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I've lived in SF for almost 10 years, and it saddens me to live in such low trust community because of all the crime. It changes people. I've had my car stolen

I've lived in SF for almost 10 years, and it saddens me to live in such low trust community because of all the crime. It changes people. I've had my car stolen once and broken into several times. I've had two bikes stolen, once out of an office building, and another time through an iron gate that blocks my doorway. My neighbor had his motorcycle stolen out of his garage. I've caught someone stealing packages from a building I lived in. Last time I moved, someone tried to break into my U-Haul. I've seen people walking out of several stores with bags stuffed full of stolen goods (going to Westfield mall feels surreal—even inside the mall, shops need to hire their own private security to protect themselves). These are just a few incidents that come to mind—I could list many more. My point in listing all of these cases is to say—it's not enough to look at crime metrics. Not to say that we shouldn't look at metrics and try to improve them, but the current metrics are flawed to some degree. People in SF-proper (e.g. mid-market, SoMA, Mission, Haight) are living with a constant low-to-moderate anxiety that they will be robbed at any time. In all cases that I've been close to, there have been no arrests or prosecution. You won't find that I had to chase away someone trying to break into my U-Haul in any crime statistic report. No one from SF is comfortable leaving anything in their car, leaving their garage open, parking their bike outside. All I want is a candidate to run on the platform of simply enforcing the law—it's baffling to me how controversial that is. Perhaps we'll get the right catalyst for that to happen someday.

AverageDude 4y ago
>All I want is a candidate to run the platform of simply enforcing the law—it's baffling to me how controversial that is. Perhaps we'll get the right catalyst for that to happen someday. And this is what gives a chance for extremist to flourish. For some reasons, US politics has no centre, it’s always far away from the axis. I think it’s time to have a “Balance Party” in the US :)
- kevviiinn 4y ago
  There's no balance because its all right wing and getting more extreme every year
- def_true_false 4y ago
  It sounds like you might want to look into changing the voting system. The problem with this is that people who have most experience with other systems (immigrants) usually can't vote and have fairly easy exit to another, saner, place. I think Alaska and a few other states have experimented with other voting systems recently. I'm not sure where I've read about it, but there seems to be a subreddit about this: https://old.reddit.com/r/EndFPTP/ https://old.reddit.com/r/EndFPTP/ Unlike other solutions, this one takes years or decades, but, on the other hand, it might actually work.
- firstlink 4y ago
  [flagged]
maratbn 4y ago
As for me I used to go to SF at every opportunity. Now I only go there if it is absolutely necessary for some short errand, and as soon as I'm done I leave ASAP before my car gets broken into. In my view the main problem is not the politicians but the ineffective opaque police that does not have to produce any metrics and is not subject to any kind of oversight, not in SF and not anywhere else either. For example, I had a car window smashed not in SF but in Fremont, and when I went to the police, they informed me that that is not even an arrestable offense. Window was smashed in front of a hotel with a prominent security camera overlooking the street. The police told me they left a voicemail with the hotel asking if their camera caught anything. The hotel never returned the police voicemail, the police never bothered to follow-up with the hotel, and told me they don't have authority to take the security footage of the public street without hotel's consent. Some time later I noticed that the hotel removed that street-facing security camera they had, leaving just an empty pole. I wrote a letter to the Fremont city council regarding their police not wanting to work and lying to victims of crime. And that's when I got back some police action -- in the form of a mental Fremont PD police sergeant calling me in the morning to harass me and bitch about my letter. So even if SF is bad, outside SF it is not much better. Another nugget to consider is that back in 2014, back when crime was nowhere as bad as today, CA voters, not liberal politicians, voted for Proposition 47 "Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Act" which made potential felonies chargeable only as misdemeanors.
- rainy59 4y ago
  Vancouver is just as gorgeous as SF and much safer (downtown was kinda sketch years ago) but kinda tech hostile All of the west coast suffers from high structural costs. People really only endure SF for the venture money and trips to GG bridge, otherwise it makes little sense as a founder to operate there. My dream tech scenario would combine Sand Hill or London VC with Eastern Europe operating costs and lifestyle. But SF is a hotbed of AI now and so ppl literally risk their lives to work there If you could fund and run an AI startup on the Croatian coast, I imagine SF might empty out pretty quick
  - rainy59 4y ago
    Obviously I wrote that before learning about Paul Schmidt
okdood64 4y ago
I'm with you, people don't even report crime here because it's so commonplace. What a sad state of affairs. Fact: the last 4 out of 7 friends I had that got their car broken into didn't bother reporting. They just fixed their car and went about their life.
lobsterthief 4y ago
> You won't find that I had to chase away someone trying to break into my U-Haul in any crime statistic report. This is known as the “dark figure of crime” btw: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_figure_of_crime https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_figure_of_crime
4dayworkweek4u 4y ago
[flagged]

AverageDude 4y ago

>All I want is a candidate to run the platform of simply enforcing the law—it's baffling to me how controversial that is. Perhaps we'll get the right catalyst for that to happen someday. And this is what gives a chance for extremist to flourish. For some reasons, US politics has no centre, it’s always far away from the axis. I think it’s time to have a “Balance Party” in the US :)

kevviiinn 4y ago
There's no balance because its all right wing and getting more extreme every year
def_true_false 4y ago
It sounds like you might want to look into changing the voting system. The problem with this is that people who have most experience with other systems (immigrants) usually can't vote and have fairly easy exit to another, saner, place. I think Alaska and a few other states have experimented with other voting systems recently. I'm not sure where I've read about it, but there seems to be a subreddit about this: https://old.reddit.com/r/EndFPTP/ https://old.reddit.com/r/EndFPTP/ Unlike other solutions, this one takes years or decades, but, on the other hand, it might actually work.
firstlink 4y ago
[flagged]

maratbn 4y ago

As for me I used to go to SF at every opportunity. Now I only go there if it is absolutely necessary for some short errand, and as soon as I'm done I leave ASAP before my car gets broken into. In my view the main problem is not the politicians but the ineffective opaque police that does not have to produce any metrics and is not subject to any kind of oversight, not in SF and not anywhere else either. For example, I had a car window smashed not in SF but in Fremont, and when I went to the police, they informed me that that is not even an arrestable offense. Window was smashed in front of a hotel with a prominent security camera overlooking the street. The police told me they left a voicemail with the hotel asking if their camera caught anything. The hotel never returned the police voicemail, the police never bothered to follow-up with the hotel, and told me they don't have authority to take the security footage of the public street without hotel's consent. Some time later I noticed that the hotel removed that street-facing security camera they had, leaving just an empty pole. I wrote a letter to the Fremont city council regarding their police not wanting to work and lying to victims of crime. And that's when I got back some police action -- in the form of a mental Fremont PD police sergeant calling me in the morning to harass me and bitch about my letter. So even if SF is bad, outside SF it is not much better. Another nugget to consider is that back in 2014, back when crime was nowhere as bad as today, CA voters, not liberal politicians, voted for Proposition 47 "Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Act" which made potential felonies chargeable only as misdemeanors.

rainy59 4y ago
Vancouver is just as gorgeous as SF and much safer (downtown was kinda sketch years ago) but kinda tech hostile All of the west coast suffers from high structural costs. People really only endure SF for the venture money and trips to GG bridge, otherwise it makes little sense as a founder to operate there. My dream tech scenario would combine Sand Hill or London VC with Eastern Europe operating costs and lifestyle. But SF is a hotbed of AI now and so ppl literally risk their lives to work there If you could fund and run an AI startup on the Croatian coast, I imagine SF might empty out pretty quick
- rainy59 4y ago
  Obviously I wrote that before learning about Paul Schmidt

okdood64 4y ago

I'm with you, people don't even report crime here because it's so commonplace. What a sad state of affairs. Fact: the last 4 out of 7 friends I had that got their car broken into didn't bother reporting. They just fixed their car and went about their life.

lobsterthief 4y ago

> You won't find that I had to chase away someone trying to break into my U-Haul in any crime statistic report. This is known as the “dark figure of crime” btw: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_figure_of_crime https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_figure_of_crime

4dayworkweek4u 4y ago

[flagged]