Before we get to the juicy details of how much money Team Newsom is taking home, it’s worth noting that Mayor Gavin Newsom spent last Friday handing out draft copies of the report in which these figures can be found–a report that Budget Analyst Harvey Rose drew up at Sup. Jake McGoldrick’s request to figure out the impacts that staff changes within the Mayor’s Office would have on the City’s budget–changes Newsom announced Jan. 4.
It’s also worth noting that Rose didn’t know that Newsom Chief of Staff Phil Ginsburg was standing around last Friday telling the press that his report was a piece of “bull-.”, until the press called him later that same day and asked him for a comment.
And that all this unauthorized report distribution and undefended “bullshit” calling was happening just five weeks after Newsom announced that the City is facing a $229 million budget deficit and that therefore the city must implement an immediate hiring freeze and across-the-board departmental budget cuts.
Unlike Sups. Chris Daly or Aaron Peskin, who are more typically the targets of the mayor’s famously snippy wrath, Rose isn’t a politician, but a widely respected analyst, and so Team Newsom could hardly accuse him of “political theater”.
Instead, Ginsburg told the Chronicle that, “The budget analyst has no understanding of how salaries work in this city,” while Newsom made the vague claim that, “It’s personal.”
But however much they tried to put a negative spin on Rose report, Team Newsom could not deny that it paints an unflattering picture of the Mayor’s Office as a place that is using over $1 million from other departmental budgets to make new hires and increase the salaries of staff that are assigned to the Mayor.
As Rose reports “The Mayor’s practice of including positions assigned to the Mayor’s Office, but funded in the budgets of the Municipal Transportation Agency, the Human Services Agency and the Planning Department Budgets, understates the Mayor’s Office’s budgeted and actual costs for such positions, while such costs are overstated in those three other Departmental budgets.”
Rose’s report found that
a) The estimated total increased annual salary and fringe benefits costs of the 17 newly-appointed department directors to replace existing directors, and the ten Mayor’s Office staff appointments, two of which are completely new functions, are $553,716.
b) Other City departments fund about $1.34 million in annual salary and fringe benefits for ten positions assigned to the Mayor’s Office, including the mayor’s new climate change director Wade Crowfoot and new Homelessness Policy Director Dariush Kayhan.
c) The costs of appointing Ed Harrington, as General Manager of the SF Public Utilities Commission, Ben Rosenfield as Controller, Mirian Saez, as Interim Director of the San Francisco Housing Authority, and Jordanna Thigpen, as Acting Director of the Taxi Commission have yet to be announced.
d) Terminating Susan Leal, General Manager of the SF PUC, without cause, as is Newsom’s stated intention, will add a further $401,392 to City costs.
e) the mayor’s Office is also recruiting for a replacement to the CityBuild Director, at a cost of $144,596.
In face of these dicey accounting practices, Rose suggests that the Board of Supervisors rescind funding for positions assigned to the Mayor’s Office but included in other departments’ budgets, and the cost of these positions, estimated to be $898, 718, could then come from the Mayor’s General Fund monies.
The Board, says Rose, could also eliminate MTA funding for Mayor’s Office positions which do not directly benefit the MTA’s core functions. Those positions could then be funded, Rose reports, to the tune of $240,943, from the Mayor’s Office’s General Fund monies.
Rose’s report also notes that, “The newly appointed Climate Protective Initiatives Director is a new function unrelated to the MTA’s Safety and Training Unit,” even though the position if currently being funded through monies set aside for that unit.
And now, here are the figures, taken directly from Rose’s report, which show who, on Team Newsom, is making more or less, compared to previous directors and appointees:
Team Newsom t heads making more than Predecessors (the “Gimmee More” gang)
Kevin Ryan, Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice: $160,862—$42,848 more.
Joyce Hicks, Director Office of Citizen Complaints: $$171,262—$42,276 more.
John Rahaim, Director Planning Department, $210,000—$34,422 more.
Michael Cohen, Director Mayor’s Office of Economic And Workforce Development,
$193,570—$33,930 more.
Mike Farrah, Director Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Services: $120,900—$28,340 more
Adrienne Pon, Director Mayor’s Office of Community Development: $143,123—$12,993 more.
Luis Cancel, Arts Commission Director: $140,000—$8,648 more.
Chris Iglesias, Director Human Rights Commission: $149,058—$3,146 more.
Team Newsom members making less than Predecessors:
Ed Reiskin, Director, Department of Public Works: $195,000—$25,419 less
Fred Blackwell, Director, SF Redevelopment Agency: $178,724—$18,000 less
Nancy Alfaro, Director, 311, $149,058—$15,942 less
Micki Callahan, Director, Human Resources, $195,000—$9,672 less.
Anita Sanchez, Executive Director, Civil Service Commission, $128,752—$6,986 less.
Cristine Soto-DeBerry, Mayor’s Liasion to the Board of Supervisors: $91,000—$6,084 less.
Appointments to New Functions
Dariush Kayhan, Homeless Policy Director, $169.624
Wade Crowfoot, Climate Protection Initiatives Director, $130,112
Appointments to Existing Functions
Nancy Kirschner Rodriguez, Director of Government Affairs, $143,123—$19,207 more.
Dwayne Jones, Director of Community Engagement and Communities of Opportunity: $143, 123—$14, 371 more.
Catherine Dodd, Deputy Chief of Staff for Health and Human Services: $143, 123—$4,513 more.
Maya Dillard-Smith, Violence prevention Director, $91,520—$4,342 more)
Astrid Haryati, Greening Director, $111, 228—no change.
Jason Chan, Mayor’s Liasion to Commissions, $81,276 ($13,442 less.
Erin Hicks, State and Federal Affairs, tba.
The Salary ‘To Be Announced” Gang.
Ed Harrington, General Manager, SF PUC—tba
Ben Rosenfield, Controller
Mirian Saez, Interim Director, SF housing Authority,
Jordanna Thigpen, Acting Director, Taxi Commission.
vs. 
