by El Reportero Staff
Legislation that would require property owners to remove or replace wooden utility ladders from their buildings was passed to the Board of Supervisors on Oct. 27.
The Board received the legislation after unanimous support from the Building Inspection Commission Supervisor for San Francisco’s District 1 Jake McGoldrick voiced his support for the legislation. McGoldrick spoke before the Land Use Committee on Oct. 27.
If passed, the legislation would add a section 605 to the housing code, requiring R1, R2 and R3 occupancies to dispose of wooden ladders.
A press release from McGoldrick’s offi ce stated that old ladders may be replaced with ladders composed of code compliant material. What these materials are to be determined by the Department of Building Inspection.
McGoldrick’s office cited an incident from last year involving the death of a 25-year-old man as he attempted to climb a “visibly rotten” wooden ladder at a residence in the Richmond District to reach a friend’s apartment.
San Francisco fire stations give free smoke detector batteries
Two San Francisco fire stations handed out batteries for smoke detectors at no charge on Saturday, Nov. 1, 2008.
Fire Station 5 on Turk Street and Fire Station 7 on Folsom Street were the participating stations.
The San Francisco Fire Department said the promotion was held on Nov. 1 to coincide with the beginning of daylight-saving time on Nov. 2. The beginning and end of daylight-saving time are “easy to remember” times for replacing smoke detector batteries, SFFD said. SFFD recommends replacing smoke detector batteries at least two times every year.
Report on “young voters’ issues” released
Young Workers United, a San Francisco-based labor organization, released on Oct. 28, 2008 a report on the results of a survey they conducted on the campus of City College of San Francisco.
The report was released on front steps of San Francisco City Hall. Young Workers United surveyed 500 City College students on issues they found important for the elections on Nov. 4, 2008.
67.26 percent of participants said healthcare is “very important.” 67.88 percent said affordable housing in San Francisco is either “very important” or “important.”
Proposition B, which would have appropriated a portion of property tax to allocate towards affordable housing in the City of San Francisco, failed with a bare majority of 50.54 percent of San Francisco voters voting against it on Nov. 4.
In survey results, 54.24 percent of respondents said “access to well-paying jobs” is their primary issue.
Of the students surveyed, 80.97 were eligible to vote, while 79.78 percent were registered to vote.
Young Workers United surveyors registered 75.53 percent of participants who were eligible to vote, but unregistered. The registration effort raised the “registration rate” of the sample to 93.44 percent, United said.
Young Workers United, founded in 2002, describes itself as “a multi-racial and bilingual membership organization dedicated to improving the quality of jobs for young and immigrant workers and raising standards in the low-wage service sector particularly restaurants in San Francisco through organizing workers and students, grass-roots advocacy, leadership development, and public education.”
