At 5 a.m. on Tuesday, a man with a machete-like blade attached to a long stick was spotted hacking away at the front yards of homes along Harrison Street between Norwich Street and Precita Avenue, just south of Precita Park.
One resident, who requested to be left unnamed due to fear of retaliation from the man with the machete, was awake when the incident occurred. She said she heard “a weird noise” in front of her home and went to check. She saw a man walking down the street with what she described as a “machete with a broom handle” and an ax in his backpack. She said the man was working very quickly with a blade sharp enough to cut through branches around two inches in diameter.
A neighbor, Nigel Phillips, caught a man on camera walking down the street carrying a curved blade attached to a long stick and wearing a backpack with a long thin handle sticking out the top.
A witness to the series of incidents called the San Francisco Police Department at 5:05 a.m. and officers arrived on scene around 15 minutes later. But the man had already moved on.
Mission Local’s calls to the police regarding the matter have not yet been returned.
The unexpected landscaping left tree limbs, bushes and potted succulents scattered over the pavement. According to neighborhood resident Mark Browne, almost every house along the block received this impromptu pruning, which he said seemed to be aimed at clearing any overhanging plants and trees.
Much of the debris was still left scattered along the street yesterday morning. Suma, another neighbor, said she was walking her dog, Tofu, along the street and described the cuts as sharp slashes.
An area resident said they have seen this man before, cutting down foliage in the Bernal neighborhood. She added that the defense he keeps making is that he is doing a public service for the neighborhood.
One resident who suffered damages to her tree and a pot of succulents in front of her home estimated that the succulents that lost leaves and were cut back to their stems would result in around $2,000 worth of damages since some were rare varieties and would need to be replaced. Her front tree which was “slovenly cut” is lopsided with most of the canopy that shaded the sidewalk now gone.
No one approached the man while he was walking down the block and cutting trees and bushes, Suma said, adding that she was thankful no one intervened since he was carrying two sharp blades.
Residents noted that, in a prior instance, something like this happened on the other side of the street.
While eyewitnesses lost sight of the man at Harrison Street and Precita Ave, a path of plant destruction continues along Precita Avenue towards Folsom Street before heading down towards Charlie’s Cafe where a tree was damaged.
A spokesperson from Public Works confirmed that the department did not remove the tree.
“We are sending inspectors out to take a look at the tree and gather more information. At this point I don’t know for sure who did it but it does suggest vandalism in the way the tree is chopped and the branches left on the sidewalk,” said Beth Rubenstein of Public Works.
Another unstable kook on the streets of SF. Surprise surprise
Brandon is new to the concept that mental illness exists, or that if you get a city large enough, there might even be more than one such person.
Brandon apparently also hasn’t figured out that when people with mental illness don’t have stable housing and good mental health care, sometimes their mental illness is hard to control.
Cynthia is unclear with concept that if you lionize and normalize uncivilized behavior you will have a city controlled by uncivilized behavior and being fled from by civilized people and businesses. This will create a doom loop of decay and crime.
“If you lionize and normalize uncivilized behavior you will have a city controlled by uncivilized behavior and being fled from by civilized people and businesses. ”
Since that’s not how it works, it’s a good thing I’m not familiar with it.
How do you know this guy doesn’t have access to stable housing and mental health care?
Because people who have those things don’t act like that.
He came from Precita/Coso towards Precita Park. We have him on our security camera spending a few minutes on our low branches at 3:25AM. If only the city would trim the trees as they are supposed to…