Fogcast: The Bay City Beacon Politics Podcast Fogcast: The Bay City Beacon Politics Podcast

California lurches toward rent control, but the housing crisis rages on; San Francisco is closing its juvenile detention facility, but justice is still elusive. The Beacon boys discuss the pros and cons of incremental progress and count the blessings buried in the quagmire of San Francisco politics.

Sam Moss joins the Beacon team to discuss proposals in state and local government to speed up affordable housing production. Why is it so expensive to build inexpensive housing, and why are the politics of permitting so thorny? Notorious YIMBY gadfly Sonja Trauss joins the podcast to discuss the potential for building municipal social housing in lieu of neoliberal workarounds. The issue is complex, but one thing is clear: everyone is mad.

The Beacon boys join Diego's former boss, housing activist gadfly Sonja Trauss, to discuss recent homeless shelter proposals and transit density legislation. Along the way, they bump into issues of environmental law, Beto's prog rock destiny, and lobsters.

The Fogcast team mourns slain cyclist Tess Rothstein and examine's the city's action (or inaction) on street safety improvements. Will San Francisco ever value human life over cars? Supervisor Matt Haney has taken the lead, but he's also thrown down the gauntlet on another issue: navigation centers. If the City opens its largest homeless shelter on the Embarcadero, Haney says another district should open one as well. Will the real City of Saint Francis ever step up?