Local News & Views

Contrary to Mayor Ed Lee’s claim in a press release issued yesterday by the Mayor’s Office, the Superior Court issued an important victory for Bayview environmental health advocates by blocking the proposed early transfer of the toxic parcels of the Hunters Point Superfund site.

Trust and humanity are every day seeming more elusive as we struggle to sort fact from fiction, love from treachery – and human resiliency keeps us from despair.

Public Defender and dedicated activist for criminal justice Jeff Adachi has passed. Jeff began in 1987 as a deputy public defender and, through his drive and dedication, became a five-time elected Public Defender for San Francisco. He set a goal to create an agency that would become a guiding light for all other offices around the country. It worked.

To date, Mayor Breed has appointed or re-appointed 75 commissioners to help address the issues facing San Francisco. Over 60 percent of her appointees are women, and a majority are people of color. Four of the commissioners sworn in April 19 are from the LGBT community.

Hundreds gathered last night for a candlelight vigil and march to City Hall in honor of Jeff Adachi, San Francisco’s beloved public defender who died suddenly last week.

We are calling for Mayor Breed and the Board of Supervisors of San Francisco to partner with the financial community to help save Bryant Mortuary, a 55-year-old family-owned business at 645 Fulton St. that recently fell victim to a predatory loan. The business is one of the last remaining representations of a once-thriving Black community in San Francisco.

On Nov. 18, 1978, the world as we knew it was changed forever: 918 victims, of whom 305 were children – including 40 infants – lost their lives along with U.S. Congressman Leo Ryan and a United Press International film crew. The place was Peoples Temple in Jonestown, Guyana – that Paradise of Pain – founded and led by James Warren “Jim” Jones, forever rendered infamous by its name “Jonestown.”

"He was making plans to live, not to die." The mother of Gregory Johnson Jr., 20, questions the suicide theory posed by law enforcement officials, remembering her son as a positive, cheerful young man.

No matter the turnout of Sunday’s vote, whether we continue to strike or not, we as teachers, students, families and community members will continue to demand justice and quality education for public school students.

I often tell people to imagine if someone came into your home and snatched the roof off your bedroom, dorm room or home, leaving you exposed, over-seen, no longer covered. In other words, no longer “safe” to be messy, unorganized, unclean or just human, because now you no longer were living with what housed people live with every day and take completely for granted, the privilege of privacy.

Hundreds of young San Franciscans and their supporters rallied on the steps of City Hall Tuesday as a majority of the Board of Supervisors prepared to introduce legislation at the board meeting to require the closure of San Francisco’s Juvenile Hall by December 2021.

Frustrated parent: “So what is it that teachers want? Is this just for more pay?” Teacher: “The district is sitting on $30,000,000 and there are times teachers don’t even have paper and toner for the printers. We don’t have paper towels in the staff lounge. Classrooms don’t have textbooks.”

‘Reversing the Outmigration’ is a project allowing Black journalists to examine the myriad issues affecting the Black community in San Francisco, in collaboration with SF African American Chamber of Commerce President Fred Jordan by Kevin...

I was the founding chairman and national organizer of the Black Panther Party. Our first organizing tactic was to legally observe the police in our Oakland and Berkeley Black communities. During those hard core late 1960s racist, fascist times, we took a big chance with our lives patrolling the police. It was a time of rampant vicious police brutality and murder of Black people by police that was 10 times worse than today.

Every day we have been blessed with people (some returning and some new) coming in to read to the children, play music with them, create art with them, race, jump rope and play basketball, color, play games and just sit with the students who are having a tough time navigating a difficult situation. Finally, a tentative agreement has been reached.

Double punch to the solar plexis – Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corp. moves to evict, ignoring the SF eviction moratorium and denying supportive resources to Black family.

37 percent of Bayview residents (27,094 people) live on less than 200 percent of the FPL ($40,840); 19 percent (13,935 residents) live in families with incomes at or below the $20,420.

Chancellor Wood and his Contra Costa Community College District (4CD) office advisors violated district and state policies in pursuit of their campaign to remove the last two Black upper level managers at CCC.

How is it that a social worker was caught committing perjury and yet no one has held her accountable? Where is the oversight of our child welfare system and juvenile courts? Where is the outrage that this is happening and American families are being unnecessarily destroyed in court proceedings that operate under a shroud of secrecy, in court proceedings in which criminal misconduct is covered up and the best interests of children are ignored?

“Black community organizations require mission-aligned leadership to implement their purpose. Instead, Booker T. Washington Community Service Center VP Farah Makras informed me that many of her friends voted for Donald Trump.” - Former Board President Julian Davis