While the past 15 months have certainly taken a toll on all of us, we can now look ahead to a brighter future. The power of positive thinking helped many people escape the darkness a global pandemic can evoke. It can also help us see the silver lining in what we’ve been through.

How can we adapt? How can we operate our businesses more efficiently? How do we connect with people?

Now that we’ve been through the worst of the COVID-19 public-health crisis, many of us can hit the reset button and get a fresh perspective on best business practices as we enter a new era. Our small family business not only survived but began to thrive as the pandemic progressed. How? It most definitely was not easy. Part of our success is attributed to our unique corporate structure: a service and retail business comprised of a full-service plumbing company and a decorative hardware showroom. But there is more to it than simply that. What follows is what we learned amidst our struggles as we enter a post-COVID Era.

Still a ‘People’ Business

Decorative plumbing and hardware is unique in that it remains a “people” business. Artificial Intelligence and technology may be replacing jobs in other industries, but ours still requires people. There are just too many unpredictable factors and variables that come into play when we’re dealing with a new construction or a remodel project that cannot be solved by an algorithm. As we all know, these types of projects are emotional and, as a result, each one requires a unique human connection.

What has evolved is the way that we connect with people. On The DPHA Drip podcast (Episode: The Consolidation Effect), I had an enlightening conversation with Vik Szemerei, director of strategic accounts at The House of Rohl. One of the biggest takeaways from the conversation involved talking about how the pandemic has forced us to think about how we connect with people and how we operate more efficiently due to the increased value of time.

We both agreed that it makes absolutely no sense to fly across the country to sit in the room with people for a PowerPoint presentation. Save the PowerPoint or strategic talking points for a virtual meeting. When you are meeting with someone, use that time to connect, get to know each other and communicate. So, while our industry is still largely a people business, we can effectively utilize new technology to do better business with people, not to replace people.

Rethinking Events & Showcases

There seemed to be a saturation of events and showcases before the pandemic – so much so that it almost seemed like burnout was inevitable.

Those planning the events and showcases were struggling to figure out how to remain relevant amongst their competition, while those attending were struggling with which events would be worth the investment to attend. This would often lead to disappointment from exhibitors due to low attendance and thus less engagement from attendees because of the low energy.

DPHA adapted by hosting a virtual conference in 2020 and expanding its outreach to a new sector of attendees. Through our relationship with ASID, NKBA and other relevant associations, we extended invitations to architects and designers across North America, yielding hundreds in attendance. Moving forward, DPHA is implementing new strategies to make our annual showcase more accessible by doing the following:

Offering a Hybrid Model: the showcase can be attended virtually or in-person.

Being more design centric: ASID will have their own booth at the conference this year, and several design centric breakout sessions will take place.

Educational Sessions will be available in-person or as part of the virtual event.

The pandemic has forced us to rethink the way we connect with people, which has also forced companies to rethink the way they allocate their market and related budgets.

Company Roles & Structure

Efficiency and adaptation have been common themes, so it is natural for this concept to be fluid in all aspects of business. Companies both large and small have regrouped to think of ways to be more lean, agile and receptive to growth and change.

Technology can also be utilized to improve processes in different areas of your business. For example, our service department switched to a “remote dispatch” model to avoid close contact with one another when public health was uncertain. What we realized in that adaptation was that it increased the efficiency of our technicians’ ability to complete their projects more effectively and expanded our network radius. We can hire technicians out of our service area to reach more potential customers and eliminate the detriment of a commute.

If your bookkeeper, accountant or administrator does not have to be in the office, your hiring pool can expand tremendously. Showroom design consultants could be more accessible and make a greater impact outside of the showroom. Technology and innovation have been critical catalysts for improving processes, increasing productivity and maximizing accessibility.

A New Era

We are all in a unique position to reinvent ourselves in business and as individuals. The loss of human connection will hopefully inspire us to live with more gratitude.

Technology and innovation have helped us discover our potential in business. We now have the opportunity to create a unique new synergy by using technology to make us more connected instead of creating more distance. Businesses can utilize technology to maximize efficiency while placing more emphasis on connecting with the people they do business with. Events and showcases can expand their network while keeping the family culture alive.

With all of these advancements and new insights, we can all move forward together with hope in this post-COVID Era.

J. Philip Hotarek is operations manager at Lutz Plumbing Inc. and currently serves as board secretary for the Decorative Plumbing & Hardware Association (DPHA). A former NCAA and professional ice hockey player, he spent summers working in the family business as a plumbing apprentice and has been working full time for the company for the past 10 years as a design consultant and plumbing technician. He is currently stepping into a management and ownership role for Lutz Plumbing Inc., whose decorative hardware showroom serves the San Francisco Bay Area.

The post Adapting to the Put up-COVID Period appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

Union Bank struck a deal to sell their tower at 75% of the original list price, setting the first new benchmark. Other towers are waiting in the wings.

By Wolf Richter for WOLF STREET.

We’ve tracked what older office towers, many from the 1980s and 1990s, are worth when they are eventually sold, either in a foreclosure sale or a regular transaction. Two Houston towers were sold in a foreclosure sale at a price that saw the lenders — holders of commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMB) — lose 80% and 88%, respectively. CMBS holders suffered a 100% loss in the foreclosure of the vacant 1980’s 46-story “One AT&T Center” in downtown St. Louis.

Foreclosures are brutal and belong to the extreme. Regular selling is a little less brutal, and we’ve documented a number where investors in CRE bonds have suffered losses in the range of 35% to 50%.

These losses from CRE debt are in addition to landlords’ equity losses. In the big losses in office debt so far, it has been investors who have been on the hook, not banks.

Now we have the first sale in the new era of home office and office downsizing in San Francisco, which has overtaken Houston and Dallas as the worst major office market in the US. There are a number of office towers on the market. One of them, Union Bank’s headquarters at 350 California Street in the Financial District, has found a buyer.

Union Bank, which owns the 300,000-square-foot tower and uses a portion of it, put it on the market as a sale-leaseback, where it would lease back a small portion of the tower. The rest would be free. In 2020 it was trading at $250 million with zero interest rates. In 2022 it pulled the listing. During this time Mitsubishi UFJ sold Union Bank to US Bancorp, the fifth largest bank in the US; The deal was completed in December 2022.

Then, in February 2023, Union Bank re-listed the tower for $120 million.

The company has now entered into a deal to sell the building to San Francisco-based SKS Real Estate Partners and South Korea-based Genesis for $60-67 million, according to sources cited by the San Francisco Business Times. This would be around 75% off the original listing price.

The price of $200 to $225 per square foot will set a benchmark for the value of older office towers in San Francisco. A sense of reality sets in. And it could make other deals possible. Until this sale, nobody knew what anything was worth in this new era, when about a third of San Francisco’s office space is in the rental market.

This tower does not involve debt. There are quite a few office CREs that are owned by corporations that occupy them and may be debt free and are up for sale, including the nearby 550 California owned by Wells Fargo, which originally bought it for $160 million US Dollar then withdrew the listing and will try again in 2023.

So this tower of Union Bank isn’t a story about lenders stuck with huge losses, and it’s not a story about a landlord defaulting on an adjustable-rate mortgage whose interest rate has doubled in two years. These are the problems currently plaguing office CRE.

The Union Bank deal is a story about a bank selling a tower it has owned and occupied for many years that has been depreciated year after year, reducing the book value of the building’s original purchase price. Also, according to The Registry, $41 million has been poured into the building over the years for seismic and other upgrades, as well as various renovations.

This is the easiest kind of deal in a very tough market. And there are a few other deals like this that could happen in San Francisco, including Wells Fargo’s tower, that could further define the benchmark price.

But there are already two massive defaults in San Francisco: PIMCO’s Columbia Property Trust has defaulted on the debt of the 201 California St. and 650 California St. office towers.

The price of $200 to $225 per square foot of the Union Bank tower at 350 California sends shivers down the spines of holders of the CMBS that hold the defaulted mortgages on those two towers. they don’t want to have to sell those towers in a foreclosure; You’ll be motivated to negotiate a deal with Columbia Trust because foreclosures get really ugly in stressed markets.

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By Jonathan Brocklebank for the Scottish Daily Mail

13:14 February 21, 2023, updated 15:51 February 21, 2023

She was smart, articulate, and—remarkably given her youth and the sheepish tendencies of many of her peers—a woman of her own. The problem with Kate Forbes, from the perspective of her allies, was her apparent lack of ambition.

When asked in 2020 if she was interested in the top job, she replied that she was “absolutely” not.

When the question came up again the following year, she was just as firm — and more explicit about why it definitely wasn’t for her. “The more I see the job up close,” she said, “the less appealing it is.”

So that’s it. The brightest rising star in the nationalist movement had no interest in replacing Nicola Sturgeon, especially in a political arena she felt “felt more toxic than ever.”

She had just married Ali – Alasdair MacLennan, a chimney sweep ten years her senior, and was adjusting to life as a parent to his three teenage daughters.

Kate Forbes (pictured here in the Scottish Parliament building) is entirely her own wife, writes Jonathan Brocklebank

She became pregnant shortly afterwards and took maternity leave in July last year as the Scottish Government’s first cabinet secretary.

Daughter Naomi is only six months old now.

Just in case Miss Forbes still had an ounce of doubt about keeping her name out of any leadership race, Nicola Sturgeon’s resignation speech could have been almost tailor-made to sweep her away.

Life as First Minister is “relentlessly” hard, she said, and “giving absolutely everything of yourself to this job is the only way to do it”. There is “virtually no privacy” and “a First Minister is never off duty”.

And yet, in her first public statement since Miss Sturgeon resigned on Wednesday, there was a slightly different assessment of the desirability of the post the SNP leader is vacating.

“We need a leader who is bold, courageous and energetic, with a fresh face and ready for new challenges,” explained Miss Forbes in a slick video posted to social media.

“I am that leader.”

Whether the Dingwall-born former chartered accountant is a leader at all remains to be seen. But it’s already emerging that she’s the candidate who will represent the biggest cultural shift since the Sturgeon era.

The pair are far from each other on almost everything except the independence goal itself. Regarding abortion, one of them is pro-choice, the other pro-life. One is for gender reform, the other against. One is a bright social progressive, the other a social conservative. One speaks of hating the Tories and the other of loving Jesus.

One is a lowland city dweller with an equally compact inner-city constituency, the other a highland countryman whose territory spans thousands of square miles.

If Humza Yousaf considers herself Nicola Sturgeon’s continuity candidate, Miss Forbes is certainly the screeching halt in her predecessor’s direction of travel. The gaping chasm between them is the fault line that runs right through their group.

In short, the newest entrant to the leadership race is the Sturgeonistas’ worst nightmare. Would she overthrow the party to the right? Break Parliament from its commitments to gender reform? Maybe even work constructively with the Tories in Westminster?

Hear the SNP’s obviously nervous Mhairi Black about the prospect of a new party leader who deviates from the hard left’s agenda of the last eight years: “Any attempt to move to the right would destroy the main motivation for many activists, the doors open,” she called.

“If you take that reason away, you won’t find anyone under the age of 35 willing to deliver your leaflets very quickly.”

Well, Miss Forbes is 32 – and handing out leaflets is where it all started for her at SNP.

When she first began helping with local party campaigns, she had spent several of her childhood years in India, where her parents were missionaries.

Fluent in Gaelic and a member of the Free Church of Scotland, she made no attempt to downplay her from the start of her political journey.

“To be honest, I believe in the person of Jesus Christ,” she explained in 2021. “I believe that he died for me, he saved me and that my calling is to serve and love him and me to serve and love his neighbors with all your heart and soul and mind and strength. Politics will pass. I am a person before I became a politician and that person will continue to believe that I am made in the image of God.’

In a party whose statements by members often appear interchangeable, this was anything but usual.

This politician could obviously imagine things that were more fundamental to her than independence.

From Dingwall Academy she went not to a Scottish university, as aspiring SNP politicians almost always do, but to Cambridge University to study history.

The newest entrant to the race for the lead is the Sturgeonistas’ worst nightmare

Upon returning to Scotland, she completed an MSc at the University of Edinburgh in diaspora and migration history – subjects dear to her heart after learning how the Highland Clearances drove her ancestors from the Applecross Peninsula in Wester Ross.

She later studied to be an accountant and spent two years with banking giant Barclays.

She then became an assistant to MSP David Thomson before – almost by accident – at the age of just 26 she landed on the spot he vacated in 2016.

Despite many urging her to run, she said, “I looked at myself and thought, ‘Too young, too immature, too little life experience’.”

The fact that she was back in her childhood bedroom at the family home in Dingwall only seemed to underscore her youth.

But she prevailed, increasing the SNP’s majority in the constituency of Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch – and she remained in the family home for months after her election.

Her real coming of age in politics, however, came at age 29, when she was asked at the very last minute to deliver the SNP budget after Treasury Secretary Derek Mackay, it turned out, resigned out of favor, according to News to a Teenage Schoolboy.

It seemed like an impossible question. It was 7 a.m. on the day of the testimony when the call came from Miss Sturgeon’s office. Miss Forbes had to go through 283 pages of budget plans before she could deliver it.

She recalled, “In that moment, you don’t have the luxury of thinking too hard about what you’re asking of you, you just do it.” And she did it with more aplomb than the shamed Mr. Mackay had ever mustered.

From that day on she was traded as a possible successor to Miss Sturgeon. In fact, the party leader is said to have privately admitted that of all the possible candidates for her successor, Miss Forbes was the most talented.

Less than two weeks after taking office, she was appointed Treasury Secretary, becoming the youngest person ever appointed to the role and the first cabinet secretary born in the 1990s.

However, the intervention that Miss Forbes made last year was less remembered.

She was one of three government ministers to sign a letter raising concerns about the potential impact on women of allowing people to self-identify their gender and urging the Scottish Government to delay its controversial gender reforms .

Ash Regan, who is also challenging for the SNP leadership, was another.

In January last year, Miss Forbes confirmed that her position on the matter was unchanged and expressed fears that the Gender Recognition Reform Act (Scotland) could be a “bad law”.

If not for her maternity leave, she would have had to either vote for this “bad law” or leave her government post, as Miss Regan did last year.

Perhaps, by Miss Sturgeon’s reckoning, that same maternity leave would put Miss Forbes out of the leadership race if she snapped it up fast enough.

If that was the plan, it surely failed.

The next-generation ‘fresh’ candidate has Bute House in her sights – and should she get there, her predecessor’s legacy could be the first to be shredded.

The post Why Kate Forbes represents the largest cultural shift from the Nicola Sturgeon period appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

San Francisco 49ers general manager John Lynch told local reporters on Monday that he doesn’t anticipate Dee Ford to be with the team much longer.

The Niners acquired the defensive end for a second round pick in 2019 and gave him a five-year, $85 million contract extension that hasn’t paid off. Ford has played 18 regular season games in three seasons with the 49ers. He recorded 9.5 sacks in his time in scarlet and gold.

“I don’t see a lot of hope with (Ford) being a factor for us on the field moving forward,” Lynch said, via NBC Sports Bay Area’s Matt Maiocco.

Ford was a Pro Bowler for Kansas City in 2018, when he recorded 13 sacks in 16 games. But he only played 11 games the next year, one in 2020 and six in 2021. He suffered a concussion last season, but his back has been the main issue.

“I think we tried to be as patient as possible, and no fault of Dee, he just ran into a bad situation with his back, where he couldn’t get healthy,” Lynch said.

Ford, 30, restructured his contract before the 2021 season. The salary cap-manipulating move shrunk his base salary from $15 million to $4 million. His cap hit for 2022 is roughly $7 million, and his dead cap number is over $14 million.

Based on Lynch’s comments, the door’s shutting on Ford. But it’s unclear how SF will handle his contract.

“We’ll figure that out, exactly what the transaction will be,” Lynch said. “But not enough hope and progress to see him playing for us moving forward.”

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Julie Levitch wasn’t arrested until a sweaty evening in August 2020 when a neighbor heard broken glass and called the police.

Levitch, a 52-year-old mother of two, had gone to her boyfriend’s house to return his phone. The doorbell was broken, so she knocked on the window. It had cracked, and when she tapped the glass, her hand broke right through, leaving a bloody wound, she said. When the Phoenix police arrived, the couple stated there was nothing wrong – but officers arrested Levitch and charged her with criminal harm through misdemeanor.

She spent the night in jail, where she says she was sexually molested, the cave was searched and put in solitary confinement for 16 hours. Three months later, prosecutors agreed to drop the charges.

Now Levitch is suing – not for her arrest and detention, but because the county jail posted her mug shot online. Like many law enforcement agencies, the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office routinely releases photos of people admitted to the local detention center, potentially permanently devastating their lives before they were convicted.

“That photo will be out there forever,” Levitch told me, worrying about how it would affect everything from job openings in her job as a technical writer to new friendships. “We live in a society where you’re supposed to be innocent until proven guilty, but I was found guilty the minute the mug shot showed up.”

The Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office has not yet responded to Levitch’s lawsuit, and a spokeswoman declined to comment on pending litigation.

In the digital age, those images of people’s worst days lurk forever as internet clickbait. Many news outlets have stopped posting mug photos – or at least so many of the photos – but some states and cities are starting to grapple with a more fundamental problem: Why are police posting mug photos – and should they be allowed to?

“If you see a mug shot, you are suspecting crime,” said Imani Gandy, a law and court journalist and a vocal critic of the representation of colored people in the news media.

In Oregon, after January 1, law enforcement officials may only release booking photos under certain circumstances, such as trying to find a fugitive.

***

The first time I saw my own mug shot was the day after I was jailed in New York state for heroin. It was December 2010, and I was still on the high of drugs, when the other women in the cell block woke me up to point out my frowning face on the evening news.

With scabby cheeks and a red nose, I looked worse in this photo than any other I’d ever seen of myself. I had no idea then how stubbornly it would follow me. Long after I stopped getting high, articles about my arrest – with that “faces of meth” -like picture attached – were the first results when I typed my name into Google, like a digital ball and a chain to me connects with a previous life.

Still, I was fortunate and privileged to be given a second chance, unlike so many others. When I started working as a reporter, it was part of my job to add mug shots to dozens of local news and crime stories. Media has long been posting the images that drive web traffic and, with it, advertising money.

It wasn’t until some editorial offices began to abandon this practice that I began to wonder why we had ever done this and urged my own editorial team to stop. (The Oregonian / OregonLive has severely restricted the use of mug shots in recent years.)

***

It was only recently that I began to ask why the police had to publish mug shots in the first place.

Some law enforcement agencies are asking themselves this question as well. The Justice Department has repeatedly refused to post mug shots, arguing in a federal appeals court that there is no public safety interest in posting images that represent a “permanent picture of one of the most difficult episodes in a person’s life.”

Last year the San Francisco Police Department also suspended their release.

“The widespread publication of police posting photos in the news and on social media creates an illusory correlation for viewers that encourages racial prejudice and vastly overestimates the propensity of black and brown men to commit criminal behavior,” said Chief Bill Scott at the time.

Now the department only publishes arrest photos if they have a clear law enforcement purpose – such as finding a suspect or missing person. Last month, Newark, New Jersey police announced a similar policy change.

At least three states have gone a step further and have banned some mug shots from being published. In 2019, New York changed its Open Records Act to prohibit posting of mug shots unless it helps law enforcement. That year, California banned police from posting the pictures on social media, and Utah banned mug shots from posting until after the conviction.

The changes generated some resistance, particularly from civil rights groups and journalists. At a February hearing, Salt Lake City investigative reporter Nate Carlisle asked lawmakers to reject Utah law, pointing out that mug shots are sometimes the only evidence of police brutality during an arrest.

“I just don’t think it’s good public policy to hand out fewer government documents,” he told me a few weeks ago. “Whether journalists should publish them is another discussion.”

Since mug shots are often viewed as public records rather than criminal records – the latter of which are considered too personal in many states to release – it’s hard to win a lawsuit like Levitch’s.

“These lawsuits are usually dismissed because the agency says, ‘It’s a public record and we have the right to publish it,'” said Sarah Lageson, a Rutgers sociologist who studies mug shots.

There are a few exceptions, she said. A 2016 court ruling allowed the Department of Justice to withhold mug shots, and in a Pennsylvania case, ex-prisoners were awarded cash damages when a federal jury ruled that releasing mug shots was against the Open Records Act.

“It should be a change in the law and then we wouldn’t have to rely on judicial interpretation of what is publicly available in the digital age,” said Lageson.

Some law enforcement say that posting mug shots can encourage other victims to come forward, and others claim – without evidence – that threating a mug shot can help deter crime.

But for people who have publicly posted their mug shots, it seems like the practice also discourages rebuilding a life. Sometimes it’s hard to pinpoint the exact damage because when a would-be job or a landlord or date pops up after discovering a stigmatizing picture online, we usually never know. To Levitch, this seems to undermine the basic protections our justice system should have.

“Is it constitutional to publish mug shots that damage the reputation of people when they are still innocent?” Said Levite. “It just seems naturally unfair and not American to do this.”

Keri Blakinger is a salaried writer whose work has focused on prisons and prisons.

The post Rethinking mugshots: On-line period means they stay endlessly so states, together with Oregon, are shifting to restrict launch appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

“It was the single biggest factor in saving my business,” said Ben Bleiman, partner of Tonic Nightlife Group and nightlife advocate, of the parklets that popped up during the pandemic. Bleiman, who owns the Teeths in the Mission District and Soda Popinski in Nob Hill and is the president of the SF Bar Owner Alliance, is not alone. Numerous restaurant and bar owners, whose businesses were on the brink of ruin, confirm his opinion: “Without the option of having the parklets, we would not have survived financially,” says Laurie Thomas, owner of Rose’s Café and Terzo and managing director of Golden Gate Restaurant Association.

And now these parklets are permanent. After a final vote on July 13th, the mayor officially signed the law and signed the deal on Wednesday, July 28th. The newfangled Shared Spaces Parklets (or, in common parlance, Streeteries) that emerged from the pandemic are becoming a permanent fixture to help empower small businesses while reducing the overflow of cars and parking spaces in our city. What once proved nearly impossible in SF – allowing small businesses to use public sidewalks and parking spaces for customers – became a reality, though it took months for that decision to be made. Making parklets permanent became a contentious local debate, but now these outdoor spaces are here to stay, and they will change the San Francisco landscape forever.

Interesting facts about the history of parklets

Parklets are nothing new. Although they have become popular with SF restaurants over the past year, the advent of the Parklet restaurant wasn’t just during times of pandemic. They were widespread in Europe; Just ask your most contradicting friend with “Wanderlust” in his Instagram bio and you will get an ear. But it’s a different situation in California, and seeing parklets come into play shows how much cars have encroached upon our livelihoods – and our lives.

In the early days of the automobile, pedestrians and vehicles shared the street. (Evidence of this pairing is the short film A Ride Down Market Street Before the 1906 Fire, which detects streetcars, horse-drawn carriages, cars, cyclists, and pedestrians, all moving at a condensed but chaotic pace.) In the decades that followed, the needs of motorists overshadowed the lives of pedestrians and literally sidelined them.

But almost 100 years later, pedestrians began to push back in small but fine efforts. In 2003, Environs Landscape Architecture built the Piazza Basilone in San Diego, where passers-by could sit, chat and have lunch. Then, in 2005, three designers from Rebar, an art and design studio with activist leanings, turned a parking lot at First and Mission in San Francisco into a mini park with lawn, tree, and seating. This experiment resulted in Park (ing) Day, an annual holiday on the third Friday in September when people around the world take over parking spaces and open parks to the public.

How restaurant owners reinvented parklets

In the run-up to the pandemic, San Francisco had already started its own parklet program, although, according to Rebar’s idea, these looked more like small public parks. It wasn’t until the pandemic that triggered the Shared Spaces program that restaurants and bars really had the opportunity to redesign parklets as outdoor dining areas. Restaurants that range from the two-star Michelin Sparkler season in SoMa to the neighborhood favorite New Dumpling King in the Outer Sunset, and bars like the Gay Leather Dive The Powerhouse or the Haight Street Stapel das Alembic, built parklets that serve hungry guests could feed, serve tipsy regular customers and rejuvenate their sales-hungry businesses.

Since the program came into effect, more than 2,400 applications have been submitted and an estimated 1,900 approved. The permit fee of $ 1,000 to $ 3,000 per parklet was waived for two years. Best of all, segments of busy thoroughfares, such as Valencia Street and Grant and West Portal Avenues, are closed to most vehicle traffic and pedestrians are being let out of their cement prisons on the sidelines. Parklets popping up everywhere – in a city teeming with Byzantine permit procedures apparently out to stifle business efforts – was a source of cheer, and eventually a night on the town.

But that doesn’t mean the vote was without debate.

Why the ongoing debate about parklets is fueling

The final decision to make parklets permanent was delayed for many months. The Shared Spaces program launched in spring 2020 as a temporary measure; Mayor London Breed suggested making it permanent in early 2021; but in June it turned into a contentious debate with the board of directors, who held multiple hearings, accommodated hundreds of callers, and added many amendments, putting the vote beyond reopening SF and California completely.

As much as restaurants and bars need this assistance and parklets are so popular with guests, the main concerns were accessibility for seniors and people with disabilities. “The city is great at finding solutions without asking all stakeholders like seniors and people with disabilities what would be best for us all,” says Pi Ra, director of transit justice at Senior and Disability Action, who also identifies as disabled senior. “The original legislation should fail without paying much attention to accessibility or traffic problems.”

There were also structural issues that could have hampered guests and passers-by, and changes examined the details of how many parklets invaded the sidewalk and whether they were really accessible. “Not only does eating outside make me more fun, it also makes me feel safer than someone at high risk of dying from COVID,” said Aubrie Lee, a Bay Area resident with muscular dystrophy and one Electric wheelchair used. Lee points out that if parklets are not fully accessible, they will limit people. “Superstructures that block the sidewalk or otherwise require me to turn around and roll onto the street are at high risk of death. Other setups, like parklets that were built at the height of the sidewalk, are so much more accessible. “

It probably didn’t help that restaurants were being built in a rush. “Thirty-one years after the Americans with Disabilities Act came into effect, there is no reason any structure should have these problems, which may have been made worse because things happened so quickly,” notes Autumn Elliott, a disability rights attorney in California. But after all, the city made a commitment to get it right. To bring ADA rules in line, the final Shared Spaces Act now requires at least eight feet of free sidewalk space greater than three feet wide, with smaller walkways requiring six feet of access. Companies that do not have enough sidewalk space can apply for a parking lane or a street space.

By July the debate had boiled down to two remaining issues. First, which department should manage parklets: Before the final vote, city guides had to decide whether to go to San Francisco Planning, the notoriously sluggish agency that manages parklets, or San Francisco Public Works, the contested and involved agency that distributes sidewalks and groceries, Should appoint truck permits to administer the program. The overseers voted 7-4 for the lesser of two evils, the planning department.

The second question, whether restaurants and bars should block their parklets outside of opening hours, provoked further concerns – especially with regard to the privatization of public space. While Supervisor Hillary Ronen noted that the city is “giving up an enormous amount of public space” to help businesses, she told the San Francisco Chronicle, “I believe the public should have as much access to it as possible.” Supervisor Aaron Peskin spoke about it repeatedly Privatization of public space. Comparing parklets to beaches, he argued that citizens should be allowed to sit in a parklet and have a coffee at any time.

However, restaurant and bar owners shouted that they spent tens of thousands of dollars on parklets, while the lockdown caused them to amass hundreds of thousands of debts and to deal with less than decent conditions in their parklets at dawn. “I had to get rid of massive, really impressive amounts of diarrhea,” says Bleiman. In the case of a compromise, the supervisory authorities voted 6 to 5 in favor of companies being able to lock their common rooms between midnight and 7 a.m. the right to secure a parklet at night.

How parklets change San Francisco forever

Whatever problems these Shared Spaces face over the next few years – including concerns about further privatization of public space or stagnation in traffic, the latter of which could easily be addressed if San Francisco actually makes public transport a top priority – the existence of Parklets on streets are a welcome change from the vacancy signs that obscure most of the city that knows how.

Parklets have also added architectural flair to the urban landscape, with shared spaces available in a variety of designs and vibes. Mister Jius’ neon green U-shaped outdoor seating, which was arguably the most exciting parklet in town, although not currently in use, goes well with the Kodachrome colors of Waverly Alley. South Beach’s 21st Amendment features a mid-century modern vibe over a sloping roof to let rain and mayflies slide off its steep silhouette. And you’ll find rooms adorned with chandeliers, like the one at Rooh in South Beach, or with a tiered structure that accompanies the famous San Francisco hills, like the one outside Devil’s Acre in North Beach or Woods Cervecería opposite the Mission Dolores Park.

Given the city’s propensity for cold weather, many guests will prefer to sit inside – as opposed to an inch off the 38 Geary bus during an atmospheric river event. In view of the construction costs and the shortage of labor, parklets are not worthwhile for all restaurants. And many parklets, while built under strict structural safety guidelines, are thin compared to the constant requirements and may not be built to last. Still, some restaurant and bar owners believe parklets will stay with them through this recent surge in COVID cases and even into winter. “I don’t see any major problems,” says Bleiman. “Some [parklets] are exposed to the elements as they have no roofs and are therefore closed when it rains. And others don’t want to pay for heat lamps to make it too cold for them. All surmountable problems. ”

Mayor Breed signed the Shared Spaces legislation on July 28, making it official. Despite the famous soupy weather and steep hills of San Francisco, parklets are here to stay. The city is finally cultivating the outdoor dining scene it deserves, even if it looks a little different than expected and emerged from the ashes of a crisis.

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in the case of the Colorado Rockies, if they were at the Olympics, they would have had a shorter night.

Olympic baseball, which began Wednesday, has some notable differences from major league baseball

The big guy is the rule of escape that would have saved the Rockies a few innings. The game ends if the team loses at least 10 runs after 7 innings. It shortened the 12-2 win over Philadelphia in Colorado on April 25 and the 12-0 win over San Francisco the next day, May 13, defeating Cincinnati 13-8.

The Olympic Course Rules were introduced by the World Baseball Softball Confederation in all games except the round medal game. A final out also occurred if the team advanced 15 runs after 5 innings.

Olympic baseball is a return to the preanalytical era. Since MLB Statcast is not installed, there are no problems with the spin rate, the exit speed or the starting angle.

“Basically we had nothing,” said American third baseman Todd Frazier after the Americas qualifier. “There was no video. There was no analysis process. This is your bat. Bring your own. “

Here are 10 nuggets to compare and contrast with.

10. The balls are different. The ball is not a Major League Rawlings breed, but a WBSC version with slightly different stitching. On the other hand, the WBSC ran out of baseball at the Americas qualifier in Florida and the organizers switched to minor league balls in the middle of the tournament.

9. Faster in kilometers. The only metric is really a metric: field speeds are listed in Yokohama. Both miles / hour and kilometers / hour stadium scoreboards. To those wondering, the average speed of 99.2 mph led by Jacob DeGrom’s Major League Baseball sounds like it doesn’t get any further at 159.6 km / h.

8. Who is here and who is not. Of course, DeGrom didn’t take part in the Olympics. The Olympics are limited to 40 players who are not on the Major League Baseball roster. Nevertheless, technically qualified players are often blocked by clubs. St. Louis three-time left-handed Matthew Liberatore was scheduled for qualifying for the United States, but the Cardinals refused to send him to Japan. The list has a vintage feel to it. The US team includes Edwin Jackson and David Robertson. The Dominican strike order in the opening round on Wednesday included Jose Bautista, Juan Francisco and Emilio Bonifacio. However, Japan canceled the tournament’s Central League and Pacific League seasons and welcomed Masahiro Tanaka as a pitching staff member. Oh: And the roster is 24 instead of 26.

7. More exiting runners. Even more extreme is the basic rule of placing a runner on second base at the start of each subsequent innings. Runners are placed first and second. MLB and the Major League Baseball Players Association hired second base runners in an extra inning last year to get people out of the ballpark faster, but Rob Manfred will be dropped after this season. He said it was likely.

6. Check tick. Similar to Triple-A and Double-A in 2018, a 20-second pitch clock is used as the basis without a runner.

5. Look at the touch. There are also high five restrictions. There is no celebration from the coach while the base is being rolled. “When a batter hits a home run, members of his team are not allowed to touch the batter until he passes home plate,” they say.

4. Access and information. Probably a pitcher? Perhaps. What do you think of the coach before the game? According to WBSC spokesman Richard Baker, he won’t be able to hit the media on game day until the end of the game. Thoughts of game stars? The clubhouse is closed and players have to walk past the media on their way out of the stadium, but not the reporters.

3. Keep things moving. Manager and Coach Hill Trip? There are 3 additional trips in any game without a switch and every 3 additional innings instead of 1 per inning per pitcher with no pitching changes. Managers and trainers with batteries and base runners also have a limit of three stops.

2. There is no home plate collision. It is forbidden to put the barrel in the catcher and try to remove the ball.

1. Notice to HOUSTON ASTROS ALUMNI: “The use of electronic devices during the games is prohibited. Electronic devices such as cell phones, laptops, tablets, camcorders, transceivers, field staff, shelters, bullpen, etc. Do not use to communicate with clubhouse or booth staff. The only exception to this rule is the use of phones / cell phones for communication between the shelter and the bullpen, but such devices are already in place. Must be approved by the WBSC. “

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Other AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/olympic-games and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports

Explainer: Olympic baseball dates back to the preanalytical era San Francisco Japan Richard Baker Colorado Rockies Colorado

Source link explainer: Olympic baseball goes back to the preanalytical era San Francisco Japan Richard Baker Colorado Rockies Colorado

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