The Public Press and KALW (91.7 FM) teamed up for a budget roundtable that aired Aug. 17 on the “Crosscurrents” news program. A panel of local experts offered a lively and informative on-the-air discussion about San Francisco’s budget crisis and its impacts on residents and communities.
Category: City Hall
Posted inCity Budget Watchdog, City Hall
SF supes skirt law in restoring funds to service providers
Amid intense lobbying to restore social-service funding to this year’s budget, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors earmarked $1 million for specific organizations, flouting the city charter.
Posted inCity Budget Watchdog, City Hall, Public Safety
Supes on: the budget — ‘There needs to be more dialogue,’ says Maxwell
Sophie Maxwell praises the health department for efficiency and calls the budget policy debate “healthy.”
“The police, that’s the end. Public safety starts in the middle. Public safety starts with education. Public safety starts with health … by the time they get to the police we have failed them.”
Posted inCity Hall
Propositions 1A and 1B
Late last month, more than 200 UCSC students staged a walkout and rally to protest budget cut proposals. Many of the students and supporters voiced their concerns that the budget axe would fall heavily on the Community Studies and the Latin American and Latino Studies departments. Earlier this month rumors surfaced that UCSC officials planned to eliminate the community studies program, a major focused on social activism and that two prominent LALS lecturers would be let go.
Read full story here.
Posted inCity Hall
‘Remind me why I was so afraid’
Late last month, more than 200 UCSC students staged a walkout and rally to protest budget cut proposals. Many of the students and supporters voiced their concerns that the budget axe would fall heavily on the Community Studies and the Latin American and Latino Studies departments. Earlier this month rumors surfaced that UCSC officials planned to eliminate the community studies program, a major focused on social activism and that two prominent LALS lecturers would be let go.
Posted inCity Hall
Cabbies steamed over proposed taxi overhaul
Tuesday afternoon, the Board of Supervisors is expected to consider a resolution to reject the proposed budget of the San Francisco Municipal Railway because of steep fare hikes, deep service cuts and millions of dollars in questionable reimbursements to other city departments. But the proposal that has drawn the most ire at public hearings is Mayor Newsom’s plan to overhaul the city’s taxi industry by changing the system for awarding the coveted driver permits known as medallions. Newsom and Muni’s parent, the Municipal Transportation Agency (MTA), say the scheme would generate $15 million a year in new revenue for the cash-strapped transit system.
Posted inCity Hall
UCSC students rally against budget cuts
Earlier this month rumors surfaced that UCSC officials planned to eliminate the community studies program, a major focused on social activism and that two prominent LALS lecturers would be let go.
Posted inCalifornia, City Hall, Government & Politics
State lacks control over grant spending, audit finds
Local officials in California failed to properly account for millions of dollars spent on homeland security efforts in the state, made dubious purchases that may not make communities safer, and could have overpaid millions by not seeking competitive bidding for equipment, according to an audit by the inspector general of the US Department of Homeland Security.
In one example cited, a California county bought a $96,600 generator to provide its public works department with emergency power during a catastrophe but didn’t factor in a $130,000 overhaul of its electrical system needed to accommodate the generator. So nearly two years after the purchase, the new equipment wasn’t ready for a disaster and might never be, county leaders admitted.
Posted inCity Hall, Transportation
In spite of budget woes, Muni expects to improve commuter service
For years, a lack of information left Muni in the dark about what it was doing well, what it had to improve and what its riders actually needed. But a proposed shuffling of resources following the Transit Effectiveness Project, a massive systemwide study, would add more frequent service and extend routes on some express lines serving city commuters.