Earlier today, city election chief John Arntz told us that today's most recent round of ranked-choice voting tabulations determine "nothing."
Fair enough. But it's better to win than to lose, and it's better to be ahead than behind. You can bet that all the politicos involved and their supporters are climbing the walls to learn the results below. Well, here you go.
Your esteemed online news editor Joe Eskenazi will be talking about pension and health care reform -- which he wrote about with Benjamin Wachs in the SF Weekly cover story "Let it Bleed" -- on Crosscurrents today at 5 p.m. on KALW (91.7 FM.)
In fiscal year 1999-2000, the city spent about $300,000 on its retirement system. In fiscal year 2009-10, it was $200.5 million. Benefits alone -- not salaries, just benefits -- for current and retired employees this year are budgeted at $993 million. Spending on retirees' health care and pensions is conservatively projected to triple within five years.
Quintin Dailey, the basketball savant who led the University of San Francisco to its last glimpse at national prominence before, literally, killing the program, has died in his sleep. He was just 49 years old.
Dailey was, statistically, the best collegiate scorer the Bay Area has ever seen; his 25.2 points per game in 1981-82 outshines K.C. Jones, Bill Russell, Jason Kidd, Kevin Johnson, and all the rest. But it's Dailey's guilty plea in 1982 to assaulting a USF nursing student that will forever be foremost in fans' minds. That crime -- originally charged as an attempted rape -- led to an NCAA inquiry of USF. The school then shocked the sporting world by pulling the plug on its hallowed basketball program, only restarting it in 1986. USF hoops has never been close to nationally prominent since.
With a thump of his gavel moments ago, Board President David Chiu noted "This ordinance is finally passed." What's more, it passed 8-3 -- a veto-proof majority against a promised rebuke from Mayor Gavin Newsom.
The legislation in question was an ordinance that will ban restaurants from handing out toys with their meals unless said meals meet strict nutritional requirements. While the ordinance's sponsor, Supervisor Eric Mar, described it as a "small step" toward combating the nation's childhood obesity problems, it could also be a large step toward triggering a lawsuit from McDonald's or other fast food behemoths.
Any Berkeley journalist comes to dread two assignments: the school board and KPFA.
It's difficult to cover any of the myriad twists and turns of KPFA and Pacifica Radio's salvos at one another without tumbling down the rabbit hole and tracing everything back to the time someone in management threw his huarache at a union broadcaster in 1972. But we'll do our best.
The Pacifica Network yesterday followed through on threats of pending layoffs and dispatched the hosts of its popular Morning Show. If you believe management, this was due to budgetary problems. If you believe the sacked hosts, their show brought in more money than it spent, and this was political retribution over a longstanding labor dispute.
A federal judge has found that Zynga could be responsible for allegedly misleading business offers marketed to players of its popular Facebook games, setting the stage for a class-action lawsuit against the San Francisco-based company to move ahead.
The plaintiff in the case, Rebecca Swift, is one among the sad legions of gamers who have grown addicted at some point to Zynga's simple games, such as FarmVille, FrontierVille, and Mafia Wars. She alleges that she was scammed into participating in business offers in order to obtain "virtual cash" to spruce up her virtual Zynga estates, only to be unexpectedly billed by advertisers. (Check out TechCrunch's extensive coverage of the "ScamVille" scandal for more details.)
San Francisco election junkies are already well aware that today the city will again run Ranked-Choice Voting and give a clearer tabulation of who may be our next supervisors.
But Department of Elections Head John Arntz isn't putting a whole lot of value in what he and his round-the-clock vote-counters will reveal today. When asked what we could determine from today's forthcoming numbers, he candidly answered "nothing."
Peeing with prostate problems can be a real pisser. But even more uncomfortable, we imagine, is having your method of micturating be the subject of examinations and cross examinations in court.
That's exactly what was debated in a doozy of a case in which a homeless man named Anthony Richey was accused of indecent exposure and lewd conduct for allegedly masturbating in an alcove at Eddy and Franklin Streets on July 25. Those are only misdemeanor charges, yet they still would carry a six month county jail sentence and lifetime sex offender registration.
Kevin Reed can't catch a break. Reed, the CEO of medical cannabis delivery service The Green Cross, has for the past three years hosted an annual pot party/fundraiser called the SF Cannabis Cup (re-dubbed the "Cannabis Competition" for this year's fete due to copyright concerns), in which a select group of judges -- all medical cannabis patients -- get completely ripped as they sample roughly 60 of the best grams of cannabis, concentrates, and edibles Bay Area dispensaries have to offer.
The fourth annual iteration is this Sunday, Nov. 14 -- but after a few calls from SFPD forced a costly venue change, all of the funds that were to go to the SF chapter of Americans for Safe Access have been eaten up. And now, New York City-based cannabis culture magazine High Times is threatening Reed with legal action, promising at least $75,000 in legal fees as well as seizing all of the proceeds from the event if Reed goes forward.
How did this happen, when the prior three cannabis competitions went off without a hitch -- and one of which, the 2008 event, was attended by two High Times reporters (who reportedly had a blast)?
It all started with food trucks.
Funny thing about Instant-Runoff Voting: The results often aren't so instant. A number of elections around the state are still undetermined. What does the future hold? Gnashing of teeth, threats of litigation, and, of course, counting, counting, and recounting.
In an Instant-Runoff Voting anomaly akin to the Giants catching the Dodgers in '51 after trailing by 13 and a half games, Jean Quan is poised to knock off Don Perata in the race for mayor of Oakland. Alameda County officials say final results could be ready as soon as today.
