This story is a little like checking into a nice hotel, pulling back the comforter on your bed, and seeing millions of cockroaches scurrying for cover. The other day, my young neighbors from across the street came over and wanted to talk. The story they told me is one that I thought wouldn't happen in "liberal" San Francisco. It just shows that crooks, standover merchants and extortionists are everywhere, and especially where there is money.
More on the flip
Across the street from us lives an old woman, Carmen, who has lived in her house for a very long time. She and her husband owned not only the house but the vacant lot next door. They used to park their car there. After her husband died, Carmen sold the vacant lot to a family who wanted to build a house and rent it for a few years. Part of the deal, for some weird reason, was the inclusion in the Bill of Sale a clause that stipulated that Carmen would always have a parking space on the lot. The family, of course, paid no attention to the clause, because it was meaningless in their view, and ultimately they planned to sell the house anyway. And they do, to a nice young couple who questioned the clause and won a nice discount on the sale price to get them to accept the worrying encumbrance on their property. A few years passed. Carmen started suffering from dementia. So her brother and his wife took over, and somehow ended up owning the property. Eventually, the young couple decided that they ought to do something about the clause, and with new owners, thought they were dealing with reasonable people. But they weren't.
The first thing they heard was that they had to provide a parking spot in their garage to the brother and his wife. They said they had a right to access to the garage, even though it was not a 2-car garage. The young couple demurred. Next they get letters from an attorney demanding access. Finally they get a demand from a man, a wealthy property developer, on the San Francisco Police Commission, a friend of Gavin Newsom the Mayor, who demanded a key.
So they go to the City Planning department and ask if this is legal. No, they are told; it shouldn't even exist. You cannot stipulate such a thing. So they are comforted. The letters and calls do not stop, however. They finally go to a neighborhood planning committee that is split on the subject. Thanks, neighbors! They go to Tom Ammiano, the district supervisor, and he, of course, does nothing. Wat do you expect from a guy that started as a comedian and is now just a joke?
But the shock is when they go back to the City for a definitive vacating of the "variance" and meet a stone wall. The City will give them no assistance. Why? well, because the City made a mistake and doesn't want to get sued. That's the charitable explanation, I guess. The more realistic explanation is that the property developer on the Police Commission made some calls.
OK, here's the final section. The brother offers a deal to the young couple. In exchange for a very large amount of money, they will apply to the City to vacate the "variance". And so the young couple caves, and signs a contract. That's how extortion works in America's most liberal city.
I just had to write this. If you feel that somehwere in America there is a place where the taint of wealth and power has not seeped into the very marrow of the country then you are mistaken.