Last week Valleywag wrote about Mission hipsters taking on the Google with spray cans.
This past weekend on my walk home after a Friday night tutorial at Zeitgeist on how to graffiti like the pros (it involves a paper bag), I noticed the same stencil spray painted on the corner of 24th & Guerrero.
I walk past the Google shuttle stop every morning and I don’t know that I’d go as far as to call them “trendy professionals”, but I think the graffiti guys and the googlites have a lot in common, per Richard Flordia’s thesis in “The Rise of the Creative Class.” Florida posits that creative professionals are simply seeking communities with a sense of ‘authenticity’… that would be panaderias over Banana Republic.
Shootings > Starbucks?
It’s too bad the salaries of Googlites can’t take care of drive-by shootings on the same corner. From SF Gate on June 23:
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San Francisco police also were investigating a shooting Sunday night of a man in his mid-30s who was attacked near the corner of 24th and Guerrero streets by a person who jumped out of a car and started shooting. The shooter then jumped back into the car and fled with a driver, according to police.
In related news, if “young professionals” don’t do it, the government will take care of public blight for you:
Sad chapter in Western Addition history ending
The Fillmore, where 60 percent of the residents were African American, was declared blight in 1948. The first demolition project began in 1956. The second phase, the brainchild of the redevelopment agency’s then-head Justin Herman, began in 1964 and expanded the area to 60 square blocks. Eminent domain was used to purchase Victorian homes and buy out local businesses. The thriving black business community was destroyed as owners of nightclubs, barbershops, banks and retail stores were forced to close up shop.
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The city plans to turn over 1,300 acres – more than half of the Bayview-Hunters Point area – to the Redevelopment Agency to help clean up blight, build affordable housing and stimulate business. The project creates the largest redevelopment district in San Francisco history.
** Update, Aug. 18: The graffiti lesson was delivered on Day 14, check out Notes from the Zeitgeist
