The official gazettes of City Hall will tell you that the closure of Ellis Street Last  Friday, January 30, 2026, was a festive prelude to the spectacle of Super Bowl LX. They will speak of the SFPAL Punt, Pass & Kick event as a bridge between the San Francisco 49ers and the youth of the Tenderloin. But if one looks past the glossy press releases and into the cold, hard arithmetic of the municipal ledger, a different story emerges. It is a story of a city that provides a five-hour sanctuary for its children while the remaining nineteen hours are ceded to a “Gold Rush” of synthetic despair and administrative neglect. Continue reading →