Dear Editor:

I confess I was completely confounded by Mr. Marc Solomon's guest editorial piece for Beyond Chron. While I'm not a member of SF HAC, I attended with interest the March 28th panel discussion on building "workforce housing" for San Francisco's much-neglected, working middle-class -- those who make too much money for subsidized, below-market rate housing and not enough to afford market rate condos averaging $700,000 a unit. It was an interesting gesture even if it was somewhat contrived and not the open, vigorous discussion for which I had hoped.

But what's Mr. Solomon's point? A confusing hodge-podge of half-baked platitudes predicated on a soupcon of facts. He advises that the application of microeconomics' fundamental law of supply and demand , in relation to San Francisco's housing market, has been gross skewed or rescinded by the vast influx global "investment capital"?

Frankly, his manifold assertions leave me breathless: that housing developers have somehow magically managed to uncouple the price of housing from the cost of construction? That delays in the construction entitlement process have no impact on the resultant price of housing? That there should be constraints on the profit incentive in the risk/reward equation for those who elect to risk there capital to try to build new housing in the current political climate of San Francisco? That the deeply flawed Kaiser Marston study should be taken seriously? And his generalizations offer no subtlety or distinction whether we are taking about in-fill housing on a human scale, or luxury, gated communities posing as skyscrapers.

In the end, he advises that the best course is to go slow. Ludicrous. Does he really believe that he and his cohorts can also socially engineer it so that the people of this city put their lives on hold while they sort things out?

Lauren S. Ladd



To the Editor,

"Allowing people to live close to their jobs..." is a signal line in Casey Mills article of April 10th, Climate Change and Affordable Housing: Time to Make a Strong Connection. What a wonderful line. It conjures up images of thuggish employers willfully forcing victimized employees to find housing far removed from the workplace, presumably for evil reasons. "Argh... Bob Cratchett, Oi've decided yew 'ave ter live in Upper Warlingham wots 'free how'rs commute from Marley & Schrooge, 'ere in Soho."

Most folks, poor and not-so-poor, live where they live and work where they can find work. Over the last several decades jobs in the San Francisco Bay area have spread over a wider and wider area. This is particularly true for start-up companies which create the most number of new jobs in our economy [at both ends of the salary spectrum]. Sample the people you know and work with; you will find most commute to work. This will be true whether you work on Market Street or in an Industrial Park off I680.

What was there about Casey Mills' employment history that led to such an unrealistic view of housing and work location? Or to blame climate change directly on the cost of housing? There does seem to be a direct connection between large numbers of individual folks commuting in cars and increasing levels of carbon dioxide and other "greenhouse" gases in the atmosphere. The more useful solution is to call for realistic and civilized public transportation, along with finding ways of shifting energy production away from its present carbon base. Even if we could wave some sort of Progressive wand and magically make San Francisco Bay area housing much cheaper, it would have little effect on global warming.

Admittedly, housing costs are a problem. The long rise in property costs hurt more folks, both poor and not-so-poor, than the few developers and real estate vultures that it helped. In the next round, I suspect we will see those same developers and real estate vultures raking in big bucks, Federal, State, and City, putting up pseudo-low cost housing. To do so, of course, they will have to further cement their shameful relationship with the Welfare Mafia. Expect to see more and more calls for getting rid of the modest standards of construction, safety, and quality that we all fought so hard for [there is no free lunch].

The reality is that Bay housing costs are driven by ever increasing pressures of immigration. Not the traditional immigration described on the plaque under the Statue of Liberty, but immigration of the advantaged, educated, and skilled fleeing that great cesspool of obesity to the east of the Mississippi River. If you want to see the secret results of this in the raw, just visit any neighborhood meeting south of Market and in Hunter's Point. Oops...!!!

Wayne Lanier



Editor,

Thank you for succinctly stating the obvious!! Bush is not above the law and the Administration is replete with criminals and incompetents with no sense of history - they have to go!!

Ciao, Yale Sacks



Paul,

Another, perhaps more palatable scenario (at least for Republicans) is to follow the historical template set 30+ years ago. When we got the impeachment goods on Nixon, there was a big "whoa up." Who was the one man certain to make a worse president than Richarn Nixon? That, of course, was our vice president Spiro Agnew. We face the same scene today. Impeaching Cheney (the one man more universally despised than Bush junior) would lead to Bush nominating Cheney's replacement. The replacement of Cheny with a "kinder and gentler" face available among Republicans could lead straight to NC Senator Elizabeth Dole. While Dole has been a lackluster Senator, she has not been especially tainted by the administration's crimes.

But when Dole (or any other nominee) goes before the Senate for confirmation as Cheney's replacement, we must extract from her a pledge of no pardons, no immunity for any member of the administration. We must learn from our failure to get that pledge from Gerry Ford in 1973. The crimes of the Bush/Cheney administration are unpardonable.

John Heuer



Editor,

If I am correct we came to SF 2 years ago for an impeachment rally and here we still are- having another rally April 28th near our home town in Medford Oregon. Two observations- amazing to me that other countries have more people in the streets against Bush than us and how ineffectual most Democrats are as far as impeachment.
So I have figured out that since we can't get people in the streets or civil disobedience going we just keep calling our congresspersons and senators and ask for impeachment. What say you?

Arlene in Applegate, Oregon



Paul,

I read your story and I have to say the fact that you make mention that the disabled people are grandstanding makes me really sad. I went to the meeting of my own volition, without being contacted by any group because I was truly concerned about being able to access the park, not some of it, but all of it because it is a public space. The problem with trying to tailor disability policy to a wide range of people is that everyone's needs are different. For example my needs are going to be significantly different than the gentleman who is an amputee that came to the meeting or people in wheelchairs,ect. Mostly though I don't want to have to wait for a shuttle to take me to the bathroom when I need to go. I have what is called a spastic bladder and it will wait for no tram. Plus as far as I can remember public bathrooms in the park are fairly spread out.Please keep in mind that for most of us in the disability community that the concerns center around basic dignity not political gain, at least not where I stand.

-Sarah



Paul,

Regarding the Column "Landlord Threatens Restraining Order Against Senior Tenant – For Paying Rent" on April 11th, I thought that I read a while back that there is a campaign going on to get Sheriff Michael Hennessey to refuse to carry out these evictions, when they come to him. Do you know if that's true? I would like to see something like this happen. I lived all of my life in San Francisco until 2001, when Imoved to Chico.

Walter Ballin


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