Subject: John Avalos

• News & Booze: Pre-Election Smackdown

  November 2, 2008

• Halloween at the Cat Club, Dia de los Muertos in the Mission and the Alternative Press Expo: Your Monday Morning Hangover

  November 3, 2008

• SF 2008 Election Winners & Losers

  November 5, 2008

• San Francisco Voters are Smarter Than They Look

  November 5, 2008

• SF Gov InAction: These Are Not the Budget Numbers You're Looking For

  The excitement stops here. I know ... I know ... that today's the day Gubernatorial Candidate Gavin Newsom releases his budget for San Francisco (a California city he occasionally resides in for campaign purposes). And I know that, when he does, we're all going to die a little. I know. But, the action's still not likely to happen this week.The budget will be a big document. People will need time to go through it. Oh, sure, someone's likely to start shouting about it any second now, b

  June 1, 2009

• Rookie of the Year: David Chiu Just the Latest Young, Inexperienced Smart Guy to Obtain Presidency

  Chris Daly Twirls His Mustache, Cackles at Ross Mirkarimi as Chiu Ekes Out Win By Joe Eskenazi Watching a man with mutton-chops every bit as stylish as his white overalls engrave the word "President" on Supervisor David Chiu's office door, one couldn't help but recall good ol' Will Shakespeare: "Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and others have greatness thrust upon them."Depending upon how surprised the rookie supervisor really was to win a back-and-forth election for Board P

  January 8, 2009

• Political Satire, Like Prostitution, is Being Ruined By Amateurs

  THIS is how you make fun of progressive supervisors! I have a message for the four new Supervisors: Hello. My name is Benjamin. And my job is to say much, much, funnier things about you than anybody did last night. Last night, of course, was the "Roasted Supes" party, which is a vaguely clever name, or "the People's Inauguration," which is not. It was supposed to be a roast, in which women close to the new Supervisors - former teachers, roommates, co-workers and wives - said funny th

  January 9, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: Supes Stand by Each Other After Little John Avalos Has His Bar Mitzvah

  This is the week the new Board of Supervisors goes from JV to Varsity. I know it felt like they'd hit the big time before, what with hundreds of people crowding the hearing rooms to yell at them about stuff they hadn't done -- but that's just the crowd getting fired up by San Francisco's airheaded cheerleader, Gavin "I'm really a Mayor!" Newsom. I know they thought that holding big hearings on potential budget cuts -- without actually doing anything about them -- was a big deal: But no, it

  February 9, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: Supes Dream of Presidency, Take the Week Off -- Except For a Major Budget Showdown that Could Doom Us All

  For the last eight years in San Francisco, "President's Day" was a cruel joke on a city with no sense of humor about politics. Sure, America could boast Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and TWO Roosevelts -- but we were stuck with Bush. None of our traditional coping strategies worked. No matter how much we visualized change, no matter how many social networks we joined, no matter how "sex-positive" we were, and no matter how much fun we made of people who weren't visualizing sex-positive so

  February 17, 2009

• Labor Groups, Babies, Very Old People, Supes Rally Against Rec & Park Cuts -- But Layoffs May Already Be Fait Accompli

  Supervisor John Avalos told Rec & Parks workers he'd like to help them -- but he has no idea how. He still got a friendly round of applauseFashion-wise, children often make the best accessories. Far better than purple tchochkes -- but at today's SEIU City Hall rally on behalf of soon-to-be laid off San Francisco recreation directors, there were plenty of both. A succession of Recreation & Parks Department workers, labor leaders, baby-toting moms, little kids, a bevy of elderly Chinese pe

  February 19, 2009

• Supervisor John Avalos' Triple Word Score

  District 11 residents should be comforted that Supervisor John Avalos knows all 22 of the acceptable words with "Q" and no "U"When it comes to decor, Supervisor John Avalos' office has his standard issue City and County of San Francsico calendar ... and that's it. Far in the corner of the barren room is a small shelf tightly packed with LPs; he notes he's been playing The Cramps incessantly since Lux died. All told, it's the kind of conspicuously empty room that makes one think the first words o

  February 20, 2009

• An Odd Tradition: Thousands of Dollars Flood to Winning S.F. Supes After Polls Close -- From Their Enemies

  Joe EskenaziSupervisor John Avalos admits that taking post-election donations from former political enemies looks bad -- but having a massive campaign debt is badYou'd think making a donation to a San Francisco supervisorial candidate would be a bit like a horse race: You make your "bets," you cheer down the stretch, and, if you bet correctly, you get a "return." In some ways it's like that. But once the horses cross the finish line, the analogy blows up. In a San Francisco supervisorial horse r

  February 24, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: 'Avalos' Law' Predicts Virtually No Meetings This Week

  For all its good points (and I dare you to name three) the new Board of Supes is not dynamic. Their meetings are regularly canceled, and their agendas are limping along. It's a sign of the times and failure both: Despite the calls for bold new leadership, the Supes have spent most of the last few weeks realizing they have nothing to lead. There's no discretionary money left. They can't agree amongst themselves on a veto-proof plan for either cuts or new revenues, and without that they have

  March 9, 2009

• Supes Hit Ctrl Alt Del on Department of Tech's Plea for $750,000 Temporary Home

  The city doesn't have any money for you to find a home either, JohnnyOn Monday, SF Weekly's Benjamin Wachs was bewildered that the Department of Technology was begging the Board of Supervisors for a $750,000 new temporary home -- after three years of failing to locate a permanent home, which won't be rendered one penny cheaper as a result of this proposed temp site. What's more, this project was punted by the Supes last year after the Department of Tech could not produce a detailed expenditure p

  March 19, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: Another Battle in the War on Fun, Children, and Food Made with Real Organic Cruelty

  Monday, March 23, 10:30 a.m. - City Operations & Neighborhood Services Committee It's hard to figure out what Sophie Maxwell and Gavin Newsom have in common. Sophie, after all, is a black woman who doesn't like technology but will answer her land line to talk to friends and critics alike, while Gavin is a white man who thinks that everything he texts should be secret because, hey, he did it on his iPhone, and you don't come between a man and his iPhone. That's personal -- way more pers

  March 23, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: Supes To Be Renamed 'The Super Friends' And Only Use Powers For Good. PLUS: Is Gavin Newsom a Cylon?

  Monday, March 30, 1 p.m. - Land Use & Economic Development Committee I'm thinking of holding a garage sale. My worldly possessions -- not to brag -- include a bag of kumquats, a DVD of Waking Life, a book of commonly used Scottish phrases, and a bottle of something that this guy on the corner swears is wine. The city is also planning to hold a little garage sale. Up for auction: Seven parcels of land along the former Central Freeway right of way and Octavia Boulevard. Their value is est

  March 30, 2009

• Excelsior District Bar Owner Fights for His Business' Life Today In Planning Commission

  From the bar's Facebook pageNero the bartender and his colleagues at the Broken Record hope they'll be able to pour past 11 p.m.In San Francisco there's a bar to cater to just about everybody's interest -- but it seems no one's interested in hearing the barkeep bellow "last call" at 10:30 p.m. Jason King, owner of the Broken Record on Geneva, will find out today in a Planning Commission hearing if that shall be his fate or if he'll get to stay open until the wee hours other bars are entitled to.

  April 2, 2009

• Broken Record Bar Wins the Day In Planning Commission -- Can Now Stay Open Later Than 'Tonight Show'

  We noted this morning that the Broken Record bar out on Geneva was fighting for its business life today, as its owner pushed to be granted a conditional use permit that would permit him to stay open later than 11 p.m. Jason King said that he would not be able to remain financially viable if forced to make last call at 10:30. Luckily for him, it looks like he won't have to. With a 6-1 vote, the Planning Commission granted King his permit. "I think the real coup de grâce was when John Avalos walk

  April 2, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: Can We All Please Stop Being Surprised By Incompetence at City Hall?

  Last week's revelation that the city's 311 call center charges MUNI almost $2 every time someone asks them to look up a bus schedule was like blogger crack. Not a single San Francisco political blogger had sex last week because they were all too busy telling their partners about it. Why? Well ... bloggers. Also because, to be blunt, the 2009 political season has been incredibly dull. How dull? About as boring as watching an appropriations hearing called to discuss pricing structures for

  April 13, 2009

• The Class of 2000

  Eight years after being swept into office, a once-disorganized band of neighborhood leftists tries to create a citywide political machine.

  October 29, 2008

• Supes Punt MTA Budget Imbroglio To Special Meeting Next Wednesday

  Oh, they're dragging this out...The ongoing rancor over the Municipal Transportation Agency's woeful budget has transformed into quite a cliff-hanger: First Board President David Chiu fired a shot across MTA and the mayor's bow by crafting legislation allowing the supes to scuttle the budget. Then, at the last minute, Chiu signed off on a tepid compromise -- earning the enmity of his peers. Then said peers resurrected the threat of voting down the budget and Supervisor John Avalos marched over t

  May 19, 2009

• Still Crazy After All These Years: Bay Guardian's Warblings Drown Rational Discussion of Solar Project

  The price is wrongA grumpy minority on the Board of Supervisors tries in vain to put the brakes on a renewable power project that makes bad business sense. This may sound familiar to observers of politics in San Francisco, where left-wing Democrats on the board tend to outflank their more moderate colleagues when it comes to pie-in-the-sky energy initiatives. Not so fast: You haven't seen this movie before. Today some of the board's most staunchly liberal members -- Ross Mirkarimi, David Camp

  May 5, 2009

• MTA Budget Showdown Leads To ... Wait For It ... A COMPROMISE!

  Jim HerdThat sound you heard earlier today was every City Hall journalist in San Francisco slapping his palm on the table when the Board of Supervisors vote over the controversial Muni budget was continued. And continued again. And more time went by. And now ... after several hours of behind-the-scenes intrigue, a compromise budget has been announced. Chris Roberts at SF Appeal has been live-blogging this thing -- a Godsend for those of us chained to our desks -- and SF Weekly's Peter Jamison is

  May 12, 2009

• The Ass Appears on Stage. Its Name: Public Power.

  If only it were collectivized...The big news out of yesterday's five-hour Board of Supervisors meeting was the adoption of a last-minute compromise on the Municipal Transportation Agency budget despite plenty of complaints from a cadre of left-leaning supes concerned about fare increases and other issues. But that wasn't the only bitching and moaning that went on at City Hall yesterday afternoon. In fact, some of the same supervisors angry over the MTA budget were downright apoplectic -- again -

  May 13, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: Mandatory Composting Gets Some New Sponsors. Which Bin Do We Put 'Futility' In?

  I hope you'll forgive me if I keep this week's Gov InAction curt: I told WAY too many David Chiu jokes over the weekend, and now I'm worn out. I've got to remember to pace myself. However, in case you're wondering, here's how many David Chius it takes to change a light bulb: • None: Aaron Peskin already changed it. • One: and he will change it, assuming no one else can agree on a consensus candidate for the job. • Two: it takes two David Chius to gloat about a major accomplishm

  June 8, 2009

• Supes' Proposed $82M Cuts to Cops, Firefighters are 'Symbolic' -- But Portend Bare-Knuckle Budget Battle

  The budget battle is under way...A shot across the bow. A brushback pitch. A dropping of the gauntlet. Call it what you will, but when the Board of Supervisors' Budget and Finance Committee yesterday approved $82 million in cuts from San Francisco's police, fire, and sheriffs' departments it was a statement. In essence, the Supes are putting it this way to Mayor Gavin Newsom: "You wanna cut social programs and health services and give the police, sheriffs, and firefighters more? Not without gett

  June 11, 2009

• Progressive Supervisor: I've Been Spammed By Gavin Newsom

  On not one, but two occasions (if not more), Supervisor John Avalos has derisively suggested that Mayor Gavin Newsom resides in a different universe than the rest of us. We're not sure if Pacific Heights qualifies as another universe, but, whatever plane of existence Gavin dwells in, it appears he has ready access to at least two things: L'Oreal Total Control Clean Gel and John Avalos' private e-mail account.  Avalos told SF Weekly he was surprised to stumble across a "Buck the system with

  June 12, 2009

• S.F. Supes Discover The Internet Is a Series of Tubes for Sending Pennies to Your Cronies

  'We don't bid, or go in for these city contracts, and we don't intend to do it now.'If one attends any meeting, at any time of day or night, at San Francisco's City Hall, one's likely to find buzz-cut shutterbug Luke Thomas taking photographs for his Web site Fogcityjournal.com. His 10,000 monthly readers tune in for inside-inside-local-government stories such as the Jan. 4 headliner "The Case For John Avalos" by Chris Daly, in which Board of Supervisors member Daly used the site to urge his col

  June 16, 2009

• Update: City Money Going To Media Outlets That Print Public Notices Isn't Chump Change After All

  There's gold in them thar public notices...A previous post about a resolution under consideration Wednesday by the Board of Supervisors to hand out public notice money to news Web sites closely allied with the board's progressive wing wrongly conveyed the idea that we're talking about chump change. We've since checked the numbers with the controller -- and for Web sites such as FogCityJournal.com and BeyondChron.com, the $50,000 or so annually that a city-designated "outreach advertising" public

  June 16, 2009

• Revenge of the Politicos? Lefty Supes Move To Yank City Ads from Chron, Ex.

  Of all the harping about the "mainstream media," perhaps the shrillest version comes from politicians occupying the left fringe of this city's politics. Their news source of choice, for example, is a local liberal news and opinion Web site, BeyondChron.org. On his own blog, Supervisor Chris Daly has praised his colleague John Avalos for denouncing the Chronicle for political bias, because it uses the term "far left" rather than "progressive." The Ex, has been the subject of e

  June 19, 2009

• Supervisors consider ballot measure to pull city ads from newspapers

  June 24, 2009

• Despite firefighters' scare tactics, city unlikely to burn to the ground because of proposed cuts

  June 24, 2009

• Sf Gov InAction: Special Faux-Guest Edition!

  Do you ever get tired of doing the same thing every week? Me too. So this week I decided to imagine how SF Gov InAction would look if it were written by five of this city's most ... um ... noteworthy ... pundits. You say "parody," I say "homage." Either way: Enjoy. Monday, June 29 11 a.m. - Budget & Finance Committee (as written by TIM REDMOND, San Francisco Bay Guardian Managing Editor) I was driving back from a trip to wine country last week and noticed that there were a lot fewer

  June 29, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: The Budget's All finished, Except for the Backstabbing

  Our story so far: The Supervisors were drinking champagne in City Hall last week after reaching a budget deal that restored an unprecedented amount money to programs that Mayor Gavin "Call me Governor" Newsom cut from San Francisco because he thought it would play well in Fresno. Par-TAY! But then Chris "Cassandra" Daly, the Supervisors' progressive Id, ruined the vibe by going to the budget committee and yelling lines from Jerry Maguire at it. In other cities, people would be surpris

  July 6, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: Peace Between Bloggers and Journalists for Our Time!

  Print journalists and bloggers are feuding again. It's a quiet feud so far -- an incendiary article here, a subtle dig in a blog post there -- but it's real, it's between people I know and respect, and it makes me want to hide under the bed the way I did when the monsters attacked mommy and daddy. At least, I think they were mommy and daddy. This all happened after the nice man with candy lured me into the van . Adolescence is a confusing time when you're tied to a chair. The point is:

  July 21, 2009

• San Francisco Has a Budget -- and Chris Daly Has Left the Building

  Once more, for old time's sake. Lost somewhere between the news of Sacramento's impending raid upon municipal revenue streams and President Obama's comfy jeans, San Francisco's Board of Supervisors yesterday passed the city's contentious, agonizing $6.6 billion budget. This wasn't done without Supervisor Chris Daly's acknowledged "best friend" John Avalos -- whom he so designated during an awkward public browbeating/recitation of the second-most famous line from Jerry Maguire earlier this month

  July 22, 2009

• It's Your Friday Morning News Quiz!

  He's commissioned polls revealing you'll probably get No. 3​Look to your left. Look to your right. One of you will be gone by the end of the day. Oh, you don't work for Mayor Gavin Newsom? Never mind. Breathe deeply -- it's Friday, Mayor Newsom hasn't kicked you out yet, and you deserve to take our news quiz. Good luck! 1. An unknown bastard or bastards caught national headlines this week by burning San Francisco's: A. BillboardsB. Outhouses. C. WalgreensD. Vehicles. 2. San Francisco's Ani

  July 31, 2009

• 'Squishy Numbers' Be Damned, Controller to Give Mayor City's Financial Report Today

  While it remains to be seen how much the state will be taking from San Francisco, the controller's office will issue a report today​Can you see Gavin Newsom as a game show host? He's got the hair, he's telegenic, and if we sweet-talk Gene Rayburn's relatives, maybe he can even get the long microphone. Between internecine struggles and, now, the looming question of just how much the state will whisk away from the County of San Francisco, this year's budget battle really has resembled an old edi

  August 4, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: Your 'Labor Day' Guide to What the F*#@k Happened in the Last Eight Months

  With a federal holiday appears on the calendar, city hall's motto becomes: "Ask not what your country can do for you, but how much time off you can take from your country". In this particular case, The supervisors like to celebrate Labor Day by pretending to have labored, while their staff likes to celebrate Labor Day by pretending to rest. (The one exception to this rule is Michela Alioto-Pier and her staff, who celebrate Labor Day by going into labor). The result for both is a three week "v

  August 24, 2009

• Supervisor Asks Ethics Commission to Investigate Mayor ... Whom Commission Depends on for Its Funding.

  Joe EskenaziWill Supervisor John Avalos still be smiling after the Ethics Commission finishes investigating the complaint he made aginst the mayor?​By now, political junkies are well-informed about the gathering storm regarding Mayor Gavin Newsom's office leaking a confidential city attorney's memo to the Chronicle. Whether you buy into Newsom's rationale -- which echoes King Louis XIV's pronouncement of l'etat, c'est moi -- or give any credence to the possibility the mayor broke the law is on

  August 25, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: In S.F. Math, 2 2 Does Not Equal Four, But Sexual Harrassment = $90,670.20

    Here is the exact moment when covering San Francisco government goes from sad to pathetic: It's when you come home after a nice vacation, dust off your lap-top to catch up on what you've missed, and realize that San Francisco has no idea how many working fire engines it has.I'm pretty sure that if we were a real city, with a functioning government, this kind of thing wouldn't happen.I would, in fact, like to use this as a defense against all those who claim that my coverage of San Fran

  September 14, 2009

• Just About Everybody in S.F. Loses With State's Budget Cuts -- But Losing Less Is the New Winning

  ​When the city controller yesterday announced state budget cuts will deal San Francisco a $26.5 million punch in the gut, your humble narrator immediately thought of Jon Lovitz. Just as the Saturday Night Live nebbish once pitched himself to single women with the battle cry "Lower your standards!" so the controller's report was a classic example of bad news being a welcome respite from horrific news. Sure, a $26.5 rug being pulled out from beneath the city is bad -- but it's not nearly as bad

  September 15, 2009

• Safe Bet: Newsom's Pot Shots at Longer Parking Meter Hours Mean You'll Be Suffering More on Muni

  Jim HerdWhoosh! There goes your parking revenue! ​As first reported on Streetsblog and then this morning in the Chronicle, Mayor Gavin Newsom has made clear that he's no fan of alleviating Muni's revenue headaches by extending parking meter hours. Muni's pledge to study the merits of extended parking meter hours was one of the only takeaways for progressives during the painful Muni budget dustup from earlier this year; let Newsom's current behavior be a warning to anyone else who sees fit to s

  October 5, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: Pot Farming Illegal Immigrants Threaten to Bring DJs to City Hall Meetings!

    Monday, Oct. 5   10 a.m. - Public Safety Committee   On the whole, people are in favor of "Public Safety," so most of the time the Public Safety Committee is pretty uncontroversial. The chairman arches his eyebrows and asks the Mayor's Office of Criminal Justice "Why aren't you making us safer?" and nobody ever thinks "Hey, that's a really unfair question, you oppressive bastard!" Not today. Today, a full two-thirds of the agenda (okay, two items out of three) are l

  October 5, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: City Brings Hammer Down on Anti-Prostitution Program, Then Forms a Glee Club to Sing Social Services to Sleep

    I've had a really busy few weeks, and I haven't been able to catch up on any of the new fall shows yet. So I tried to cram a lot of television in this weekend while writing SF Gov InAction. Just so you know. Monday, Oct. 19, 10 a.m. - Public Safety Committee Somebody has to say it: the Public Safety Committee we have in San Francisco isn't nearly as good looking as the one they have in CSI Miami. Can we get them re-cast? I wouldn't mind if the supervisors stay around a

  October 19, 2009

• Next Stop: Oz. There's No Place Like Muni, There's No Place Like Muni...

  Joe EskenaziNo Toto, though...​ While riding tornadoes over the rainbow is the preferred route to Oz, it turns out the Muni train is ever so slightly more reliable. And, as we've documented numerous times in the past, they'll even take your little dog, too. Our eye-catching Dorothy Gale stepped on the train at Powell, followed the yellow-brick road only momentarily, and disembarked at Montgomery. We had time to ask her what was going on ("it's October!") but didn't catch her name. What a world

  October 22, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: Gavin Newsom, the Morning After, Will Still Have to Celebrate Small Business Month

    The news at the end of October was devastating for San Francisco: Trauma and Gavin Newsom for Governor were canceled in the same week. It's heartbreaking: Both were expensive pilots with such promising premises. In Trauma, a group of troubled but devil-may-care emergency medical technicians raced through San Francisco saving people from giant fireballs and learning to trust in each others' sex appeal. In Gavin Newsom for Governor, a devil-may-care San Francisco mayor deeply concerne

  November 2, 2009

• SF Gov InAction: Supes Vote to Give Cats, Entertainment Commission, Claws

    I'm worried about the supes. Are they feeling all right? Are they eating enough protein? Are they celebrating legal weed a little too early?I'm concerned because there's a federal holiday -- Veteran's Day -- right in the middle of the week, and it's the only day the supervisors are taking off. Not the day after, not the day before, not most of the week. Just the one holiday. Does that sound like them? No. No it does not. It sounds like something a governing body in a responsible ci

  November 9, 2009

• Breaking: Controller Reveals City Has No Money for Additional Expenditures -- City 'Cannot' Spend Anymore Without Cutting

  Busted​In a chilling move, the city controller's office announced it will formally rescind its certification of any supplemental expenditures by the city -- in plain English, there's no money and the Board of Supervisors can't spend any more unless more revenue comes in or the current budget is cut.  "We're going to decertify the supplementals," confirmed deputy controller Monique Zmuda -- who had no idea when the last time was the city was forced to take this drastic a financial step. Th

  November 16, 2009

• Controller: Dire Financial Warning Is No Political Ploy

  ​Yesterday, SF Weekly broke the news that the city's finances are in such bad shape that the controller has forbidden the mayor or supes from making any expenditures not previously budgeted; the controller cannot guarantee the money is there. Yes, it's that bad. This takes the wind out of the sails of the Progressive Armada, which had been planning a showdown today regarding legislation that would have spent around $8 million to stave off layoffs of union health workers and rescinded pay freez

  November 17, 2009