within the Ingleside community, please let the captain know.

Upcoming Meeting Dates:

  • January: Wednesday, Jan 20th, 7-8:30 pm, Upper Noe Rec Center, 295 Day St. at 30th.
  • February: Tuesday, February 16th, 7-8:30 pm, Ingleside Police Station, 1 Sgt. John V Young Lane
  • March: Date to be announced, Jewish Home of SF, 302 Silver Ave at Mission.

SPFD Ingleside Contacts:
Emergency, dial: 911
Non-Emergency: (415) 553-0123
Tip Line: (415) 575-4444
Precinct phone (415) 404-4000

Email: SFPDInglesideStation@sfgov.org
District Station Website

PHOTO: Telstar Logistics

Saturday Afternoon: Let Your Kids Frolic in the Junipero Serra School Playground

/ Todd_Lappin / 2 Comments

JSerraYard

Casey Berkovitz, an organizer with the San Francisco Shared Schoolyard Project, invites one and all to the grand opening of the Junipero Serra Elementary School playground, weekend edition:

We’re organizing an event at Junipero Serra Elementary School (625 Holly Park Circle) on Saturday January 16th, from 11 am to 1 pm.

Our organization, the Shared Schoolyard Project, has worked to make the schoolyard there available to the public on weekends, and we are hosting an event to celebrate that and inform people in the neighborhood.

Join Supervisors David Campos and Mark Farrell and the San Francisco Shared Schoolyard Project at Junipero Serra Elementary School on Saturday, January 16th for an exciting kick-off event marking the schoolyard’s grand opening.

The community-driven event will feature a ribbon cutting ceremony, free lunch, and activities for the whole community. Activities will include painting a mandala with Little Artistas, books with the Bernal Heights branch library, and soccer and poetry with America SCORES! Find out more and RSVP right here.

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PHOTO: Junipero Serra Elementary School playground, courtesy of the Shared Schoolyard Project

Bernal Filmmakers Producing “The Last Black Man in San Francisco” Headed to Sundance Screenwriters Lab

/ Todd_Lappin / 3 Comments

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Bernal Heights filmmakers Joe Talbot and Jimmie Fails just got some more good news about The Last Black Man in San Francisco, the feature-length film they’re now producing after completing a successful crowdfunding campaign last year.

They’re going to Sundance!

Specifically, they’re going to the Sundance Screenwriters Lab, which is a huge deal in a pre-production sort of way.  Team LBMSF writes:

Our script was just accepted into the Sundance Screenwriters Lab!!!! This is HUGE. Over 5 days, we will workshop the script with industry mentors that Sundance has selected for us at the Sundance Resort in Utah. Past attendees include Darren Aronofsky (Requiem for a Dream), Wes Anderson (Bottle Rocket), Ryan Coogler (Fruitvale Station), Ben Zeitlen (Beasts of the Southern Wild) and many, many more. From there, we will go to the Sundance Film Festival and Joe will be joined by producers, Khaliah Neal, Carlton Evans, Michael Kontomanolis, and Natalie Teter to meet with other industry players as well as potential crew. (Between us, there are a couple DP’s we have our eyes on.) Beyond all those wonderful things, being selected for the Labs is one of the most coveted seals of approvals in the industry.

Big red carpet congrats!

To track the progress of The Last Black Man in San Francisco as it makes its way to the big screen, like the Facebook Page or sign up for their glamorous mailing list.