Robbing the Richmond

Robbing the Richmond

Despite suburban feel, urban ills plague residents

            Somewhere between the extra long city blocks, lurks the face of crime, and more specifically, theft. Whether it’s robbery, larceny, or burglary, the Richmond’s got it all.

“This is the worst year yet,” said Linda Lee, the 12-year owner of Sparkle Laundry. “A few weeks ago someone tried to pry open our machines to get the coins out.” Lee believes the problem can be attributed to tough economic times, decreased community programs, and adolescent truancy.

SFPD’s 2010 online Crime Map shows that there were 260 offenses in the Richmond District within the last 30 days: 60 burglaries, 19 robberies, and 181 thefts (larceny).

According to Sgt. Steve Thoma, the theft problem in the Richmond is consistent with past years. Aside from lots of stolen bikes and broken glass, the Richmond is “real quiet, and the people are nice out here.”

Residents and business owners seem to disagree.

Everybody’s complaining about theft,” said Joe Massis, a 10-year resident and owner of the Richmond Market. “Cars, stereos, everything. It seems to be worse now than ever before, I have to watch everyone [in my store] closer.”



When someone finds their bike gone, or their window broken, with no suspect in sight, they might chalk it up to bad luck and go on with their day. Sgt. Thoma advises that residents instead call 311 and report the crime. Although the victim’s “stuff” isn’t usually recovered, filing a claim gives police a better idea of problem areas and patterns within the district. They will then target and saturate these areas with undercover police officers to try and eliminate the problem.



The Richmond District Blog of San Francisco keeps track of Richmond “goings-on” and includes a weekly repost of the San Francisco Police Department’s Richmond Police Blotter.



On Feb. 5, a Richmond resident got off the bus at 6th Avenue and Geary and as she walked home was approached from behind by a suspect who grabbed her purse and ran.

This would appear an ordinary incident except that: “further investigation revealed that the suspect had committed a robbery at 25th Avenue & Geary less than an hour prior.”

Bus lines provide mobility to thieves and this factors into the Richmond theft problem as well. There are ten bus lines that span far and wide throughout the district. Within four days, similar incidents had occurred. From breaking open change machines to steal coins, to full on armed robbery of businesses; breaking and entering and stealing bedding, bicycles, wallets, jewelry, laptops, purses, and cell phones from locked homes.

Although not the busiest of districts, the Richmond still has criminal activity. It is part of a bigger city, complete with all the joys and ills of urban life.



“We are in a deep depression and it’s very scary,” Lee said. “In twelve years of business, this is the worst year yet as far as crime goes.”

What's all the fuss about a Walk Out Rock Out?

So we're being royally punished as students, meanwhile we cut class in order to protest the cutting of classes. I don't get it.

As students march, or dance rather, around campus, pushing a mobile music cart, waving signs that read "No business as usual," "Amend Prop. 13," "Education is a right," and "SFSU out of order," it forces the rest of us to really beg the question: are we right to protest in such a manner?

As these students boldly chant the words "rise up SF state, shut it down like '68!" do they even know what happened in '68?

Are they conscious protestors, or wily kids that like to dance?

Meanwhile in the Cesar Chavez quad, hip-hop music blares and amateur dancers bust their moves in a wide empty circle.

People sell art. Clubs table. Cheerleaders rally for the big weekend game.

I asked the students at the Fashion Network Association booth how that felt about the Walk Out Rock Out movement, to which they replied that they had no previous knowledge to the event and no particular feelings towards the motivation. They told me that they would be tabling there regardless, it's Thursday after all.

So I moseyed on, curious to what students like me might be thinking.

Back at Cafe Rosso, I talked briefly with Stella, a student of the American Language Institute. She gave me her unique perspective from the standpoint of an international student.

"I think it kind of doesn't work," she said assertively. And although she feels this she added "it's ok if it still can help them to relax."

Another student, SFSU music major Jesse Adams said that at "first glance it seems fun to have a dance party, but it seems counterproductive, distracting, and not respectful to other students."

His program colleague, Rebecca Hale added, "it's separating people. They’re yelling at us but we agree with them mostly."

So there it is. Some are in the know, and some aren't. The people I spoke with support the cause of protest to furloughs, but and not the action of walking out.

Protest can be done in a number of different ways, but information and comprehension of a central problem is the starting point.

Let's try to band together in the future in a more productive and conducive way so that we don't end up ultimately losing in our education.

The greed flaw: the rope to hang the corporation

Corporations are psychopaths. No, really. The documentary film The Corporation makes this bold assertion and a few more.

Not only are they legally considered to be individual, on a diagnosis checklist, they check every box.

“They would have all the characteristics,” says Dr. Robert Hare, consultant to the FBI on psychopaths.

The film’s narrator questions, “if the dominant institution of our time has been created in the image of a psychopath, who bears the moral responsibility for its actions?”

These tough, not to mention politically charged questions, give this documentary it’s chutzpah.

Many consumers take the corporation for granted in daily life, spending their routine days drinking Starbucks coffee, filling up with Chevron gasoline, and cooking Rice-A-Roni (the San Francisco treat!) for their families.

Little thought may go into where the product comes from and most of all, at what cost.

The film does a thorough job of bringing significant evidence to light that could sway an average consumer to rethink their consumption habits. 

“I’m driving my truck through this incredible flaw in capitalism, the greed flaw,” Moore asserts of his success in liberal “leftist” documentary film. “The thing that says ‘the rich man will sell you the rope to hang himself.”

Unfortunately for the "conscious" consumer, the film does little more than present a "singing to the choir" kind of mindset. 

The "prognosis" as the film coins as the last of many chapters, is that there is indeed hope. Well, there better be. Otherwise most folks (especially those first being exposed to such information) might return home after the 2 1/2 hour cinematic “downer,” to abruptly end their newly informed lives. 

Luckily the film features many of the country's intelligently interesting people: the late Howard Zinn, Naomi Klein, Noam Chomsky, Moore, along with many others.

Bottom line: worth a viewing, especially if you can get someone opposed to seeing it to watch it with you. 

Former police chief asserts professional values, disproves old stereotypes

Some associate cops with their widely known stereotype: sneaky, corrupt, lazy donut-devouring individuals. Culturally, Americans have learned to be skeptical of police officers, often believing that they do more harm than good. Or that they do absolutely nothing at all.

On another note, republicans are conservative. They all think the same and stand behind the same political ideas. Tony Ribera, who has been branded San Francisco’s scarlet letter of “conservative republican,” opposes the death penalty and a ban on assault weapons.

Former police chief, San Francisco born and bred Ribera, spoke on this idea and many related themes with a group of SFSU journalism students today.

Ribera never had a pool in his backyard or long blond hair. He was always more fond of sports then academia and when he returned from his brief deployment to Vietnam, he took to police work like “a duck to water.” He was drawn to the underlying values that the field offered him: comraderie, friendship, social networking, and "best of all, the ability to help people directly."

He has also learned to deal with the stigma of law enforcement taboo, such as the idea that police departments have too many secrets and that cops should only talk to media when forced.

The perception of police distrust originated when officers received much lower salaries, avoided the media at all costs, and engrained the idea of a “conspiracy of silence.” This reality changed tremendously after 1950.

Ribera is a strong proponent of ethical leadership in all fields and clings to the importance of being truthful, transparent, and above all, compassionate. “Lots of administrators miss this,” Ribera spoke of the essential element, and proceeded to pose the often ignored question, “how does power affect people?”

These words ring true to us all in some way, shape or form. And yes, a so-called conservative cop said that. Generalization busted.

Bottom line: give the police guys a chance. They are here to help.

The 2003 republican mayoral candidate is considered a media expert on the highly publicized and scrutinized New Year’s Day 2009 BART shooting. He is the director of the International Institute of Criminal Justice Leadership at the University of San Francisco.

R.I.P. Ariel Hembel

He was always there.
Whether on the sunlit headlands with Mia, mini Mia and the Mendo crew.
Or at the LR airport rousting girls and spinning donuts.
Sparing a cig. Popping a scrim. Giving great hugs.
Lou dog, Grace, Naomi, and Ling. We were all there. 
Maybe it was at a summer fest, smiling quietly, clinking bottles, enjoying a wildly inappropriate joke. Always joyous, laughing, gracious.
Silent and regal. Strong and reserved.
This is the man I will remember. Forever missed.  
He is an embodiment of love. Of joy and living in the moment.
And he is now gone.
Rest in peace dear Mendonesian, you will always be with us in spirit.


For more great memories visit http://www.facebook.com/pages/In-Loving-Memory-of-Ariel-Robin-Hembel/209971232307?ref=mf

From Refugee to Rap Star: The Story of Kanaan Warsame

Rap music gets a bad rap. Our parents tell us it’s loud noise with too much cursing. Radio stations and dance clubs play only mainstream rap, materialistic music about bitches and “gats.” Drugs and “bling.” Music so devoid of any real message, it often seems that being offensive is the main purpose.            

At some point, somehow, the true art of rhyme was abandoned and henceforth replaced with superficial words mixed with overused, repetitive beats.

Thankfully there is good news for all hip-hop and rap fans that share in these concerns. Just when it seemed that rap music was beyond redemption, Kanaan Warsame, or simply K’naan, appeared on the scene. He actively reinstates the intention and origin of hip-hop music by using his poetic rhymes as a lyrical weapon.

He draws his main inspiration from a war torn childhood in Somalia. His music is spine chilling and uplifting while attempting to teach and entertain. He truly represents the voice of the global struggle.

K’naan is both a poet and a rapper.

“So what’s hardcore?” K’naan asks on his debut album The Dusty Foot Philosopher.

“Really, are you hardcore? Hmm.-

We begin our day by the way of the gun,

Rocket propelled grenades blow you away if you front,

We got no police ambulance or fire fighters,

We start riots by burning car tires,

They looting, and everybody start shooting,

Bullshit politicians talking about solutions,

But it’s all talk, you can’t go half a block without a roadblock,

You don’t pay at the road block you get your throat shot…”

                Before he felt the warmth of spotlights on his face, he felt the heat of gunfire and grenades. And before he became an internationally recognized celebrity, he narrowly escaped one of the world’s most war-torn countries. Now the Somalian-born K’naan appears in North America, flooding the airwaves and truly “blowing up the spot.”

He was born Kaynaan Warsame in 1978. His name translates to “traveler” in Somali and he is a refugee now residing in Ontario, Canada. K’naan spent part of his childhood in Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia, where he lived in the district of Wardiihigleey. This area is more commonly referred to as “The River of Blood” due to ongoing political conflict and violence that continues to this day.

K’naan’s father left Somalia ahead of his family and moved to New York to find employment. With the money he sent home, he included rap albums for K’naan. Through this musical medium, K’naan taught himself to speak English by studying the hip hop and rap diction of American artists such as Nas and Rakim. He then copied the phonetics of their lyrics and style, even though he could not comprehend the actual meaning of the songs.

In 1991, civil war broke out as the Somali government collapsed. K’naan was fortunate to have his visa approved in the nick of time and was able to take the last commercial flight out of the country before the U.S. embassy closed it’s doors. He was reunited with his father and other relatives in Harlem, New York City and they eventually moved to Rexdale, Ontario where there is a large Somali-Canadian community.

           K’naan dropped out of high school in the tenth grade and traveled throughout Canada, rapping at open microphone events. In 1999 he befriended a Canadian music promoter who got him a gig at the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees where he performed a spoken word piece in criticism of the United Nations and their failed aid missions to his home country.

           Fortunately for the young artist, Senegalese singer Youssou N’Dour sat in the audience and was extremely impressed with K’naan’s courageous performance. Soon after the show, N’Dour invited him to contribute to his 2001 album, “Building Bridges.” Because of his addition to N’Dour’s project, he was taken along and featured on his worldwide tour.

           In the next few months, K’naan worked on more United Nations events and performed at the Montreal Jazz Festival. He met a Canadian producer who helped him create his debut album, “The Dusty Foot Philosopher,” in 2005. This first album slid under the pop culture radar. He opened shows for Damian Marley’s Welcome To Jamrock tour, and kept a small yet diehard following over the next three years.

With his most recent release of “Troubadour,” K’naan is now widely embraced as a worldwide hip-hop celebrity and being welcomed with open ears by everyone from National Public Radio to MTV. His second album, released in early 2009, resonates much catchier rhythms and lyrics than his previous tracks and sounds to be catering to a much different crowd. This scene is the North American popular culture, and so far he is having ample success.

           K’naan has collaborated with artists such as Nelly Furtado, Mos Def, The Roots, Dead Prez, Damian Marley and Pharoahe Monch.

Staying true to his poetic roots, K’naan raps as if he’s teaching a course on hip-hop 101. He aims to educate and inform with his clear and clever rhymes. He infuses the mix musically with hints of reggae and authentic African drumbeats.

            Some of his new tracks mirror his first album in essence and originality while others ooze with a feeling of exceedingly aged cheese and make the listener long for authentic songs past filled with hand drums and raw “riddims.” This evidence of smoothing over the bare instrumentals with synthesized sound “goo” and frequent choral “la la la’s,” shows K’naan’s evident migration from raw, rootsy goodness to lame ass radio routine.

Although he remains true to the art of rhyme, he falters in successfully “trodding” through the muck which some of us refer to as “mainstream music,” or “radio rap.” Fame and acclaim will continue to lift this newfound superstar up, hopefully without tainting his highly original style. Regardless of what the future may hold, K’naan is an inspirational individual with endless talent and a grassroots, global message.

 For more information or to hear K’naan interviews and music visit:

www.npr.org keyword: k’naan

www.mtv.com/music/artist/knaan/artist.jhtml

www.knaanmusic.com

www.thedustyfoot.com

www.myspace.com/knaanmusic.