Here is some SCARY news from the North...
The San Francisco Department of Parks and Recreation (RPD) has a general manager. His name is Phil Ginsburg. You detest this man. RPD also has 7 commissioners that are supposed to be the voice of the people, so that there is some oversight to the staff. The chair of the commission is Mark Buel. You also detest this man. The rest of the commissioners are actually kinda cool. But powerless. I'm going to tell you a few things, and you may wish you get involved in the future. Things are happening that are totally unsustainable. Here are some facts:
SF has tons of parks. We moved all our cemeterys to Colma. That's why.
SF has, like most cities, a zoning department. It selects what
geographic locations can be utilized for what purpose. Some residential, some commercial, some manufacturing, some landfill ect... The Zoning guys delineated park lands. RPD is trying to sell parkland to commercial interests. Sell it. For money. Forever. Sell the land. Parkland. They sell parks. Without any oversight, permission or apology. They sell it to businesses, and manage to skirt all the zoning crap. Zoning is mute when it's parkland.
RPD has publicly stated that it wants to take the parks system off the general fund and make it a self sustained business. Run by a private company. You are hearing this correctly.
There is ZERO oversight to RPD. They do whatever they want. Only the Mayor can appoint the commissioners. The mayor hires the general manager. We have a very strong mayor system here in SF. Phil Ginsburg and Mark Buel are buddy buddy with Newscum. If you think that the dysfunction of the Newsome administration is behind
us, think again. Ginsburg wants to run for Supe.
These people are slimly scumbags like you've never seen before. It's crazy. Here is a post from a guy who trying to get some people to come to a meeting to stop RPD from closing a public park. If you have time, maybe you should go. The whole food truck and trailer debacle at Dolores Park was the tip of the iceburg. We are trying to start an organization that has a full time employee so we can have constant pressure on them. It's not easy. Here's what we have:
http://dpblac.wordpress.com/Here is the letter from George:
Dear Friends and Neighbors,
The Recreation and Park Department (RPD) has scheduled another meeting to privatize the JP Murphy Park Clubhouse located at 1960 9th Avenue at Ortega. The meeting is scheduled for Monday, January 31st from
5:30pm - 7:00 PM. As many of you know, the RPD spent $3.9 million in bond money to remodel the park and clubhouse, fired all of their recreation and park directors on August 15th without notifying the public, and now consider the park to be "underutilized." The RPD wants to lease the JP Murphy Clubhouse to a non-recreational, for profit business.
The West of Twin Peaks Central Council (WTP), a 70 year old organization that represents 17 homeowners associations in Districts 4 and 7 voted unanimously at our January 24th meeting on two resolutions (attached) that are 1)against the privatization of RPD property throughout the City and 2) specifically against the RPD's attempt to Privatize JP Murphy Park.
The WTPCC believes that the park needs of the San Francisco citizens who pay for the parks are now secondary to the RPD's attempts to generate more revenue from the parks. We are asking the RPD to rehire a rec and
park director for JP Murphy Park and once again provide all of the tiny-tot services, park programs and after-school services that the neighborhoods have paid for with property taxes and bonds.
Please attend this important meeting at JP Murphy Park and bring as many of your friends and neighbors as possible. The people who pay for the parks should have a say in what happens to their parks.
Time: 5:30pm - 7:00 pm
Date: Monday, January 31st
Place: JP Murphy Park
1960 9th Avenue/Ortega
San Francisco
Thank you for your participation and help. I hope to see you all on Monday.
Best Regards,
George Wooding
President
West of Twin Peaks Central Council
We have to make it enivitable that Phil Ginsburg gets fired. We can not support any mayoral candidate that sides with this. It's just totally fucked. This is war.
chicken
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