Thousands of people, including college, high school and elementary school students, plus parents, teachers and other activists, converged in streams on downtown San Francisco to protest cuts in public education Thursday afternoon. Organizers said that more than 4,000 people marched down Mission and Valencia streets to Market, and then to the Civic Center Plaza.
Author Archives: Monica Jensen
Monica Jensen, the multimedia editor at SF Public Press, is also a volunteer at the “Crosscurrents” news program on KALW Public Radio. She has been documenting a collective art project titled “Welcome to the NeighborHood” in Bayview-Hunters Point. The project has been exhibited in the Sargent Johnson Gallery in the African American Arts and Culture Complex, and will be displayed at Zeum and Art 94124. Jensen is also the winner of an honorable mention from the National Press Photographers Association Best of Photojournalism award.
Posted inCity Hall, Education
Intercept truants in early grades — Q&A with Abraham Simmons
Abraham Simmons, the volunteer chairman on the San Francisco civil grand jury report on truancy, says the situation in San Francisco hasn’t changed much in the past seven years: around 5,000 students are habitually truant each year.
Posted inCity Hall, Economy & Business, Social Justice
City to carve out more contracts for ‘micro’ businesses
In a bid to make it easier for local businesses to grow in a down economy, San Francisco supervisors want to give more small, city-based firms a competitive edge in city contracts.
Posted inSocial Services
Gay teen shelter closure helps span city budget gap
The Ark House, a faith-based shelter for black gay, lesbian and bisexual teens, may shut its doors March 1 if the Department of Health’s proposed cuts are approved. The program’s closure, which is expected to save the city more than $400,000 a year, is one of a handful the city hopes to enact in the middle of its fiscal year to balance the budget. The projected deficit for the year starting in July is $522.2 million.
Posted inNeighborhoods
Welcome to the Neighborhood: Bayview-Hunters Point India Basin and Mission Bay
In 2008, an art collaboration between professional artists and youth from Literacy for Environmental Justice, headed by Wendy Testu, began in Bayview-Hunters Point. Using scavenged material, the group transformed refuse into art pieces — a mixed media collage, a visual listening pod, an “insert here” project, screenprint design and photomontage.
Posted inEnvironment, Parks & Open Space
‘Big Year’ promotes saving local endangered species (Photo Gallery)
In an effort to educate visitors to the Golden Gate National Recreation Area about the 33 endangered species that inhabit it, Bay Area conservationists and local residents gathered Jan. 9 for the 2010 Endangered Species Big Year.
Posted inHealth
Citywide vaccine clinic plans began years ago
The plans for Tuesday’s vaccine clinic, in which thousands of San Franciscans received swine flu shots, had been in the works for years, according to a spokeswoman for the city Department of Public Health.
Posted inNews
Supervisors: holidays a bad time to lay off city workers
More than 500 low-wage city workers threatened with job and pay cuts this fall received a holiday-themed reprieve Tuesday, as the Board of Supervisors delayed layoffs in the hopes of finding federal and state funds to prevent cutbacks.
Posted inNeighborhoods, Public Safety
March for women against rape
More than 800 people participated Saturday in the fourth annual Walk Against Rape. The event, sponsored by San Francisco Women Against Rape, raised more than $55,000 for the 35-year-old sexual assault crisis center in the city’s Mission District.
Erica Guajardo Johnson, an organizer with San Francisco Women Against Rape, said she was approached by a man during the march who broke into tears while telling her that he was raped many years ago. Seeing everyone marching together gave him the courage to ask for help, Johnson said.
“I just wanted to squeeze him,” Johnson said. “That’s exactly what this is about … to give someone the power to admit to themselves and to the world that it’s not your fault.”