News
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Arizona and public smoking feel the heat in San Francisco

04.30.2010
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This week San Francisco sought to outlaw a few things: doing business with Arizona and smoking in public places. Last Friday Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer signed into law SB 1070, a measure that would require immigrants to carry documents verifying their immigration status. It also gives police officers the authority to question a person on their citizenship based on reasonable suspicion that they might be in this country illegally. In response to the signing, the San Francisco Chronicle on Wednesday reported on a call for a boycott of Arizona by San Francisco politicians. Proposed and supported by City Attorney Dennis Herrerra and members of the Board of Supervisors, the boycott calls for an end of all business with the State of Arizona and to all city business with Arizona-based companies. Supervisor David Campos told the Chronicle, "We want to send a message [that] there are consequences when you target a whole people."
On Monday, NBC Bay Area reported on new anti-smoking rules that went into effect in San Francisco.

Education
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Oakland teachers and families’ one-day strike (photo gallery)

04.29.2010
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Oakland teachers and families picketed outside schools Thursday. According to various reports, few students attended school.
Click a photo to view the  full screen gallery.

Joyce Baker, a music teacher in Oakland, plays drums with Oakland Unified School District music teachers, during the one-day strike at Frank Ogawa Plaza. » Read more

Public Safety
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Asians denounce suspected hate crimes

04.28.2010
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Hundreds of Asian Americans joined city supervisors and Mayor Gavin Newsom at a rally Tuesday to call for safer neighborhoods after a rash of attacks against Asians, with much of the blame being focused on African Americans.
Newsom promised a $100,000 reward for finding the youths who assaulted and fatally injured Huan Chen on Jan. » Read more

Arts & Culture
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Banksy street art pops up around town

04.26.2010
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British graffiti artist Banksy has been leaving his mark around San Francisco, including a rat that appeared this morning on the side of the Red Victorian Cafe on Haight Street.
Banksy, who keeps his identity a closely guarded secret, has placed his street art in cities around the world. » Read more

News
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San Francisco gives Web users a peek at lobbyists’ work

04.26.2010
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San Francisco has taken a big step toward shedding light on the dealings of lobbyists with local lawmakers, by taking information that was once relegated to filing cabinets and putting them up on the Web for everyone to see.
But the site, completed this year by an outside firm after local officials called for greater access to these documents, still has some bugs after months of active development. » Read more

News
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BART giveth, Muni taketh away

04.23.2010
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As Muni strives to tighten its belt with the recently proposed San Francisco transit budget, BART aims to please with a daily $5 discount and decreased SFO surcharge fees for San Francisco Airport employees. On Wednesday the San Francisco Chronicle reported that the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency board adopted a $750 million budget for the next 15 months that would cut service 10 percent and eliminate 584 jobs. The Board of Supervisors, has yet to review the Muni budget. The supervisors have the power to reject the proposed budget and ask for a new one. If the current plan is rejected, the agency’s board has until May 1 to adopt it. 
Nathaniel Ford, the Muni’s chief executive officer, told the Chronicle: “We are in a situation where we don’t have the money coming in to support the level of service we have.

Courts & Legal Issues
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Some Lawyers Want to Keep Debt Collection Out of the Courts

04.23.2010
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Nancy Taylor, a longtime resident of San Jose with an excellent credit rating, was startled when she began receiving phone calls and letters from debt collectors in 2007.
The incessant calls and letters came from people claiming, erroneously, that she owed an outstanding balance of about $2,000 on her Sears charge card. » Read more

City Hall
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Neighbors scuttle plan for condo tower near Transamerica pyramid

04.21.2010
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After nearly five hours of public debate, the Board of Supervisors halted plans for the development of a 38-story condominium tower Tuesday night. 
Many of the project’s opponents were concerned with the possibility that the building would harm surrounding parks — Maritime Plaza, Sue Bierman Park and the privately owned redwood grove at the foot of the Transamerica pyramid.  » Read more

News

Join us for Journalism Innovations III

04.20.2010
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We’re posting this on behalf of Independent Arts & Media, our fiscal sponsor and one of the lead organizers for Journalism Innovations III. We’ll be participating in the conference and hope you’ll consider joining this extended conversation about the future of journalism. — SF Public Press
*               *               *               *               *
Journalism has changed. Thanks to the Internet, we can now find hundreds of articles, about a single topic, from multiple sources, at the push of a button. Journalism continues to change, as aggregators and community based sites combine traditional reporting with the dialogue that we share among ourselves, online, on the streets and within our neighborhoods.  
We will adapt and overcome as journalists, as dialogue makers and as those who rely on news and information, adequate enough to help us make daily decisions in a modern democracy.