SF PoliticsPosted by sasha at 23 Oct 2006 08:05 am
According to the latest Matier and Ross, Rob Black is leading Chris Daly 37-31. The poll, however, was conducted by the very groups interested in defeating Chris, so it may not be too accurate (not to mention I have to believe that the margin of error must be 5% as it is). But it does show that the hundreds of thousands of dollars big business is pouring into the race is having an effect.
So it is important to help out with the campaign, either through volunteering or goving money.
October 23rd, 2006 at 10:11 am
if anyone has copies of direct mail being sent for or against Daly, Black, et al, I’d love to get a jpg or PDF for this fall’s mail archive…you can email me or go to the site at
http://www.gregdewar.com/political_direct_mail_archive_2006/
and send in anything you get. No one is running for Supervisor where I live, so things are kinda boring.
October 23rd, 2006 at 10:22 am
Hey, Greg, Check out the blog on Chris’s site (daly06.com). One if the first messages has a link to PDFs of a bunch of them. See also the Plumbers’ mail.
October 23rd, 2006 at 11:24 am
Has it ever occurred to you that maybe the residents of D6 are sick and tired of Chris and his BS? Case in point: http://thedalyshow.blogspot.com/
Oh, and this interesting tidbit from SFGate.com:
Seems that all the development Daly helped usher in to the former warehouse district also has brought in a lot more upscale voters who don’t necessarily share Daly’s lefty politics. In fact, a third of the district’s roughly 36,000 voters have turned over since Daly was first elected in 2000, with 3,000 new voters added in the past year alone.
October 23rd, 2006 at 12:52 pm
I submitted a comment to “thedalyshow” this morning and some kind of Blogger glitch sent me a bounced-back copy of a mechanical notification email that was inviting the owner of the site to post or reject my comment. I can therefore report that the owner of “thedalyshow” has or had the address rch427@yahoo.com, which Googles to one Robert Haines, vintage clothing enthusiast.
Mr. Haines has revealed enough off-message idiosyncracies in comments discussions that I do believe he’s acting from real personal conviction, not as some kind of paid political operative. However, I mention this here because I’m wondering if he might be the non-Haaland “Robert” who also makes comments critical of Chris Daly over here.
The thing is, I’m inclined to suspect there are really not very many of us taking the time to comment on the Internet about the District Six election, and the use of aliases by many Daly critics is confusing the issue of how many unpaid critics Chris Daly actually has and how many of those actually live in our district.
October 23rd, 2006 at 1:29 pm
Your paranoia of “the man” is truly astounding.
Most of us who are calling Daly out are not paid “political operatives”. We’re simply concerned citizens who decided to use the blogsphere to voice our opinion.
October 23rd, 2006 at 2:42 pm
Someone using an address belonging to the Sutton Law Firm has already clicked over to my home Web site from this thread. I don’t think that someone was working for free.
October 24th, 2006 at 2:22 pm
Hm. As of mid-morning today the “thedalyshow” blog suddenly lost all its comments and older posts. It’s now displaying only the most recent post (about the Chinese beads business, which I had answered over there with this link.). A pity, as the conversation over there was just starting to get beyond polemics into some more thoughtful discussion.
October 24th, 2006 at 4:15 pm
Speaking of paid operatives (and paranoia): I saw Frank Chu today, walking with his “12 Galaxies” picket sign past the Oracle convention. The back of his sign was an ad for Rob Black.
October 25th, 2006 at 8:38 am
Funny,
All of my coments here have been mysteriously not posted.
Let’s look at the facts Martha. Chris Daly has totally failed our community. He is no progressive out for the little guy. In the big battles my community went though Chris steadfastly refused to meet with us but took time out of his busy schedule to meet with paid lobbyists for the other side (who have coincidentally donated large amounts of money to his very rich campaign).
The reality is that Chris has made plenty of deals with the devil and when faced with the consequences of his choices- a lot of angry constituents- he can only whine that there is some big bogeyman out to get him. Right. The downtown interests he goes on about are donating to his campaign!
I am no paid operative, as I’m sure you would love to believe. I am simply a totally fed up, pissed off long time resident of the district who knows from experience that Chris Daly does not represent my interests.
October 25th, 2006 at 10:32 am
OK, “thedalyshow” is back today. Go figure.
October 25th, 2006 at 3:14 pm
Well, Laura, like other Black-ites you generalize broadly for the sake of rhetoric (”totally failed”), and omit specifics and have nothing to offer.
E.g., What were the “big battles with Your community” and whose community are you speaking for here?
As a member of the “renter community”, I’m worried about what happens if Chris isn’t around. Are you expecting Black to fight for the district’s majority renter population?
Can you imagine Michaela Alioto’s assistant negotiating for the 360 Trinity Plaza renters who would’ve lost their apartments or Rincon Hill’s $120 million community benefits?
I’ve gotten at least 8 expensive negative hit-piece flyers from Black, email I never opted-in for, and as of today, a meet-the-candidate flyer with no indication where it’s from–just a yahoo email address. Now here’s a campaign to believe in!
People may well think you’re a paid operative, because it’s hard to imagine any other justification for such disingenous bile. Don’t feel bad: they’re giving you the benefit of the doubt.
October 25th, 2006 at 4:55 pm
Wow Theo,
For someone who has never met me, or explored my political beliefs or experiences you have certainly made A LOT of assumptions. I am a long time resident of SoMa and have done battle with (for example) an illegal and disruptive business and a developer wanting to build a far too tall and ill designed building on an alleyway. Chris Daly did not help us with the developer of the building, and refused even to meet with the community about the business in spite of many, many requests. He met with the lobbyists instead. He has since taken sizeable campaign contributions from both the developer of the too tall building and the lobbyists for the illegal business. Hardly a politician out for the little guy.
When our community requested he take care of the crack house/ drug den that had moved in to the old Bessie Carmichael School he claimed it was all Park and Rec’s fault and there was nothing he could do. The crack house remained in place for months until a fed up resident of the neighborhood called a press conference. So yes, Theo, he FAILED to accomplish the things I would expect of a district supervisor with the interests of the community in mind.
As for the mailers, my household has now received six glossy mailers from Chris Daly’s very wealthy campaign, exactly equal to the mailers we have received for Black, and far beyond what we have received from Drake(2) or any of the other candidates.
As for your own hostility, I see no reason for it. Why be so defensive?
October 25th, 2006 at 8:52 pm
Laura, you raise more questions than you answer and still offer no arguments to vote for your candidate.
Is it presumptuous to figure you already know that your district supe is not your block’s very own land use attorney?
When you’re battling a building’s height limitations and design, you go to Planning. If it’s a conditional use situation, you can appeal Planning’s decision to the supes, but not otherwise.
As for the “illegal and disruptive business”, that would be what now? The supe’s not the cops and not the D.A. As someone who doesn’t live on your block, I’d hope you not waste our district supe’s time.
1. Are you a renter?
2. What possible reason do you have to think Michaela Alioto’s assistant would help you curb overreaching development in SOMA?
October 25th, 2006 at 9:01 pm
From an unpaid operative in District 6
Daly report from Tehama Street.
Daily, I am overwelmed by the odor of urine wafting from every doorway on my block. Daily, I listen to an argument between my 3 and 5 year old sons as to whether what they are seeing is “person poop” or “dog poop”; this argument is usually won by the first child who points out the presence of a nearby soiled napkin and shouts “dogs don’t wipe their hineys! “. Daily, I must navigate my way around “street camping” as I leave my house. Daily, I must tell the kids to ignore the homeless men yelling at them on the way to school. Daily, I tell my children not to touch anything on the street, sidewalk, or even in our flowerbed, as it is filthy. Daily, I have what has come to be known in our family as the “needle talk”; this is the one where I point out to my 3 and 5 year olds, the used hypodermics in the tree wells and try to explain why they could die if they touch them. Daily, I attempt to come up with an understandable explaination, for my children, of exactly what it is that the drug users and prostitutes are doing. Daily, I continue to hope for a moment of the overworked DPW and police department’s time, so I call to report what I see.
I am sick and tired of Daly…….I will be voting for Rob Black!!!!
Allison
Mother of three, ages 5,3, and 1.5 years
Tehama Street
October 25th, 2006 at 9:59 pm
Laura, I live on Rausch St., probably very close to you. When you say “illegal and disruptive” are you referring to one of the places that has live music, such as BrainWash? Or maybe the former Up and Down Club, now known as “Eight,” next door to Cassidy’s? I do hope it’s not BrainWash you mean, as the Brain has been the soul of this part of SoMa for some time, and our own laundry is heading for spin cycle over there as I write. I agree sometimes the Up and Down Club got too loud and rowdy but have you found the new business there to be troublesome as well?
About your developer problem, we had a prolonged series of negotiations with George Hauser over here (now thankfully resolved) but are you talking about somebody else?
Also, do you mind explaining what or when this press conference was about the former school building? I actually hadn’t heard about there being a “crack house” problem over there — just knew that some people had cars broken into on the alleys SE of Seventh and Folsom between the old school building and the new one.
I’m also surprised to hear you have received six Daly mailers. I think we’ve gotten only one over here.
Allison on Tehama — (1) You are aware, aren’t you, that Chris Daly isn’t the police chief, the DPW chief, or the mayor? And (2) Are you sure all these things happen every day? I think you and I must be near neighbors too. Thanks to all this “pee and poo” campaigning, I’ve been paying attention for the last couple days to the number of times I’ve had to step over anything of the sort. After several errands, including walks to Rainbow Grocery and the Fox Plaza post office, my grand total is twice.
October 25th, 2006 at 10:56 pm
…and we’re just back from making a discovery while changing laundry to the dryer at BrainWash.
The BrainWash magazine racks often contain different stuff around the time of an important local election, so I took a look. And there I found October issues of a 32-page newsprint magazine called “The Loin’s Mouth” that has never before appeared in BrainWash during the ten years we have been washing laundry there. The magazine contains — whaddayaknow! — an interview with Rob Black, and at the very end of the rather flattering four-page interview writeup, a little white sticker appears reading, “For more information on Rob Black, please visit www.robblack2006.com.”
I was also intrigued to find a column on p. 15 by one Colin Hussey that begins with an angry-sounding open letter critical of Chris Daly. The illustrating photograph for the column is a black-and-white version of this photo — that is, one of the very same photographs posted by “rkchamberlain2″ on the Flickr gallery set up by the “safasoma” people. (For a review of the “safasoma” anti-Daly gambit, which insulted SoMa voters’ intelligence with anonymous pre-stamped postcards, see this previous leftinsf thread.)
FWIW, this same “Loin’s Mouth” publication has a web site but the online content there seems to be from a previous issue.
…and won’t somebody please advise the pro-Black independent expenditure people that South of Market and the Tenderloin are different neighborhoods? I realize that from their heights we all look alike down here (rabblerabblerabblerabble…), but they only would have needed one or two native informants to tell them why it’s poor localization practice to ask the diverse BrainWash clientele South of Market to identify with slumming yuppies in the Tenderloin.
October 25th, 2006 at 11:51 pm
I agree that having to walk through filth and waste is offensive, and is vital issue that needs an immediate remedy, but D6 doesn’t have a monopoly on the issue!
Where is your Mayor? In 2003 everyday I walked to work, housed in the same building as the former Newsom for Mayor HQ, and every day I gingerly stepped around waste on the ground and watched for the pigeons overhead.. I always resented Newsom’s lack of action, once elected, especially as it was occurring right at his HQ, so he had to know about it . But then I remembered, he was whisked into the garage, straight through to HQ , without every seeing the filth on the streets. That is the kind of mayor he is, isolated from the ordinary citizens and their everyday issues…
Then I see the city wants to clean up graffiti?! I say, no one has to worry about getting sick, or tracking graffiti in their home, so if the city wants to clean up, and can’t do it all, I say skip the graffiti, and take care of the sidewalks and the pigeons.
To blame Daly for a problem that is a city wide issue that needs a city wide solution, even Pier-Alioto’s district is like walking through a doggy toilet, (why do people walk dogs but think they do not clean up after them?),is just a convenient way to shift Newsom’s responsibility onto a supervisor who has consistently worked very hard for the citizens.
October 26th, 2006 at 12:47 am
Hi Martha,
I have done many a load of laundry at brainwash, and have no complaints about them or any of the bars and clubs in the neighborhood. No, this particular business was far more disruptive.
They were required to notify neighbors of their plans to open and then go through public hearings with planning to get a conditional use permit. They were a controversial operation and they knew it, so they refused to notify neighors and refused to submit to the necessary hearings. We went to our district supervisor, in addition to Planning, and requested help. Seems like a pretty appropriate use of my supervisor’s time to me. However, Daly refused to meet with us. He apparently had ties to the business owners and their friends. I would expect that a quick phone call to planning enforcement or the city attorney would be a reasonable action from a man who claims to be here to protect the community from well monied and ill intentioned outsiders. Alas, we received no such help or attention.
Instead, according to several sources, including the business owners themselves, the fabulous Chris offered them a nudge-nudge wink- wink on the enforcement issue. The community was forced to hire a lawyer (mostly pro bono, thank god) and take it to courts to shut them down. It was expensive, time consuming and extremely harrowing for everyone living here.
I cannot tell you the sense of betrayal I felt, as someone who had previously believed in our system of government. It was a clear lesson to me that it is all about money and connections. The business owners had both and we had neither, so we were screwed completely. There was Chris Daly, of all people- Chris Daly!! pandering to a well funded, high profile lobby with staff lawyers while refusing to meet with neighbors. Is that the guy we elected?
As for the poop and needles.. I regularly visit the communtiy garden near Brainwash, and I can’t imagine what route you take if you have only come across two piles of poop in a few days. You must only be counting the ones that are still steaming ;)Or perhaps you don’t walk around with young children. Since they are closer to the ground and more interested in goop than the rest of us they seem to be experts at locating the stuff. Oh, and the bright orange needle caps are another big draw. If you tell me you never see those either, I’m moving in with you.
BTW, if you frequent Brainwash how did you NOT notice the drug den at the old Bessie? It was a very big deal for months and months.
Theo, when dealing with an out of scale building that has no low income units, one might assume that the man who campaigns on a “stick it to the developers, I’m all about housing” platform might be interested. The building was also precedent setting and established new height limits for alleys with broad planning and quality of life implications for all of SoMa. What do you think a Supervisor’s role is exactly?
And I don’t recall mentioning who “my candidate” is, nor am I making any attempt to campaign for anyone. I am simply expressing my discontent with Daly. Nice assumptions though.
October 26th, 2006 at 1:36 am
Well, anyway I’m glad to hear you’re not an opponent of BrainWash. I understand you may prefer not to disclose the name of the business that was a problem for you, so I’ll stop guessing now, but it’s kind of hard to look into the charges you make without knowing who was involved. Dunno how I missed the Bessie Carmichael drug problem. Probably by living to the west of Brainwash and getting the general feeling that it wasn’t safe to park between the new and old school sites and consequently not parking over there.
Sure, we see stuff on the sidewalk, little orange caps included, and occasional needles, but not all the time. I suppose if you have small children each such moment becomes more memorable, but I really don’t think it’s all that frequent.
BTW, I’ve posted images from that “Loin’s Mouth” publication over here.
October 26th, 2006 at 8:14 am
Yeh Martha, the battle with that business was incredibly unplesant. We had the law squarely on our side and still we couldn’t get anything done. All respect I had for Chris Daly as our protector was dashed when I came face to face with the reality of who he is. I’ll be at the park opening on Friday. If you are there I can give you the details in person. Your hair will stand on end.
October 26th, 2006 at 10:49 am
Thank you for mentioning the park opening. I did not see or hear about any announcements of the event and could not find any sign of it online. A Rec & Park lady just returned my call though & said it’s 3-5 p.m. tomorrow with a barbecue and activities. She’s forwarding me an announcement that I will post on my site and circulate to neighbors over here.
Out of curiosity, what circles have we failed to travel in that we didn’t hear about this event?
October 26th, 2006 at 11:18 am
Oh Martha….we must not be near neighbors at all if you disbelieve the frequency and severity of the encounters I have on Tehama Street. In an effort to avoid hyperbole, I described only those occurances that are commonplace. You suggest in your comment to Laura that having small children makes these moments more memorable….what I described is so frequent that it ceased to be memorable at all.
However, here are some of the more memorable moments from my Tehama Street log. There was the day my husband left for work to find his car window broken. While examining the damage he unknowingly stepped in a pile of human feces. When he came back in the house to get some cardboard and tape to patch up so he could get to his job, he tracked the filth into the house. I’m not sure if this is memorable because we actually had human fecal matter ground into our rug or because I had a crawling infant at the time. How about the time a friend came to visit and I asked her where she had parked…her reply “next to a pile of poo”, to which another visiting friend replied, “oh good, you got parking on the block”. And then there was the afternoon I spotted a couple engaging in a sex act on the sidewalk across the street from my house. I suggested that they take their activity elsewhere. I guess they decided to play ping pong instead because I saw them entering the Gene Friends Rec Center.
Two weeks ago, I was out with some Mommys and kids when I saw a guy getting ready to urinate on a tree. I asked him not to and suggested he use the public restrooms at the above mentioned rec. center. He became belligerant and told me that he had a right to “piss” wherever he wanted. When I pointed out that in fact he didn’t, he threatened to break my neck.
A couple of highlights from this week: the men’s underpants filled with poop in a treewell and the bus stop that had been used as a toilet. The bus stop was especially memorable for a number of reasons: there was a trail of little poop squirts leading to the main deposit on the seat, there was a copious amount of soiled napkins around it, and the bus stop itself was likely to be used by some of the attendees of this weeks Oracle conference.
And yes, I do know that Chris Daly is not the mayor, police chief, or DPW director. I also know that he voted to block a ban on public urination and defecation and he has indicated that he doesn’t want the SOMA area to be “too clean”.
October 26th, 2006 at 12:11 pm
Laura, thanks so much for mentioning the park opening. For interested parties, Rec and Park did send me a copy of a very nicely designed official announcement poster that I have posted on my own Web site, whence anybody wishing to spread the word is welcome to download it as far as I’m concerned. Strangely, this sign does not seem to have been circulated very widely. I am not even sure if the press have been told.
So I just printed out a few copies of the poster and took them around the neighborhood, where I had an odd series of conversations. It emerged first that the staff at BrainWash had not known about the park opening either & I was the first to supply them with any publicity about the event. Next I discovered that the park site itself, where contractors are busily preparing for tomorrow’s opening, has no actual sign anywhere saying that tomorrow there will be a grand opening for the park. The contractors gave me permission to put up my own 8-1/2 by 11 copy of the sign on the fence, so now there is a small bit of an announcement on the site saying that tomorrow there will be a Grand Opening.
Maybe this is just my suspicious nature, but I have to wonder if somebody somewhere doesn’t want it widely understood that a nice new park is about to open in District Six.
October 26th, 2006 at 12:50 pm
Actually Martha,
The opening of the park is being put on by Daly’s office. It is happening before the park is really ready so that he can claim it to be done before the election. He intentionally did not publicize it widely because those of us who have been involved with the park planning for years might actually call him on the fact that it is over one year late(it was supposed to open last year- but was delayed so that a crack house could take up residence) or that the “family friendly” budget he claims to have put through failed to include the park staff we begged for in order to make sure the crack house doesn’t return. They publicized the opening only to their own inner circle of devotees who will show up and pretend that he is solely responsible for the park and that plans for it were not underway before he took office, or that after he took office the delays did not grow in length and severity.
I say publicize away. You might actually get some real residents there, not just the green bead wearing Daly worshipers.
So you are right, my dear. There is a “conspiracy” here. It just isn’t the one you thought.
BTW, if you are free tonight, there is a fundraiser for the park at the End Up from 6-10pm.
http://theendup.com/events/special_stan.html
Tickets are $15 for munchies , DJ Ron/e and a good chance to party with your neighbors. Please come out and support us! And spread the word on your travels.
October 26th, 2006 at 1:37 pm
Well, that’s certainly another spin, but whatever the political reasons, it simply seems wrong that this free public municipal event wasn’t publicized even to those of us who are near neighbors. Please feel free to download the poster from my site and circulate it. I’ll take around a few more copies from here this afternoon.
May I ask how you heard about the event yourself?
October 26th, 2006 at 2:16 pm
Martha,
You may not agree, but, in my opinion, two poos is two too many. How many do you think is ok?
Jim
October 26th, 2006 at 2:46 pm
You may not agree, but, in my opinion, two people without housing is too many. How many do you think is OK?
Which problem would you like to work on first?
October 26th, 2006 at 4:07 pm
Martha,
Why must we choose one issue. Don’t you think a competent supervisor can handle both issues at once?
October 26th, 2006 at 4:58 pm
To Allison,
I’m a little troubled…could these scenarios you describe truly mean that Care Not Cash is…(dare I say it?)not WORKING? Surely you can’t lay the issue of poverty and homelessness on Chris Daly? Though it does seem that this has become the handy way of poking jabs at him.
But for the sake of argument, let’s assume you really do think Chris is at least a contributing factor to this problem. Are you holding Mayor Newsom at least as responsible, if not more so, for these same problems? Have DPW, the cops, and other relevant departments been accountable? To hear you say it, but for Chris’ actions, all would be well in D6.
In fact, D6 has always had more than its share of the impoverished of SF. Sometimes it has gotten better, sometimes worse. Yet, political forces never seem to tire of playing political football with this issue.
Yet, at least I’ve witnessed Chris trying to address some of the poverty in his district. He’s tried to house people, keep housing affordable, create jobs, and address the needs of seniors and youth.
These activities might not have happened on your block, or happened directly to you, but please don’t diminish the real accomplishments or impact they’ve had.
October 27th, 2006 at 4:30 pm
So if I understand correctly, to Daly supporters, Chris is responsible for everything good in the district and the Mayor/Cops/DPW/Park&Rec are responsible for everything bad. Does the fact that SEIU (DPW and Park & Rec, only 40% of whom live in the city at all) has no bigger champion than Daly figure into anything? I’m mad at the mayor for not doing enough, but at least he seems to be trying. Daly seems to be advocating for city employees who aren’t doing the job for d6 while Daly’s supporters are blaming the problems on d6 on those same Daly loving city employees. So who supports the actual residents? I’d go with Black.
October 27th, 2006 at 7:08 pm
Re: the poll, it occurs to me that any poll reaching only D6 voters who have ground-line telephones is necessarily going to skew posh.
October 28th, 2006 at 7:21 pm
Dan,
I take issue with your criticisms of DPW.
Since Newsom’s election and the hiring of Mohammed Neru as head of DPW, I’ve noticed a significant improvement in DPW’s efforts to keep the City clean, not only in D6 (where my gf lives), but in my own D5. I think DPW street cleaners have been doing a much better job and that they have a stronger presence now than they did under Willie.
I think with the creation of 28-Clean and an overall improvement in DPW, the mayor’s done a good job on that front.
I’ve had trouble getting them to keep on top of the crap on Capp Street, but after calling 28-Clean (and writing down the confirmation number–that’s key for follow up), they did get the sidewalk repaired and have come by with a power hose. Call 28-Clean. Report the problem. Get the confirmation number. Call back again. Ask for a supervisor.
That’s how the system works.
I disagree with the mayor on many things, but I think one of his worst problems is his arrogant staff. Twice in the past year, I’ve called his office with a question. Both times they asked if I was journalist. When I told them no, they brushed me off and never answered my question. That’s so transparently bad. Jennifer Petrucione’s the worst of them in my limited experience.
October 30th, 2006 at 8:44 pm
I’ve lived in D6 for several years. I remember when all the live work lofts were going up and the dot com boom and eventual bust - seeing all the land grabs and condos going up all around us and also in the Mission. Chris could certainly work harder to hold the Mayor and police accountable to the issues of public safety and health issues in the streets - even his critiques would agree that he definitely isn’t the Mayor’s “boy”, like Alioto Pier and Rob Black. The devil is always in the details. who is behind the candidates - it’ a good indication. Rob Black - Newsom, Alioto Pier, Plumbers Union, big dowtown interests such as the Golden Gate Restaurant Ass. Chris Daly - Leno, Democratic Club, labor, progressive organizations. People are capitalizing on those issues that are real for people and push people’s buttons.
What has Black actually done? do you really know what someone will be like when in office? Rob Black is a republican lite with a democratic ticket. His own party didn’t endorse him over Chris.
Even pictures in the mailings when comparing rob to Daly accomplishments are stark and the cowboy hat gimick? Give me a break - Black’s campaign message must think we’re all idiots.