July 1, 2007
Day Around The Bay
--Picture of a woman collecting bottles from people in the iPhone line by reader zombie. Thanks for sending them in, zombie! [ZombieTime.]
--Four murders in San Francisco this weekend, 10 murders throughout the Bay Area. One guy was stabbed in the back at Columbus and Union (by Washington Square Park). [Chron.]
--Spotted: Gavin Newsom and Jennifer Siebel on a dinner date at the Slanted Door last night. [from a reader!]
--The Chron Sunday Styles section started the new post-Swells column, called "Pix." It's just not the same without Catherine Bigelow, sigh. [Chron.]
--Sad news in the search for the missing Alameda County woman. [ABC 7, the Chron.]
--Your latest in gentrification -- they're converting a porn theater into condos in San Mateo. [The San Mateo County Times.]
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how many poor chinese elderly are there in this town living off recycling?
how sad is that
How do they trade in these things for money? What is the monetary value?
Cans & bottles are worth 4 / 8 cents each, or maybe they've bumped up the value to 5 / 10 cents each (5 cents for small bottles or cans, or 10 cents for anything that holds over 24 ounces). That's the California Return Value ("CRV") they tack onto just about every non-dairy liquid you buy at any grocery store.
I only know of one place near downtown S.F. that accepts bottles & cans for returns, the basement of Cala Groceries at California & Hyde. For a very short time, I used to lug my bags of recyclables down there; but there's always such a long, stinky line of homeless and "professional collector" Chinese people that it's just not worth the one hour average wait to earn a slip of paper which you can get cashed or use toward groceries in the grocery store upstairs.
After 50 bottles / cans of any one type, the recycling center stops giving the flat CRV value back and then it's refunded by weight (which is a much worse deal). So the recycling fee is really only mildly lucrative to those people who lug huge garbage bags full of recyclables down there.
Those Chinese collectors have an efficient routine. A couple of them come by the city garbage cans underneath my window 4 a.m. each morning and they crush the plastic ones to stuff them into their bags on the end of poles, which they balance on their shoulders. If they could get into my apartment building's garage area, they'd hit a jackpot with all the cans & plastic bottles that us psuedo-yuppies throw into the recycle bin.
California should just be honest about it and rename "CRV" into "homeless tax".
i think we should stop paying people to recycle in the city to stop this disgusting process. they make a mess out of any full trash can, they wake people up at 4am, they steal money from the city that would have not had to be paid if it went directly to the waste management company. it is a tax on us at the end of the day. it needs to be eliminated.
i watched a story on waste management a few weeks back and they realize now how it's in their best interest to minimize what goes into their landfills. they have plenty of full time workers on the conveyor belts pulling out all the materials from our trash that can be recycled.
it's time to change this perception and this waste of money/lifestyle that probably only helps subsidize homeless folks and avoids their need to go seek real help.
In regards to the San Mateo story...
That is one way to fight porn now why didn't anyone think of doing that at the Armory?
mmmm...
Gavin is still "Dating" Genypher Seebull now, after you "been woken up by an earthquake" together and she is the "OFFICIAL" Mayor girlfriend (I wonder if Gavin knows?) doesn't she become like that chick that gavin's significant other?
I wonder if Genypher had her assistant email SFist the info..things have been quiet since he doesn't talk about her in the media.
First off, the Armory is an historic unreinforced masonry structure. In order to shore it up for residential or government services, the cost would be prohibitive, in the seven figures. Porn is the best we're gonna do with that structure. And as a resident of that neighborhood, it sure is nice to see it all lit up and beflagged, the flagophile I am.
What a weekend. First, the working man I am, days filled with software engineering, I bike up to The New May Wah on Clement in the Richmond District to buy my favorite soy protien, variously known as Yuba, Tofu Skins or Bean Curd Sheet.
As I am biking past Green Apple towards Sloat Garden center to pick up a bit for the garden, what do I see but a gaggle of petitioners!
Assuming that it is a recall McGoldrick operation, I stop by and lo and behold, who do I see but Mayor Gavin Newsom collecting signatures with underlings. As usual, our self confident Mayor ignores me, like he usually does in City Hall.
So I hang around the stalls of books on the sidewalk, waiting for an underling to ask me to sign the petition. But alas, nobody bites. Don't think they had a chance to speak amongst themselves as to who I was.
My intent was to tell the underlings that the Mayor was too afraid to answer my question, which would have been fun. So after Sloat, nothing compelling there, I made my way through Golden Gate Park to Oak where I caught the lights and beat cars from Stanyan to Pierce for the ride through the Lower Haight and back down to the North Mission.
Yesterday, my partner wanted to visit the MUNI museum at MUNI hotel, the one they built over the turnaround which made MUNI service worse.
Before, that, starving, we headed to the Ferry Bldg for some lunch. Where did I end up eating?
The Slanted Door, where I got "out the door" on Sundays with a delicious veggie spring roll eaten on a balmy SF day by the bay. Used to years of false promises, I all but flung myself at Debbies feet begging them to reestablish themselves on Valencia, where their original locale was vacant...PLEASE, come back to the Mission, Slanted Door!
First Green Apple, then Slanted Door, I was afraid that the Mayor was stalking me and our policies, what with his press releases and policy initiatives vacant and substanceless...someone get me hair gel, arm candy and press releases!
-marc
Marc, they *did* try to make all sorts of things out of the Armory, but NIMBY NIMBY NIMBY opposition to every damn thing led to it becoming the porn palace it is today. Which isn't bad in itself - who can oppose kink?! - but is unfortunate that it took too long.
I used to live on Julian Ave behind the Armory and have been through it from top to bottom several times. Mission creek flows through the basement.
They (Eikon?) tried to turn it into a dot.com office space. Had that succeeded, it would have gone belly up in 2001 when the market crashed. Eikon now owns the construction boondoggle at 18th and Mission, over the former Golden Apple market.
They then tried to turn the Armory into a server farm, which would have been a wonderfully unattended use for the property. This would have involved significent diesel generators to provide backup power.
Finally, after that was shot down, a few years later, Acworth purchased the place and gave it a new life.
-marc
The other recycling center is at Market + Buchanan, directly under the Mint Building (also where the streetcar boneyard is located). That place was hoppin' on Sunday morning. Don't walk past it if you can; the place reeks of rotting beer and trash.
marc,
i'm guessing the signatures were for the free wifi and the community court, yes?
please confirm he was not part of any recall campaign.
The sigs appeared to be those in lieu of filing fees with a visibility option for the candidate.
But I did not get close enough nor did they approach me so that I could see the petitions.
I did not notice any recall Jake propaganda in merchant windows on Clement.
-marc
Regarding the Slanted Door, they will not be going back to the Mission. My understanding is that they were driven away from the Mission by the same sort of fine neighborhood folks that gave kink.com so much trouble with the Armory. The blame the Slanted Door with starting the gentrification of the Mission and attracting all those trendy restaurants to the area. Never mind that the Slanted Door guys where self-made local boys and finally made it.
I hear that Gavin is paying $5 a signature. The going rate for signature whores is usually $1 or $2. The way it works is you have to either pay a $5000 fee or collect 10,000 signatures. Or if you're Gavin and you refuse to abide by the voluntary spending limit, you can pay $50,000 to have people collect those signatures.
-(NotSFist)Jeremy
(still can't get this new-fangled comment system to recognize my login)
That's not what Debbie Phan says.
There was seismic work done to the Valencia site and that led to their (temporary?) relocation.
Plans were to do something similar to "Out The Door," perhaps noodle-based, on Valencia, but the Ferry Building site has been so successful that they're busy with that.
The Phans own that site.
I'd trust Debbie's word rather than a guest on sfist.com, frankly, especially since in November of 1999, there was an "Ammiano for Mayor" poster in their window.
-marc
here's what those signatures were for marc:
http://www.actlocallysf.org/petition.php
actually, those signatures were for gavin to run for mayor again without having to pay a filing fee. must be some arcane rule about if you get enough support you can avoid paying that fee.
I love how Mission hipsters now complain that Slanted Door has left the hood. Anyway...
The signatures are in lieu of filing fees. Signatures in lieu are also useful to collect lists of supporters, as well as to show strength. Newsom is running virtually unopposed so this is just for show, and building Team Newsom for next time.
I've been living in The Mission for almost 20 years.
As Abe Simpson said, 'I used to be with it, but then they changed what "it" was. Now, what
I'm with isn't it, and what's "it" seems weird and scary to me.'
-marc
On folks grabbing recyclables from residential recycle bins from www.SFSafe.org's newsletter fresh off the email delivery wagon:
Don't Ignore Theft of Curbside Recyclables
Stealing recyclables is a problem throughout San Francisco. Recycling poachers look for items of value such as aluminum cans, bottles and personal information. This crime problem has a far-reaching and negative impact on neighborhood public safety, the environment and consumer recycling efforts. As a direct result, you and your neighbors are exposed to:
Increased noice & trespassing on private property, at all hours;
Increased street litter and contamination of potential compost in another bin;
Reduction of recyclables collected for San Francisco means higher garbage rates for you.
You and your neighbors can prevent the theft of recyclables by:
Placing your recyclables on the curb by 6 am the day of pick-up;
Shred paper with personal information;
Organize a SAFE Neighborhood Watch on your block and communicate with your neighbors and the police regularly. Call SAFE at (415)553-1984;
Never confront or stop poachers!
Observe and report recycling poachers to the SFPD by calling (415)553-0123. Take detailed notes on the vehicle license number, car description, time of the theft, description of the person, direction they were heading;
Call Sunset Scavenger at (415) 330-1300 or Golden Gate Disposal & Recycling at (415) 626-4000 during business hours to report the theft of recyclables.
Yes, I too hate the recycling poachers from China. Here in the Richmond District where it is always windy, they have the nasty knack for tipping over my garbage can during their rifling session and leaving me to collect a week's worth of filthy garbage up and down my street. I generally wave my golf club at them a la Michael Skakel to get them out of my driveway while cursing them in my bad ABC Cantonese. My WASP boyfriend thinks that it's funniest thing ever. Don't they know that loose trash attracts rats and that is how the bubonic plague began? Nevermind, I just remembered what happened in China with SARS. Enuff said.
To elucidate on the who's who in the Mission to esp in response to [7] aj, [17] aj, [8] guest, [12] guest:
The neighborhood folks were not involved in the Slanted Door or the Armory incidents. The ones to blame for all that happened in both these fiascos are the nonprofits: MAC, MEDA, Poder...
Even though they repeat the mantra that they represent the Mission, they do not. Please do not buy into the misrepresentation that they do somehow represent the Mission neighbors.
They are funded by the City's General Fund and represent themselves. Everything they do is to keep their funding intact. Our tax dollars are letting them work against us.
If they can't have "it" then they make sure no one else can either. In these cases, "it" was the Slanted Door and the Armory.
It was not "nimbyism" in either instance. It was the nonprofits' greed and selfishness.
This is a rather late reply. It probably won't be read, but for the record, regardless of what marc says Debbie Phan says today, at the time people in the mission where very much oppsed to the Slanted Door expanding. See http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2002/07/08/MN215970.DTL&hw=foreign+cinema&sn=152&sc=080
"That is what led activists from the Mission Anti-Displacement Coalition to protest Slanted Door's expansion plans in December. They noted that the Valencia Street restaurant would be taking over a space that had been occupied by two neighborhood-oriented businesses -- spaces that would probably be lost forever to immigrants or low-income people wanting to own a business.
Phan's opponents didn't care that he attended Mission High School 20 years ago, or that he maxed out his family's credit cards to open his restaurant six years ago. "