$2.8 million for Newsom's Community Justice Center? Hell, no."There are so many things on the chopping block that this seems out of whack.”
So said Sup. Tom Ammiano at yesterday’s Board hearing on the Mayor's Community Justice Center, sounding diplomatic compared to some of the pointier comments that his fellow supervisors made, as the Board voted 7-3 to send Newsom's $2.8 million CJC back to committee.
But then again, all the supervisors sounded outspoken compared to Sup. Geraldo Sandoval, who recused himselffrom the discussion , on the grounds that he is running for judge. (Sandoval’s absence felt even more ironic as the hearing progressed and a couple of sitting judges spoke in favor of the center.)
Now, everyone knows that wannabe governor Mayor Gavin Newsom has been itching to add the CJC t to his political resume ever since visiting a similar one in New York.
Everyone also knows that the Board of Supervisors doesn’t like it when Newsom goes behind their backs and doesn’t let them share in his perceived political glory.
So it came as no big surprise when the supervisors bounced the mayor’s pet project back to the Board’s Budget and Finance committee, arguing that it makes no sense to spend almost $3 million this way, when hundreds of programs that would potentially have served the center’s diversionary aims are being cut in the Mayor’s budget.
To make his point , Budget and Finance Committee chair Sup. Jake McGoldric, dug his nails deep into the numbers buried within the mayor’s 479-page budget to unearth evidence that the Center could cost up to $3 million a year.
Then Sup. Chris Daly dug his oars deep into the political waters and grilled Superior Court Judge Howard Kahn, Superior Court Commissioner Ron Albers and Superior Court Judge David Ballati, until Kahn admitted that the CJC was not the judges’ brainchild, after all.
“I plead guilty to not being good at PR and to being politically naïve,” Kahn said, quick to add that he did not participate in any of the attacks on Daly.
“I can not help it if the Mayor’s Office uses their free speech rights to publicize things that in many cases may not have been accurate,” Kahn said.
And Sup. Ross Mirkarimi illuminated some of the backstory behind all this mess, when he got Kahn to clarify that the center, which sits bang slap in the center of Daly's district, would NOT be used to handle “quality of life” crimes, such as defecating, urinating or sleeping in public.
“None of these conditions, if they be crimes, would be covered,” Kahn stated. “We would not intend to handle infractions in the Community Justice Center.”
Instead, said Kahn, the Tenderloin-based CJC would handle misdemeanors and non-violent felonies, including prostitution-related crimes and grafitti.
‘This part of San Francisco has a disproportionately high number of arrests for drug crimes, about 50 percent of all such crimes in the City,” Kahn said.
Many in the room agreed that it makes sense to divert cases into substance abuse, mental health and behavorial programs, rather than send them directly to jail.
And along the way, this reporter learned that it costs the City $152 a night, per jail bed, (the argument being that the CJC would save the City $1.4 million annually in jail bed costs alone, by diverting folks to programs, not jails.)
At which point the Board returned to their, “But-what-about-Newsom’s-cuts-to-all-such-programs?” refrain.
‘No programs are being contemplated for reduction or elimination because of the existence of the Community Justice Center,” Kahn argued. “This is a triage situation.”
“If there was enough money is this budget, it would be worth trying getting to yes,” said Board Chair Aaron Peskin,as he joined Ammiamo, McGoldrick, Daly, Maxwell, Mirkarimi and Dufty in voting to send the plan back to committee, until such time as money miraculously breaks free to restore a bunch of slated cuts, plus the CJC…
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Comments (3)
In a reply to some concerns I raised about this to a member of the CJC Community Advisory Board, I ultimately received an email back that came from Starr Terrell, who works inr the Mayor's Office on Public Policy and Finance.
Ms Terrell reports that "Dr. Mitch Katz, the Health Commission, the Mayor and all of the other
minds who are working through how to do as much, and in some cases more, with less" decided to cut outpatient drug treatment "because outpatient
programs without methadone have not shown to be more effective than referring clients to AA and NA."
One wonders, then, why in dealing with his own alcoholism, Mayor Newsom didn't just go to AA, rather than to his friend at Delancy Street. At least there, Newsom's addiction issues would have been kept anonymous, rather than spilled to the press by his friend/counselor at Delancy.
Furthermore, if non-methadone outpatient treatment is so utterly ineffective, why then does the City pay continue to spend any money at all on such programs? Why, in fact, does the Mayor have a Task Force on Methamphetamine, when all that really needs to happen is to make sure everyone knows where the next twelve-step meeting is.
San Francisco's ostensible policy is drug treatment on demand, and a hell of a lot of substance users (like the Mayor) have demanded something different - and better - than AA/NA.
As far as the Community Advisory Board for the CJC goes, the person I originally contacted concluded in her most recent email to me, thanking me for my input: "Those of us on the advisory committee have posed many concerns and questions and input from you and others is extremely helpful." Here's the punchline (again, quoting verbatim from that email):
We have spent many hours agonizing over the unhelpful impact the Mayor and his staff have had on the effort around the CJC.
So, the Mayor wants this thing, but all he can do is fuck it up.
Posted by Scott Bravmann | June 11, 2008 06:23 PM
Sigh. What a sad little city we've become. No one is interested in working together to create and adjust and think on our feet and move this city forward. Everything has to be a childish squabble between the mayor and the supervisors.
I'm so sick of this high school behavior. Just because the mayor proposes something, that doesn't automatically make it evil. Just because the supes propose something, that doesn't make it automatically evil. Could you all just try to focus on doing the right thing? Do you HAVE to act so stupid?
It is time for the leaders of this city to grow the hell up. If you can't get past this petty squabbling, then y'all need to be recalled and replaced.
This is a ridiculous way for a city to run, especially one that prides itself on being progressive. If progressive means you act like a spoiled child and split into little cliques and score points by dissing the other cliques, then I'll take whatever the alternative is. This is nuts.
Posted by Sigh | June 11, 2008 07:03 PM
Hey,
I agree to Scott Bravmann's sayings.
This is very difficult to set up here and step forward in the career where people are careless and less cooperative.
Posted by Anwalt für Arbeitsrecht | July 28, 2008 01:28 AM