Dog Bites

Rust in Peace
The S.F. Port Commission has let another opportunity drift out to sea. The agency is abandoning a project that would have enhanced railroad access to the container berths along the city's southeastern shoreline, where shipping business has dwindled in favor of the rail-friendly Oakland port. The improvements would have cost about $12 million. The commission balked, citing high cost. But few knew that nearly $9 million of the tab was already committed from state and federal sources. And much of the commission's share would have come from long-approved bond funds. Plans continue full-steam ahead, however, on the commission's pet project: a so-called restoration of the Ferry Building that aims to Disney-ize the edifice with distinctly nonmaritime boutiques and entertainment venues.

Passport, Please?
Proposition 187 hasn't satisfied the anti-immigrant sentiments of Gov. Pete Wilson's allies in Washington. Republicans would deny legal immigrants access to more than 30 benefit programs, including Medicaid, prenatal care, Supplemental Security Income and foster care. "[The] line is no longer between who is or is not documented, but between citizens and noncitizens," says Ignacious Vau of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights. "This broadens the fear because the number of legal immigrants far exceeds undocumented immigrants."

Political Brown-Out
Supervisor Angela Alioto must have thought she was on the receiving end of a PG&E power play when she moved into her new office in the War Memorial Building on February 21. Her colleagues' electricity kicked in without a hitch, but Alioto, who advocates a government takeover of the utility giant, couldn't get the juice flowing to her computers for an entire day. "I told PG&E's lobbyist that I was going to follow him around from now on," quips Alioto aide Jerry Windley.

Marta Sanchez-Beswick, George Cothran, John Sullivan