Renovations, Innovations and Downright Skulduggery
• • • • • • • • • • January 2026 • • • • • • • • • •
It’s been stated: “Old politicians never die — they just run once too often.” And, “a New Year’s resolution is something that goes in one year and out the other.”
Last month brought cheer to many readers as AAA and GasBuddy reported that nationwide gasoline prices declined to a $2.90-per-gallon average, though not in California, where the best locations charge $3.95 per gallon. The aforementioned $2.90 is 17 cents lower than November and 7.3 cents lower than 2024. You, naughty non-electric-motor-vehicle drivers, can consider this your holiday present.
Not so fortunate are BART passengers and other Bay Area transportation riders who are confronted with a regressive sales tax increase when using BART and other municipal transit systems, such as MUNI. If passed by voters this year, it will bump the sales tax in San Mateo, San Francisco, Alameda, and Santa Clara counties to over 10% to fund over $1,000,000,000 for transit systems.
Meanwhile, Waymo now fears competition from Amazon’s Zoox, another robotaxi operator, which launched a free robotaxi service in San Francisco neighborhoods if you were prescient enough to sign up for a waiting list last November to use it by vehicles without a steering wheel, transporting a maximum of four passengers. Zoox is made in Foster City. It started in 2014 and was acquired by Amazon in June 2020 for over $1,200,000,000, and Zoox has been testing the fleet with safety drivers in SF’s Mission, South of Market, and Design District neighborhoods. It also operates in Las Vegas. Waymo now operates at SFO and San Jose’s Mineta International Airport, and provides service to Miami, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and Orlando.
Born in Hong Kong, Connie (Chan) fought with us to stop the closing of the Great Highway and the “upzoning” of the Sunset, Richmond, and other neighborhoods by Mayor Lurie under state law authorized by her opponent Scott Weiner, who’s never seen a land developer he doesn’t want to please.”
A San Mateo Daily Journal reader (Zinovy Fichtenholz) last month revived the question of who controls demolitions and renovations of the White House and identified those that occurred just from 1933, when Franklin Delano Roosevelt used private funds to install an indoor swimming pool so he could exercise. From 1948 to 1952, President Harry S. Truman gutted and remodeled the White House at taxpayer expense after a constituent paid for a bowling alley as a birthday present. In 1955, Dwight David Eisenhower moved the bowling alley to the White House basement. He built a putting green with private funds. John F. Kennedy used taxpayer money to erect the Situation Room in 1961. In 1970, Richard Milhouse Nixon spent taxpayer money to convert FDR’s swimming pool into the Press Room. Gerald Ford secured private donations to build an outdoor swimming pool in 1975.
The “Savior” (Barack Obama) the Harvard Law School flash in 2009 was the only presidential inauguration my wife and I have attended (thanks to US Senator Diane Feinstein), secured private money to build a basketball court (since he probably missed Harvard Law School’s Hemenway Gym where your scribe used to cavort after morning classes) and in just two years Joe Biden spent $50,000,000 of our money to remake the Situation Room. Amidst the foregoing history, “Bone Spur” Trump doesn’t look so disdainful of the “common man” and taxpayers with his East Wing demolition in the White House. Mr. Fichtenholz also reminds me that California’s State Capitol, where I served Californians for 12 years as a State Senator, has been under renovation for two years. It won’t be completed until 2027, not 2025 (as promised), for $1,200,000,000 in taxpayer money, but it is now supposed to be finished, costing us taxpayers $1,630,000,000! For the record, I never thought the State Capitol needed renovation. Where has our next president, on the first floor of the Capitol (Gavin the Great), been on this renovative taxpayer hijacking?
Meanwhile, the San Francisco political beat continues. I was delighted to observe, then endorse Supervisor Connie Chan’s run for District 11, US House of Representatives, to replace the Honorable Nancy Pelosi after Madame Nancy’s 39 years of service to San Fran and the US of A ends this year. Born in Hong Kong, Connie fought with us to stop the closing of the Great Highway and the “upzoning” of the Sunset, Richmond, and other neighborhoods by Mayor Lurie under state law authorized by her opponent Scott Weiner, who’s never seen a land developer he doesn’t want to please.
Meanwhile, an initiative to return zoning responsibility to local government continues to require registered voters to qualify for the June 2, 2026, statewide election. The sponsors are called “Our Neighborhood Voices.” Getting this initiative on the ballot is essential to local good government! Please register to vote if you haven’t thus far. The state and local elections will be held on November 3, 2026.
Meanwhile, an October poll by Reuters/Insos (?) found that the most significant factors in deciding how Americans will vote in this year’s election are: cost of living (40%), protecting democracy (28%), immigration (14%), and crime (99%). Incidentally, Department of Labor statistics released in late November 2025 show that 25% of the 7,600,000 Americans unemployed in September 2025 had, at best, a bachelor’s degree.
Immigration, illegal and legal, continues to absorb “Draft Dodger” Trump, who fired 11 San Francisco immigration judges and one assistant chief judge last year. One judge retired. That’s a total of 12 judges, leaving only nine judges to process cases. As I’ve stated before, I support legal immigration, which benefits our nation. The denial rate nationwide last year was about 59%. One fired judge had approved nearly 91% of asylum and temporary protected status cases. All those fired had approved asylum rates of about 90%. The US Department of Justice is hiring immigration judges and describes them as “deportation judges.” Their salary is $159,951 to $207,500 annually, plus a 25% hiring incentive.
Purging immigration judges who grant relief to immigrants seeking asylum isn’t new for a president. One president in my lifetime removed people from federal departments (especially political rivals) and appointed his own. The president was Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1933. It resulted in a US Supreme Court case protecting executive branch employees from dismissal. In 1789, Congress gave the president the power to remove the heads of the Treasury, War, and Foreign Affairs (later renamed the Department of State). Although I’m not a fan of San Francisco and other local governmental entities becoming “sanctuary” enclaves, I do believe in judicial independence and oppose presidential dictation of judges’ decisions, especially the US Supreme Court.
We have local governmental law to consider now, with the introduction of a proposed Charter amendment by Supervisor Bilal Mahmood, which, if passed by voters, would prohibit supervisors from serving two terms (eight years) and then permit their candidacy after a four-year hiatus. As noted last month, by The SF Standard, the measure appears to be a reaction to the possible candidacy of former Board of Supervisors President Aaron Peskin in 2028. As a Charter amendment, Mahmood’s legislation needs five sponsors. At press time, Mahmood hadn’t informed taxpayers who they were. Peskin has been the only person to serve over two terms in the 26 years since San Francisco voters approved district elections to the dismay of residents. Peskin is an honest, intelligent, and devoted supervisor. If Mahmood wants to improve local governance, why doesn’t he introduce a Charter amendment to restore at-large election of our City Hall heroes? (He probably wouldn’t be elected!) Candidates now spend tens of thousands of dollars on elections, costing taxpayers the $150,000 salaries of four staff members to serve 1/11th of our City and County, in addition to their own $175,000 annual gouging. I recommend a “No” vote if Mahmood’s brainstorm is on the June 2nd ballot.
In 1850, Daniel Welster proclaimed: “I shall know but one county… I was born an American; I shall die an American.” As Board of Education members try to make us all proud of San Francisco public schools, I remind readers that America’s public education began on April 23, 1635, with the establishment of Boston Latin School in Boston, Massachusetts.
Quentin Kopp is a former San Francisco supervisor, state senator, SF Ethics Commission member, president of the California High Speed Rail Authority governing board and retired Superior Court judge.
January 2026
