SAN FRANCISCO BRIEFING March 2005

News this month

Stepping down

California’s secretary of state, Kevin Shelley, was a rising star in the Democratic Party. The son of a former San Francisco mayor, he won acclaim for managing California’s thorny 2003 gubernatorial recall race. Now corruption charges have forced Mr Shelley to resign his high-profile job as state elections chief.

Several allegations haunt the former secretary. One surfaced last summer when it was reported that Mr Shelley, a San Francisco supervisor at the time, received $125,000 in campaign donations from people who later got grants to build a community centre, which never got built. Federal and state investigators are also looking into whether Mr Shelley misused up to $1.9m of federal money intended to raise voter participation. Accusations of sexual harassment and verbal abuse have also been made by some of his employees. Arnold Schwarzenegger, California's governor, has appointed Bruce McPherson, a former state Senator and a moderate Republican, as Mr Shelley's successor.

A rocky road

Carly Fiorina’s reign as chairman and chief executive of Hewlett-Packard (HP), one of the world's largest technology firms, ended on February 8th, when directors forced her resignation after spats about the company's continuing fiscal doldrums. In 1999, the glamorous and charismatic Ms Fiorina became the first outsider to run HP since its foundation in 1938. She made heady claims about transforming the legendarily slow-to-act technology powerhouse and threw her energy into a merger with Compaq, a computing giant, in a bid to lower costs and gain scale.

After protracted merger negotiations, HP failed to show a definite strategy and the market punished its stock. Though HP's crown jewel, the printing and imaging business, continued to make money, the firm remained an also-ran in other sectors, such as personal computers and data storage. HP insists that Ms Fiorina's departure will herald an “accelerating execution” of its existing strategy. Robert Wayman, a 36-year veteran at HP, succeeds her as interim chief executive; Patricia Dunn is now chairman. Some suspect that Ms Fiorina, $21m severance package in hand, aims to enter politics.

Bravo

David Gockley, the longtime head of the Houston Grand Opera, has been named the new director of the San Francisco Opera (SFO). He replaces Pamela Rosenberg as general director from January 1st 2006, though he joins the company on July 15th 2005. His contract expires after the 2010-11 season.

Mr Gockley has been involved with the Houston Grand Opera for over 30 years, helping it earn its national reputation by combining financial success with cutting-edge works by avant-garde composers, such as John Adams and Philip Glass. His business acumen is badly needed at the SFO, where the finances are wheezing. Mr Gockley's plan to resuscitate the company will involve propping up the costs of more challenging works with sales from more populist productions. Some of his proposals include expanding the opera’s season by finding a way to stage shows in the spring (when the San Francisco Ballet takes over the War Memorial Opera House, SFO's winter home). That would probably require smaller indoor and outdoor venues throughout the Bay Area, which could inexpensively widen the opera's audience.

Sky high

Bay Area house prices, already among the nation's highest, are still soaring, with sales in January reaching the highest level for that month since 1989. The typical single-family home in San Francisco now costs $713,000, up 23% from last year’s $580,000. Marin County remains the most expensive place to buy a home, with a median price of $850,000.

New studies also show that 9% of homes sold in the Bay Area are going for $1m or more. This amount may seem reasonable to anyone from New York or London, but prices that high have only recently become common in the Bay Area. And the tidy sum doesn't even go very far: $1m buys a small cottage in San Francisco or a two-bedroom condominium in Silicon Valley. The trend is expected to continue, as the local economy rebounds from the high-tech crash and the region's charms (weather, scenery and culture) continue to attract new residents.

Dying to belong

A 21-year-old student at Chico State University who was hoping to join a fraternity died during hazing, after drinking five gallons of water. Members of Chi Tau kept Matthew Carrington up through the night, forcing him to drink the water and then do push ups. He collapsed during the exercises, and suffered a seizure. Water intoxication leads to swelling cells, putting pressure on the brain and nerves. A similar initiation recently killed a student in New York.

Some fraternities say they have resorted to initiation tortures using water or milk following campus crackdowns on alcohol-related hazing. After repeated alcohol violations, Chi Tau was stripped of official recognition by Chico State in 2002, and lost its charter from the national organisation. Prosecutors may file manslaughter charges against the fraternity members allegedly involved in Carrington's death.

Catch if you can

March 2005

Blind at the Museum

Until July 24th 2005

This exhibit explores the nuanced relationship between sight and the visual arts. In particular, the emphasis is on blindness, with a variety of artists approaching the theme of vision and disability in different ways. The show aims to question how we see things, and how we should understand blindness.

Alice Wingwall, a Berkeley-based photographer and sculptor, is an inspiring example of someone who has continued to create stunning works long after losing her sense of sight. Some say her disability has even enriched her artistic “vision”. This show includes pictures and photo collages she created while going blind. Also look for the work of John Dugdale, who was a fashion photographer before going blind. He uses the optical aids which now guide his sight—eyeglasses, camera lenses and the like—to distort the photos he takes.

UC Berkeley Art Museum. Tel: +1 (510) 642-0808. See the museum's website.