The Sheridan Report
by Matthew C. Sheridan
“It is out there. It can’t be bargained with. It can’t be reasoned with. It doesn’t feel pity, or remorse or fear. And it absolutely will not stop—ever—until you are dead.”
In James Cameron’s apocalyptic film The Terminator, a cybernetic assassin travels back in time in an attempt to alter history by assassinating the mother of the yet-to-be-born leader of the resistance against the machines that have taken over the planet.
This fall, voters in San Francisco will have the chance to defeat the man who has his political machine ready to exterminate the group of San Franciscans most needed for the city’s survival: the middle class. Having extracted—just from a single developer—a $34 million slush fund (the so-called “nonprofit community fund”) along with $68 million for affordable housing (half for his district alone), the man who rose to power attacking “the Brown machine,” now has his own machine. His army: a slew of nonprofit staffers, affordable housing developers, the bourgeois left and some of his fellow supervisors.
Even his supervisor cohorts sit idly by as the callous machine barrages citizens, city officials and even cops with his rabid narrow mindedness. They don’t just tolerate the verbal assaults; the supervisors coalesce around many of his fanatical ideas.
Of the 11 ballot measures to be voted on by the voters this November, seven were submitted by the machine running roughshod over our political system. The proposals are just more of the same—increasing taxes, calling for the impeachment of President George W. Bush and jacking up fees for owners seeking to fix up their rental units or who employ the Ellis Act. Three out of four ballot measures in the last election cycle were his as well.
Of course, just like a bully on the playground, anyone who dares to disagree with him is promptly labeled a Republican, speculator or, most recently, a war profiteer.
In the movie, the machines took over and decimated the planet: “They say it got smart, a new order of intelligence. Then it saw all people as a threat, not just the ones on the other side. Decided our fate in a microsecond: extermination.”
In San Francisco, the machine took over and is decimating the city. In just a few years—at the rate we are going—San Francisco parks will be barren sand dunes, void of non-native grasses, people and dogs. The only means of transportation will be bicycles or the state-mandated MUNI (cars will be banned). The few children actually being raised in the city will face school segregation based on their mothers’ educational background. Cutting down a tree in your own backyard will be a criminal offense. The only legal form of owning property will be through bureaucratic city-run land trusts.
Toward the fiery end of the movie, the terminator machine is ultimately destroyed by another machine. But today, San Francisco’s ruthless machine faces a possible new threat; not another machine, but another form of technology.
Can Techies Fight the Machine?
It’s the little search engine that could. Launched in the late 1990s, as the dot-com was winding down, Google—based in Mountain View—has grown into an industry giant. Just like its stock price and market share, the number of employees has steadily risen to just under 8,000. And many of their best and brightest want to live—no surprise—in San Francisco. Last fall, Google launched a shuttle service to transport its employees from numerous locations around the Bay Area to and from its campus in Mountain View. Other companies have shuttle service for San Francisco residents, but usually from just a few spots downtown or from Caltrain stations in the South Bay. Google is different.
According to Google spokesperson Sunny Gettinger, the shuttle service picks up employees in many San Francisco neighborhoods, as well as in a few cities around the Bay Area. “We’ve made it so the shuttles are as efficient as possible with multiple stops in the same area,” asserts Gettinger. Google believes that anyone with the talents and skills should live the life they want to live; translation: the Mission, Marina and other trendy districts should prepare themselves for an onslaught of Googleites. The strategy of making it easy for employees to live in the city and have a stress-free 39-mile commute is a very Google idea. “We want them to succeed, and make it as easy as possible to get to work and to get home, and the shuttle was put into place to do that,” posits Gettinger. She says the shuttles are generally full and most of San Francisco is covered, with the exception of the Sunset and Richmond districts.
This shuttle system has translated into an even more competitive San Francisco rental market. “We’ve been renting to a lot of Google employees of late, with most of them using Google’s shuttle service to get to work,” comments David Luong, a leasing agent with Cournale & Co in San Francisco. “They’re allowed to bring their bikes and can even lug their dry cleaning on board and have it done at the office.”
The news of the influx of Googleites may remind many of the bygone dot-com era, a time that many here hope to forget. But, will the future look like the past? Will the people arriving here today become fodder for the machine, or will they rise up and destroy it?
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the viewpoint of SFAA or San Francisco Apartment Magazine. “The Sheridan Report” does not make any guarantee, warranty or representation as to the completeness or accuracy of the information contained herein. Matthew C. Sheridan is the editor of San Francisco Apartment Magazine and the East Bay’s Rental Housing magazine. For more information, please visit www.sheridanreport.com. Copyright © 2006 by San Francisco Apartment Magazine. All rights reserved.