The San Francisco Housing Crisis

With the school’s deferral to rehire a Public Information Officer after more than a year, and no contact information on their public information page, journalists have to resort to the directory to get ahold of the people and information. We must search through the many departments and employees to get to the person who we believe will be able to get us the information we need. Because there is no one responsible for providing us this information, our requests are often left unanswered. San Francisco Sunshine Ordinances require any public records

In the process of interviewing faculty, board members and administration alike, I have found a consistent pattern: no one (who is willing to talk to me) is fully knowledgeable on the overarching changes and further implications of our school. Some faculty have asked only to be used as information sources without publishing their name for fear of losing their job. Faculty members who do speak with me are the most cooperative and have offered the most complete information they can, but it often needs follow up from the decision makers. Board member responses to interview questions have ranged from “I’m not sure” to “I will have to be briefed on that before I can answer these questions.” Chancellor David Martin seems to be the most informed and most vocal in pushing decisions through, but he has tactfully avoided speaking to myself or any of my colleagues as far as I understand.

Martin did briefly appear to increase transparency when he held a community budget forum on the 2023-24 budget. However, those in attendance soon found out that this meeting

Thank you, City College, for creating such a dramatic environment for me to learn how to overcome bureaucracy and lack of transparency in public institutions. The skills I’m learning to creatively get around the obstacles that impede discovering the truth, I know will truly help fuel me in my journalism career.

By Beth Lederer bethlyn2020@gmail.com

It was hard to keep up with my classwork because of the way that power outages were happening. I had two power outages at my house and they were around two to two and a half hours each. It was really difficult though because now I have to catch up. I'm taking four classes and I’m lost on what's going on.

Other than the power outages, I would say I did get more done at home and I'm glad we had some rain. The extreme weather was a little surprising, it felt weird but cool.

- Sarah Kassab

It affects my everyday routine. When it rains you can’t really go outside. I take my dogs for walks a lot. Depending on how slippery the road is you have to drive more safely. When it's light, I’ll drive but if it's raining really hard and I have to come to class, I like to catch a bus. I’ve been in some instances where it's been raining very hard, and someone has swerved into me which has been a very close call.

The rain on the weekends definitely gives me a chance to catch up on any assignments which I haven’t done so that’s a pro. The rain keeps me from being outside with my dogs.

When it’s raining, I’ll take them for a walk around the block just so they can go outside and use the bathroom. When it's not raining, I take my dogs for long walks, usually for four to five hours per day. The dogs are brother and sister, one dog loves the water, whenever there are puddles she’ll run through them, splashing them.The brother doesn’t like getting wet. The dogs are a Catahoula Leopard dog mixed with a Rottweiler.

The rain keeps me confined to the house, which I don’t mind because obviously you have to spend some time in the house but anytime I get, I just like to go for a hike, try to go somewhere new. I live in Treasure Island, it's a perfect place to walk my dogs.

- Ajani Jabari Aragon

I actually work at the airport, San Francisco International Airport (SFO). I load planes all day long, 12 hours a day, 16 hours a day. So the weather has really impacted me

It's not just bags we load, sometimes fancy race cars, sometimes it's like 10,000 pounds of salmon because I work outside in the rain. I was soaking wet and it was cold too. It's right on the bay. I got a raise because I had to work two to three months of that, and everybody else was calling in.

I’m a veteran as well, US Air Force veteran taking business classes. I lead all below operations for airlines such as China Airways, Philippine Airlines, Emirates. It's not just bags we load, sometimes fancy race cars, sometimes it’s like 10,000 pounds of Salmon.

It was stormy, we’re on the coast, right by the water. So my loader to load the plane was swaying this way and the plane was swaying opposite. So I had to tie everything correctly to get everything on the right way, plus it was storming at the same time. I lost my load sheet five times and I was fumbling for that. A load sheet you have to put it on for center balance so the plane doesn’t tip, when it goes up, the weight has to be distributed evenly.

I’m in a good position to travel now. On the weekends we’re traveling more, nobody wants to be here now. We just came back from vacation. We went to Napa the weekend before last and we went to New Orleans for my nephews birthday.

- Marc Anthony J. Bundy

The weather has added to the expenses of the commute. I commute from Sacramento two times a week, four trips total each week. I’ve had challenges with my car. The whole reason I don’t live in San Francisco is money, it’s a little bit cheaper to live out in Sacramento and commute. The commute is definitely more than two hours almost every time. Two weeks ago my car wouldn't start and also this week. I had to buy a $150 jump starter at Walmart. Walmart didn’t have the $99 one I wanted to get, only the more expensive one. So I used it to jump start my car this morning. I had to pay somebody to jump it before my last class two weeks ago. But because of the weather, I ended up actually missing my class even though I got my car jumped. There was bad weather and there was a wreck on the freeway. Every place I called to try to get them to come to jump my car, “oh it will be 45 minutes because there’s a wreck on the freeway right where you’re at.” I’m a veteran, and there are at least seven veterans in my class. Most of the veterans commute, most of them don’t live in San Francisco.

Right now there is no heat in the science building. It kind of affects the results in the class and makes it really cold.

Right now there is no heat in the science building. It kind of affects the results in the class and makes it really cold. When you’re in there your hands get really cold, it's a brick building. My professor bought in portable heaters and we’re using Bunsen burners. The heat has been out the whole semester.

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Rachel Robinson

So funny story, it was last Sunday, it was around 1:00 a.m. My dad was awake in the living room. I had my headphones on, I was talking with my friends, we were playing video games and all of sudden I heard my dad yell “Kenny” from the living room. I'm a little annoyed because he’s yelling at me. Like “what’s going on?” I take one part of my headphones off, and he says, “Kenny it’s flooding.”

“What?”

All of sudden from underneath my closed door, water just starts seeping into my room, and I’m shocked and I don’t know what to do. And it’s coming in and it’s starting to fill up the floor of my room. I’m moving frantically, trying to raise all the electronics above on platforms, on chairs, on tables. It was maybe an inch high throughout the entire room, that's when I ran to the door. I had some towels hung up somewhere and started plugging up the door. Then I exit to my parents room because there is an entrance to my room from the living room. My parents' room is elevated already, so no water has gotten into their room. And I'm looking in the kitchen, and there’s water just pouring through the kitchen like a stream, a river almost. And it’s coming through the kitchen and through the living room. My dad has the backyard door open, and he has a mop and is trying to sweep the water through. It’s just absolutely crazy. We had sandbags in front of the garage so the water didn't come from there. The water actually came up from the garage drain. Some city sewer systems must have gotten flooded and they didn’t have the facilities to handle all the extra water and it just started coming out enough to create a stream. My shoes got soaked and I had to wear really old shoes on Monday when I went to school. My AC adapter got fried, and some plywood boards that I used to stage for flooring for the rest of my room just got soaked. I probably need to remove them because of mold. Everything was so hectic. My mom was wearing bags on her feet and my dad in his sandals and socks all soaked sweeping the water. My aunt, who is the owner of the house, was taking pictures and video evidence so she could contact the city government so they could do something about the flooding.

My mom was wearing bags on her feet and my dad in his sandals and socks all soaked sweeping the water.

- Kenny Khuong

Women’s Badminton at CCSF

By Gracia Hernandez Rovelo ghern140@mail.ccsf.edu

The City College of San Francisco Rams women’s badminton team has had a history of winning, becoming coast conference champions in 2010, 2011 and 2012. The high profile competitive team was crowned state champion in 2010 and runner-up in 2009, 2011 and 2012.

With the direction of the Head Coach Tiffany Mariano and Assistant Coach Jesus Hernandez, the 2023 City College women’s badminton roster features talented young players like Xinyi Cai, Yuchu Huang, Rianna Lee, Kayla Mann, Eunice Claire Millares, Carolyn Nyguyen, Adriene Pineda, Malia Santiago, Kaylie Sumi, Kristin Vinluan and Kelly Yau.

City College of San Francisco Athletics Department cited Carolyn Nguyen as Ram of the Week for women’s badminton; Nguyen stood out with high scores of 21-6 and 21-7 against Skyline on Thursday, March 9.

Heading into the Conference Championships at Fresno City College on May 5 to 6 and CCCAA State Championships at San Diego City College on May 11 to 13, the Rams team has won important games in conference play against Skyline, Evergreen Valley, Fresno, Mission and De Anza in a powerful drive to recapture the state championship.

Spring Athletics Calendar

Women’s Tennis

Friday March 17, 2pm Rams vs. West Valley at CCSF***

Tuesday March 21, 2pm Rams vs. Chabot at CCSF

Wednesday March 22, 2pm Rams vs. Cañada at CCSF (Rescheduled from 2/27)

Friday March 24, 2pm Rams vs. Cabrillo at CCSF

Monday March 27, 2pm Rams vs. Ohlone at CCSF***

Men’s Baseball

Thursday March 16, 2:30pm Rams at West Valley***

Saturday March 18, 12pm Rams vs. West Valley at San Francisco State University***

Tuesday March 21, 2:30pm Rams at San Mateo***

Thursday March 23, 2:30pm Rams at San Mateo***

Saturday March 25, 2pm Rams vs. San Mateo at Fairmont Field, Pacifica***

Tuesday March 28, 2:30pm Rams at Skyline***

Thursday March 30, 11:30am Rams vs.. Skyline at Fairmont Field, Pacifica***

Women’s Badminton

Thursday March 16, 3pm Rams at Mission***

Tuesday March 21, 3pm Rams vs. De Anza at CCSF***

Thursday March 23, 3pm Rams at Fresno***

Women’s Swimming

Friday March 17, 2pm Cabrillo / Ohlone / West Valley @ Hartnell

***CONFERENCE GAMES

By Xela Vargas xelavargas222@gmail.com

Although recent rain storms have dampened the City College's Womens tennis season with reschedulings, the Rams team is holding its own as it approaches the coast conference championship, which will take place April 13-15 at West Valley College. As we all know, this spring we have been confronted with rain storms after wind storms and even hail storms. Tennis being an outdoor sport has been deeply inconvenienced by the forces of Mother Nature. At press time, the team is 2-2 in conference play and 4-2 overall. The 15-member team is led by Head Coach Mary Graber and Assistant Coach Lance Johnson. Team members include Lauren Acuan, Tiffany Beavers, Aurora Bellone, Rosanna Chiu, Susan Curry Walker, Anh Duong, Julia Milena

Durkin, Alanna Hale, Sherry Lee, Christina Ling, Marietta Nunoz, Lily Tan, Gina Tsui, Tianrui Xu, and Bernice Zhu. Days prior to the CCC tournament, the Rams will have played nonconference games against Chabot College at home on April 3, an away game against Monterey Peninsula College on April 5, followed by another away game at Canada College on April 6.Shortly thereafter, the CCCAA state championship takes place at Ventura/Ojal from April 27-30.

Despite the inconvenience of the heavy rains, the team has persevered and played well. Keep track of the team through April, which will surely test the teams strength heading into championship play.