San Francisco Examiner
Editorial Originally Published July 16, 2007

In one of the more practical visionary plans to emerge from the San Francisco municipal government during recent years, Mayor Gavin Newsom’s Task Force on Green Building has laid out a detailed blueprint for phasing in green standards that would make The City the most environmentally advanced in the nation by 2012.  Advantages to the public from adoption of such rigorous environmental standards for all new private and government-funded construction would include projected savings of 220,000 hours of electricity and 100 million gallons of drinking water, elimination of 60,000 tons of CO2 emissions and 700 million pounds of construction/demolition waste. Read more »

By Cecilia M. Vega, Wyatt Buchanan
San Francisco Chronicle
Originally Published April 14, 2007

Cars would be banned from a stretch of Golden Gate Park's main road on Saturdays for six months of the year under a groundbreaking agreement reached Friday that could end a long-running and acrimonious debate over vehicle usage in San Francisco's largest park.  The compromise, which will require approval from the Board of Supervisors, came after more than 15 hours of negotiations in City Hall brokered by Mayor Gavin Newsom's office. It would make a stretch of roadway off limits to vehicles from the first Saturday of April through the last Saturday of September every year. The deal also covers a smaller area than is currently closed off to cars on Sundays and makes the ban permanent, scrapping a proposed six-month trial period. Read more »