Trifter

San Francisco is the city of hills and attractions that captivates tourists from around the world to visit this “Golden Gate City by the Bay.” I have lived here since 1995 and have witnessed such an upheaval of change that this embitters and saddens me. One needs to take a closer look at San Francisco, to find its problems. As everywhere in the U.S., there are over-reaching layoffs and a high unemployment rates.

You look past the famous Transamerica Pyramid that overshadows our financial district and you find a pervasive darkness. Stores, restaurants, business, and even franchises have closed. Tower Records, Virgin Megastore, Comp. U.S.A. all closed their doors either recently or years ago. I went to my local movie megaplex to watch a film last night and though the theaters are doing well, the surrounding stores are either closed or empty of customers. I went to look for my favorite restaurant there and was literally greeted by a blank wall. There was a food court of eight restaurants and now there are only two. There once was a high tech Sony outlet. That closed years ago along with the large computer games store. Incidentally this building is directly across from the three large convention centers.

Our own independent local stores have or are closing. Stacey’s Bookstore which not only sold works of literature and non-fiction but also technical textbooks in the areas medicine, psychiatry, engineering, accounting, was a well-established business that had been opened for fifty years. They closed last November. Last year, Cody’s Books, which had been opened for forty years, closed of its outlets in Berkeley and San Francisco. All along Market Street, the main drag of San Francisco has multiple shops, former car dealerships, specialty stores, furniture stores and many shops  are dark and empty. Restaurants seem to disappear weekly. My favorite independent small video store is closing and the retailer told me that Blockbuster nearby will be closing their doors and along with 100 franchise outlets across the nation. There are also empty homes and apartments. However thrift shops that sell used items and low end merchandisers doing well as long as they can pay the skyrocketing rent.

There has also been a great homeless problem in this city but the scale has outreached its limits and scores of people sleep on the sidewalks. There are armies of panhandlers at almost every block downtown. Shelters are overcrowded. Social agencies and nonprofit organizations have disappeared.  Soups kitchens are overcrowded with people that are somewhat well dressed. There have been and are continuing massive cutbacks in the Department of Public Health leaving many with no medical and mental health care and substance abuse programs for low-income individuals and families. Countless offices are being slashed of heir employees and funds. Donations to charity organizations are drying up and fundraisers are sparsely attended, San Francisco General Hospital as well as other hospitals is overwhelmed with patients and lack of means to handle the overflow. Yet major pharmaceutical companies and health insurance groups are high profit margin industries.

I realize that this mass national problem and there simply is there is no quick fix or solid solution to this economic downturn. What of the future of my city? What of the future of the nation and the world for that matter? I have no answers. I can not understand economy but I can see. I am not blind to inflation rates and foreclosures of the picturesque Victorians in this city I call home that rebuilt itself after a massive earthquake and fire in 1906 in addition to a large quake called Loma Prieta exactly ten years ago.