Weighing in on the "Wrecked Park Department"By Ben Terrall
Hundreds of Recreation and Park Department workers and their supporters, family, and friends packed a Recreation and Park Commission hearing on proposed budget cuts to the department on Thursday. Overflow attendees watched the hearing on a large screen in another room.
They warned that the cuts will decimate violence prevention programs and have other serious long-term costs to San Francisco, while criticizing the purported privatization savings as a costly illusion. And still, the commission voted unanimously to approve the package of cuts.
Dozens of people from all over San Francisco, some of them returning after not getting to speak at last week’s similarly packed budget meeting, gave testimony to the commission. They were a cross-section of ages, races and social backgrounds. One person offered comments against proposed parking meters in Golden Gate Park, and several for continuation of threatened programs. The vast majority stated their strong opposition to projected layoffs of up to 72 Recreation Directors.
During several hours of statements, we did not hear one person support proposed cuts or the Rec Connect model for replacement of recreation directors, which most speakers described as privatization.
Nonetheless, at the end of the afternoon, the commission unanimously approved the budget as proposed by RPD management.
Before the hearing, more than 100 people rallied on the steps of City Hall in support of the threatened RPD employees. Sup. Ross Mirkarimi spoke out against privatization of any RPD services. Adults and children waved signs reading “don’t give our kids pink slips” and “keep our kids safe – keep our directors.”
Glenn Havlan, an employee of RPD for 20 years who works with the city’s San Francisco Free Civic Theater, followed Mirkarimi at the microphone. Havlan told the crowd, “the system won’t collapse without the managers – the rec directors rarely see them and the public never does.”
Mark Mahoney, a father whose two boys also spoke about their use of the West Sunset Recreation Center, echoed many others when he explained that he and his kids used the center not because of the programs, but because of the directors facing layoffs.
Dale Scott argued, “There hasn’t been sufficient outreach to the communities. It’s not about the programs, it’s about the people.” Scott asked why golf courses that were losing money were being kept open while working people with years of public service were being summarily laid off.
Rec Director Cortez Espinoza said, “Getting rid of the directors was a quick fix. Why weren’t we brought to the table? It’s sad when the people above you don’t respect you.”
Khaldun Rucker, a handsome, well dressed young man in a sharp hat, delivered an especially powerful statement in which he said that without his local rec director, he would have wound up in jail or dead.
Rory Smith, who works with at-risk youth at the Crocker-Amazon Rec Center, invited the Commissioners to come out to “the tough neighborhoods and see what we do.” He observed, “We keep our kids off your kids,” which drew a chuckle from the woman in front of me.
Nada Alghaithy explained to the commissioners that on her limited income, there was no other option than the Ingleside Rec Center for any of her five children. Other parents echoed this point, saying they could not afford a nanny or increasingly expensive day care.
Maria Su, acting director of the Department of Children, Youth and their Families (DCYF), told me that Recreation and Park Department Director Jared Blumenfeld was misinformed when he claimed 10 Rec Connect centers would be funded. Su said that DCYF only had the money to maintain and fund five Rec Connect facilities. Speaking at the hearing, Don Franklin, a shop steward for his SEIU Local 1021, asked if DCYF couldn’t fund additional Rec Connect projects. “We’re facing layoffs. Who’s going to do the work?” Franklin called himself “old school” and said, “If it looks like a rat, and smells like a rat, you know the rest.”
Kim Mitchell told the commissioners, “You will get what you pay for if you cut the rec directors … We’re going to have an epidemic of violence.” She argued that “it’s going to cost more in the long run” and used the analogy of a “a car [where] you thought you were saving money” by going to a cheaper mechanic, but “wound up paying more” in the long run.
After the heaing, Havlan told me, “It’s pretty rotten. I’m shocked the commissioners have such contempt for public service.” Havlan described the “managers who were brought in to this” as “people who make a living cutting jobs” and “itinerant professional managers, serial careerists moving from city to city and contract to contract.” He said, “They never played square with us. They never said what they were really doing. They’ve been deceptive the entire time.”
He described the budget discussions as filled with “half truths and euphemisms… They won’t come out and tell the truth.”
Noting that “Rec Connect and other non-profits connected to the Mayor will make out well” after the cuts, Havlan singled out RPD Deputy Director Dennis Kern and Manager Terry Schwartz as being especially complicit in arranging the stealth layoffs pushed forward in the new budget. A document released to the San Francisco Chronicle shows that with zero overtime in calendar year 2008, Kern accrued pay of $168,897. For the same period, Schwartz made $141,129, also without overtime.
A source in the RPD told us, “I think the best thing for folks to do now is to make their voice heard with their respective district supervisor and the Mayor's Office. The Board of Supervisors won't receive this budget until after the layoffs, but if they hear from people, it will help strengthen the position of those Supervisors who support us. I believe that Mayor Newsom will reconsider this drastic position if enough political pressure is placed upon his office.”
digg •
del.icio.us •
sphere •
google
•
Comments (3)
I would like to thank you for the articles on the Rec Dept. I was in a couple of productions of the SF Free Civic Theatre and know Glenn Havlan pretty well. My experience with the company was helpful for me getting some stage work. When I received the letter from Glenn that his job was in trouble because of budget cuts, I did not know what to do. I got myself together a couple of days before the meeting on the 13th, and I wrote a letter, from Glenn's letter, and emailed it to everyone, to the Board of Supervisors, and the Directors. I also wrote to everyone I knew, friends, Theatre Companies,etc., to show up to the meeting, I couldn't because I had to work, Damn Corporate Amorica, if they could not show up, to write to everyone above and to contact Theatre Bay Area, our "community organization." I thought they would take interest in this because SF Free Civic Theatre has brought QUALITY Free THEATRE to everyone in SF. But I am not sure they showed up, I not sure they cared. While you put an article about the situation and gave an update, TBA were more concern in Sacramento and a general tone in one of their editors that need an emergency action.
I would like to ask, if I may, to have the public contact Theatre Bay Area about this and to have them fight with Glenn to save this theatre company.
Theatre Bay Area
415-430-1140
870 Market St #375
theatrebayarea.org
Posted by Kirk Matthew White | February 24, 2009 05:41 PM
Raise taxes now
repeal prop 13
save our Parks, schools, health dept.....
Oh, there goes the alarm. Time to wake up
Posted by Thomas McIntyre McIntyre | February 24, 2009 10:06 PM
One thing people need to know, your tax dollars are going to pay these exaggerated salaries of these RPD Managers. Their mission is to destroy Rec. Directors and dismantle them completely!
Terry Schwartz is responible for having taken away field time from Rec. Directors, they only get one hour per week to practice a Baseball Team, how are they going to be able to prepare and teach their players with such little time? This is a deliberate attempt at sabotaging them and depriving access to the most needy of San Francisco kids. Disturbing! But that's what $141,129 of taxpayers money gets you! Don't let these people get away with this! And not abandon the most needy in our community!
Posted by Fred Stein | February 25, 2009 09:34 AM