Economist.com Cities Guide: San Francisco Briefing - April 2006

News this month

A murder in Chinatown

The murder of a prominent figure in San Francisco's Chinese-American community has called attention to the underside of some of the city's Chinese organisations. Allen Leung, 56, was killed in February by a masked man who came to his office demanding cash. Investigators believe that the murder was more than a simple robbery gone wrong.

Mr Leung served on a local economic task force and was president of the Chinese Community Cultural Association. He also led two influential Chinese brotherhoods, known as "tongs". Tongs grew out of secret societies in 17th-century China and helped Chinese immigrants survive discrimination in 19th-century California. Their purpose is avowedly social, but some tongs have historical ties to gambling, drugs, prostitution and organised crime. In the past year, Mr Leung had told the FBI's Asian-organised-crime squad that he feared for his life because a former leader of Hop Sing, one of the tongs he led, was trying to extort $100,000 from him.
Investigators say they have received little co-operation from Mr Leung's business associates. In April, Hop Sing announced a $250,000 reward for help in the investigation.

The rains came

The Bay Area endured its second-rainiest March on record, and April has shown little sign of improvement. The deluge has caused road closures, flooding and crop damage, and claimed its first life on April 12th, when a 73-year-old man in Marin County, just north of San Francisco, was killed in a mudslide. In early April Arnold Schwarzenegger, California's governor, declared a state of emergency in 16 northern and central California counties-and may add more counties to the list.

Spring's torrential rain follows a wet winter, calling attention-yet again-to the vulnerability of levees in the Sacramento and San Joaquin delta region. In January, flooding prompted Mr Schwarzenegger to declare states of emergency in 34 counties; one month later, he announced another state of emergency for the state's levee system. Predictions that the rains will last until the end of April worry flood-control authorities, who are watching the levees that protect towns along the banks of the San Joaquin River. Levee breaks have already forced people to evacuate a trailer park and an elementary school in the Central Valley.

Fish fight

America's secretary of commerce, Carlos Gutierrez, will soon decide whether to restrict salmon fishing along the Pacific Coast during the forthcoming fishing season. Fisheries regulators have recommended restricting commercial fishing in northern California and southern Oregon for May, June and July.

The limits are designed to save salmon runs in the Klamath River, which winds through Oregon and California's far north. The Klamath was once the third-most productive salmon river system in America, but its habitat has been denuded over the last century by hydropower dams and the diversion of water to farmers. The river has become the subject of bitter legal battles among farmers, fishermen, environmentalists and Native Americans who depend on Klamath salmon for their livelihood.

With the salmon season running from April to October, many commercial fisherman say the proposed restrictions could push them into bankruptcy and severely damage the region's $150m fishing industry. The restrictions could also force gourmands to pay higher prices for wild salmon or make do with farm-raised fish.

Exam pressure

A Bay Area school district has decided not to join a revolt against California's controversial high-school exit exam. Trustees of the 36,000-student West Contra Costa Unified School District in the East Bay had considered becoming the first school district in California to defy a state law requiring high school students to pass the exam to earn a diploma. One of the district's trustees, David Brown, had proposed granting diplomas to nearly 500 students who failed the test, but fulfilled other graduation requirements. He said the test unfairly penalised students with learning disabilities or who were not proficient in English. But on April 10th-with the state threatening to withhold school funding if the resolution passed-the school board voted against Mr Brown's plan. Graduates who fail the exam will not receive a diploma, but instead get a certificate for completing other course requirements.

The exit exam, which tests eighth-grade level maths skills and tenth-grade level English skills, is the subject of a class-action lawsuit pending in San Francisco's Superior Court. The exam was adopted by the state legislature in 1999, but this is the first year that students will be penalised for failing the test. Jack O'Connell, the state superintendent of public instruction, adamantly defends the exam, saying it is the best way to assess whether students have the basic skills needed to function in higher education or the workplace.

Going wireless

Gavin Newsom, San Francisco's mayor, has announced a deal with Google and Earthlink to provide free wireless internet access throughout the city. By early 2007 people using computers within city limits will be able to connect to the internet. Google is offering the free service, but its speed is a modest 300 kilobits per second and users will need to navigate past a variety of on-screen advertising. For about $20 a month, Earthlink offers a speedier connection without the advertising. The deal has generated controversy, mainly from privacy advocates who criticise Google's plan to track users' locations in order to match them with advertising from local businesses.

The new Wi-Fi may inspire San Franciscans to take their laptops to the city's parks and street benches, but they would be advised to keep their wits about them. Cafés already offering wireless service have become popular with thieves who grab laptops from patrons and run. 18 such robberies have already occurred this year, including one case in which muggers stabbed a 40-year-old man in the chest in order to steal his Apple PowerBook.

Catch if you can

April 2006

The 49th San Francisco International Film Festival

April 20th - May 4th 2006

This two-week film festival has been showcasing new and independent films from around the world for nearly half a century, and this year has particularly rich pickings. Highlights include "Perhaps Love", a lavish all-star musical romance by Peter Chan, a Hong Kong director; "The Wild of Blue Yonder", an inventive science-fiction fantasy by Germany's Werner Herzog; and "A Prairie Home Companion", Robert Altman's latest, based on Garrison Keillor's long-running weekly radio show and starring Meryl Streep, Lily Tomlin and Kevin Kline.

Mr Herzog, an iconoclastic director who has made more than 40 films, including "Aguirre, the Wrath of God" and "Grizzly Man", an acclaimed 2005 documentary, will be honoured at an awards ceremony on April 27th. Ed Harris, an American actor, will also collect an award for his work, which includes his performance as John Glenn in "The Right Stuff" and as Jackson Pollock in "Pollock". Mr Altman's film closes the festival on May 4th.

The 49th San Francisco International Film Festival. Tel: +1 (925) 866-9559 or visit the website for details. Films will be screened at theatres around the Bay Area-Kabuki 8 Theatres, the Castro Theatre, the Cowell Theatre and Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley-and at Landmark's Aquarius Theatre in Palo Alto.

More from the San Francisco cultural calendar