By Christin Evans, HANC Board

In the United States, private for-profit banks have evolved the products they offer and the customers they serve to maximize profits leaving significant gaps in products and services for San Francisco’s low income workers, affordable housing projects, and small businesses.  While the Bay Area has a relatively large number of community banks and credit unions, these institutions lack the scale and reach to adequately meet the needs of this vastly underserved market. 

The San Francisco Reinvestment Working Group convened by LAFCO (Local Agency Formation Commission) earlier this year has been writing the business plan for a public bank to seek to create the foundation for a municipal bank which has a primary goal of serving its community over the interest of profits.  The Working Group, given a mandate by a unanimous vote of the Board of Supervisors last year, has been developing a plan to use city assets currently stored in private market banks to capitalize a municipal benefit corporation or private bank within the next few years. 

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By Calvin Welch, HANC Board

This November’s election was held in the new Supervisor districts created earlier this year which divided the Haight-Ashbury into three districts: 1 precinct in District 1, 7 precincts in District 5 and 5 precincts in District 8. The  three sub areas of the neighborhood used in previous "How the Haight Voted" presentations--the North Panhandle (from Fulton to Fell, Stanyan to Baker ), the Flatlands (Oak to Frederick, Stanyan to Baker) and the Hills (Frederick to 17th, Stanyan to Upper Ashbury)--will continue to be used, but the precincts have been reconfigured.  For example in the Hill precincts, three previous precincts have not only been re-numbered but also combined into a single new precinct (9802) that includes streets on the west side of Stanyan and are now part of District 8.  Our neighborhood now has 1 precinct in the North Panhandle in District 1 (9147), 5, all except 9803 in the Hills  in D8 (9802-06) and 7 precincts (9501-06) remaining in the North Panhandle and Flatland precincts ( where 9803 now sits).  Thus under the new precinct lines there are four precincts in the North Panhandle, five in the Flatlands and four in the Hill precincts.

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By Tab Buckner, HANC Board

When Haight-Ashbury residents voted in the November 8th General Election, they participated in a 19th Assembly District race for the first time. California’s legislative district lines were redrawn for the next decade and AD19’s new boundaries were moved eastward to include most of the Haight.

As of December 5th, AD 19 Assemblyman Phil Ting will begin his final two-year term. Ting was first elected in 2012 and his district has encompassed the western side of San Francisco as well as Broadmoor, Colma, Daly City and South San Francisco. He lives in the Sunset District and serves as Chair of the Assembly Budget Committee after having been Chair of the Assembly Committee on Revenue and Taxation. Prior to joining the State Legislature, Ting served as San Francisco’s Assessor-Recorder since 2005.

Assemblyman Ting is scheduled to speak and answer questions at HANC’s General Meeting on Thursday, December 8th.

We have two separate speakers for our November meeting. 

Adrian Leung, SFMTA’s bike share and bike parking manager will discuss these programs and take questions.  Some initial questions include:  are additional bikeshare stations planned for the Haight-Ashbury, and if so, where?  What options are available for those with limited mobility?  What data is available to the public and what is considered proprietary?  How long are the current contracts, and who are they with?  Bring your questions to add to this list.

David Hartsough, a Haight-Ashbury resident will discuss his life work, Non-Violent Peace Making and Non-Violent Peace Movements.  He is co-author of his autobiography, Waging Peace: Global Adventures of a Lifelong Activist. He cofounded the Nonviolent Peaceforce and World Beyond War.  He has been involved in nonviolent peacemaking in the United States, Kosovo, the former Soviet Union, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Iran, Palestine, and Israel.  He is the executive director of Peaceworkers.

Bring your questions and bring a friend to the November 10^th HANC meeting, beginning at 7:00 pm.  Instructions for joining are in the adjacent article.

By Teresa Palmer, MD - Geriatrics / Family Practice

(Attending Physician at Laguna Honda 1989-2004)

[This is a follow-up to the article in the September HANC Voice, https://www.hanc-sf.org/24-home/714-what-happened-at-laguna-honda]

Our City Attorney dropped his lawsuit defending Laguna Honda Hospital (LHH) in mid- October. In return, the Feds (Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services-CMS) agreed to delay defunding  LHH until November of 2023, BUT to delay required discharges and closure only until February of 2023 (with the possibility of extension for good behavior).

This delay is to give LHH time to meet Federal criteria to resume normal operations. Closure, discharges and bed cuts are still very much on the table -despite the extreme shortage of safe nursing home beds for the poor everywhere.

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If you have not yet voted, remember to vote by Tuesday, November 8.

HANC, as a 501(c)(3) non-profit, cannot endorse candidates.  We can endorse or oppose ballot measures, and have endorsed the following ballot measures:

Nominations for the HANC Board are open through the election at our November Meeting.  All current HANC members are eligible to serve and to nominate other members.  If you would like to serve, or would like to nominate someone, you can do so before the vote at the November meeting.  The term is from December, 2022 through November, 2023.  The current HANC Board has made the following recommendations for officers and Board members for the upcoming term:

President:                                        David Woo

Vice President:                                Lisa Awbrey

Recording Secretary:                      Jim Rhoads

Corresponding Secretary:               Bruce Wolfe

Treasurer:                                        Christin Evans

Nominating Chair:                          James Sword

Membership Chair:                         Richard Ivanhoe

Housing & Land Use Chair:           Calvin Welch

Recycling Chair:                              Karen Fishkin

Members At Large:  Tab Buckner, Nate Horrell, Danielle McVay,

                                  Christian Vaisse, Tes Welborn