Good Morning, San Francisco

A gray, cool morning out there — 53°F with a few clouds, topping out at a balmy 56°F, so keep that extra layer on. Today we're talking about what happens when City Hall learns absolutely nothing from its own scandals.

City Hall Wants to Hand a Scandal-Plagued Nonprofit the Keys to a Community Center. What Could Go Wrong?

Here's a question that should be simple: If a nonprofit is connected to a program where millions of public dollars went missing, should the city hand that organization more public assets? If you answered "absolutely not," congratulations — you have more common sense than the current administration.

Mayor Lurie is backing a deal to let a nonprofit tied to the Dream Keeper Initiative scandal take over operations at a city community center. The Dream Keeper Initiative, you'll recall, was San Francisco's $120 million program launched in 2021 to redirect funding to the Black community. Noble goal. The execution? A catastrophe. Reports surfaced of financial mismanagement, zero meaningful oversight, and public dollars that evaporated into what can only be described as a bureaucratic void. Multiple nonprofits involved faced serious questions about whether the money ever reached the people it was supposed to help.

So naturally, the city's response is to reward that ecosystem with more responsibility. This is the San Francisco governance loop in its purest form: launch a program, fail to oversee it, watch it implode, then double down because the political optics of pulling back are worse than the fiscal reality of throwing good money after bad. It's not compassion — it's cowardice dressed up as equity.

What makes this especially galling is the timing. The city is staring down budget deficits. Residents are fed up with the sense that accountability is something that only applies to taxpayers, never to the organizations feeding at the public trough. If Lurie wants to prove he's serious about fiscal responsibility, this is the easiest layup imaginable: pause the deal, demand a full accounting, and make the nonprofit earn trust before handing over keys. The fact that this apparently needs to be said out loud tells you everything about where we are.

The Rundown

City Hall & Politics

Supervisors add three charter amendments to November ballot. The Board is putting an affordable-housing trust fund expansion, a public bank, and a commission overhaul before voters this fall. Each idea has been floating around City Hall for years without gaining enough traction to actually reach the ballot — the public bank proposal in particular is a perennial zombie that keeps shambling back. Voters should ask one question about each measure: what does implementation actually cost, and who's on the hook?

Supervisors Wong and Sherrill flagged for PAC funding. Both supervisors received campaign backing from Everyneighborhood, a PAC that labor groups have labeled anti-worker. The characterization is contested, and neither office has responded publicly. Worth watching, but "a PAC supported candidates who won" is not inherently a scandal — it's how elections work. The real question is whether the money influenced votes, and that requires receipts, not vibes.

Public Safety

Pedestrians report surge in crosswalk close calls. SF residents are describing near-daily incidents of drivers blowing through marked crosswalks, with particular frustration aimed at gig-economy drivers. Some want to crowdsource license plate shaming online, which — let's be honest — accomplishes exactly nothing. The actual fix is enforcement, and that requires SFPD and SFMTA to prioritize it. Until then, keep your head on a swivel.

Illegal right turns at Highway 101 Willow exit go unaddressed. Residents near the Willow Road exit in East Palo Alto have been flagging dangerous illegal turns during rush hour, and nobody — not the county, not elected officials — will return their calls. A textbook case of jurisdictional buck-passing where drivers pay the price. Someone owns this intersection. Act like it.

Housing & Transit

Caltrain names a train after Pelosi as ridership climbs. Love her or not, Pelosi helped unlock federal funding for Caltrain's $2.4 billion electrification project, and the agency is now calling itself the fastest-growing transit system in the country. Naming a train after a politician is peak Bay Area, but credit where it's due — electrification is a genuine infrastructure win. Whether that ridership growth holds is the real story.

The Westfield tomb on Market Street still haunts downtown. The shuttered San Francisco Centre remains the most visible symbol of the city's post-pandemic retail collapse — dark, empty, and enormous. Retailers didn't leave because people stopped shopping. They left because the city couldn't keep the surrounding streets safe and functional. Until City Hall confronts that reality honestly, no amount of "reimagining" will fill nine floors of dead retail space.

Insurance & Cost of Living

California FAIR Plan hikes rates nearly 30%. The state's insurer of last resort is jacking up homeowner premiums after the 2025 LA wildfires drained its reserves dry. Here's the kicker: private insurers are now passing $1 billion in costs onto all policyholders statewide — including people who've never filed a claim and don't live anywhere near a fire zone. This is what happens when a backstop program designed for emergencies becomes a primary insurer by default. Sacramento built a system that was never meant to hold this much weight, and now everyone's footing the bill.

Culture & Food

Free Bollywood dancing hits Union Square. A participatory Bollywood dance event is coming to the plaza — no tickets, all ages, and yes, you will be pulled in. Check SFFuncheap for the confirmed date before heading out. Park in the Geary garage or just take BART like a civilized person.

Dollar drinks and decade wars in North Beach. Friday nights are bringing $1 drink specials and a DJ battle-of-the-decades format to North Beach. Arrive early — "no cover" has a way of becoming "cover after 9pm." Parking in North Beach on a Friday is an act of pure optimism.

Free happy hour concerts return to Golden Gate Park. Live music at the Bandshell, roughly 5–7pm on weekday evenings all summer. Bring your own food — options nearby are thin. This is the rare city program that costs you nothing and actually delivers. Enjoy it.

One More Thing

If you need a reset from all the City Hall dysfunction, take a weekday morning at the Palace of Fine Arts. The swans don't care about your budget deficit, the rotunda doesn't have a PAC, and nobody will ask you to approve a charter amendment. Sometimes the best thing San Francisco offers is a bench, a lagoon, and ten minutes of silence.