A Martin Luther King Boulevard for the dupes in San Francisco

When my son John was young and just beginning to drive, I cautioned him to never get off the highway onto an exit for "a Martin Luther King Boulevard” because, I explained, they were always in the worst part of a city’s slums. “The politicians come in, promise to do all sorts of good things, then name a street after the man and leave, never to reappear until the next election”.( I’d made that discovery on my own back when I was hitch-hiking and driving cross-county several times in the early 70s, but Warren Beatty’s 1978 film Bulworth captured its essence perfectly.)

John was skeptical, and probably mistook his father’s cynicism for racism, but some years later after he’d made his own trips across the country and up and down the coasts, he remembered what I’d warned him, and told me, “Dad, you were right”.

So all of that wordage was to lead into this story, reported today:

San Francisco mayor quietly signs reparations fund that could lead to $5M payments per person

The fund would be a remedy for alleged historic discrimination and displacement, according to an ordinance

The mayor of San Francisco signed an ordinance that creates a "Reparations Fund" that could one day grant each of the city's eligible Black residents up to $5 million in reparations for alleged historic discrimination and displacement.

The ordinance, which was passed by the Board of Supervisors earlier this month, was signed by Democrat Mayor Daniel Lurie two days before Christmas. It establishes the legal framework for the fund but does not allocate funds or guarantee payments. The fund can be financed with private donations, foundations and other non-city sources. 

It proposed that the city "[p]rovide a one-time, lump sum payment of $5 million to each eligible person [estimated at 46,000 “victims”."

Any taxpayer-funded reparations payouts would require separate legislation, an identified funding source and mayoral approval. Lurie told Fox News Digital that no taxpayer money would be paid into the potential pot, given the city's $1 billion budget deficit.  

"I was elected to drive San Francisco’s recovery, and that’s what I’m focused on every day," Lurie said in a statement to Fox News Digital. "We are not allocating money to this fund — with a historic $1 billion budget deficit, we are going to spend our money on making the city safer and cleaner."

….

So: another meaningless street renaming, with a couple of new agencies to provide some no-show jobs for the pols’ cronies, and that’s it, period:

The report also recommended a guaranteed annual income tied to area median income and the creation of new city agencies, including an Office of Reparations, to administer programs. It also called for major housing interventions, such as rental assistance, homeownership support and city-backed funds to purchase property along Black business corridors, as well as multi-million-dollar investments in Black-owned businesses.

Here’s Bulworth: