Petrelis Files

Vid Excerpts From Mission Housing Meeting on Monday

A robust crowd turned out on March 16 at the Galeria de la Raza on 24th Street in the Mission, after longtime Latino advocate Roberto Hernandez organized the community meeting to discuss his plans to address development and lack of affordable housing in the area.

Over at the Mission Local site, writer Daniel Hirsch has a good recap of the evening along with the list of demands and a may of major developments in the Mission created by the Anti Eviction Mapping Project.

On the positive, it was a good turnout and there was plenty of energy in the room. It was also great that Roberto had a printed agenda, names and contact info for Planning Department employees responsible for certain big developments, the same for members of the Board of Supervisors and plan to protest inside City Hall on Friday, May 1.

The down side was that many of the presenters and folks who spoke were the same folks saying the same things we've heard for quite a while. There was very little time for open discussion, during the time I was in the room. Due to an allergic reaction from folks wearing fragrances, I stepped out on to the sidewalk for 25 minutes.

Former planning commission member and member of the Board of Supervisors Christina Olague spoke at length about organizing a crew to regularly attend commission meetings, but unfortunately had no plans to be at their weekly meeting tomorrow, Thursday.

However, on Tuesday, we exchanged emails and it turns out she and a few others are attending the commission hearing because data will be presented about Prop K, the policy statement voters approved in November about affordable housing goals.

Seems to me this was an excellent organizing hook to get folks to City Hall tomorrow to feed two birds with one seed. Speak during general public comment about items not on the agenda, an example includes curbing market rate condo development in the Mission, and address the commissioners a second time after the Prop K findings are presented.

The 800-pound elephant in the room that needed attention was the abysmal failures of Supervisor David Campos to have _any_ plan for _any_ housing problems in his district. Many times, people spoke about a moratorium on market rate housing construction, yet no one talked about where exactly Campos' language for it was and what his legislative plan is. How much longer will Mission activists wait for Campos to get his act together?

There was one man who called out, "Campos, take a stand!" and his aide Hillary Ronen was in attendance for about an hour. Big whoop.

Frankly, instead of applying pressure to dozens of planning commissioners and planning department employees and the Supervisors and their staff, pick just a single politician who needs his butt kicked: Campos. Get him to do his job and have _him_ pressure the planning folks and other Supervisors and the Mayor and Rep. Nancy Pelosi.

Finally, wife-beater Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi, the man who's in charge of the department that carries out evictions and who is up for re-election in the fall, made an appearance and didn't speak. One woman presenter rambled on about creating an eviction free zone and it would have been a step forward if Mirkarimi had heard folks tell him to stop the evictions -- if he wants our votes.

Here's a video of excerpts from the meeting: