The Commons San Francisco

The most engaging way to get more than a glimmer of what we mean by the commons is to join us on our three hour walking tour of San Francisco's Union Square/Financial District neighborhoods.

We begin at 312 Mason Street (at O'Farrell), and travel to the TransAmerica Pyramid. Along the way we'll discover how humanity has used private property to create buildings, businesses and wondrous technology . . . provided there was access in the first place to land and public infrastructure. 

Leaves nearly every Saturday morning at 9:30 am. Or by commission.

Telephone 415-948-4265 or

e-mail  info@TheCommonsSF.org

for location and time of departure.

FREE or, if commissioned,

$10/person, group rates available

Saturday, Feb. 2

T.I.C.'s into Condos

walking tour

9:30 am  312 Mason St. 

San Francisco

The SF Board of Supervisors is taking up the fast-tracking conversion of Tenancies-in-Common into Condominiums. Tenant Rights advocates want to preserve the rental stock and resist rental conversions into home ownership. Would-be condo owners know that with conversion of TIC to Condo, unit value will increase by upwards of ten percent, and that makes securing a loan much more likely.

Come along on a walking tour of land use history and possibility in San Francisco and beyond. Our guide, Leon Phat (past candidate for SF Mayor and Supervisor), escorts participants through a short history of San Francisco land use social movements, identifying places and people who have valiantly tried to secure both individual liberty and community puissance. Leon will present the 130 year old San Francisco legislation, as vital today as it was in 1879, which would simulatanteously make renters and land owners of us all, and in so doing resolve the housing schism manufacturing displacement, poverty, political opportunism, and the intellectual aneurism which plagues The City.

Free. Anticipate losing a millimeter of shoe tread on this dialetic stomp through downtown. 

Saturday, Jan. 12

Sacred Economics walking tour

9:30 am  312 Mason St. 

San Francisco

Come along on a free walking tour of San Francisco social movement history that features the social philosophy of Charles Eisenstein, elucidated in his text SACRED ECONOMICS.

This fast-paced tour presents the key points of Eisenstein's text: the commons, usury as profane, circle better than line, and connection preferable to mere autonomy.

Pagans, non-profit administrators, and advocates of banking reform specially encouraged to attend. 

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Saturday, Dec. 1

Talking to Republican, Tea Party kin walking tour

9:30 am  312 Mason St.  San Francisco

Talking politics or religion at home can be wearying for many a San Franciscan. Come along on this walking tour and we'll set you up with a whole new angle to take that will have you and your kin step outside the usual lines of battle, and quite possibly find substantial new swards of common ground!

And we'll pay you $15 to do it!

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Saturday, Nov. 24

Prop. 30 and Texas vs California business friendliness walking tour

Texas is the favored home and destination of business folk and businesses according to the business community itself. Why? Because there is no state income tax. There is a state sales tax of 6.25%, but that compares favorably with California's Prop. 30 rate of 7.5%.

The primary reason Texas can afford no state income tax is because it levies a significant severance tax on oil production. California doesn't have a severance tax on oil production in despite of being the #3 oil producing state.

Come along on a walk that blends SF social movement history with the white-hot 1879 San Francisco social philosophy advocating the equivalent of a 90% severance tax on timber, oil, and urban land ownership. That philosophy was so hot UC Berkeley suppressed its teaching (and still does) in 1880; so hot Karl Marx condemned it; so hot former Senator Phil Gramm of Texas publicly vilified it and its progenitor in 2002; so hot Jim Hightower urged progressives keep silent about it; so hot it nearly melts New York's Wall Street gang because it emanates from the poem Emma Lazarus wrote just before she penned The New Colossus which is graven on the base of the Statue of Liberty; so hot it would bankrupt Dianne Feinstein's husband, Richard Blum; so hot it would lower rents in San Francisco by 20%; so hot it would raise enough public revenue to obviate the need for a state income tax and state sales tax; so hot it would make California at once the most business friendly, labor friendly, and social programs friendly state north of the equator.

And, good golly, the walk's free!

The Giant's ain't got nuthin' on this San Francisco story, fog-bathers; come out and rub some good stuff all over your brain. 

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 Saturday, July 28

Routing Ba'al Ze Mitt

Walking Tour

 Come along on this FREE walking tour of San Francisco social movement history, which concludes with two swift and devastating to the Republican/Romney agenda arguments for your use in private and public discourse.

One of the stories we present is the history of the Mormon diaspora to San Francisco before the Gold Rush. Did you know that Mormons believe that when righteous men die they become gods and CREATE their own planet? Mormons believe that Jesus Christ created this planet and begot Adam and Eve. Wow!

Now, for the sake of engaging Romney in a conversation let's agree to accept at face value that belief. What kind of a planet would Mitt Romney create, and with what social expectations? What would be his Sermon on the Mount?

And, by the by, what kind of a planet would you make, and with what social expectations?

Come along on a walk which makes the case, using San Francisco history, for treating land as THE COMMONS.