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The City and County of San Francisco chose to create a special committee to review the Presidio Trust Implementation Plan (PTIP).
The committee consists mostly of neighborhood groups and the Sierra Club. Neighborhoods groups mostly surrounding the Presidio whom have been given the shaft by the Presidio Trust on most issues linked to the neighborhoods, the constituents and their rights. I have stated many times the PTIP was created to circumvent the 1994 General Management Plan (GMP) and the Environmental Impact Study (EIS). Both these documents have been shelved by the Presidio Trust. Both documents had wide Bay Area input. The neighborhood groups got Supervisor Leland Yee to support them. The Board of Supervisors agreed to create a special committee and supported the Presidio Group with secretarial help and even qualified legal advice. It was nice to see City Department Heads show up at the meetings and reveal next to nothing about the Presidio. After all one City Department does not know nor care to know what the other City Department is doing. Foremost in line and noted for its corruption the City Planning Department. The Presidio is federal property and has been ever since the State of California handed it over to the United States. Prior to that Mexico had to give it up to the gringos for some little gold. And before that they just stole it from the Native Americans. It is always strange how some folks garner laws and regulations and attach it to stolen property. Today, most everyone prides and makes a buck in California - but the First People of the State that is California are kept on the sidelines. What is even more shocking is that over sixty percent of California Tribes are not Federally Recognized. But that means nothing to the Trust or to those who live on stolen property. The Presidio is a little over 1480 acres. Most of the property some eighty percent is controlled by the Presidio Trust. The National Park Service (NPS) controls the rest mostly along the shoreline. The Trust really does not look at the Presidio as a Park. It looks at it as more of a commercial estate and looks forward to cater to the rich and filthy. The likes of Shorentine, George Lucas, and other greedy entities who kept the company of ENRON. More progress would have been done had it not been for the economy and the exposure of so many crooks in the financial arena. The Trust has it fair share of crooks - among them James Meadows who screwed thing up and was rewarded by being given a $280,000 reward. Much white upper management - many inept and corrupt still walk the corridors of building 34 at the Presidio. Recently crooks who worked for the Port Authority in the Real Estate and the City Planning have made a cozy nest, get high paid salaries and a lot of coaching from corrupt Trust Board Members - like a Murphy. The final GMP and EIS have no place for any monster like the one George Lucas wants to build. No place for 1500 under ground parking spaces on a site that is seismically suspect. The project will add to the burden of the City and County of San Francisco and load the already saturated Raw Sewage Treatment Plant situated in the Bayview. The City will have to supply clean drinking water. It will have to take the entire storm water. Extra traffic will play havoc on City roads. It will bring vehicular pollution and destroy the Park in the long run. Digital Centers are toxic and consume energy. The special group created does not understand the operations of the Presidio. It has no idea about the current aging infrastructure. It is not fully aware of toxins laying in all the batteries all over the Presidio. Battery Caufield has radioactive agents and Battery Wagner the worst possible bacteria. It will cost the Trust over 200 million to clean just these two batteries. The longer they wait the more the cleanup cost! The Trust could have used the 100 million dollars the Army gave it to clean up the Presido. It prefers to live off the interest of this money. The Restoration Advisory Board consisting mostly of snobs saw fit to harass the Corps of Engineers when they were in charge of the clean up at the Presidio. But today these same vermin see no damage done when the Presidio Trust does no clean up. The City Supervisors cannot really understand the workings of the City and County of San Francisco. Their City Planning is in shambles. They have no Planning Commission. The San Francisco Airport has some White Cult ruling the Airport much as the slave owner did not long ago. In short the Board of Supervisors have their hands full and saw dust in their eyes. They can see the Presidio but cannot look at it for long. Some of us suggested that the City and the Presidio have many agreements with the Trust. The City should review the agreements. Right now the City accepts a paltry sum of $100,000 as sewage fees from the Presidio Trust annually. If the City charged a comparable constituency the sum would be much like $10,000,000. The same is with clean drinking water. The City supports the Trust on the Ocean Beach corridor, the Marina corridor, and many emergency areas. The U.S. Park Police write tickets but the adjudication is done in City Courts. The City might rake in some money but it still over burdens our judicial system. Time for the Presidio to have its own courts. May be the Rangers and the U.S. Park Police will write fewer tickets regarding leash laws because for the first time they will be on a leash! We offer the Trust free MUNI transportation. Maintain all the outfalls and the drain storms, all of which are maintained by the City. And as I have mentioned umpteen times the City prides that it takes all the excreta from the Presidio. This is a real shame! A stupid city attorney was bold to state to the special committee that the City is fully satisfied with the money it gets from the Presidio. In other words the stupid attorney and the City do not care if in future and right now our City's aging infrastructure, our Raw Sewage, our clean drinking facilities are burdened. Again and again the streets in the Bayview and especially along 3rd Street run with raw sewage. The smell from the over burdened Sewage Treatment Plant is spread for miles around. During the raining season, children and others have to wade through the raw sewage. Our City is more interested in the money and NOT concerned about the citizens. It is time the Board of Supervisors asks for a second opinion. Have the head of the City Attorney's office look into the factors that I have described. The Presidio should pay its fair share for all City services provided and the fair share should be made public. The public wants to know how much the Presidio pays for sewage? How much for clean drinking water? How much for the drain storm water which burdens the City's infrastructure? How much does the City spend on Public Transportation within the Presidio? For the adjudication processes linked to the U.S. Park Police? How much for Emergency Services? Investigate and find out if there is some connection between the Mayor and Don Fisher who is a Trust Board Member? Investigate and find if Hillary from the Trust Planning and Green from the City Planning - have a common denominator to undermine certain factors that adversely impact the City and from which the Presidio profits. Does the Lobos Creek Aquifer belong to the City and County of San Francisco? Why does the Trust tap indiscriminately without notification into this source? Are they stealing our resources? I know the Board of Supervisors has a lot of stupid issues before them. I attend the meetings of the Board of Supervisors and see how they talk the talk but do not walk the walk. Sometimes, they will spend hours debating an issue only to find out that they should have shut their mouth and not discussed it at all. The Presidio of San Francisco is a National Park. It belongs to all the people all over the United States and I suppose that also includes the Board of Supervisors. The Board of Supervisors will have a special meeting on August 22, 2002 at 2 p.m. I will appear before the Board of Supervisors and state to the Public at large - some of the points I have stated here. There was a time when the Army and the City had a special relationship. Again and again the old photographs depict the close relationship. The Presidio Trust and the National Park Service have profited from the City and continue to leach on to anything they can get for free. It is time that we set the ground rules once and for all. If the Trust Board Members deem fit to attend this special meeting- let them hear it from the Board of Supervisors - the Legislative Branch once and for all. Let them hear it from the constituents of the City and County of San Francisco. The Trust runs the Presidio and considers it Federal Jurisdiction - the City has its own jurisdiction - today there is no clear boundary and that has to be set in clear terms on every level. |
