Is San Francisco really that bad?

[Huss]

There is crime everywhere, just like shark attacks and car wrecks.
I was just in SF last weekend.
I walked all over The Financial, North Beach and SOMA.
Like many, many,many times in the past...........i had no trouble..

Worst type of shark attack? Land sharks. You just don't expect it.

 

[Kino]

There are probably more than a few Psych majors plumbing this site for their final thesis...

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

Worst type of shark attack? Land sharks. You just don't expect it.

That's funny.

 

[BrianShaw]

There are probably more than a few Psych majors plumbing this site for their final thesis...

There are also probably more than a few PhotoPirates plumbing this thread for recent wide-angle pictures of SF tourist traps.

 

[Mike Lopez]

There are also probably more than a few PhotoPirates plumbing this thread for recent wide-angle pictures of SF tourist traps.

Ha! Well played.

 

[takilmaboxer]

I really wonder what effect legalization will have on illegal grows. The price of pot has dropped so much that production has to be at a larger scale than in the old days and that's hard to do when you're growing in the back country (don't ask me how I know). When I lived in the woods of Northern California and Oregon we would go hiking in the winter and often encounter fallow illegal grows. We'd inform the local cops (both of them) and know where to avoid during summer. Meth labs are entirely another matter as they are much smaller. But I don't see how small scale pot farming can compete with the mega-greenhouses that exist today. So...maybe a little safer in the hills?

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

I really wonder what effect legalization will have on illegal grows. The price of pot has dropped so much that production has to be at a larger scale than in the old days and that's hard to do when you're growing in the back country (don't ask me how I know). When I lived in the woods of Northern California and Oregon we would go hiking in the winter and often encounter fallow illegal grows. We'd inform the local cops (both of them) and know where to avoid during summer. Meth labs are entirely another matter as they are much smaller. But I don't see how small scale pot farming can compete with the mega-greenhouses that exist today. So...maybe a little safer in the hills?

Do you ever sample along the way? Like you might with mushrooms.

 

[Huss]

I really wonder what effect legalization will have on illegal grows. The price of pot has dropped so much that production has to be at a larger scale than in the old days and that's hard to do when you're growing in the back country (don't ask me how I know). When I lived in the woods of Northern California and Oregon we would go hiking in the winter and often encounter fallow illegal grows. We'd inform the local cops (both of them) and know where to avoid during summer. Meth labs are entirely another matter as they are much smaller. But I don't see how small scale pot farming can compete with the mega-greenhouses that exist today. So...maybe a little safer in the hills?

You’ve never come across a recent illegal grow. They are run by the cartel. The reason they exist is because while California may have legalized pot, they saw it as a gold mine for tax revenue. And tax it at such a high level that it directly caused these new illegal grows and related crime. Cuz the cartel don’t pay tax.

 

[jtk]

The cartel (cartels) buy real estate, especially strip malls, in order to cash in. None of this has anything to do with San Francisco.

 

[wiltw]

I really wonder what effect legalization will have on illegal grows. The price of pot has dropped so much that production has to be at a larger scale than in the old days and that's hard to do when you're growing in the back country (don't ask me how I know). When I lived in the woods of Northern California and Oregon we would go hiking in the winter and often encounter fallow illegal grows. We'd inform the local cops (both of them) and know where to avoid during summer. Meth labs are entirely another matter as they are much smaller. But I don't see how small scale pot farming can compete with the mega-greenhouses that exist today. So...maybe a little safer in the hills?

Interesting to learn that growers of know good quality stuff in the Santa Cruz mountains had not found expansion market for their product in spite of legalized growing and distribution and sales. There was an article in the newspaper some time back about the obstacles that they encountered. Although not about Santa Cruz growers, this article gives some insight into the lack of economic success

Why legal weed is failing in one of California’s legendary pot-growing regions

In Trinity County, boom-and-bust cycles are part of history. Legal cannabis promised to be an economic shot in the arm. But that expectation quickly collapsed.

lookout.co

My wife inherited a home from her parents, which has been rented to same person since before their passing (after we put them into a senior residence). He invested in marijuana business, and it has been nowhere near the success he hoped it would be, to the point that he has largely withdrawn from that market and returned to his proven business of buying properties, renovating then, then flipping them.

Despite legalization, continued federal status makes it hard for pot businesses to have conventional bank accounts for paying creditors and employees, and since a lot of cash moves about, the pirates target the movements of cash so not only is money in jeopardy but employees are endangered. The taxation of the businesses is a significant issue, as mentioned in a March 2022 article

Tax Hikes Continue to Hit the Cannabis Industry Hard | Good Times

Six Santa Cruz County cannabis businesses have shuttered over the last year.

www.goodtimes.sc

The lack of federal legal status interferes with legal pot business operators having access to financial institutions, insurance, and related services.

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

Interesting to learn that growers of know good quality stuff in the Santa Cruz mountains had not found expansion market for their product in spite of legalized growing and distribution and sales. There was an article in the newspaper some time back about the obstacles that they encountered. Although not about Santa Cruz growers, this article gives some insight into the lack of economic success

Why legal weed is failing in one of California’s legendary pot-growing regions

In Trinity County, boom-and-bust cycles are part of history. Legal cannabis promised to be an economic shot in the arm. But that expectation quickly collapsed.

lookout.co

My wife inherited a home from her parents, which has been rented to same person since before their passing (after we put them into a senior residence). He invested in marijuana business, and it has been nowhere near the success he hoped it would be, to the point that he has largely withdrawn from that market and returned to his proven business of buying properties, renovating then, then flipping them.

Despite legalization, continued federal status makes it hard for pot businesses to have conventional bank accounts for paying creditors and employees, and since a lot of cash moves about, the pirates target the movements of cash so not only is money in jeopardy but employees are endangered. The taxation of the businesses is a significant issue, as mentioned in a March 2022 article

Tax Hikes Continue to Hit the Cannabis Industry Hard | Good Times

Six Santa Cruz County cannabis businesses have shuttered over the last year.

www.goodtimes.sc

The lack of federal legal status interferes with legal pot business operators having access to financial institutions, insurance, and related services.

They'd make more money switching to film.

 

[DREW WILEY]

Outsiders might think of Calif as wealthy due to the tech industry, or perhaps Hollywood. But it's also got the most financially productive farmland in the world. It's amazing what's grown here. But now the no. 1 income crop is actually pot, and at least 75% of that is illegal, zero taxes collected, and it involves an enormous quantity of water being pirated and polluted. Some of these are huge Cartel operations way back in the brush with workers helicoptered in, and guarded with fully automatic weapons. Yeah, they keep them way back in, where few few tourists or hikers are apt to go anyway. They tend to discovered when their metal-roofed sheds and warehouses get their camo covers burned off during forest fires, and spotted by fire fighting or damage assessment overflights. By the time authorities can safely get there after a big burn, everyone has left. These aren't amateurs anymore. And most of the meth trade in Central Cal is not amateur either, but part of an international cartel run by an infamous motorcycle gang.

Don't say this got nuthin' to do with SF or other big city problems. ..... Why do you think people steal so often? There have been major drug production busts right across the Bridge in scenic Marin woodlands. Maybe some of the apes from Planet of the Apes started it when they escaped across the GG Bridge to begin with. There must be some truth to that, since a lot of human mutants were certainly the end result.

Beware Matt - the apes were last seen headed north!

 

[faberryman]

I definitely wouldn't take a camera with me when visiting illegal marijuana operations run by the Cartel or meth labs run by an infamous motorcycle gang, unless I had some human mutants to act as body guards.

 

[Huss]

I definitely wouldn't take a camera with me when visiting illegal marijuana operations run by the Cartel or meth labs run by an infamous motorcycle gang, unless I had some human mutants to act as body guards.

Why would you visit an illegal operation?

 

[faberryman]

It seems like like it might be an interesting photo project. Certainly more interesting than taking photographs of mimes in Ghiradelli Square. Been there, done that.

 

[DREW WILEY]

Some of legal ones with high overhead are starting to go rogue in order to price compete. But that's how most of em started out anyway. But it's also how to attract unwanted attention from dangerous competitors with a lot more firepower. That's even more the case with meth. The internationally franchised biker gang involved has whitewashed itself with lawyers and a PR campaign for the public, Christmas toy drives n' all; but the meth producers themselves know darn well the serious risk of trying to go around them; and that's what counts
to the domestic meth cartel itself.

When I ran into one of the head Foresters for the Shasta NF district, which has the most illegal pot operations of all, I asked him why they didn't crack down on it more. His answer was frank and sadly logical. He responded that if they did, those "same types" would simply shift from growing over to meth instead, which would be an even worse scenario. And it's inevitable in those narco counties that law enforcement itself is tainted to a real extent.

 

[Sirius Glass]

Outsiders might think of Calif as wealthy due to the tech industry, or perhaps Hollywood. But it's also got the most financially productive farmland in the world. It's amazing what's grown here. But now the no. 1 income crop is actually pot, and at least 75% of that is illegal, zero taxes collected, and it involves an enormous quantity of water being pirated and polluted. Some of these are huge Cartel operations way back in the brush with workers helicoptered in, and guarded with fully automatic weapons. Yeah, they keep them way back in, where few few tourists or hikers are apt to go anyway. They tend to discovered when their metal-roofed sheds and warehouses get their camo covers burned off during forest fires, and spotted by fire fighting or damage assessment overflights. By the time authorities can safely get there after a big burn, everyone has left. These aren't amateurs anymore. And most of the meth trade in Central Cal is not amateur either, but part of an international cartel run by an infamous motorcycle gang.

Don't say this got nuthin' to do with SF or other big city problems. ..... Why do you think people steal so often? There have been major drug production busts right across the Bridge in scenic Marin woodlands. Maybe some of the apes from Planet of the Apes started it when they escaped across the GG Bridge to begin with. There must be some truth to that, since a lot of human mutants were certainly the end result.

Beware Matt - the apes were last seen headed north!

The first or second Planet of the Apes movie had the first apes escaping across a bridge in Century City in West Los Angeles.

 

[DREW WILEY]

The plot line had them escaping SF over the GG into the redwoods. If it had been west LA they arrived at, they would have turned around and surrendered, since it would have been worse than where they came from. But if it had been a real world incident instead of fiction, I can attest that Berkeley had more strange monkeys that anywhere else on the West Coast. I worked there for 45 yrs.

But these days that ole stereotype applies to only about 3% of the ole hippie population who escaped the hunters and taxidermists working on a Smithsonian 60's diorama. Some of the monkeys did survive fo awhlle over in Marin in Susalito and Bolinas, or further north in Garberville. Berkeley itself is getting more and more gentrified as the biotech capitol of the world, along with the University getting more and more tech oriented. But there is still a huge homeless problem involving a lot of addiction and mental illness, plus its internal crime.
It you want to see a hippie, go to the Smithsonian and see a stuffed one. No more left around here.

 

[Huss]

The plot line had them escaping SF over the GG into the redwoods. If it had been west LA they arrived at, they would have turned around and surrendered, since it would have been worse than where they came from.

Whoa whoa whoa. This thread is about San Fran bashing, not Los Angeles bashing.

No piggy backs! It’s poor form, like someone paying for an ad in the B&S, and someone commenting in it that they also have one like it to sell.

 

[takilmaboxer]

We did in fact encounter cartel grows and always ratted them out, they were our friends' competition. Northwest CA/southern OR are very white and the illegals are obvious. That's why they moved further into the hills. All forms of organized crime are VERY dangerous, but they are supplying people's demand, and as Drew noted that is precisely what causes crime in places like SF. The guy robbing you at gunpoint is not a pot head - he's addicted to a white powder, and for him, NOTHING ELSE MATTERS.

 

[DREW WILEY]

Well, it's time for me to chime out... I think we've already driven enough apes far enough north to keep Matt preoccupied and tormented for awhile. So at least something good came out of this long discussion.

 

[faberryman]

I was watching an interview that George Santos gave on a Brazilian talk show in which he recounted having been mugged in NY and the muggers having taken his shoes. And so I am wondering if I should leave both my camera and my shoes at home when I visit SF, it being a big city and all. Then I read about some of the stuff found on the sidewalks in SF and thought I might risk wearing shoes, but not risk taking my camera. In fact, I thought about taking two pairs of shoes just in case I got mugged, so that I would have a backup pair. If I were murdered during the mugging, I would also have a pair of shoes to be buried in, though I'm not sure why anyone would want to be buried with their shoes on. Then I was thinking that maybe I should go out and buy a pair of really comfortable shoes for my backup shoes, in case they make me wear shoes when I'm dead. I am not sure that Sartre was right when he said Hell is other people. I am thinking Hell is spending an eternity in uncomfortable shoes. Anyway, when you are dead, all sorts of decisions are out of your hands, so you sort of need to plan ahead. I would like to commend George Santos for prompting me to consider these issues.

 

[Sirius Glass]

I was watching an interview that George Santos gave on a Brazilian talk show in which he recounted having been mugged in NY and the muggers took his shoes. And so I am wondering if I should leave both my camera and my shoes at home when I visit SF, it being a big city and all. Then I read about some of the stuff found on the sidewalks in SF and thought I might risk wearing shoes, but not risk taking my camera. In fact, I thought about taking two pairs of shoes just in case I got mugged, so that I would have a backup pair.

I still have my shoes and my Hasselbalds after a week in San Francisco.

 

[Rayt]

I live in SF and shoot all the time with my Leicas. This one was from a few days ago. Pier 43 Fisherman’s Wharf.

 

[wiltw]

I was watching an interview that George Santos gave on a Brazilian talk show in which he recounted having been mugged in NY and the muggers having taken his shoes. And so I am wondering if I should leave both my camera and my shoes at home when I visit SF, it being a big city and all. .

Losing your shoes is better than losing your shorts!