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Day Around the Bay
Why Are You at Work Today?
Our friends over at Eater SF pointed out this item in the New York Times: an article pointing out several of the ways in which San Francisco is making an impact on our everyday lives, from the plastic bag ban to fines for businesses who leave their lights on overnight.
The laws -- both proposed and passed -- that are highlighted in the article point out the possibility that San Franciscans are being overlegislated to the extreme. Sure, these laws are meant to improve the quality of life and make sure San Francisco is uber-green, but when is it too much?
Eater created the helpful list below of the instances NYT cites as SF government overlegislation. What do you think? Are we being "overlegislated"?
- Business owners must offer health care, typically a rarity in the restaurant industry except for managers, to all employees.
- Employers must offer 9 days sick leave to all employees.
- Chain restaurants must post nutritional information for all menu items.
- Minimum wage is $9.36, more than $3.50 above the federal rate, and will increase next year.
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But the more laws we have, the more ways there are for us to be bad-ass lawbreakers with six-strings on our back. And be wanted dead or alive. Now get that song out of your head.
That last one is uproarious
Most of those seem entirely reasonable.
Sure, a few are out of bounds.
But I think it's a pretty good legislative batting average, overall.
We need more non binding resolutions. More non binding resolutions dammit!!!
This one:
"The Board proposed to prohibit new liquor stores within 500 feet of churches or recreation centers."
...just doesn't make sense in a dense city. Imagine what would happen to the Mission District if this were the law.
The corn syrup one is ridiculous, and the proposal to require permits and insurance for events is just an attempt to squeeze SF residents for more money. The Supes have made wasting time an art form.
It's because we hate freedom!
San Francisco is the laughing stock of the nation. Newsom tries to counter this in national media for his gubernatorial run and portray himself as competent and having accomplished something. He is so arrogant and out of touch with the working people of SF he probably doesn't think that we read the NYT, he thinks only the petite bourgeoisie political class read this kind of newspaper.
As Peskin and company term out, there will be a fight for the direction of the BOS. Newsom, the republicans, the Committee on Jobs, and the rich cabal of white people who believe they own SF on one side, the other side: the serfs who serve the wealthy bourgeoisie political class, comprised of the likes DiFi, Newsom, Pelosi, Boxer, etc... and the spoilers like Chris Daly who are more interested in building their own not for profit kingdom ala Randy Shaw and Steve Fields will fuck the whole thing up!! Thank God, the property taxes are low in CA or everyone would leave.
Damn you fizzandpop.
I think the overlords supervisors are doing one heck of a job constraining individual rights. They are essentially the extremist-liberal versions of Falwellian-conservatives.
I'd suggest any candidates for Supervisor take on a platform of moving the Board's Tuesday, 2pm afternoon meetings to Tuesday evenings at 6pm when the majority of working stiffs would actually be able to attend. I'd also suggest taking a stance that they'd like to team up with other Supervisors (maybe several district candidates could line up on this one) to spend their time reviewing existing laws, eliminating the garbage that is only subjectively enforced as it is.
I like some of the laws mentioned above (plastic bag ban, sick day minimum, liquor store locations), but I don't like the current Board's notion that their success is based on the number of resolutions and laws they submit.
1. Only pass laws that are actually going to be enforced.
2. Enforce laws on the books, as intended.
3.......
Profit
I think NYC is just jealous of how green and liberal SF is.
@freelivin:
Dealing with parishioners and/or kids (recreational areas)??? I think that we need mandatory liquor stores within 500 feet of those places.
imagine what little useless legislation we'd have if we got rid of the district cronies and had real citywide representation? something tells me there's a real cause and effect thing going on here with 11 nincompoops competing for more crazy headlines in most of this legislation.
cranky now is an expatriated san franciscan and my new colleagues laugh uproariously at all the rules i tell them about.
one of the reasons i left, aside from living in a rent controlled rat hole for too long, was the number of ridiculous laws the city passed. the prostitutes in my back yard and the pot smokin' dumb burning man idiots could break the law with impunity, but oh my gosh if you dared have a plastic bag!
but didja notice the date the article was published -- he he -- totally 4/20...
@Rincon -
I believe the idea of having Tuesday evening meetings has been discussed in the past and its not unpopular.
The problem with doing so is that the BOS mtg is staff intensive. The sheriff's deputies, the clerks, the a/v folks and various department staffers who help make the meetings run would all have to be paid overtime thus making an evening meeting far more expensive than the current 1-5. The last thing we need in this city is to waste more money on meetings.
Believe me, people find a way to get to Board meetings. Ever witness the public comment period?
Heelloooo...
Attention please.
All those antibusiness measures decried by the NYTimes and which Newsom attacks came from....Newsom!!
This is just another Newsom ploy to attack the other side of City Hall, only now he is so classless that he takes it all the way across the USA to do it in the New York Times where he attacks his own city -- and many of his own proposals.
How cheap is that?
The ones on the books are mostly pretty good.
The ones "proposed" are insane crap.
Weird, something might actually be working.
Also:
"Employers must offer 9 days sick leave to all employees."
Is that over the next two weeks? This year? Over the course of three years? To employees who have worked there at least 5 years? To new mothers? To your mother?
Perhaps one of those staff people who work 8 to 5 could be given the duty of reading aloud public comments from residents who can't attend at 2pm because they're working ... or they could allow us to send audio/video mail (G-rated only, but of course - no nudists). :) The Supervisors get an echo chamber of the same crowd of folks who are free at 2pm on Tuesdays along with special visits by the people who stand to benefit at the taxpayers' expenses to support getting a chunk of the pie for themselves. Not many parents in that group ... not many young, working folks in that group ...
I am glad that the meetings are easily observed thanks to SFGovTV. I'll give them 1 star for that.... and encouragement to spend the extra $60k to make sure there are audio recordings of ALL the various commissions and other meetings that aren't currently recorded for folks who couldn't attend to hear.
i love sf for it's crazy liberal laws...like no plastic bags...healthcare for every employee...sick leave...high minimum wage (living wage!!!!)...no styrofoam....lobbyist name tags? sounds good to me!
sure some are weird...but hey, i'd personally love it if hfcs were outlawed...and i'll suffer a stupid no alcohol within x feet of jesus, if it means i get to live in the greatest city in america. :D
and hey, i've lived in tx. so i've been on the exact opposite side of the fence, too.
save us from ourselves! we're so stupid!
yes, really.
Most of the laws are entirely reasonable. Why exactly, does an office building need to leave its lights on all night? It doesn't, it's a horrible waste of energy. Why do we need plastic bags when there's a mound of plastic garbage the size of Texas floating out in the ocean?
Some of the laws passed, however, are simply not feasible at the local level, e.g., insurance and sick days. San Franciscans should not be asked to pay extra to take care of something that should really be done at the federal level.
That being said, an extra $1.25 to pay for healthcare? Meh, in light of a typical meal out, is that really going to kill anyone?
People with time on their hands make it to Board meetings. People with jobs do not. The board likes it that way.
bluecanary: Other people say the mound of plastic garbage is made of other things besides plastic, and that it's only the size of Rhode Island. Who's lying?
Oh, only Rhode Island? And garbage consisting of things OTHER than plastic?
Well, carry on, then!
I would have to know the origins of these "other people" to know who was lying.
It's only the size of my cat, and it's made up of things other than plastic. Like my cat.
and yet they all move here...