Hire Locally Will Become the Law in San Francisco

[The Northerner]

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — This city is about to enact one of the nation’s toughest ordinances requiring its officials to hire locally, over the objections of neighboring counties that say it will hurt their residents.

Under the ordinance, city contractors and subcontractors working on city-financed construction projects worth $400,000 or more would be required to hire at least 20 percent of their workers from San Francisco. The requirement will increase by 5 percent each year until it reaches 50 percent in 2017.

Contractors will be forced to pay penalties if they do not meet the requirement.

The legislation, however, exempts two major city-financed projects in San Mateo County: improvements to San Francisco International Airport and San Francisco’s water system.

Mayor Gavin Newsom declined to veto the measure on Thursday, meaning it will take effect next year. Even if he had vetoed it, the Board of Supervisors had enough support to override it — they passed the measure 8 to 3 earlier this month.

In a letter to the supervisors, Mr. Newsom said the city should work with its neighbors.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/25/us/25workers.html

[Dappleganger]

1. I agree with this...

we had a situation not long ago with major city construction of a municipal building where the contractor got into trouble for hiring illegals. Hundreds of out-of-work local construction workers found out about it and went to picket downtown, which in turn caused some positive change. Especially in this type of economy with so many locals out of work, when it's your tax dollars being used the work should as much as possible be given priority to those in the city who are funding the project.

[CreekDog]

8. seems kind of unfair to those just outside San Francisco

i live just outside the city limits because i couldn't get a place in the city at a payment or rent i could afford.

SF itself is only 7x7 square miles and holds just about 12 percent of the Bay Area's population.

i would support the measure if it had a threshold for SF workers but also local workers that could transit, carpool or were within the 9 county or surrounding counties metro area.

[SoCalDem]

2. Hire local...shop local or perish...n/t

[-..__...]

3. Are they going to require and check for immigration status as well?

If not... fuck them and their hypocrisy.

They're just as guilty and complicate as any other employer that hires illegal aliens.

[bhikkhu]

5. I think where one lives and pays taxes is the issue

...the idea should be that if someone lives in the county and pays taxes in the county, those taxes should be spent within the county to benefit the taxpayers as much as possible. It is a common myth that people who's papers are not in order - lacking citizenship or with uncertain status - do not pay taxes. More often than not they pay taxes the same as their neighbors, but because of their status are often excluded from the services those taxes are meant to provide.

Not to sidetrack the discussion here, but hypocrisy, guilt, and complications abound on all sides of the "illegal alien" issue.

[Book Lover]

4. Just to fill in one quick point

That water system waters a hell of a lot more than just San Francisco county.

http://bawsca.org/docs/hetch_map.pdf

[CreekDog]

9. and they passed a measure in SF that says that city ratepayers would bear less of the costs

of that system than ratepayers outside (i'm in San Mateo County and we use SF water --well, the SF water system).

San Francisco is actually the largest landowner in San Mateo County since they have their watershed and airport in our county.

and that makes for an interesting relationship.

[Book Lover]

10. Coastsider here

They also have their golf course in my city, and their jail just over the hill.

And didn't you just love that proposed into-San Francisco toll that just got shot down, for now?

[CreekDog]

11. yeah, if they want to build a transit system to get me into SF that's one thing

but just to pass through or get there when the system we have is so limited from San Mateo County.

i could understand congestion management in the crowded parts of SF, but just to charge people coming into SF County when a lot of us live here because SF is too unaffordable --that's just cruel.

[Book Lover]

16. Well, for what it's worth, I don't live in SF because I prefer (gasp!) living on the coast

I know, I know, I'm a crazy minority. I go into the city for work and fun, but live there? No thank you. And to charge me $6 to cross an invisible line? That's ballsy. One of our many transit problems is, as I'm sure you know, the lack of interoperability between systems. Or like I also say, "BART and SamTrans, making sure you miss your connection by 3 minutes for over 40 years."

[CreekDog]

17. Ah, Samtrans...this will make you angry:

once i went to a Samtrans meeting about Bus Routes of all things.

i asked the rep there why the bus that goes down Grand Ave. in SSF and to Caltrain, turns off short of Caltrain several blocks before BUT ONLY DURING COMMUTE TIME. in other words, this bus used to go down Grand Ave. and take you to the Caltrain Station all day, except in the morning when you were going to it.

the rep said, they didn't go to Caltrain because ridership was too low to justify it.

i said, but IT GOES THERE ALL DAY WHEN THERE ARE FEWER RIDERS GOING TO CALTRAIN.

then he said something about federal transit funding only happened if ridership was at a certain level. i found this comment helpful --because it helped me understand that i was talking to the dumbest person on the face of the earth who happened to know a few transit related buzzwords yet obviously could not think his way out of a paper bag.

:grr:

i think the current bus route actually does go to Caltrain even during commute hours now, for what it's worth.

oh and as for timing and connections, for years, the El Camino Buses Samtrans ran would arrive at the Caltrain stations a few minutes after the train left, and Caltrains during midday run once an hour at times but the headways are rarely short.

[Recursion]

6. Won't this just lead to (even more) gentrification?

DC tried this, and everybody who wanted the contracts just snatched up lofts in Northeast.

[Liberal_in_LA]

7. cities and counties around LA would riot if such a law was enacted

I use to work with folks from 'bedroom communities' that would work in LA and talk trash about it (some of it racist). They'd shut up when I would ask why they worked in LA

[Zax2me]

12. As long as it is cost feasible....

Fiscally responsible, more power to them.

[xchrom]

13. recommend

[Le Taz Hot]

14. I don't know about "law."

That seems a little heavy-handed. But to PROMOTE the idea is something I think most municipalities could get behind. Fits in easily with the self-sufficiency/community/sustainability movement.

"Shop and Hire Locally"

[DemocratSinceBirth]

15. I Don't Mind A Residence Requirement After One Is Employed

But to require it prior to being unemployed strikes me as fundamentally unfair and cold hearted;especially in the worst economy in nearly eighty years...