The community counter-initiative is a “poison pill” that would stop development so the Hunters Point Shipyard can be cleaned. Currently, these “Radiologically Controlled Area” signs are commonplace.

Lennar BVHP LLC and the Pacific Heights mafia have pumped over $625,000 into their Bayview Jobs, Parks and Housing Initiative that is expected to qualify for the June ballot in San Francisco. It would give Lennar another 350 acres adjacent to the Hunters Point Shipyard with the expectation that Lennar will build at least 10,000 homes and a new 49ers stadium alongside a landfill that is one of the nation's most toxic and is heavily laced with radioactive waste.

Opposing Lennar's initiative is a new counter-initiative sponsored by community residents and Supervisor Chris Daly titled Affordable Housing Requirement for the Candlestick Point and Hunters Point Shipyard Mixed-Use Development Project. It demands that 50 percent of any housing built on the stretch of land from the Shipyard to Candlestick Point be affordable to the people who live in Bayview Hunters Point now.

We do not have $625,000 to waste - most of Lennar's war chest is being spent on consultants - but our initiative does have strong grassroots support. Right now a growing army of volunteers is working the streets, and the campaign to gather 8,500 signatures by Feb. 4 is going well, both at home in Bayview Hunters Point and throughout San Francisco.

The Bayview Jobs, Parks, and Housing Initiative has the support of the Pacific Heights mafia, who do not care about poor folks and affordable housing. They care about making money any way they can.

Lennar and its allies are getting our land and our tax dollars for free. They do not want any meaningful cleanup or abatement. They want to cap the landfill and build homes on toxic land. Lennar has a track record of building homes on toxic land all over this nation.

The community's Affordable Housing counter-initiative, however, will stop them cold. It mandates so much affordable housing that Kofi Bonner, president of Lennar's urban land division in San Francisco, the company that has been poisoning the community with toxic dust for nearly two years, called it a "poison pill."

Lennar is one of the builders hardest hit by the mortgage crisis and recently sold 11,000 homes and lots at 40 cents on the dollar. Its stock has been reduced to junk bond status.

While big developers want to make big money - Bonner said Lennar is counting on a 20-25 percent profit - that the community initiative would deny them, there are many local small developers that can build truly affordable housing using creative financing. Unlike Lennar, small developers hiring community residents will improve the dismal Hunters Point economy.

Lennar did not expect us in two weeks to collect over 8,500 signatures. But we are doing so well that we will sail by our goal ahead of the Feb. 4 deadline.

Over a thousand people are knocking on doors collecting signatures all around San Francisco, and people are flocking to sign. Our volunteers are wearing badges in compliance with the new state law that requires signature gatherers to show whether they paid or volunteering. We managed to get 700 badges and all of them are gone.

We want Lennar out of our community; they have poisoned our children. We want the Pacific Heights mafia out of our community; we will never trust them. We want the crooks and the ploys of the City and County of San Francisco out of our community.

If you are against any development on toxic land until it is cleaned to residential standards in accordance with Prop P that passed in 2000 with the support of over 86 percent of San Francisco voters and if you are in favor of community-controlled development of truly affordable housing when the time comes, we urge you to support the community's Affordable Housing initiative and help gather signatures.

Meet your neighbors at POWER, 32 Seventh St., at 10 a.m. on Saturday and Sunday, Feb. 2 and 3, to push the signature-gathering campaign to victory.

Francisco Da Costa is the director of Environmental Justice Advocacy. www.hunterspointnavalshipyard.com. He can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it or through his website, www.franciscodacosta.com. This story is adapted from the version posted at www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/01/26/18475086.php.

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