Gay Indian prince hits SF
26
ARTS
10
27
SF Ballet
Bonjour
The
www.ebar.com
Since 1971, the newspaper of record for the San Francisco Bay Area LGBTQ community
Vol. 48 • No. 11 • March 16-22, 2017
SF bans travel to South Dakota
Acting SF schools chief vies to keep post by Seth Hemmelgarn
by Matthew S. Bajko
T
he gay man who’s serving as interim superintendent of the San Francisco Unified School District has applied to keep the job permanently. Myong Leigh, 46, said last summer that he Jane Philomen Cleland didn’t want to keep the top job. SF schools chief “I’ve never seen Myong Leigh myself as a superintendent,” he said at the time. “What I’m best at is implementing work, thinking strategically,” and “working to implement change rather than to be the public face of the district.” But in an email last week, Leigh, who declined an interview request, said that he’d changed his mind “after thorough deliberation.” “I’m committed to the San Francisco Unified School District and want what is best for our students, staff, and community,” Leigh said. “SFUSD is a great school district, so I imagine many strong candidates are interested in this role. I know the Board of Education will carefully weigh many important considerations about what our district needs at this time.” Commissioner Mark Sanchez, the only gay member of the school board, said in an interview, “I’m supportive of [Leigh] applying. ... I have a deep amount of respect for him. Over the years, I’ve gotten to know him very well. He’s very steady, he’s honest, and he’s extremely likeable and humble. I think he has a lot of the qualities we like to see in a leader. He also knows the district really well.” Leigh has worked for the district since 2000, most recently as deputy superintendent. Former Superintendent Richard A. Carranza left the post last summer to lead the Houston Independent School District Board of Education. San Francisco’s school board unanimously agreed to appoint Leigh as interim superintendent upon Carranza’s departure. Sanchez said that among other achievements, Leigh helped design the district’s weighted student formula, “which allows us to use the needs of the individual student to drive the funding” for how that student is supported. “It’s a better way of funding than just giving a flat amount for every student.” Sanchez said. The district received applications from 30 people for the position, Sanchez said, and the board hopes to make a selection “by the end of March or early April.” Gay San Francisco Supervisor Jeff Sheehy, who’s daughter is a San Francisco public school student, said that he doesn’t know Leigh well, but “I think he would be a great choice,” since his selection would “send a clear signal to LGBTQ students” that San Francisco’s school district “is a safe and welcoming place.” t
S
Harvey rides again Kelly Sullivan
C
heryl Brinkman, chair of the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency Board of Directors, shares a laugh with fellow MTA officials and Castro leaders during the rededication of the Harvey Milk streetcar Wednesday, March 15 at Jane Warner Plaza. MTA spokesman Paul Rose said the streetcar, number 1051, was completely rebuilt and restored during a two-year upgrade by
the agency and the Market Street Railway. The new streetcar now has improved braking and the latest security cameras, while inside there are placards about Milk, the first openly gay person elected to office in San Francisco who was murdered in 1978. Rose said the project was part of a $31 million contract to restore 26 different streetcars.
LGBTs condemn attacks on Jewish community by Heather Cassell
B
ay Area Jewish LGBTs have condemned the more than 100 anti-Semitic bomb threats that have occurred at Jewish community centers and other places around the country and vow that they won’t be deterred from being open and welcoming. The bomb threats have been made at Jewish community centers and day schools. Additionally, hundreds of headstones have been desecrated at several Jewish cemeteries since the beginning of the year. One of the most recent incidents occurred March 9 when a bomb threat was called in to the Jewish Community Center in Los Gatos. No device was found during a search. Gay state Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), who is Jewish, condemned the threats. “These despicable attacks on the Jewish community show, yet again, that anti-Semitism is alive and well in our country and around the world,” Wiener wrote in an email to the Bay Area Reporter. “The Jewish people are never truly safe, as we have learned the hard way many times over the millennia.” The first wave of threats across the U.S. began January 9. Authorities are treating the threats as hate crimes.
Jo-Lynn Otto
The Oshman Family Jewish Community Center in Palo Alto was one of many Jewish centers and day schools that have received bomb threats in recent weeks. Authorities said that all the threats have been hoaxes.
All the bomb threats have been hoaxes, according to law enforcement authorities. The FBI is investigating. Locally, the Osher Marin Jewish Community
an Francisco this week banned its employees from using taxpayer money to travel to South Dakota now that lawmakers in the Mount Rushmore State have become the first to enact anti-LGBT legislation in 2017. Last Friday, March 10, South Dakota Governor Dennis Daugaard signed into law Senate Bill 149, which legally protects faith-based adoption and foster care organizations that refuse, based on their religious beliefs, to place children in LGBT households. A broad coalition of national adoption advocates and LGBT rights groups had opposed the bill, noting that same-sex couples are six times as likely to become foster parents than different-sex couples. Now South Dakota could also become the fifth state on the travel ban list maintained by California officials due to passage of the law. At the start of the year, California named a quartet of states – Mississippi, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Kansas – to its list banning state officials from using taxpayer money to travel to those states due to their having enacted See page 14 >>
Center in Marin and the Ronald C. Wornick Jewish Day School in Foster City received bomb threats that forced evacuations on January 18. On February 27, another double bomb threat happened, first at the Anti-Defamation League headquarters in San Francisco and an hour later at the Oshman Family Jewish Community Center Taube Koret Campus for Jewish Life in Palo Alto. The Bay Area is North America’s fourth largest – and the United States’ third largest – Jewish community, according to J. magazine, a local Jewish weekly publication. Jewish LGBTs make up 8 percent of the Bay Area’s LGBT community, according to the Jewish Community Federation of San Francisco, the Peninsula, Marin, and Sonoma Counties and the Jewish Federation of the Greater East Bay’s 2010 survey, the most recent available. The overall Bay Area’s Jewish population currently is estimated to be 391,500, reported J. Authorities have made one arrest so far, but do not believe the man is responsible for all of the bomb threats. Juan Thompson, 31, was taken into custody March 3. Thompson is suspected of making eight bomb threats, including the ADL. However, authorities believe Thompson, a St. Louis resident and former journalist who was fired from the Intercept for fabricating See page 14 >>
{ FIRST OF THREE SECTIONS }
GET IN THE DRIVERS SEAT. Financing with us leaves more money in your wallet.
SanFranciscoFCU.com l 415.775.5377
Federally Insured by NCUA