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This raptor, spotted right next to the gold and black dome, is the kind of bird needed around San Francisco's Civic Center.
Guarding against what, you say? Pigeons! The problem with pigeon droppings on the glass roofs of the two City Hall light courts led to them being covered over with concrete in the 1950's. Or so the story goes. Will the two nests built for falcons on top of the building in the 1990's ever have occupants? San Jose's City Hall has raptors, why not ours?
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Nice photo. Looks like a juvenile Red-Tailed Hawk.
There was one that frequently sat on the very top of the dome last year.
Other Hawk sightings:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jdersh/902841342/in/pool-63052053@N00/
This one is eating dinner.
Do they like the flavor of Supervisor meat?
There are peregrine falcons nesting in Alta Plaza Park, and the neighborhood has been rather free of pigeons lately.
There's a whole family of Cooper's Hawks in Lafayette Park, with 4 young fledglings.
Is that a flame the hawk is sitting on? At first glance it looks like a hand with a very noticeable finger upraised-- a perfect symbol of City Hall Governance as it were.
Too bad we can't just directly net the pigeons, and ship them to PA to be shot by VP Cheney:
http://www.newyorker.com/talk/2007/07/09/070709ta_talk_collins
It was done in Trafalgar Square. Possibly still is, but it turned out to be unexpectedly expensive. Also there are stories of a Peregrine (can't remember the name, but it was something charming and colloquial) who made a lot of especially gory kills in front of kids & tourists, making enough of a spectacle that he was withdrawn.
When I passed through Trafalgar a month ago, it had no pigeons in it all, for the straightforward reason that a concert was being set up. So there's another solution -- frequent, pigeon-displacing concerts. :)