by Sebastian on January 8, 2024 (BeyondChron.org)
Ellis Street between Franklin Street and Van Ness Avenue. Dec.25, 2023
On Christmas Day, drug addicts shot up and passed out on the trash-littered sidewalk along Ellis Street between Franklin Street and Van Ness Avenue, just across the street from Sacred Heart Cathedral Preparatory School.
Then, SHC rang in the New Year by installing garden planters in front of their soccer field on Eddy Street between Gough and Laguna Streets.
Sacred Heart Soccer Field. Jan.2, 2024
That location was a hot spot for homeless encampments.
Sacred Heart Soccer Field before the garden planters were installed
San Francisco Urban Garden District keeps expanding.
A block away from SHC, the view of Burger King on Van Ness Avenue is devastating.
Burger King, 819 Van Ness Avenue. Jan.2, 2024
I wrote about their smashed windows in October 2023.
They fixed their windows but got smashed again and even tagged with graffiti a few days later.
And this time, their drive-thru order glass window was also smashed.
“It’s lawless. I called the Police but they didn’t come. It’s tough to run a business without any support from the City,” a frustrated Burger King employee said to me.
Will the Burger King on Van Ness Avenue shutter next after the KFC on Duboce Avenue and Guerrero Street?
Across the street from Burger King, another store’s window was also smashed recently.
Tents in front of 850 Van Ness Ave. Jan. 2, 2024
San Francisco voters I talked to share the same frustrations over homelessness, crime, and open-air drug markets in the City.
They want change and to see their 3 major concerns get solved.
Several have expressed their frustrations with the Mayor through open letters and even music.
Patrick Ascaso, the owner of Le Marais Bakery and La Grande Creperie posted a letter on his Sanchez Street cafe window expressing his frustrations on the lack of the City’s support after several burglaries at his Noe Valley bakery.
John Chacas, Gump’s chairman took a full page in the San Francisco Chronicle to run an open letter to San Francisco leadership slamming the City’s streets condition.
David L. Faigman, the chancellor and dean of UC College of the Law San Francisco wrote an op-ed in the San Francisco Chronicle about public safety and the worsening condition of the Tenderloin.
Chino Yang, the owner of Kung Food restaurant/a rapper made a diss track about Mayor London Breed and S.F. crime called “San Francisco Our Home”
But things only get worse in the first week of the new year.
What a way to start the new year with the bad news about the Webster Street Safeway closing!
The community knew it was just a matter of time before the store closed due to rampant shoplifting.
In the end, it’s the community that gets hurt by the store closing.
They have to go further away to do their grocery shopping.
The Webster Street Safeway is not the only store closing this year.
Adidas in San Francisco Centre Mall on Market Street is set to close on January 13.
50% off Store Closing Sale at Adidas, 865 Market Street. Jan.6, 2024
Hollister Co. in the mall also quietly closed on December 13, 2023.
Shuttered Hollister Co., 865 Market Street. Jan 6, 2024
But on the bright sight, William-Sonoma in Union Square is not having a store-closing sale.
“We are staying for another year,” a store employee told me when I visited the store on January 6.
William-Sonoma was going to leave Union Square this year and the building would become a Channel store.
San Francisco voters are at their wits’ end with the state of their city.
They ask “What will be the breaking point?”
They demand law and order and change in 2024.
They want SF’s wannabe mayors to read their lips: “Business As Usual Has Not Served This City Well!”
