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Why San Francisco’s city government is so dysfunctional

economist.com

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Re: Why San Francisco’s city government is so dysfunctional

#141

Post by robbrown451 »

fmajid wrote: post #136
robbrown451 wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean by a "serious diversity problem"? Not white enough, or what?

African-Americans ethnically cleansed from the city, first by Justin Herman’s “revitalization” of the Western Addition, or the shocking fact that black men in Bayview-Hunter’s Point have a life expectancy 20 years less than other SF males , and in fact lower than the US average for black males. Just because we have a black female mayor does not mean the real racism of SF is gone, just as electing Obama did not miracu…

Are you sure that's what the parent post meant?

I don't agree that they have been "ethnically cleansed." I'm sure economics has forced some out.

I've live in many parts of the country, and this is by far the least racist, and most racially diverse, place I've lived.

Black men in the city would be expected to have a lower life span than black men nationwide, since urban black neighborhood are more prone to drugs and gangs. Have you compared to other big cities, as opposed to just nationwide?

Re: Why San Francisco’s city government is so dysfunctional

#142

Post by dilyevsky »

pjlegato wrote: post #46
diffset wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The homeless and those issues pretty much only exist in the tourist areas near downtown, the tenderloin, soma, etc. The tourists come and see all of that and get the idea SF is some horrible dystopia, but unless you live in those areas, it's not a problem. I lived in Noe Valley for 3 years and never ran into a single problem from your list. SF is so much more than downtown.

The "bad / dangerous" part of the city is now significantly larger than it was even three years ago, when you moved here. It's been expanding rapidly the past few years.

I saw a homeless dude yelling some crap in the middle of international terminal of SFO just today.

Re: Why San Francisco’s city government is so dysfunctional

#143

Post by tshaddox »

runarberg wrote: post #55
rpmcmurdo wrote: post #17

27 year San Francisco resident here. The government here is dysfunctional because that's what people voted for. The fact that people pay so much to live here says that people are willing to put up with a lot in exchange for living in a diverse and beautiful city.

Just because people vote for it, it doesn’t mean it is what people want. There is also the option that the voting system is faulty and that the voters don’t have a real option. As an example, the city of Reykjavík has 23 representatives in the city council. They are voted proportionally from parties represented distinct views. San Francisco board of supervisors have 11 members, less then half of Reykjavík’s despite h…

> Just because people vote for it, it doesn’t mean it is what people want.

This is really key, and should be a bigger topic of discussion in mainstream political philosophy. Governments that purport to be democracies ought to be responsible for aligning policies and outcomes with the preferences of the electorate. It's far too common for people to dismiss literally any problem in an ostensibly democratic jurisdiction as "well that's what the people voted for," as if the only end goal of a government is to pass some bare minimum threshold of being considered a "democracy" and the rest of the responsibility is on the electorate.

Re: Why San Francisco’s city government is so dysfunctional

#144

Post by babesh »

manderley wrote: post #71
babesh wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Peninsula is generally much better run than SF. It kind of helps that it isn't one big city. It forces the cities to compete and makes the democracy more direct and participatory. It also limits the blast radius of bad decisions. Also, because of the greater percentage of kids, the parents often vote based on what is best for their kids. The issues are much more mundane. Better roads, funding for schools, etc...

The housing crisis is perpetuated by a lack of coherent planning. It's also why transit is suboptimal. It definitely doesn't help that it isn't one big city, it's actively detrimental.

It doesn't make sense for the Bay to be one big city. There is this giant thing in the middle of it that greatly increases travel time. It is called the Bay.

Even travel down the Peninsula is extended because of the linearity of the Peninsula (you travel up and down it).

It makes more sense for there to be regional centers. Develop Oakland. Develop San Jose even more. Maybe turn Hayward into a regional hub (fat chance but the geography is interesting). San Mateo is growing for a reason.

Hook the centers together with fast regional point to point transit. There should be no stop trains between SF, San Mateo, San Jose, Oakland, and Hayward.

It is all incredibly obvious if you look at a map. It is all driven by geography.

This is also the reason that Mountain View and Fremont have grown rapidly. Just look at the map. Maybe add them as regional centers.

Re: Why San Francisco’s city government is so dysfunctional

#145

Post by space_fountain »

mixmastamyk wrote: post #128
space_fountain wrote: post #62

I think some of the responses here are too gloomy. Look things are bad but SF does have a lot going for it and it's a lot less bad than some people think, just don't live in SOMA or the tenderloin and you'll be a lot better off. SF has lots of wealth and resources just waiting to be tapped into, a climate that's likely to get nicer over the next several decades (maybe ignoring smoke), some of the highest densities bo…

Unwilling to fix is a de facto unfixable. Until something major changes.

Well, there is lots of working being put in by a lot of people to fix parts of it. For example CA is in the process of passing a law to upzone large swaths of single family housing. The YIMBY movement is gaining steam. I think one fo the saddest things in politics at least in the west is this sort of defeatism where large swaths of the electorate think that things are unfixable. I think especially as technologists we should recognize that real problems exist, but also that fundamentally they are all fixable and we should try to fix them.

Re: Why San Francisco’s city government is so dysfunctional

#146

Post by babesh »

babesh wrote: post #144
manderley wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The housing crisis is perpetuated by a lack of coherent planning. It's also why transit is suboptimal. It definitely doesn't help that it isn't one big city, it's actively detrimental.

It doesn't make sense for the Bay to be one big city. There is this giant thing in the middle of it that greatly increases travel time. It is called the Bay. Even travel down the Peninsula is extended because of the linearity of the Peninsula (you travel up and down it). It makes more sense for there to be regional centers. Develop Oakland. Develop San Jose even more. Maybe turn Hayward into a regional hub (fat chanc…

The strength of the other regional centers will force SF to compete for companies and also for residents via quality of life.

Re: Why San Francisco’s city government is so dysfunctional

#147

Post by space_fountain »

lhorie wrote: post #126
space_fountain wrote: post #62

I think some of the responses here are too gloomy. Look things are bad but SF does have a lot going for it and it's a lot less bad than some people think, just don't live in SOMA or the tenderloin and you'll be a lot better off. SF has lots of wealth and resources just waiting to be tapped into, a climate that's likely to get nicer over the next several decades (maybe ignoring smoke), some of the highest densities bo…

> just don't live in SOMA or the tenderloin and you'll be a lot better off I mean, that's basically just saying "lalala can't hear ya". The entire point of calling SF dysfunctional is that a significant number of people in those areas (and others) are on the streets without access to needed psychiatric help and other basic needs. As a result, there's so much petty crime going unreported that any statistics on the mat…

I think there's a certain kind of voice that's common on here who moved into SF. Got an apartment in one of the new apartments downtown and then experienced a concentrated blast of poverty which isn't representative of the majority of SF. It doesn't help that most new construction in SF has been in these parts of the city either. My point isn't that SF doesn't have huge problems, but that if you live in these parts of the city you'll be seeing a lot more of it on a daily basis than is maybe entirely realistic

Re: Why San Francisco’s city government is so dysfunctional

#148

Post by lhorie »

bastard_op wrote: post #108
rpmcmurdo wrote: post #17

27 year San Francisco resident here. The government here is dysfunctional because that's what people voted for. The fact that people pay so much to live here says that people are willing to put up with a lot in exchange for living in a diverse and beautiful city.

Not sure I would ever call San Francisco "beautiful" - it was a dirty, beat-down city when I lived there in 1999/2000. Unless you can afford a view to just stare over the actual city to the waterfronts, pretending a bum isn't taking a shit on your doorstep right now and leaving their heroine needle for you to clean up. Working in Manhattan many years later, I expected much the same arriving for the first time, but su…

San Francisco's geography is extremely heterogeneous (especially considering the size of the city). All of these are simultaneously true:

- yes, there's human feces and needles and tent cities in the Tenderloin/SOMA area

- Painted Ladies is an old-ass building, as is much of the residential sprawl around it

- Fishermans Wharf is a textbook tourist trap

- there's a ton of nice forest-y areas (Presidio, Glen Canyon, Stern Grove, etc)

- Sea cliff area is textbook rich person neighbourhood

- Financial district actually looks like a modern metropolis

Picking one facet and ignoring the rest is... cherrypicky.

Re: Why San Francisco’s city government is so dysfunctional

#149

Post by jbelich »

tdeck wrote: post #134
junon wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's human feces everywhere outside the tourist/financial districts, and the entirety of the inner city (Tenderloin) is disintegrated and full of poverty, homelessness and crime - and it's predominantly people of color who accumulate there. If that's "diverse" and "beautiful" then I'd hate to think what "monocultural" and "dull" looks like...

> There's human feces everywhere outside the tourist/financial districts, This is not accurate. The Sunset, Richmond, Parkside, Presidio, Marina, and many other parts of the city are very clean (or at least not notably dirty for a city). Perhaps the Marina/Presidio could be called tourist areas but the Sunset and Richmond certainly are not.

I think the homeless dude passed out covered in (presumably his own) shit at the Stonestown muni stop not 2 hours ago would disagree with you

Re: Why San Francisco’s city government is so dysfunctional

#150

Post by jbelich »

metalforever wrote: post #48
ithinkso wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People are willing to put up with a lot if it means they don't give anything to someone that doesn't deserve it. 'I will walk through a pile of shit before my money is used for you to shit somewhere else you lazy fuck'

You don't actually live in SF or you would know that there's not actually literal piles of shit everywhere.

the passed out homeless dude covered in (presumably his own) shit at the Stonestown muni stop not 2 hours ago would disagree with you.
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