No on G

I was disappointed that the Bay Guardian caved in and endorsed Proposition G, the deeply flawed ballot measure that legalizes the illegal southern entrance to the parking garage in Golden Gate Park [Endorsements, 10/21/05].

If passed, Prop. G would "clarify" 1998's Prop. J (which authorized construction of the garage) to allow an entrance and exit inside the park. But Prop. J clearly stated that all entrances and exits would be situated outside the park, in accordance with its principal purpose of reducing the impact of automobiles in the park.

Under pressure from the wealthy north park neighbors, former mayor Willie Brown moved one of the entrances slated for their neighborhood deep inside the park. A trial court judge ruled that this entrance was legal, as long as parking was removed from MLK Jr. Drive. Prop. J promises us that if we legalize this entrance, no parking will be removed.

So far, garage proponents have broken every single promise of public benefit intended to mitigate the impacts of building a massive, car-dependent structure in a public park. These promises include:

1) no public money spent to build the garage;

2) garage revenue, after O&M [operations and maintenance], diverted to the Recreation and Parks Department;

3) no through-traffic through the Music Concourse;

4) entrances and exits outside the park; and

5) garage proceedings subject to the Sunshine Ordinance and the Brown Act.

Opponents of Prop. G, myself included, fear that it will be added to this string of broken promises. It effectively diverts our attention from the real problem, which is that once the southern entrance opens, it will send shock waves through the rest of the park, down Lincoln Way, and into the Ninth Avenue business district. When that happens, garage supporters will come back with another ballot measure to widen MLK and all the other feeder roads in the park as well. At that point it will be impossible to stop them.

Katherine Roberts

San Francisco

The Cisneros problem

I'm troubled by your endorsement of Joe Cisneros [for treasurer].

Cisneros appointed Leo Fermin (Honduras-SFO fund diversion scheme) to the "public" watchdog slot at the Treasury Oversight Committee, which meets without observing basic sunshine. Sunshine requests receive conflicting responses from various staffers, and the treasurer has been cited by the Sunshine Task Force.

The dramatic decrease in return on investments to $7.6 million, down from the 10-year average of $40 million, can't be dismissed as market fluctuation. Limiting investments to the top three banks eliminates competition from smaller local banks that bring higher returns and reinvest in our communities.

Auditing businesses is down 50 percent. Cisneros lacks the experience to oversee the city's 26 auditors, he does not know where to look, what to look for, or what to expect, because he has never performed an audit. Calvin Louie has audited government accounts for 32 years.

Cisneros's Working Families Tax Credit, inherited from the Newsom campaign, is a mandated duty of the office. His literature talks about setting up a program for the "unbanked" sometime soon. Louie, since serving on the Human Rights Commission, has volunteered time and expertise to credit unions for a decade, bringing financial literacy to low-income communities.

Finally, the Chronicle reported that Cisneros failed to pay his own taxes on his monster home remodel.

Doug Comstock

San Francisco

Pelosi's approach

In last week's Bay Guardian, an editorial appeared encouraging the Democratic County Central Committee to support a resolution authored by Bernal Heights Democratic Club president Tom Gallagher.

Gallagher's resolution asked Rep. Nancy Pelosi to support a measure in Congress calling for an immediate withdrawal from Iraq. The editorial criticized a separate resolution that I had submitted, which asked the president to support Pelosi's efforts to bring our troops home.

I write to explain my position and the position of the DCCC. I support the immediate withdrawal of troops from Iraq, as do almost all of my colleagues on the DCCC. However, different Democrats in Congress have taken different approaches to achieving this unifying goal. Rep. Lynne Woolsey has taken one approach. Rep. Pelosi has taken a different approach. None of us, frankly, knows which approach ultimately will be most successful. So, in my mind, we should be supporting all approaches by members.

I also believe that the DCCC's position on this issue should be about the vision of ending the war and bringing our troops home and not about individual personalities.

At the DCCC meeting, we adopted a compromise resolution that I authored. My resolution, which passed almost unanimously after a thorough and thoughtful discussion, calls on all of our Democratic elected officials to work to achieve immediate withdrawal of our troops.

Scott Wiener

Democratic County Central Committee member

San Francisco