News From Our Partners

Mission businesses hit with 'drive-by' disability lawsuits

Submitted by MCAnderson on Thu, 04/05/2012 - 15:17

By Rigoberto Hernandez, Mission Local

The owners of Elsy’s Restaurant on Mission Street have faced their share of roadblocks to operate in San Francisco.

For reasons that are still unclear, the San Francisco Planning Department delayed Elsy’s opening for eight months in 2006. In 2008, a corrupt restaurant inspector asked the owners for money in exchange for a food handler’s certificate. The inspector was later fired by the Department of Public Health. Finally, in 2009, they thought they would be able to focus on their Salvadoran cuisine.

Then in January 2010, noted serial litigator Thomas Frankovich sued Elsy’s for an alleged violating the 1990 Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA), which requires buildings to be accessible to people with disabilities. The lawsuit alleged that Craig Yates, who is paraplegic, had difficulty accessing Elsy’s cashier counter and bathroom.

As with most of the lawsuits filed by Frankovich, Elsy’s owners decided to settle and make the required alterations, which involved lowering the cashier counter about 8 inches and building a new wheelchair-accessible bathroom. The old bathroom was in a back room near the kitchen and required negotiating a small set of stairs.

“All of this cost us money,” said owner Jaime Gonzalez, detailing the list of expenses: about $100,000 for the fixes and $17,000 to settle the lawsuit.

They aren’t the only ones. Frankovich has sued at least 23 businesses in the Mission since January 2010 — most of them small, minority-owned restaurants.

Read the complete story at Mission Local. 

Free bus rides for youth still an option, but plan lacks funding

Submitted by Jerold Chinn on Wed, 04/04/2012 - 15:55

Muni still hasn’t decided whether it can afford to let young people in San Francisco ride buses and streetcars for free. But a decision could come within the next two weeks.

The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency’s board of directors delayed a vote to approve a two-year budget on Tuesday, because members could not determine whether they should give out free Fast Passes for all youth or just those from low-income families. Both motions failed 3-3.

The two-year proposed budget, which includes free Fast Passes for low-income youth, must now go back to the board, but with an option to extend free passes to all youth.

Ed Reiskin, the director of transportation, said there would be a $6.7 million gap if the transit agency went the all-youth route. He said the proposed budget needed to reflect this change to show where the money would come from to fill the gap.

Funding for the two-year pilot project for either option would come from the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, but the funding source has yet to be identified.

Board member Cheryl Brinkman said she did not think providing free Muni Fast Passes for all youth would be sustainable pass the two-year pilot project. Another board member, Jerry Lee, was concerned that Munimight fall short in funding operations if the free-for-all-youth option were approved.

The transit agency’s two-year proposed plan includes an operating budget of $816.4 million for the 2012-2013 fiscal year, and $844.1 million for the 2013-2014 fiscal year.

The two-year budget proposal would close out a projected $53 milliondeficit by enforcing parking meters on Sundays and cutting management and worker overtime. It also includes more funding for Muni maintenance, which he calls the “heart” of the budget.

The Sunday parking proposal has gotten heat from religious leaders who said the proposal would hurt those who attend church on Sundays.

The board of directors will take up the free-for-youth issue and its two-year budget again at the April 17 meeting. The transit agency must submit a balanced budget to City Hall by May 1.

S.F. transit agency jettisons plans to install smart meters in Mission

Submitted by MCAnderson on Wed, 04/04/2012 - 13:09

By Rigoberto Hernandez, Mission Local

The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency will not include the Mission and other eastern neighborhoods in its SFpark pilot program as originally planned, according to an announcement.

SFpark, funded through a federal grant, uses demand-responsive pricing to free up parking spaces. In December,  the agency had proposed installing some 5,000 SFpark meters in the Mission and surrounding neighborhoods to offset the loss of parking caused by the construction of a park on 17th and Folsom streets.

“Many neighbors in the 12th & Folsom, 17th & Folsom, Dogpatch, and Potrero Hill areas have expressed uneasiness about being part of the SFpark pilot project until further evaluation of its success,” read the statement by SFpark. “Based on this feedback, the SFMTA will no longer propose for these areas to be included as SFpark pilot areas. As the SFMTA revises parking management proposals for each of these areas, they will reflect regular its [sic] policies and practices.”

Read the complete story at Mission Local.

Muni still chasing 85 percent on-time performance goal

Submitted by Jerold Chinn on Mon, 04/02/2012 - 12:52

Muni's on-time performance showed little improvement during the last three months of 2011. According to the latest numbers from the transit agency, Muni was on-time 71.7 percent of the time, up from 71.1 percent from the previous quarter.

The city mandates that Muni hit an 85 percent goal, which was approved by voters in 1999 through passing Proposition E. The transit agency has yet to meet this goal.

"The numbers are what they are, but we are more focused on improving our customers’ experience on the system,” said Muni spokesman Paul Rose.

The report covers the first six months of Ed Reiskin's reign as director of transportation. Reiskin was appointed by the Municipal Transportation Agency’s board of directors last July.

Reiskin is taking a major step in an effort to improve service by finally allowing all-door boarding on Muni buses starting July 1.

Rose said once all-door boarding is implemented, the system should see “immediate positive impacts,” such faster boarding times, reduced travel times and more reliable service.

There is some good news to report. Unscheduled absences by transit operators went down from 13.9 percent to 12.2 percent during  the last three months of 2011.

The transit agency's directors will discuss the latest report at their 1 p.m. Tuesday meeting at City Hall along with their two year budget and a proposal to give out free Fast Passes to the city's youth. 

Advocates push for more attention to laws that target homeless

Submitted by T.J. Johnston on Sat, 03/31/2012 - 18:11

Homeless people in San Francisco, much more than the other city residents, find themselves at the wrong place at the wrong time, getting ticketed or arrested for any of more than 20 minor offenses. The city’s chronic low-level harassment of people living on the streets and in shelters amounts to a mass violation of civil rights, say advocates organizing an international day of action.

San Francisco is not unique in enforcing what are often known as “quality of life crimes.”

Two North American networks of homeless advocacy organizations — the San Francisco-based Western Regional Advocacy Project and the USA-Canada Alliance of Inhabitants, in Dowelltown, Tenn. — hope to bring attention to what they call the “criminalization of homelessness.” They assert a that the homeless have a “right to exist” in public spaces.

“Crime statistics nationally now include millions of homeless people who were sitting, lying down, hanging out and — perhaps worst of all — sleeping,” said Paul Boden, director of the advocacy project.

The groups together are organizing public rallies and direct action in 15 cities in the U.S. and Canada. San Francisco activists are gathering at Union Square at 2 p.m. Sunday. They chose the location because businesses increasingly are focused on sweeping homeless people away from the area, in favor of tourists and window-shoppers.

In a recent study, the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty in Washington, D.C., found police in 234 U.S. cities employ similar strategies.

Most of San Francisco’s ordinances have prohibitions specific to time or place. A 2011 San Francisco law restricted public behavior at two plazas in the Castro District. A 2010 voter initiative banned sitting or lying on sidewalks within a 16-hour time period.

Cleaning up gas stations' legacy in Mission District

Submitted by MCAnderson on Mon, 03/26/2012 - 11:44

By Noah Arroyo, Mission Local

What the Mission District lacked in rich people, it made up for in gas stations.

Because the neighborhood was a major transportation corridor, “they were everywhere,” said Albert Lee, who handles many of the city’s cleanup cases as a senior inspector for the Department of Public Health’s Local Oversight Program.

The legacy of that bounty is contamination. Early tanks were built with steel that inevitably corroded and leaked. Other neighborhoods, like wealthy Nob Hill, also experienced contamination leaks, but theirs came from personal heating-oil tanks, Lee said.

A map of contaminated sites in the Mission shows 157 former and 15 ongoing sites. The contamination “plumes” come almost exclusively from older-generation underground storage tanks where gas stations stored gasoline, said Chuck Headlee, the underground storage tank manager for the S.F. Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board.

Read the complete story at Mission Local.

Bikeshare program heading to S.F. this summer

Submitted by MCAnderson on Thu, 03/22/2012 - 12:24

By  Jon Brooks, KQED News Fix

In August, the San Francisco Municipal Transit Agency will roll out a new bikeshare program in a staggered launch. The effort is part of a five-city initiative by the Bay Area Air Quality Management district to bring bikesharing to the region. The other participating cities are San Jose, Redwood City, Mountain View and Palo Alto.

The San Francisco program will offer 500 bikes at 50 stations downtown, South of Market, and along the eastern edge of the city.

Read the complete story at KQED News Fix. 

Community leaders call for transparency in S.F. Police-FBI collaboration

Submitted by MCAnderson on Wed, 03/21/2012 - 15:52

By Zaineb Mohammed, New America Media

Arab American, Muslim and South Asian community leaders are urging Mayor Ed Lee to approve an ordinance that they believe could re-establish trust between their communities and the San Francisco Police Department.

Recently, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors narrowly passed the Safe San Francisco Civil Rights Ordinance, intended to prevent civil rights abuses in Police Department-FBI collaboration. The measure, proposed by Supervisor Jane Kim and supported by about 80 civil rights, legal and community groups, hopes to increase transparency and restore local control over the actions of San Francisco police officers operating as members of the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force.

The ordinance is up for a final Board of Supervisors vote this week, and if it passes, it will head to the desk of Mayor Ed Lee.  

Read the complete story at New America Media.

Health clinic goes on the road to help underserved youth

Submitted by MCAnderson on Thu, 03/15/2012 - 11:02

By Jordan Katz, KALW

What’s the quickest way to a child’s heart? How about a Harry Potter movie? The staff at the Bay Area’s Teen Health Van know their patients are no exception.

Katie Baker, the van’s newest physician’s assistant, says showing movies makes the patients feel “more comfortable” when waiting for treatment. The mobile clinic’s waiting room is the size of a cubicle. The movie drowns out any sounds coming from nearby exam rooms, helping preserve patient privacy. Patients range in age from 10 to 25 years old. Half are homeless. Most lack health insurance.

“The kids that we see typically have not had regular health care,” says Dr. Seth Ammerman, a practicing pediatrician and medical director of the Teen Health Van. Ammerman says most of the patients have had sporadic physical examinations, if at all. “What we do is provide comprehensive medical care,” Ammerman says.

Read the complete story at KALW. 

Kidnapping charges dropped after supposed victim changes her story

Submitted by Jason Winshell on Wed, 03/14/2012 - 16:26

Charges against an El Sobrante man suspected of kidnapping a woman off the streets of San Francisco were dismissed after the supposed victim changed her story in the course of legal proceedings.

A Superior Court judge dismissed the charges on Jan. 20 and freed Terrell Trammell from San Francisco County Jail. The woman police suspected of being the victim said she was Trammell’s girlfriend and not a kidnap victim as she had earlier claimed. 

Stephanie Ong Stillman, spokeswoman for the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office, said that accounts of the incident from independent witnesses revealed that the suspected victim may have gotten into Trammell’s car voluntarily. 

At the time of arrest last December, the police said Trammell rammed his car into a San Francisco Police Department car on Oakland’s International Boulevard. But no such charges were ever filed.