sperbonzo

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...sn=001&sc=1000

"It is too easy to make fun of the people who packed Room 400 in San Francisco's City Hall to stop American Apparel from opening a store on Valencia Street in the Mission District last week.


They are not serious people. They live in a world where facts like 27 vacant storefronts on Valencia Street and 9.3 percent unemployment statewide and nearly 600,000 jobs lost nationally last month do not matter. The few who read books know no authors beyond Naomi Klein. They do not believe that the world has changed since the 1999 World Trade Organization protests in Seattle. This accounts for both the static nature of their vocabulary - "no formula retail!" is their death chant, though anyone who has picked up a newspaper in the last five months could tell you that there isn't a single retail establishment with a formula today - and the juvenile nature of their worldview. They do not want to see businesses be successful. They do not want the Mission District to be welcoming to different types of people.

What they want is magic.

The word "magic" kept recurring during the hours of public comment at the Planning Commission meeting where the American Apparel store's permit was up for a vote. "Valencia Street is a magical place," one speaker said. Another claimed that "Our neighborhood is a dream, a delicate flower." Others spoke of American Apparel as a "parasite" on their "ecosystem." Several local business owners testified that it was their "dream" to operate in such a "magical" place, and noted, with horror, that they might have to make alterations to their business plans if a new store opened in the area.

As it happens, American Apparel is somewhat of a magical company. The company makes its clothing in downtown Los Angeles, employing mostly Latino and Asian immigrants. It offers its workers health care. It pays more than twice the federal minimum wage.

These used to be called progressive values, and I noticed that some of the people who did not want American Apparel bringing these values to the Mission understood that they should make an attempt to hide this fact.

"This is not about American Apparel," Stephen Elliott told me. Stephen Elliott is the founder of the "Stop American Apparel" Web site and the starting point of this "movement." Yet he insisted to me that "if you allow American Apparel to come in, you're going to have a much harder time saying no to the Gap."

I suppose it is easier to fight against the Gap, but the Gap was not up for a vote at the Planning Commission last week. I thought about pointing this out to city Supervisor David Campos, who attended a "movement" fundraiser and yet claims that he did not "take a stand" on the issue. "I was showing that I shared their concerns, which have been expressed, about formula retail," Campos told me. Campos also happens to be an immigrant, from Guatemala, but this irony is lost on him as well.

Though some claim that this was always about "formula retail," as I sat watching the Planning Commission meeting I noticed something else. Most of these people were happy to sacrifice other people's lives, other people's dreams, for their idea of magic.

When a young man stood before the board and said that he only had health care because of his job at American Apparel, a voice in the overflow room called, "Get a job somewhere else!" Another employee told a story about a young Latino man who was able to send money to his family in Central America, and this news was met with sneers. An American Apparel representative told the board that he had gotten messages from people threatening to throw a brick through the store window, and the crowd laughed.

The commission voted against issuing the permit, and American Apparel is lucky. What a burden it would be to have a store in a magical place with such nasty elves."


AND THIS WAS AN ARTICLE FROM A NATIVE COLUMNIST!!! ??




The wacky left is just unbelievable sometimes.



.

__________________
Michael Sperber / Acella Financial LLC/ Online Payment Processing

[email protected] / http://Acellafinancial.com/

ICQ 177961090 / Tel +1 909 NET BILL / Skype msperber

tony286

they dont want their neighborhood walmartized is that so bad?

D Ghost

Half those fuckers in the Mission wear American Apparel! ... ROFL

Domain Diva

Next they stop Mcdonalds,Starbucks etc,complain of global branding or some other reason and before you know it you see a ghost town with everyone complaining how bad things are....

__________________

$5 submissions

That is an extreme case of the tight planning/land use/zoning controls in Northern California. On the plus side, it has produced some of the best scenery/open space on the West Coast. On the down side, in addition to pushing development (and some jobs) away, it also jacks up the price of housing by constricting supply.

__________________

sperbonzo

I guess not, but at the same time this is typical of people that want so much to help others, as long as it's not in THEIR back yard....

__________________
Michael Sperber / Acella Financial LLC/ Online Payment Processing

[email protected] / http://Acellafinancial.com/

ICQ 177961090 / Tel +1 909 NET BILL / Skype msperber

tony286

or maybe small local businesses can go in. Maybe you didnt know but small people have cafes, burger shops not just big corporations.

sperbonzo

I guess you missed this bit:

"27 vacant storefronts on Valencia Street"


.

__________________
Michael Sperber / Acella Financial LLC/ Online Payment Processing

[email protected] / http://Acellafinancial.com/

ICQ 177961090 / Tel +1 909 NET BILL / Skype msperber

sperbonzo

Tony, with the 27 empty storefronts there, what are the owners of those buildings supposed to do for money? What if YOU owned those buildings and couldn't rent them out?

I predict that the same people that blocked this business will demand that government tax money (ie the rest of us), be used to bail out the mission district in order to support their choices.

.

__________________
Michael Sperber / Acella Financial LLC/ Online Payment Processing

[email protected] / http://Acellafinancial.com/

ICQ 177961090 / Tel +1 909 NET BILL / Skype msperber

tony286

I dont know what they can do but some places they get really pissed about big chains. Not just the left coast.

baddog

Yes. it is idiotic. I can't believe how you can take a stand against improving a neighborhood's economy.

baddog

Valencia St isn't exactly Big Sur.

teh ghey

The Castro used to be an amazing neighborhood, Now its all homogenized. StarBucks, Haagen Daaz, Prudential Real Estate, it doesnt have that same special feeling it used to have.

baddog

So did Haight-Ashbury, but I bet it makes a lot more money now than it did in its hey-day.

teh ghey

I think its sad. Id rather keep it sacred and keep the history of it. These were the birthplaces of huge movements in our lives.

Domain Diva

I love small boutique and mom and pop stores,the vibes great and you get that little extra service touch,many would agree a neighbourhood like that has a feel to it......but as much as we would like to stay in the past and live in this ideal world, everyones now more demanding than ever and wanting lower prices and faster services or certain brands (even me) so these huge global monsters fill that demand....sad but true....and holding them back is not the solution,its us the consumers that are to blame.


Just my

__________________

baddog

Believe me, the first time I saw the Ben & Jerry's and The Gap there I about cried, but you have to evolve.

fuzebox

Sperbonzo don't be a stranger on ICQ

$5 submissions

Like I said, this particular case is an extreme example of the general anti-growth paradigm so prevalent in Northern California and parts of Santa Barbara.

__________________

HorseShit

all gays there I wouldn't go there if someone payed me 1 mil

escorpio

Heh. You said HOMOgenized.

__________________
Unvaxxed, still alive.