Berkeley councilmember the latest local politician harassed out of his job
Yet another Bay Area politician has experienced harassment and threats, prompting one more promising talent to check out of a local political career. Rigel Robinson (who became Berkeley's youngest councilmember at 22 years old when elected in 2018) just announced he's resigning from Council and ending his mayoral campaign, as reports Berkeleyside. He cites “perpetual” stress from getting harassed, stalked, and threatened by the public. Recently in SJ tells a similar story: councilmember Dev Davis stated she wouldn't run again for office after being aggressively protested and threatened with a bomb outside her home.
Read More
Is it fair to make low-income residents balance out rich people's outrageous carbon footprints?
San Jose prides itself for carbon neutrality initiatives like banning natural gas infrastructure in new construction (and that'll cost homeowners a pretty penny). But a recent Oxfam International study discovers that the world's richest 1% are culpable for—gulp—16% of carbon emissions. Why, Phys.org asks, do policymakers regressively target low-income people's kitchens, while giving a free pass to the wealthy's personal travel on carbon-spewing airplanes and large company investments?
Read More
☆ Oliverio: SB 335 would sanction (yes, more) “unrestricted” County spending
Silicon Valley Taxpayers Association's Pierluigi Oliverio scrutinizes Sen. Cortese's proposal to make our County sales tax jump from 1.86% to 2.49% (blowing past the current cap of 2%) in this Opp Now exclusive, noting that Santa Clara County already has “no lack of revenue” (and regularly squeezes taxpayers for non-priority projects). Oliverio's not alone in questioning SB 335: read analyses from watchdogs Pat Waite and Dan Kostenbauder and Elizabeth Brierly here.
Read More
Forcing drug addicts to get clean can be quite successful, research says
Healing from substance abuse must start from within... right? Programs like Newsom's CARE Court (which requires severely mentally ill/addicted individuals to enter treatment) are criticized as being inhumane and pointless by folks like Assemblymember Ash Kalra. But Wall Street Journal rebuts these claims, analyzing CA studies on compulsory drug treatment. The results? It's often just as effective as voluntary treatment.
Read More
☆ Explicit antisemitic imagery in local pro-Hamas flyer deeply disturbs Jewish leaders
On 1.3, KTVU broke the story that the Bay Area's Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) had spoken out against antisemitic imagery in a flyer promoting a pro-Hamas rally in San Jose. The flyer featured the defacement of a photo of County District Attorney Jeff Rosen (who is Jewish): Rosen's eyes were x-ed out, and the Arabic word for “uprising” written across his forehead. The caption to Rosen's photo read, “Resist against Zionism by any and all means necessary.” The flyer said the rally (to be held at Rosen's office) was sponsored by: Silicon Valley for Palestine, B.L.A.C.K. Outreach San Jose, FRSO San Jose, and HERO Tent. In this Opp Now exclusive, JCRC Bay Area, Chabad House (Almaden), Stanford University's Chabad, and American Jewish Committee (AJC) San Francisco analyze the incident.
Read More
Opinion: Sorry, SF activists; public drug abuse is “very literally” trashing downtown
Local org Drug User Liberation Collective has sparked controversy with its “DOWNTOWN IS FOR DRUG USERS” signs, posted in San Francisco's Tenderloin to protest Mayor Breed's initiative against public drug intoxication. The signs claim SF's open-air drug market is “very literally not hurting you, your business, or the economy”—though businesses big and small, like the extolled Gump's, beg to differ. An SF Standard excerpt.
Read More
☆ District 6 Council hopefuls on balancing homeless solutions with neighborhood needs
Opp Now reached out to SJ D6 City Council candidates to address the following question: How should councilmembers balance requests to increase homeless alternatives (interim housing, sanctioned encampments, etc.) with appeals to preserve vibrant/safe business and residential districts? An Opp Now exclusive with varied takes from Michael Mulcahy and Alex Shoor.
Read More
Los Angeles case study: “Affordable” homeless housing is pretty darn unaffordable—and unfinished
Newsom launched Project Homekey in 2020 with the goal of cheaply converting hotels into interim homeless housing. Today, the millions of dollars taxpayers have invested in grants continue to disappear, due to lack of oversight (L.A.'s real estate partner Shangri-La Industries is now being sued for “conspiracy to defraud”) and delays from CA's Housing Dept. Meanwhile, many renovations remain uncompleted. KCRW's report below, with Sen. Cortese's (D-SJ) comment.
Read More
UC Irvine/Pepperdine economics profs predict negative consequences for minimum wage hike
Local economics professors David Neumark and David Smith read the tea leaves on California's minimum wage increase (up by 50 cents to tally $16/hr), pointing out studies that connect mandated pay hikes with dirtier restaurants, pricier goods/services for locals, and tremendous job losses (perhaps up to 50,000). From ABC30 in Fresno.
Read More
Sen. Jones: ACA 1 “wrongly chips away” at Prop 13, empowers “greedy” pols
ACA 1's proposal to lower California's two-thirds voter approval requirement down to 55% for “infrastructure” measures is controversial, many claiming it'd amplify crazy tax hikes and expensive gov't projects. KCRA News reports that State Senator Brian Jones—along with Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association head Jon Coupal—believes the measure would undermine taxpayer protections. Meanwhile, SJ City Council has greenlighted ACA 1 despite residents' Prop 13 concerns.
Read More
DEI Industrial Complex losing favor with local tech giants
CNBC reports that Google/Meta (and tech companies writ large) are downsizing Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs and have let go unprecedented numbers of DEI employees. Are Bay Area tech companies realizing that these “equity” job titles tend to be expensive, authoritarian, ineffective, and (yep) even racially discriminatory?
Read More
Public housing's terrible track record points to irredeemable “flaws,” says Atlantic
It's about time policymakers like SJ's “learn from the past” on housing, argues Manhattan Institute's Howard Husock in the Atlantic. He traces public housing's failures back to the early 1900s, when many neighborhoods were replaced by gov't-managed housing. The too-predictable result? Low-income/minority families were denied home ownership (and its financial benefits). Also, housing bureaucracies grew strict/unaccountable without market competition.
Read More
