Speaking of our fine mayor, Newsom's recently released budget plan, it seems, will "terminate critical health and human services, while pumping up salaries for police by 25% and adding many new high paid patronage positions into his own administration," at least according to the folks over at something called the People's Budget Collaborative, brought to you by the loopy kids at the Coalition on Homelessness. They claim the following cuts will happen. Ahem: 1)......

While he wouldn't say whether or not Cynthia Thompson will receive a much deserved ax, today Mayor Gavin Newsom did announce that he will hack away at some 1,000 city jobs as well as "limiting overtime costs and raising some city fees." Overall, 450 workers stand to lose their jobs. (And thus 450 sandwich artists are born.) Newsom unveiled his shiny new 2008-2009 budget proposal over at the Hunters Point Shipyard this morning. During......

535 San Francisco Unified School District teachers will receive layoff notices this morning due to state cuts in education funding. Today's pink slip handouts stem from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's budget '09, which will see San Francisco schools losing around $40 million. According to CBS 5, Mayor Newsom is doing what he can, even if it's a Band-Aid solution to a longterm problem. Mayor Gavin Newsom has said he plans to ask the Board of......

Students at Encinal High School walked out of their classrooms today in response to proposed budget cuts. Last night the school board held a tense meeting that went well into the wee hours of the morning, voting to increase class sizes by cutting advanced placement classes, most high school sports, music in the elementary schools, and counselors in the middle schools, reports NBC 11. Students walked out today, marching straight over to the school......

Well, whaddya know. No sooner did we lavish praise upon the SF County Transportation Authority than Nat Ford, head of Muni, decided that he might be interested in committing a hostile takeover of the SFCTA... thereby making the TA as flawless as Muni. Good idea! If our agency was melting down, and there was another one making us look bad, we might want to buy it and run it into the ground, too! (That's......

It's going to be a far busier-than-normal meeting of the SF County Transportation Authority tomorrow. There's huge stuff on the agenda: updates on the bike plan; millions of dollars being thrown around for the Transbay Terminal; $160,000 for reducing graffiti on street signs; potential changes for Geneva Ave and McAllister Street, including a possible permanent re-route of the 5-Fulton; safety upgrades at 9th and Irving; and some forward momentum for restoring mass transit on......

Remember how the city is supposedly facing yet more budget problems? Well, that hasn't stopped the Gavster from doing some spending. Budgets shmudgets....

Nature lovers will be peeved. Under the budget proposed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger today - dear God, just how did we get here? starting off a sentence like that? - nine local state parks would face a temporary shutdown until California learns how to balance its checkbook, pay its bills on time, stops disrespecting their mommas on Maury, or something like that. Statewide, the Gov is considering closing 48 state parks. Among those close......

Remember that budget surplus? Remember when we were flush with cash and we decided to go on this spending binge and Chris Daly got into a fight with everyone because he wanted to spend the money his way and not everyone else's way? Well goodbye to all that because Gavin announced that we know have a whopping $229 million dollar deficit....