San Francisco Public Press (https://www.sfpublicpress.org/2021/03/)
Federal officials are considering a proposal to allow a developer to tear down and rebuild a 20-year-old public housing complex in the Western Addition — a plan that does not address residents’ demands for repairs to health and safety issues in the current structures. » Read more
Scanning the street as he walked, Forrest Liu, a group leader with the Chinatown Safety Patrol, stopped occasionally to scrutinize a car or a person. The protocol he had laid out for the handful of volunteers walking with him that day was “stop, observe, record, report.” » Read more
Some students are headed back to classrooms in April, under an agreement between the San Francisco school district and unions. The youngest students are going back first, in a hybrid schedule that will expand in-person learning through the month. The reopening plan includes safety measures to protect against COVID-19, such as ventilation, cleaning, masking and spacing out desks. » Read more
Non Plus Ultra, an event company that leases the Palace of Fine Arts, Pier 70 and the Old Mint, is under fire from employees who allege it filed fraudulent unemployment claims, harassed and bullied staff and fired them when they confronted leadership, according to a lawsuit filed March 1 in San Francisco Superior Court. » Read more
In late February, the City College of San Francisco Board of Trustees voted to approve sending notices of potential layoffs that, if implemented, would reduce the amount the college spends on full time salaries by 30%. City College says the existence of the college is at stake, and it is facing a projected budget shortfall of $33 million. » Read more
ProPublica, a national nonprofit investigative journalism organization, has selected San Francisco Public Press reporter Nuala Bishari as one of three fellows for its Local Reporting Network. Bishari and the Public Press’ editorial team will work with a ProPublica senior editor to co-publish her local accountability stories about housing and homelessness for a year, starting April 1. ProPublica will also provide expertise in data, research, engagement, video and design. Other newsrooms participating in the Local Reporting Network this year are Open Vallejo, a Bay Area nonprofit startup, and Outlier Media in Detroit. This group of projects is made possible by a grant from Knight Foundation.
The only kind of fighter jets Mellay Menelik had heard before was the Blue Angels performing aerobatics over her native San Francisco. Last November, shortly after celebrating the harvest coming in at a farm she runs in Ethiopia’s Tigray region, she heard a similar sound, but this time, the roar of military planes was “debilitating.” » Read more
Looking back on a year of responding to the coronavirus pandemic, Dr. Kim Rhoads and Dr. Carina Marquez named two key components to improving public health, now and in a post-pandemic future: Prevention and community engagement. Rhoads and Marquez, who have been helped establish neighborhood testing and vaccination centers, reflected on a year of pandemic response with “Civic.” » Read more
A regional journalism organization recognized freelance investigative reporter Seth Rosenfeld with a freedom of information award this week for his Public Press series exposing secrecy and lax state regulation of the burgeoning ride-hailing industry.
Rosenfeld spent five months in late 2019 and early 2020 digging into the cozy relationship between the California Public Utilities Commission and the companies it purportedly regulated, Uber and Lyft. » Read more
A new city agency, founded in the wake of rising concerns about the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing’s ability to house the city’s homeless population, aims to bring 2,000 people into permanent shelter by the end of the year.
The Office of Housing Opportunities will be a division of the COVID Command Center, shifting responsibilities away from the homelessness department. » Read more