San Francisco Pretrial Diversion Project

not a bad trade off as i got a ticket for urinating in ggp pre-​entry to outside lands
do you see the irony here
nonetheless can’t condone it as i was in the wrong even though we all know we get waifs of it all over this city
besides being a bad citizen, i didn’t want to pay the $ 200 ticket so paid $ 20 to the city and provided my services and slapped on the flourescent vest, grabbed a pointy stick, garbage bag and off we were to pick up trash from 16^th/​valencia upward to 24^th/​potrero for a few hours which equates to a 8hour city shift
met some fine folks too!

It’s only a matter of time that someone working under this project 20/​pretrial diversion gets stabbed by a HIV infected NEEDLE littered around the city. We came across at least 5 of them on the ground mixed in with trash.
Not sure why we don’t do real community service — like clean the muni/​bart stations from the rank ass piss smells with a mop and bucket or do a beach clean up walk instead of waste everyone’s time walking around with a bag searching for trash that has already been cleaned up.
Get real yos.

Yup. I got a ticket for running a red on my cute little vintage ’78 Schwinn cruiser. Sigh. As embarrassing as that is, I decided that I didn’t want to pay the $ 200 ticket. I pled no contest to get it reduced down to $ 115 and decided to volunteer for 12 hours at $ 10/​hour instead of giving the city my money.
Turns out that I had already filled out a volunteer application for the SFSPCA back in October and was too lazy to turn it in. Well, Project 20 gave me the best kick in the butt to get that rolling again. I went down to the office, where I was promptly put in the system. I paid a $ 20 admin fee (this increases the more hours you have to volunteer) and was asked to pick a non-​profit to volunteer at. Picked SFSPCA, spent 12 hours doing laundry and took a training class so I could start helping out with the doggies :)
All in all a good experience!

I did this back in 2006 when I got a bogus parking ticket and was all «hell no I’m not going to pay this.» I got as far as protesting it in the mail, which was OF COURSE denied. Note: I have never had a protest in the mail approved even with evidence that would have convinced the most skeptical jury. DPT/​MTA automatically rejects every single mailed-​in protest on the theory that most people will give up and pay at that point. It’s not about justice, it’s not about traffic flow and make sure people don’t hog parking spaces, it’s about wringing as much money as possible out of the citizens of San Francisco.
After the mailed-​in protest was denied, the next step would have been to have a hearing before a hearing officer but I felt my chances of getting the ticket dismissed would be low because the meter maid had lied on the ticket and it would have been tough to prove that. And, in order to have a hearing you have to pay the ticket first.
So, I was at a decision point: roll the dice with the hearing, or enroll in Project 20 and do some volunteer work. The reason it was a decision point is that it’s either/​or. You can protest in the mail and still enroll in Project 20, but once you pay the ticket and have the hearing, if you are denied at the hearing, stick a fork in it, Project 20 is no longer an option.
So, I enrolled in Project 20. For a $ 78 ticket, I believe (going from long-​ago memory).
I had to pay $ 20 to participate, so already I’m looking at saving only $ 58. But still, volunteer work = good. Not paying $ 58 = good.
I signed up to work for PAWS (Pets Are Wonderful Support). At $ 6 per hour I had to work 13 hours to pay off the full $ 78.
I worked at their offices for a few hours cold-​calling people from their mailing list to tell them about some promotion they were having. Then I picked up a couple of patients and took them and their dogs to the groomer.
Then — and this was REALLY fun — I got to work outside Giants stadium on «Take Your Pet to the Game» day, handing out flyers for WAGS Hotel and PAWS. Then once the game started, I got to go in to the game and watch. I had never been inside Giants Stadium (Pac Bell Park at that time, I believe — the name changes so often I can’t keep up with it). I wandered around, bought some divine garlic fries and a beer, petted a lot of dogs, checked out the stadium, and generally had a great time.
So, I saved $ 58, did some volunteer work and had a great afternoon. Win/​Win/​Win.
But, doing the math? I got paid $ 58 for 13 hours’ work (not counting travel time to and from my assignments). Add in roughly an hour and 30 minutes round trip for each day I worked, and you’re up to $ 58 for 17.5 hours out of my life, or roughly $ 3.31 per hour.
You have to be extremely altruistic or extremely poor (and have a lot of free time) to make this worthwhile. Hence the three stars.

I completed over 240 hours of community service that was transferred up from Santa Clara Co. from August to October of ’09. Most of the people there were paying off parking tickets therefore they only had one or two days to complete. They would come in, put on the vest, pretend to sweep, hide in a bathroom for awhile, and then spend most of the time on their iphone. It still boggles my mind that these people who are supposedly too poor to pay a sixty dollar ticket have the latest 3gs. Whatevs nobody said america had its priorities straight.
My first few days were TERRIBLE mostly because of a dick DPW supervisor that smelled the fear radiating from my upper middle class caucasian lookin’ self. The crews started being nicer to me when they saw that I was actually working my ass off and I started speaking spanish to them. If you can translate instructions to Juan and Maria (relax i’m hella hispanic) then you’re golden.
My debt to society is paid off now but the memories remain (along with all those gardening gloves i stole). I’m serious… going from being an overpaid, work from home freelancer to manual labor in Hunter’s Point with Roslyn and Mr. Ha handing me litter pickers and orange vests! And I had fun!
The most important thing is to know whom to go with!!! Some of the DPW supervisors really are assholes with a vendetta and will work you «like slaves on a plantation”*. Go with Mr. Ha, go with Roslyn, go with Francisco, go with Sylvia. And most importantly, yeah you’re just there for a day and I’m sure you think you’re better than some city employee that picks up trash or whatever… but you’re not. Treat them with respect and stop acting like you’re too good to sweat.
*dpw worker’s words. not mine.
P. S. — that iphone might come in handy when you’re not being asked to work. there is a lot of sitting around and waiting so bring a book or some music or some knitting to prevent insanity.