Here's the letter I have written about Newcomer High School. I don't know what the energy working group email is so I'm not sending it to that (it would take 15 minutes for me to sift through my juno adress book to find it). It's also attached. Sue The Transportation Working and the Sustainability Working groups of the San Francisco Green Party support the efforts of the staff at Newcomer High School to eventually turn the Sixth Avenue lot between Irving and Judah into a schoolyard 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We do not support overnight or weekend parking on this lot. Background: Newcomer High School, which had been at a site in Pacific Heights for about 25 years until August 2006 when it was moved to the Laguna Honda site in the Inner Sunset, has not offered physical education until this year, when Proposition H funds became available to hire a P.E. teacher. The principal would like to use the Sixth Avenue lot for P.E., as there is no indoor gym, and as a place for students to exercise and relax before and after school and during lunch. However, the Department of Parking and Traffic has leased this lot from the school district for many years for neighborhood parking, and neighborhood outrage over the loss of parking has delayed the start of P.E. classes and even prevented the students’ free time use of the lot. At this time, DPT and the school district have implemented a pilot program to permit overnight and weekend parking for one month. Our position: While the San Francisco Green Party believes that community members should have adequate notification of policy changes at a minimum, and should be invited to participate in the decision-making process at best, the San Francisco Green Party in this case supports a prohibition on overnight and weekend parking on the Sixth Avenue lot because: a) The students at Newcomer are all immigrant students, and most of them are students of color whose families are economically challenged. The families of most of these students have made the decision to send their children to San Francisco at great personal and family sacrifice but with an eye toward improving their futures. They deserve a safe, clean lot for exercise; b) A pilot program permitting overnight parking has already distracted the principal from many of her responsibilities, as she has been required to be on site to sign towing forms for many illegally-parked vehicles. Also, the fact that it is currently available for overnight and weekend parking has meant that the gate has been unlocked after hours, and people come onto the school grounds and dump their trash there, among other illegal activities, on a regular basis; c) The P.E. teacher, in consultation with others, has already drawn up plans for the Sixth Avenue lot, once it has been resurfaced in the summer of 2007. Those plans include striping for basketball, pickleball, volleyball, wiffleball and softball, among other sports. The principal would also like to put benches around a center tree for use of students before and after school, but especially during lunch on nice days. Toxic residue and oil slicks from parked vehicles present health hazards to students, and will accelerate the deterioration of the lot. Also, maintaining the lot as a parking lot after hours would preclude the part of the lot to be dedicated to a wiffleball/softball diamond from ever being transformed into a dirt or grass diamond; d) Permitting overnight and weekend parking on the schoolyard sets a terrible precedent for the rest of the school district; and, e) Vehicles going into and out of the lot cross the 6th Avenue bike lane, endanger bicyclists. We suggest that overnight and weekend parking be eliminated after the schoolyard is resurfaced and striped during the summer. This delay will give adequate time for people who currently use the parking lot to adjust – and for Muni to add service to the Inner Sunset, if need be. We also encourage the principal of Newcomer High School, school district officials, and the Recreation and Park Department to work on a system of sharing the Sixth Avenue lot such that the lot can remain available to the neighborhood for recreational purposes, as the closest basketball court is 14 blocks away in the Panhandle. Send to: ross.mirkarimi@sfgov.org sean.elsbernd@sfgov.org Esther V. Casco, ecasco@muse.sfusd.edu (Clerk of the Board) Eric Mar <emar@sfusd.edu> Mark Sanchez <msanchez@sfusd.edu> Eddie Chin <echin@sfusd.edu> Norman Yee <yeen@sfusd.edu> Jane Kim -- I don't know her email yet KimShree Maufas -- " " Hydra Mendoza -- " " David Campos: camposd@sfusd.edu Baje Thiara (Newcomer principal), bthiara@muse.sfusd.edu Organizations to enlist: Chinese Progressive Association La Raza Central Legal ???? SPUR Livable Cities SFBicycle Coalition PTA Sierra Club -- Pinky and I are taking care of this SF Tomorrow (not likely to support this proposal) SF Beautiful others