Downtown on the Corner

As a result of some work I am doing I have gotten to spend a bit more time in downtown SF than I have up until now. Actually, I am spending a bit more time downtown anywhere than I have in a while. Years ago I worked in downtown Milwaukee for almost five years. When you work in a downtown area you start to take for granted the environment there. The noise, traffic, smells and the people.

There is no more striking example of a mix of people than standing on a street corner at the edge of a downtown's redevelopment zone. Right there where the suits and the homeless mix brings you an incredible range of the American experience. In San Francisco you get the added bonus of tourists of all stripes (from the backpacking college students to the families with their $800 strollers) digital cameras in hand.

So there I was standing on a street corner just beyond the fancy lunch spots and just where the transitional living facilities start taking in the parts of American society that are hidden from many of us. It is there that you are reminded that there are still a lot of people who are not only struggling, but are in many cases sliding backwards. Actually these folks were sliding backwards during the "Bush boom" (as Paul Krugman calls it) and are now in free-fall today. The coming cuts in social welfare programs, charitable giving and menial employment will undercut the few support systems that are left. The result will be more evocative of the third world than the shiny city on the bay that San Francisco wants to be. But SF is not alone. Go stand on a street corner in Oakland, Richmond or even Concord and you will see the same struggle for survival. Even the Safeway in my neighborhood has acquired a few resident pan-handlers, sitting outside on the bench with a constant request for small change.

You might well ask, what can be done? Well in addition to all the volunteering that is going on these days (which is laudatory) I would encourage folks to continue to donate in whatever way they can to agencies that are engaged in direct service. Also, people might want to start thinking about how the tax structure of our communities, counties and states has contributed to the current problem. Think Global- Act Local.