John Upton San Francisco→ Profiles Bay Bridge eyebar fix Hetch Hetchy series Earthquake anniversary Cosco Busan oil spill Power plant debate Radioactive air pollution Gas pipeline safety johnupton@gmail.com latest at sfexaminer.com			San Francisco Sharks discovered entering Bay  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, May 24, 2010 Brian Monroe was surfing in choppy conditions off Ocean Beach during low tide on a recent cloudy afternoon when the ominous figure of a ferocious predator broke the water's surface. Experts say a 2-foot dorsal fin that emerged less than 100 yards away belonged to a great white shark. "I turned right towards shore and calmly paddled in," Monroe said. "I didn't want to draw attention to myself." Encounters with the large marine creatures are common off California's beaches, where they are frequently spotted, but researchers have discovered that they venture under the Golden Gate Bridge and into San Francisco Bay. A handful of radio-tagged great whites were detected swimming inside the Bay during a multiyear international study into the species' Pacific Ocean migration patterns. Out of 78 sharks that were tagged with acoustic transmitters between 2006 and 2008, five were detected passing through the Golden Gate, according to research results published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, a scientific journal. The sharks did not venture deep into the sprawling estuary. Instead, they stayed close to its mouth, which straddles the counties of Marin and San Francisco. The findings lend credibility to a long-standing theory that a 1926 attack on a boy in blood-tainted waters near a whale-processing facility close to Oakland was the work of a great white shark. The offending species was never definitively identified, and great whites have never been spotted inside the Bay, according to Ralph Collier, an official with the nonprofit Shark Research Committee. "It wouldn't surprise me if great whites were to enter the Bay," Collier said. "For years, it was suspected." Because of their hunting techniques, young sharks between 9 and 12 feet long are more likely than adults to enter the Bay, according to Collier. Wetsuit-clad surfers and divers are vulnerable to attacks because they resemble the marine mammals sharks eat. But swimmers are more likely to be killed. The most recent death in California blamed on a great white occurred two years ago, when a 66-year-old retired veterinarian was attacked while swimming at Fletcher Cove, north of San Diego. Roughly two shark attacks were documented annually along the Pacific coastline between 1950 and 2000, according to figures published by the shark research group. Great whites were the suspected culprits in 87 percent of California shark attacks, the group's figures show. Pacific chorus frogs recovering, spreading throughout S.F.  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, May 2, 2010 The once-familiar sound of a tiny frog is returning - slowly and noisily - to San Francisco. Pacific chorus frogs, also called Pacific tree frogs, are abundant throughout much of Western North America, including Canada. But the green-and-black amphibians almost disappeared from San Francisco last decade, their pond-based habitats were largely paved over or manicured for enjoyment by people. Now, careful management of some of the last remaining members of the wild population that once stretched across The City is proving successful. The male frogs can be heard noisily croaking in the Mission district, where a population was established from tadpoles several years ago in a Capp Street backyard. The males unleash the familiar "ribbit" sound in an effort to find springtime mates. Other calls are produced year-round. "There have been absolutely no complaints from the neighbors," tenant and professional reptile breeder Jack McAllister said. "In fact, a lot of them have commented on how much they enjoy it." The population in McAllister's backyard grew from tadpoles that were harvested on the eastern side of Potrero Hill in early 2007 at the site of San Francisco's last known wild colony. McAllister is among the local conservationists who are now spreading the frogs to other sites in The City by seeding carefully selected water bodies with tadpoles. The delicate frogs are sensitive and they don't survive in backyards or other settings where chemical pesticides, fertilizers or similar products are used, according to McAllister. "The key ingredients seem to be sunlight, higher temperatures and gardens that are left to grow wild," he said. "Some situations work much better than others." The frog lovers are cagey about revealing the exact locations of the new populations, but they can be found at a Visitacion Valley school, in Mission, Bernal Heights and Sunset neighborhood backyards, and at the 70-acre Glen Canyon Park. "We're hoping the frogs can re-establish themselves back into their historic range and become an integral part of life in The City," McAllister said. Electric cars searching for a place to plug in  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, April 18, 2010 A line will start forming this week for people wanting to buy mass-produced electric cars, but the vehicles' rollout could be hindered by a shortage of Bay Area charging stations. Nissan Motor Co. Ltd. will begin accepting online reservations for the fully-electric Leaf vehicle on Tuesday for a $99 fee. It plans to become the first auto giant to mass market electric vehicles, but industry watchers say other manufacturers are also poised to get combustion engine-free products out to consumers soon. The first Leafs could become available in December to those at the front of the virtual queue in the Bay Area, which was selected as a test market because of the region's high concentration of hybrid cars. Electric vehicles differ from traditional cars and hybrids because they rely on power that's produced elsewhere, such as in a coal- or gas-fired power plant or at a wind or solar farm, instead of burning fuel. Tailpipe emissions from internal combustion engines create health problems and localized greenhouse gas effects in urban areas. Electric vehicles are considered environmentally friendly because they reduce overall air pollution emissions, particularly if they are recharged using renewable energy. Charging times can vary from two to 15 hours depending on the type of charging station used and the car being charged. An apparent burst of interest in electric vehicles among car manufacturers died swiftly in the late 1990s. But supporters of the technology say rising petroleum costs, tightening air pollution regulations, improved battery technology and increased public awareness about climate change will finally help electric vehicles begin to phase out the use of personal combustion engines. "I've been watching this stuff for the better portion of 12 years and it's exciting that, this time, it's going to happen," said Ron Freund, chairman of the 43 year-old nonprofit Electric Auto Association. "The memory of 2008 gas prices is too fresh," he said. "Just wait until India, China and Brazil all start drivingour automotive cast-offs as well as their own cars." One of the most important ingredients for an electric vehicle culture would be the introduction of a network of public charging stations, according to Freund and others. "Public infrastructure will help reduce the anxiety that some people feel of, 'Well, what if I run out of juice?'" he said. Nissan has been working with Bay Area agencies to smooth local permitting issues related to private charging stations and to provide public charging stations by the end of this year. Eager to reduce air pollution, counties, cities and other agencies are banding together to try to cobble together a network of hundreds of public charging stations throughout the Bay Area and down to Monterey. The Bay Area Air Quality Management District agreed to provide roughly $2 million toward the Association of Bay Area Governments' coordinated effort and the California Energy Commission expects to rule on a similar grant request on April 26. The project could be pared back if the grant request is rejected in favor of some of the 51 other applications filed for a $13.8 million pool of funds available under the state's Alternative and Renewable Fuel & Vehicle Technology Program. San Francisco officials have identified 22 city-owned garages where initial charging stations might be provided. Several demonstration charging stations are already in place opposite City Hall. No fees are expected to be levied for electrons that will flow into cars from the public charging stations, according to Environment Department official Bob Hayden. "In these public garages, you would have to pay the garage fee," Hayden said. "Charging a car for an hour or two while you're in a meeting would only be 10 to 15 cents. It wouldn't be worth it to charge for the electricity." It may take a lot of juice to fill up an electric car The Bay Area's electrical grid is being prepared for an influx of private electric car charging stations. The charging stations can drain three times as much power as a San Francisco household typically consumes at any given moment, according to Saul Zambrano, a power-demand official at Pacific Gas & Electric Co. Smart-grid technology is being developed to help cars communicate with the utility when they are plugged in, according to Zambrano. "We need to know that a car is charging, how long it needs to charge and how we can balance that so that we don't tax the wires or the transformers," Zambrano said. San Mateo County and its cities have not applied for state funds to install charging stations, according to EV Communities Alliance executive director Richard Schorske. "I'm reasonably confident that's not going to last for long," he said. The county planned to purchase 10 electric vehicles, which would lead the installation of charging stations, but those plans were put on hold because of budget problems, according to public works official Jim Porter. "We're in a holding pattern," he said. Most San Francisco residents do not have garages, and San Francisco environment official Bob Hayden said The City will work to help owners of multifamily apartment buildings install shared charge-stations. It's anticipated that car charging will take place mostly at night, when demand for power is lowest and electricity is cheapest. Although solar power is not generally available from the grid in the evenings, wind power is strongest at night. Sit-lie clashes with San Francisco policies  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, April 2, 2010 A proposed anti-loitering law contradicts scores of city policies that aim to turn sidewalks into vibrant social gathering places, city planning officials found. Mayor Gavin Newsom introduced sit-lie legislation after moving into a home near the Upper Haight neighborhood, where hordes of young people spend hours lazing on sidewalks. Residents of the former hippie bastion have said during City Hall hearings that they are intimidated by the loafers. If approved by the Board of Supervisors, the sit-lie law would outlaw sitting or lying on footpaths citywide between 7 a.m. and 11 p.m., with 30-day jail sentences and $500 fines for repeat offenders. Sitting on blankets and fold-up chairs on sidewalks also would be illegal. The proposed law would give police officers new powers to tackle problems with chronic loiterers. But the Planning Commission voted 6-1 on Thursday to oppose the legislation after hearing the results of an analysis by Planning Department staff. The nonbinding vote serves to advise lawmakers. Streets take up one-fourth of The City's land, and San Francisco has worked in recent years to re-engineer its sidewalks as gathering spaces to help address a shortage of public open space. The use of sidewalks as gathering places is considered particularly important in high-density neighborhoods, such as South of Market and the Tenderloin, where there are not enough neighborhood parks to meet the needs of residents. Commission Chairman Ron Miguel said Thursday he often sits on a street bench while his grandchildren sit on the ground nearby. "Technically, that's prohibited [under the sit-lie law]," Miguel said. Newsom's Pavement to Parks program, for example, has converted a handful of street-side spaces, including one at 17th and Castro streets, into areas where neighbors can lounge and chat. Under the sit-lie law, it would be illegal to sit down in such parklets unless a permanent bench was installed, commissioners were told. "Overall, policies in the general plan say that sidewalks are not just for movement; sidewalks are places to gather," Planning Department Legislative Analyst AnMarie Rodgers told commissioners Thursday. "The sidewalks should supplement our parks system, especially in dense areas where people don't have access to parks," Rodgers said. Current San Francisco policies say sidewalks should be considered part of The City's open space system, according to Rodgers. Nicolas King, an official in Newsom's Office of Criminal Justice, told commissioners the media had blown the legislation out of proportion and that police would use discretion when enforcing the proposed new law. "It's really not that much of an exciting proposal," King said. "It's not going to be something that results in a police state." Burial ground disturbed underneath Bay Bridge  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, March 12, 2010 The Bay Bridge's deadly S-curve was built hundreds of feet above a Muwekma Ohlone tribal burial ground, and spirits whose bodies were unearthed and placed in storage are said to be restless. The Ohlone were the first people to inhabit the Bay Area, where their burial grounds and other sacred sites are frequently unearthed. At least 26 Ohlone skeletons were discovered between 2002 and 2004 in a burial ground at Yerba Buena Island, which was subsequently excavated to clear a path for a new Bay Bridge east span. The east span replacement project has suffered billions of dollars in cost overruns and a decade of construction delays that could force motorists to navigate the temporary S-curve - a dogleg where the speed limit drops from 50 mph to 40 mph - until 2014. A truck driver was allegedly traveling at 50 mph when his pear-laden truck flipped Nov. 9 off the recently installed S-curve and plummeted to the former burial ground, where he died. The California Highway Patrol responded by aggressively policing the speed limit and Caltrans placed addition striping, signs and other features on the S-curve, helping to slash the curve's high accident rate. Bodies unearthed at the Ohlone burial ground were treated differently depending on which government owned the land where they were discovered. Bodies found on state-owned land were appropriately ceremonially reburied elsewhere on the island, according to tribal spokeswoman Ann Marie Sayers, who led the ceremony. But skeletons found on adjacent Coast Guard land were placed in storage because the tribe, which is recognized by California, has not been recognized by the United States since the 1930s. Remains found on Coast Guard land at Yerba Buena Island could only be legally repatriated to the Ohlone people and reburied if the U.S. Department of Interior formally recognizes the tribe, according to Coast Guard spokesman Dan Dewell. The remains are stored securely, he said. The remains of tens of thousands of Ohlone people excavated from various places, generally on federal land and placed in storage, could be ceremonially reburied if the tribe wins federal recognition through a lawsuit filed in 2003, according to Sayers. "It creates confusion in the energy and frequency when they're not at peace or in the spirit world," Sayers said. "There are burials that want to be reinterred - they want to go back to the spirit world. When there are accidents on the Bay Bridge, it doesn't surprise me at all." Bridge closing to prep for season  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, March 12, 2010 While Pablo Sandoval and Tim Lincecum practice for the upcoming baseball season, city workers are preparing one of the world's longest single-leaf drawbridges for hordes of fans that will cross it by foot to reach AT&T Park. The Francis "Lefty" O'Doul Bridge, one of three drawbridges in The City, will close from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. weekdays this month while the Department of Public Works performs maintenance. Most of the planned work involves checking and repairing the roadway deck plates that were installed over the Bay-facing lane to allow pedestrians to cross Mission Creek Channel from Lot A, where fans park cars and disembark from buses, to AT&T Park. "If a plate were to become loose, it would become a road hazard," department spokeswoman Christine Falvey said. "During baseball season, when the public walks on the roadway to get to and from the parking lots, it would be a tripping hazard." Crossing the bridge's steel-grate surface would be a treacherous endeavor for heel-wearing fans if the road plates had not been installed. The bridge was built in 1933 as the Third Street Bridge and renamed in 1990 in honor of the former player and manager of the San Francisco Seals, a minor-league baseball team. Joseph Strauss, who designed the Golden Gate Bridge, was the project's chief engineer. The drawbridge was built to replace a 29-year-old, earthquake-damaged predecessor that was too short to accommodate many of the cargo ships that serviced the United Fruit Co., which operated warehouses along the creek's shoreline. Unlike most drawbridges, which are split in the middle and contain two leafs that rise when ships need to pass through, the Lefty O'Doul Bridge contains a single leaf with a hinge at the northern end. To open the span, a bridge operator working in a short tower on the waterway's southern bank remotely unlocks the leaf and uses a radio signal to turn gears that tip the finely balanced bridge onto its end. City workers normally open the bridge within an hour of receiving a request from a recreational boater, emergency craft or houseboat operator, regardless of the time of day or day of week. But on game days, when the bridge closes to traffic and opens to pedestrians, sailors must patiently wait while crowds of excited baseball fans move in droves across the striking steel structure. Baseball fans will test the freshly maintained deck plates April 9, when the Giants play their home opener against the Atlanta Braves. Treasure Island development slims down  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, March 11, 2010 Tall buildings will rise on Treasure Island, but the prospect of consistently narrow towers was rebuked by The City's planning chief because they might resemble Vancouver, British Columbia. Draft design guidelines for the redevelopment of Treasure Island - where new stores, a hotel and thousands of new homes are planned to be built in the coming decades - were presented Wednesday by master developers and city staff to island directors. Much of the Oakland-facing part of the artificially made island will be left as public open space, parks and a farm or community garden. But the San Francisco- and Yerba Buena Island-facing elements of the sparsely populated island are planned to be heavily developed. Most of the buildings will be residential and reach up to five stories. But at least a handful of towers reaching up to 650 feet, about 60 stories, are planned that will forever change the view from The Embarcadero. To improve the pedestrian experience on the island and minimize shadows, developers propose limiting the width of the new towers. Additionally, streets are orientated in an unusual triangular pattern to minimize wind and maximize the amount of sunlight at the ground level. A 600-foot tower could not be built wider than 150 feet, under the draft guidelines. A 450-foot tower could be up to 145 feet wide. Squat, 70-foot buildings, on the other hand, could grow up to 200 feet wide. "The story here is the visibility of towers," San Francisco Planning Director John Rahaim said. "They'll be more visible than anything downtown or anything in any part of The City." Rahaim said the guidelines need to be flexible and also need to be crafted to prevent multiple tall buildings from being constructed to the same height. If too many towers are built to similar heights following the narrow-building guidelines, then the island could resemble downtown Vancouver, according to Rahaim. "The bigger problem with Vancouver is that there is incredible monotony," Rahaim said. "It's all perfectly done and it's all boring." Expected development costs rose by roughly $250 million during the past four years, in part because the Navy is asking for more than $100 million for the island. Those additional costs are being offset by reduced spending on parks, by renting instead of purchasing three ferries and by developing larger housing units, according to Mayor Gavin Newsom's economic adviser, Jack Sylvan. Changed look ahead for SF’s iconic span  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Feb. 26, 2010 Stretches of prominent tent-like shelters will wrap around the massive cables that drape between Golden Gate Bridge towers for years while the cables are repaired and repainted. Bridge officials are preparing to begin a 3½-year effort this summer to repaint and repair the two main cables, which contain remnants of the original 1930s lead-based paint. Up to four crews will snake slowly along the cables inside 60-foot long, prairie schooner-style tents as they replace paint and perform maintenance work, according to chief bridge engineer Denis Mulligan. Work will begin with a single crew working on the west side of the middle of the bridge, and up to three additional crews could be deployed as the tent-enclosed efforts move toward the shorelines, Mulligan said. "When we start at mid-span, you'll notice it," Mulligan said. "It's like a sock over a section of cable." The enclosed tents will protect workers from the weather and help prevent tools from falling onto the roadway. The crews will repair frayed cable, tighten loosened bolts and replace damaged caulking at the cast-iron bands from which vertical cables are suspended at 50-foot intervals. They will also chip away at old paint and apply a new coating. The $30 million cable repainting project will be more painstaking and time-intensive than efforts undertaken in recent years throughout the rest of the bridge, where old paint was shorn away using high-pressure abrasive blasting. Such blasting techniques could damage the tens of thousands of individual wires that are tightly wound together to form the main bridge cables, Mulligan said. Work on the cables will involve the use of hand tools that are designed to remove the coating and vacuum up dislodged paint chips. Abrasive blasting work elsewhere on the bridge has been undertaken inside depressurized plastic bubbles that helped prevent lead paint chips from escaping into the Bay or shorelines. "Lead is great for corrosion protection, but it's bad for flora, fauna and people," Mulligan said. Extensive cleanup efforts are under way on shorelines at both ends of the bridge to remove lead chips that were scattered into the environment before the dangers of lead were understood. Work on the main cables will likely begin once crews have finished a similar two-year recoating project on the bridge's vertical suspenders and could last for 3½ years. Depending on the weather, work on the vertical suspenders is expected to finish in May or June, Mulligan said. Cable-test flub caused outage  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Feb. 25, 2010 A widespread power failure was triggered Friday when an electrical worker improperly switched on a massive trans-Bay power cable, according to a company responsible for the infrastructure project. The outage, described by PG&E as a "flicker" that lasted less than a second, affected electricity customers throughout San Francisco and on parts of the Peninsula. Some customers reported losing power for minutes after the 11 a.m. blunder, but PG&E spokesman Joe Molica said the utility company did not detect any outages. The flicker occurred when the Trans Bay Cable was improperly switched on by an operator during testing, according to Trans Bay Cable LLC spokesman P.J. Johnston. The operator inadvertently skipped a step in mandated operating procedures, Johnston said, leading to a short-to-ground incident that shorted out PG&E's local grid. "It was like any other electrical short, only on a massive scale," Johnston said. Cable testing, which was suspended after the accident, resumed Wednesday using enhanced procedures to help ensure that the mistake is not repeated. The cable was laid recently by a joint venture that includes private companies and Pittsburg. The joint venture does not include PG&E, but the cable connects to the utility company's grid at a PG&E-owned switchyard in The City's Dogpatch neighborhood. The $505 million Trans Bay Cable could deliver 400 megawatts of electricity into The City from power plants and other energy sources in Pittsburg once it's fully operational. It will be capable of delivering more power than the natural gas-fired Potrero Power Plant can generate, allowing the Mirant Corp.-owned polluting plant to be shut down this year if the cable proves reliable. The cable also is critical for the planned CleanPowerSF program, which could see a team of companies compete with PG&E for power sales to residents and businesses within a year under California's community choice aggregation laws. The Trans Bay Cable was not damaged by Friday's incident, which occurred in a cable that connects the massive piece of infrastructure with PG&E's Dogpatch substation, according to Johnston. The Trans Bay Cable was scheduled to become fully operational in March, but it's unclear whether that goal will be met. "These critical months of testing are really important, so we're going to do as much as necessary," Johnston said. "This is a project that will be operating for 30 or 40 years or more." Much-delayed Bay Bridge retrofit feels growing pains  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Feb. 14, 2010 As the price tag climbs into the billions and commuters face re-routes and higher tolls, the Bay Bridge rebuild is crawling along, beset by cost overruns, largely because of the complicated and untested design of a short but visually striking stretch of the 4.5-mile crossing. The 1930s-era Bay Bridge, which carries 280,000 vehicles daily and is one of the longest in the country, is composed of two spans. The western span links San Francisco with Yerba Buena Island; the eastern span links Yerba Buena Island with Oakland. After the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake shook loose a section of the eastern span, Caltrans - the state agency that oversees the bridge - accelerated plans to retrofit both spans for better protection against earthquakes. The 1.8-mile western span retrofit was completed early last year at a cost $471 million - which was $82 million less than originally budgeted. The eastern span, on the other hand, is being replaced - and the project is running a decade behind schedule and up to $4 billion over budget compared with 2001 estimates, according to the project's latest financial update. Construction of most of the eastern span was completed in 2007 as a 1.2-mile elevated skyway, which follows its predecessor's basic style but uses technology that Caltrans says will better protect it during earthquakes. But problems have arisen, largely because the skyway is being painstakingly linked with Yerba Buena Island through construction of the world's longest self-anchored suspension bridge. Unlike most of the world's self-anchored suspension and conventional suspension bridges, which use two or more towers, the 2,050-foot self-anchored suspension section has a single tower that will stretch 525 feet into the sky. The tower will support cables that will form unusual triangular patterns. The remarkable appearance helped clinch the ambitious decision to pursue the design, after elected officials squabbled in the 1990s and pushed for a postcard-worthy landmark. But the design is coming at an ever-ballooning cost to toll-payers who use the Bay Bridge and six other Bay Area bridges because local bridge retrofit projects are being funded partly by a pool of money collected from tolls. Only one contractor bid in 2004 to build the self-anchored suspension bridge: The bid was twice as much as had been anticipated and the expected final cost continues to climb. In June 1997, a Caltrans advisory panel estimated that the east span would cost $1 billion if the entire bridge were built as a skyway. It would cost up to $340 million more to incorporate a self-anchored suspension bridge or similar-looking section into the design, Caltrans' panel of advisors said. But the latest official project update shows that the self-anchored suspension bridge alone will cost $2.3 billion. The entire east span replacement project is forecast to cost more than $6 billion. Additionally, a 15-month delay in the first shipment from China to Oakland of steel pieces for the self-anchored suspension bridge, which arrived in January, was caused by "the complexity of the design and fabrication," according to a December project update published by Caltrans. "This is a very tough bridge to build - that's all there is to it," program manager Tony Anziano said during a recent hearing. "It's not an erection challenge. It's a fabrication challenge because of the size and complexity of the bridge." The self-anchored span could be ready by 2013 and needed connectors could be in place to allow a grand bridge opening by late 2014, which is a decade behind schedule, according to the December report. Until the new bridge opens, motorists traveling between Oakland and San Francisco must slow down from 50 mph to 40 mph to avoid crashing or flipping off a temporary S-curve that was installed during Labor Day weekend as part of the rebuilding project. Bridge officials blame many of the delays on land disputes with the Navy and other organizations that forced Caltrans to build the self-anchored suspension bridge towards the end of the east span project, instead of at the start. "If we had been able to build it according to the original strategy, west to east, we could have gotten the SAS strategy underway many years before," Bay Area Toll Authority executive director Steve Heminger said during a recent hearing. Embracing the unconventional The eastern and western spans of the Bay Bridge were built in the 1930s using contrasting designs - but neither span incorporated an unconventional feature designed to beautify the new east span. The western span and the Golden Gate Bridge, which have withstood all major earthquakes, were built using a conventional suspension bridge design. But the much-longer eastern span of the Bay Bridge, which has proved vulnerable to earthquakes, was built in the 1930s as an elevated roadway held in place by robust towers driven deep into the muddy Bay floor. Most of the eastern span has already been rebuilt as a more modern, attractive elevated roadway than the span that it will replace. But the so-called skyway remains unused while work to connect it with Yerba Buena Island using a self-anchored suspension bridge continues. Self-anchored suspension bridges use just one single support tower, and the 2,050-foot stretch being built will be the longest in the world. Instead of anchoring overhead cables into the ground, cables in self-anchored suspension bridges are wrapped above and below the bridge and then bound together. Because it is impossible to hoist road segments onto such a bridge during construction, Caltrans contractors are building a temporary bridge, upon which the permanent bridge will be laid. Bridge seen as crucial to project  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Feb. 8, 2010 A four-lane bridge is one of the most contentious components of redevelopment plans centered at the shuttered Hunters Point Naval Shipyard, where 10,500 new homes could be built in the next two decades. The proposed 902-foot Yosemite Slough Bridge would extend Arelious Walker Drive north from the Candlestick Point area over the mouth of a narrow waterway known as Yosemite Slough. It could improve transit and cycling opportunities for planned new neighborhoods, but its development could impact nesting birds and tidal mud flats in the natural restoration area, according to the environmental impact report from the San Francisco Planning Department. The NFL has told The City that the bridge is needed to carry fans north from the Peninsula to a proposed 49ers stadium. All lanes, including two for cyclists and pedestrians and two bus lanes, are planned to open for automobile traffic only when games and events are held at the proposed stadium. But critics say new residents and businesses could push for cars and trucks to be allowed to traverse the span at all times. With the shipyard now part of the 49ers' backup stadium plans, city officials have begun extolling the proposed bridge's general transit benefits. If the stadium is not built, officials plan to use its site north of the slough for a business park targeted at environmental and green-tech industries. "The bridge is an important element of the project's transportation plan, with or without the stadium, especially for the job-generating green tech center on the shipyard," according to a Mayor's Office of Economic and Workforce Development draft memo. The redevelopment plans will be debated today by a Board of Supervisors' committee. The office expects to seek final board approval in June. Construction of the bridge also will require approval by the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. "Without the bridge, the [bus rapid transit] would run approximately an additional mile through an industrial area around Yosemite Slough and through seven additional intersections with extra right turns, degrading the effectiveness and appeal of public transit and pushing more automobile traffic onto neighborhood streets," the memo said. The Sierra Club and other environmental groups oppose construction of the bridge. "There's shadowing and then there's the noise," Sierra Club spokesman John Rizzo said. "It's just incompatible with the stated purpose of this area." Power shift  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Jan. 28, 2010 Under the leadership of Mayor Gavin Newsom, The City's energy spending has been redirected from efficiency programs for public buildings to incentives for private renewable projects. Private solar panel installations more than doubled in San Francisco after The City began doling out millions of dollars in public subsidies from a fund created to slash municipal power use. Since mid-2008, the GoSolarSF program has provided rebates in excess of $10,000 to some homeowners, private businesses and other applicants to help subsidize solar panel installation costs. It's credited by industry members, environmentalists and city officials with driving strong growth in the number of solar panels in San Francisco. GoSolarSF sparked The City's transition from a solar power laggard into a leader, with its residential per capita solar generation capacity exceeded in California only by Los Angeles County. But the spending spree comes with a trade-off: The $15 million being poured into privately owned panels could have been spent on energy-efficiency projects to reduce the costs and climate changing emissions caused by the use of electricity by San Francisco's departments and services. There are at least 1,720 solar panel installations in San Francisco that could collectively create 9 megawatts of electricity, San Francisco Department of the Environment figures show. There were fewer than 700 installations when GoSolarSF was proposed by Mayor Gavin Newsom in late 2007. After industry members and environmentalists lobbied recently against the imminent demise of GoSolarSF, which had burned through nearly all of its $9.5 million allocation, Newsom used his State of The City address to announce an injection of $5.5 million in additional funds to save the program. "We've put together the largest incentive program of its kind in America," Newsom said during the Jan. 14 address. "As a consequence, we now are the leader of any large urban city in the state of California in per capita solar generation." The GoSolarSF handouts continue an energy-spending trend started in Newsom's early days as mayor, when he began shifting spending away from energy-efficiency measures, such as the insulation of buildings, in favor of solar power and other renewable-energy-generation projects. Spending money on energy-efficiency projects is a less ostentatious but more effective way of reducing fossil fuel energy use, compared to spending the same amount on renewable energy projects. Consulting giant McKinsey & Co. found last year that reducing carbon dioxide emissions by investing in solar or wind energy can be at least three times more costly on a per-ton basis than switching to efficient lights or appliances. Newsom spokesman Tony Winnicker acknowledged that the benefits of energy-efficiency spending outweigh those of renewable-energy projects, but he said grants and other new sources of funding are helping The City reduce its energy use. For example, the federal stimulus program provided roughly $7 million last year to help weatherize city-owned buildings, Winnicker said. "Now we can target the [San Francisco Public Utilities Commission] resources towards solar," he said. "We don't feel like there's been a decrease overall in The City's efforts to increase energy efficiency." Funding for GoSolarSF comes from an account that has been replenished from the sale of hydroelectric power generated by the SFPUC at its Hetch Hetchy Reservoir in Yosemite National Park. The account was created by Mayor Willie Brown in response to the 2000 energy crisis. Account spending grew quickly, and more than $11 million was spent during the 2002-03 fiscal year, with three-fourths going toward energy-conservation measures to help The City reduce its electricity use, SFPUC figures show. One year later, 92 percent of the account's $7.9 million in spending went to energy-conservation measures. Following his election in late 2003, Newsom quickly changed the focus of the account. In the 2004-05 fiscal year, Newsom began shunning energy-conservation spending in favor of efforts to produce renewable energy through programs such as the installation of solar panels on a water treatment plant. To secure $3 million for a GoSolarSF pilot program, Newsom privatized a planned project to install solar panels at a southern-waterfront recycling center. Instead of paying for the panels and then using the electricity, The City leased rooftop space to a private company, which now sells power produced at the site back to San Francisco. The Board of Supervisors voted to support the program after it was amended to ensure local hiring and greater payments to low-income applicants and residents of The City's most environmentally impacted neighborhoods. GoSolarSF helped foster a local solar power industry by creating work opportunities for installers, according to Jeanine Cotter, founder of local company Luminalt. A 5-megawatt solar power plant planned to be built by October on the Sunset Reservoir will be financed through a similar arrangement, which is called a power-purchase agreement. Such financing arrangements allow The City to take advantage of federal tax incentives that are not available for municipalities, which do not pay federal taxes. For the 2010-11 fiscal year, Newsom proposes spending a record $17.1 million of the account. Of the two-thirds that would go toward renewable-energy-generation projects, $5 million will be spent on GoSolarSF, SFPUC budget documents show. Whale migration key in power-farm plans  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Jan. 28, 2010 Tracking gray whales as they migrate past the San Francisco shoreline will help provide key information for a proposed plan to for a wave power farm. The mammals - which can grow up to 50 feet long, weigh up to 40 tons and are considered endangered on the West Coast - migrate between the Alaskan coast to the shores off Mexico, where they give birth to their young. During their travels, the whales pass near Ocean Beach - but there is a lack of information about exactly where. Moss Landing Marine Laboratories researchers will partner with The City and track the mammals' depth and distance from the shoreline using visual surveys and satellite tracking devices. A review of existing scientific literature will also be undertaken. "There's a fair amount of data on gray whales down around Monterey," San Francisco Public Utilities Commission Project Manager Randall Smith said. "But there's a data gap off the San Francisco coastline." The study will help city officials decide how and where to safely place an array of potentially-revolutionary underwater devices that might eventually deliver power as cheaply as solar panels. The farm would capture and convert into electricity the power of arctic storm-generated waves as they pulse toward Ocean Beach. A wide variety of devices are being developed worldwide that could help capture the wave power: Some bob near the surface, others float midwater like balloons, and a third type undulates like kelp along the seafloor. Learning about gray whale migration patterns will help officials determine which devices would minimize the risk of whale collisions and decide where they should be located. Research by UC Berkeley professor Ronald Yeung previously identified Ocean Beach as having strong potential for the nascent form of energy generation. A wave study completed by city contractors in December confirmed the site's potential, according to Smith. "Potentially, we could do a 30-megawatt wave farm out there," Smith said. The timelines and investment structure of the wave project are unclear, largely because the U.S. Minerals Management Service - which historically managed gas and oil deposits - was recently charged with regulating offshore renewable energy projects. While the SFPUC waits for the service to finalize its permit application procedures, it's forging ahead with an environmental review of the project required by California law, which includes the whale study. Pending decision on stimulus funding delays new city hub  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Jan. 10, 2010 Work to transform a dreary transit center into a dazzling anchor for a new downtown was halted because of a delay in federal stimulus allocations, and when work will resume is unknown. The aging Transbay Transit Terminal at First and Mission streets is slated to be torn down and replaced. San Francisco's tallest skyscraper will flank the new transit hub - and surrounding former freeway lots will fill with new buildings - under closely related redevelopment. The plans are designed to extend downtown south of Market Street. A temporary terminal built next to the site was supposed to be bustling with bus traffic by now, and an army of workers should be dismantling the existing center. Instead, the temporary terminal is fenced off and workers who could have helped with demolition efforts are scrounging for recession-era jobs. The work stoppage dates back to a July decision by directors of the Transbay Joint Powers Authority, a multigovernment group created to oversee the project. In July, directors agreed to redesign the project in hopes that the Federal Railroad Administration would provide $400 million in stimulus funds needed to incorporate an underground train station. The railroad administration initially planned to announce its ruling on the stimulus application by October, and joint-powers directors said they would switch the project back to its original design if the application was rejected. On Oct. 6, however, the railroad administration said it would instead make the announcement in winter. "With an announcement in October, we would have seen no delay," joint-powers Director Chris Daly, who's a city supervisor, said Tuesday. "We were shovel-ready." On Tuesday, more than 11 months after the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act was signed by President Barack Obama, the railroad administration said it still did not know when it would rule on stimulus funding applications. "It will be before the spring," spokesman Warren Flatau said. "It's a very time-consuming effort." Toxic site ready for renaissance  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Jan. 19, 2010 Underground pools of oil pollution will be removed from beneath a recently toppled power plant to prepare a sunny swath of southeastern San Francisco for new waterfront buildings. The Hunters Point Power Plant was shuttered in 2006 - leaving just one major power plant operating within city limits - and demolition of the aboveground parts of the facility finished this year. Some underground structures still need to be removed. The future of the India Basin-flanked site, which is expected to be decontaminated and ready for construction efforts in 2011, has not been agreed on. City planners tentatively slated the site - which is between Evans Avenue, Jennings Street, Pier 96 and the Bay - for a mix of buildings that includes housing. The San Francisco Redevelopment Agency is considering whether the entire India Basin shoreline should be incorporated into a redevelopment encompassing the nearby former Hunters Point Naval Shipyard and Candlestick Park. The India Basin Neighborhood Association opposes plans to build homes on the waterfront site, in part because it's close to busy recycling and postal operations, member Jill Fox said. The association wants the site to be publicly accessible, according to Fox. "It's the only privately owned waterfront property in San Francisco," she said. The association advocates zoning the land for entertainment and food-related uses, such as cafes, grocers and nightclubs, according to Fox. The surrounding Bayview district is sparsely filled with such destinations. PG&E Corp. contractors have moved heavy machinery into place that's needed to remove underground pollutants that built up during the 76 years of power-generation operations. Workers recently began digging trenches to trap oil that infests the soil. "There's jet fuel and heavy oil," said Carol Northrup, a spokeswoman for the California Department of Toxic Substances Control, which is overseeing the cleanup efforts. "There's so much that you have it floating and pooling in the soil." The oil could pollute San Francisco Bay if it's not removed, Northrup said. Oil will be removed after it pools in the trenches, according to Northrup. Additionally, chemicals will be injected into the soil to help break down oil into nontoxic chemicals, she said. A one-year final cleanup phase is expected to begin this spring, according to Matt Nauman, a spokesman for PG&E, which owns the site. "It's premature to get into a lengthy discussion about the end use of the site," Nauman said. "The No. 1 priority is the remediation." Giant Buddha may be displayed in Civic Center  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Jan. 15, 2010 A 15-ton Buddha sculpture could reside in The City's Civic Center Plaza if the area's infrastructure proves strong enough to support the six-armed behemoth. Officials are investigating whether the rooftop of the parking garage that's buried beneath the plaza can safely support Chinese artist Zhang Huan's "Three-Headed, Six-Armed Buddha." There's no guarantee that The City's Arts Commission will raise the $100,000 that's expected to be needed to ship the work from Shanghai to San Francisco. But if sufficient funds can be secured and the parking garage's roof is found to be strong enough, the Buddha could board a cargo ship bound for The City and sprawl across 60 feet of public space between City Hall and the Asian Art Museum. The piece would be installed to help celebrate the sister-city relationship between San Francisco and Shanghai. "It would be a spectacular piece," Arts Commission Programs Director Jill Manton said. "It's never been exhibited outside of China. It will be fantastic if we can pull it together." A structural engineer will determine whether the parking lot's roof is strong enough to hold the massive artwork, according to Manton. Discussions are under way between Zhang's studio and San Francisco officials regarding the proposal to display the sculpture at the Civic Center, his studio said in a statement. "It will be our honor to show this work there," an assistant to Zhang said in an e-mail. The sculpture's theme is based on the story of the three-headed, six-armed prodigy Nezha, according to an artist's statement. "Its figure implies surpassing spirit of the challenge to self-limit, the challenge to the human limits," Zhang wrote. If the piece is installed at Civic Center, police patrols will help protect it from vandalism, according to Police Department spokesman Officer Samson Chan. In 2006, a 6-foot-tall Christmas tree at the same site that had been decorated with the help of 400 schoolchildren was stolen. "Our officers are always in and around that area patrolling," Chan said. Arts Commission President P.J. Johnston characterized discussions regarding the potential installation of the piece at the Civic Center as being very preliminary. "We're a long way off from bringing the various participants together to making it happen," Johnston said in an e-mail. Low-end eateries proliferate in The City  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Jan. 14, 2010 Sipping a coffee or grabbing a sit-down snack in San Francisco could soon become more convenient. Ambitious baristas, yogurt aficionados and sandwich sellers are seizing on falling commercial rents and vacant storefronts in the wake of the financial meltdown in late 2008. The number of applications filed with The City to open cafes and low-key eateries in spaces previously used for offices or stores soared 50 percent during the 15 months that followed the September 2008 credit freeze, compared to the same period before the meltdown, an Examiner analysis of Planning Department data found. One of the permit applications was for a yogurt shop that is planned to open downtown this month in a vacant Montgomery Street storefront that "wouldn't have been available two years ago," proprietor Jason Hui said. "It was always my dream to own my own business," said Hui, who left his job as a bank branch manager in March and has no business or retail experience. "I feel like I have enough experience from banking." Many of the 31 applications filed during the past 15 months to convert storefronts into cafes and small eateries were in San Francisco's residential neighborhoods; the 21 similar applications filed before the credit freeze were more heavily clustered around San Francisco's northeastern quadrant. The number of applications filed to convert storefronts and office spaces into full-service restaurants, on the other hand, was the same before and after the credit crunch: 20. Meanwhile, 388 eateries opened in San Francisco last year, while 377 were shuttered, San Francisco Health Department data shows. The data covers restaurants, cafeterias, soda fountains and clubs. That contrasted with the previous two years, when eatery closures outpaced openings. The average size of eateries in San Francisco has been falling since 2001, according to Kevin Westlye, executive director of the Golden Gate Restaurant Association. "People are becoming a little more conservative and they're looking at smaller restaurants in the neighborhoods," Westlye said. Westlye linked the spurt of applications to open small eateries to several recession-induced phenomena: The high unemployment rate, low commercial lease rates and popularity of low-cost dining. "Some of these people may have had a corporate job that was eliminated, so they were given a severance package and they've always wanted to have a cafe or a yogurt shop," he said. Converting an office or retail space into a restaurant is a costly undertaking that involves filing exhaustive paperwork with The City, according to Louise Dawson, a San Francisco restaurateur-turned-consultant-turned-restaurant broker. "The minute you do full cooking, you have to put a hood in and go up to the roof," Dawson said. "In a three- or four-story building, you're talking $50,000 to $100,000 right off the bat." But turning such a space into a sandwich shop or cafe is far less expensive than converting it into a diner where food is cooked. "It's easier to take over a traditional retail space and convert it to a cafe if you're just doing sandwiches, salads and coffees because it doesn't require a hood. It doesn't require a lot of the same building permits to transform that space," Dawson said. But many of the eateries will fail, particularly those in the neighborhoods where foot traffic is less heavy than it is in the Financial District, Dawson warned. After racking up $2,504 in city permit fees, Planning Department documents show a hopeful sandwich store operator recently withdrew his application to set up shop in a Cow Hollow neighborhood Pierce Street storefront. "In [some] neighborhoods, I honestly don't know how a lot of them make it," Dawson said. Sutro Dunes blooming like new  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Jan. 10, 2010 On the wind-swept western side of The City, a 3.3-acre plot of sand dunes that was once destined to be housing has been meticulously planted with native plants in order to restore the site. Neighborhood groups have transformed the previously barren Outer Richmond site across from Ocean Beach into a parkgoers' destination - and city officials will be renaming the plot in the near future to reflect the changes. Sutro Dunes is separated from Ocean Beach by The Great Highway and a parking lot. It connects with sprawling federal parkland that stretches northeast through Lands End to the Golden Gate Bridge. Sutro Dunes is owned by San Francisco but it falls within the maintenance boundaries of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. "Sand dunes are vibrant, moving ecosystems," said GGNRA spokeswoman Chris Powell. "They move with the wind, so it takes a very particular pallet of native plants to allow them to function in the correct manner." The dune plants that now cover the site were grown in a National Park Service nursery at Fort Funston, Powell said. The restoration of the dunes is a far cry from what was planned for the plot in the 1970s - high-density housing. Residents fought that proposal then, and the land remained open space. The land was eventually purchased by San Francisco and used briefly as a construction staging site for sewer improvement works, according to Tom Kuhn, member of the Friends of Sutro Park and Coalition to Save Ocean Beach neighborhood groups. The groups are credited in Board of Supervisors documents with preventing development of the site. The neighborhood groups contributed to the more than 1,000 hours of volunteer work that helped restore the native habitat, the Board documents show. "If you go to the site and stand there, it's amazing - it's a refuge," Kuhn said. "It's a throwback to the way the land was before all this ever-increasing urbanization encroached upon us." Supervisor Eric Mar, whose district covers the Richmond, praised the neighborhood groups and described Sutro Dunes as the product of activism and volunteerism. "It's one of the most awesome natural places in the whole city - it's a hidden gem," Mar said. "We hope it will lead to more beautification - the residents have talked about the steps being improved and making other improvements." To reflect the changes to the land, the Board of Supervisors may officially rename the land Sutro Dunes. It's currently called Parcel 4. Adolph Sutro, the Outer Richmond landowner after whom many of the area landmarks are named, served as San Francisco's mayor in the late 1890s. He built the Sutro saltwater baths and surrounding gardens. Salt ponds could be clue to life on Mars  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Dec. 15, 2009 A scientist who searches for extraterrestrial life will use a zeppelin airship to watch red salt ponds turn green while the environment is changed from near-Martian conditions into wetlands. Work will begin next year on a decades-long project to restore thousands of acres of industrial salt-harvesting ponds in the South Bay into native wetland habitat. The ponds are colored red because of the color of microbes that flourish in the extremely salty conditions. Green microbes will replace red ones as the wetlands are restored. Mountain View-based Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence Institute scientist Rocco Mancinelli secured NASA funding to use zeppelin airship flyovers to track the color of the salt ponds. Color changes will provide clues about the speed with which competing populations of tiny organisms die and recover as the environment is restored. Mancinelli on Tuesday plans to take the airship on a reconnaissance flight over the Bay to test sensors that will monitor the salt ponds' microbial populations. For future flyovers, Mancinelli or a colleague will occupy an airship seat during a tourist flight and use monitoring equipment to collect data about the water color. The airship is well-suited for the project, Mancinelli said. "It flies low and it flies slow," he said. "They can fly back and forth and zigzag a bit over the salt ponds." The monitoring equipment, including cameras and equipment that detects light that's invisible to humans, will support other salt pond research by Mancinelli. Other scientists will monitor fish, bird and plant populations as the wetlands are restored. The researchers' findings could provide insights into how wildlife changes as its environment heals. In reverse, the findings could help scientists predict wildlife changes as environments become more hostile, such as through global warming. The salt pond environment is of special interest to Mancinelli because it resembles the last viable living environments likely found on Mars, which is now a barren, dry planet where life, if it ever existed, would struggle to survive. Mancinelli is a researcher at a 24-year-old nonprofit institute that aims to understand the origin, nature and prevalence of life in the universe. As water disappeared from Mars' surface - either into space or deep into the planet - salt was left behind and the briny environmental conditions grew similar to the salt ponds. Monitoring the conversion of the South Bay salt ponds into wetlands will offer clues about how any Martian life might have adapted as lush environments turned into salty ponds. Recycling centers may be tossed into trash bin  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Dec. 9, 2009 San Franciscans could have fewer recycling center options because of California's financial woes, improved recycling rates and the recession. The City is already underserved by recycling centers compared with other parts of California because of its land values, which could help protect the 19 centers that remain locally from attrition that's afflicting the industry statewide. California collects up to 10 cents for every beverage bottle and can sold in the state. The money is handed back to a consumer or bottle collector when it's returned to a recycling center, which sells the waste containers to recyclers. Funds remaining from unreturned containers are used to subsidize the operations of nonprofit and grocery store-based recycling centers. Those centers may be forced to slash staff and operating hours, or shut down completely. Prices paid for recyclable material tumbled during the recession, slashing recycling centers' profits and leaving them more heavily dependent on the subsidies. But California borrowed $415 million of its surplus recycling funds in recent years to pay for unrelated programs, according to figures contained in a lawsuit filed in Alameda County Superior Court by recycling centers. At the same time, the proportion of containers being recycled increased, reducing the amount of money available to subsidize container collection activities. As a result, in November the California Division of Recycling froze subsidies paid to recycling centers, citing a lack of money in the beverage container recycling fund. Recycling center giant Tomra Pacific Inc. - one of the companies that filed the lawsuit against California for allegedly improperly using container funds for other uses - already has laid off 50 employees and closed more than 40 of its hundreds of California collection centers because of the funding shortfall, spokesman Chuck Riegle said. "Everybody's trying to identify how they can cut costs and manage their business to stay in operation," he said. Recycling centers have yet to close in San Francisco due to the subsidy freeze, but significant job cuts and closures are possible, according to Ed Dunn, general manager of nonprofit San Francisco Community Recyclers, which operates a center at Market and Duboce streets. "We're going to be in fairly serious trouble," Dunn said. The low number of recycling centers in San Francisco, which fell in recent years, could help save those that remain, according to Dunn. "Here in The City, they're pretty busy compared to the statewide average, so they'd be among the last to close," he said. Funding for solar burns out  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Dec. 2, 2009 A $9.5 million program that helped scores of businesses, residents and nonprofits install solar panels is being suspended because city funds have nearly dried up. GoSolarSF was proposed in late 2007 by Mayor Gavin Newsom and approved by the Board of Supervisors in mid-2008 to encourage solar power use and to help foster a local industry. The program's funding, which comes from the sale of power generated at the Hetch Hetchy dam, quickly ballooned from $3 million to $9.5 million. "The program has been incredibly successful," said Jeanine Cotter, founder of local solar panel installer Luminalt Energy Corp. "We've grown as a result of it, and hired San Franciscans." Already, $8.7 million of the $9.5 million available has been reserved or handed out by the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, prompting the agency to suspend GoSolarSF indefinitely for virtually all new applicants. The program's solar subsidies were previously available to anyone, but now only low-income residential applicants can qualify, according to utilities commission power official Barbara Hale. Those low-income applicants will continue to receive additional funds if they hire local installers. To qualify as a low-income customer, a two-person household must earn less than $72,500 a year. "We're having the kind of problem you love to have, which is that it's a wildly popular program," Hale said. "I think the funds will be exhausted before the fiscal year is out. We're just trying to have an operating program for as long as we can." It's unclear whether the program will be revived in the future. "Our revenues in [the SFPUC Power Enterprise] aren't growing, but our capital needs are," Hale said. "We've burned through pretty much all of our surplus." GoSolarSF applications that are already approved are not affected by the announcement, and other would-be solar panel customers could still qualify for state subsidies and federal tax breaks. After solar academy bust, out-of-towners lose favor  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Nov. 6, 2009 Out-of-town solar panel installers could be banned from a San Francisco incentive program after a rogue installer broke a promise to build a training academy in an economically distressed neighborhood. Supervisors lambasted SolarCity during a committee hearing Thursday regarding the Foster City company's failure to deliver on its commitment to build a green-collar training academy. SolarCity CEO Lyndon Rive made the commitment last year while pressuring lawmakers to approve Mayor Gavin Newsom's proposed GoSolarSF program. The academy would charge students a fee for classes and then provide guaranteed jobs as installers to graduates, Rive said at the time. He promised lawmakers that SolarCity would build the academy in the Bayview-Hunters Point area - where unemployment is rife among tradespeople of color - if they approved GoSolarSF to help residents, businesses and nonprofits meet installation costs. Newsom's $3 million GoSolarSF pilot program was approved in mid-2008 and it has grown into a $9.5 million handout that has attracted applications from more than 1,000 hopeful solar panel customers. Panels graced fewer than 700 buildings in The City in 2007. Rive said Thursday the company failed to live up to its commitment with The City, but he rejected supervisors' calls to spend money on existing training programs as compensation. The installation giant may donate employee time to support an existing training program, Rive said. Officials from various labor, training and job placement organizations that serve southeastern San Francisco residents, including Young Community Developers, depicted SolarCity on Thursday as a dishonest company that exaggerates job opportunities and fails to work with low-income communities. "The City needs to step up and enforce what was promised to the community," City College of San Francisco Trustee Chris Jackson said. Toward the end of the hearing, after Rive bolted out the door, Supervisor Chris Daly hinted at GoSolarSF changes. "If they don't want to be a good player ... then let's give all the incentives to the San Francisco-based installers," he said. The hearing will be continued in the future, Daly said. Solar array causes conflict with neighbors  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Oct. 20, 2009 Douglas Kitt and his wife spent four years saving nearly $90,000 and planning to install solar panels on their house in the Upper Haight, but a neighbor is halting their dream of a green-powered home. After installation of the panels for the three-unit building, and before they were able to hook up wiring that would flow electricity back into the power grid, nearby homeowners filed an appeal with The City against the plans. The neighbors are arguing that the panels are dangerous and could harm the character of and property values in the neighborhood. Solar panels are on the verge of becoming a common sight in San Francisco, with a bevy of local, state and federal incentives available for installing them. In early 2008, fewer than 700 panels graced San Francisco rooftops, but the programs have helped to nearly double that number to more than 1,300 today. Applications to install solar panels on 1,084 properties have been filed since The City began a multimillion-dollar subsidy program, including 76 in the Upper Haight and nearby Cole Valley neighborhoods, San Francisco Public Utilities Commission figures show. The project at the Kitts' home on Page Street near Baker Street, however, is being opposed by Maureen Gannon and Rohit Verma, owners of a nearby home. "The solar panels erected ... are egregiously not in keeping with the character of the neighborhood and are now embarrassingly visible landmarks to pedestrians," Gannon and Verma wrote in the appeal. "This significantly detracts from the character of the neighborhood." Gannon and Verma have urged the Board of Appeals - which rules on filings against permits or licenses issued, revoked or suspended by The City - to order the panels to face more directly upward. The couple says that change would protect passers-by from falling panels in strong winds or during an earthquake. Tilting the panels would also improve the view for the objecting pair. Verma told The Examiner that view impacts from the panels are important, but the issues outlined in the appeal are equally or more important. California's building code generally prevents cities from rejecting solar panel installation applications unless the panels create health and safety concerns. Gannon and Verma also asked the Board of Appeals to consider longer-term implications to San Francisco of similar panel installations, arguing that they lower the value of surrounding properties. The Kitts, who paid $87,594 up front for the installation, have been ordered to not electrically connect the panels before an appeal hearing, which is scheduled for Nov. 4. "We have this great solar system and we can't even use it," Douglas Kitt said. "We were ready to flip the switch." Tenants are moving up in a down market  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Sep. 9, 2009 It may be a good time to move. Tenants are taking advantage of a dramatic recessionary collapse in the housing market by moving into luxurious new digs at discounted rates, or by locking in attractive rents in older, rent-controlled properties. After nearly a year of increasing vacancy rates and falling prices - driven largely by layoffs and by the burst of a nationwide housing bubble - the rental market appears to be stabilizing. Between September 2008 and May 2009, more than 43,000 jobs were lost in The City, which has a population of roughly 800,000, city and U.S. Census statistics show. Forbes magazine recently rated pricey San Francisco as the fourth-worst city in the nation to live in while unemployed. Vacancy rates shot up as laid-off workers in San Francisco took in subletters or returned home to the East Coast, Midwest or elsewhere, said Colliers International residential broker Stephen Jackson. The vacancies, in turn, helped drive down the average asking price for a one-bedroom unit by more than 20 percent over the same eight-month period, from $2,350 to $1,874 per month, city statistics show. More recently, despite ongoing job losses, rental prices appeared to have begun firming up. Average rental rates began rising in May, and in June the average asking rent for a one-bedroom unit had bobbed back up to $1,902. "The market, for the most part, has stabilized," Jackson said. Yet while prices appear to have settled, landlords are still struggling to find prospective tenants to fill empty properties, according to Jackson and others working in the industry. With tens of thousands of homes sitting empty, Colliers research indicates that San Francisco's residential vacancy rate has topped 5 percent. More than 10 homes sit vacant today for every one that was vacant a year ago, the figures show. What's more, the number of apartment units on the market is swelling further as developers look to lease out condos as apartments during the real estate slump. Construction of more than 3,000 new units of housing was completed in San Francisco last year, more than in any other year in recent decades, according to The City's latest annual housing inventory. The average number of new homes built yearly in San Francisco over the last two decades was 1,620, the figures show. A slew of upscale units - the most difficult category of residential rental to lease out at present - is coming onto the market in the growing neighborhoods of Mission Bay, SoMa and near San Francisco's downtown, according to Jackson. Many of the buildings were designed and built during the recent housing boom to be sold as high-end condo buildings but are now being used for apartment rentals, Jackson said. "They're not going to be able to sell those condos - it's just not going to happen," he said. That has created opportunities for renters to lead decadent lives at relative bargain prices - until the housing market recovers. Owners of the Argenta, a recently completed, upmarket, 20-story condo building on the south side of City Hall, have been forced to rent out the building's 179 units at prices starting under $2,000 per month for a one-bedroom unit and under $3,000 for a two-bedroom unit. The building is half-occupied and prospective tenants are told they will be invited to purchase the units once the market stabilizes. Roughly two units are being rented out in the Argenta every week, according to Jackson. "Two or three years ago you could fill that whole building up in two weeks," he said. At the other end of the spectrum, savvy tenants who plan to remain in San Francisco for a long time are locking themselves into renters' market prices by signing leases for units built before the 1980s. Units built before 1979 are protected by San Francisco's rent control laws, which limit rent increases and create other restrictions on property owners, such as barring evictions in most circumstances. "In a nice rent-controlled unit, you can be set for a long time," Jackson said. Good deals are hardest to find in the hippest neighborhoods, such as the Mission and the Inner Sunset, where residents are less likely to rely on the hard-hit financial services sector for jobs, according to Matthew Sheridan, publisher of the San Francisco Apartment Association's magazine. "Those sorts of people don't hold traditional jobs like they do in a Marina residence," Sheridan said. Sheridan said an expected seasonal uptick is helping to stabilize the rental market as students return to colleges. "But after that, it's probably going to be pretty miserable for the apartment owners," he said. Job losses create office space deals Economic woes have led office tenants over the past two years to desert floor space in San Francisco that is equivalent to more than five Transamerica Pyramids, a leading local broker calculated. A glut of vacancies in The City's office rental market is creating bargain opportunities for companies and nonprofits looking to move into nicer or larger digs, according to Frank Fudem, a commercial broker with NAI BT. "Whether we're at the bottom or not, it's a tremendously tenant-friendly market," Fudem said. The market for office space ground to a halt following economic crises sparked in the second half of last year, according to Fudem. But the first signs of life are also beginning to return to the market and some deals are being signed, he said. "There has been ... a smattering of deals and a number of renewals, to the point where some people think they can detect a quote-unquote 'market,'" he said. Roughly 2.8 million square feet of office space in San Francisco has been vacated since January 2008 by businesses that are shrinking, consolidating or collapsing, according to Fudem. Tenants are taking advantage of the market by moving from low-quality Class C and B space and into Class A space, he said. Old North Beach library may withstand razing  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Sep. 3, 2009 North Beach could soon be home to two library buildings, although only one would likely be filled with books. The San Francisco Public Library is forging ahead with plans to begin building a two-story branch next year on a triangular parking lot between Mason and Lombard streets and Columbus Avenue. The City plans to demolish the old branch and create public parkland on the site, and also on the short stretch of Mason Street that divides the new and old branch sites. But the recently formed San Francisco Historic Preservation Commission agreed Wednesday to hold a hearing later this month to begin the process of determining whether the existing branch should be designated a historic landmark. A historic landmark designation would prevent the 50-year-old building from being demolished. City Librarian Luis Herrera told The Examiner that plans to begin building a new branch in North Beach won't be affected if the existing branch is protected from demolition. "The plan is to proceed with a new library in the triangle site," Herrera said Wednesday. The triangle was the Library Commission's preferred site for a North Beach branch in the 1950s, but Mayor George Christopher rejected that plan because it required a partial street closure, according to a report by San Francisco architecture firm Carey & Co. Christopher governed during an automobile-dominated period and oversaw construction of the now-felled Embarcadero Freeway and the dramatic widening of Geary Boulevard. The section of Mason Street between the old library and the new branch site was temporarily closed this month by The City, which is testing the impacts of the proposed closure on traffic. It's expected to reopen before October. A half-century ago, to avoid a partial street closure, Christopher ordered the branch built on city parkland, according to the report. The library was designed by Appleton & Wolfard and constructed from 1958 to 1959. Preservationists told commissioners Wednesday that the branch has historical significance because it was built during a revolutionary period in the history of libraries, when books started being placed on shelves for perusal by users. They also said the work of Appleton & Wolfard, which designed other branches in The City, is historically significant. "It's a wonderful building," architect Howard Wong said. "It fits really well into the neighborhood." The preservation commission is scheduled Sept. 16 to begin the historic landmark initiation process related to the old branch. The Board of Supervisors must ultimately decide whether the building is a historic landmark. City Hall solar wonderland moves forward  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Aug. 26, 2009 Solar panels may be laid above City Hall, but a proposal to allow visitors to track energy savings on electronic displays inside the building won't move forward, under an interim ruling by a historic preservation group. Mayor Gavin Newsom wants solar panels installed on the historic building as the first phase of nebulous plans to turn the streets surrounding City Hall into a so-called sustainability district. The panels would produce up to 100 kilowatts of power, enough to provide up to 5 percent of City Hall's annual energy needs. The rest would continue to be provided by hydroelectric power. The City will seek bids before November from solar panel installers interested in the work, according to Newsom spokesman Brian Purchia. Speaking in New York in September, Newsom outlined vague plans for an ecotopian wonderland in the gritty Civic Center district, replete with solar towers, windmills, closed streets and bubbling fountains nourished by rainwater. Nearly a year later, plans for the sustainability district still have not been drafted, according to Purchia, who said planning is being done "as we go." The solar panels will be paid for by the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, and The City hopes to secure federal stimulus funds to help pay for other environmental features within the proposed district, according to Purchia. The 9,900 square feet of panels would be invisible to passers-by and would not require holes to be drilled through City Hall's granite walls. "It's very clear they're not going to damage the building," said Alan Martinez, chairman of the Historic Preservation Commission, which recently approved the proposal. Plan for solar academy singed  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Aug. 7, 2009 The state's largest solar-panel installer reneged on a promise to provide job training in the Bayview district after The City spent millions on industry subsidies demanded by the company. In early 2008, Mayor Gavin Newsom proposed taking $3 million in city funds and funneling the money toward a program to help homeowners and businesses install solar panels on their buildings. Under the mayor's plan, money that had been set aside for a municipal solar plant at Pier 96 would be diverted and used as payments for property owners to obtain solar panels. During subsequent months of fiery debate at City Hall about moving public dollars toward private solar projects, SolarCity and other solar companies lobbied city officials heavily to have the money diverted. As California's busiest installer of panels, SolarCity stood to become a benefactor of subsidies provided to property owners. To build community support for Newsom's plan, SolarCity pledged to build a training academy in the low-income Bayview district. Despite millions flowing from city coffers into the solar-panel installation industry to date - with much of the business going to SolarCity - the company has failed to open the academy. The planned academy would charge $1,000 per person to train at least 30 people every two months as solar-panel installers, with guaranteed jobs. Those workers were then to be deployed nationwide to work for the company at starting wages of $15 to $25 per hour, SolarCity CEO Lyndon Rive said at the time. Newsom's program, now called GoSolarSF, has been crucial to SolarCity's recent growth in San Francisco, according to Rive. The company employs 52 people in The City, up from about 40 at the time the program was approved, he said. GoSolarSF is now funded with $9.5 million in city funds. "If it wasn't for that program, we would have had to let go of many employees," Rive said. The company walked away from its promise because there's no longer any need for the academy, with economic conditions forcing the company to temper its expansion plans, he said. "More and more of these local community colleges are rolling out green-collar training curriculums," Rive said. "It helps nothing for the industry to train thousands of people if none of them get jobs." The academy plan might be reconsidered if SolarCity ever struggles to recruit qualified workers, he said. Joseph Bryant, executive director of the San Francisco chapter of the A. Philip Randolph Institute, which advocates for black trade unionists, many of whom are unemployed in the Bayview, last year touted SolarCity's training plans while building community support for GoSolarSF. Bryant said he's disappointed that the training academy has not materialized, since no similar facilities exist nearby. "Folks out here are hearing about [President Barack] Obama and the stimulus money and green money coming, and a lot of folks are optimistic about that," Bryant said. "But we're still going to need training to acquire those jobs." The Mayor's Office did not return a phone call for comment on this story. Lawsuit alleges CitiApartments drained tenant deposit accounts  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, July 31, 2009 Rental security deposits held by one of The City's largest residential landlords were funneled into an array of bank accounts and plundered, potentially affecting thousands of tenants, according to lawsuits. Several lawsuits, including a class action, have been filed in recent weeks against CitiApartments or associated companies by former tenants who claim security deposits were not returned. "What we suspect is that the money has made it into somebody's pocket," said attorney Brian Devine, who is representing former tenants in the class-action lawsuit. CitiApartments is already the target of a city-backed lawsuit that alleges the firm harassed tenants to persuade them to move out of rent-controlled units so prices could be increased to market rate. In court, they have denied those charges. CitiApartments and associated companies, including the Lembi Group, Skyline Realty, Trophy Properties and Ritz Apartments, amassed a portfolio of properties in San Francisco that was estimated as of last year to include 307 buildings. The company appears to have overborrowed from banks by overestimating or overstating the number of tenants it could convince to vacate rent-controlled units, according to Scott Weaver, an attorney representing a group of tenants who allege CitiApartments companies withheld payments offered to vacate their units. Of the properties owned by CitiApartments and associated companies, 51 were foreclosed upon by the international bank UBS and more than 60 additional buildings are currently in foreclosure proceedings, San Francisco Superior Court filings show. In a lawsuit brought by the buildings' receivers, Laramar Group, an asset manager appointed by UBS in April to manage the 51 buildings that it reclaimed from Lembi Group, makes allegations that could explain why the various CitiApartments companies stopped refunding former tenants' deposits. Laramar Group officials allege that the company pilfered its tenants' security deposits by putting them into company accounts and then using the money to pay bills. The average security deposit appears to be between $2,000 and $2,500. Roughly 5,500 units remain in the control of CitiApartments companies, according to attorneys. That means more than $10 million in deposits belonging to San Francisco tenants could be in jeopardy. "The prior management apparently commingled security deposits with other funds in their operating accounts," the lawsuit says. "[The Lembi Group] used those security deposit funds to pay monies owed." The Lembi Group did not hand over to UBS the security deposits for the roughly 1,100 households residing in those 51 buildings when it transferred the properties, according to the lawsuit. The bank accounts for all of the foreclosed properties were "fully depleted" when they were transferred to the bank, the lawsuit says. In an effort to track down the deposits, lawyers are seeking access to accounting records of 78 companies and individuals linked to CitiApartments. The real estate crash, which city statistics indicate led to a 15 percent decline in residential rents during the past year, may have tipped the company into a financial abyss, according to Janan New, executive director of the San Francisco Apartment Association, which represents apartment owners. The association does not represent CitiApartments. CitiApartments officials did not respond to phone messages left the past several days seeking comments for this story. They have not responded in court to the allegations associated with the lawsuits regarding withheld deposits. Renters can recoup withheld deposits Several thousand renters may be left wondering what to do if they are residing in a building owned by CitiApartments. There are some ways to recoup deposit money that has been denied. Under California law, tenants are entitled to damages and refunds worth triple the amount of the original deposit if it's withheld for more than 21 days by a landlord acting in bad faith. San Francisco Tenants Union Director Ted Gullickson suggested that tenants should file a complaint in small-claims court or contact the law firm currently handling the case, Seeger Salvas LLP, if the deposit is not refunded, or do both. Courts sometimes order tenants to pay some rent to the unit's former tenant when the landlord can't return their security deposit, according to Gullickson. "As for tenants who are living there now and planning to move, they may want to think about whether or not they should pay their last month's rent," he said. Residents or former residents also need to know who controls the building. For instance, former CitiApartments buildings that were foreclosed upon transferred to companies that are paying back the deposits, according to one such company, Laramar Group, said Vice President of Asset Management Steve Boyack. Find out if you're affected Tenants' security deposits might be in jeopardy if they live in a unit owned by an entity with a name similar to any of the following*: 1100 Park Lane 124 Mason St. 737 Pine St. Citi Properties CitiApartments Fel Properties Franklin/Sutter Gaylord Hotel Gough Heights Hermann Street Lembi Group, The Lembi, Frank Lem-Ray Properties Lombard Place LSL Properties Nob Hill Tower Pacific Prestige Properties Prime Apartment Properties Ritz Apartments Skyline Realty Sutter Associates Trophy Properties * List may be incomplete Niners reveal contingency stadium plans  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, July 31, 2009 Before settling on a spot next to the Great America theme park, the San Francisco 49ers considered other Bay Area sites for a new stadium, some of which could be reconsidered if the Santa Clara plan flounders. San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom and other city officials tried to convince the 49ers to relocate from Candlestick Point to a new stadium that would be built on the site of the former Hunters Point Naval Shipyard, where a 770-acre redevelopment project is planned. The team rejected the idea, saying transportation and environmental cleanup issues identified at the site in 2005 still have not been resolved by The City. Santa Clara residents are expected to cast ballots next year on whether $114 million in public subsidies will be spent to help the team build its $937 million stadium next to the theme park. If the deal with the Silicon Valley city falls apart, one of the rejected stadium sites, outlined Thursday in an environmental impact report for the stadium project, could be given a second look. Here's why they were originally rejected: Hunters Point Naval Shipyard, San Francisco Reason: The site contains hazardous materials and it's not easily accessible by freeways or public transit. Refurbish stadium at Candlestick Point, San Francisco Reason: Residents voted last year to use the site for housing, shops and parks when it passed Measure G, which approved shipyard redevelopment plans. Santa Clara County Fairgrounds, unincorporated Santa Clara County Reason: This alternative appears to be the 49ers preferred option if the Santa Clara proposal fails. Pier 80, southern waterfront, San Francisco Reason: The site is too small and isolated. Piers 90 to 96, southern waterfront, San Francisco Reason: The site is difficult to access by public transit and is too small for tailgating. Baylands, Brisbane Reason: The landowner, Universal Paragon Corp., said a stadium would be incompatible with redevelopment plans. San Francisco International Airport, San Mateo County Reason: Endangered garter snakes are present and San Francisco, which owns the airport, said it didn't want a stadium built on vacant land at the site. Moffett Airfield, former Naval Air Station, Sunnyvale Reason: The site might not be available for private development, and a stadium would be incompatible with plans for a NASA research center. Zanker Road, San Jose Reason: It's in close proximity to a water-treatment plant and it would be difficult to secure the land. San Jose State University, San Jose Reason: Surface parking needed for tailgating is insufficient. City plans Hunters Point redevelopment without the 49ers  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, July 30, 2009 While the idea that the 49ers may be relocating to Santa Clara is spreading melancholy among San Francisco-based football fans, it's also creating uncertainty for The City's largest planned redevelopment project. A new stadium demanded by the football franchise has long been planned as the anchor of a massive redevelopment project at the Hunters Point Naval Shipyard. The plans aim to construct office and research space, shops and up to 10,500 homes in a 770-acre swath of southeastern San Francisco. And with more than a decade of construction scheduled to begin at the shipyard next year, the question hanging over the project is what to do with the 25-acre lot set aside for a stadium if the Niners decide to move out of town. As a backup, city officials and developers are drafting contingency plans, which will be put in place if the team decides not to accept the shipyard playing venue. One of those proposals is to build research and office space, especially for small companies that do business in emerging fields. But the idea is not to draw just one large company into the area to replace the stadium as the project's anchor. So-called anchor projects can help redevelopment projects succeed by attracting visitors, vitality and industry. A UC San Francisco campus is widely credited with helping ensure the success of the biotech- and housing-focused Mission Bay redevelopment project. Egon Terplan, policy director at the San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association, said the shipyard redevelopment project could succeed without a large anchor. "This is a very different kind of project from Mission Bay," Terplan said. "The 49ers stadium shouldn't be seen as analogous with the UCSF campus, because it wouldn't be used with the same frequency. I think the project would work without a specific anchor." Instead, master developer Lennar Corp. and The City hope to attract multiple institutions to establish headquarters and operations at the site to help create a greentech industry hub, under one of the two stadium-free alternatives being considered, according to Michael Cohen, Mayor Gavin Newsom's chief economic adviser. The fast-emerging greentech sector, which is sometimes called the cleantech sector, is filled with startup and diversifying companies that are developing technologies to help address environmental problems, such as climate change and freshwater shortages. Demand for such technologies is being driven largely by the introduction and proposed introduction of environmental laws, such as caps on carbon emissions, in the U.S. and elsewhere. A smaller greentech hub is planned at the shipyard if the stadium is built. "We would love to get a number of regional universities to come together - our strategy is to put together collaborations," Cohen said. "You can't micromanage it. The market and technology is going to be pushing in directions you can't even imagine now." Even with the stadium, the greentech industry will likely be a large part of the redevelopment. Existing plans include more than 2 million square feet of office and research space targeted at companies in the greentech and related high-tech sectors. Without a stadium, one of the two alternatives being explored by Lennar would see the office-and-research space doubled to 5 million square feet, according to Lennar Vice President Kofi Bonner, who is overseeing the project. "There's a tendency for those kinds of companies to want to come together in a campus-like setting where they can exchange ideas," Bonner said. "We would create a series of minicampuses divided by green space." The proposal is attractive to the greentech sector, but San Francisco faces stiff worldwide competition from other cities that are courting the same companies, according to Dallas Kachan, a journalist and marketing director at the Cleantech Group, an industry research and investment giant. "The Bay Area continues to have an important mix of capital, talent and research that makes it a hotbed of innovation," Kachan said. "But it's not the only hotbed of innovation." As a result, discounted leasing rates and other attractive commercial terms would be critical to ensuring the success of the proposal, according to Kachan. Bonner agreed. "The City would probably have to put in some incentivized programming to attract these kinds of businesses," he said. If the attraction of businesses to the shipyard site does not pan out as a viable option, there is also the plan to build houses on the stadium site. That proposal would see 1,350 homes currently planned at the current Candlestick Point site would instead be built sooner than planned at the proposed site of the new stadium, according to Bonner. Environmental cleanup of the 25-acre proposed stadium site has been prioritized over surrounding shipyard land, and it's expected to be ready for infrastructure and grading work next year. The other alternative being pursued would see building heights and density reduced in a southern chunk of the redevelopment project. "You don't add to the number of homes - you just reduce the number on this [Candlestick Point] site," Bonner said. As a result, homes could be more spacious and expensive than they would be if they were built according to current plans. If the Niners decide to not take the shipyard stadium, there is also one more question of land - an area that cannot be built on. The proposed shipyard stadium provides an innovative use for surrounding land that's not considered developable because of radiation issues. The radioactively contaminated land is proposed to be used for stadium parking, with grass parking lots used on nongame days as sports fields. If the stadium is not built, sports fields are still planned to be built in that area, according to Bonner. Homebuilding ready to begin in Parcel A Construction of new homes in the first patch of the shipyard that's slated to be redeveloped is expected to begin in the coming months. Most of the former Navy shipyard still requires extensive environmental cleanup before the Navy will transfer ownership to The City for redevelopment purposes. The cleanest slab of the shipyard, however, which is in the middle of the site and is known as Parcel A, was relatively uncontaminated and it has already been conveyed to The City. Construction of 1,400 homes on the 66-acre Parcel A is expected to take up to five years to complete. Lennar expects to complete preparatory work on Parcel A by the end of this year, and then it will commence construction of 83 homes that will constitute two neighborhood blocks within the project, according to spokesman Jason Barnett. Those homes might be ready to be lived in by late 2011 or in early 2012, according to Barnett. Transportation, pollution still sticking points for the Niners A low-rate for a new stadium at Hunters Point may not be enough to overcome the area's biggest problems - pollution and transportation. In a bid to woo the 49ers to the shipyard instead of Santa Clara, The City is offering a $1 per year lease of the proposed stadium site, while master developer Lennar Corp. is offering to funnel $100 million of anticipated redevelopment profits into stadium construction efforts. Santa Clara voters are set to decide early next year whether their city should spend $114 million to help build a $937 million 49ers stadium in time for the 2014 season next to the Great America theme park - the team's stated preferred new home. The team's training and administration facilities are already located in the Silicon Valley city. Additionally, the franchise has long been telling San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom that the shipyard ranks low on its list of potential new Bay Area homes because of transportation and pollution problems. "As you know," team owner John York wrote Newsom in a Jan. 2, 2007 letter, "we undertook a detailed study of Hunters Point (Shipyard) a couple of years ago, and concluded that the site had two serious problems." The problems, York said, were the proposed site's long distance from existing roads and freeways, as well as uncertainty over the Navy's ongoing cleanup of the heavily polluted former shipyard. In a more recent letter to Newsom, dated May 13, 2009, York commended the ongoing shipyard cleanup work, but he said "the transportation concerns that we outlined two years ago remain unresolved." Those concerns could also plague any large development aimed at businesses that are proposed to be a backup if the stadium is not constructed in the redevelopment project. Comedy’s popularity is no joke for locals  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, July 29, 2009 San Franciscans could be laughing into the wee hours when a comedy club opens in the AMC Van Ness 14 building on Van Ness Avenue. The recession has been kind to local comics and to the handful of clubs where they perform in The City, with cheap guffaws and ticket deals proving popular with thrifty but jovial locals. "With the recession, more people are coming out to laugh," said comic Kevin Avery, who performs in San Francisco. A new comedy club has announced plans to jump on The City's joke-telling gravy train. Holly Horn, a former comic, improv artist, soap opera actress and waitress, is planning to open a comedy club, restaurant and nightclub in the regal Don Lee Building at 1000 Van Ness Ave. The vacant mezzanine level of the 88-year-old building - at the corner of O'Farrell Street near strip clubs, bars and other late-night lairs - will provide a stage for comics, ventriloquists and other performers, according to Horn. The AMC Van Ness 14 will continue to operate in the building. Happy hours will be hosted on weekdays at Holly's, and late-night breakfasts will be served on weekends with entertainment until 4 a.m., Horn said. The plan is to open the club before Thanksgiving. "I want to bring back a Rat Pack feeling," she said. San Francisco is not considered a comedy mecca in the same league as Los Angeles or Chicago, but it attracts solid local talent and recognized comedians who visit to work on their routines, according to Bob Davis, executive director of the Entertainment Commission. "Comics bring out the locals - it's not just the bridge-and-tunnel crowd, it's your everyday crowd," he said. "The market is not in any way saturated [with comedy venues]." Discounted and inexpensive shows have proven popular this year, industry members say. The Clubhouse, at Mason and Geary streets, is a venue linked to a training college that specializes in no-frills stand-up comedy. Cover charges start at $5, and it's a BYOB venue. Ticket sales have been strong this year, according to marketing director Melissa Gans. Enrollment in stand-up comedy courses and other classes has also been rising, she said. San Francisco-based comic W. Kamau Bell said the training workshops that he has offered since 2005 are now more popular than ever. "When people lose their jobs, a lot of people start doing comedy," he said. Jazz nonprofit wants to build Hayes Valley venue, headquarters  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, July 20, 2009 The jazz that once flourished in San Francisco could be bopping back into The City. A cashed-up jazz organization that books festivals and performances throughout the Bay Area has released plans to build its own concert hall in the Hayes Valley neighborhood. SFJAZZ plans to tear down an auto body shop on Franklin Street, between Linden and Fell streets, and replace it with a three-story building for jazz performances, classes and administration headquarters. The nonprofit runs the San Francisco Jazz Festival, which has grown in its 27 years from a small local event into a fall hit. The group also organizes jazz concerts at venues including the Herbst, Florence Gould and Palace of Fine Arts theaters. The bank account of the organization has bulged in recent years, and it recently reported to the California Attorney General's Office that it had accumulated assets worth nearly $30 million by July 2008. And, it already owns the site of its future headquarters. Selection of the site snubs the lackluster Fillmore jazz district, which encompasses the former West Coast jazz capital that was destroyed by 1950s and 1960s redevelopment efforts, in favor of Hayes Valley. The concert hall will be built close to the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and the San Francisco War Memorial and Performing Arts Center. The proposed 9,500-square-foot theater includes seating for up to 750 people, with additional standing-room only space, and is expected to host approximately 200 performances a year on Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, according to Planning Department documents. An 800-square-foot multipurpose ensemble space is planned to be used for rehearsals and classes. The 40-foot-tall headquarters will also feature a box office, gift shop and cafe or a restaurant on the ground floor. SFJAZZ's proposal is still in the early stages of The City's protracted building-approval process, and it's unclear when construction and concerts would begin. Faulty cable blamed for underground blaze  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, July 15, 2009 A subterranean fire that shot smoke and flames out a manhole in the Tenderloin neighborhood last month was sparked by an aging cable that had recently passed a safety inspection, an investigation found. Residents were warned to stay inside to avoid breathing toxic smoke belched by the June 5 fire, which began at 11:30 a.m. and knocked out power to 8,600 Pacific Gas & Electric Co. customers. A PG&E-funded investigation by engineering consultant Exponent Inc. concluded that the three-hour blaze began when an electrical cable started sparking and eventually caught fire. Insulation that had been wrapped around the cable to prevent such an accident had broken down, according to the investigation. The cable had passed a safety inspection five weeks earlier. The fire grew when burning debris dropped from the cable onto a box-shaped piece of electrical equipment, called a switch, which was filled with mineral oil, investigators found. Insulation material and the mineral oil fueled the fire, and a tunnel that connected the vault to another vault provided oxygen needed to fan the flames, according to investigators. The wiring that first caught fire carried direct-current power. Most modern electrical wiring carries alternating-current power, but many buildings in the Tenderloin and other parts of The City contain elevators that are powered by direct current. Direct-current cables, such as the one that caused the vault fire, were laid in the 1920s in a large chunk of The City that covers the Tenderloin, SoMa, downtown, Nob Hill, Chinatown, Russian Hill and Cow Hollow neighborhoods. About one-third of that area still harbors the aging direct-current cables, according to the report. In a letter to city officials Tuesday, PG&E said it will spend $5 million to replace those cables by the end of 2010. "We recognize the need to expedite this work," PG&E Vice President Edward Salas said in the letter. Alcatraz considering sleepovers  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, July 6, 2009 The weather-worn doors to former guards' barracks on Alcatraz Island could be swung open to allow visitors to sleep overnight at the world-famous outcrop. But delicate or aging tourists might be disappointed. In keeping with the island's rugged past, overnight visitors will need to sweat for their board through physical labor to help spruce up the famous landmark, under recommendations being drafted by officials. Last year, the federal agency that oversees Alcatraz solicited public feedback on the island's future. The task was part of an effort to create a 20-year master plan for the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, which includes Alcatraz Island and some other Bay Area coastal regions. The GGNRA outlined three alternatives for the future of the island, which is a popular tourist destination that was formerly home to a military fortress, a maximum-security penitentiary and a Native American settlement. The alternatives raised the prospect that hotel or hostel accommodations might open on the island, as first reported by The Examiner. They included increasing visitor access to the island, preserving and enhancing its natural environment, and restoring and celebrating its "national treasures" - features relating to Alcatraz's checkered cultural past. More than 1,500 people and organizations submitted feedback, according to GGNRA project manager Brian Aviles. "We've selected the preferred alternative," Aviles said. "It's going to be alternative number three -'Focusing on National Treasures.'" No new buildings are planned on the island, but aging buildings will be refurbished and some ecological restoration will be undertaken, he said. "We want to focus the accommodations on providing a better place for our volunteer and educational programs - so it's going to be modest in scale, and it's going to be dorm-like," Aviles said. The dormitories will be built in future years into the cold, gray Barracks Building, which is the island's largest building and the first structure visitors encounter when they reach the island by ferry. "That was historically a barracks, and we think we can reconfigure it. We're not going to restore all of it - it's a five story building - but portions of it would be opened up to the public," Aviles said. The recommendations are due to be finalized next year, and it's too early to say how many beds or rooms will open, but Aviles said he imagined dorm rooms containing 20 beds each. A small fee might need to be paid by volunteer workers staying on the island. Many older tourists on the island Sunday turned up their noses at the prospect of sleeping in the Barracks Building - especially if labor was required. But younger visitors sounded enthusiastic. "I would definitely be interested," said Alex Cordery, a 15-year-old Englishman vacationing with pals in California. "It'd be good to be able to say that you stayed at Alcatraz." The duties of the island's newest inhabitants will be based loosely on an existing program, in which nonprofits enter a lottery to send groups to the island, where they sleep on cots in prison hallways and garden and paint during the day. Access to those programs is severely limited because the island lacks basic amenities like running water. The GGNRA is considering undertaking rainwater harvesting and water recycling initiatives on site, as well as building an underwater cable to import power from the mainland and installing solar panels on the island, according to Aviles. Residents of the Rock A history of the Barracks Building on Alcatraz Island 1860s: Construction of the Barracks Building begins. The building is designed to provide a "bombproof" fortress to help protect San Francisco from Confederate forces and sympathizers. 1890s: The Barracks Building is used to house a growing number of guards brought onto the island to oversee soldier prisoners who were punished for committing crimes during the Spanish-American War. 1930s: After the island was turned into a federal penitentiary in 1934, military living quarters inside the building were carved up to provide apartment housing for guards and their families. 1969-1979: Hundreds of Native American activists, who claimed ownership of the island, lived inside the Barracks Building. Present: The building houses a tourist gift shop, theater and historical artifacts, but most of it is locked up for safety reasons. Source: Cultural Resources and Museum Management Division, Golden Gate National Recreation Area Wave-power project faces delays, costs  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, May 30, 2009 An effort by San Francisco to harvest renewable energy from the power of the waves that roll into Ocean Beach has been dealt a blow by the federal government. The development of ocean power, a budding source of clean energy that could prove lucrative for the water-flanked city, has been a cornerstone of The City's efforts to adopt a green-energy leadership role. The City is planning two ocean power trials: One would anchor a field of submerged kelp-resembling devices 3½ miles off Ocean Beach to capture Arctic storm-driven wave power; the other would place a turbine beneath the Golden Gate Bridge to harness moon-pulled tidal power. An application to run up to three years of environmental and feasibility-related wave power studies in a 25-acre patch of sea off Ocean Beach was filed by San Francisco last year with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, a U.S. Department of Energy agency. After those studies, The City aims to install a trial wave-power plant at the site to create up to 3 megawatts of electricity, before ramping up the project to 100 megawatts, which is half of the electricity produced by the fossil fuel-burning power plant in Potrero Hill. But the application was recently rejected, because responsibility for permitting renewable energy projects on the Outer Continental Shelf, which begins three miles offshore, will now be shared with the Minerals Management Service, a U.S. Department of Interior agency that regulates mining companies and collects lease payments from them. The agency plans to require lease payments for the development of renewable-energy projects on the shelf. Other organizations will be invited to competitively bid against San Francisco for the right to develop the patch of seabed off Ocean Beach as part of a process that could take several years, according to agency Renewable Energy Coordinator Maurice Hill. If no other organizations bid, San Francisco will still be required to make annual lease payments, according to Hill. Based on preliminary data published by the agency, The City's annual lease could reach $50,000, Renewable Energy Program Manager Johanna Partin told San Francisco's Environment Commission this week. "Which is $50,000 a year more than we were anticipating," she said. The tidal-power project is unaffected by the changes. The City and its partners, including Pacific Gas & Electric Co., are waiting for approval of a permit application needed to move forward on that project. Port gets funds to treat fish waste  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, April 28, 2009 Levels of disease-spreading bacteria created by waterborne seafood waste and animal droppings are expected to decline at a popular swimming spot during the next commercial fishing season. Since the late 1980s, Dolphin Club members and other users of Aquatic Park have been pushing the Port of San Francisco to create a drainage system at nearby Fisherman's Wharf to funnel fish and crab waste into the sewer system, according to club member Meg Reilly. Funding for the project now appears to have been secured. Meat, scales, slime, entrails and enzymes from fish and crustaceans currently washes directly into the Bay from fishing boats unloading at Pier 45 and from the pier's apron, where fishermen transfer freshly caught seafood to traders and processors. Seals and gulls flock to the water around the pier to feast on the bountiful waste, and carry their droppings and leftover seafood scraps 1,000 yards west to Aquatic Park, according to Port engineering project manager John Mundy. To protect the Bay and Aquatic Park from the waste, which spreads bacteria and smells like fish, the Port plans to install a new drainage system, including pumps, to channel it into The City's sewer system, where it would be treated with sewage before being poured offshore, according to Mundy. A six-month construction effort is expected to employ up to 23 people and could begin in June, Mundy said. The Port secured the $1.8 million needed for the project in November 2006 from the California Clean Beaches Initiative, but funds from that voter-approved initiative were frozen in December because of the economic and state budget crises, Port documents show. Replacement funds were recently secured from the federal stimulus package, according to Dave Clegern, spokesman for the California Water Boards, which was charged with allocating some of the stimulus funds. "As luck would have it, the project is also now eligible for its original grant money since the state has resumed bond sales," Clegern said in an e-mail Monday. "Pier 45 will not get money from both sources, but it will definitely get the cash required for the job." Port Commissioners today are expected to vote to approve the use of the federal funds and to discuss potential opportunities to secure stimulus dollars for a long list of other Port projects. Herring count nose-dives for second year The number of herring swimming into the San Francisco Bay plummeted for the second consecutive year last winter, and the state is considering canceling the next commercial harvest. The California Department of Fish and Game estimated that 145,000 tons of the baitfish swam into the Bay during the 2005 to 2006 winter spawning season. Last winter, roughly 4,900 tons swam into the Bay, preliminary department data shows. The fish are caught before they lay their eggs by commercial fishermen using gillnets. Their eggs are harvested and exported to Japan, where they are a delicacy. John Mello, a senior department biologist, said it's a "possibility" that the next commercial winter herring season will be canceled to help protect the population, which is a staple source of food for shorebirds and bigger fish. Plans for Hunters Point Naval Shipyard revealed  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, April 7, 2009 Plans have been unveiled for the first homes to be built and sold as part of a redevelopment project of the former Hunters Point Naval Shipyard. They reveal a modern industrial architectural style that's becoming more common in the Bay Area. The proposed designs for two blocks of homes planned at the northwest entrance to the shuttered shipyard will be considered today by San Francisco Redevelopment Agency commissioners. One of the blocks, on the north side of Innes Avenue between Donahue and Friedell streets, will become the site of 63 square-edged, predominantly white-and-gray, for-sale condominiums in a glass-covered, four-story building with covered private parking, a central courtyard and rooftop gathering space, the plans show. On the other side of Innes Avenue, 25 for-sale townhomes painted with earth-toned colors will line opposite sides of a new alley, which will provide access to nonstreet-fronting ground-floor garages with 36 parking spaces. An 18-month building effort could begin on both blocks by the end of the year, according to Jack Robertson, a vice president at Lennar Corp., which was appointed by The City as the project's master developer. Prices of the market-rate homes will likely vary from $400,000 to $700,000, according to Robertson. Of the 88 units, 13 will be provided at lower prices for homeowners earning less than the area's average income. Between 200 to 300 construction-related jobs could be created, and locals will be prioritized in the hiring process, Robertson said. The 771-acre shipyard redevelopment project, which also encompasses the current site of Candlestick Park and other nearby land, is expected to take 10 to 20 years to complete. Plans call for eventually including parks, shops, offices, research space, more than 10,000 homes and, if the 49ers agree to remain in San Francisco, a new football stadium. "We view these two blocks as the opening act for the shipyard," Robertson said. "These are going to serve, even after they're sold out, as models for the future blocks." Architects and others involved in designing the project during a meeting with reporters Monday compared the blocks' designs with other Bay Area projects, including new housing in nearby Mission Bay, the Altaire project in Palo Alto and Blue Star Corner in Emeryville. But the design team also said elements, including generous bay windows, were inspired by traditional San Francisco architecture, while the overarching industrial theme with square windows pays homage to the area's shipyard history. Renters rejoice: Prices falling citywide  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, March 30, 2009 The weak economy is proving to be a blessing for still-employed renters who were forced to beg, line up and pay skyrocketing prices for apartments just six months ago. Rents are tumbling as units are vacated by laid-off workers. "We're running a vacancy rate which is unheard of in San Francisco," said Janan New, executive director of the San Francisco Apartment Association. "I don't know if rents have gone into a total free fall, but clearly they're coming down." Property owners are having a difficult time renting higher-end apartments, according to New. At the lower end of the market, apartment owners are being worn down by longtime San Franciscans taking advantage of the weak market to move into better homes or new neighborhoods. "There are clearly people moving within The City - hard bargainers who have been here for a while and know the drill," New said. "But we're not seeing people from outside coming into The City." To fill empty units, owners of large apartment complexes are offering prospective tenants significant incentives, such as a month of free rent or free parking, according to Colliers International San Francisco broker Stephen Jackson. "Mom and pop" property owners will be forced to follow suit, he said. "If you want to start negotiating your rent with your landlord, they're going to have to lower it," Jackson said. "Rents are dropping by $200 citywide." The spike in vacancies is a likely harbinger of further declines in rent, according to Caroline Latham, owner of RealFacts, a San Francisco-based real estate research firm that's finalizing first-quarter data. "People who were surveying said they hardly found any [units] with rents up, that a lot were unchanged and some were down. But overall, occupancy was down significantly," Latham said. "Occupancy is the predictor of what's going to happen to future [rent prices]." Units are being vacated as laid-off workers move out of The City or into existing households with family members or friends, according to Latham and others. "You can bet that household size is growing," Latham said. An increasing number of tenants have been approaching the San Francisco Tenants Union for advice on breaking leases they can no longer afford, according to co-founder Ted Gullickson. "In this economy, people may want to avoid locking themselves into a long-term lease," he said. "Rent control gives the same protections as any long-term lease." Gullickson believes many of the tenants he meets plan to leave The City. But San Francisco's chief economist, Ted Egan, said he's "somewhat skeptical" of the idea that laid-off residents are leaving The City in significant numbers. "Where are people going to go that's any better?" Egan said in an e-mail. "We still have the strongest economy in California, and, while it's expensive to live here, unemployed people tend to want to be where the jobs are most likely to appear." We're not going to pay Tumbling San Francisco rental prices have created deals for those looking to move. A 1,000-square-foot unit at Polk and Francisco streets, which last year would have fetched $2,500 per month, was recently rented for $2,000. The owner of a multiunit building with a pool at Laguna and Bush streets is offering free parking, previously worth $250 a month, with 1-bedroom apartments in an effort to fill seven vacancies. For the first time in a decade, Golden Gateway Commons, an upscale apartment building near the northeastern waterfront, may offer a free month's rent with one-year leases. Source: Colliers International San Francisco High-density housing planned in history-rich Dogpatch neighborhood  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, March 15, 2009 Plans in the Dogpatch area for a six-story residential building offer a glimpse into the industrial-history-steeped neighborhood's dense urban future, which will be reshaped under an exhaustive rezoning effort completed last year. New building rules covering 2,200 acres of land in The City's east, including the Dogpatch, were approved by the Board of Supervisors in November. The so-called Eastern Neighborhoods Plan was crafted to protect some light industry while allowing more housing developments. Developers have filed an application to build a 68-foot-tall building on an L-shape lot at the northwest corner of Third and 20th streets, where the height limit was previously 50 feet. The building could contain as many as 62 residential units, ground-floor retail and a two-level subterranean parking garage, planning documents show. It would replace a parking lot and a 92-year-old, single-story commercial building. The high-density project is appropriate for the location, said Gabriel Metcalf, executive director of the San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association, a think tank that deals with planning and transportation issues. "When we built the Third Street light-rail line, the hope was that it would help attract investment like this," Metcalf said. "Hopefully, there will be more projects like this moving forward." Curved elements in the building's facade evoke a streamlined look that was inspired by nearby nautical elements, such as cruise ships and historical ship-building operations, according to architect and developer Stephen Antonaros. But the design didn't impress members of the Dogpatch Neighborhood Association when Antonaros presented it to them in the fall, according to President Susan Eslick. Eslick said the association doesn't object to expected increases in the waterfront neighborhood's urban density, but she said Antonaros's project "felt massive in a way that we didn't feel was architecturally interesting." The project's design failed to include sufficient public open space, more of which is needed in the neighborhood, Eslick said. To address that concern, Antonaros said he will open the building's rear yard as a publicly accessible courtyard, where a mezzanine café will serve coffee. But, he said, the project's high density is an inevitable consequence of the new zoning rules. Construction of the project, which hasn't yet been approved by The City, might begin in several years, Antonaros said. On the opposite side of Third Street, a planned 179-unit project will rise in some places to 65 feet, and homes are already selling in the recently completed 143-unit Esprit Park project at nearby 20th and Minnesota streets. Bars, pubs going strong in down economy  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, March 9, 2009 In these economically sorrowful times, sorrow-drowning is serving as an economic salve. Bars, pubs and other purveyors of intoxicating elixirs saw more job growth in the past year than any other business sector - even as most other businesses in San Francisco and San Mateo counties lost jobs. New California Employment Development Department annual data reveals that the number of jobs in alcohol "drinking places" grew from 3,000 to 3,400 in the two counties from January 2008 to January 2009. That's a bigger job growth than any of the other 94 business sectors tracked. Most of those jobs were added in the first nine months of 2008, before the economy tanked, according to Terrance Alan, a bar and strip-club owner who sits on The City's Entertainment Commission. But even after the meltdown, people have continued to party. "People are still going out and people are still drinking, but there are changes to their behavior," Alan said. "The 80 percent that still go out spend about half of what they used to," he said. "The challenge is to keep the late-night entertainment experience high-quality when the revenue that you're used to has been cut." Bars and clubs are slashing their covers and offering better drink specials, according to Alan. "You've got the same demands on your security and door staff, your facility undergoes the same wear and tear - but you have less revenue," Alan said. Although few bars are currently hiring, most are maintaining their staff and replacing hospitality workers after they quit, he said. Meanwhile, sectors hit hardest by job losses last year were in the troubled lending industry, which triggered the economic malaise through its overlending practices. The nondepository credit intermediation industry, which includes issuers of product financing and credit cards, lost one-fifth of its jobs last year, with employment declining from 3,600 jobs in January 2008 to 2,800 in January 2009. The construction industry was also hit hard, shedding 13 percent of its employees, or 5,700 jobs. Growth and decline of jobs in San Francisco and San Mateo counties Entire economy, 20,700 jobs lost, 2.1 percent decline* Brightest industries Drinking places (alcoholic beverages), 400 new jobs,13.3 percent growth Computer systems design and related services, 2,500 new jobs, 8.3 percent growth Ambulatory health care services, 800 new jobs, 3.1 percent growth Social assistance, 500 new jobs, 2.7 percent growth Telecommunications, 200 new jobs, 2.6 percent growth Darkest industries Nondepository credit intermediation, 800 jobs lost, 22.2 percent decline Activities related to credit intermediation, 300 jobs lost, 15.0 percent decline General contracting and heavy construction, 2,900 jobs lost, 14.4 percent decline Employment services, 2,200 jobs lost, 13.8 percent decline Construction, 5,700 jobs lost, 12.8 percent decline *Figures from January 2008 to January 2009 Source: California Employment Development Department Revamped Metreon slated to be restaurant-centric  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, March 4, 2009 The cavernous electronics-dominated Metreon complex could be reborn as a vibrant restaurant- and retail-focused destination under a planned overhaul approved Tuesday. Sony recently sold the four-story mall and announced it would close the flagship PlayStation and Sony stores inside. San Francisco Redevelopment Agency commissioners on Tuesday evening unanimously approved plans by new owners Westfield Group and Forest City Enterprises to rearrange the building to better integrate it with the booming museum district neighborhood in SoMa. Under the approved plans, shops and restaurants will line the outer perimeter of the ground floor; popular New York restaurant Tavern on the Green will occupy the top floor; a food terrace will face Yerba Buena Gardens; and lights will colorfully illuminate the Fourth Street facade. The successful cinema complex will remain on the third floor. The San Francisco Filipino Cultural Center will lease space on the third floor, where it will set up its events and administrative headquarters. The entrance will be moved from the corner of Fourth and Mission streets to the middle of the block on Fourth Street. "There are teenage boys weeping all over The City about the demise of the PlayStation store," Commissioner Francee Covington said during the hearing. "But I think the new retail outlets coming in will be fabulous, and having the entrance off of the street is going to be wonderful, because that entrance has always been a tunnel." The corporate might of the mall's new owners, which also operate the nearby Westfield-branded San Francisco Centre on Market Street, has helped them secure otherwise-elusive financing needed to begin construction in spring, according to Amy Neches, project manager for the Redevelopment Agency, which owns and governs the land. New storefronts are expected to open in time for the 2010 end-of-year shopping season, and jobs are expected to more than double to 1,100. San Francisco residents will be prioritized in the hiring process, according to Neches. Terminal project ousts tenants  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Feb. 13, 2009 Rose-sharing romantics, art aficionados and late-night loungers will see cherished boutique businesses disappear from their SoMa locations under government plans to raze land for a new transit terminal. Three chic hotspots on Natoma Street are among the dozens of businesses that will be evicted this year by the $1.2 billion project to rebuild the Transbay Transit Terminal at First and Mission streets - and surround it with homes, stores and office towers. Zebulon restaurant and bar, John Colins Lounge and Varnish Fine Art gallery, bar and event space are among 33 SoMa businesses and nonprofits that the Transbay Joint Powers Authority will evict from properties it purchased for the terminal project, documents show. "They're taking a space away from us that is irreplaceable," said John Colins co-owner John Giuffre. The bar will move this spring from its elegant home of nearly four years - a freestanding, two-story red-brick, sky-lighted building - into the ground floor of a 10-story building on Minna Street, Giuffre said. Others to be evicted include leasees of office space, parking lot operators, an additional restaurant/bar and a flower shop housed in a ramshackle wooden shed in front of the existing terminal. Flower vendor Salvador Reynoso said he has been told he probably has until October to shut down shop or find a new location for his business, which was founded by his uncle 20 years ago. Businesses on Natoma Street, east of Second Street, will likely be cleared out in the second half of this year, according to Transbay Joint Powers Authority project manager Robert Beck. The one-way lane will instead be used as a car-free retail strip to serve inhabitants of the 39 new residential buildings planned around the terminal, according to Beck. The project is expected to be completed by 2014. As required by state and federal laws, all displaced businesses will receive financial assistance - expected to total $1.8 million - according to Beck. That averages out to about $54,000 per business. Still, not all businesses are going quietly. Varnish hosted a petition-signing event Thursday to fight its pending displacement. "Our goal has been to remain open at our current location as long as we possibly can, and then open within a couple of weeks at a new location," co-owner Jen Rogers said. "We want desperately to stay where we are." Rogers said she opened Varnish in April 2003 with her business partner, Kerri Stephens, after seismically retrofitting and refurbishing the two-story building, and found out one month later that their future at the location was doomed. Coast Guard adds machine guns to helicopters  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Feb. 3, 2009 The four Coast Guard helicopters that patrol San Francisco's shoreline have been replaced with stealthier and better-armored choppers that, for the first time, can be armed with machine guns. The Coast Guard is replacing its national fleet of orange-and-white helicopters under one of the post-9/11 programs started by the Bush administration to better militarize the agency. The four new MH-65C Dolphin helicopters, which are stationed near San Francisco International Airport, are upgraded versions of the aircraft they replaced. The new helicopters will not be armed all the time, but they will provide armed escorts to arriving and departing cruise ships, according to Adm. Paul Zukunft. They will be available in the event of a terrorist threat, such as the one that killed 17 sailors aboard a Navy destroyer in 2000 in a Yemeni port, according to Zukunft. He commands the 11th Coast Guard District, which spans four states and thousands of miles of ocean. "A concern of ours would be an attack much like the USS Cole - not just against a military vessel, but also a passenger vessel," Zukunft said. To help pay for new equipment, weapons and agents, the annual budget for the agency increased from $3.9 billion before 9/11 to more than $9 billion sought in 2009, according to figures published by the U.S. Government Accountability Office. The helicopters are used because it's safer to fire bullets down into the water from a helicopter near a city than horizontally from a boat, in part because bullets can bounce like skipped stones on water, according to Zukunft. Bullets fired from the M240 machine guns used by the Coast Guard have ranges of 2.5 miles, Zukunft said. Accurately shooting at adversarial watercraft is a challenge from a helicopter, according to San Francisco-based Cmdr. Sam Creech, who for 19 years has piloted Coast Guard helicopters. "Our marksmen are pretty highly trained," Creech said. "Not only are the boats moving, but the helicopter is moving." The Coast Guard this week is using a helicopter-mounted machine gun loaded with blanks in "judgmental training" sessions in San Pablo Bay, according to Creech. The training was on full display Monday morning when a three-person helicopter crew hovered over a faux-rogue Coast Guard dinghy filled with pretend terrorists wielding fake weapons. The boat and its four-person, paramilitary-garbed crew were part of the Coast Guard's Maritime Safety and Security Team - which is similar to a SWAT team, according to Creech. The helicopter swung clockwise around the boat, with its machine gun hanging out of the right-hand side and kept pointed at the boat. Eventually, the hazy sky filled with the rat-a-tat-tat of machine gun fire for the training exercise. Heavy machinery: The firearms the new Coast Guard helicopters can carry are anything but lightweight. Belt-fed, air-cooled, gas-operated, fully automatic machine guns 4-feet long and 27.6 pounds Fire 7.62 mm bullets up to 2.5 miles Can fire 200 rounds per minute in 10- to 13-second bursts with 2 to 3 seconds between bursts A heat shield protects the gunner's hand from the hot barrel Source: Product specifications published by GlobalSecurity.org Water troubles trickle down  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Jan. 22, 2009 Water that has flowed from the Sierra Nevada to taps in San Francisco and the Peninsula is set to triple in price as supply becomes more scarce, demand increases and billions are spent protecting the system from earthquakes. The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission is currently negotiating future water rates and supply with its wholesale customers, which include 25 cities and water districts and two private utilities in San Mateo, Alameda and Santa Clara counties. A 25-year contract with wholesale customers - which account for about two-thirds of water use - expires in June. Although representatives from both sides - the PUC and the Bay Area Water Supply and Conservation Agency, which is representing the wholesale customers - are tight-lipped about specifics of the negotiations, PUC General Manager Ed Harrington said the new contract will encourage water conservation through incentives and surcharges. "What we have in the contract are incentives - some might call them penalties," Harrington said. "Should we use more than [an average 265 million gallons a day], then we're going to collect a surcharge, and that surcharge will go to help the river and do environmentally good things." A plan for Hetch Hetchy upgrades locked in a cap until 2018 on the average amount of water that can be drawn daily from The City's watersheds. Although the cap is higher than the amount of water presently used, it's 7 percent less than the amount expected to be needed by PUC customers in 2018, given population growth and development in the Bay Area, agency figures show. Most of the water comes from O'Shaughnessy Dam in the Hetch Hetchy Valley, which is filled mostly by melted snow - although that is becoming more sparse. Compounding the woes of the projected water shortage, the PUC is set to increase water rates to help fund a $4.3 billion project to protect its pipes and some of its dams from earthquakes. A San Francisco household that currently pays $63 a month in water bills, which includes the cost to treat water flushed back down the drains, can expect to pay $129 by 2018, according to PUC Deputy General Manager Michael Carlin. That increase will also fund a $3.2 billion project to improve The City's sewer system. Wholesale users can expect to see the price of Hetch Hetchy water more than triple, Carlin said. Art Jensen, who's leading negotiations on behalf of the Bay Area Water Supply and Conservation Agency, spoke during an October PUC hearing of the "serious concern" harbored by its 27 member agencies about the implementation of the cap, meeting minutes show. He was joined at that meeting by officials from Burlingame, Redwood City, East Palo Alto and other cities, who said they were already working on conservation efforts and could not afford water limits. A representative from the Santa Clara Water District expressed concerns that restrictions would have a severe impact on the economies of local communities. Many of those 27 agencies have started warning customers of increasing water costs and also of expected restrictions on supplies, although they can't say for sure how much prices will rise. Milpitas has warned its customers to expect two consecutive years of 9 percent increases, according to Mayor Robert Livengood. The Coastside County Water District is struggling to meet demand for water from its customers in Half Moon Bay and elsewhere, as its water sources, including Hetch Hetchy, are being stretched to the limit, according to board member Chris Mickelsen. "So far, we've been able to keep our rate increases in the single-digit range," he said. "In the next few years, it's going to start getting painful." Peninsula water customers have negotiating strength More than 100 years ago, when Congress granted The City the right to dam the Hetch Hetchy Valley as a reservoir, several Peninsula cities gave influential support to the project. By the 1960s, those wholesale customers outside San Francisco had banded together to form the Bay Area Water Users Association. About 10 years later, the association backed a suit in federal court against The City, claiming rate discrimination since a proposed increase by the Board of Supervisors would impose higher water rates for wholesale customers outside San Francisco. Wholesale customers won an injunction against the rate increases. "The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal affirmed, holding that the 'Bay Cities,' as it referred to the plaintiffs, were co-grantees, along with San Francisco, in the rights granted under the Raker Act," according to the Web site for the organization, now known as the Bay Area Water Supply and Conservation Agency. A long-term settlement with the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission that included a 25-year contract settled the rate lawsuit in 1984. That contract is set to expire in June. "The communities in which two-thirds of water is used have no political representation in San Francisco, and San Francisco itself is not subject to oversight by the California Public Utilities Commission, as any investor-owned utility would be," according to the water agency. "In terms of the many wholesale customers who are entirely dependent on the San Francisco regional system, the SFPUC is, in effect, an unregulated monopoly." SFPUC General Manager Ed Harrington said the settlement will continue to prevent The City from increasing wholesale rates for other Bay Area users more steeply than in-city retail rates. If San Francisco tried, wholesale customers could reinstate a legal claim of partial ownership of the Hetch Hetchy dam, according to Harrington. "What The City used to do was just charge [wholesale customers] whatever it wanted," Harrington said. "All the Bay Area customers got together and sued us, and we're not allowed to do that, unless we want to go back to court." Conservation efforts necessary to close water-supply gap To close the gap between water supply and the expected demand in coming years, more conservation measures - such as recycling treated sewage for irrigation and using low-flow bathroom fixtures - will be needed, according to San Francisco Public Utilities Commission officials. "We don't have the right to simply take as much water as we feel like if it's going to have a negative impact on fish life and other people," said Ed Harrington, general manager of the SFPUC. "We have a responsibility to be good stewards." To help manage the limited water supply, several agencies using wholesale water said they might end up selling their allocation to one another if one user is able to conserve and another is not, but is able to afford extra water. The cap-and-trade system is supported by such water watchdogs as the nonprofit Tuolomne River Trust, according to Bay Area Program Director Peter Drekmeier. "It might be that one community can implement conservation and recycling programs cheaper than another community," Drekmeier said. "It's a mechanism to encourage more innovation." The Old College try Stanford University, which is allocated a maximum 3 million gallons of Public Utilities Commission water per day, has reduced its use from 2.7 million gallons in 2000 to 2.3 million in 2008, according to university documents. It has replaced more than 10,000 bathroom fixtures, created a "water-wise" demonstration garden and introduced guidelines for efficient fountains, among other measures. Facts and figures about the current and future demand of the SFPUC's wholesale water 27: Agencies that are wholesale customers of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission 19 of 27: Wholesale customers who rely on SFPUC water for more than 90 percent of their needs 65 percent: Approximation of SFPUC water that is used by wholesale customers 40 percent: Water purchased by wholesale customers for businesses and community organizations 60 percent: Water purchased by wholesale customers for residential use 1.7 million: Residents who use water provided by wholesale customers 184 million: Gallons of water per day allowed to be used by wholesale customers in 2018 194 million: Gallons of water per day expected to be needed by wholesale customers in 2018 $500: Current wholesale price per acre-foot of water $1,600: Expected wholesale price of water per acre-foot in 2018 Source: Bay Area Water Supply and Conservation Agency, San Francisco Public Utilities Commission Wholesale customers who buy their water from the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission Alameda County Water District California Water Service Co. City of Brisbane City of Burlingame City of Daly City City of East Palo Alto City of Hayward City of Menlo Park City of Millbrae City of Milpitas City of Mountain View City of Palo Alto City of Redwood City City of San Bruno City of San Jose City of Santa Clara City of Sunnyvale Coastside County Water District Estero Municipal Improvement District Guadalupe Valley Municipal Improvement District Mid-Peninsula Water District North Coast County Water District Purissima Hills Water District Skyline County Water District Stanford University Town of Hillsborough Westborough Water District Source: Bay Area Water Supply and Conservation Agency Treasure Island to be protected from rising seas  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Jan. 21, 2009 Dirt and other fill may be piled onto parts of Treasure Island to protect planned buildings from sea level rise due to climate change and other factors. A multibillion-dollar plan for the 450-acre man-made island - including a ferry terminal, retail strip, three hotels and 6,000 new housing units, including a 60-story residential tower - was adopted in 2006 by The City. But the low-lying island is vulnerable to floods if seas rise due to climate change, according to Kheay Loke, a developer with Wilson Meany Sullivan, which is partnering with Lennar Corp. on the project. The flood risk will be greatest if rising seas coincide with a high tide and large storm, according to Loke. Loke and a handful of engineers and city officials presented options last week to the Treasure Island Development Authority Board of Directors for protecting new buildings against climate change-related flooding. To protect new buildings from floods, fill will likely be dumped beneath planned development sites, according to Loke. The fill will be excavated from some of the 300 acres of island that's slated to be used for parkland and sports fields, and additional fill will be imported to the island, according to Loke. "It's all about raising grades to enable gravity drainage, as opposed to relying on levees for protection," Loke said. The developers could also choose to build sea walls - which would serve the same function as levees in the Central Valley and New Orleans - around the island to protect against flooding, authority documents show. The Board of Supervisors will ultimately decide how to protect the island from a potential 3-foot sea level rise over 70 years, according to Jack Sylvan, who oversees public-private partnership projects for The City. Property taxes could be set aside to build sea walls, or take other flood-protection measures, if seas rise more than expected, according to Sylvan. "The City is working on how it will address sea level rise in the future, assuming it does in fact happen," Sylvan said. Infrastructure work, including grading and seawalls, could begin by late 2010, according to Sylvan. Building construction is expected to start 18 to 24 months later, he said. Bay Area looks to draw water straight from the Bay  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Jan. 15, 2009 A long-running plan to keep millions of Bay Area residents with drinkable water during a water crisis such as a drought or disaster by desalting sea and river water is coming up against funding obstacles due to California's budget crisis. San Franciscans enjoy some of California's cleanest water - fresh snowmelt that gushes through a labyrinth of pipes from the Sierra Mountains down to The City. But San Francisco'slong distance from its dams leaves its water supply vulnerable to earthquakes, and its reliance on snowmelt leaves its thirst at the mercy of the warming globe, which is reducing snowpacks. In October, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission and three other local water agenciesbegan a $2 million desalination experiment in the East Bay to see whether they could affordably remove enough salt from brackish estuaries or from the sea to provide emergency drinking water to their 5 million water customers. Desalination turns salty water into fresh drinking water. In desalination plants, the water is forced at high pressure through a filter, known as a membrane, through which water molecules can pass but salt cannot. In the Bay Area, desalination efforts are under way next to an estuary in Bay Point, where a $2 million, six-month pilot project was started in October by the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission and three other local water agencies. The first round of experiments at the pilot plant concluded in December. "The very preliminary results show that it's working," said Hasan Abdullah, desalination coordinator at the East Bay Municipal Utility District, one of San Francisco's partners in the project. "I'd be surprised if we find that it doesn't achieve our water quality goals." One of the purposes of the pilot project is to test different membranes to see how well they filter salt out of brackish Delta water, where salinity levels fluctuate massively by the hour, season and year, according to project manager Mari Valmores of the Contra Costa Water District, which is overseeing the experiment in eastern Contra Costa County. The pilot project is being funded with $1 million in grants from the California Department of Water Resources, and with $250,000 apiece in cash or in-kind services from each of the participating local agencies. Desalination plants have been used in rain-poor, energy-rich countries in the Middle East for decades, according to John MacHarg, founder of Affordable Desalination Collaboration, an industry group representing desalination companies. Within the last decade, the technology has been improving and spreading worldwide as demand for freshwater has been growing, according to MacHarg. New desalination efforts are under way or under investigation around the world, including in Australia, Algeria, China and Singapore, and in a growing number of California cities and counties, including San Diego, Marin, Santa Cruz and Santa Barbara, according to MacHarg. But uncertainty about California's chronic budget deficit is clouding the future of public works projects, which could include desalination projects, according to California Department of Water Resources spokesman Don Strickland. "The state's Pooled Money Investment Board voted to freeze certain disbursements, and this could potentially include grant funds for water desalination projects," Strickland said in an e-mail. "It may be necessary to temporarily suspend payments." If funding for the desalination project from California evaporates, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission hopes the agencies can secure funding under the economic stimulus plan championed by President-elect Barack Obama, according to Michael Carlin, General Manager of SFPUC Water Enterprise. If the pilot project is successful, the SFPUC could build a desalination plant by itself or, preferably, in conjunction with other local agencies by 2012, according to Carlin. Sites being considered are inside and outside of The City, where salty water would be harvested from the ocean, Bay or Delta. The plant, once built, would operate slowly around-the-clock to ensure that it's ready to be quickly used in a crisis, according to Carlin. The proposed plant would desalt 65 million gallons of water per day and cost up to $400 millionto build and up to $47 million a year to operate,SFPUC figures show. Results from the pilot project will help refine those cost estimates. Although the water produced by the plant wouldn't taste as good as snowmelt, it would be safe to drink, according to Carlin. Mobile unit will dispense water during emergency When an earthquake or other disaster wreaks havoc with San Francisco's water supply, The City's water agency will be ready with a $500,000 mobile water treatment and bagging machine to ensure a drinkable water supply. The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission bought the trailer-mounted emergency water distribution unit last year using U.S. Department of Homeland Security funds, according to SFPUC water manager Michael Carlin. "We can hook it up to a water source and start bagging water in tough plastic bags," Carlin said. "Then we can hand them out just like bottled water." The unit can draw water out of water hydrants or from reservoirs, such as Lake Merced, and it's equipped with ozone- and ultraviolet-light-based disinfecting equipment that can be powered using a back-up generator, agency documents show. Sites identified as possible plant locations The Bay Area's four largest water agencies are jointly exploring a regional desalination project that would provide an additional water source for the region: Contra Costa Water District East Bay Municipal Utility District San Francisco Public Utilities Commission Santa Clara Valley Water District Breaking down the Bay Area project According to officials, if the pilot project is successful, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission hopes to build a desalination plant by 2012. By the numbers $234 million to $400 million: Estimated cost to build a permanent desalination plant* 71 million gallons: Ultimate possible capacity per day from the project's desalination facilities $25 million to $47.5 million: Estimated annual cost to operate and maintain the plant* 5.4 million: Residents and businesses that could be served by desalination project $1,237 to $2,994: Estimated cost to desalt one acre-foot of water - 325,000 gallons - at the plants $2 million: Cost of a desalination pilot project in Bay Point Police test ShotSpotter in the Mission  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Dec. 19, 2008 The all-too-familiar sound of gunfire that erupted in the Mission district Thursday night rang in the launch of the newest crime-fighting tool for the violence-plagued neighborhood. The shots were fired from handguns by police officers - at a stack of bulletproof vests - to test, calibrate and fine-tune roughly 20 sound sensors that will allow police to monitor gunfire in a square mile of the Mission. The area is part of Mission Police Station's jurisdiction, which has accounted for 45 homicides since 2006. Residents were warned just prior to the tests through megaphone-blasted alerts from squad cars and by street closures. At 9:28 p.m., the first test proved successful when Officer Charles Bonicci fired and the system picked it up, according to police Lt. Mikail Ali. Police won't tell the public which parts of the Mission will be monitored, but the locations of Thursday's four tests offer some clues: the first one at 18th and Lexington streets; 22nd and Bartlett streets at 9:47 p.m.; 23rd Street and Treat Avenue at 10:02 p.m.; and 18th and Bryant streets at 10:20 p.m. The final test at 18th and Bryant was the only one to prove unsuccessful, but police still officially started using the ShotSpotter system afterward to monitor the neighborhood for the telltale acoustic signature of gunfire, Ali said. An additional sensor will be added in that area to solve the problem, he said. The $200,000 system, purchased with state grants, could help police solve crimes, but it won't be as helpful at preventing crimes, according to Mission station Capt. Stephen Tacchini. The City is nearing 100 homicides this year, after a decade high of 98 in 2007. "It's a detection system," Tacchini said. "It's not a preventative measure by any means." ShotSpotter, which was invented by a group of Stanford research scientists in the 1990s, is also being used by 32 other cities, according to company spokesman Gregg Rowland. It is also currently in use in the Western Addition neighborhood and Bayview District. ShotSpotter uses pizza-size audio sensors and trigonometry-based calculations using the speed of sound to alert police to the precise location of a shooting or explosion, according to Rowland. Between March and September, a ShotSpotter system that monitors 1.3 square miles of Bayview alerted police to 166 instances of gunfire, helping lead to the June arrest on Cashmere Street of an Antioch man who fired a stolen pistol, according to Ali. It also helped police find evidence they might not have found for the investigation of a March 9 homicide, because the slain victim died hundreds of feet from where he was shot, according to Ali. Since the crime has not been solved, he would not say what evidence was found. ShotSpotter might be added to other neighborhoods if funding grants can be secured, according to Ali. Where the wild shots are ShotSpotter is currently being used in the Bayview district and Western Addition neighborhood. It was launched in the Mission district Thursday night. Bayview district figures for March 7 through Sept. 20: 1.3 Square miles monitored 166 Instances of gunfire detected by ShotSpotter 21 Instances of gunfire reported to police by citizens 1 Homicide detected by ShotSpotter 1 Attempted homicide detected by ShotSpotter 1 Arrest due to ShotSpotter Western Addition figures for April 11 through Oct. 21: 1 Square mile monitored 89 Instances of gunfire detected by ShotSpotter 34 Instances of gunfire reported to police by citizens 2 Homicides detected by ShotSpotter 1 Attempted homicide detected by ShotSpotter 1 Arrest due to ShotSpotter Source: Mayor's Office of Criminal Justice Empty offices build up in city  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Dec. 18, 2008 Companies in San Francisco are searching for subtenants to lease 800,000 square feet of office space that has been abandoned and left empty, a barren manifestation of job losses across The City. According to city statistics, 8,200 workers have lost their jobs this year in San Francisco. About 10 percent of jobs in The City are in the financial sector, which is experiencing job losses in the wake of defaults and foreclosures caused by overlending. The recent collapse of two big law firms has dumped a substantial amount of office space onto the market, according to tenant broker Frank Fudem. "If you're a landlord, it's getting a lot worse," Fudem said. Gift retailer Red Envelope is searching for subtenants for its six-story SoMa headquarters, because it was acquired in June by Provide Commerce, which is shifting its newly owned company to San Diego, according to spokeswoman Karen Behrman. However, in a speech about the economy posted on YouTube as part of his State of The City address, Mayor Gavin Newsom was upbeat about consistent growth in the amount of overall office space leased in San Francisco in recent months and years. "This has been a remarkable run," he said. Vacancy rates affect city revenue, because they can impact property values for tax-assessment purposes and because full offices pay higher payroll and utility taxes, according to City Controller Ben Rosenfield. Total office space available for lease in San Francisco recently surpassed 10 million square feet, as companies collapsed or laid off staff and as newly built office space came onto the market, according to Jesse Gundersheim, Grubb & Ellis Co. research analyst. The glut of space drove down the average amount companies are paying per square foot from $46 in July to $38 in October, and further decreases are expected, according to Gundersheim. The precise market value of office space is difficult to assess right now, because few deals are being signed, Gundersheim said. There is currently 2 million square feet of office space available for sublease in San Francisco, including 810,000 square feet that is currently vacant, according to figures provided by Tove Nilsen, director of Market Research at Colliers International. More than 500,000 square feet has been left vacant since July, Nilsen said. There's about 80 million square feet of office space in The City. The holiday season combined with the recession is making it difficult for brokers to find tenants, according to Colliers International broker Mike Monroe. "The holidays is typically a slower period for us," he said. Company seeks community support for new utility boxes  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Dec. 16, 2008 AT&T is pitching the promise of "next generation" Internet and television services for San Franciscans in an effort to win support for unpopular plans to bolt hundreds of 4-foot high utility boxes onto sidewalks and other rights-of-way throughout The City. Specific locations have not been identified for most of the 850 planned metal boxes, but they would be built close to existing AT&T utility boxes, planning department documents show. Additionally, some of AT&T's existing boxes would be expanded, and some would be moved from utility poles to footpaths. The new equipment would house technology to support the company's U-verse service, which already provides 20 megabit-per-second, faster service to around 200 Californian cities, according to company spokesman Gordon Diamond. The technology inside the boxes would support Internet protocol-based television, telephone and web services, he said, adding that installing the boxes above-ground keeps equipment dry and accessible. San Francisco Beautiful, a city nonprofit, has called on the company to follow the example of Comcast, the cable and Internet service provider, and install its boxes on private property, but Diamond dismissed that suggestion. "Our equipment has always been placed in the public rights-of-way," Diamond said. "Our new cabinets must be located close to our existing cabinets." This is not the company's first attempt to receive approval for the utility boxes. During a July Board of Supervisors meeting, the telecommunications giant withdrew its proposal to install the boxes, and pledged to submit a new plan, after lawmakers said they planned to order the Planning Department to conduct a full investigation into the impacts of the proposal. The department had originally ruled that approval of the proposal would not require completion of an environmental impact report - a process required by California law for all major projects. At a meeting attended by more than 60 speakers, many affiliated with neighborhood groups, the supervisors indicated they would overrule the Planning Department's decision. Opponents to the utility boxes say they are too big, would be visually unappealing, and would attract graffiti and illegal advertisements. Although the company has not yet released a revised proposal, in recent weeks AT&T has held community meetings to talk about the utility boxes, and feedback gathered during the meetings will be used to refine the company's upgrade plans, according to Diamond, who said he didn't know when a new application to install the utility boxes would be filed. Two final workshops are scheduled for 7 p.m. today at the Northern Police Station and 7 p.m. Wednesday at Fort Mason Center Building C, Diamond said. Rents decline for first time since 2004  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Dec. 10, 2008 Rental prices for apartments in The City, which had been skyrocketing for nearly two years, fell in October, as an avalanche of pink slips across San Francisco weighed on average household incomes and led freshly unemployed workers to abandon city living, new figures show. The average rent for a one-bedroom unit advertised on craigslist.org fell 2.4 percent in one month to $2,293, according to the city controller's October economic barometer report, released this week. That price, however, was still 3.7 percent higher than at the same time last year. San Francisco rents started falling in October and continued to fall in November, according to Victor Calanog, senior economist at national research firm Reis Inc. Rents had not previously fallen since 2004, according to San Francisco chief economist Ted Egan. During most of the current economic downturn, rents have risen as potential home buyers have remained renters while waiting for prices to bottom out, according to Egan. However, 1,600 people lost their jobs in San Francisco in October, taking the number of jobs lost in 2008 to 8,200, driving some residents out of The City and pushing down the amount people will pay to rent, according to Egan. Additionally, about 400 city workers will soon be laid off, Mayor Gavin Newsom announced Tuesday. If rents do not quickly rebound, then they will probably continue to fall until the recession ends, according to Egan. Some property owners are leaving units vacant and hoping the rental market will strengthen, rather than locking themselves into current prices, according to San Francisco Apartment Association Executive Director Janan New. Cleaning up: City hopes to cash in on clean-tech  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Dec. 4, 2008 Buried among the hoopla, superlatives and expletives that filled the streets and airwaves following President-elect Barack Obama's Nov. 4 victory was a 10-word statement that could foreshadow an economic bonanza for an industry that's beginning to emerge in The City. Eight minutes into Obama's victory speech, he unwound his momentarily clasped hands: "There's new energy to harness," he said, shaking his fingers up and down. "New jobs to be created." Local officials have a unique chance to position San Francisco - long a pastureland of grass-roots environmental entrepreneurialism and activism - to cash in on a green economy, if Obama's energy policies burst into bureaucratic reality, experts say. The City in recent years has attracted more than 100 so-called clean-tech firms that, although diverse, base their business models on meeting a shared demand: arresting and healing the environmental harms wrought by wastefulness, pollution and climate change. These environmentally focused startup companies, mature businesses and nonprofits - covering everything from legal firms to green construction consultants to carbon offset traders to solar panel installers - are the seedlings of an emerging clean-tech industry. Clean-tech firms and other companies accounted for 750,000 green jobs nationwide in 2006, including nearly 14,000 in San Francisco, according to an October report prepared for the U.S. Conference of Mayors. The firms employ a diverse group of workers, including machinists, scientists and businesspeople. The City is working to create office and laboratory space for the industry in eastern neighborhoods, including a large incubator facility planned at the redeveloped Hunters Point Naval Shipyard, said Michael Cohen, chief economic adviser to Mayor Gavin Newsom. "We recognized fairly early on that San Francisco was a rather natural fit to be a leader in the green or clean-tech industry," Cohen said. "It's that confluence of financial savvy, technological savvy, creativity and the public good which is quintessentially San Franciscan." San Francisco has worked to attract the industry to The City by offering payroll tax exemptions for particular types of clean-tech companies with between 10 and 100 employees, according to Cohen, but figures show just two companies claimed the exemption last year. A Board of Supervisors committee Wednesday recommended expanding the type and size of firms that qualify for the exemption. San Francisco's strict environmental laws, including nation-leading packaging and green-construction requirements, provide San Francisco-based clean-tech companies with a local test market for their products, according to Cohen. More than two-thirds of the clean-tech firms in the Bay Area are working on projects that could help tackle climate change, according to figures in a September report by the San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association. Areas of high interest include creating non- or low-carbon-emitting power, developing ways of using less energy, and sucking airborne carbon back into the earth. Of the 425 Bay Area clean-tech firms identified in SPUR's report, 119 were based in San Francisco. "Companies in this industry are emerging and dying on a daily basis," said report author Egon Terplan, a policy director for SPUR. If city officials play their cards right, San Francisco could become the hub of a high-growth, high-employment clean-tech industry - but if they fail, that mantle could go to another Bay Area city, just as Silicon Valley dragged the technology industry's center of gravity south to the Peninsula, according to Terplan. The local clean-tech industry is expected to receive a major boost from a plan for a cap-and-trade program designed to slow climate change, outlined by Obama during his campaign and reiterated in statements following his election. Under Obama's plan, the federal government would auction off the right to emit a limited amount of climate-changing carbon. Money raised annually, $15 billion, would be loaned or given to alternative energy and energy conservation entrepreneurs, and used for other energy initiatives such as green-collar job training and home insulation. Alternative energy would become increasingly competitive under Obama's system, because it would be subsidized by increases in the price of fossil fuels, which most Americans currently rely on, according to Keith Schneider, spokesman for the San Francisco-based Apollo Alliance, a clean-energy policy group co-founded by Obama campaign adviser Dan Carol. The alliance, however, is pushing for a $50 billion a year investment in clean energy - more than three times the amount pledged by Obama - but it is nonetheless supportive of the president-elect's plan. "In this country, we've talked for years about a balance between the economy and the environment," Schneider said. "Obama said, 'No, we're tilting our economic development strategy towards the environment.' That's huge." Promised training academy still without home in The City SolarCity's plans to create a solar panel work force training academy in the Bayview district are languishing, five months after the Board of Supervisors approved a solar subsidy program demanded by the company. In April, amid intense lobbying of supervisors by The City's solar power industry, SolarCity Chief Executive Lindon Rive issued an ultimatum: Unless a solar subsidy program proposed by Mayor Gavin Newsom in late 2007 was quickly approved, the company would shift a planned training academy from the Bayview to another Bay Area city. The academy would train at least 30 solar panel installers every two months for $1,000 apiece, with graduates offered jobs paying $15 to $25 per hour, Rive said. In June, supervisors approved a $3 million subsidy program worth up to $6,000 per home. The incentive program has helped SolarCity sell panel arrays to 74 homes under a zero-down financing plan, but the company hasn't identified a location for its proposed academy, according to Rive, who said the board's feet-dragging caused the delay. "We will need a training academy, but moving into a new facility takes months," Rive said. Supervisor Jake McGoldrick, who opposed the subsidy program because it would drain money from city-owned renewable power projects, downplayed the importance of the academy and said it should be called an apprenticeship program. "They want to get themselves some cheap labor," McGoldrick said. Working for the environment Green jobs could be found across the country in 2006. United States: 751,051 New York: 25,021 Washington, D.C.: 24,287 Houston: 21,250 Los Angeles: 20,136 Boston: 19,799 Chicago: 16,120 Philadelphia: 14,379 San Francisco: 13,848 San Diego: 11,663 Pittsburgh: 9,627 Source: U.S. Conference of Mayors Job concentration Clean-tech firms based in San Francisco: 31: Finance 27: Green building and design 18: Energy and environmental consulting 16: Energy generation 7: Clean transportation 6: Air, water and environment 6: Trading offsets 3: Energy efficiency 2: Recycling and waste 1: Energy infrastructure and storage Source: San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association Transbay Terminal targets stimulus cash  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Nov. 27, 2008 A bus terminal in San Francisco might be flattened by the federal government. Demolition of the Transbay Transit Terminal is one of the public-works projects identified as a candidate for assistance under a stimulus bill before Congress. The Job Creation and Unemployment Relief Act - one of the spending-heavy bills written by federal lawmakers to help save jobs and companies amid an economic collapse sparked by overlending in the finance sector - passed the House in September and is waiting for a Senate vote. If it becomes law, the bill would pump tens of billions of dollars into municipal infrastructure projects in an effort to create jobs and invigorate the economy. Officials in San Francisco are currently cataloging employment-generating projects that could qualify for funding under the proposal. To qualify, projects must create lots of jobs and begin within four months. "There are a number of city projects that would score very well under the criteria that's being considered by the Senate," said Michael Cohen, chief economic adviser to Mayor Gavin Newsom. "Among those is the Transbay Terminal." The bill might be signed into law at a fortuitous moment for the Transbay Joint Powers Authority, the multiagency body overseeing the planned rebuild of the terminal at First and Mission streets. Construction of a temporary terminal southeast of the permanent location began this month, the first phase in a six-year project to tear down the existing terminal and replace it with a modern facility flanked and funded by new homes and a 1,000-foot office tower. Officials hope to eventually extend the Caltrain line from Mission Bay to the terminal. The Joint Powers Authority might ask for more than $200 million under the stimulus bill, according to figures provided by finance consultant Nancy Whelan. Projects identified include the $23 million construction of a temporary terminal, the $22 million demolition of the existing terminal and a $62 million effort to relocate underground utilities. The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency has identified more than $500 million worth of potentially eligible projects, including $270 million for a new control center, according to spokeswoman Kristen Holland. The San Francisco Unified School District would likely seek federal funding under the stimulus plan to improve classroom energy efficiency, modernize science and engineering labs, and improve computers and internet connections, according to spokeswoman Gentle Blythe. Stimulus candidates Projects in The City that might qualify for federal funding under a proposed job-creation bill: San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency New control center: $270 million Traffic system that prioritizes transit over cars: $215 million Pedestrian signals, including 400 with countdown clocks and 200 with audible tones: $4 million Transbay Joint Powers Authority Architecture and design services: $63 million Construction management services: $30 million Construction of a temporary transit terminal: $23 million Demolition of existing terminal: $22 million San Francisco Public Utilities Commission Earthquake-protected water tunnel in San Mateo County: $33 million Ultraviolet system to disinfect drinking water: $8 million Sources: Municipal Transportation Agency, Transbay Joint Powers Authority, Public Utilities Commission Global downturn hits Bay Area businesses  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Nov. 20, 2008 Businesses in San Francisco have been hit hard by the global economic malaise, with new figures showing Bay Area business optimism has sunk to new lows and more than one-third of companies in The City expect to shed staff before June. The Bay Area Council, a big-business-funded public policy organization, released quarterly figures this week that suggest a Bay Area-wide slump in business confidence will affect job security most severely in San Francisco and San Mateo County. Across the Bay Area, 47 percent of companies expect conditions in their industries to worsen during the next six months, according to figures in the 13-page report. "A lot of people have been hoping that the recession and the downturn would pass by the Bay Area," council spokesman John Grubb said. "We're not going to escape that fate." Bay Area business confidence in November reached its lowest point since the group began surveying chief executives four times a year in 2001, figures show. The industries with the bleakest job outlooks include the construction and transportation sector - with 60 percent of Bay Area firms expecting to reduce their work force in the next six months - along with the retail and financial services sectors, according to the report. U.S. Census data show 10 percent of employees in San Francisco and San Mateo County work in the financial sector, which is experiencing consolidations and layoffs linked to the credit and banking crises. Nationwide, about 7 percent work in the industry. Tumult in the financial industry is rippling through other sectors of the economy, including the commercial real estate sector in downtown San Francisco, where all the financial giants involved in takeovers or mergers maintain operations, according to tenant broker Frank Fudem. "It's a multiplier effect," Fudem said. "We're seeing contraction in many other sectors that are not financial in nature." More than 700,000 square feet of leased office space had been abandoned by tenants and left vacant in 2008, before the financial markets descended into turmoil, according to Fudem. The impact of the turmoil on commercial occupancy rates is expected to hit in the coming months, he said. "We are not at the bottom," Fudem said. Gabriel Metcalf, executive director of the San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association, said The City cannot afford to take its long-running status as an economic powerhouse for granted. "Most people assume we'll come out of this - and we will - but I think we need to stay focused on the long-term competitiveness of the region," Metcalf said. "We need to do some pruning on the tangle of regulations that has grown up in the last decade that raise the cost of doing business here." Underground power plant might be built in SoMa  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Nov. 17, 2008 As controversy rages about if a power plant should be built or rebuilt in southeast San Francisco, city officials have quietly been developing plans for a separate underground plant to service planned high-rise buildings in SoMa. Massive amounts of power will be needed for the planned 1,000-foot Transbay office tower and rebuilt Transbay Transit Center at Mission and First streets, and for the thousands of new homes and millions of square feet of office space expected to be built in the coming decades in the South of Market neighborhood. The privately owned and operated plant would be designed so it could eventually run on hydrogen fuel cells instead of fossil fuels, Environment Department building official Mark Palmer said. Hydrogen fuel cells are an emerging type of technology that can be recharged using renewable or non-renewable power. Waste heat from the plant would be trapped and used to warm water for a combined heating district, dramatically improving the plant's efficiency and eliminating the need for individual heating and cooling systems, which are often built on rooftops, according to Palmer. "Instead of having a boiler and an air-conditioning plant in every building in a certain district, you could build a central facility that would provide heating and cooling for all the buildings," Palmer said. Combined heating districts, which are common throughout the world, can double a power plant's efficiency by reducing the amount of heat that is wasted, according to Palmer. The districts also maximize useable space in new buildings. About 170 buildings in San Francisco are already heated and cooled using a similar network of steam created by non-electricity producing boilers at Jessie Street between 5th and 6th streets and near the corner of Post and Hyde streets, according to NRG Energy, which owns the system. The steam can be seen wafting up from city streets. Eric Brooks, chairman of the San Francisco Green Party's Sustainability Working Group, pointed to climate change and said The City should spend generously on a plant that runs on hydrogen cells that are recharged using renewable energy. "Building any fossil fuel power plant - even if it's really efficient - is a bad idea," Brooks said. A feasibility study, expected to be published within eight weeks, will determine how much power and heat will be needed by new SoMa buildings and whether it could be provided by a subterranean natural gas-burning power plant, according to San Francisco Redevelopment Agency Project Manager Mike Grisso. Lennar Corp. seeks higher return for S.F. redevelopment project  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Oct. 28, 2008 Massive redevelopment efforts at Candlestick Point and the long-shuttered Hunters Point Naval Shipyard - including a possible new 49ers stadium - will be in peril unless profit margins increase, the developer warned Monday. The San Francisco Redevelopment Commission approved a nonbinding, multibillion-dollar draft financing plan negotiated between government officials and developer Lennar Corp. to build homes, office and research space, shops and parks in the southeast neighborhood. However, further negotiations are needed in the coming months to increase the projected monthly internal rate of return - a measure of profitability - from 15.8 percent to 22.5 percent, Lennar chief local negotiator and Vice President Kofi Bonner told The Examiner after the hearing. The current rate would result in a projected profit of $700 million during 15 years. "This project, in its entirety, is not where it needs to be," Bonner said. "The capital markets would not look at this given the risks." Projected profitability could be lifted by increasing planned taxes, amending construction schedules and tweaking other elements of the redevelopment plan, Bonner said. In an effort to convince the 49ers to remain in San Francisco, The City is proposing to lease 17.4 acres of land at the former shipyard to the franchise for $1 a year, and Lennar is offering the franchise $100 million toward construction of a new stadium, the draft plan shows. The proposal also shows the number of housing units that could be built on the 770 acres of waterfront land has increased from 10,000 to 10,500 since June, when 62 percent of San Francisco voters backed the plan by endorsing Measure G. San Francisco Redevelopment Agency Executive Director Fred Blackwell said Lennar's push for bigger profits is reasonable, but it will be a challenge. "I think it can be achieved, but I think we're going to have to really dig deeply," Blackwell said. If the project moves forward, a 15-year building phase could begin by 2011 or '12, according to Redevelopment Agency official Stephen Maduli-Williams. Angel Island fire controlled after 43 hours  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Oct. 15, 2008 The wildfire that ravaged more than half of Angel Island was fully contained by 4 p.m. Tuesday - 43 hours after the spectacular inferno started to take hold of San Francisco Bay's largest island. Some firefighters were scheduled to leave the island Tuesday evening after battling the blaze, which charred 380 acres of the 740-acre state park, but most of the 275-person contingent will begin leaving Wednesday, according to Mike Giannini, Battalion Chief of the Marin County Fire Department. "There's virtually no chance that the fire will spread, but there are still hotspots," Giannini said at 6 p.m. The hotspots, which included smoldering stumps, burning branches and patches of cindering grass, were all located within the core of the swathe of burned earth and they were not expected to reach the charcoaled perimeter to fan new flames, according to Giannini. A "significant number" of exotic Eucalyptus trees have been removed from the island in recent years, and their removal helped protect all 120 of the mostly-low-lying historic buildings on the island, according to Giannini. "Eucalyptus burns extremely fast and extremely hot," Giannini said. "Had the Eucalyptus trees been in place during the course of the fire, it would have been extremely difficult to protect those structures." Officials have yet to determine the cause of the blaze, according to Giannini. The fire originated on the eastern side of the island, in an area between two campsites, said Roy Stearns, spokesman for the California State Parks, the agency that maintains operations on Angel Island. Twenty-nine campers were evacuated from the island Sunday after the fire broke out about 9 p.m. The family of one of the 11 full-time state employees that work on the island that included a young child was sheltering in Tiburon late Tuesday, according to Angel Island Park Superintendant Dave Matthews. The rest of the families and workers remained on the island despite an absence of electricity, he said. The fire will make island life initially difficult for its human inhabitants, but it was healthy for its wildlife, according to Matthews. "Fire is a natural part of our ecology, especially in the California environment, so having a wildfire go through does help rejuvenate the plant species," Matthews said. The island's water supply comes from wells that were unaffected by the fire, according to Matthews. A Pacific Gas & Electric Co. crew on Tuesday began assessing damages to the island's power supply, which is delivered from the North Bay through underwater cables, according to spokesman Joe Molica. Molica said he didn't know how long it will take the company to replace damaged wires, poles and transformers to help repower the island. "We have to replace equipment in some pretty rugged terrain," Molica said. The island reaches a peak of 788 feet at Mount Livermore. It has served as a U.S. Army fort, an immigration station and a missile base. When rainy weather arrives, it's harvest season  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Oct. 9, 2008 Rainwater-harvesting systems have long graced rooftops in far-flung, water-poor lands, but for some San Franciscans - such as Tara Hui of Visitacion Valley - the exotic practice is a modern-day reality. Hui is a trailblazer of rainwater harvesting in San Francisco, having started a small operation when it was still outlawed by The City. Now, the 38-year-old urban farmer has 25 barrels connected to the 1,000-square-foot roof of her home - and Hui is acting as an adviser and pinup girl for a city-run campaign to convince others to emulate her once-renegade ways. Hui picked up the empty ingredient drums for free from food manufacturers and paid about $200 for plumbing equipment, she said. "I felt really terrible irrigating with freshwater from the tap," Hui said. "So I just started tinkering and I looked online for some resources." Fortunately for Hui and residents who hope to cut utility bills and prevent sewage-tainted floods in The City, water officials are lending a helping hand to the growing conservation trend. A plumbing rule was changed in 2005 to allow San Franciscans to rearrange their gutters to funnel rainwater into tanks and drums. The change allows residents to conserve water as well as reduce the amount of rainwater that flows into The City's sewer system. The sewage and stormwater that gushes beneath the streets can overload the sewer system during storms. "There's no reason why we should send all of this rainwater to our treatment plant when we could capture it and use it," said Public Utilities Commission official Sarah Minnick. Minnick is spearheading a campaign of giveaways, workshops and potential subsidies to promote urban rainwater harvesting as part of a $100,000 water-outreach program. If every drop of rain falling on a 1,000-foot roof in the Mission district is harvested, a household could save 12,500 gallons of water and $196.41 on their water bills in a year of average rainfall, according to analysis of Public Utilities Commission figures and historical weather data from The Examiner. Minnick suggests using harvested rainwater for cleaning and irrigation rather than for drinking. City permits and plumbing skills are needed to use rainwater in toilets. Rainwater has long quenched households in the dry continents of Australia and Africa, and droughts and growing demand for water in the United States are beginning to help a growing industry sell more equipment here, industry members told The Examiner. California's rainwater-harvesting industry is in its infant stages, but it's growing quickly as the statewide water crisis becomes more severe, said Tim Pope, president of the 500-member American Rainwater Catchment Systems Association. "As water's getting more scarce, people are getting a bit more hip to it," said Tim Antonoplos, a salesman for a tank-supply company based in Southern California, where rainwater harvesting is more common than in Northern California. The 20 or so inches of rain that fall each year in San Francisco - which is less than half that of Portland, Ore., and about 50 percent more than that of Los Angeles and Stockton - is very clean because it falls from storms that have arrived from the Pacific Ocean, National Weather Service meteorologist Dwane Dykema said. Despite the abundance of clean rainfall, just a handful of San Francisco residents have started capturing water that runs off their rooftops since 2005. "People don't quite know what to do with the water," Minnick said. "People call us, and we try to hook them up with various resources." To demonstrate rainwater harvesting's simplicity, Minnick's team recently installed an array of eight rain-catching barrels at the water treatment plant in the Bayview district. They bought the barrels, which were originally used to import olives into the U.S., from a hardware store. The Public Utilities Commission will begin raffling off 100 barrels during workshops at its Big Blue Bucket Eco-Fair at Jerrold Avenue and Phelps Street in the Bayview from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, and it's considering offering subsidies to cut the costs of harvesting systems, Minnick said. Water from above fuels plans for new City Hall A lavish network of ponds and fountains planned in front of City Hall will be nourished using rainwater, but it will also be topped up with tap water or groundwater during drier months. The decorative system, which might provide water for irrigation and to flush toilets, will trap stormwater to help prevent it from flooding The City's sewers after storms, according to Public Utilities Commission water official Rosey Jencks. The network is part of Mayor Gavin Newsom's recently announced plan to turn the Civic Center into a "sustainability district." One of the district's goals would be an 80 percent water-use reduction at City Hall. Newsom spokesman Joe Arellano said nonstorm-water sources of water will sometimes be used for the feature, saying drinkable water will be used only "where required." Funding for the $2.6 million system has not been secured. "We hope to receive future Federal Energy and Water Appropriations, SFPUC budget line items and grants," Arellano said in an e-mail. Do-it-yourself rainwater harvesting Tips Redirect your downspout into containers connected by tubes Use emptied food-grade barrels instead of new plastic containers Food manufacturers sometimes give away empty barrels Avoid harvesting water off tar-covered rooftops Clean your rooftop before installing a system Clear debris out of gutters frequently Costs $10 to $35: Empty 55-gallon wine or food barrel $660: Plastic 400 gallon urban water tank (29" x 60" x 71") $28 and up: Gutter connection with leaf and mosquito screen $58 and up: Optional diverter to avoid initial runoff from dirty rooftop $28: Optional water filter $525: Optional 115-volt hose pump Sources: Public Utilities Commission; craigslist.org; Loomis Tank Centers; Tara Hui Coast Guard has girded defense since 9/11  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Sept. 11, 2008 In the seven years since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the San Francisco Bay has become massively more militarized, draped with a heavily armed flotilla of helicopters, ships and agents ready to protect lives and commerce from the presumed threat of tyrannical terrorists. The U.S. Coast Guard's orange, 21-foot dinghies zipping about the Bay in bolstered numbers are equipped with 4-foot-long machine guns that can tear through steel by unleashing 10 bullets per second. The familiar buzz of four unarmed Coast Guard helicopters that patrol the shorelines is being swapped out for the quieter drone of similar-looking but armor-laden choppers equipped with machine guns and rifles. "Shortly after 9/11, we started ramping up," San Francisco Sector Commander Capt. Paul Gugg said. "At times, it's completely unnecessary to be armed. But there are those situations where you're dealing with people who have been acting illegally or negligently." The Bay Area is listed by the Department of Homeland Security as one of the seven U.S. regions with the greatest risk of a terrorist attack or natural disaster because of its landmarks, urban density and economy. In August, the federal department set aside $37.2 million to protect the region from threats or unforeseen accidents. The Coast Guard is just one of several agencies that have broadened their presence in the Bay Area. The agency's requested budget has risen from $3.9 billion before 9/11 to $9.4 billion in 2008, U.S. Government Accountability Office reports show. There now are 27 armed small Coast Guard boats stationed in the Bay Area - up from 19 before 9/11, according to agency figures. To help operate the new vehicles and wield the additional weapons, the Coast Guard has expanded its force of officers and broadened their training. The new measures are designed to protect the Bay Area and Port of Oakland against foreign and domestic enemies, Gugg said. "The mounted automatic weapons are relatively new in the numbers and on the type of craft that you're seeing," Gugg said. The 27-pound M240B weapons mounted on the agency's 25-foot response boats and 41-foot rescue boats are fully-automatic machine guns that can spray 200 to 600 rounds per minute fed through ammunition belts, product specifications show. They can hit targets 2.3 miles away. The agency's 87-foot boats can fire 5-inch slugs through .50-caliber machine guns, according to officials. Unlike the Army, Air Force, Navy or Marines, which are normally barred from enforcing civilian laws by the 1878 U.S. Posse Comitatus Act, the Coast Guard has broad enforcement authorities for Californians covering everything from fishing-license rules to narcotics interception and counter-terrorism missions. A new vessel-boarding team developed by the San Francisco Coast Guard in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks led to a "significant increase in personnel," spokeswoman Lauren Kolumbic said. By the numbers $20 million: Price of each new MH-65C Dolphin helicopter 4: Helicopters stationed at Yerba Buena Island 180 mph: Top speed of the U.S. Coast Guard's new helicopters $2 million: Price of each 41-foot rescue boat $250,000: Price of each 25-foot response boat 46 mph: Top speed of the Coast Guard's 25-foot response boats $24.4 billion: Imports through Port of Oakland last year $11.4 billion: Exports through Port of Oakland last year Sources: U.S. Coast Guard, Port of Oakland Small fish, invisible fence protect city's water supply An unlikely combination of invisible electronic fencing and 2-inch bluegill fish has been deployed to help protect San Francisco's drinking water in the wake of Sept. 11. The drinking water is carried from Hetch Hetchy through seven counties down 185 miles to taps in San Francisco and neighboring municipalities. Greg Suhr has traveled as far as Israel for water-defense ideas since the San Francisco Police Department deputy chief was appointed to manage homeland security for the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission in 2005. He is charged with protecting the water from poisons and other malicious contaminants. Since 2006, the agency's security staff has been "fine-tuning" an invisible fence in Yosemite designed to detect humans creeping toward valuable water supplies. The biggest challenge has been false alarms triggered by wildlife, Suhr said. This year, the agency secured an $8 million U.S. Environmental Protection Agency grant to expand a 3-year-old bio-monitoring program to place additional bluegills in drinking water. Computers monitor the fish and set off alarms when they change the way they swim or act, Suhr said. New life for Lake Merced  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Sept. 4, 2008 Once upon a time, The City's largest body of fresh water was a haven for boaters, anglers and city dwellers seeking myriad forms of recreation - until droughts and development drained the water, drove off revelers and killed the fish. Can a new wave of activists, officials and stakeholders turn the lake into a destination again? When considering water recreation and viewing options, most San Franciscans think of The City's beaches and the Bay. Less attention is paid to its freshwater lake. Located in the southwestern corner of San Francisco, Lake Merced was once a boating, fishing and picnicking hot spot, but those pastimes virtually disappeared when droughts more than a decade ago dried the freshwater system - which is actually four interconnected lakes - into a muddy mess. These days, Lake Merced is percolating with new life, but derelict remnants of its former self still suppress its potential to return to the social hub and urban sanctuary it once was. When the lake's level fell, reaching a 60-year low around 1993, fish grew elusive and foul-tasting, the lake's ecology crumbled and a muddy odor became rank. That led a concessionaire to abandon the charming wooden boathouse from which he ran a bar, rented boats and sold bait, tackle and fishing licenses. Supervisor Sean Elsbernd, a native San Franciscan whose district includes Lake Merced, said he remembers its decline. "I did see, as a kid, the water levels getting lower - I saw that all through the late '80s and '90s," the District 7 supervisor said. "Nothing is more frustrating to me as District 7 supervisor than to drive past Lake Merced and see the dilapidated boathouse." But Elsbernd said he holds out hope that recommendations being prepared after nine years of meetings by an advisory group of environmentalists and recreational groups will help turn Lake Merced once again into a popular "recreational, educational and cultural resource." Unveiled this spring, the Lake Merced Watershed Plan considers a number of scenarios for the 614-acre lake and park area that aim to return it to its former glory, with restored wetlands, park benches, a campground, restrooms and a nature center to complement boating, fishing and trail activities. Working in conjunction with the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission - which owns the lake as an emergency backup water source - the plans will be discussed at meetings with neighborhood associations and recreation groups this month, SFPUC project manager David Behar said. Additional uses of the lake could include continued skeet and trap shooting, a new or restored boathouse, competitive rowing, dragon-boat races, kayaking, a nature-education center, a bait-and-tackle shop, kiosks, and picnic and play areas, according to a draft plan released in April. Controversial components of the proposal include a call to evict the lakeside Pacific Rod and Gun Club, an 80-year tenant of the area. There is also concern that changes at the lake could include new development opportunities - a possibility that has residents of a nearby 721-apartment complex on edge, said Lakewood Tenants Association president Mona Cereghino. "The lake has always been very juicy for contractors," she said. A new recreational plan for the lake is scheduled to be ready early next year, Behar said. Once the plan is finalized, however, fundraising efforts and environmental reviews will be needed to help realize the vision, he said. Dee Dee Workman, who helped form the Lake Merced Task Force, said a new plan could see the lake transformed into a destination as popular among day-tripping locals as the waterfront, Presidio and Golden Gate Park - in stark contrast to today. "There are an awful lot of people in San Francisco who have lived here for a number of years and couldn't find Lake Merced on a map," Workman said. City lost its prime fishing hole Falling water levels in Lake Merced robbed The City of what had been known as a "jewel" among U.S. urban fisheries. As the lake's water levels fell late in the 20th century, the cold water turned warm and inhospitable for many of the aquatic inhabitants, according to Lake Merced Task Force member Dee Dee Workman. "The lake almost died," Workman said. "The water was so bad that no one could fish. All they were catching were these yucky bottom feeders." Until it shuttered in 2002, the lake's bait-and-tackle proprietor would annually stock the lake with trout to help drum up business, said Mondy Loriz, an official at nonprofit fishing advocacy group CalTrout. "From the '50s through the '70s and part of the '80s, the fishing was really outstanding at Lake Merced," Loriz said. "One of the big fishing magazines claimed it was the jewel of all urban fisheries." The California Department of Fish and Game still stocks the lake with baby trout. Loriz said as residents and city officials go forward with plans for the lake's renaissance, he hopes fishing programs for youths are resumed. In addition to trout, there are fish similar to largemouth bass in the lake, which could be supported as a new fishery with a few ecological measures, Loriz said. "They would be able to reproduce in the lake, and they don't compete with trout," Loriz said. New, sustainable water sources on tap In the late 1980s and early '90s, water levels at Lake Merced fell 10 feet from the already low levels, caused by a variety of factors, including droughts and nearby pavement-happy developments that prevented rainwater from recharging underground aquifers, according to members of the Lake Merced Task Force. At the same time, pumping was increased from the same aquifers to keep parks and golf courses lush. After droughts sent water levels to a 60-year low around 1993, refilling efforts using water from The City's Hetch Hetchy dam have since helped lift them by nine feet. Pumping from underground aquifers - along with a new system of wetlands along John Muir Drive to clean rainwater runoff and channel it into the lake - is being considered by The City to help push water levels up while protecting Hetch Hetchy reserves. A day at the lake The City is looking to add to the activities already available at Lake Merced. Among proposed changes Restore existing boathouse or build a new one Build a nature center Create a children's play area Creation of wetland habitat Restore boathouse full-scale restaurant and bar Remove or reduce skeet shooting/firing range Add new restrooms Recreational activities at Lake Merced Fishing Boating Trail activities Bicycling Skeet shooting Picnicking Camping Wildlife viewing Source: Lake Merced Watershed Plan Lake Merced by the numbers 614: Acres of land and water 70: Species of birds observed nesting 4: Interconnecting lakes 2.1: Miles of trails 45,000: Approximate number of fingerling rainbow trout stocked in 2007 9.25 pounds: Weight of a record-breaking trout caught in 1952 Sources: San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, California Department of Fish and Game, San Francisco Public Library, CalTrout The magic of wind power  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, July 31, 2008 Scores of windmills, which for millennia have provided a familiar backdrop to agrarian life, are poised to blow into San Francisco's urban core on the winds of technological and bureaucratic change. Wind power is considered a renewable energy source, like solar. A wind turbine can look like a giant fan - simply put, the wind turns the blades, spinning a shaft connected to a generator to make electricity. Nationwide, the number of small, electricity-producing wind turbines grew from several thousand earlier this decade to more than 35,000 in 2007, according to the American Wind Energy Association. In San Francisco, four wind-energy companies have set up shop; in April, Mayor Gavin Newsom announced the formation of a task force dedicated to looking at The City's potential to pursue and encourage wind power. To date, six turbines have been installed in San Francisco, three on private homes. Earlier this month, Newsom eliminated one of The City's biggest barriers to residential wind energy by sending out directives asking planning and building-inspection departments to "expedite permitting and minimize costs" needed to install residential, commercial and municipal wind turbines in The City. Prospective wind harvesters have been hamstrung by the lack of a standard turbine-permit application process, said San Francisco builder Robin Wilson, a task force member who last year founded Whirligig Inc., which sells and installs turbines. Until now, San Francisco has been able to take only small steps on the path to wind power, those paved by city supervisors who have supported individual wind projects in their districts. Supervisor Tom Ammiano, a task-force member, tweaked height rules to help Todd Pelman, founder of the San Francisco start-up Blue Green Pacific, install a turbine on his Bernal Heights home. Board colleague Bevan Dufty also helped secure a permit for a residential turbine on a home in the Castro. In addition to encouraging wind-power technology for residents and businesses, Newsom also ordered city departments to incorporate wind turbines into city facilities "whenever and wherever possible" in his July 17 directives. There are currently no wind turbines operating on municipal buildings or city-owned land, however, and a study revealed the challenges San Francisco faces if it wants to create a large-scale wind-energy project. Commissioned by The City in 2004, the study discovered "poor" economic feasibility for wind-energy projects at Pier 39, the San Francisco Zoo and Hunters Point - all waterfront locations. Treasure Island and the airport were found to harbor wind-energy potential, while Twin Peaks was the most promising site studied. There is massive variation in the amount of wind energy that can be captured in San Francisco, which is dominated by microclimates and wind-tunneling buildings and streets. "If you're really interested in doing wind at your site," suggested The City's Environment Department Renewable Energy Program Manager Johanna Partin, "you should really put up a wind data-collection device for six months." The City is considering subsidizing the prices of so-called wind anemometers, which retail for $150, or renting them out to residents to help defray the costs of the measurement devices, Partin said. On a larger scale, Partin said the new urban wind-power task force will also investigate The City's options to build an offshore wind farm, similar to one recently approved in Massachusetts. In that project, 130 planned open-water turbines will produce 420 megawatts of electricity - more power than is produced by The City's only remaining power plant at Potrero Hill. Home turbines may avert bird death problem Robin Wilson, who founded San Francisco based Whirligig Inc. to sell and install turbines, said she was pleased when Mayor Gavin Newsom took a tangible step to encourage the development of wind power in San Francisco by asking city departments to expedite permitting for turbines. "I had about 30 names of people who definitely wanted them," she said. "I've contacted all of them and everybody's excited." The turbines sold by Wilson's company sell for between $17,000 and $20,000, but a state rebate will slash the price by one-fourth or more, she said. In windy conditions, one of the company's 33- to 60-foot high windmills, which resemble scaled-down versions of the steel structures cemented into the Altamont Pass, could power a modest home, product specifications suggest. The early-generation Altamont Pass turbines have earned ire and lawsuits from bird-lovers for their raptor-killing side effects, but Wilson said she hasn't found any dead birds in the 11 months that she has used her company's product at her Mission home. The Altamont Pass is in a migration route and the fast-spinning blades are invisible to birds, while Wilson said her products are easier to see. Newfangled gadgets prove effective so far Less powerful but more compact turbines are being engineered in the Bayview workshop of start-up company Blue Green Pacific, which has installed elegant 6-foot-high, horizontally-rotating prototypes on top of a windswept garage in the Castro, primarily for testing purposes. Founder Todd Pelman said he has a list of "hundreds" of Bay Area residents queuing for the virtually soundless toys. The products will have an "emotional" appeal, like a Prius, he said. "One of these isn't really going to make a difference - but if there's many, then there's an aggregate effect," the former engineer said. Pelman said he hopes to start selling prototypes within a year. The company, which is in "a race" to raise money and secure a position in the emerging market, aims to mass-market the appliances for under $5,000, he said. Winds of change fail to blow for SFPUC building One of Mayor Gavin Newsom's July 17 directives on wind power ordered city departments to incorporate wind turbines into city facilities "whenever and wherever possible." Less than a week later, however, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission announced it was walking away from plans to build an ultra-green building near City Hall with windmills on the roof and walls due to rising costs and sobering environmental findings. SFPUC staff discovered the windmills would generate far less power than originally imagined, according to John Doyle, an SFPUC official who oversees energy-generation projects. "Even though people think it's windy in San Francisco, it's not that windy," Doyle said. "There might be places like Twin Peaks or Visitacion Valley or some other places where you might get some strong winds." Ahead of the game There are currently six wind-energy turbines in San Francisco. 45-foot vertical-axis windmill on a Mission neighborhood home Pair of 6-foot 22-inch-wide horizontally-rotating turbines on a Castro garage Similar 7-foot turbine on a Bernal Heights rooftop Vertical-axis windmill at the Randall Museum Pilot turbine on Treasure Island Source: San Francisco Environment Department By the numbers 34 Members of a city-sponsored urban wind-power task force, announced in April 6 Wind turbines in The City 0 City-owned wind turbines 4 San Francisco firms developing or selling wind turbines 9 Bay Area firms developing or selling wind turbines 8.2 mph Average wind speed 33 feet above Pier 39 12.7 mph Average wind speed 33 feet above Twin Peaks Sources: San Francisco Environment Department, San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association New College collapse has theater reeling  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, June 19, 2008 An alternative-film theater was left crippled with debts and a radical bookstore lost a slab of its business in the Mission neighborhood following New College of San Francisco's recent collapse. The 36-year-old progressive university was shuttered after the Western Association of Schools and Colleges yanked its accreditation in February after a yearlong investigation into claims of financial and operational mismanagement. Some employees continue to fight to reopen the school. The Roxie Theater, which was donated to New College in 2006, will celebrate 100 years of film screenings next year if new owners can turn around its financial woes. "The bills were all being forwarded to New College, so we didn't even know they were unpaid until the power went out or until the water was off," said operations manager Rachel Hart, one of the 20 part-time workers paid in April for the first time in nearly six months. "We just did whatever we could to keep operating." More than 30 neighborhood theaters have closed in the past 30 years and roughly one dozen remain, according to San Francisco Neighborhood Theater Foundation President Alfonso Felder. He blamed rising real estate prices and downtown multiplex theaters for the trend. New College graduate Alan Holt, a 2007 writing and literature major with no theater industry experience, took over management of the Roxie in April with an infusion of cash from himself and his father. Holt said he is in negotiations to purchase the theater, which he hopes to run as a nonprofit so it can raise tax-free funds from donations and membership dues. The theater under Holt will continue to rent out its space for special events and increase the number of films that it distributes to help lift profits and retain greater revenue shares of the films that it screens, he said. "We just want to continue to show films that you won't see anywhere else," Holt said. "You want something that's commercially viable, but you also want to be able to pick up some films that aren't." The Modern Times Bookstore on nearby Valencia Street also was left struggling in the wake of New College's collapse, according to Ruth Mahane, a member of the collective that runs the leftist shop. "They used us for their course books and things - so that's a big chunk out of our money," she said. City's strategy fueling biotech boom  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, June 14, 2008 Companies that reinvent and retool the building blocks of life - including proteins, DNA and human tissue - are driving a bricks-and-mortar construction boom in Mission Bay. "When we started four years ago, we had one biotech company," Mayor Gavin Newsom proudly announced at a press conference earlier this month about The City's fiscal situation. "Now there are 44." The convergence of 12 venture capitalists in San Francisco with biotech portfolios, including five in Mission Bay, has helped the sector grow, according to Jennifer Matz, deputy director in the Mayor's Office of Economic and Workforce Development. The industry's growth, however, has been driven largely by UC San Francixco's biomedical research facility in Mission Bay and the more than 300 acres of surrounding land that was specially zoned to cater to the needs of life-sciences companies, according to Matz. "Mission Bay is developing out as the hub of the life-sciences community in San Francisco," Matz said. "It's drawing talent and researchers and dollars from the surrounding Bay Area." More than 630,000 square feet of private office and research space has been built for biotech companies in Mission Bay since the redevelopment began in 2000, according to San Francisco Redevelopment Agency project manager Kelley Kahn. Another 1 million square feet is under construction and an extra 1.6 million square feet is in the pipeline, Kahn said. In 2005, The City began offering certain biotech companies an exemption from its 1.5 percent payroll tax. Seven companies employing 215 people applied for the exemption last year - up from six companies and 162 employees the year before, according to data from the San Francisco Office of the Treasurer and Tax Collector. They earned average salaries of $99,000. Global trends in the industry have led to the outsourcing of specialized functions such as research and sales, said Matt Gardner, president of Bay Bio, a Northern California industry group. "A company with a research headquarters can be a white-collar operation, and that's opened up lots of opportunities for San Francisco to expand its biotech base rapidly," he said. Protein- and antibody-research company FivePrime moved from South San Francisco to Mission Bay in 2005, according to its CEO, Gail Maderis. The company aims to start testing its products on patients later this year, she said. Maderis said the company employs about 90 people from around the Bay Area, and that The City's decision to waive the payroll tax for certain biotech companies helps it compete with surrounding counties, which don't charge such a tax. By the numbers How the biotechnology industry is building a home in San Francisco: 3: Biotech companies in The City in 2004 44: Biotech companies in The City today 3: Private biotech buildings opened in Mission Bay, 2005-08 4: Private biotech buildings planned to open in Mission Bay, 2008-09 6: Private biotech buildings planned to open in Mission Bay after 2009 7: Biotech companies receiving payroll tax exemptions in 2007 $319,123: Payroll tax waived for biotech companies in 2007 Sources: Mayor's Office of Economic and Workforce Development; S.F. Redevelopment Agency; S.F. Office of the Treasurer and Tax Collector Major players Some of the biotech businesses headquartered in San Francisco: Established in The City The Gel Company Presidio Pharmaceuticals Inc. Prosetta Corp. Vaxart Inc. Wave 80 Biosciences Inc. Moved to The City Celgene Corp. FibroGen Inc. FivePrime Therapeutics Inc. Osprey Pharmaceuticals USA Sirna Therapeutics Inc. Source: Mayor's Office of Economic and Workforce Development Bay to Breakers cleanup an obstacle this year  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, May 19, 2008 Dancing in the streets to electronic beats at the 97th annual ING Bay to Breakers was quelled Sunday afternoon when police were called in to clear a path for street sweepers and trash collectors. San Francisco resident Jesse Hooper was one of the thousands of disappointed people who jeered as a line of 10 motorcycle-riding police officers shouted orders and sounded sirens over the din of bass-heavy boom-boxes to help clear Fell Street. "It's a Sunday afternoon and the stereos are playing and everyone's having a good time," Hooper said. "Is it really a good time to clean the streets?" The race was won by a pair of speedy Kenyan athletes, but more than 35 tons of mess that trailed the event was left behind, mostly by ambulatory revelers more interested in drinking than in sprinting. Nearly 70 city workers used their hands, brooms, bags and a flotilla of heavy-duty trucks to scour the trail of smashed liquor and beer bottles, empty wine boxes, discarded costumes, fast-food containers, plastic bags and disposable cups that littered the course from The Embarcadero to Ocean Beach. As the workers marched west from Van Ness Avenue they ran into a wall of boisterous partiers - many in disintegrating costumes and some wearing little more than the skin they were born in. Department of Public Works deputy director Mohammad Nuru, who coordinated the massive clean-up operation, said he called in police around 1 p.m. so his workers could do their jobs. "Last year we didn't need police," Nuru said. "There were a lot more people this time. This year the most difficult part of the race was Fell Street - there were too many house-parties; too many drunk people." Many entrepreneurial passers-by were filling shopping trolleys with empty bottles and cans as The City's cleanup crews drew near, but much of the recyclable material that the passers-by missed was crushed along with unrecyclable trash in dump trucks. Golden Gate Disposal and Recycling Co. set up recycling points along the route, according to general manager Maurice Quillen. He said event organizers were responsible for making sure waste was sorted properly, and he said recyclable material mixed with trash will end up in landfill. Bay to Breakers cleanup efforts Waste collected: 35.45 tons Workers: 69 Mechanical sweepers: 8 Water and steam trucks: 6 Dump trucks: 2 Source: San Francisco Department of Public Works Blighted street seeing the light  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, April 25, 2008 A French bakery and restaurant set to replace a pawn shop and liquor store near Market and Sixth streets will become the latest in a barrage of boutique businesses to move into the world-wearied neighborhood when it fires up its ovens this summer. The City's Redevelopment Agency has seen 22 new businesses move onto Sixth Street between Harrison and Market streets since 2003, slashing the strip's retail vacancy rate from 43 percent to 15 percent and helping to knock liquor stores and other "adult businesses" out of the area, according to project manager Mike Grisso. The next new business slated to open along the corridor is a French-themed bakery, cafe and bistro which has recruited its pastry chef from Paris, according to business owner Steve Barton. Meanwhile, change also is sweeping through nearby streets. The Warfield Theater will likely see improvements undertaken later this year, according to property owner David Addington. Addington also owns a nearby building that houses The City's largest pornography store. "There's a chance that [Secrets Adult Super Store is] not long for this world," he said. An increased police presence in the past nine months has helped chase off drug dealers and other "antisocial activities" that dissuade new businesses from leasing in the area, according to Addington. "They're not unpleasant people - they're kind of nice," Addington said. "But if you're from out of town and unaccustomed to seeing these sorts of things, the experience can be very unsettling." Southwest along Market Street, modern-looking residential towers with 1,900 units are expected to open opposite the Orpheum Theater by 2010, according to developer James Sangiacomo. In the opposite direction along Market Street, a five-story glass-fronted mall is scheduled to open between Fifth and Sixth streets by 2011, according to project manager Sean Thompson. Nearby, the elegant but little-used sandstone-walled courtyard in the heart of the former U.S. Mint is expected to be roofed over and turned into a restaurant by 2012, according to facilities manager Art Ferretti. Mint Plaza opened next door in November. The transformation is positive, according to Gabriel Metcalf, head of the San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association. He described Market Street as San Francisco's "most important street," in part because of the massive amounts of transit and transport that run through and beneath it. "Private investment is starting," Metcalf said. "It's time to match that with some public investment." Wave of development could sweep through four eastern neighborhoods  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, April 17, 2008 A building boom in San Francisco's east side could start within a year, with white-collar jobs and thousands of new homes expected to replace dwindling industrial jobs in a sweeping 2,200-acre rezoning proposal ready to be debated by city leaders after nine years of planning efforts. The 1,373-page draft Eastern Neighborhood plan - which will guide the future development of areas including the Central Waterfront, Potrero Hill, the Mission and some part of the South of Market neighborhood - goes before The City's Planning Commission today. The plan, if eventually adopted by the Board of Supervisors, is expected to reduce the amount of light industry in those areas, by allowing increased housing density and building heights, and changing building rules. If the plan is approved, higher-density homes could be built in the neighborhoods to house more than 20,000 new residents by 2025 - a 30 percent population rise, according to findings in a draft environmental impact report. John Rahaim, The City's planning director, said the plan aims to slow the ongoing loss of light industry and other related businesses that historically dominated San Francisco's east. The draft plan aims to encourage construction of new homes and "employment space" that's better suited to emerging "knowledge-based" industries, Rahaim said, such as those in the biotechnology, environmental and information technology fields. The total number of jobs in the neighborhoods is expected to remain relatively unchanged if the rezoning goes ahead, but the number of industrial jobs could fall by as much as one-third to 23,000, according to the environmental impact report. The proposal also includes plans for at least four new parks, would develop transit-, bicycle- and pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods, and preserve certain view corridors. At least 88 development projects are on hold pending the plan's finalization, according to Rahaim, who said he hopes to have the approval process completed by the fall. Construction of those projects could begin early next year and the housing and office markets will determine whether a building-boom occurs at that point, he said. The plan's path to approval could be a bumpy one. Some city legislators have expressed concerns about keeping unbridled development in check and dozens of residents and neighborhood groups attended planning commission meetings in December and January to voice opposition. Critics of the plan say they fear neighborhood identities will be lost, along with diversity and small businesses. Developers and builders also say they are worried by the proposal, which requires around one-third of the new units to be sold at below-market rates to very low- to middle-income earners. Residential Builders Association President Sean Keighran said more incentives, such as height allowances and flexibility should be offered to builders in exchange for the construction of more inclusionary housing. Benefits of plankton disrupted by acid?  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Jan. 21, 2008 Oceans have grown more acidic as rising levels of carbon dioxide have filled the Earth's air, prompting a trio of San Francisco State University researchers to investigate whether marine plankton will continue to produce much of the globe's oxygen as its wet world grows more hostile. Massive blooms of microscopic phytoplankton are sometimes visible from space. Unlike other types of tiny, fast-growing plankton, phytoplankton grow using energy from the sun. Phytoplankton feed ocean ecosystems, fighting global warming by turning carbon dioxide into protective shells that are eaten by other creatures or sink to the sea floor. "They're bringing the carbon dioxide down into the deeper water," San Francisco State University biology professor Ed Carpenter said, "so they're helping to slow global warming." Like plants, phytoplankton release oxygen into the air, and they produce half of the world's breathable oxygen, Carpenter said. But the world's air is becoming so saturated with carbon dioxide that oceans have grown increasingly acidic since the Industrial Revolution, Carpenter said. Ocean acidity could rise by the end of the century because of rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere, said Carpenter, who added that increasingly acidic water can burn through carbon shells that protect marine creatures. To see whether plankton can survive and thrive in increasingly acidic water, Carpenter and two other researchers secured $1.2 million from the U.S. National Science Foundation to conduct long- and short-term experiments in the coming years. One set of the short-term experiments will compare plankton growth in conditions that simulate today's ocean conditions with conditions that simulate those expected by 2100, said SF State biology professor Jonathon Stillman, who is working with Carpenter on the project at a laboratory in Tiburon. Long-term experiments, on the other hand, will monitor clouds of rapidly multiplying phytoplankton as it evolves in acidifying water over 700 generations, according to Stillman. That will test whether plankton evolve defenses against the changing ocean conditions expected in the coming 93 years. "If there's going to be an adaptive response," Stillman said, "we should see it by the end of two years." The research team began preparing for the experiments last summer, according to Stillman. Pacific chorus frog on the mend in S.F.  original / top By John Upton San Francisco Examiner, Oct. 15, 2007 Urban wildlife sanctuaries, including an overgrown Capp Street backyard, are helping bring a tiny frog's once-familiar bellow back to San Francisco. "At one time, the chorus frog was the sound of the Bay Area," said Jim McKissock, who has seeded The City in recent years with the young of the only remaining local population. "Now they're virtually all gone." McKissock said local vernal habitats of the Pacific chorus frogs - which are also known as Pacific tree frogs - have been almost entirely paved over for new developments in San Francisco, and that the frogs have been nearly "weed-whacked out of existence" in overmanaged parks and lawns. Frogs from a healthy, successful Brisbane population shouldn't be brought to San Francisco, according to McCkissock, who wants to protect local strains of the species. "If we lose these here, we'll never be able to bring them back," he said. McKissock, who founded the local conservation nonprofit Earthcare, said he chose to use some of the precious few local tadpoles to establish a population in a Mission back yard maintained by Ned McAllister. "It's lush and overgrown," McKissock said. "That also encourages a lot of insects - the frogs eat the insects, and the insects need a place to live, too." McAllister estimated that 40 to 45 frogs have grown up from the 100 tadpoles introduced in May to his backyard pond. They've ventured from the pond to distant corners of the yard, where they crawl on cactus, vines and flowering plants. Although the frogs and tadpoles are still too rare to be given to anyone who wants them, McAllister said he hasn't needed to stock his yard with wildlife for it to quickly fill with amphibians, including salamanders, and a smorgasbord of other types of little-noticed wildlife. "It's just about letting it go," McAllister said, "and getting past the concepts of creating a highly manicured, nice garden." The professional reptile breeder said that to create an urban wildlife refuge, dead plants should not be raked up, but should instead be left to cover and leach their nutrients back into the soil. He also said pesticides, fertilizers and other chemicals are "absolutely deadly to any kind of amphibian" and should not be used. The frogs need abundant sunshine, water and plenty of cover, said McAllister, who has hung mirrors from a fence to reflect sunlight back into the yard. He is also building a series of small, vegetated, mosquito-proof ponds throughout the yard, which he hopes to vegetate with native grasses. One lies under a hammock. "You basically want to try to invite the wildlife into your yard," he said. "Things will land in your yard if you just leave it, like mosses, and who knows what else." top				← Sharks discovered entering Bay, May 24, 2010 ← Pacific chorus frogs recovering, spreading throughout S.F., May 2, 2010 ← Electric cars searching for a place to plug in, April 18, 2010 ← Sit-lie clashes with San Francisco policies, April 2, 2010 ← Burial ground disturbed underneath Bay Bridge, March 12, 2010 ← Bridge closing to prep for season, March 12, 2010 ← Treasure Island development slims down, March 11, 2010 ← Changed look ahead for SF’s iconic span, Feb. 26, 2010 ← Cable-test flub caused outage, Feb. 25, 2010 ← Much-delayed Bay Bridge retrofit feels growing pains, Feb. 14, 2010 ← Bridge seen as crucial to project, Feb. 8, 2010 ← Power shift, Jan. 28, 2010 ← Whale migration key in power-farm plans, Jan. 28, 2010 ← Pending decision on stimulus funding delays new city hub, Jan. 20, 2010 ← Toxic site ready for renaissance, Jan. 19, 2010 ← Giant Buddha may be displayed in Civic Center, Jan. 15, 2010 ← Low-end eateries proliferate in The City, Jan. 14, 2010 ← Sutro Dunes blooming like new, Jan. 10, 2010 ← Salt ponds could be clue to life on Mars, Dec. 15, 2009, 2009 ← Recycling centers may be tossed into trash bin, Dec. 9, 2009 ← Funding for solar burns out, Dec. 2, 2009 ← After solar academy bust, out-of-towners lose favor, Nov. 6, 2009 ← Solar array causes conflict with neighbors, Oct. 20, 2009 ← Tenants are moving up in a down market, Sep. 9, 2009 ← Old North Beach library may withstand razing, Sep. 3, 2009 ← City Hall solar wonderland moves forward, Aug. 26, 2009 ← Plan for solar academy singed, Aug. 7, 2009 ← Lawsuit alleges CitiApartments drained tenant deposit accounts, July 31, 2009 ← Niners reveal contingency stadium plans, July 31, 2009 ← City plans Hunters Point redevelopment without the 49ers, July 30, 2009 ← Comedy’s popularity is no joke for locals, July 29, 2009 ← Jazz nonprofit wants to build Hayes Valley venue, headquarters, July 20, 2009 ← Faulty cable blamed for underground blaze, July 15, 2009 ← Alcatraz considering sleepovers, July 6, 2009 ← Wave-power project faces delays, costs, May 30, 2009 ← Port gets funds to treat fish waste, April 28, 2009 ← Plans for Hunters Point Naval Shipyard revealed, April 7, 2009 ← Renters rejoice: Prices falling citywide, March 30, 2009 ← High-density housing planned in history-rich Dogpatch neighborhood, March 15, 2009 ← Bars, pubs going strong in down economy, March 9, 2009 ← Revamped Metreon slated to be restaurant-centric, March 4, 2009 ← Terminal project ousts tenants, Feb. 13, 2009 ← Coast Guard adds machine guns to helicopters, Feb. 3, 2009 ← Water troubles trickle down, Jan. 22, 2009 ← Treasure Island to be protected from rising seas, Jan. 21, 2009 ← Bay Area looks to draw water straight from the Bay, Jan. 15, 2009 ← Police test ShotSpotter in the Mission, Dec. 19, 2008 ← Empty offices build up in city, Dec. 18, 2008 ← Company seeks community support for new utility boxes, Dec. 16, 2008 ← Rents decline for first time since 2004, Dec. 10, 2008 ← Cleaning up: City hopes to cash in on clean-tech, Dec. 4, 2008 ← Transbay Terminal targets stimulus cash, Nov. 27, 2008 ← Global downturn hits Bay Area businesses, Nov. 20, 2008 ← Underground power plant might be built in SoMa, Nov. 17, 2008 ← Lennar Corp. seeks higher return for S.F. redevelopment project, Oct. 28, 2008 ← Angel Island fire controlled after 43 hours, Oct. 15, 2008 ← When rainy weather arrives, it's harvest season, Oct. 9, 2008 ← Coast Guard has girded defense since 9/11, Sept. 11, 2008 ← New life for Lake Merced, Sept. 4, 2008 ← The magic of wind power, July 31, 2008 ← New College collapse has theater reeling, June 19, 2008 ← City's strategy fueling biotech boom, June 14, 2008 ← Bay to Breakers cleanup an obstacle this year, May 19, 2008 ← Blighted street seeing the light, April 25, 2008 ← Wave of development could sweep through four eastern neighborhoods, April 17, 2008 ← Benefits of plankton disrupted by acid?, Jan. 21, 2008 ← Pacific chorus frog on the mend in S.F., Oct. 15, 2007