Alex Ludlum, the San Francisco land use commissioner, resigned in a blistering letter to Democratic Mayor London Breed after his doom loop walking tour became popular online before being canceled.
Ludlum said in the letter that it saddens him that some have taken his “protest against the squalor” of his neighborhood’s streets and the prevalence of crime as a sarcastic jab at those struggling there. The letter written by Ludlum was published in the San Francisco Chronicle.
He said that satire is ineffective because it distracts from the community’s real issues.
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the former commissioner was outed when the refunds for his “doom loop” walking tour, which was intended to showcase the grimy underbelly of downtown San Francisco, leaked his email address.
But Ludlum wouldn’t back down from his critique of broad rules that let a criminal underworld flourish in San Francisco. The drug trade, which is now uncontrolled, is the evident root of our issues.
According to Ludlum, as long as there are open-air drug markets, addicts will continue to suffer, pedestrians and office employees will be inconvenienced, small companies will fail, and cultural life will come to a standstill. The whole downtown area will be in distress until the markets shut.
The mayor’s previous appointee to the Commission on Community Investment and Infrastructure has expressed optimism that Breed will keep working to resolve the city’s most pressing problems.
According to Breed’s spokesperson, Jeff Cretan, the choice to plan and advertise the trip was a “grave lapse of judgment.” He said every day, they go to work focused on solving the city’s problems and making progress for the city.
An anonymous insider signed off the first flyer for the Doom Loop Walking Tour in San Francisco as though they knew all there was to know about the city’s worst parts.
CBS News Bay Area reports that in response to the “doom loop” tour’s negative coverage of San Francisco, a counter-effort dubbed “We Love SF” was launched.
