Free Republic

A nonprofit that provides services to homeless people in San Francisco has been accused of $100,000 fraud and nepotism. The industry built on supposedly helping the homelessness in San Francisco means that those raking in money from donations want to keep the crisis going.

A weekend spring storm that drenched the San Francisco Bay area and closed Northern California mountain highways also set a single-day snowfall record for the season on Sunday in the Sierra Nevada. The wet weather system had mostly moved out of the state by Sunday morning, but officials warned that roads would remain slick after around two feet (60 centimeters) of snow fell in some areas of the Sierra. “Did anyone have the snowiest day of the 2023/2024 season being in May on their winter bingo card?” the University of California, Berkeley Central Sierra Snow Lab asked on the social...

San Francisco's well-publicized homelessness crisis is emblematic of the problems facing many of America's big cities as they struggle to provide affordable housing against the backdrop of high interest rates and low inventory. This has led the city to employ a variety of methods to tackle the problem, but a recent plan to provide tiny houses for San Francisco's homeless population has residents furious over the cost. The units would cost a reported $113,000 each to construct. Considering that the average home in San Francisco costs nearly $1 million the $113,000-per-unit cost for the tiny houses seems in line with...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Wearing a bright safety vest with the words “Safe Passage” on the back, Tatiana Alabsi strides through San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood to its only public elementary school, navigating broken bottles and stained sleeping bags along tired streets that occasionally reek of urine. Along the way in one of America’s most notorious neighborhoods, she calls out to politely alert people huddled on sidewalks, some holding strips of tin foil topped with illicit drugs. “Good afternoon, happy Monday!” Alabsi says to two men, one slumped forward in a wheelchair and wearing soft hospital socks and one slipper. Her...

Tech workers in San Francisco plan to create a square-mile downtown 'commune' that allows people to 'live, eat and work' all within a 15-minute walk A utopia-like space is set to be launched on March 11 in downtown San Francisco City Campus was created by four community builders' It is supposed to have everything that people need within a 15-minute walk Tech workers in San Francisco have planned to create a downtown 'commune' that will allow people to 'live, eat and work' all within a 15-minute walk. Set to be launched on May 11, City Campus, a nonprofit, plans to...

LA County Assistant DA Diana Teran, who oversaw George Gascón's efforts to prosecute law enforcement officers instead of criminals and to release thousands of felons from prison early, was arrested Saturday on 11 felony charges related to the "unauthorized use of data from confidential, statutorily-protected peace officer files." Like many alleged felons in Los Angeles County, Teran was out on bail less than an hour after her arrest. Unlike many alleged felons in Los Angeles County, the Diana Teran scandal has the potential to topple the county's power structure, or to put a severe dent in it. That potential exists...

Auditors have slammed a homelessness nonprofit in San Francisco for being 'careless and irresponsible' with $240 million of taxpayer money, in the latest scandal to rock California's bloated charity housing sector. HomeRise, one of the city's main providers of homeless housing, 'misused' funds, lacked financial controls and engaged in other practices that 'heightened the risk of fraud,' says a damning city report. It's the latest in a slew of revelations about waste in California's so-called 'homelessness industrial complex' — a gravy train of funders, officials, and shelter owners more keen on swallowing public funds than solving the problem.

<p>To fully grasp the current situation in San Francisco, where venture capitalists are trying to take control of City Hall, you must listen to Balaji Srinivasan. Before you do, steel yourself for what’s to come: A normal person could easily mistake his rambling train wrecks of thought for a crackpot’s ravings, but influential Silicon Valley billionaires regard him as a genius.</p>

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the US has seen evidence of Chinese attempts to “influence and arguably interfere” with the upcoming US elections, despite an earlier commitment from leader Xi Jinping not to do so. Blinken made the comments to CNN’s Kylie Atwood in an interview Friday at the close of a three-day to trip to China, where the top American diplomat spent hours meeting with top Chinese officials including Xi, as the two countries navigated a raft of contentious issues from US tech controls to Beijing’s support for Moscow. Blinken said he repeated a message President Joe...

California Senate candidate Rep. Adam Schiff faced a rude welcome in San Francisco as he was reportedly a victim of a carjacking just hours before a campaign dinner. Thieves broke into his car parked in a downtown garage, stealing his bags, leaving Schiff to attend the event in shirt sleeves and a hiking vest. Despite the setback, Schiff thanked supporter Joe Cotchett at the ritzy dinner in Burlingame, where he was commended for his resilience by Cotchett

Hello to the city, goodbye to your luggage. That was Senatorial candidate Adam Schiff’s rude introduction to San Francisco’s vexing reputation for car burglaries Thursday when thieves swiped the bags from his car while it sat in a downtown parking garage. The heist meant the Democratic congressman got stuck at a fancy dinner party in his shirt sleeves and a hiking vest while everyone else sat in suits. Not quite the look the man from Burbank was aiming for as he rose to thank powerhouse attorney Joe Cotchett for his support in his bid to replace the late Dianne Feinstein...

S&P Global Ratings announced yesterday that it was changing its outlook on San Francisco's debt from stable to negative.The outlook on the city-county’s outstanding general obligation and appropriation debt was cut to negative from stable this week by the ratings company. The weakness in the city’s commercial real estate market and tourism activity were factors that drove the move, S&P said. Adding to the city’s burdens, San Francisco’s budget expenditures outpaced revenue growth in fiscal 2023.To be clear, the ratings agency hasn't downgraded the city's credit rating, which is still at "AAA," the highest possible. A downgrade in the credit...

SAN FRANCISCO, CA — As part of their mission to combat misinformation online and ensure accuracy of what people read, Snopes journalists announced plans to personally fact-check the entire San Francisco Poop Map. The initiative will allow Snopes to judge the legitimacy of user-reported sightings of human feces strewn along the city's roadways and provide residents with reliable information on the locations of publicly deposited poo. "Confirming the existence of reported dumps is important," said Snopes journalist Fred Larkin. "We simply cannot allow false reports of human waste to be propagated across social media. There are a lot of people...

Community Justice Exchange, part of the Soros-funded Tides Center, solicits legal defense donations for arrested protesters.. Scores of "Free Palestine" protesters across the United States took to the streets Monday to block major airports, highways, and bridges. Those who are arrested will receive bail money and legal support from a left-wing dark money behemoth funded by George Soros, an online fundraising page shows. The protests, which took place in dozens of U.S. cities including San Francisco, Chicago, New York City, and Philadelphia, were organized by A15 Action, a newly formed group that worked to "coordinate a multi-city economic blockade on...

San Francisco has long been feared to be falling into a doom loop, a situation where taxpayers leaving the crime-ridden city results in lower tax revenues leading to cuts in services and rising taxes, making it even less desirable to live in. It can be especially devastating when a community's essential businesses, such as grocery stores, decide to leave. San Francisco experienced this last year when Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN)-owned Whole Foods Market Inc. shut down its flagship store in the city after being open for just over a year, citing employee safety concerns. Nearly 570 emergency calls were reported from...

When you sup with the Devil, you must bring a long spoon. Berkeley law dean Erwin Chemerinsky has never been a favorite of mine, but I love irony, and this week he’s my avatar of people whose actions have come back to bite them. He has publicly bragged, for example, how much easier it is to avoid anti-discrimination laws in his faculty hires than it is in student admission, tacitly admitting that is what he has done and what he encourages others to do. But that seems to be of no avail to him now that he’s become a target...

The USS Hornet may be a decommissioned aircraft carrier, yet it has nevertheless become the launch-site for a controversial new war in the skies. The Marine Cloud Brightening Program's Coastal Atmospheric Aerosol Research and Engagement project, led by researchers from the University of Washington, took to the deck of the Hornet Tuesday to launch streams of particles into the sky above the San Francisco Bay. Their ultimate objective is apparently to block and reflect sunlight in hopes of limiting "global warming." CAARE researchers behind the geoengineering scheme opted not to announce their experiment, reportedly citing concerns that there might be...

The share of San Francisco sellers losing money on their home sale is sitting near its highest level in more than a decade, largely because prices have come back down to earth after skyrocketing during the pandemic. Nationwide, the share of sellers losing money is much smaller (4%) because home prices remain near their record high. In San Francisco, the typical seller who’s parting ways with their home for less than they originally paid is losing $155,500. Nationwide, the median loss is roughly $40,000. New England sellers are least likely to lose money, with less than 2% of Providence, RI...

Want more food deserts in San Francisco?Here's how you get more food deserts in San Francisco.According to Reason magazine:The San Francisco Board of Supervisors is considering a remarkable policy that would allow people to sue grocery stores that close too quickly.Earlier this week, Supervisors Dean Preston and Aaron Peskin introduced an ordinance that, if passed, would require grocery stores to provide six months' written notice to the city before closing down.Supermarket operators would also have to make "good faith" efforts to ensure the continued availability of groceries at their shuttered location, either through finding a successor store, helping residents form...

A San Francisco supervisor wants to require grocery stores to provide six months of notice before closing a location A San Francisco lawmaker introduced a proposal that would require grocery stores in the city to provide six months of notice before closing a store and to explore a replacement supermarket at the vacated location. Dean Preston, a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, introduced what he calls the Grocery Protection Act – which is based on a proposal the board approved in 1984 that was vetoed by then-San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein. Preston's proposal would require grocery store...