Yesterday's Board of Supervisors meeting was mercifully short, thanks to an absolute dearth of discussion and a full roster of supervisors arriving on time to the People's Chambers. Items 1 - 11 breezed right on through on a roll call vote, which means the $1.1 million staircase in Hunters Point gets it's federal funds, the Mission Streetscape Plan is finally approved and (most importantly) Southern Pacific Brewing Company gets it's liquor license. With those out of the way, it was on to the final vote on the Twitter Tax break, which went exactly as you might expect.

Supervisor Avalos, with his own mayoral campaign to think about now, stood up to speak his peace and thank the other dissenting voters one last time before the same 8-3 vote went through. This isn't the first time Avalos has laid issues to rest like this. A month ago, he lamented the passage of the weak Mayoral Question Time process in the same way. It's nice to see someone on the board who doesn't take a loss lying down, but in this case the discussion of the business tax, the payroll tax and taxes on stock options has already moved on. Even Ross Mirkarimi seems ready to talk with President Chiu, Mayor Lee and Supervisor Farrell about how to tackle the issue in the long term. No need to be a martyr here. Zero points for John Avalos.

Likewise, the vote on the non-resident fees for the Botanical Garden passed with the same narrow margin as last week, but none of the five supes who voted against it felt like giving it a proper eulogy. Instead, one Mary Spoerer decided to go all Queen of Hearts on the Board, screaming "Off with your heads!" and waving goodbye as a deputy pulled her out of the room.

Supervisor Wiener took a moment to speak to his "long overdue" tenant displacement legislation which passed unanimously on the first vote. Later the D8 supervisor said he was happy to have his "kumbayah moment", but he was still disappointed to see that the Transit Workers Union was moving forward with their strike vote. He called for the TWU and the MTA to take the opportunity to reform Muni and save money in a "horrific budget year". Nice sentiment, but we'll wait to see if Wiener has any teeth on the MTC before we award points for raging against Muni. Everybody and their sister does that already and that obviously hasn't gotten us much closer to Muni reform.

And speaking of showing one's teeth: at his D8 town hall meeting this past weekend, Supervisor Wiener let the audience know they could contact his office if they spotted coyotes in District 8. So obviously, Scott Wiener gets +1 for being the only Supervisor we know of with a coyote engagement protocol.

From there the board moved on to introducing new legislature, none of which was particularly interesting:

Supervisor Mirkarimi introduced a resolution to support SB 729, which makes it slightly more difficult for banks to drop a foreclosures on mortgaged homes.

Eric Mar introduced legislation to keep discarded restaurant grease out of our city's sewers, which is apparently a real problem we have.

Jane Kim requested a hearing to get an update on what happened to all those homeless people who were evicted from the Transbay Terminal, commended the Tenderloin community for their efforts after a recent 3-alarm fire in her district and then playfully adjusted her hair with the carefree air of a shampoo commercial.

Completely arbitrary +1 to Jane Kim for classing up this snoozefest. Maybe we could also get her to eat Doritos during Board meetings and solve that budget deficit through SFGovTV product placement.

Mark Farrell finally introduced his legislation to reform the tax code in the wake of the Twitter tax break.

David Chiu followed Farrell's tax reform comments by saying he's also committed to solving this problem, but he's waiting on more data from the City Economist and Controller. So, we'll just say any points either of these guys would get for this are canceled out until we see more action here.

Chiu also supported a new health care initiative that would created a more central repository for patient records (because paper records are a mess and often "illegible", as he says). He closed with a proposal to use Bay Trail funds to make Fisherman's Wharf more agreeable during the America's Cup. If you ask us, the most agreeable part of Fisherman's Wharf is that we never have to go there, ever.

Our final vote on this week's meeting is a resounding "meh." Jane Kim is finally back in black and Scott Wiener's coyote policy put him back on top of the rankings in a tie with Ross Mirkarimi. As a tiebreaker, we'll just say Mary Spoerer wins this week for showing some signs of life and giving the Sheriff's Deputy something to do.

Final Ranking: (this week's points in parenthesis)
5 Ross Mirkarimi (No change)
5 Scott Wiener (+1)
4 Sean Elsbernd (No change)
4 Mark Farrell (No change)
2.5 Carmen Chu (No change)
2 David Campos (No Change)
1 David Chiu (No change)
1 Malia Cohen (No change)
1 Jane Kim (+1)
-1 John Avalos (No change)
-2 Eric Mar (No change)
-999,999,999 Mayor Ed Lee (No appearance this week)

Despite a deficit of $306+ million, the San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors, mayor and other elected officials could receive thousands of dollars more in their paychecks come next fiscal year. "The salaries of each of the 11 members of the Board of Supervisors will increase by nearly $2,000 next fiscal year, from $96,549 to $98,469, reports The Examiner. "Other, more highly-compensated elected officials, such as the city attorney, will see their salaries grow next year compared to this year by more than $4,000. The mayor’s salary will increase by $5,462 from $247,473 to $252,935."

But. Even with the pay increases, as SF Weekly points out, "city supervisors are still receiving salaries that are well below 2009 levels."

This week's Board of Supervisors meeting agenda lacks the star power of an Ed Lee cameo, so those of us following along at home will probably be left with nothing to discuss other than the seasonal-appropriateness of Supervisor Kim's outfit. If we can get past our sartorial obsessions, however, here's what we'll be keeping an eye on:

Item 0: Resolution to get Scott Wiener a pre-meeting espresso and/or 5 Hour Energy Drink - Not an actual agenda item, but after last week's naptime, SFist editorial staff approved a resolution to make sure D8 Supervisor Scott Wiener doesn't nod off again.

Item 3: Approval of Liquor License for Southern Pacific Brewing Company - Others have written about the NIMBY problems facing the new brewery, but we'd just like to see even more local beer. The city will never reach a critical mass of loca-tipplers if all our brewpubs are micro.

Item 4: Approval of $1.1 million federal grant for Arelious Walker Drive Improvement Project - The saddest looking stairway in all of Hunter's Point is going to get a million dollar facelift. We don't expect this to be much of a discussion since the money's coming from a federal grant, but maybe Malia Cohen will give a rousing speech? One hopes.

Item 8: Mission District Streetscape Plan - Passed on first reading last week. Expect it to finally pass this week.

Item 12: Twitter Tax Break - Wait, we're still talking about this? Yes, we are. Because the amendments keep getting screwed up. Assuming all the paperwork is in order this week it should be finally passed.

Item 13: Botanical Garden Non-Resident Fee - Temporary Mayor Ed Lee won out over Possibly Mayor John Avalos last week in an item that had far too much discussion when you realize we're still talking about charging tourists to look at plants. If last week's vote carries over, non-residents will continue paying to look at said plants until at least September 2013.

New Business:

Item 14: Temporary Good Samaritan Occupancy - the first new item on today's list would allow city officials to bestow Good Samaritan status after tenants are dislocated due to emergencies like fires, earthquakes, landslides, etc. D8 Supe Scott Wiener is sponsoring this one after a firebug hit his district, but we think Marina Supervisor Mark Farrell added his name to the legislation because there's a strong chance his district could sink in to the Bay at any moment. Good Samaritan status creates some exceptions to the rent law so that displaced victims could enjoy lower rent for an agreed-upon period of up to two years. After that period, the landlord is free to evict the tenant on just cause or bump up their rent back to market rates.

Item 21: Resolution supporting Assembly Bill 877, Non-Felony Vehicle Code Violations - Resolutions are crap, in general, but Ross Mirkarimi would like to support the California Assembly's bill that would make it easier for the formerly incarcerated to obtain a driver's license.

Item 22 and 23: Redevelopment Improvements of Arelious Walker Drive Stairway and Bayview Opera House - These two items would allow the Redevelopment agency to spend another $61,500 on that stairway mentioned in item 4 and another $1.18 million on improvements to the Bayview Opera House and it's surrounding plaza.

The full board agenda is available here and the meeting thing kicks off at 2 p.m. on Tuesdays. For those of you who like to follow along from home, you can stream it live on SFGovTV.org

Just as everyone who showed up for Question Time with Ed Lee at yesterday's Board Meeting started to nod off to the Mayor's smooth-as-felt, Kermit the Frog voice, Board President David Chiu skipped ahead to the closed session item on pensions, "out of respect for the Mayor's schedule." Apparently they have zero respect for our schedule because the secret pension discussion took over an hour. And those benches outside the People's Chambers are not ideal for napping. Still, we'll award +1 to Mayor Lee for his crack at David Campos. That means he only has 999,999,999 to make up after his last appearance. Harsh, we know, but Lee should understand that it ain't easy inheriting a huge deficit.

Returning from the closed session, the meeting resumed with Jane Kim who apparently didn't do her homework and left her amendments to the Twitter Tax break legislation off of the distributed materials. Yikes! How embarrassing!

Still, no one seemed to give a shit about the amendments which adjusted the tax break area slightly and put responsibility for annual progress reports on the shoulders of the City Administrator - the item finally passed with the same 8-3 vote as last week. Snooze.

After President Chiu steered the meeting towards special commendations, Supervisor Kim recognized The Eagle Tavern as a "cultural institution" and honored the bar for the money they've raised for various causes during their Sunday Beer Busts. While Kim gets to claim geographic jurisdiction over the Eagle, David Campos and Scott Wiener chimed in to express their demographic support. In this case, heartfelt support outweighs the icky feeling that comes with tagging along on a colleague's commendation, so we'll allow it and donate +1 across the board (pun intended?) to those three. Still, the Eagle needs action more than commendations in order to be rescued, so we won't award any points just for being gushy either.

Eric Mar commended Modern Times bookstore, another local business and gathering place that won't be around much longer. Another cute commendation, for sure, but mentioning the great discounts you can currently find at Modern Times maybe wasn't the best "on the bright side..." point you could make. Later, during a lengthy hearing regarding a T-Mobile cell site in North Beach, Mar seized the opportunity to wave his Android phone around in the air and talk about how much he loves it. Of course Eric Mar has an Android phone. What a nerd. +1 for encouraging bookish communities, -1 for being tardy and awkward. Zero points for Eric Mar. Cool phone!

D11 supe John Avalos took the reigns for the discussion of the non-resident admission fee at the Botanical Garden: he talked about German tourists who passed on the garden because it was too expensive, a local woman who didn't carry ID and was denied entry and that one time he had to ride his bike "back up the hill" when he forgot his wallet (a story that had absolutely nothing to do with the Botanical Garden aside from explaining why some of us might not always have identification on our person. Anyway, his kids love the Botanical Garden! And as he said, this issue "affects all of San Francisco." Sure, it affects the entire wallet-losing population of San Francisco. Those of us with plant allergies and/or readily available proof of a San Francisco zipcode probably aren't affected so much. -1 to John Avalos for forgetting his wallet.

Overall the Botanical Garden discussion went on for far too long when you consider we're basically just talking about charging tourists for stuff we locals get to do for free. (That's the definition of a tourist - look it up.) But David Chiu raised a good point: "We don't live in a perfect world," he said, "we have structural budget deficits as far as the eye can see." Just think though, if you lived in the Botanical Garden, you would live in a perfect world. And there wouldn't even be tourists there because they can't afford it. But that's our joke, not Chiu's so he won't get any points for it. Besides, we're still pissed the closed session took priority over tin hats and public comment. -1 for David Chiu.

On the other side of the Botanical Garden fence, we'd say Supervisor Mirkarimi's speech was a waste of breath, but that would be a waste of blog inches because we know he'll still talk forever next week. And anyway, Ross managed to work in a zinger to describe his displeasure with the fee. Something to the effect of: "We let visitors park for free all day in city parks, but we charge the to look at plants." POW! The board just got MirkaREAMED. (Ugh, sorry.) +1 for Ross Mirkarimi.

While all this was going on, Scott Wiener, probably still exhausted from a long night barhopping from the Eagle to Skylark, was spotted getting dangerously close to falling asleep sitting. The Castro supe didn't have the luxury of dozing off during the closed session so he perfected that ol' college classic of gently closing one's eyes and hoping no one would notice. Since some of us on the editorial staff spent years trying to perfect this technique, we desperately want to give Wiener 10 points for not ending up with his head on the desk, but in the world of real grownups we just can't bring ourselves to condone this sort of behavior. The board was nice enough to hold off on voting for his off-leash dog area item until he could get a nap in though. -1 for Scott Wiener. We're still big fans, but grab some coffee, dude!

Malia Cohen was relatively silent except for when she spoke in favor of the admission fee at the Botanical Garden. We would normally ding her a point or two for peppering her public speeches with a whole lot of "uh..." and "um...", but honestly she needs the practice in front of a room, so we'll allow it.

After public comment and some breezing through the trivial items, the nearly 6-hour meeting wrapped with Ross Mirkarimi taking the top spot this week, all thanks to that diamond in the rough of his notoriously long speeches. Our previously leader, Scott Wiener wavered a bit, but in the end didn't change. Carmen Chu, Mark Farrell, Sean Elsbored were present, but like...not really. Meanwhile, the nerd patrol holds court at the bottom: Eric Mar has some ground to make up, but not nearly as much as Mayor Lee.

Final Ranking: (this week's points in parenthesis)
5 Ross Mirkarimi (+1)
4 Scott Wiener (+1,-1)
4 Sean Elsbernd (No change)
4 Mark Farrell (No change)
2.5 Carmen Chu (No change)
2 David Campos (+1)
1 David Chiu (-1)
1 Malia Cohen (Meh)
0 Jane Kim (+1)
-1 John Avalos (-1)
-2 Eric Mar (No change)
-999,999,999 Mayor Ed Lee (+1)

Tardy: Eric Mar.

Last week's meeting turned out surprisingly short after most of the supes managed to keep their discussions of the Twitter tax break relatively brief. This week, a slightly longer list of agenda items, some administrative items to take care of, and a very special cameo by Temporary Mayor Ed Lee might stretch the meeting's run time a little longer. With that said, here's a brief rundown of how Question Time with Ed Lee will play out and the agenda items we'll be keeping an eye on after the Board is finished gently poking the Interim Mayor:

Mayor Question Time: 2 p.m. Special Order - Question Time is scheduled for the 2nd board meeting of every month from now on and Supes must submit questions ahead of time, so don't expect anything too timely. Discussion of any regular agenda items is against the rules and the Mayor will have 5 minutes to answer each supervisor's submitted question. In situations where time-sensitive policy questions need to be asked of the Mayor, any supervisor can move to allow a spontaneous question, but they'll need 8 votes from the board to get an answer out of him. If the public wants to comment on anything the Mayor had to say, they'll have to wait until regularly scheduled Public Comment time.

For his first round, Lee will answer five questions from Districts 1, 3, 5, 7, and 11 (All of these questions fall under Agenda Item 1, by the way):

• D1 Supe Eric Mar submits the longest question asking how Lee intends to "create a framework where all neighborhoods and business districts get assistance and advantages in terms of job creation and community benefits?" Mar also wants to know how the Mayor will make sure the entire community is involved in creating the community benefits agreement in the midmarket corridor and elsewhere.
  
• Not sure why D3 Supe/Board President Chiu needed to submit a question publicly since he and Lee seem to be joined at the hip lately, but he's interested in how the Mayor gauges budget cuts to major city services and whether Lee plans to look for new revenue sources to make up the budget deficit.
  
• From D5, Ross Mirkarimi is already thinking ahead to that possible term as Sheriff - he wants to know how San Francisco should deal with the responsibility of housing inmates that Governor Brown's AB 109 bill will unload on local municipalities. That's kind of an unexpected question, but we hope Lee offers to reopen Alcatraz.
  
• From the Outer Sunset, D7 supe Sean Elsbernd asks for the Mayor's thoughts on "city employee pensions, health care and retiree health care".
  
• In D11, John Avalos wants to know how Mayor Lee plans to revitalize the area around Balboa Park Station and turn it in to a true transit hub, rather than just a maintenance facility.

Regular Agenda Items:
Items 2, 3, 4: The Twitter Tax Break, Urban Agriculture legislation, and new lease terms with the 49ers at Candlestick were all passed last week. Expect them to be bundled together for final passage, unless someone wants to be a total jerk about the Twitter thing.

Items 5, 6: This whole thing over admission fees at the Botanical Garden has gotten some people riled up, and these two items both relate to that: Item 5 is the Mayor's legislation to continue charging non-residents an admission fee. If item 5 passes, the charge for out-of-towners to tour the Botanical Garden will stick even if Item 6 shifts $143,000 from the general fund to the Botanical Garden. If Item 5 fails but item 6 passes, access fees for the Botanical Garden will disappear, just like that. If you're confused, just be glad you're a city resident and still free anyway. Then remember this is the kind of crap we have to go through pretty much every time we want to charge tourists money to look at plants.

Item 11: Mission District Streetscape Plan: recommended from the Planning Commission, the ordinance would adopt the Mission District Streetscape Plan, which includes new parklets, traffic calming on residential streets and greening efforts in that sketchy Northeast corner of the Mission.

Special Order: Appeal of Final Environmental Impact Report on the 350 Mission Project - The owners of 50 Beale Street are appealing the EIR for the 350 Mission project around the corner. The 350 Mission project will demolish a 4-story office and retail building and replace it with very green 24 story office building.

Special Order to determine whether 1653 Grant Ave/501 Greenwich St project is exempt from Environmental Review: Notorious NIMBY group, the Telegraph Hill Dwellers, want an environmental review of project in their neighborhood. Strap on your tinfoil hats, kids, because this one involves installing cellphone towers. Could be a big to-do.

Item 20: Opposing the GGNRA's new Off-Leash Policy for dogs: Just a resolution, but Scott Wiener is all fired up to get the Board on record opposing Golden Gate National Recreation Area's proposed policy change that will mean leashing your dog in the park. Wiener would also like to scold the new plan for not considering the impact this will have on the rest of the City's dog runs.

The full board agenda is available here and the meeting thing kicks off at 2 p.m. on Tuesdays. For those of you who like to follow along from home, you can stream it live on SFGovTV.org

For the second week in a row, the Board of Supervisor's meeting kicked off with all members of the board actually present and accounted for. As they very well should have been, because yesterday's main event, the Twitter Tax Break, should have brought out some lively discussion. It should have. But it didn't.

Items 1-7 slid right through on roll call votes in about 3 minutes, which must be some kind of record, and the clerk was calling on Tenderloin Supervisor Jane Kim to deliver her supporting statements on the proposed tax break in less time than it usually takes Ms. Kim to get from her office to the People's Chambers.

Kim delivered her arguments with all the panache of an 8th grader giving book report - which is to say we got a lot of fluffy talk about how Market Street is a vital corridor in San Francisco. But, whatever - she made up for it with all the style of a substitute teacher in her light, springy pantsuit and pink blouse. At the risk of turning these Power Rankings in to a fashion event, we must say ditching the glasses this week did help to draw some attention away from her boilerplate statements about revitalizing the (barf) Uptown Tenderloin District. When you wear glasses people kind of expect more insightful comments. So, right off the bat, it's -1 for boilerplate statements, but +0.5 for fashion statements (and because the dangling 0.5 from last week was kind of bugging us). That works out to -0.5 for Jane Kim after her opening remarks, but this item was her baby, so she's not out of the woods yet. Also, new favorite supervisor tic:

Supervisor Avalos was the first to buzz in and respond, speaking out against giving exemptions to the payroll tax. Businesses should be socially responsible, he explained, and giving tax breaks to the already wealthy is only "aiding and abetting the exacerbation of these disparities in wealth" in the corporate sector. OK, that's a pretty good recession-era argument that will play well with the have-nots, and it justified his Nay vote, but it didn't offer any alternative solution other than pointing out that there are already quite a few benefits available to businesses in Civic Center, Central Market and the Tenderloin. Again: nice thoughts, but we haven't seen those efforts do a whole lot to move the needle in the Tenderloin yet (pun intended - sort of). Avalos gets -1 because we're bored.

Ross Mirkarimi rang in next. He talks a lot, and god bless him for that, even if we need to diagram his sentences to figure out what he's getting at. (See also: "Goddammit, Ross".) Distilling yesterday's speech down to something tweetable: Ross wanted to delay the vote until the board could review the new amendments about the partnership deal Twitter would be engaging in. To review what the city and the neighborhood get in exchange for the tax break. He also said "toothless" twice to refer to how other efforts like this never actually make the businesses give back to the city. While we can never be sure what he was really getting at, we think he was talking about blowjobs, so what the hell: +1 to Ross Mirkarimi.

Scott Wiener followed Mirkarimi and offered his support for the Twitter tax break. The Castro supe gave a measured approach, calling for a broader approach to tax reform in the long run but immediate action to keep Twitter in town now. He also kept his comments to under 3 minutes, which is how you win over the youngs. +1 for Scott Wiener.

Eric Mar said some stuff. (We think?) He stood up and he talked in to the microphone, but all we heard was "thanks to..." Thanks to David Chiu. Thanks to Ed Lee. Thanks to Supervisor Kim. Whatever, boring. -1 for Eric Mar. It would've been minus two, but the Richmond supe got a haircut.

Up next was David Campos, who admitted to not speaking up during the discussions leading up to this, but he did follow up on Mirkarimi's mention of the Biotech tax break - Campos wanted to review whether or not the Biotech tax break and the Film Industry tax breaks are actually working. He also expressed his concern for the impact the Central Market tax break would have on other neighborhoods. All good points, but not compelling enough to win anybody over. And anyway, he ended by covering his ass and explaining that he looked forward to working with Supervisor Kim to make sure the plan helped all of San Francisco moving forward. -1 on Campos for removing the spine from his Nay vote.

Mark Farrell, a cosponsor on the legislation, emphatically weighed in on the side of the tax break but scolded the board for making it all about Twitter and talking about the bill as a corporate giveaway. Essentially, he was calling for the approval of the bill, but reminding everyone that further revision is needed to the payroll tax. We'll allow it, but won't award any points because, duh: you said that last week. Thanks for keeping your comments short though. No change for Mark Farrell.

President Chiu and Sean Elsbernd switched seats so Chiu could address Avalos' points about the previous efforts to revitalize the neighborhood. Those obviously haven't been working, Chiu pointed out, so we need to change the status quo first and address the payroll tax later. Fair: +1 for David Chiu. Maybe it's just his mayoral play, but the guy is growing on us.

Carmen Chu added a couple points from her perspective as budget committee chair, but honestly we heard most of it already. Zero points for Carmen Chu.

Malia Cohen finally gets +1 for her quip: "I think the honeymoon is over." But didn't add much else other than to remind us that 3rd street needs some revitalization as well. It sure does! Let's focus on the TL though.

Sean Elsbernd said nothing. He must be worn out after last week's Parkmerced Project. No points for Elsbored.

The only other discussion worth mentioning was David Chiu's Urban Gardens deal - a no-brainer, really, but President Chiu had to remind everyone that he was proud to be sponsoring it along with (Temporary) Mayor Ed Lee. Barf. Why don't you guys just get a room already?

At the end of the day, we're kind of confused about how Jane Kim still manages to rank near the bottom, with her nice outfits and all that, but good looks aren't everything. We'd give her another point for her overall win on the Twitter thing, but we've already been accused of point inflation once. So keep working on it, Jane! Scott Wiener inexplicably regains the top spot, making a case for the need to be consistently reasonable rather than when it's convenient. Eric, we're really sorry for everything - nice haircut though.

Final Ranking: (this week's points in parenthesis)
5 Scott Wiener (+1)
4 Sean Elsbernd (No change)
4 Mark Farrell (No change)
4 Ross Mirkarimi (+1)
2.5 Carmen Chu (No change)
2 David Chiu (+1)
1 David Campos (-1)
1 Malia Cohen (+1!)
0 John Avalos (-1)
-1 Jane Kim (-.5)
-2 Eric Mar (-1)

At last week's board meeting we saw the current lineup tackle their biggest issue so far: the Parkmerced project which could do a great deal to shape the future of the southwestern edge of the city. Well, they didn't quite tackle it, so much as they put it off until May. This week the agenda is a bit short, but today's big issue: the payroll tax break Twitter and other Mid-Market and Tenderloin businesses (Item 8) could lead to some lengthy debate, especially after some alternative solutions were introduced last week. So with that, here's what we're looking at on today's agenda:

(Remember, the fun kicks off at 2 p.m. and you can always follow along live at SFGovTV.org or grab the whole agenda here [PDF warning] if you like legalese.)

Item 3: Requiring active ground-floor commercial uses along Fillmore Street between Bush and McAllister in the Western Addition. Expect Ross Mirkarimi to (again) give a brief speech about his push for a more lively Lower Fillmore. And then expect everyone to go along with it and pass it without too much trouble.

Item 5: Resolution urging the Federal government to minimize cuts to the Community Development Block Grant Program. We're still not big fans of resolutions here, but with five supes, plus the Mayor putting their stamp on this one, we'd like to see someone make a move in favor of actual action rather than resolutions. Last week it was D2 Supe Mark Farrell who spoke out, but if any one else needs to pick up a few points in the power rankings, here's your chance.

Item 8: Payroll Expense Tax Exclusion in Central Market Street and Tenderloin Area. The Twitter tax break: No need to go over the details again, but we'll be looking to see where the discussion goes in light of proposed legislation from President Chiu and Mayor Lee, as well as options Ross Mirkarimi and Mark Farrell introduced last week.

Item 10: Updating planning code to define Urban Agriculture. This will allow for neighborhood gardens and "large-scale urban agriculture" and define how these things are regulated under the planning code. If it passes, San Francisco will have one of the most progressive stances on growing plants inside the city. Jesus, we're such hippies again.

Item 11: Settles the lease dispute with the 49ers, according to the agreement that David Chiu and Temporary Mayor Lee worked out with the team. It's pretty much a no-brainer, but it's also something Gavin Newsom could never get done. (But that might be because Newsom and Jed York were jealous of each other's haircare regimen.)

From the Board's mailbag, the Clerk has received: 19 letters concerning the Parkmerced project, 11 letters supporting a ban on unsolicited yellow pages, and a letter concerning "No Smoking Signs" at transit stops from one Larry Caruso.

Our interest in the Board of Supervisors weekly meetings has been waning ever-so-slightly every week since the class of 2011 took their place in the People's Chambers. So, in order to bring a little more excitement back in to our city's politics, here's our completely unbiased recap of last night's meeting, along with a scorecard and not-at-all-subjective Board of Supervisors Weekly Power Ranking:

With supervisors Campos, Cohen and Mirkarimi absent from the meeting attending a transportation conference in Washington DC, things were a little quiet in the People's Chambers yesterday. Between the thin list of interesting items on the agenda, multiple private sessions and a lengthy special commendations section, the meeting was doomed to be a snoozer anyway. Still, that doesn't mean we can't pine for the booming voice of Ross Mirkarimi to come gliding out of the loudspeaker to console us.

Ross isn't the only member of the board who can project his voice though: during roll call we got a very emphatic "HERE" from Jane Kim, which we will gladly accept as an acknowledgement of last week's tardiness. While timeliness is appreciated, no one gets points just for showing up, even if you are dressed smartly in black. Still no points for Jane Kim.

As the meeting gets underway in the People's Chambers this afternoon, we should point out that there are actually two agendas for today's Board of Supervisors meeting (Dueling agendas, huh? Imagine that...): The first is our usual 2 p.m. meeting and the second is a Special Meeting to approve Temporary Mayor Ed Lee's budget amendment for the City and County Redevelopment Agency (assuming it went through Budget and Finance Sub-Committee earlier today). On to today's items of interest, in order of their appearance:

(Remember, the fun kicks off at 2 p.m. and you can always follow along live at SFGovTV.org or grab both agendas here if you like legalese.)

• Item 6. Sunshine Ordinance Task Force: The Sunshine Ordinance is why we have so much readily available data and information about the goings on in city government. So, obviously we think it's important because it saves us the trouble of digging around for records in the bowels of City hall where there's no probably no WiFi. Also, SFist pal and alum Jackson West is being appointed, so it's kind of like we're going legit with this whole blogging thing.
• Item 21. Upper Fillmore Neighborhood Commercia District: Mark Farrell's proposal to lift the ban on new restaurants along Fillmore in Pac Heights is still bouncing around in the People's Chambers. You'll remember Farrell wants to replace empty storefronts with restaurants - conditionally, of course, because we wouldn't want any chain joints up there.
• Item 23. Process for Mayoral Appearance at the Board of Supervisors: Yep, still waiting on final approval of the process. When we checked in after last week's meeting, Avalos was trying to inject some spontaneity in to the process, but President Chiu and Anti-Happy Meal Mar were happy to just give Temporary Mayor Ed Lee all week to prepare answers to questions submitted by the supervisors. Those guys all seem like great pals.

From the Clerk's mailbag:

Interim Mayor Ed Lee, as many of you know, only took the job on the promise that the law could be changed allowing him an exception from the rule that says that mayors and supervisors can't be given government jobs for one year after holding office. The Board quietly withdrew the proposed rule change from the June ballot this week, promising instead to get this done by legislative means.

It doesn't seem like anyone wants to screw Ed out of his beloved bureaucrat job, but signs point to the fact that polling might have suggested a ballot measure wouldn't have passed. And now Supervisor John Avalos is hedging saying he'd be "uncomfortable" voting on such legislation. "I shouldn’t have to bend an ethics rule for him," he said. WOW. Really, Avalos? That's cold.

Over in Bernal Heights a battle is being waged over a vintage Coca-Cola ad that typifies all we know and love about San Franciscans. The fight pits neighbor against NIMBY neighbor, preservationist against anti-consumerist, sentimentalist against anti-corn syrup activist — and therefore it has the makings of a made-for-KQED movie. You see, as Bernalwood first reported, an anonymous Bernal resident complained to the City about a vintage, painted Coca-Cola sign on the side of a building at the corner of Tompkins and Banks Streets. The complaint: The sign promotes the unhealthy consumption of sugar, and what's more, it violates San Francisco's strict anti-billboard law.

The 15 by 7-foot sign actually predates the 1965 ordinance in question, and Bernalwood later determined that it was from pre-1949, preserved between that date and 1991, when the homeowner removed some asbestos siding that had covered it up (the building was home, until the late 60s, to Tipton's Grocery). It was in pretty good shape when it was uncovered, but the homeowner, Richard Modelo, has kept it preserved at the request of neighbors, repainting it several times in the last 20 years so it looks quite new.

Following the anonymous complaint, the city served Modelo with an order to paint over the sign, but as the Examiner and the Chron now report, neighbors are fighting back.

Todd Lappin, the blogger behind Bernalwood, says, "It’s vintage commercial art. This is a historical part of our neighborhood. It’s a way for people to connect to the past." But under city law, the sign is technically illegal, and now that it's been brought to Planning's attention, a special "historic sign district" might have to be created to save it. Supervisor David Campos is contemplating this, but he's getting impassioned emails from both sides, and he's hedging. "We're trying to fight childhood obesity," he says. "We don't want to promote kids drinking Coca-Cola."

Really, now? And what about that HUGE neon Coke billboard by the freeway in SoMa (near 4th and Bryant)? That one's probably a bit more effective on the advertising front, don't you think, Campos?

Board of Supervisors meetings haven't been quite as exciting after the 11th-hour fireworks that went down just before the class of snooze-thousand-eleven took their seats last month. Hopefully, the rookies will find their stride soon enough and start sniping at each other about banning non-vegan rubber bike tires or what have you, but as today's full board meeting gets underway (like, now-ish - you should tune in) we thought we might highlight some of the issues on today's agenda that seem to have people talking.

First up is this deal on tax breaks for Twitter, which we mentioned before. The Appeal has a nice roundup of where we stand now, but the gist of it is: the tweety-bloggy company threatened to move to Brisbane in order to get a better deal on their payroll taxes. So, the City was working on a deal to keep the company in town and also lure them to that gross section of Mid-Market. Some people (you know: lefties) seem to think this could lead to other large companies trying to leverage their size for better deals from the city - which is a valid concern, but we might also point out that 95% of Twitter's staff would rather die than work somewhere as unfashionable as Brisbane (where ever that is). So: grain of salt. Also, if the Board approves the current tax breaks they'll only be for new hires - not all employees - so the city wouldn't lose money on the deal, but Twitter might also hire like half the city tomorrow. So again: grain of salt.

The Board is also mulling over an Infrastructure Financing District for Rincon Hill, which would work similarly to Redevelopment in that it would drive private investment in neighborhood improvements, but it would get the city around some of those state-level cuts to redevelopment agencies (which may or may not be legal).

What else? Oh yeah, keep an eye out for resident bible-thumper Mark Trout who is hopefully incorrect about his Biblical prediction that something terrible will happen tomorrow.

[SFAppeal]
[SFBoS]

Supervisor Scott Wiener has had quite enough of the 'unsavory' characters who congregate around the Castro Safeway with their cart-loads of bottles and cans, headed to the recycling center. He's been aware of neighbors' complaints for years regarding that Safeway, and he proposes that the City lobby the State to mandate that all bottle redemption centers begin offering food vouchers in place of cash for recyclables. We're envisioning a citywide revolt by elderly Chinese ladies who carry around those red, blue, and white heavy-duty plastic satchels.

"We want to have recycling centers that give lower-income people what they need,” Wiener says. It sounds like they want to have recycling centers that don't draw "unsavory" poor people. And is that really the only reason the hippies, et al like to camp out around Safeway?

Ed Dunn, executive director of San Francisco Community Recyclers, finds all this offensive, and notes the apparent quality-of-life campaign being waged on the other nearest recycling center in the Haight, which he also runs. "They’re the centers abutting the wealthiest parts of town,” Dunn said. “Why don’t they offer them a gas card too?”

We'd like to remind Wiener that Care Not Cash hasn't really reduced the number of homeless/indigent who flock here.