Web Log
Oct 11, 03:30 AM | Author: jane kim | Category: politics
not enough going on for you?
For me, September, not January, is really the beginning of the year. I start a new school year with a newer batch of youth leaders to train, but just in general, I feel that energy is high in San Francisco. There are always a batch of campaigns to work on and plenty of interesting projects and events.
Here is a list of things going on this Fall that I find of interest:
1) Kanye Was Right
A great new site is up, started by Van Jones (Ella Baker Center for Change) and James Rucker (MoveOn.org), named www.colorofchange.org. Driven by the horrific and racist Katrina catastrophe, they started this website to utilize the organizing power of the Internet to rally and strengthen the voice of Black Americans and allies. Order your “Kanye was right” T-shirts here! Shirts are printed on American Apparel, so they got those baby t-shirt sizes.
2) Board of Education is looking for a new Superintendent.
This is old news, but Arlene Ackerman announced her retirement on Tuesday, September 6th. She cited that she and the Board of Education are incompatible and will be exercising her controversial “golden parachute” clause, meaning she will walk away from a poor school district with $375,000. (Read past blog on this issue here.) She is set to retire June 30, 2006.
Now, the search begins to find a new Superintendent. Names such as Supervisor Tom Ammiano, Henry Der (who made the short list with Arlene back in the 2000 search, a former deputy Superintendent at CA Department of Education and a long-time civil righs activist) and Gwen Chan, current Deputy Superintendent have been floated around. It should be interesting and very exciting.
3) November 2005 Election!
As usual, we have a whole slew of local and state propositions. Check out my endorsements on Issues.
In addition, the Assessor race (probably the most interesting) is still on. The two front runner candidates are current Supervisor Gerardo Sandoval, of District 11 and Phil Ting, current appointee by Mayor Newsom to be Asessor since July 2005.
It’s been an interesting race, primarily because both candidates hail from and claim a progressive background. They have been splitting the endorsements of labor unions, democratic clubs, electeds and progressive leaders.
Gerardo has a very progressive voting history to fall back on, as a Supervisor for the past 5 years. While Gerardo would most likely do a good job as Assessor, bringing in much needed money from downtown, we would risk losing a great vote on the Board of Supervisors if he does wins. Phil was a student organizer at UC Berkeley, advocated for the release of Wen Ho Lee and served as Executive Director of Asian Law Caucus the last two years during which he pulled together a GREAT organization going through tough times. Some of my most favorite people in the world work or have worked at ALC (Gen Fujioka, Malcolm Yeung, Victor Hwang, Ivy Lee, Khin Mai Aung). Unfortunately for Phil, he did not take stances on many controversial initiatives the last two years due to a voter education grant that ALC had, forcing us to guess how he would stand on many issues.
Read more about them on their website (click on their names).
········· ∞∞∞ ·········