The paperwork for a ballot initiative that seeks to establish an official “Thou Shall Not Covet” policy for the City of San Francisco has been submitted to the Department of Elections.

The proposed language for the deceleration, which specifically targets the movement of professional sports teams around the Bay:

“We the People of the City and County of San Francisco California will not invite, entice, encourage, cajole or condone the relocation of any professional sports team that has previously established itself in another municipality and has demonstrated clear and convincing support from community and fans for at least twenty years and is profitable. And we stand against any sports team ownership group that attempts to avoid payment of an outstanding public debt. Instead of looking for an opportunity to take from our neighbors we wish to fully support each other and the entire Bay Area.”

And as envisioned, a special election would be held to vote on the measure.

On a side note, construction on Chase Center, the Golden State Warriors’ future arena in San Francisco’s Mission Bay, is currently on track to be finished in time for the 2019-2020 NBA season.

93 thoughts on “Initiative to Establish a ‘Thou Shall Not Covet’ Policy for S.F.”
    1. At least the city isn’t forming a working committee…? FFS, we have to vote on *everything* here.

  1. I will vote for this, but only if they add an apology to New York for our theft of the Giants, to Philadelphia for pinching the Warriors, and to the village of Tamien for stealing their Ohlone lacrosse team a ways back. We are bad, bad people and need to fully apologize for it.

    1. But no apology to Oakland for taking the Warriors after 45 years of the kind of support they never received in their 9 years in SF/Daly City.

      1. You want to remove that language from the initiative? I’d be okay with that. After all, Oakland never apologized for “taking” the Warriors from SF.

        1. They played mostly in Daly City. Also, Oakland rescued the Warriors from a horrible venue and a disinterested San Francisco fan base. The Warriors are much more Oakland after 45 years playing in the city, then they ever were San Francisco.

          1. I just don’t understand why you want to remove the language that apologizes to Oakland for taking the Warriors. You’re blowing hot and cold here.

          2. “Who is going to apologize to Oakland?”
            Um, the people of SF in this initiative if it passes. You are making no sense at all.

          3. I was born in Daly City 41 years ago. All those years of having to drive or BART to Oakland for Warriors games!

            Forget empty apologies. We want reparations

        2. also, what oakland did or did not do is not relevant here since it is not the city establishing a “thou shall not covet” policy ironically right after taking the warriors from the city across the bay that has “demonstrated clear and convincing support from community and fans for at least twenty years and is profitable.” granted the warriors have fans from all over the bay and they’ll likely stick through the move, but sf is sending such a bizarre message with this…

  2. Why stop at sports teams? Stop trying to lure tech firms from around The Valley, too. And decent chefs / restauranteurs. And anyone that can parallel park.

  3. Good grief. How about “thou shall not be so damn stupid and obstinate, lose all common sense, and basically act like a 12 yr. old in an adult sized body?”

  4. This is the stupidest thing I’ve heard all day and a complete waste of time and money. OTOH if it keeps us free of the Santa Clara 49ers…..

  5. I’ll vote ‘no’ just because it’s being put in a special election. To waste the money that a special election will require just to try and pass an initiative that does almost nothing should be criminal in and of itself.

    1. Do you believe that the “they” who thought this up are the same “they” who own the Warriors?

      1. Where were these people when Lacob was coveting San Francisco while refusing to pay his debts in Oakland? Too late know to worry about stealing teams from another city when your city just stole the Warriors from Oakland. They should have made a big fuss before the dirty deed was finalized. Now it doesn’t matter.

        1. His debts to Oakland? He bought the team like 5 years ago.

          Your whole argument is a baseless. Warriors will be closer to Oakland than San Francisco is to the 49ers. Oh jeez Oakland natives will have to take a 20 minute BART ride to Chase Center. Someone please think of the children!

          1. The point is using Oakland for 45 years, never acknowledging the city in their name or jerseys, making money hand over fist in a renovated arena paid by Oakland tax payers, and then when it’s time to repay the loyalty of Oakland and the east bay by possibly investing in a new arena in Oakland, the Warriors toss Oakland aside and invest in SF. They USED Oakland for 45 years. You miss the point entirely. It’s not about being “20 minutes away.” It’s about using, exploiting, and disrespecting an entire city, as ownership enriched themselves at the expense of Oakland taxpayers.

          2. yeah, 45 years of operating a business in Oakland, bringing jobs and joy during some of the not so best of all years in the city by the creek; and yet, some long time Oaklanders are so upset they cheer for the Cleveland Cavaliers and denigrate the business owners again and again and again. Would make a great ad for the Oakland Chamber of Commerce and Regrets.

          3. E.Gonsalves: You’re saying that they used Oakland for 45 years, but yet you want them to stay? If those 45 years were that bad, shouldn’t you be saying “good riddance” at this point?

  6. What hypocrisy. They’ve already “taken from their neighbor.” What do you call taking the Warriors from Oakland even as Warrior ownership refuses to pay back the 60 million dollars in bond payments outstanding on the 1997 renovation of the Oakland arena. San Francisco is really something. How arrogant and clueless.

  7. A special election to vote on one measure? That seems very expensive. Didn’t the voters vote not long ago to space out elections to save money and avoid voter fatigue?

  8. OK so it’s a nice sentiment, but it is very much a bit late. Why not just craft a resolution more definitive of the following:

    “No professional sports team who has relocated to SF may sell tickets for a game performed within the city limits until any outstanding debt exceeding $1 million initiated by the team and for the benefit of the team in another jurisdiction has been satisfactorily retired.”

    Note the implied side effect either way – basically no way that the 49ers can ever come back to SF city limits as I’m sure they will be on the hook for decades for levi stadium.

  9. This is ironic. It is the people who have written this legislation that is exhibiting covetousness, based on my reading of scripture. The Warriors are free to move wherever they please, and “demanding” that a team stay so that the “richer” SF doesn’t run off with the “spoils” is actually the very definition of coveting. The lack of peace in the hearts of people who are “upset” by this move seems more like coveting, than it does righteous anger.

    A more appropriate invocation of scripture would be to characterize SF as a modern day Sodom, especially if one focuses on the teachings of the prophet Ezekial 16:49. The argument here would be that San Francisco is similar to Sodom, in that it is over-fed and unconcerned about the poor. All of those hipsters drinking 5 dollar lattes while writing legislation like this would be the main offenders here. They are concerned about the poor so long as they don’t have to make serious sacrifices (social, physical, emotional, financial) to support them.

    One can also make the argument that SF is greedy, which i believe it is, but it’s not greedy because of this stadium. It’s greed plays out in different ways.

    If anything, I would argue that the Warriors are being “greedy” by trying to maximize profits. So, greed may be the best lense to look at this situation, not covetousness. The ironic thing is that their desire to maximize profits is what has built the warriors into an amazing team that millions around the world get to enjoy. So, I don’t have a problem with the “maximize profit” model, so long as their is a reasonable measure of corporate social responsibility, which the Warriors have.

    If this legislation came out, I would vote against it.

    1. What social and corporate responsibility have the Warriors exhibited by abandoning Oakland after 45 years of loyal support along with getting a beautiful new taxpayers funded renovated arena in 1997?

      What exactly have the Warriors done to help Oakland socially and economically? And I’m not talking about the shallows transparent photo ops visiting poor minority kids at their poor East Oakland schools. The Warriors are huge disloyal greedy phonies who care nothing for a city they have exploited for 45 years.

      Unfortunately, the Mayor and Oakland City Council have been cowed by the Warriors measly nickle & dime contributions. A renovated basketball court here, a small contribution to a kids shelter there, a free box at Warriors game, and all of a sudden Libby Schaaf has no criticism to the local or national media regarding the Warriors move from Oakland to SF and no interest whatsoever in publicly complaining to the NBA about the relocation to SF, or even the willingness to ask for an expansion NBA team for Oakland.

      The Warriors, the NBA, and the City of San Francisco should be sued for economic harm caused Oakland by this irresponsible and needless relocation.

      1. This is high comedy. But I’ll play along. Who would be the plaintiffs in the lawsuit? What would be the legal claim?

          1. Why not sue the Warriors? They are the ones moving. But you want to sue the people who have the deepest pocket, not the ones who are responsible for the alleged harm. You must be a democrat.

          2. I would sue the Warriors, the NBA and the City of San Francisco for conspiring to damage Oakland economically and also harming Oakland taxpayers by refusing to pay 60 million in Arena renovation bonds.

      2. Well, for starters, all NBA teams have to adopt some form of “social responsibility“.

        I believe the real debate centers on how much are the Warriors responsible for? Should they pay everyone’s college education? Should they make every Oakland resident wealthy? I think the obvious answer is no. Okay. So, how much should they give? I don’t know the answer to this.

        The tech company I work for gives pretty generously, and yet, there are under performing school kids, hungry families, violent crime, and many other difficulties in communities less than 1 mile away. What is our responsibility? What is our “fair” share? I don’t know.

        Should we as a company be allowed to leave if that will benefit our stakeholders more, or should we be forced to remain here forever, beyond our will? I believe we should have the freedom to move. In all honesty, I think mobility (people, careers, and jobs) is the key to prosperity.

        Because of my perception based on the company that I work for, I tend to have a similar attitude towards the warriors in Oakland. I didn’t see sports franchises as being different from other corporate entities.

        Thanks for sharing your insights.

        1. What the Warriors should have done was build their private arena in Oakland not relocate to San Francisco.

          Oakland supported this team for over for decades. The Warriors have been incredibly successful in Oakland. Lacob has enriched himself tremendously via Oakland’s publicly owned arena.

          Oakland was not a failed host city with a horrible venue. Oakland did everything sports francises ask of host cities. Oakland is the best host city in the NBA. How do the Warriors and the NBA justify doing this to their most successful and passionate host city? If Oakland can lose its NBA franchise then no sports host city in America is safe from the same fate regardless of how well they support their pro franchises.

          This is wrong on so many levels. The City of Oakland and the Mayor are also co opted cowards for going along with this travesty. This comes down to city leaders having no pride in their city and just handing the team over to SF for a few trinkets from the Warrior billionaire ownership.

          1. Yeah, another poke in the eye to Oakland and the East Bay. No doubt that’s what Lacob is plotting.

          2. its certain. i have it from a good source that he will change to SF Warriors one year after moving

          3. You are uninformed and seemingly ignorant. Who are you to tell a private company where they ‘should’ relocate? Your assumption relies on the premise that GSW fans are all from Oakland they aren’t. Also, do your homework: the team has definitively said they will not change the name.

          4. My assumption is that Golden State fans come from all over the Bay Area and the City of Oakland has hosted and subsidized the team with an arena for the last 45 years. Do all San Francisco Giant fans come from San Francisco? Let’s relocate the Giants to Walnut Creek and call them “Golden State.”

      3. You do realize the Warriors are a private enterprise and for you to suggest they should be sued is just showing everyone your lack of maturity and intelligence .

        1. A private interprise which was subsidized with a renovated arena back in 1997. A subsidy which Oakland and Alameda County are still on the hook to pay after the Warriors abandon their loyal host city of 45 years. The NBA and the City of San Francisco should forbid the Warriors from playing in SF until their 60 million debt to Oakland taxpayers is paid off.

          1. Oakland and Alameda taxpayers have no one but themselves and their own governments to blame for making a bad deal with the Warriors and an even worse deal with the Raiders. SF voters stood up to the Giants and 9ers and their own politicians and many times rejected similarly one-sided deals. At least Oaklanders seem to have learned from their expensive lesson. You get the gov’t you deserve and the sports teams you can afford.

          2. from the financials it looks like about a breakeven for SF taxpayers, as they pay a few million per year in extra transportation/police/etc costs and get that back in the ~$2.5/attendee entertainment tax. The Giants got a $2/person discount on that fee, which saves them $6+ million/year every year; and the Giants got a sweetheart lease on the land, whereas the Warriors LLC paid much more for their second choice location in SF than they would have for anywhere available in Oakland. But almost surely a very wise investment. The increase in the value of the franchise due to moving to SF will be more than the cost of the land.

            Most of the “costs” to SFers are the externals, primarily worse traffic in the PM rushing hours pre-game/event workdays. Another burden of our cup overflowing…

          3. Those “external” costs can be huge. Additional gridlock, pollution, loss of revenue for other SF businesses due to gridlock and disposable income spent inside Chase Center instead of at small neighborhood businesses. Also, the further gridlock and congestion in SF and on the Bay Bridge will make SF less desirable for business retention and expansion. The flood of business and residential relocation to less congested and more accessible Oakland will accelerate due to Warrior greed.

          4. Doesn’t cost SF taxpayers anything for someone to buy a beer at a Giants game instead of at one of the nearby bars. Same for their food, clothing, trinkets, etc. And same for when the Warriors are back in SF.

            Besides, something like half of the attendees at the new SF Warriors’ arena will be folks that arrive from the east bay, peninsula, and marinland that would not have come to SF otherwise on that day. Moving their disposable spending to MB is a net gain for SF and net loss for Oakland.

            The extra Bay Bridge traffic shouldn’t be very great (less than 1000 cars over the couple hours before a game/event) and is reverse commute. The major congestion effects will be within a few blocks to a half mile of the venue for a couple hours before and after an event, just like for the Giants. The new SF Warrior’s arena replaces additional planned office space. That means, relative to the expected/planned use of the parcel, the arena will reduce the AM commute congestion, while increasing the PM commute congestion. No one knew traffic patterns could be so complex.

            I’ve written plenty about these congestion issues on SS. They are due to the enormous growth in wealth creation in SF, particularly over the past ~20 years. That’s why so many companies and people have been moving to SF. So many that it eventually spilled over to much less desirable locales, even Oakland.

            Oakland suffers quite a bit from the externalized congestion/pollution costs of SF’s boom. Rushing hours traffic on 580 and 880 in Oakland are much worse than they used to be. The big difference is that most of the extra congestion in SF is from people with SF as their destination and where they pay various employment and sales taxes, while most of the extra congestion in Oakland is from people driving through it to get to more desirable locations, including SF and SV.

            BTW, MB used to be the big railroad marshaling yard for the then dominate port in the bay area: the Port of San Francisco. Since that nasty polluting work moved to the freight yard between 880 and Maritime St in Oakland, MB became available for the Warriors and a new children’s hospital, and thousands of housing units, millions of sqft of new office space, parkland; and yes increased congestion. The best loss SF ever had was losing port business to Oakland.

          5. Very convenient of you not to mention that the 880 AM commute bottleneck north bound on 880 flows smoothly after Downtown Oakland. There are 220,000 jobs in Oakland so those freeways are used by a couple hundred thousand people to get to DTO, Port of Oakland, Oakland International, and to the many manufacturing and warehouse jobs up and down the 880 corridor. There is still so much abandon “prime” real estate where the Port of San Francisco used to be. Clearly the Port was a huge loss for SF and a tremendous benefit to Oakland.

          6. Oakland slightly net exports workers (~211k residents with a job, ~208k jobs in Oakland), according to the US Census ACS 2015. Of the ~208k people that work in Oakland, ~160k get to work via car/truck/bus/taxi/motorcyle (also US Census ACS 2015). Therefore you are very wrong about the number of people that use roadways of any kind (not just 880) to get to work in Oakland.

            FTR, far more people use the freeways in Oakland to commute from outside of Oakland through Oakland to get to job on the other side of Oakland, than use those freeways to get to a job in Oakland. Not even close.

            Yes, losing most of the port business was a big loss for SF back in the old days, with the emphasis on the “was” and on the “old days”, as in the past, many decades ago, but it opened up a huge area that has become more valuable than any land in Oakland, and where far more housing and office space has been built than in all of Oakland over the past 20 years. Truly a huge undeniable win in our generation. Meanwhile, we all know how Oakland has struggled to replace their declining industrial and PDR businesses. Nevertheless, as one SFer to an Oaklander, my deepest thanks to your city for hosting the port. A dirty and all too often thankless business, but at least it went to someplace with less valuable real estate. Shame though that your forebears destroyed a magnificent wetlands to create an unnatural port.

          7. The idea that Oakland’s freeeays are meant as a way to get through Oakland and go to SF is wrong.

            Those Oakland freeways are a huge benefit to Oaklanders and to other Bay Area residents as they make their way to so many wonderful Oakland destinations such as the awesome and expanding Oakland Zoo, the gorgeous Mormon Temple, the expansive and amazing Oakland regionsl and city park systems such as Sibley, Huckleberry, Redwood, Chabot, Roberts, Joaquin Miller, knowland, the wonderful Chabot Space and Science Center, the bucolic Chabot Golf Course, the charming alpine-like Montclair Village for dinning, etc. All these great attractions are accessible via highways 13, 24, & 580.

            The fantastic Oakland Museum, the charming Children’s Fairyland, gorgeous Lake Merritt, the world class Christ the Light Cathedral, the opulent Paramount, Fox, and Grand Lake theaters, the entertainment, shopping and dinning districts of Jack London Square, Uptown District, Fruitvale, Chinatown, Temescal, Lakeshore/Grand, Piedmont Avenue, Rockridge, etc., are all accessible via highways 24, 580, 880.

            The beauty of Oakland, unlike San Francisco, is that you can be kayaking at the Oakland Estuary or Lake Merritt in the Downtown Oakland area, and in 10 minutes, be in a Redwood forest similar to Muir Woods due to Oakland’s fantastic freeway system.

            You can also hike in gorgeous Redwood Park and 10 minutes later be shopping on Oakland’s charming Piedmont or College Avenues. After horse back riding, mountain biking, or hiking in Oakland’s extensive parklands, one could be having pizza at Zachary’s also on College, or enjoying a fabulous Chocolate Sundae at Fenton’s on Piedmont Avenue. After enjoying Fenton’s, the amazingly scenic and historic Mountain View Cemetery at the top of Piedmont Avenue awaits exploration.

            Oakland’s world class freeway system surpasses anything in San Francisco where residents crawl along congested city streets or take unreliable and dangerous public transportation just to get across town.

          8. The majority use of the freeways in Oakland are by vehicles that enter Oakland on a freeway and exit Oakland on a freeway without ever leaving the freeway network to reach a non-freeway street in Oakland. That is just a simple fact. If you want to claim some “meaning” out of this indisputable fact, then go ahead, but don’t kid yourself that most of the traffic on the freeways in Oakland ever reach a surface street in Oakland. Just passing through, Elmano. Just like most of the freight that passes through the Port of Oakland.

            BTW, the same is true for the freeways in El Cerito, Berkeley, Albany, Emeryville, Richmond, San Leandro, Castro Valley, South San Francisco, Millbrae, …., and most cities in the Bay Area, but not San Francisco.

            And Oakland does not “have a freeway system” — those are all federal or state roads and part of national and state freeway systems. And yes, I agree that it is easier to get around Oakland by car than SF, one of the benefits of the enduring unpopularity of Oakland.

          9. No city in the Bay Area has better inter city freeway access than Oakland. I call it “Oakland’s freeway system” because the fantastic highway 24, 13, 580, 880, & 980 freeway system is located within Oakland city limits. Oakland may have the best freeway system in the United States.

          10. 80% of trips through oaklands freeways dont start or end in oakland. they are people getting in and out of SF

          11. Elmano, you probably meant intra city, as “inter city” means between cities, which would reinforce the fact that most of the freeway traffic in Oakland has other cities as both their origin and destination. Either way, sure, Oakland does serve as quite the freeway interchange for the inner east bay, not unlike Newark for NJ near NYC.

            Without 580 and 24 it would take so much time to commute to SF from the Tri-Valley and Walnut Creek areas that many of those residents would have to move to Oakland instead of just driving through it, and some SF based companies would have to relocate to the east bay. Again, an SFer thanks Oakland for chopping up their neighborhoods with freeways so that so many people could live and work in more desirable places than the city (and freeway interchange) by the creek.

            FTR, I980 and S13 may be “located within the Oakland city limits”, but I580, I880, and S24 are not. They are located in the State of California and pass through many cities. And I80 crosses the continent. Regardless, none of these are owned or operated by the City of Oakland and it is simply incorrect to call them “Oakland’s freeway system”, but then correctness doesn’t seem to rank high in your fables.

          12. Jake, yes, Oakland, unlike San Francisco, has a great “intra” city freeway system. Oakland’s freeway system is also used by residents to get to the ever growing international flight options out of Oakland International Airport. San Francisco’s thoroufare freeways system designed for East Bay people who drive through San Francisco and to the Milbrae Airport and also for commuters driving through San Francisco heading for the Silicon Valley and to pacific coast beach towns. San Francisco’s inadequate freeway system heavily weighed and sitting lopsided on one side of the city is designed for the benefit of commuters heading to and from the East Bay and to and from SFO and the Silicon Valley. SF residents have to make do with freeway like congested blvds with a zillion traffic signals.

          13. Oakland’s superior freeway system also free up Oakland’s main blvds such as Broadway, Telegraph, MacArthur, from the congestion seen on San Francisco city streets. The one hour wait to go four blocks in downtown San Francisco in order to get on the Bay Bridge to get to Oakland is appalling.

            Freeways are not inherently bad. The problem is that California does not maintain its big city freeway systems. California allows ugly weeds, litter, graffiti, etc. to dominate its freeways in LA, Oakland, San Jose and San Francisco. Maintaining and beautifying Oakland’s extensive freeway system is what’s needed to maximize this asset.

          14. Those freeways indelibly reduced Oakland’s desirability compared to many other cities in the Bay Area. When 24 and 580 were made into effective modern freeways in the 1960s, Oakland declined while Walnut Creek/Concord and Tri-Valley areas boomed.

            I guess it is somewhat commendable to try to make the best of a bad thing, but seriously, those freeways butchered Oakland and mostly to the benefit of other parts of the east bay and SF and San Mateo Counties.

            Oakland/Berkeley used to have a half-way decent light rail system. Bring back the Oakland Traction Company and take down the freeways and let a thousand Oakland DTO dreams bloom. Until then, Oakland will remain for most freewayloaders primarily a drive thru on the way to and from more desirable locales.

          15. Highways 24 and 580 bisect five of Oakland’s most expensive and desirable neighborhoods. These freeways service, Rockridge, Piedmont Avenue, Temescal, Trestle Glen, & Grand Lake/AdamsPoint. Highway 13 splits Oakland’s pricey Montclair District as well as bordering the desirable Oakmore neighborhood. Highway 13 also runs 1/2 a mile north of the City of Piedmont. Highway 880 runs through the pricey Jack London Loft District.

            LA has freeways running all over town. Interstate 10 goes through expensive Santa Monica and next to Beverly Hills. The 405 borders Bel Air and Brentwood. Those are some faulty inaccuracies regarding freeways in Oakland and the relative desirability of neighborhoods due to proximity to freeways.

          16. Those “most expensive and desirable neighborhoods” would be much more expensive and desirable if fwy 24 did not exist. And more to my point, Walnut Creek, Concord, San Ramon, etc would be much less desirable and expensive without fwy 24. They’d be less populated too. And some of their wealth and population would have gone to Oakland, except Oakland declined while they boomed and thrived with the coming of the freeway. Same for 580. Oaklanders don’t need 24 and 580 to get to SF or SV or along the Richmond to Fremont axis. And most of the traffic on those freeways in Oakland ain’t Oaklanders anyway.

            FWIW, Jack London is not “pricey” by SF standards, or San Mateo standards, or Santa Clara standards, or Marin standards. Aside from a few blocks it is dumpy. And yes I’ve been there recently, as well as more than 20 years ago and in between. Look you’ve very consistently graded Oakland by lesser standards than are expected in SF and SV, but now you are just flipping the bird to reality.

            Oakland’s long decline was aided and abetted by those 1960s era freeways. Belair and Brentwood are as far from downtown LA as Orinda is from downtown SF. In both metros the freeways enable the sprawl, which is not advantageous to the central cities. BTW, Oakland is similar distance from the SF CBD as Crenshaw and East LA are from downtown LA. See how well they did with the automobile freeway sprawl of the second half of the 20th century.

          17. “Oakland’s long decline?” Oakland is booming now more than it has in 50 years. Homes in Rockridge within a stone’s throw of Highway 24 go for over 1.6 million. I’m here at beautiful Market Hall as I type this as traffic speeds by on 24. Not even a problem. It’s like the waves crashing on the beach after a while. You also forget that the least desirable parts of deep east Oakland split the greatest distances between the 880 and 580 freeways in Oakland.

          18. Sad that we would consider this a “boom”, but then after a ~60 year period (1950-2010) with almost no net population growth, I guess the low expectation grading curve for Oakland is firmly established. I wonder if any of us will ever see the time when the Oakland DTO has “boomed” enough that parking is neither cheap nor easy to find.

            FWIW, Oakland had a fairly similar boomlet in the 1980s. Oakland’s current population is only about 4% higher than in 1990. Boomtown, indeed. Meanwhile, Concord’s population has increased 16-fold since 1950. And the Tri-Valley area has more jobs than Oakland. All those areas gained far more from the freeways than the city by the creek.

            So yeah, Oakland has had a long (several generation) and huge decline wrt to many neighboring cities and among the essential causes was the construction of the 580 and 24 freeways.

          19. You actually think that parking in Downtown Oakland is easy to find?

            Also, you do realize that Oakland has set an all time population record of 427,000 residents in 2017. Oakland also has 3500 units of housing currently under construction with another 18,000 units in the pipeline. There are also 21 highrises in various stages of development in Oakland’s pipeline.

          20. I actually know that parking in downtown Oakland is both easy to find and cheap. I also know there’s an app for that. It tells me in seconds that there are dozens of parking facilities in DTO where I can park for prices starting at under $2/hr during the busiest times of the business day. I can even reserve a spot. I also personally know quite a few blocks in DTO where I can park for free, though I can’t reserve those spaces. You don’t seem to know your own city so well.
            As for the boomtime population of Oakland, I know the US Census latest population estimate for Oakland is 419k. That was for 2015. They haven’t released an estimate for 2017 or 2016. What is your source? Is it more accurate/reliable than the US Census Bureau?
            BTW, that’s only about 9% greater population than Oakland had in 1950, per US Census. SF’s 2015 population was only 12% greater in 2015 than it was in 1950. Both SF and Oakland were disadvantaged by the freeway construction of the 1950-80 era. Both had declining population until around 1980, while the suburban sprawl boomed in SV and the outer east bay. It took two economic booms for them to regain their 1950s level population: the 1980s PC boom and the 1990s Internet boom. Both those booms, like this one were greater and earlier in SF than in Oakland.
            Your meager list of housing units and commercial construction in Oakland merely highlights how tepid the growth actual is and how low the standards for “boom” are in the city by the creek. Maybe eventually there will be a real boom in Oakland or enough accumulation of from the succession of these little SF-spillover boomlets for the multitude of half empty parking lots and garages in DTO to get replaced with places of work or residence. Maybe, eventually, but not likely in our lifetimes, Elmano.

          21. The intra-region rivalry is amusing if not sad. San Diego has a larger population than SF and Oakland combined. Even SJ has been left in the dust by San Diego’s growth.

            Forbes list of the prime cities for job and population growth and subsequently for real estate investing and outright home ownership does not include SF or Oakland or any Bay Area city. LA is building a potentially great public transportation system. DC is extending its subway system way into the burbs of Virginia and Maryland. And that gold rush city to the north – I’ll leave its accolades for another time.

            The Bay Area? Increasingly it’s being outpaced by other metro areas despite what many want to believe. The lack of regional cooperation is a major impediment to this region being able to compete with other increasingly dynamic metro areas.

          22. San Diego has more than three times the land area of SF and Oakland combined. And even with all that area it has less population than SF and Oakland and Berkeley combined. If SF was the size of San Diego it could include all of San Mateo County north of 84, from San Gregorio to Redwood City.

            FTR, SF grew faster than SD in population percentage from 2010 to 2015, per the latest US Census data.

            We can all rest assured that the long time SoCal “rivalry” between SD and LA has not abated with the newly named Los Angeles Chargers; or between DC and Baltimore, or between the MD suburbs of DC and the VA suburbs; or between Dave and reality, sad as that is and amusing as it isn’t.

          23. Dave, the problem with the Bay Area region is that SF-centric thinking as the Warriors are showing with the relocation from Oakland is chocking off the region. The political engineering by SF interests to artificially make SF the center of the region creates unnecessary congestion, pollution in order to locate corporations on a peninsula linked by bridges to the region. This is the same thinking which wants to drag HSR up a wealthy peninsula and into a San Francisco culdesac at the expense of a central location to the entire Bay Area. SFism is chocking off growth and prosperity for our region.

          24. Elmano, you misread your own source: it says Oakland grew by 2,883 residents in 2016, for a 0.7% increase. Whereas, SF grew by 9,339 residents in 2016, for a 1.1% increase. It also says SF added more housing units than SD. And it also says that Oakland grew less in percentage than the average for both Alameda and Contra Costa counties; well behind Dublin, Livermore, Haywired, Pleasanton, Newark, Brentwood, Pittsburgh, Hercules, Martinez, Oakley, Pleasant Hill, San Ramon, Walnut Creek, Concord, and many others.

            It says Oakland is a laggard, a boomtown only by a below standard.

            FWIW, SF was the population and economic center of the Bay Area until the early 20th century. Post-WWII the center shifted towards the south bay and then somewhat towards the tri-valley. There are two major economic centers of the Bay: SF and SV. Due to our magnificently congested freeway system, the sprawl spreads the population out across many counties.

      4. Go ahead and file a lawsuit, it would get laughed out of court. Though, you might be able to jumpstart a new career as a stand-up comic.

  10. What a joke, the City Attorney should focus on the crimes being committed in this City and not about economic benefits. Then again, the snowflakes in SF have lost touch with the general population.

  11. I love it. This is almost as good as the proposition on naming the “George Bush SF sewage treatment plant” that passed a couple of years ago. Maybe Oakland / Alameda county can come up with a proposition naming the EBMUD sewage treatment plant after the Warriors owners….

    1. That is an excellent idea. The Lacob Sewage Treatment Plant. This would be only structure in Oakland with this billionaire’s name on it. This tells you how greedy Lacob has really been to Oakland. Despite his tremendous wealth he has contributed nothing substantial to the betterment of Oakland. Lacob has only managed to USE Oakland via taxpayer funded improvements while also extracting money and disposable income from zither loyal Oakland businesses and into his Atherthon pockets.

  12. It’s utterly insane that any time was spent for a) Socketsite to publish such a silly story; b) all of the above comments to be written; and c) me to read the comments and write this. There’s no way this “initiative” gets enough signatures.

    1. I hope this doesn’t interfere with sending the Traitors packing to another Las / Los Whatever.

  13. I don’t know if you were here when they first started playing games in Oakland. After the then Oakland Clippers left because lack of fan support at the time the trend then was building larger arenas, the Oakland Coliseum, which was built for their new franchise, the Oakland Clippers. There was no fan support. I was upset.

    Given the trend then, the larger arenas evolved. SF had the Cow Palace, Oakland had a new fresh arena w/o a major tenant and completion of a mass transportation system, BART, Changing the name from SF to Golden State was done to stipulate this is not a move nor take nor steal. At this time, I blame the media for not correcting a lot of newcomers who just don’t know or care.

    I’m just glad like you they are coming home. He knew the specifics. Sad so many people are misinformed. True media can e bias and true so many of them live in the east bay…although they know the truth. Warriors ownership and people like me knew it was “only temporary”.

    My argument with friends who think the Golden State name will stay. They weren’t here back then. I’m sure the Warriors will reclaim SF in due time freeing up Oakland to now seek their team since they now can support a team, I blame the media. I went to school with Ray Rattto and he should spill the truth……but of course he is from the east bay.

    1. The truth is that the Warriors were not supported when they played in SF/Daly City. The Warriors averaged less than 5,000 fans per game in “San Francisco” at a time when franchises like Boston and Los Angeles were averaging between 10,000 and 12,000 fans per game. SF has never been a basketball town.

  14. I am not really sure what the purpose of this initiative would be? A declaration of policy has no real force of law, other declarations of policy have been completely ignored.

    Basically, this initiative would serve no purposes except to waste money on a special election.

  15. As a matter of principle, I will vote against the interests of anyone who is obnoxious enough to propose a special election on nonsense like this.

  16. How about the city apologize to the citizens (whether they be in tents, passed out on the street, in rental housing or in Noe Valley swank pads) for wasting time on stuff like this instead of dealing with the homeless crisis right here at home? We can and should do better than this.

    1. I agree that we can and should “do better than this,” however a while back 65.29% of San Francisco voters decided that they did not want to devote $50 million a year from a small sales-tax increase proposed in a ballot initiative (Proposition K) to fund the then-existing shortfall in the number of emergency adult shelter beds.

      That is a powerful revealed preference that “dealing with the homeless right here at home” is not, in fact, “a crisis” for most voters. Or at least, that most voters want something done (see Propositions Q and J on the same ballot), but they don’t want to pay for it.

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