Lily�s Diary

On the Lookout for Elder Abuse

by Lily

October 2
With frustration born of watching endless Katrina footage, Maggie and I finally signed up for the Neighborhood Emergency Response Training (NERT). In truth, I was also prodded by the embarrassment that comes whenever any speaker on the city's impending disasters inevitably says, "All the NERTs in the room, raise your hand." The free training consists of six three-hour sessions taught masterfully by members of the San Francisco Fire Department. If you think this is stuff you already know, you're mistaken. Did you realize that most of those injured in the Kobe earthquake could have been saved if there had been people who knew enough to tilt their heads back to open their windpipes? In the third session, we got to act out a real-life scenario. Maggie volunteered to play a person whose leg was trapped under a steel beam. While the rest of us were learning about levers and cribbing, she was moaning in a most distracting manner. (I think the dramatics were for the benefit of the hunky fireman who was instructing us.) You learn to evaluate your building for potential dangers, to master basic first-aid skills, and to prioritize after a disaster; and, just as important, you learn what you should not do. You can find out when the next series starts by going to www.sfgov.org/site/sfnert.

October 15
Elder abuse was the advertised topic of the police department's community meeting last week. I thought I'd pass it up as I'd been to meetings every night that week, but I was ultimately shamed into going by my neighbor, Bunny, who always laments the poor attendance at these monthly meetings. �The captain tries so hard,� she often says. Little did I think I'd come away with information of particular interest to us landlords of a �certain age.� Elder abuse is currently being interpreted not only as granny bashing but also as any crime in which old people are the targeted victims. Many such schemes are aimed at property owners who, because of rent control, are forced to search out the least expensive ways to maintain their rental properties. The biggest scam is cheap roof jobs and/or gutter replacements because the victim cannot actually go up on the roof and check the quality of the job; and, of course, when the rain actually comes, the roofer can indefinitely delay any remedy for shoddy or incomplete work. Other schemes, even more despicable, involve a person who rings your doorbell, claiming he is doing a job estimate for your next-door neighbor and needs access to your backyard. Eager to help your neighbor, you go to unlock the service door and escort him into the backyard. In the meantime his hidden partner is entering your house with a garbage bag. Yes, there are these kinds of people operating in our city.

October 19
Window covering is always a problem in an empty apartment. I used to install low-end mini-blinds from Home Depot but since I never see mini-blinds in display rooms anymore, I'm assuming that they're no longer on any tenant's wish list. When apartment #2 was ready to show, I thought I'd put in old-fashioned window shades. I'd remembered an SFAA meeting a few years ago when a speaker on �Marketing Vacancies for Greatest Returns� had advised their use, describing them as neutral and functional, for they allow the tenant to add the kind of off-the-shelf drapery sold at Pottery Barn (I noted a whiff of condescension there). I began a search for window shades. To make a very long story short, I started perusing the basic version at J.C. Penney's and ended up at a wonderful window-shade studio called Maxwell Window Shades out on Judah Street. The man who waited on me was tall, handsome and soft spoken. There was an implicit understanding that a woman like me would want the best. There were so many delicious choices of weight, finish and color that I felt as though I was visiting a Hong Kong tailor. Then he silently placed before me a thick book of fringes. He seemed to know what I myself did not—that I needed fringe on those shades. After that, I was asked to pick one of 20 scallop designs for the end to which the fringe would be glued. Before I knew it, I had signed away $600 and the odd thing was that I felt just wonderful about it. Hey, there's nothing wrong with a little "pride of ownership"once in a while. It makes me nostalgic for the days before rent control.

October 23
My punishment for being a gadfly is to be on several citywide email message boards. As a result, I am privy to the missives of many activists who feel they see the real evils in our city and are only too happy to point them out. Rarely, though, is there such uniform alarm as that over the development of what has come to be called �The Eastern Neighborhoods.� After years of saying that the so-called housing crisis is a supply-side problem, people seem totally surprised when the long-awaited housing arrives in the form of high-rise, market-rate condos in under-utilized areas of the city such as the waterfront, Potrero, Mission Bay, Third Street and even Visitation Valley. Like, where did they think this housing was actually going to be built? Some object to the high density, lack of parking and open space; while others say that the 12% of units set aside as �affordable� is not enough. Others, like the Coalition for San Francisco Neighborhoods, object to the shortcuts in public process, the intentional skirting of Planning Department scrutiny and the lack of neighborhood input. Some are just miffed because someone's going to turn a profit. (The Bay Guardian wants to put a five-year moratorium on the building of all market-rate housing.) As for myself, despite the seductiveness of the "new urbanism," I admit a strong prejudice against buildings over 40 feet in our beautiful city.

October 28
My hairdresser, Max, owns a four-unit building in the Richmond with a tenant (Mary Jane) who has asked for a concession in his no-pets lease to bring in what she refers to as a "comfort" dog. Max grants that he's always considered her to be two cards short of a deck, but the thought that a dog might solve her problem never occurred to him. He called the San Francisco Rent Board for advice and was told that if the tenant had a letter from her doctor (she did, sort of), it fell under the Americans with Disabilities Act and would have to be permitted. Max now feels he needs to write a letter to his other tenants that explains the exception to the no-pets rule, but he is having difficulty phrasing it without insulting his comfort-challenged tenant. While the dye was soaking into my roots, I took a swipe at it. "Dear Harold: I want you to know that although we have a no-pets policy (which we fully discussed when you begged me last year to let you take in your dead sister's Shih Tzu), Mary Jane in apartment #4 finds herself with an emotional need for a Labrador retriever. Yes, I know you had an emotional need to keep the Shih Tzu, but Mary Jane has a letter from her doctor and you did not." No, no. It needs something much simpler: "Dear Harold: You will soon be seeing a Labrador retriever in the hall. Don't think of it as a pet, but rather as medicine for our neighbor Mary Jane in Apartment #4." Oh, hell, it's not my problem.

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the viewpoint of the SFAA or the San Francisco Apartment Magazine. �Lily's Diary� is written by a longtime rental-property owner who reserves the right to remain anonymous on the grounds that her tenants might gang up on her. Comments, corrections or ideas are welcome at lilysdiary@aol.com. Copyright © 2005 by the San Francisco Apartment Magazine. All rights reserved.