Housing, Politics, Uncategorized

Secret in-flight recording sparks rage over wildfire insurance ‘bailout’

By Sophia Bollag, Joe Garofoli : sfchronicle – excerpt

SACRAMENTO — A conversation with a lobbyist secretly recorded on an airplane is shedding light on discussions of possible wildfire insurance legislation that consumer advocates are worried will be pushed through the Legislature in the final two weeks of the session.

“We are trying to jam a bill in the last three weeks,” longtime insurance industry lobbyist Michael Gunning says on the recording, which was taken on a Southwest flight from Los Angeles to Sacramento. He went on to explain that major insurance companies, including Farmers, State Farm and Allstate, have been reducing their footprint in the state…

The conversation goes to the heart of a question roiling Sacramento in the last days that bills can be written before the end of the legislative session: What can state lawmakers do to stave off concerns of an insurance crisis in California — a state that boasts the strongest insurance protections for consumers in the country?…

Consumer Watchdog has long been a thorn in the side of the insurance industry, and its founder was the chief backer of Proposition 103, the 1988 voter-approved ballot measure that created California’s strict rules governing insurance policies in the state. That measure also created the office of the insurance commissioner.

Gunning, a registered lobbyist with the firm Lighthouse Public Affairs, did not return a call seeking comment for this story. A colleague from his firm followed up with an emailed statement, characterizing the recording as an example of Gunning’s work to address California’s housing crisis.

“Let’s not do a bailout at the end of session with no public scrutiny,” she said. “It never ends well for consumers when lawmakers push through a bailout at the end of session.”…(more)

This news broke on national broadcast news so the secret is out.

Most bills are created by lobbyists who go to great lengths to hide the details from the public until the bills are passed. People have been complaining about backroom deals for years, but, the information has fallen on deaf ears.

All of a sudden the media is acting surprised. We shall see how far they go with it. Will they only despair of insurance company scams or will they admit how widespread the practice is? How many bills are passed without public knowledge or participation?

Isn’t this how we got SB35 and SB2011 that are now being blamed for such monstrosities as 2700 Sloat and a little known project going up on a greenway next to Sunset Blvd.? Is this how they will confiscate the parks and golf courses and waterfront sites that are not tied down to a trust of some kind? In San Francisco our public parks are being leased to private enterprises for a pittance . Not much is of limits when the developers get greedy and the state reps are hooked on their largesse.

Uncategorized

CH Planning applies new housing law to rejected SF housing tower

TRD staff : therealdeal – excerpt

Developer adds AB 2011 application to two lawsuits over project in Outer Sunset

The developer behind a failed plan to build a 50-story condominium tower in San Francisco’s Outer Sunset has pulled another arrow from its quiver: a new law to fast-track affordable homes.

Reno-based CH Planning, led by John and Raelynn Hickey, has added Assembly Bill 2011 to two lawsuits attempting to overturn the rejected project at 2700 Sloat Boulevard, the San Francisco Business Times reported.

The couple are seeking streamlined approval under the law that went into effect July 1 to redevelop the Sloat Garden Center, creating a controversial highrise over low-lying homes and businesses, a few blocks from the beach.

AB 2011, known as the Affordable Housing and High Road Jobs Act, fast-tracks housing on commercial properties by allowing ministerial approval if certain housing and labor standards are met… (more)

Let’s see Buffy and Wierner worm their way out of this one. What would happen if they declared Sloat Blvd. a SLOW STREET? Would that make it a non High Road Jobs Act Street immune from application of AB 2011? Could refusal of insurance companies to cover the project become a factor in making it less desirable? Could the coastal commission take meaningful action or would they, considering the plan is to not protect the coastal area from rising tides? How creative can we be?

Uncategorized

People’s Park Student Housing Project Could Move Forward Under New Bill Headed to Newsom’s Desk

By kqed staff : kqed – excerpt

UC Berkeley could be one step closer to breaking ground on its fiercely contested student housing project in historic People’s Park if the governor signs a bill scrapping certain building regulations.

AB 1307, introduced by Assemblymember Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland), whose district includes Berkeley, would amend California’s sweeping Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) by exempting proposed housing developments from first having to study potential noise levels generated by future tenants.

The bill also eliminates the need for universities to prepare an environmental impact report that considers alternative housing sites for a residential or mixed-use housing project if certain requirements are met…(more)

Uncategorized

Report: Investors behind mysterious $800 million Bay Area land grab are Silicon Valley power players

Megan Fan Munce, Shira Stein : sfchronical – excerpt

The investors behind a mysterious company buying up thousands of acres in Solano County have been revealed to be a group of Silicon Valley power players.

Flannery Associates caught the attention of both local politicians and several federal government agencies after it spent more than $800 million buying up 140 properties in Solano County over the past five years, purportedly to build an entirely new city.

But until Friday, where exactly the money was coming from was unclear.

Citing three unnamed people familiar with the plan, the New York Times reported Thursday that the company’s investors included Laurene Powell Jobs, owner of The Atlantic and widow of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, and Andreessen Horowitz, a Menlo Park-based venture capital firm that’s backed companies like Skype and Lyft, among a host of other prominent Silicon Valley power players.

The original man behind the idea was Jan Sramek, according to the Times, a former Goldman Sachs trader, according to his LinkedIn account.

Sramek’s goal was to build a new city between Fairfield and Rio Vista, according to both a poll sent to Solano County residents earlier this week and a 2017 pitch reviewed by the Times…(more)

Well, the mystery is solved. Silicon Valley wants to build a brand new city out of nothing. At least this plan will disrupt fewer settled people than bulldozing and gentrifying neighborhoods. I hope they can fill their dream cities with people who like their plans. Perhaps the investlors will even live there.

Uncategorized

California spends billions on homelessness, but political squabbling undermines efforts

By Cal Matters : smtp – excerpt

Since Gavin Newsom began his governorship more than four years ago, the state has spent upwards of $20 billion on efforts to solve – or at least reduce – California’s worst-in-the-nation homelessness crisis.

The spending continues, but the number of people living on the streets, in squalid camps or in ramshackle motorhomes and trailers continues to climb.

That sad fact was underscored recently by a new census of homelessness in Los Angeles County, which has a quarter of the state’s population but nearly half of its homeless people. The study found a 9% rise in the number of homeless people in the county to 75,518, with more than half (46,260) in the city of Los Angeles…

California’s failure, at least so far, to get a handle on its homelessness crisis has made it a target of scornful national and international media attention and a model of what to avoid for other states…

The most obvious of those squabbles has been the running feud between Newsom and local government officials. He accuses the locals of being insufficiently vigorous in implementing programs while they say they need permanent sources of financing rather than the year-to-year appropriations Newsom has offered…(more)

Uncategorized

Amid rumors about mystery Bay Area buyer, poll on creating ‘new city’ sent to locals

By Katie Dowd : sfexaminer – excerpt

Amid a flurry of rumors about a mysterious buyer who has purchased 52,000 acres in Solano County, local residents have received a survey gauging support for a “new city with tens of thousands of new homes.”

Fairfield Mayor Catherine Moy confirmed to SFGATE on Tuesday that Solano County residents have been receiving the push poll, and former Fairfield councilmember Marilyn Farley told SFGATE that she received the survey via text message.

The survey is extensive, and it may be the first window into what Flannery Associates plans to do with its newly acquired Bay Area empire.

The group, which incorporated in Delaware, where it is not required to name the people behind the business, has been the subject of speculation and even a possible government probe. Starting in 2018, Flannery began purchasing parcels of land from Fairfield to Rio Vista. (One of its first purchases was near Flannery Road in Rio Vista, possibly giving the group its name.) By its own admission, Flannery paid over the market rate to acquire that land, but in the years since, nothing has been developed on it. The group is now the largest landowner in the county.

The clandestine nature of the purchases — and the fact that Flannery’s properties now flank three sides of Travis Air Force Base — led to concerns about national security. Rep. Mike Thompson, whose district includes parts of Solano County, told SFGATE last week he has been “pushing” the Treasury Department, the Department of Defense and the FBI to investigate the acquisitions…(more)

Where are Wikileaks and Julian Assange when you need them. They should experts to figure these things out.

Politics

Chaos Is Not a Viable Leadership Style

by Theodore Kinni : strategy-business – excerpt

Sowing seeds of confusion and discord is no way to run an organization.

Thirty years ago, the business world had a fling with chaos theory — the idea that although nonlinear systems, such as markets and companies, are inherently unpredictable, some order exists within them nonetheless. Tom Peters told us that chaotic markets harbored valuable business opportunities. Meg Wheatley said that chaotic companies were more adaptive, creative, and resilient than hierarchical companies. But I don’t recall anyone recommending chaos as a leadership style.

To be sure, there are prominent leaders today who adopt chaos as their modus operandi. Take Brandon Truaxe, the CEO of Deciem, a fast-growing Canada-based beauty products company that expects to record US$300 million in sales this year. Since January 2018, here are a few things he has done. Truaxe fired his social media team and started posting strange messages on Deciem’s Instagram account, including, as described in Elle, “closeup videos of him talking disjointedly about the popular skin-care line’s vision, a river flowing around a mass of garbage, and a photo of a dead sheep, captioned with a promise to never test products on animals.” He fired co-CEO Nicola Kilner, which prompted chief financial officer Stephen Kaplan to quit. (In July, Kilner rejoined the company.) Truaxe also emailed the company’s employees, “I’m done with DECIEM and EVERYTHING. No need to discuss.”.

One big benefit of being a chaotic leader is that you get a lot of attention. In this social media–driven, attention-addled, 24/7 world, it could be that the quantity of attention matters more than its content. Indeed, even as media and customer reactions to Truaxe’s actions turned negative, the company’s products continued selling briskly. “All they’re (his actions) doing is creating more sales for me,” Truaxe told WWD.

Well, maybe. But before you adopt a chaotic leadership style for its Barnum-like marketing effects, you probably should pause to consider what it does to the people and organizations that you are charged with leading. Chaotic leaders are like Loki, the trickster of Norse mythology, who sows the seeds of confusion and discord.…(more)

Look no further than Elon Musk, who completely destroyed Twitter, and who knows what else in an inexplicable mania to blow it up and start over. Some governments seem to be on a similar track. They are so compelled to rush headlong into the unknown future that they throw many successful business practices out the window while the confusion leaves businesses with no choice by to bail. If there is one thing the market hates it is confusion, or so we are told.

Politics, Transportation

Cruise Car hits Fire Truck

VIDEO: SF fire truck, driverless Cruise car collide, injuring passenger, company says.

By Gloria Rodriguez : abc7news – excerpt (includes video)

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) — A driverless Cruise car and a fire truck collided in San Francisco late Thursday night, sending one passenger to the hospital.

The crash happened at the intersection of Turk and Polk in the city’s Tenderloin district after 10 p.m.

Video shows the Cruise car with its passenger side doors smashed in after the collision with a San Francisco Fire Department truck responding to a call nearby… If you have been following the Autonomous Vehicle saga waiting for the shoe to drop. It finally has. A Cruise car hit an emergency vehicle and injured a passenger. . .

VIDEO: Driverless Cruise car struck by SF fire truck, injuring passenger, company says
abc7news.com

https://abc7news.com/cruise-driverless-car-sffd-fire-truck-accident/13666936/#:~:text=Cruise%20says%20that%20one%20of,one%20passenger%20to%20the%20hospital.

We should take this opportunity to request an audit of the California Public Utility Commission (CPUC). In their zeal to thrust the state into high growth, forced density and future technologies, the CPUC has removed important safety guardrails that protected the public. Our their health, safety, and economic well-being have given way to the demands of corporate investors. Many of the recent CPUC decisions have come in spite of requests and warnings from the public that were backed by scientific and expert opinions that the changes were not in the publics’ interest.

Who does the CPUC work for? Why do they ignore experts on subjects they are clearly not prepared to judge? Why are they forcing us to rush into a dubious future with products and services that we do not need or trust and many will not use? Why are they setting up job cutting technologies that are unproven, untrusted against the public’s will?

They clearly blew it with robotaxis that have been nothing but trouble since they were given the green light to expand. What else are they getting wrong and who are the people that are making major decisions re: public health, safety and the economy?

How honest and competent is the state system that oversees people who have such a heavy hand on our lives? Where does their money come from and what is their incentive for raising the cost of living by forcing the public to foot higher energy bills? First they cut the payments to the solar producers who are feeding the grid to lower the costs of producing energy. Now they want to raise the cost to consumers by adding “taxes” onto the bills they just claimed to have lowered. How dumb do they think we are?

What is the end game and who is pulling the strings? Why is our governor appointing these people to oversee these important decisions that affect most aspects of our lives, from jobs, to housing and transportation, to energy and the economy. Who will step up to take control of conditions that have banks and insurance companies fleeing the state? What do they know that we don’t?

Housing, Planning, Politics, Transportation

Can Bay Area Political Leaders Solve Climate Change?

By Marc Joffe : cato – excerpt

Passing laws, adopting regulations, and spending money to fight climate change are popular activities for both elected and unelected officials in the San Francisco Bay Area. But since they only govern 2.3 percent of the U.S. population, their ability to turn the tide on greenhouse gas emissions is limited. Instead, their costly and coercive policies drive up the area’s cost of living and help drive out residents.

In a previous post I described some of the high cost, low ridership Bay Area transit projects that raise local sales taxes while replacing only a handful of car trips. Since I last wrote, we have learned that San Francisco’s new $2,000,000,000 Central Subway is afflicted by serious water intrusion issues, making the travel experience less appealing for the roughly 1,000 passengers that use the Chinatown station each day.

More recently, local lawmakers have declared war on natural gas, an energy source that used to be popular with some environmentalists because it burns more cleanly than other fossil fuels. But now the intention is to fully embrace electricity even though California is unwilling to add nuclear generating capacity and lacks the enormous number of solar panels and windmills needed to fully power the state…(more)

Uncategorized

San Diego Planning Commission Rejects Voluntary State Density Law

By James Brasuell : Planeten – excerpt

The density-enabling mechanisms of the California law Senate Bill 10 are too much for San Diego’s citizen planners.

The San Diego Planning Commission—the citizen advisory group on planning in one of the YIMBYest cities in California—won’t go so far as to eliminate single-family zoningthroughout the city.

“San Diego’s Planning Commission unanimously voted against a key part of Mayor Todd Gloria’s housing plan Thursday that would have eliminated single-family zoning in much of the city,” reports Phillip Molnar.

That key part was the Senate Bill 10, a voluntary statewide bill that “[allows] a single-family home to be torn down and replaced with a new structure of up to three stories with up to 10 units in much of the city,” according to Molnar…(more)