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San Francisco’s juvenile hall was scheduled to close last year. So why are kids still locked up there?

May 19, 2022 by www.sfchronicle.com Leave a Comment

Three years ago, the Board of Supervisors made the landmark decision to shut down its juvenile hall by the end of 2021, becoming the first major city in the nation to do so. Yet the Youth Guidance Center, as it’s officially known, remains open.

The move came in the wake a Chronicle report that showed a dramatic drop in serious youth crime that had left the state’s juvenile halls almost vacant. In its place, supevisors pledged to stop incarcerating kids and instead create home-like rehabilitative centers, including a secure site for those who pose a public safety risk. But so far, no site has been identified and no firm timeline for closure exists.

Supervisors will discuss the stalled plan at a committee hearing Thursday.

An average of just 14 juveniles per day were kept in custody in San Francisco in 2021 — at an annual cost of about $1.1 million each— inside a facility built to hold as many as 150 people.

Supervisors were supposed to approve final plans six months prior to the closure but that didn’t happen. The juvenile hall closure task force submitted a report to the board outlining recommendations on processing juvenile offenders, including possible locations for a secure yet “non-institutional” facility.

Yet juvenile hall is still housing a veritable handful of youth inmates with no firm plan for closure.

Supervisor Shamann Walton, who authored the closure legislation with Supervisor Hillary Ronen, said he wouldn’t set a “make believe timeline” for closing juvenile hall but insisted that plans are moving forward.

“We are still committed to closing juvenile hall,” he said. “But there are some real obstacles.”

The hearing and extended delay come at a time when San Francisco’s commitment to criminal justice reform is being tested. Concern about crime in San Francisco is running high, despite data that shows a complex picture , and a variety of polls show that most San Franciscans support the effort to recall District Attorney Chesa Boudin, who they believe has been too lenient.

The 2019 decision to close juvenile hall — with a 10-1 vote — came on the heels of a national conversation about the school-to-prison pipeline and how to bring down incarceration in California. Supervisors talked about the trauma inflicted on young offenders who spend a typical day sleeping in locked cells, their bed a thin upholstered mat atop a concrete platform. City officials deemed this type of detention for children morally unacceptable and ineffective at rehabilitating young people. They also decried the exorbitant cost.

Nikita Saini, Ronen’s aide, said the slowdown in the closure plans shouldn’t be seen as a lack of commitment.

“We’re just really trying to weigh everything,” she said, “but as far as shutting down juvenile hall, we want to make that a reality.”

The biggest holdup, she said, is finding a secure, locked facility for juvenile offenders that satisfies both reform advocates and state corrections department requirements.

“We want something that is non-institutional rather than a place of isolation,” she said. “But it’s hard to find that and meet requirements. You can’t just find a house in San Francisco.”

For instance, she said, the state requires 8-foot wide hallways — much wider than the average width of a home hall.

Plans to shutter juvenile hall, which require court approval, have been slowed by COVID as well.

Walton said the next steps, which the committee is likely to recommend Thursday, include directing the city’s real estate department to identify acceptable locations for secure housing and directing the creation of support programs for children and families identified in the task force report.

That would include the creation of a wellness advocate and the city’s Department of Children, Youth and Their Families work with the Juvenile Probation Department to change the way juvenile hall is operated.

“At the end of the day, there are some issues we are not fully in control of,” Walton said, citing the need for court approval. “But we are not backsliding.”

Michael Cabanatuan (he/him) is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @ctuan

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San Francisco faces $1.3 billion shortfall in quest to meet state housing goals

May 19, 2022 by www.sfchronicle.com Leave a Comment

San Francisco would need an additional $1.3 billion in order to meet the state-mandated affordable housing production requirements set to kick in next year, according to a report from the Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development.

That’s just the start: The number swells each year, topping out at $2.4 billion by 2029.

While San Francisco is still working on its “housing element” — a housing production plan every California city is required to complete every eight years — city planners face a daunting task: how to create 82,000 new homes in the eight years between 2023 and 2030, including 32,000 that are affordable to very low-income and low-income families. The housing requirements assigned to every city are known as Regional Needs Housing Allocation, or RHNA.

The looming affordable housing funding gap was the topic of a hearing Thursday at the Board of Supervisors Government Audit and Oversite Committee.

At the hearing, committee Chairman Dean Preston questioned whether the city was doing enough to prioritize homes for working class residents in a city where just 7% can afford market rate rents — which reach into several thousand per month.

“What is clear is the existing strategies are not going to get us there,” he said. “In best case scenario, with traditional approaches, we chip away toward our goals but we certainly don’t get anywhere near them. New tools are needed.”

While San Francisco produces more affordable housing than any other city of comparable size — it currently has 11,000 units in its pipeline — its production of market-rate housing far outpaced its affordable housing output in the current eight-year RHNA cycle. The city built 48% of its affordable goal and 151% of it market rate goal.

The city is currently facing stern headwinds on both the creation of market rate and low-income housing.

On the market rate side, development applications have slowed to a trickle as for-profit builders have postponed or canceled projects because they don’t work financially. Market rate projects generated $208 million for affordable housing fees in the last five years.

On the subsidized side, soaring construction costs have added millions of dollars in costs to many projects, which puts San Francisco at a disadvantage when competing against other California cities for affordable housing tax credits and bonds.

Lydia Ely, deputy director of the Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development, said that the city has little or no money beyond the projects that are already in the planning or construction phase.

She said that San Francisco is “disadvantaged” by a 2020 change in the way that California divides tax credits and affordable housing bonds, the two programs that pay for most low-income housing construction. Before 2020 San Francisco could count on receiving the OK for all of its bond and tax credit applications. Under the new system, the city is losing out to cities that have far cheaper construction costs and land value.

She called the changes “the biggest threat to our production.”

“Those sources used to come as a right, over the counter,” said Ely. “Right now they are highly competitive and over-subscribed.”

“Even though we are robustly pursuing all the local sources — we cannot expect those sources to grow significantly, its just too volatile and the unknowns are too unknown,” said Ely. “Beyond the fact that we need more we can’t anticipate what those sources will be.”

She said construction costs have risen 25% in the past two years and every project that “is starting construction is needing a couple of million more” from the city.

Preston used the hearing to advocate that the city earmark all of the money generated by Prop I for affordable housing. Prop I, which Preston sponsored and which voters approved in 2020, increased transfer tax on properties over $10 million.

Preston said that that voters “went and created $170 million of annual revenue general fund for affordable housing yet we seem to be in a fight every year.”

Jeff Cretan, a spokesman for Mayor London Breed, said that Prop I is a general fund tax “not dedicated to any specific purpose by the voters.”

“The mayor and the board of supervisors make decisions how to allocate the general fund during the budget process, which kicks off in two weeks when the mayor introduces her proposed pudget,” he said.

J.K. Dineen is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @sfjkdineen

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Prime Minister meets Vietnamese in San Francisco

May 18, 2022 by en.vietnamplus.vn Leave a Comment

Prime Minister meets Vietnamese in San Francisco hinh anh 1 Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh meets Vietnamese in San Francisco . (Photo: VNA)

San Francisco (VNA) – Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh has lauded overseas Vietnamese ( OVs ) in general and those in the US in particular for their contributions to the homeland as well as the Vietnam-US ties.

At a meeting with representatives of the Vietnamese community in San Francisco on May 17 (local time) as part of his trip to the US, Chinh noted that OVs have engaged in 376 projects in the form of foreign direct investment (FDI) with total registered capital amounting to 1.72 billion USD.

Remittances to Vietnam exceed 10 billion USD each year, hitting 12.5 billion US D last year, he said, stressing that the capital has played a role in the country’s socio-economic development.

The leader reiterated that the Party and the State have always regarded OVs as an integral part and an impulse for national development, which has been reflected in the institutionalisation of resolutions, directives and conclusions on OVs issues in legal regulations.

The PM asked Vietnamese abroad to preserve and promote the Vietnamese culture and make more contributions to the homeland, and urged representative diplomatic agencies to pay more attention to their material and spiritual life.

Chinh also commended OVs for their contributions during the combat against the COVID-19 pandemic at home.

He used the occasion to brief the expats on orientations, targets, solutions and achievements of Vietnam after 35 years of Doi moi (reform), as well as the country’s external relations, including the Vietnam-US ties and the ASEAN-US relations.

Expats expressed their delight at the socio-economic achievements Vietnam has recorded over the past time, especially in the COVID-19 fight, post-pandemic socio-economic recovery and international integration.

They raised proposals on streamlining investment procedures to make it easier for them to contribute to the nation.

In this regard, the PM assigned relevant agencies to acquire the opinions and take appropriate solutions.

This is the third meeting between the PM and Vietnamese in the US during his week-long trip.

Later the same day, PM Chinh and his entourage left San Francisco for Hanoi, concluding his trip to the US to attend the ASEAN-US Special Summit and make visits to the US and the United Nations./.

VNA

Filed Under: Uncategorized Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh, OVs, San Francisco, US, FDI, Vietnam, VietnamPlus, Vietnam news, Politics, ..., Vietnamese Consulate in San Francisco, vietnamese food san francisco, vietnamese embassy in san francisco

San Francisco Firefighters Who Refused Virus Vaccine Being Axed

May 19, 2022 by www.breitbart.com Leave a Comment

Even though there were medical and religious objections included in San Francisco’s coronavirus vaccine mandate policy, officials did not allow them when reviewing the cases of 17 firefighters. Thirteen have already been fired and the hearings for the others are proving contentious.

Former firefighter Michael Kricken, who already contracted the virus, had his hearing in March before the Fire Commission.

“God gave me natural immunity already,” Kricken said, adding it was his “God-given right to decide what I put and not put in my body.”

Kricken has been on unpaid leave since October 14 and was fired on March 16.

Ken Cleaveland resigned as fire commissioner in February, according to the San Francisco Chronicle .

“I just can’t go through this torture anymore,” Cleaveland said, adding that the stories from firefighters who were losing their livelihoods were “heartbreaking.”

“Despite testimony from families, pastors and others, city officials did not exempt any of the firefighters,” the Chronicle reported. “Ultimately, Cleaveland became frustrated with colleagues and department heads who refused to budge on the health order.”

“If we had a little more flexibility, I would still be on the Fire Commission today,” Cleaveland said.

The left-wing Chronicle spun its reporting to cast doubt on the firefighters:

Currents of politically charged vaccine hesitancy appear to run deep within a segment of San Francisco’s firefighters. Last June, 103 of them, and 89 other city employees, submitted identical letters to the city’s human resources department, rebuffing the vaccine mandate and suggesting it infringed on their “God-given and constitutionally secured rights.”

While such hearings normally take place behind closed doors, many firefighters have elected to let the public participate, and some sympathizers have posted videos of the meetings on social media or in blogs that present the terminated firefighters as martyr-like figures. In these videos and in minutes supplied by the commission, public speakers have recited scripture, invoked the Nuremberg trials, and cited unsubstantiated theories about laboratories in Wuhan, China, or the “racial specificity” of proteins in the coronavirus.

The Chronicle included comments from other firefighters.

“You guys are all puppets, and — and you’re answering to your slave masters, and you’re committing horrible atrocities against these people,” Michael Crotty told the commission on March 30. “Think about that. You sold us out for money. You took away our careers.”

Firefighter Jessica Beers wore a T-shirt at her hearing that bore the slogan “Let’s Go Brandon,” which the Chronicle described as “acknowledged disparagement of President Biden.”

Next on the coronavirus chopping block could be paramedics who miss the June 30 deadline for a virus booster shot.

Follow Penny Starr on Twitter

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Leader of anti-abortion rights group accused of stalking doctor who provides abortions in San Francisco

May 19, 2022 by www.cbsnews.com Leave a Comment

A Los Angeles man is facing charges after he and a group of others allegedly “invaded a health care clinic and stalked a doctor who provides health care, including abortions, to women,” the San Francisco District Attorney’s office announced Thursday. Aaron Jonathan Hurley is a leader of Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising, an anti-abortion rights group, officials said.

Hurley is charged with felony stalking, misdemeanor obstructing freedom of access to a clinic, two misdemeanor vandalism charges, misdemeanor trespassing with intent to interfere and misdemeanor interfering with a business, the district attorney’s office said in a statement.

Video surveillance from March 13 allegedly shows Hurley and several others covering a statue at the San Francisco General Hospital in fake blood and “stickers with the doctor’s name on it.” They also allegedly left handwritten notes that said “harvested” and “sold $500.”

A day later, a woman showed up at the Women’s Options Center and allegedly pretended to need care in order to gain access to the clinic. When a nurse approached the door to talk to her, Hurley and several others ran into the clinic, the statement said. They filmed patients and staff and allegedly tried to “barge into operating rooms,” the district attorney’s office said.

Hurley also allegedly entered a clinic where the victim works, chanting the doctor’s name and saying “We know who you are, we know what you do.” The district attorney’s office said the doctor, patients and other staff were concerned for their safety.

That night, Hurley and others went to the doctor’s house and put a sticker on the front door that said “a killer lives in your neighborhood,” the statement said. They also allegedly placed the stickers at neighbors’ houses.

“Flyers were also distributed, displaying a QR code that led to a website that specifically named the doctor, provided false, inflammatory claims about abortion procedures, and attacked the doctor for providing abortion services,” the district attorney’s office said. “Flyers were also placed around the doctor’s neighborhood.”

Hurley was scheduled to be arraigned Thursday afternoon.

Authorities cited another suspect, identified by the district attorney’s office as Kristen Turner. An arrest warrant is pending for another suspect in the incidents, identified as Lauren Brice Handy.

“Reproductive rights are under attack across the country—and here in San Francisco,” San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin said in the statement. “My office will unconditionally protect all medical providers and women who exercise their constitutional right to seek abortion or other reproductive health care. Make no mistake: anyone who harasses, threatens, or interferes in any way with the constitutionally protected work of doctors and staff —who heroically provide care— will be held accountable. We will ensure that all patients and medical providers are safe.”

The announcement from the San Francisco District Attorney’s office comes just days after the Department of Homeland Security sent out a memo to state and local law enforcement agencies warning of an increased risk of violent threats in the wake of the leaked Supreme Court draft opinion that could overturn Roe v. Wade .

The bulletin warned of an emerging “threat to government, religious, and reproductive healthcare personnel and facilities and ideological opponents,” as well as social media threats that discussed “burning down or storming the U.S. Supreme Court and murdering Justices and their clerks, members of Congress, and lawful demonstrators.”

The investigation into the string of incidents in San Francisco is ongoing, the district attorney’s office said.

    In:

  • Abortion
  • San Francisco
Sophie Reardon

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Sophie Reardon is a News Editor at CBS News. Reach her at [email protected]

Filed Under: Uncategorized Abortion, San Francisco, san diego to san francisco, San Francisco and San Diego, san francisco san francisco, abortion rights, san francisco to san jose, anti abortion, Anti abortion law, Rights of accused, internet providers san francisco, Constitutional Rights of Accused

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