Author Archives: gdewar

Last weekend I decided to check out Janet Reilly’s 2006 kickoff for her campaign for the California Assembly. Loyal readers will recall that Janet had her campaign start in May of 2005, complete with an appearance by 2004 Presidential Candidate John Kerry.
While last year’s event was held downtown and was a gathering of both political insiders and grassroots supporters, the event held last Saturday was one dominated by local district residents who were solidly behind Janet’s campaign at West Portal Elementary, conveniently located just above the West Portal Muni tunnel.
Current Assemblyman Leland Yee (who is now running for the State Senate) introduced Janet and endorsed her to succeed him in the Legislature. Former Lt. Governor and Speaker Leo McCarthy also addressed the crowd. Here you can see a photo of Janet and Assemblyman Yee as Janet began to give her speech.
You can read her remarks here as well.
All in all she gave a good speech – clear, to the point, not too long, and not afraid to speak up on some issues that are sure to create some debate during this campaign.
What I liked best though was that it was clear to me that despite what some nadering nabobs of negativism might say in the press, she was running because she really wants to do the job of representing the district – which is rare these days when you see so many people run just to see their name in the paper and their picture on TV, or just find a gig to make plans for the next campaign – a nasty side effect of term limits. Besides, if she wasn’t serious, there’s no way she could have attracted a crowd like
this on a foggy Saturday morning.
It will be an interesting season for San Francisco/San Mateo County voters in both the 12th Assembly District and the 8th State Senate district, since they will have two very open races with many hard working candidates. But after seeing just how well organized Janet’s campaign has been to date, and how tech-savvy and people-savvy it has operated so far, I’d have to give the edge to Janet in this race.
Special Note to Los Angeles Readers: During a recent trip to Los Angeles to enlist support for her campaign, both the LA Independent and Joe Scott’s The Body Politic blog, among other places.
Part of being a legislator is of course to represent your home area, but part of it is also to be able to work with people around the state, and Janet’s got the edge in this race on that issue for sure.
Pictures graciously provided by Carolyn Weiss.

You know it’s getting bad for political appointee Annemarie Conroy when even the local TV news, not known for really going after news stories, starts an investigation into the qualifications of Ms. Conroy for one of the most critical jobs in a city that is certain to have a disaster.
KGO News, bucking the trend of faux journalism at the local level, took a hard look. And what they found wasn’t too great. The second half was broadcast last night, and frankly NO ONE looks good in all of this.
Not only is Ms. Conroy’s entire qualification that she’s a politico related to an ex-mayor (who gave her a first job in politics, only to be tossed out by voters a couple o’ years later!), and that now taxpayers are paying $40,000 a year to send her to Monterey to get a master’s degree.
Yeah. $40,000 so she can learn something about her job. If the Big One hits, or terrorists attack, she’ll be far, far away from San Francisco. Lucky her. Given how many classes one needs to take to get an M.S., one would imagine we won’t be seeing her around her office much.
Don’t you wish you could get paid $160,000 for a job you’re not qualified for, then have taxpayers pay you to go to school AND pay your tuition, so you could sort of be qualified for the job you’re being paid $160,000 for? I sure do! Beats working, that’s for sure. And that whole “disaster” thing? Well we can just rely on the feds to take care of us! Wowee the crack they’re serving these days is simply crack-a-rific!
Mayor Newsom is still defending the appointment, which seems odd. If we have learned nothing else from Katrina. we should all learn that putting unqualified political hacks into critical, technical jobs leads to disaster. Surely the Mayor who has often stood on principle, could realize that in this case, giving Ms. Conroy the boot to a job where she can be political and not harm anyone, in favor of someone certified to do the job, might be a good idea.
My previous posting on this subject saw a big spike in google searches. Clearly I’m not the only person worried about the issue. And, judging from some of the IP addresses that hit this site from those google searches, some are in City Hall.
UPDATE: Yet another salvo has been fired in the direction of Political Hack Annemarie Conroy, with two supervisors asking for her resignation. Only two now support her – including Assembly Candidate Fiona Ma. You can see the latest KGO TV report here.
Fiona Ma may want to reconsider her public remarks. If this is the kind of person she feels is qualified to take over 160,000 a year in salary, a free government SUV, free tuition for a Master’s Degree (aka on the job training), and other goodies, for a job Ms. Conroy is NOT qualified for and regards the public with contempt when challenged, well then, I’d say voters in next year’s primary may want to ask Ms. Ma some more in depth questions about the kinds of people she feels should be in jobs that literally can hold the power of life or death over them.
© 2003-2006 Greg Dewar | All Rights Reserved | Originally Published at www.schadelmann.com

Don’t think a disaster like New Orleans can happen to you?
Here’s the full quote of qualifications for Annemarie Conroy, a good pal* of failed Mayor Frank Jordan and Token Republican in San Francisco Government:
Annemarie Conroy holds a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of California at Berkeley and a Juris Doctorate from the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. She was admitted to the California State Bar in December 1989.
Doesn’t that make you feel good? An ENGLISH MAJOR who has the good grace of being a Republican and a friend of a powerful past mayor is now in charge of recovery from one of the three top threats to the US (the others being a terrorist attack in NYC and a big ass storm in New Orleans. I think those happened already).
More importantly it shows how you as a San Franciscan are very vulernable to a political hack for your survival. This has been the problem in San Francisco for some time now – people never get hired or fired for work performance – it’s all about appeasing people with big paying jobs, regardless of the impact. That’s why we have Tony Hall, a former supervisor, “running” Treasure Island, and why Ms. Conroy, the former head of Treasure Island, is now running Emergency Services.
It’s all well and good when the money’s flowing and life is swell that we give these well-padded politcos more money to do nothing. The problem is we pay when a real disaster happens. Wouldn’t it be nice if instead of hiring Ms. Conroy, we’d hired someone who’s got experience running relief and diaster ops for a big city or small country? Maybe somoene who has a bit more in the smarts department than a Cal degree in English?
Perish the thought. But that’s why it’s time we push forward and get some solar rechargers and satphones for our police, fire, and Mayor, and for citizens. We can’t rely on Ms. Conroy to be concerned with much else besides her pension and her paycheck, and she certainly doesn’t have a background that warrants her appointment to this job. But I’m sure appeasing the former Supervisor helps so when we’re all staring at the rubble, we can at least be confident Little Annemarie got her good paying job.
UPDATE: Some have suggested a solar powered or charged cell phone is “expensive” or “not feasible.” To prove them wrong, I direct you all to this link at Apple’s online store. It’s for a pocket solar powered iPod charger, one of many types of solar chargers you can get for iPods and cell phones.
None of this has to be difficult, expensive , or line the pockets of some big stupid meathead-run company like Halliburton. It’s called “getting things done” and it’s a novel concept, I know, but we gotta try. Can’t hurt, can it?
UPDATE II, ELECTRIC BOOGALOO: Apparently the anxiety I have over this political appintment is shared by others. Since the news of Hurricane Katrina, the number of people hitting this site + posting off of Google with search terms involving “Annemarie Conroy” and “patronage” and “disaster” (or variations therein) have caused a minispike in traffic.
For some historical background, take a look at an old article from 1999 that details her previous patronage appointment and give you an idea of so-called “liberal” San Francisco works.
Where’s a paper ready to go on a crusade for All That Is Good and True when you need it the most? How about we put aside the tut-tuts being aimed at Bush and instead focus on making SF the best possible place for civil defense and relief at the local level? Too bad Willie Brown blew all the money during the boom on his buddies…but that’s another column….
FINAL UPDATE (REALLY): Today, the SF Board of Supervisors announced a full on audit of the department, realizing that FEMA (AKA FEEBL) can’t be relied on, and that we have got to have our act together as best we can.
*Actually she’s a relative. This was meant to be a joke.
© 2003-2006 Greg Dewar | All Rights Reserved | Originally Published at www.schadelmann.com