As a way to look back on the year that was, we asked our staffers what their favorite stories were from 2015. These were not necessarily our most read stories (that list happens tomorrow) or even the most important ones, but the ones at year’s end that stick in ours mind for whatever reason. So, if you’ll indulge us a moment, here’s a rundown of our favorite stories from 2015:
Lydia Chávez, Executive Editor
Hottest Eating Spot in the Mission? The Salvation Army by Laura Wenus. It’s funny the stories you remember and it isn’t always the most popular ones, but this one did pretty well. I would have loved this story regardless because it was about a community coming together and doing what it is famous for – cooking and feeding people. We forget that places like Tartine Bakery and Bi-Rite are successful way beyond the Mission, but they don’t forget their roots and they step up – in big and small ways – without being asked. They got in touch with us after the fire to ask what they could do for the families staying at the Salvation Army and I passed on a request for eggs and pancake batter, but they never let on that they ran with that request and began organizing meals for the families. When I visited the Salvation Army one morning, I noticed that the bread looked awfully familiar and the meals far from run of the mill and then the supervisor showed me the schedule of meals Tartine and Bi-Rite had organized with the help of many Mission restaurants. Laura followed up and wrote the story.
Despite the Best of Intentions, SF Family Faces Eviction from Affordable Housing by Laura Wenus I liked this story because it was impactful journalism at its best. The Palacios were one of several families at a press conference held for families being evicted. Their story was the most complicated because they should have been able to stay and piecing together the reasons why they were unable to remain took an enormous amount of reporting on Laura’s part. Everyone failed them – the city, the non-profit that was supposed to help and their housing association. Laura’s story revived their case and we hope to be writing a follow up soon.
Laura Wenus, Managing Editor
Mission Fire Tenants: There Were No Smoke Alarms by the whole team!
It’s hard to believe the Mission and 22nd street fire was just at the beginning of this year, but I think our fire coverage certainly takes the cake in terms of our 2015 reporting efforts. I hope (and assume) we will continue to watch fires in the neighborhood closely and keep an eye on what happens to the buildings afterward. This coverage also made it clear that often, the real fallout of a fire isn’t the horror of watching your place burn down and being stuck on the street with nothing but what you happened to have on at the moment, but the uncertainty and endless limbo that goes on for years after a fire occurs.
Generation Tinder: Online but Hardly Connecting by Laura Waxmann
This is a great great slice-of-life piece Laura Waxmann wrote about the local representatives of Generation Tinder. I loved the personal stories that Tinder users were willing to share with Laura for this piece, and it left me feeling that despite (and perhaps even because of) the superficiality of in-app people-browsing, most people are still looking for real-world connections.
Cristiano Valli, Tech
Everyone has a different Mission in mind. If we had a short-novel contest about “My Mission” we would discover a range of nuanced Missions. The changes we’re witnessing today started a long time before the last few years of craziness. My Mission was changing at the beginning of century — and still it has already managed to disappear.
All I knew, in the few weeks that changed my life was the bike scene and breakfasts at Boogaloos, a few blocks between the pre-hip Zeitgeist at the corner with Duboce, and the Silver Sprocket Bicycle Club, in the basement by the side of the Valencia Cyclery. Bike messengers were starting to look cool on their single-speeds and Critical Mass was all over the news. So these two stories are the ones that best represent the neighborhood I’m personally missing:
Lost SF History, a Bike Messenger Retrospective by Emma Neiman and An Ode to Boogaloos by Gregg Schoenberg
Fun fact about Boogaloos: Even in 2003 — in a pre-iPhone San Francisco in which using a mobile phone in parks and on MUNI was considered rude — Boogaloos used to charge an extra $1 if your phone would ring. You can still see a sign with a vintage phone ban on one of the columns of the place.
Laura Waxmann, Reporter
Sexual Battery Victims Frustrated at Police Response by Laura Wenus
This two-part report sensitively addresses the challenges experienced by many sexual battery victims when reporting crimes that were committed against them to the police. Laura Wenus told the victims’ stories with much care, and with her reporting uncovered the lack of transparency in the manner that sexual assault cases are handled and reported by the SFPD.
Moratorium, Airbnb Regs Fail While Housing Bond and Progressive Supe Win by Mission Local team
With the Mission Moratorium and other highly anticipated measures aiming to address the city’s housing crisis on the ballot, the weeks leading up to the November elections were tense and exciting. As the results came in on November 3, the Mission Local team covered the climactic evening at different locations in the Mission. Joe Rivano Barros followed leaders of the Proposition I campaign and captured their hopeful look into the future as the moratorium was struck down. I was reporting from Virgil’s Sea Room, where writer and mayoral candidate “Broke Ass Stuart” Schuffman conceded that he may have lost the race for City Hall, but achieved his goal of challenging Ed Lee. Back at the office, Laura Wenus made sense of it all, and compiled our reporting into a timely and informative story. Team work!
Joe Rivano Barros, Editor
Andrea Valencia’s coverage of the fatal police shooting of 21-year-old Amilcar Pérez-López was one of our most impactful pieces this year, as it gave voice to the two roommates of the dead Guatemalan immigrant for the first time and presented an alternate to the official account of the shooting. Andrea’s story represented solid reporting: Going to the vigils, speaking with the community, and making herself trustworthy to those she knew had the testimony she needed, even if the two roommates remained too frightened to give their names.
Ultimately, it was not enough to have a conflicting account and a corroborating autopsy. If the shooting had been captured on video as it was with Mario Woods, perhaps there would have been more consequences. But getting the record straight and presenting the accounts of those two roommates was necessary reporting and a valuable contribution to the tale of Pérez-López’s death.
The profile by Noah Arroyo of Luis Aranda, a Mexican folksinger often seen with a cowboy hat, aviators, and snakeskin boots, was my favorite piece of the year. Noah’s writing is crisp yet descriptive, giving me the details I need to see Aranda in my mind — before I get to the impressive photos that accompany the piece.
It’s ultimately a tragic tale: A diabetic man separated from much of his family — still in Mexico — is barely making enough to get by, and in fact is often told to leave restaurants because of concerns Aranda is taking tips that would otherwise go to the waiters. Not a great feeling for anyone involved, I’m sure. It’s also a very common tale, of course, and I often think of Noah’s piece when walking by the buskers hustling on the streets or in Bart stations throughout the Bay Area — and I give them some cash.