Good use for Milk plaza money
I believe that the group that wants to tart up the Castro Muni station should take its $10 million, give it to the AIDS museum, have it named after Harvey Milk, and consider their job done ["AIDS Museum in visionary stage," May 31].
Jerry Lang
San Francisco
Disagrees with neighborhood preference
At a recent Openhouse panel discussion, I was the person who asked: "What is the thinking behind the neighborhood preference?"
I don't think I got a satisfactory answer.
The neighborhood preference is the third criteria for eligibility for winning the lotteries for senior affordable housing at 55 Laguna and 95 Laguna: (3) Households that submit acceptable documentation that at least one member lives in supervisorial District 8 or within a half-mile of the project will be given the third highest preference in the lottery ranking process under the Neighborhood Resident Housing Preference (NRHP). The NRHP applies to up to 40 percent of the units in this project (16 units).
Former Openhouse board member Marcy Adelman, and Openhouse Executive Director Karyn Skultety, attempted to answer my question. My understanding of their response is that they (Openhouse and Mercy Housing) felt it was important to give priority to residents of and near the Castro. Still not sure why.
My thinking is that although the Castro remains a center for the LGBT community in San Francisco, many in the LGBT community have either never been able to afford to live there or have more recently been forced to move from the Castro.
That shouldn't make them less eligible to land a new home at 55 Laguna or 95 Laguna.
And to set aside 16 units out of a total of 39 units at 55 Laguna for those who live in the neighborhood effectively says to the rest of us: others need not apply here.
Mike Zonta
San Francisco
Helping in red areas of CA
This is the letter to the editor I did not write before June's primary election to invite a discussion if, in the Trump era, local politics may be a luxury we cannot afford.
I think I'll live if my candidate Mark Leno wins or London Breed is mayor, same if my District 8 candidate Rafael Mandelman won or the incumbent; but literally might not survive two more years of a Republican congressional majority.
So now with Leno's lead sadly reversing, but Mandelman having won, while I gave each support and/or money, I traveled some Saturdays from San Francisco to Modesto to knock on voters' doors, and recruited others to do the same and/or make phone calls from San Francisco to there.
We will still live in San Francisco. But the progressive voter turnout and results in California Congressional District 10 in Modesto - to create the conditions to defeat Republican conservative Congressman Jeff Denham in a district Hillary Clinton won in the last presidential election - are affirming.
From now to November, consider joining us at http://www.resistry.net/ or email me at [email protected] to make these trips or calls and have the conversations yourself. It's the activist help outside the city that I've wanted San Francisco progressives to do since moving here 30 years ago, in addition to fighting for overall reasonable folks locally.
Charlie Spiegel
San Francisco