Did San Francisco’s Crap And Crime Dissuade Shohei Ohtani From Signing With The Giants?
Buster Posey noted how the 'perception' of San Fran being a crime-ridden city could factor into whether players decide to sign with the Giants.Buster Posey noted how the 'perception' of San Fran being a crime-ridden city could factor into whether players decide to sign with the Giants.Bags of poop thrown at home of socialist Seattle official who led 'defund the police' efforts; she says cops are dragging their feet on catching culprit
Bags of poop have been thrown at the home of socialist Seattle councilmember Kshama Sawant.
Despite leading efforts to defund the city's police department in 2020, Sawant is saying police are dragging their feet on finding the culprit.
What are the details?
Conservative commentator Jason Rantz initially reported that Sawant demanded that police post officers outside her home from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. until the suspect is arrested, according to multiple sources who spoke to Rantz on the condition of anonymity.
Rantz added that Sawant’s request came as the department is "dangerously understaffed, thanks to her efforts to defund and dismantle the department since 2020. The SPD has lost at least 135 officers this year — nearly 500 since 2020 — and cannot meet staffing minimums across any precinct and watch."
Soon KCPQ-TV reported that Sawant wrote a letter to officials claiming Seattle police are "failing to investigate" who threw bags of human into her yard six times, most recently on Oct. 13. She added that one of these incidents was followed by a threatening email sent to her city council office, the station said, calling her "the queen of s**t" and saying "you can sit on your throne of human excrement."
Sawant — a member of Socialist Alternative — suspects the attacks are politically motivated, KCPQ reported.
She also claimed police have been dragging their feet, closing the investigation Tuesday just five days after it began, the station said. Sawant added that after one bag of poop was thrown on her lawn, a police officer allegedly asked her husband, "What do you expect us to do?" KCPQ reported.
"There is obviously a glaring inconsistency between this approach and the way in which former Mayor [Jenny] Durkan, after a peaceful Black Lives Matter protest was held a short distance from her mansion, was provided with a 24-hour stakeout for a full year," Sawant wrote to city officials, according to the station. "As a socialist city councilmember who has participated in Black Lives Matter protests, I am being told that my case of six threatening incidents involving human excrement doesn’t merit even a serious investigation, let alone protection."
What happened next?
Police on Thursday added to its blotter a request for the public's help in identifying the "man suspected of throwing feces at a councilmember's home" — without mentioning Sawant.
"Friends of the victim were watching the home when the suspect threw a plastic bag, containing several individual bags of suspected human feces, into the yard," police said. "The friends confronted the suspect and snapped multiple photos as he ran away. Witnesses described the suspect, pictured below, as an Asian man, approximately 5-foot 4-inches tall."
Sawant added that the controversy surrounding the thrown bags of poop "was apparently leaked to the right-wing media by Seattle Police," the station said.
"Needless to say, it is disturbing that right-wing media, including a police-run website named [Law Officer], portrays these attacks on my home as justified against an elected representative who has the temerity to criticize the police or attempt to hold them accountable," she added, according to KCPQ. "That is certainly a dangerous direction, especially if it is embraced by police and de facto supported by SPD leadership and the city’s Democratic Party establishment."
While Sawant said she's filing a complaint with the Office of Police Accountability, the station noted the following statement from police:
"The department takes incidents involving public officials seriously, and investigators have canvassed for evidence, gathered information from witnesses and reviewed everything collected thus far. At this time, the department has not found any evidence this case would meet the city or state standards for hate crime laws, but SPD will follow available leads should new information arise. The department encourages anyone with additional information about this case to contact police."
Seattle police searching for man accused of throwing bags of feces at councilmember's houseyoutu.be
'The property's really being used as a toilet': Homeless camp brings poop, high crime, and constant danger — and leads to shutdown of iconic burger joint
Tom Burke owns a Portland bowling alley that sits right next to one of the iconic Burgerville restaurants that pepper the Pacific Northwest — and he's seen trouble mounting in the area for quite some time.
"We have put our life and soul into these businesses here and to see Portland go from where it was even as little as five years ago to where we are today, there's no question, its disheartening," Burke, who owns a pair of King Pins, told KOIN-TV.
'The property's really being used as a toilet'
A homeless camp has been operating this year right by the Burgerville and King Pins — and has brought with it nothing particularly appetizing.
"The environment around the restaurant has deteriorated seriously," a Burgerville spokesperson told the Portland Tribune, according to KOIN. "Police are now being called daily. Burgerville employees have found weapons, drug paraphernalia, and human waste on the property."
Burke put it more bluntly: "The property's really being used as a toilet," he told the station in regard to Burgerville. He added that King Pins — and its family-oriented customer base — is suffering the same indignity, the station said.
"And the unfortunate thing is, you know, you have families and children that are walking up the path, and at any time you can find hundreds of needles," Burke added to KOIN. "Any time they come out and clean up ... they are able to find so many needles and feces."
Burgerville closes, gets boarded up
Burgerville — a 60-year-old restaurant chain with 1,000 employees and around 40 locations — decided the problems were getting too out of hand and boarded up the Lents area eatery at 3504 S.E. 92nd Ave. in what's being billed as a temporary closure, the station said.
The chain told KOIN it hired private security to try improving employee and customer safety — but no dice.
Burgerville CEO Jill Taylor told the station that all employees at the closed restaurant have been offered jobs at nearby locations.
"It is not just Burgerville," Taylor added to KOIN. "Other businesses are being impacted, too. There is a humanitarian crisis happening throughout our region, and we need to come together around solutions."
Burke told the station that Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler and County Commissioner Jessica Vega Pederson have been contacted about the problems — but no responses from them thus far.
"The homeless crisis is certainly a very serious situation in Portland. We all know it, we've all been impacted by that, but this is really not the place to have a homeless camp right next to our businesses," Burke added to KOIN.
He told the station he wants Wheeler and elected leaders to come out and see for themselves what the area looks like before the occasional cleanups and sweeps take place.
"We've put our life into this, but we don't really think that we're getting the support that we need from a business standpoint," Burke noted to KOIN.
Anything else?
The station said Wheeler's office provided a statement on the matter: "We take situations like this very seriously. Community safety is one of the mayor's top priorities, and it's unfortunate anytime people and businesses in our community feel unsafe. We continue working with the Portland Police Bureau to identify resources and solutions to improve safety citywide."
San Francisco — where feces, piles of garbage have been filling its once-storied streets — to buy designer trash can prototypes for up to $20,000 each
San Francisco faces a ton of big problems: A broken school board more interested in flying its left-wing flag than educating students, woke culture further infecting city politics, and brazen violence and other crimes committed in broad daylight.
And let's not forget a major health issue: Feces and garbage filling its once-fabled streets as homelessness and drugs run rampant.
Sure, the poop problem may not be quite as bad this year as in the past — after all, 13,856 reports of human or animal waste between Jan. 1 and July 12 is certainly less than the 16,547 reports of feces over the same period last year.
But perhaps a solution is at hand: the city's Department of Public Works wants to replace 3,000 green trash cans with bigger and better-looking ones, KPIX-TV reported – the station even used "designer" to describe their model names.
And the price tag for the prototypes? They'll cost taxpayers about $20,000 per can, the station said.
What are the details?
Officials told KPIX that sleeker designed bins with sensors alerting crews when they're almost full will be more tamper-resistant, keep out rodents, and help to make sidewalks cleaner.
But one city resident told the station the plan is "insane."
Matt Haney of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors agrees: "$20,000 a can is ridiculous," he told KPIX.
The station said the "costly cans even have designer names like the 'Salt and Pepper,' 'Slim Silhouette,' and the 'Soft Square,' which all feature roll-out liners or toters that can be mechanically lifted instead of manually taken out."
Haney didn't seem impressed.
"Why are we still doing this rather than putting out a bunch of different cans that are already produced, that are much cheaper?' he asked KPIX.
More from the station:
The Department of Public Works installed 3,000 of the green cans in the 1990s. Even they admit the $20,000 price tag is expensive for a prototype but promise the cost will go down once it's mass-produced.
"I want us to be, frankly, the model for other cities," public works acting Director Alaric Degrafinried told KPIX. "Portland, New York, Sydney, wherever it is across the world, to take our cans or to try and model their cans after ours."
The station said the plan is to test three models this fall then choose the final trash can possibly early next year and get a final cost. Public words told KPIX the final cost per can would be about $4,000 each once they're mass-produced.
But the current green trash cans cost just north of $1,200 each, the station said. However, another resident told KPIX that people using the current trash cans are the problem, noting that "they go looking for drugs. They go looking for things to recycle. In the neighborhood I live in, they bust them open, pull things out. Sometimes they get too full."
Public works wants to spend $537,000 from $840,000 on reserve for the project, most of which is due to the design cost of the new bins, KCBS-AM reported
San Francisco Mulls Installing Sidewalk Trash Receptacles Costing $20 K Eachyoutu.be
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