Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Gavin's Flaccid Package
Stimulate this!Mayor Gavin Newsom unveiled his economic stimulus plan this week revealing a flaccid response to very recent economic woes.
1. Payments from state and federal governments to S.F. are down
2. Property transfer tax revenue is down. From $6.7 billion (gross sales, not the revenue from the transfer tax) in calendar 2007 to just slightly over $1 billion for the first 8.5 months of 2008.
3. SF will be affected by the general macroeconomic slowdown.
4. Retail sales are down in S.F.
5. Business tax revenue will go down.
6. The newly strengthened dollar will hurt S.F., like reduced tourism for example.
The most recent economic data released by the Controller's Office shows the city's unemployment rate was at 5.9 percent in August; a year ago it was at 4.6 percent. Still, the state's unemployment rate, for example, was 7.7 percent in August.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Greenwashing To The Governor's Mansion
Saadia Malik of the San Francisco Bay Guardian [SFBG] takes a look at Gavin Newsom's newest green initiatives:
GREEN CITY Mayor Gavin Newsom has made a high profile push for several new green initiatives in recent weeks, a concerted political move that comes just as he and his political team are aggressively working to subvert a city ballot measure that would make far bigger gains in combating climate change and greening the city's energy portfolio than anything he's proposing.
Julian Davis, campaign manager for Proposition H, the Clean Energy Act, told the Guardian:
Davis said the steady stream of green initiatives from the Mayor's Office are simply a means to make up for the mayor's severe deficiency in environmental credibility.
Complete Article: Greener Than Thou by Saandia Malik
Video Credit: EnergyEnvironmentTV
GREEN CITY Mayor Gavin Newsom has made a high profile push for several new green initiatives in recent weeks, a concerted political move that comes just as he and his political team are aggressively working to subvert a city ballot measure that would make far bigger gains in combating climate change and greening the city's energy portfolio than anything he's proposing.
Julian Davis, campaign manager for Proposition H, the Clean Energy Act, told the Guardian:
"San Franciscans should be ashamed that they have a mayor who is greenwashing and gay washing his way to the governor's mansion."Newsom opposes Proposition H, which would direct the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission to figure out how to provide clean and renewable energy to the city, and Pacific Gas & Electric Co. has hired Newsom's chief political strategist, Eric Jaye, to lead the multimillion dollar campaign to defeat the measure.
Davis said the steady stream of green initiatives from the Mayor's Office are simply a means to make up for the mayor's severe deficiency in environmental credibility.
Complete Article: Greener Than Thou by Saandia Malik
Video Credit: EnergyEnvironmentTV
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