Joe vs Amy: Round 3
When we last left Amy Lee, she had been vindicated by the Building Inspections Committee and given the job as Head of the Department of Building Inspectors. All this over the protests of Joltin' Joe O'Donoghue and his buddies because of her pregnant condition. With job finally assured, she promptly celebrated by going out on maternity leave where we all thought things would go happily ever after.
But no.
Now, her entire family is basically living in the living room of their duplex apartment in Upper Haight because she was hit with a late appeal on an already given out permit to re-do her top floor. A re-do that had already been started and now can't be worked on until at least a hearing on Dec. 14th.
The last minute appeal was put forth by attorney Andrew Zacks who filed it at the behest of Citizens for the Equal Treatment of the Permit Process (or CETPP). While everyone involved denies it, everyone else much is saying that the person behind it all is Joe O'D himself. And not just because who the hell else would be motivated enough to start an organization over the equal treatment of permits?
The story, however, gets curiouser and curioser. Zacks has gained a measure of infamy in this city for being one of the tenants rights folks' archenemies. He has recently been protested over his role in a variety of Ellis Act evictions, including as a property owner who evicted everyone under the same act.
So what sort of ironies do we have here? Like a developer who once-upon-a-time was the darling of progressives is now political bedfellows of somebody progessives consider an evil-doer. Or a man notorious for complaining about the abuse of appeals abusing an appeal. And then there's just the fact that something normally used to fight off evil high-rises and any sort of development is now being used on somebody’s private home. And not like some Monster Mansion, either, just a plain ole duplex.
Said Amy Lee in response: "This city is crazy.''