If you build it, we may punish you.
That's the message from San Francisco lawmakers to companies that are lining up to build President Donald Trump's border wall.
At a meeting Tuesday night, supervisors considered a measure to deny contracts to companies that even bid on the wall project. A couple of dozen Bay Area companies have reportedly shown interest, and on Tuesday a San Francisco supervisor warned those companies that it may cost them.
"These companies have a choice to make: Build the wall or work with the city and county of San Francisco," Supervisor Hillary Ronen of the 9th district said.
Ronen picked the offices of T.Y. Linn to make her announcement because the company was paid millions of dollars to be the consultant on the eastern span of the Bay Bridge and has expressed an interest in designing the president’s border wall.
"Stick to building bridges, not walls," Ronen said.
The company, housed on the 23rd floor, had no comment on the proposed city ordinance.
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Ronen said she feels confident it will receive widespread support.
Resident Gloria Esteva said Trump’s border crackdown has separated her family and prevented them from visiting her grandson, who is battling cancer.
Back in 2005, when Gavin Newsom was mayor, the board voted unanimously on a similar measure to cut off contracts with any garment company that did business with so called sweatshops. The result: Police and firefighters couldn’t get new uniforms because none of the city’s contractors would make a bid.
Ronen said she’s not concerned about a similar situation with her ordinance.
"There are plenty of general contractors and plenty of archetects and plenty of materials providers out there," she said.
Late Tuesday night, the Oakland City Council unanimously approved a similar resolution, and state lawmakers are looking at legislation that would require the state’s two huge pension funds, CalPERS and calSTERS, to divest from any company that works on the border wall. The public employees and teachers pension funds are worth hundreds of billions of dollars each and are the two largest in the country.
San Francisco’s ordinance will have a committee hearing in April.
