Subject: Public Finance

• New School Tax To Hit Ballot by June 2008

  October 2, 2007

• Chicken John Pissed At Ethics Commission

  October 3, 2007

• EFF, ACLU Go to Bat for Wikileaks

  February 27, 2008

• DARPA Creates Cyborg Spy Moths, Girls' Locker Rooms Everywhere Compromised

  March 19, 2008

• IRS Goes After Examiner Owner

  June 10, 2008

• Governor Newsom? Who Knew?

  July 2, 2008

• Mayor, Board President's Payroll Tax Plans are Different; Supes Notified Via Press Release

  It turns out the mayor does have a device for communicating with David Chiu. It's called a press release.Yesterday we wrote about how Mayor Gavin Newsom announced at the San Francisco Business Times breakfast that he was proposing an overhaul of the city's payroll tax -- which came as news to Board of Supervisors President David Chiu, who had proposed overhauling said tax two weeks ago. It turns out that the proposals are, indeed, different -- and the mayor's payroll proposition was just one of

  February 12, 2009

• Dog Bites

  June 7, 1995

• Paper Trails

  June 28, 1995

• Candidate Promises Citizen Mayor Delivers?

  July 5, 1995

• Transit Spotting

  A transportation activist points to inefficient and costly projects like the Central Subway.

  March 25, 2009

• Care Not Cash Volunteer Recommends Work, Ass-Kicking to Homeless in SF Weekly Letters

  January 23, 2008

• Porkmistress Pelosi

  Madam Speaker says she wants to tame pork-barrel spenders. Takes one to know one.

  January 3, 2007

• Rent to Evict

  November 8, 2006

• Doublespeak With Forked Tongue

  When dealing with Chris Daly and his political objectives, it's best to leave reality behind

  May 3, 2006

• Letters to the Editor

  Week of Wednesday, October 19, 2005

  October 19, 2005

• Noir You See It, Noir You Don't

  Naming one of the masterminds of the SFO Enterprises scandal as a "watchdog" over billions in public investment: city government or pulp fiction?

  August 10, 2005

• The New California Adventure

  June 9, 2004

• Letters to the Editor

  February 11, 2004

• The Tax Man Cometh

  The federal government looks to eliminate abusive tax shelters, and it may cost San Francisco tens of millions of dollars

  January 21, 2004

• Total Future Awareness

  The Defense Department hires a New Economy futurist to help fight terror. Don't you feel safer already?

  September 17, 2003

• Gimme Shelters

  After mortgaging our future in an orgy of budget-related borrowing, the Legislature hatches new orgiastic plans: sleazy tax shelters

  August 13, 2003

• Vicious Cycle

  May 7, 2003

• Common Cents

  January 22, 2003

• The Ghost of Scandals Past

  Previous "creative financing" debacles should haunt city officials who've approved a risky $1 billion lease of Muni streetcars

  April 17, 2002

• A Taxing Problem

  February 20, 2002

• How to Kill a Nonprofit

  A federal audit reveals the waste and mismanagement that ruined a once-promising minority aid program

  September 27, 2000

• Shaky Ground

  Environmental activists adopt a new strategy -- playing the race card

  January 5, 2000

• Mecklin

  On the Money

  December 8, 1999

• Indecent Disclosure

  November 17, 1999

• Opening Pandora's Box

  Once-secret documents reveal the tobacco industry's battle to gut anti-smoking education in California. Former Assembly Speaker Willie Brown and former Gov. Pete Wilson helped.

  November 17, 1999

• Crime and Patronage

  For more than a decade, three different mayors have let one man dole out government jobs to alleged murderers, crack dealers, and other serious felons. The question, obviously, is why.

  August 19, 1998

• By George!

  A forgotten San Francisco economist survives, barely, in his adopted city

  July 8, 1998

• Downtown's Fairy Godmother

  Doris Ward, San Francisco's assessor, is tossing around commercial tax breaks as if they were fairy dust. It's costing the city at least $100 million a year.

  May 6, 1998

• The Grid

  March 11, 1998

• The Redevelopment Sinkhole

  Years of reckless borrowing have sent the city's Redevelopment Agency spiraling into debt. Mayor Brown's pet projects may flush it down the drain entirely.

  February 4, 1998

• The Great Bank Thievery

  The city and state say the Bank of America stole hundreds of millions -- even billions -- of dollars from the government. But didn't San Francisco finance officials know what was going on? And shouldn't B of A executives be under criminal investigation?

  December 31, 1997

• The Grid

  February 12, 1997

• State Ballot Measures

  October 30, 1996

• The Burton Money Machine

  John Burton's 1040s reveal that politics doesn't pay

  March 20, 1996

• Clockers

  Residents of a downtown loft tell you where to get off

  November 29, 1995

• The Last Tycoon

  Walter Shorenstein's skyscrapers shaped San Francisco. His cash configured City Hall. Publicly, he's pristine. But there's more than meets the eye to the man behind the megaliths.

  May 10, 1995

• Chronic City: Oh, Noes! Fewer Narcs! Budget Crisis Could Mean Fewer Drug Busts.

  Is it game over for the state's narcotics officers? California's budget crunch could cut almost a third of the agents from the Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement, according to Attorney General Jerry Brown.Budget negotiators, facing the financial meltdown of the state treasury, have proposed lopping $20 million from the bureau, on top of $12 million in previous cuts. Brown called it a "terrible budgetary decision" that would lead to layoffs for nearly a third of the BNE's agents.The agency, part of

  June 29, 2009

• S.F. Cracks List of Nation's Three Fastest-Plummeting Housing Markets (We Took Bronze)

  New statistics show you absolutely can't afford these houses, but they now likely cost 28 percent less than last year's ridiculous pricesWhat do Phoenix, Las Vegas and San Francisco have in common? Yep: sketchy nightclubs and plummeting housing prices. According to S&P data released today, San Francisco's median housing prices have dropped 28 percent since last spring, one of the three largest declines in the country. We take the bronze behind dubious gold-medalist Phoenix (down 35.3 perce

  June 30, 2009

• Did City's Goof Cause Tax Collectors to Overcharge San Francisco's Small Businesses?

  A ballot proposition that raised the amount of money San Francisco businesses need to pay their employees before being subjected to city payroll taxes seems to have gone unnoticed by the very people charged with enforcing it -- San Francisco's tax collectors. Last year, voters overwhelmingly approved Proposition Q, which, essentially, did two things: It broadened the number of businesses subject to payroll taxes (notably including partnerships such as law or architectural firms) but also raised

  July 1, 2009

• S.F. Treasurer Admits City Goofed on Payroll Taxes, Hit Up Companies That Don't Owe Any

  Treasurer Jose Cisneros: Sorry, our badYesterday we reported that it appeared the city's tax collectors forgot about an overwhelmingly approved ballot proposition that raised the payroll a business must pay out in order to to owe San Francisco payroll taxes. City Treasurer Jose Cisneros today confirmed that, yes, the city was still following last year's rules and hitting up companies with payrolls that don't meet the city minimum to cough up payroll taxes. "We sent out our prepayment bills and i

  July 2, 2009

• Sacramento's Dem, Republican Leaders Schedule Caucus Meetings to Sell Legislators on Budget Deal

  Cutting billions from health and education while 'borrowing' from local governments -- the California dream!Some of the haziness surrounding the state's tentative budget deal will burn off this morning, as party leaders have scheduled 9 a.m. caucuses to outline the finer points of a plan that promises not to thrill anyone.The broader strokes of the pact to stave off California's $26.3 billion shortfall were published late yesterday. Perhaps most concerning to those fortunate enough not to rely o

  July 21, 2009

• Show 'Em What They Lost: Controller Issues Report Detailing How Much State Will Vacuum Away From S.F.

  ​As promised, city controller Ben Rosenfeld this afternoon released a report detailing the hit San Francisco will take as a result of state borrowing, filching, and other creative accounting tactics. What, you were expecting good news? How about this: Hundreds of Muni vehicles didn't crash today. As for the city's finances, well, it's bad. Here's the breakdown as explained to SF Weekly by deputy city controller Monique Zmuda (any forthcoming errors are solely our own). All told, the city is go

  August 4, 2009

• Stimulus Wreckage

  September 30, 2009

• Oops, They Did It Again -- Public Campaign Finance Advocates Bemoan Latest 'Raid'

  ​Public campaign financing isn't just a political football here in San Francisco -- it's a football so frequently kicked, punted, or otherwise buffeted the laces have come undone. And is there any money to fix it? Don't ask! The latest instance of San Francisco politicos stating they like the idea of candidates not owing fealty to major donors, but the public -- but don't like paying for it -- will come tomorrow. During the summer, the Board of Supervisors restored $1 million Mayor Gavin Newso

  October 6, 2009