Mayor Ed Lee

One percent assault the waterfront

Zelda Bronstein
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One percent assault the waterfront

While the 99 percent are fighting to hold onto a crowded encampment at Justin Herman Plaza, two new condo projects are moving along in San Francisco that would give the one percent specatular views from their mulitmillion-dollar homes on the waterfront.

And as much as OccupySF has been a challenge for Mayor Ed Lee, his administration’s response to giving choice parcels to some of the wealthiest people in the country will test his housing policy and his political independence.

The Port Commission is holding preliminary meetings on the 8 Washington project, which is about as direct a conflict with the city’s General Plan and housing needs as anyone could ever imagine. The developer wants to build 165 of the most expensive condos in the city’s history, aimed entirely at the very, very rich. Many will no doubt be used as pieds a terre for people who will live in San Francisco only a few weeks of the year. The project will do nothing to address the desperate need for affordable housing and housing for the middle class.

Rose Pak, the Chinatown business consultant who was central to Lee’s campaign, told me a few months ago that she supports the project. Marcia Smolens, one of the city’s top lobbyists, is working on it. There will be big money and clout pushing this — even though there is no rational reason why San Francisco should ever approve it.

And while BeyondChron claims that gentrifcation and overdevelopment isn’t so much of a problem these days because “financing … development is more difficult than ever,” the developers don’t seem to have noticed. A Nov. 11 story in the San Francisco Business Times (you can only get a few paragraphs if you don’t subscribe) explains that “developers are starting to plan new projects again after more than three years of inactivity” –and one of the biggest is a 284-foot, 160 unit residental highrise at 75 Howard Street. There’s a parking garage now on the site, which would be demolished to build condos that one expert told the BizTimes would sell for 1,000 a square foot.

You got that? A 1,000 square-foot one-bedroom unit would go for $1 million.

So we have two major waterfront projects — both of them high-end luxury condos, both of which would have just lovely views of the OccupySF encampment — moving forward while the barricades go up and the mayor decides when to evict the protesters. A classic battle for the soul of the city. Who’s side will Ed Lee be on?

AIDS vigil returns at Occupy SF

Zelda Bronstein
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AIDS vigil returns at Occupy SF

A coalition has come together to bring a striking new component to OccupySF: a rebirth of the ARC/AIDS Vigil. The vigil created an encampment similar to OccupySF’s at UN Plaza in the 1980s and remained there for ten years, protesting the federal government’s refusal to put resources into research and support for people with HIV/AIDS. Some who were involved in the vigil are currently part of the OccupySF encampment as individuals. Now, many hope to make that relationship more direct and active.


Brian Basinger, a longtime activist in several capacities including work with the AIDS Housing Alliance, is one of those involved in this effort. Says Basinger, “We are resurrecting the ARC/AIDS Vigil at 11/11/11 at 11:11 am. We are going to provide housing counseling, bring needle exchange, providing HIV testing, distributing organic vegetarian brown bag lunches, holding a speak-out, and presenting our demands to mayor Ed Lee to cure homelessness for people with HIV/AIDS, LGBT youth and transgender San Franciscans.”

All of this will take place tomorrow from 11am-2pm at Justin Herman Plaza, the site of Occupy SF’s encampment. Or, says Basinger, “Ethel Merman Plaza, as we like to call it.”

Those interested in the speak-out should be sure to get there by 11:11, as that will likely be first on the agenda. The food distribution is planned for the end of the kick-off event.

The group will provide services to the OccupySF encampment and anyone who comes through it. “We’re looking to create a safe space for homeless LGBT youth to gather…queer homelessness is invisible. We experience homelessness differently than the non-gay world.”

Like the ARC/AIDS Vigil of the 1980s and the Occupy Movement today, this event has the potential to be ongoing. Said Basinger plainly, “We won’t leave until we get our demands are met.”

Basinger warns: “It’s going to rain. But we want to highlight that people with fullblown AIDS and cancer are out in the goddamn rain everyday because the mayor has failed. ‘Ed Lee gets it done’- he’s not ‘getting it done’ for people with AIDS.” Basinger added that San Francisco “has the highest rate of homelessness for people with AIDS in the country.”

The group is putting out a call for “Rain gear to keep us warm- tarps and umbrellas.” Added Basinger, “Umbrella, ella, ella. Also, we put out a call for Rhianna. Rhianna, if you’re listening, come tomorrow.”

And with the impossible to predict explosion of the Occupy Movement- hey, anything could happen.

 

Mirkarimi victory seems assured

Sasha Cuttler
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Mirkarimi victory seems assured

The San Francisco Elections Department counted more than 25,000 ballots today and just posted new ranked choice voting tallies that continue to indicate Ross Mirkarimi has been elected sheriff, widening his margin of victory from yesterday’s count. Mayor Ed Lee and District Attorney George Gascon saw their margins shrink slightly, but they are also the clear winners.

With only about 7,000 provisional ballots still be counted, it’s unlikely that these results will change. Lee’s share of first place votes dipped by about a half percentage point to 31 percent, while second place John Avalos, third Dennis Herrera, fourth David Chiu, and fifth place Leland Yee each gained a bit of ground.

It took 12 rounds of reallocating votes, one more than yesterday’s tally, but the latest count shows Lee winning with 60 percent of the vote to Avalos’s 40 percent.

In the sheriff’s race, the only variable after yesterday’s count was whether Paul Miyamota might be eliminated before Chris Cunnie – raising the question of whether Mirkarimi would get a big enough chunk of Miyamoto’s votes to put him over to top. But with Mirkarimi gaining ground in first place votes to 38 percent, and with 1,117 votes separating Cunnie and Miyamoto in the second round, it would be almost impossible for the winner to change.

In the DA’s race, Gascon dropped and David Onek rose by about a half percentage point, but with more of Sharmin Bock’s votes going to Gascon, he wins in the third round with 63 percent of the vote.

San Francisco’s political spectrum: a primer

Sasha Cuttler
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120
San Francisco’s political spectrum: a primer

During yesterday’s post-election wrap-up at the San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association, political consultant and analyst David Latterman cited the ideological breakdown of San Francisco voters: 19 percent are progressive, 36 percent are liberal, 39 percent are “moderate,” and 6 percent are conservative. I cited those figures in a post I wrote yesterday on the latest election results, and some people responded by asking me to explain those terms, so let me take a crack at that because I think it’s important to understanding the city’s political dynamics.

I even discussed the matter with Latterman – who self-identifies as moderate, whereas I and the Guardian have a progressive worldview. “That’s a fantastic question and I don’t think any of us can give suitable answers,” Latterman said. “These aren’t hard lines. It’s like: I don’t know how to define pornography, but I know it when I see it.” Nonetheless, we agreed on the basic outlines and borders between the labels, even though we might frame them and value them a little differently.

In San Francisco, there is general agreement on most social issues among the moderates, liberals, and progressives, although we may disagree on political tactics. We all basically support gay rights, reproductive freedom, the value of diversity, environmentalism, and freedom of expression. That’s why most people consider San Francisco to be a famously liberal city, because of our tolerance on social issues, which only that 6 percent who are conservatives don’t share.

Yet San Francisco is still a deeply divided city on economic issues, including land use and the role of government. This is where most of the political conflicts and divisions occur, and it is here where our political spectrum is as wide as anywhere – perhaps even wider given the extreme wealth and poverty here, as well as the long history of political activism and the setting of national political trends. And it is in this realm that our labels come from.

A “moderate” in San Francisco – which is a real misnomer despite its widespread usage – is a fiscal conservative: anti-tax, anti-regulation, an almost religious faith in the free market, and a resentment of the poor (particularly the homeless and the jobless) and those who advocate for them. They want bare minimal government and see the role of government as primarily to facilitate economic activity in the private sector and to provide the basic infrastructure that the private sector needs to operate efficiently. They even believe social services should be provided by the private sector, such as nonprofits, rather than by government. On economic issues, they’re almost indistinguishable from conservatives, with whom they disagree on social issues.

On the other end of the spectrum are the progressives, who don’t trust capitalists and large corporations and believe they need to be heavily regulated and taxed to provide for the common good. We believe in progressive taxation and a redistribution of wealth, particularly from the richest 1 percent, and that government has an important role to play in leveling the economic playing field and playing referee. Progressives generally believe this country has been drifting to the right for at least the last 31 years and that this is a dangerous trend that needs to be addressed with fundamental, systemic reforms. And at this point, we’re willing to adopt radical strategies for triggering that change, such as Occupy Wall Street or other forms of civil disobedience.

The liberals of San Francisco are somewhere in the middle. They’re Democrats (or DTS) who don’t believe in radical change or anything that might disrupt the existing order, preferring incremental reforms over long period of time. They accept the legitimacy of the two-party political system and an economic system governed by Wall Street and powerful corporations, and they believe we need to do what we can within that framework. They use neoliberal economic policies like business tax cuts and incentives to encourage private sector job creation and housing development, and they accept a shrinking public sector, which they expect to operate more like the private sector, and a waning labor movement.

The reactions to the OccupySF movement is an interesting illustration of the dividing lines. Moderates have voiced tepid support for the movement’s critique of the growing gap between rich and poor, but they’re appalled at the tactic of occupation, believing curfew and anti-camping laws are more important. Progressives have been the most enthusiastic supporters of a movement that echoes their core values and physically challenges the status quo. Liberals basically support the movement, but they’ve been very uneasy with the tactic of occupation and have been vacillating on how to deal with it.

Latterman and the moderates – as well as many liberals – see ideology as a dirty word, and he was happy that in this election “it was the least ideological race we’ve seen in a long time.” Mayor Ed Lee and Board President David Chiu – both of whom hover in the liberal to moderate range, depending on the issue – also treat the notion of ideology with disdain, claiming to support practical, pragmatic, or common sense solutions to problems.

But progressives see ideology as the essence of politics. They understand the world in terms of class struggle, and believe that the very rich have been aggressively exploiting the people and the planet for too long, and that the only real way to make progress is to fight them and win. They believe in the Occupy paradigm that the 1 percent – the greedy rich who have corrupted our political and economic systems – are actively hostile to the interests of the 99 percent. We know that’s an unsustainable system and we’re hopeful that this is the moment when progress – the core of our belief system, that it’s possible to devise better economic and political systems than the ones we’ve inherited – could finally be attainable if we continue to organize and challenge the system.

That’s my general analysis of San Francisco’s political dynamics. What’s yours?

Ed Lee, Leland Yee and the progressive vote

Zelda Bronstein
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50
Ed Lee, Leland Yee and the progressive vote

A couple of months ago, I got into an argument with Enrique Pearce, who runs Left Coast Communications, the firm that set up Run Ed Run and ran one of the independent expenditure committes for Ed Lee. I told him that his firm was misnamed, that Lee was not a “left” candidate; he told me that Lee was the best bet for progressives because he was the “only candidate who could stop Leland Yee.”

Now: We can all argue forever about Yee’s progressive credentials (I’ve done that in detail here). But if Pearce was telling the truth, he was wrong, so wrong, and the numbers show it. Leland Yee came in fourth. Lee didn’t prevent Yee from becoming mayor; he prevented John Avalos or Dennis Herrera from becoming mayor. Very different story, Mr. Pearce.

Willie Brown and his rich friends were all ecstatic at his party at the Palace Hotel, and why not? They’re back in the game, back in charge at City Hall. And if Brown — who, by the way, engineered this whole thing in one of the most brilliant political moves in San Francisco history — is that happy, there’s a reason for it. The wealthy and powerful interests in San Francisco think Lee is going to do what they want. That’s why they’re celebrating his election.

I’m not trying to be a downer here — it’s still possible that the ranked-choice voting system will put Avalos in first. But it’s not at all likely. The only way that could happen: If the “anybody but Ed” vote was so strong on election day that virtually all of the second-place votes from Bevan Dufty, Jeff Adachi, Yee, David Chiu and Dennis Herrera went to Avalos. Possible, but don’t be on it.

The reality is we’re probably facing four years of Mayor Ed Lee, and I hope he proves me wrong and shows that he’s willing to stand up to the people who put him in power. Possible, but don’t be on it.

The first numbers

Zelda Bronstein
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0

The absentees are in, and it’s no surprise that Mayor Ed Lee is in the lead. In fact, he’s way in the lead — he’s got 39 percent of the 67,000 absentees. I expected him to have a big advantage here, since he did a lot of early GOTV.

Worth noting: John Avalos, the most progressive of the major candidates, is in second in the absentees. That’s a very good sign for the Avalos campaign. But Lee is almost 20,000 votes ahead of Avalos and Dennis Herrera, and that, folks, will be very hard to make up.

The district attorney’s race is over; George Gascon has won.

The sheriff’s race is interesting; Ross Mirkarimi — again, the most progressive candidate — is actually ahead in what is looking like a very conservative absentee vote. He’s only got a slight lead over Chris Cunnie (31.7 percent to 31.4 percent, a total of a couple hundred votes) but that margin will grow as the night moves on. Mirkarimi, it appears, will finish first.

Here’s why I say it’s a conservative absentee turnout: The sales tax, Prop G, is losing 57-42 and Prop. H, the neighborhood schools measure, is ahead 58-41. Both results suggest a strong westside turnout in the absentees.

I’m surprised that Mirkarimi is doing so well with this bunch.

And I’m a little surprised that Prop. C (the “consensus”) pension reform is so far ahead of Prop. D (the Adachi pension reform). Even in the conservative areas, C is leading by 7 percent.

By the way, the school and street bonds have won. If they’re over 66 percent (and both are) in this batch of votes, they’ll win handily.

 

Impertinent questions to Sup. Sean Elsbernd

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 At Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting, Sup. Sean Elsbernd voted against a sensible resolution supporting regulated and safe patient access to medical cannabis in San Francisco.

He was on the losing end of an an 8-3 vote, with Sups. Carmen Chiu and Mark Farrell also voting against.

I was curious why, in San Francisco in November of 2011, he would vote against what I and many others considered a sensible but restrained resolution supporting local small businesses that are regulated and paying taxes and about the only business showing growth in the city.

So I emailed him some Impertinent Questions:

“Why do you continue to support a federal crackdown on medical marijuana? Why do you do this as a purported advocate of small business and bringing in more tax revenue to the city?”

I  also asked Elbernd who he now supported for mayor, since the last time I heard from him he said he would support Mayor Ed Lee only if there were no other candidate who could beat State Sen. Leland Yee. He replied that had not endorsed a candidate for mayor, but if I contacted him after the election he would tell me who he voted for. “Rest assured,” he said, “the Bay Guardian endorsements will certainly influence my decision making process.”

On the marijuana issue, Elsbernd objected strenuously to my statement that he “supported the federal crackdown. Please send me the recording, clip, reporter’s notes, or any other documentation you have that demonstrates t hat I specifically said I supported the federal crackdown.”

Elsbernd asked if I was referring to his note vote on the resolution. (B3 answer: I was.)

“Are you erroneously extrapolating an opinion of mine based on my ‘no’ vote. Is that journalism or is that political spin? Would not a journalist simply ask the question like this, ‘Why did you vote no” on the resolution Making assumptions without any fact to back it up seems a bit irresponsible and lazy for a journalist. While you e-mail me under the guise of being a constituent, and your certainly live in District 7, we both know that this email discussion will be posted very soon on your Bay Guardian website (hello to all of who have time in your day to read Bruce’s blog) with additional edits and snide comments to which you will not me the opportunity to respond. (B3 comment: Elsbernd knows that I send him Impertinent Questions from time to time and that the Q and A will appear on my blog. And he knows he can answer in the blog comments or in a letter to the Guardian. To his credit, Elsbernd always answers me and I enjoy hearing from him. And I keep inviting him to talk things over at tapas night on Thursday night at the Que Syrah wine bar in West Portal in his district. I even offer to buy the first flight, but alas  he never shows.)

Elsbernd then says he will answer my real question. “Why did I vote ‘no’ on the resolution?

Did you read the entire resolution? (B3 answer: yes.) Did you agree with every ‘whereas’ clause and every ‘resolved’ clause? (B3 answer: Yes.) Elsbern continued, “I do not. In particular, I strenuously object to the ‘whereas’ clause on page l, line 12-16, which implies that all licensed medical cannabis dispensaries in San Francisco are ‘clearly acting in good faith,’ and that they ‘take every measure possible to be safe and professional members of the community.’

Elsbernd then gets specific: “I suggest you talk to your neighbors on the other side of Portola/Junipero Serra who live near the dispensary on Ocean Avenue and ask them if ‘every measure’ has been taken to to be safe and professional members of their community. I suggest you read the police reports in and around the area over the last five years and compare those same reports o before the opening of the dispensaries and ask whether or not ‘every measure possible’ has indeed been taken. If you take the time and do that work, I think you’ll understand, why, as the representative of those neighborhoods, I voted against that resolution. (B3 answer: I am always take note  when Elsbernd purports to represent his constituents in his district. But he could have amended the motion in committee (he was absent on the committee vote) or at the board. Instead, he used this single example to justify his opposition to a timely resolution putting the city squarely on record as being opposed to the ridiculous, expensive, job-killing, and tax-killing crackdown by the federal government on medical marijuana and its use in treating debilitating diseases and chronic pain in thousands of patients in San Francisco and throughout the state. The resolution also resolved that the supervisors “encourage the President and Congress of the United States to enact legislation requiring federal law enforcement to respect state medical cannabis laws.”)

Elsbernd also argued that the resolution called “for a massive tax reduction for all dispensaries in its resolved clause to support HR 1985, a bill by Rep.Stark granting a tax exemption for all such businesses? I know the Guardian typically opposes all business tax exemptions. Do you guys support this one.” (B3 answer: The Stark bill is not a a tax reduction bill. It is a bill aimed at reversing an IRS crackdown on many large dispensaries—including Harborside Health Center in Oakland, the largest in Northern California, that they cannot write off normal business expenses and must pay a 35 per cent levy on those claims going back for three years. Harborside’s Steve DeAngelo told the Guardian that this IRS attack would put Harborside—or any company with high overhead costs—out of business.  http://www.sfbg.com/2011/10/11/feds-crack-down

Stark’s bill would reverse that IRS decision and allow dispensaries to deduct expenses according to state law just like all other businesses in California.
http://americansforsafeaccess.org/downloads/Stark_bill_2011.pdf

And so my original Impertinent Question remains: why is Elsbernd (and Chiu and Farrell)  supporting in effect a federal crackdown aimed at killing off marijuana dispensaries and killing off a growing sector of small business and a valuable source of tax revenue? If he isn’t supporting the federal crackdown with this vote, what is his position on medical marijuana dispensaries?  Wine and tapas, Sean?  B3)

Dick Meister: Searching for Joe

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By Dick Meister

Dick Meister, former labor editor of the SF Chronicle and KQED-TV Newsroom, has covered labor and politics for more than a half-century. Contact him through his website, www.dickmeister,com, which includes more than 300 of his columns.

San Francisco’s unions have been looking for another Joe Alioto ever since he left the mayor’s office in 1976 after eight years of being one of the best political friends organized labor ever had – anywhere.

Unions certainly have no chance of finding such a staunch supporter among the candidates for mayor in Tuesday’s election – not even in former Supervisor Michela Alioto-Pier, Alioto’s granddaughter. She reflects the conservative views of her former supervisorial district, which encompasses the upscale Pacific Heights and Marina neighborhoods.

Some of the other candidates claim to be labor-friendly, and some actually are. But none have gained anything approaching the all-out, almost unprecedented support that unions gave Alioto. Not surprisingly, unions have in turn been promised only relatively little post-election support by Tuesday’s candidates.

Alioto’s rewards to labor were based in part on the fact that, as he declared, “the controlling and decisive factor in my election was the support of organized labor.”

His administrations, he said, were “first of all sympathetic to labor.”

Alioto appointed union representatives to all of the city’s boards and commissions, some of which previously had little or no union representation, and helped unions in major strikes against recalcitrant employers, often stepping in to convince the employers to settle.

Probably the greatest benefits to union members came from the downtown building boom that Alioto launched, creating thousands of construction jobs.

So, with no Alioto-like union supporter in this year’s mayoral race, who are unions supporting? And how is labor likely to influence the outcome as well as the votes for ballot propositions, particularly Props C and D that involve the pensions and health care of public employees that have come to preoccupy municipal and state governments everywhere?

It seems clear that labor’s influence on the election outcome will turn out to be relatively slight, certainly considerably less than in Alioto’s time – less, in fact than in just about any other city election since the 1930s, when San Francisco was celebrated as one of the country’s premier “union towns.”

But no more. It’s sometimes hard to believe that San Francisco was ever a union town in the same league as New York, Chicago and Detroit.

The general public hardly hears from the city’s once vibrant and highly influential Labor Council and its leaders these days. Individual unions such as the Service Employees, Longshore and Warehouse Union, Nurses Association and Unite-Here, the hotel workers union, still have considerable clout, as do a few others. But that’s about it.

It’s partly the fault of the news media, but their scant coverage of organized labor reflects the failure of unions to take the leading position in politics as in economics that they once had, and must have if they are to prosper.

Unions are staging something of a comeback with the growth of public employee unions, which now dominate organized labor in numbers and influence – though locally unions probably do not yet have enough influence to play the role that once put them in a position to help elect politicians who considered them indispensable.

Public Defender and mayoral candidate Jeff Adachi and his conservative backers are trying hard to seriously weaken the growing strength of San Francisco’s public employee unions and their members, mainly through Proposition D. The apparent frontrunner in the mayor’s race, acting Mayor Ed Lee, is no particular friend of labor, either. Neither was Lee’s predecessor, Gavin Newsom.

Labor wasn’t helped by last year’s elections that gave the Board of Supervisors a strong minority of members on the political right who are at best indifferent to unions. Only five of the 11 supervisors can be legitimately considered pro-labor progressives.

It would help labor greatly to have a strong pro-union mayor, but none of the major candidates would play that role. The Labor Council endorsed Dennis Herrera and Leland Yee. The Building and Construction Trades Council went with Alioto-Pier and Yee.

But what about me? Glad you asked. I say it should be Herrera, who’s an excellent city attorney, has a broad base of supporters and, as a Hispanic, would give that underrepresented minority an important voice in City Hall. All the major candidates for sheriff and district attorney have solid credentials, and I’m sure any of them would do a good job.

Can’t see any reason not to vote for Prop A, a much needed school bond measure, and Prop B that would authorize bonds to pay for needed road and street repair. A big no on the foolish Prop E that would allow the Board of Supervisors to undo measures previously approved by voters.

No on F, another foolish and unnecessary measure. But Prop. G’s a good one. It raises the sales tax by half a percent to finance public safety programs and services to children and seniors.

Prop H is bad news. It would take away parental choice of schools and force students to attend only their neighborhood schools. Since many neighborhoods are still segregated by race or along socio-economic lines, it also would re-segregate schools citywide.

The main event includes, of course, Props C and D, and we should reject both measures. Don’t be confused by those who say, “I can’t vote no on C, because if D gets more votes, Adachi will win.” That ain’t necessarily so, for if neither measure gets at least 50 percent+one of the votes, then both would be defeated.

Make no mistake: Both propositions would be extremely harmful, because both would needlessly increase the financial burden of city employees by limiting the pensions of many new employees, while at the same time requiring them to make higher contributions to city pension funds. Both measures would also require some current employees to contribute more, although Prop D’s rates are somewhat higher, especially for higher income employees. Both C and D would also limit cost-of-living raises for current retirees.

Ever since voters in 2004 approved a badly needed reform of the City Health Service System that oversees the health care of employees and retirees, their elected representatives have had a genuine voice, with four members on the service’s seven-member governing board. The other three have been City Hall appointees.

Prop C would reverse the numbers, substituting another City Hall appointee for one of the elected members and otherwise limiting the voice of the elected members. Sponsors of Prop C would have you believe that the proposition is a “consensus” measure agreed to by all parties. But don’t you believe it.

Retirees, who make up a large part of those in the Health Service System, were not allowed to be part of the consensus negotiations, presided over by acting Mayor Lee.

It’s certain Joe Alioto would never have allowed that to happen.

Dick Meister, former labor editor of the SF Chronicle and KQED-TV Newsroom, has covered labor and politics for more than a half-century. Contact him through his website, www.dickmeister,com, which includes more than 300 of his columns.

Powerful, mostly peaceful Oakland action ends badly

Sasha Cuttler
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After a long day of mostly peaceful demonstrations by thousands of protesters who joined OccupyOakland’s General Strike and Day of Action yesterday, it’s still unclear why the Oakland Police – which had stood down the entire day, leaving the movement to self-police – massed in riot gear around midnight and used tear gas and other projectiles to clear the streets and make a reported 80 arrests.

Spokespersons for the Oakland Police Department and Mayor Jean Quan haven’t returned Guardian phone calls, and reports in the Oakland Tribune and other media outlets don’t indicate exactly what prompted police to change tactics and aggressively confront the demonstration. Protesters had taken over a vacant building and erected barricades in the streets shortly before riot police showed up, and it appears from a Tribune video that a dumpster was set on fire after the police showed up.

Before the standoff between city officials and demonstrators in Oakland again took a violent turn, the day was notable for its lack of police presence around the occupied Oscar Grant Plaza and nearby 14th and Broadway epicenter. And despite a small number of masked agitators who broke bank windows and sprayed graffiti – much to the chagrin of most protesters who actively opposed such tactics – the movement was remarkably nonviolent and self-policing, particularly given a crowd of what seemed to be around 10,000 people at its peak. Protesters even handled traffic control, using a megaphone to help motorists through intersections congested with passing demonstrators.

“This is an extraordinarily peaceful collection of diverse people,” Sen. Loni Hancock (D-Oakland) told the Guardian just after 5 pm as a massive march left the encampment to shut down the Port of Oakland. “I feel like they’re doing what no elected person can do: they’re putting economic equity issues in front of the American people.”

“This is beautiful and powerful. This I love,” agreed Oakland City Council member Libby Schaaf, beaming as the peaceful march took off, although she told us that she was disappointed to see Oakland businesses vandalized, including her beloved Noah’s Bagels. “Fight greed, not bagels.”

Most of the crowd condemned the violence, and many openly worried that it would undercut the positive demonstration of people power and the airing of frustration with economic injustices in the country. But even Hancock said a few bad apples shouldn’t spoil people’s understanding of what an important day it was.

“I’m very grateful to them for calling attention to economic inequality. It is in the interests of cities that this issue take center stage,” Hancock told us. “There are so many things that have been talked about that are now on the stage and it’s a very important conversation to have.”

But many in the movement were disappointed nonetheless, despite the myriad successes in shutting down business nonviolently. Around 3 pm, a crowd of thousands marched past a Chase Bank at 20th and Berkeley streets where the front window had been shattered, as was the case with at least six other businesses. Taped to the windows were signs reading “We are better than this” and “This is not the 99%. Sorry, the 99%”.

As the huge crowd repeatedly chanted “peaceful protest,” Ryan, a 31-year-old Oakland resident, expressed his frustration over vandalism he blamed on out-of-town instigators. “People from Oakland would not damage their city like that,” he told me. “Last week was beautiful, we were dancing and singing in the streets,” he said, referring to the largely nonviolent response to police violence, “but this is bullshit.”

Large protests almost always have members who want to escalate the conflict and who see breaking windows as a legitimate tactic, and yesterday there were sometimes tense conflicts between protesters who disagreed on the issue. Another complex issue is how to now view Oakland Mayor Jean Quan, whose support for last week’s violent police crackdown prompted calls for her recall or resignation, although her subsequent apology, the re-encampment of Frank Ogawa Plaza, and yesterday’s police stand down caused some to rethink whether to actively oppose her.

“My goal for today is to spur the international movement forward and to show what we’re capable of,” said 23-year-old Iris Brilliant, who got more actively involved in OccupyOakland after the crackdown and said she was happy to see the police kept at bay. “It’s important to push this forward.”

But Tania Kappner, a 41-year-old teacher from Oakland, still hadn’t forgiven Quan or the police for the violent excesses in last week’s raid. She was camped out in Oscar Grant Plaza in a tent with the sign “Mayor Quan Must Go!”

“It’s good she’s not sending them in on us today, but she never should have done it in the first place,” Kappner told us. “We’re calling for her to go and the police who did it to be jailed.”

With the decision to again unleash the riot police and tear gas and arrest big numbers of people – which was the very thing that prompted such huge numbers of people to turn out yesterday, giving OccupyOakland the numbers and power to easily shut down the port and dozens of businesses – Oakland and the larger Occupy movement might again find itself back at square one.

The National Lawyer’s Guild, which had observers on hand to witness the late-night police crackdown, issued a statement today condemning the city’s actions and saying they violate a crowd control police the NLG helped the city write to settle lawsuits stemming from the OPD’s use of rubber bullets to clear anti-war protesters from the Port of Oakland back in 2003.

“Like we saw last Tuesday, the OPD actions in the late night hours violated numerous provisions of the Crowd Control Policy and the Constitutional rights of activists,” explained NLG’s San Francisco Bay Area chapter president Michael Flynn. “Our legal observers did not disobey any police orders and neither did many of the other arrestees.”
“The Crowd Control Policy clearly prohibits shooting munitions into a crowd,” added NLG attorney Rachel Lederman. “While the police are allowed to use tear gas, they are supposed to use a minimum amount and only where other crowd control tactics have failed.  It is not at all clear that less violent and less provocative measures would not have sufficed to achieve any legitimate law enforcement objectives last night.”

Meanwhile, in San Francisco, Mayor Ed Lee has reportedly assured OccupySF that he won’t follow through on threats to raid the camp if tents aren’t removed, at least not anytime soon (many observers speculate that he’ll at least wait until after next week’s mayoral election). But Lee has been unwilling to make a clear public statement that raids are now off the table.

When we sought to clarify Lee’s position and get his reaction to a Board of Supervisors resolution calling for the city to allow a 24/7 encampment, his Press Secretary Christine Falvey wrote: “The mayor has not focused on the resolution, but has been focusing on meeting with clergy, labor, occupysf demonstrators and his department heads to make sure that the site is kept clean, safe and accessible for everyone. He remains concerned about overnight camping and the public health and safety issues that brings. That said, he has seen some good progress over the last few days because of his open communication with the group. DPW cleaned up the site over the weekend and the demonstrators helped facilitate the cleanup. Tents were moved off the Bocce Ball Court as well. The group is working with Fire and Public Health officials to make some improvements. The dialogue is ongoing.”

Photos by Steven T. Jones

Anyone but Lee

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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198
Anyone but Lee

tredmond@sfbg.com

Two weeks ago, the race for mayor of San Francisco seemed in the bag. Mayor Ed Lee was so far ahead in most polls that everyone else looked like an also-ran. A Bay Citizen simulation of ranked-choice voting showed Lee getting enough seconds and thirds to emerge easily as the winner. His approval rating with voters was above 70 percent. The money was pouring in to his campaign and to the coffers of independent expenditure committees promoting him.

But that was before the voter-fraud scandals, OccupySF, Sup. John Avalos appearing on national TV, a controversial veto, Sup. David Chiu getting the endorsement of the San Francisco Chronicle, and an attack on City Attorney Dennis Herrera backfiring.

“It’s changing,” Corey Cook, a political scientist at the University of San Francisco, told us. “I don’t know whether it’s tightening up, but it’s certainly changing.”

One campaign consultant, who asked not to be named, was more blunt: “The Lee campaign is one bad news story away from free-fall.”

That’s not to say Lee is going to lose, or even that he’s anything but the clear front-runner. But over the past week, as Lee has taken a series of hits, supporters of the other candidates — particularly Herrera and Avalos — are starting to wonder: Could somebody else really win?

The answer, of course, is yes — anything can happen in the week before an election. But defeating Mayor Lee will take a confluence of events and strategies that starts with a big progressive turnout — and with voters who don’t like the idea of an incumbent with ties to a corrupt old political machine carefully allocating their three ranked choices.

 

NO SURPRISE

So far, there’s been no crushing “October surprise” — no single event or revelation that can change the course of the election. And the impact of anything that happens in the next few days will be blunted by the fact that 27,000 absentee ballots have already arrived at the Department of Elections.

By all accounts, Lee’s campaign and the somewhat sketchy independent expenditure groups that are working in parallel, if not in concert, have done an impressive job of identifying and turning out absentee voters. Local consultants from most of the campaigns agree that at least 20 percent of the final turnout will be Chinese voters — and Lee will get at least 75 and as much of 90 percent of that vote.

But as Cook notes, there are still “huge undecideds” for this late in a race. And while Lee was polling above 30 percent a few weeks ago, by most accounts his numbers have been dropping steadily. One recent poll shows him falling 10 points in the past two weeks, leaving him closer to 20 percent than 30 percent.

“If the election were held three weeks from now, he’d lose,” said one consultant who asked not to be identified by name.

What’s happened? A confluence of factors have put the incumbent in a bad light.

The voter-fraud allegations have made headlines and the district attorney is discussing a criminal investigation. Although Lee and his campaign weren’t directly involved — the possibly illegal efforts to steer voters to Lee were run by one of the IEs — the last thing a politician wants to see in the waning days before an election are the words “voter fraud” and “criminal investigation.”

And the allegation — that Lee supporters in Chinatown filled out ballots for absentee voters then collected them for later delivery — play right into Lee’s weakness. While voters generally have good impressions of his work at City Hall, the fact that he’s connected to sleazy operators and tied to the old discredited Brown machine continues to haunt him. And this sort of activity simply re-enforces that perception.

The Leland Yee campaign has taken direct advantage of that perception, releasing a parody of the hagiographic Lee biography written by political consultant Enrique Pearce. “The Real Ed Lee story,” which repeatedly talks of his connections to unethical power brokers, hit the streets this past weekend.

Lee also sided with the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce over a coalition of labor and consumer groups with his veto of legislation by Sup. David Campos that would have prevented employers from draining $50 million per year from health savings accounts set up to comply with city law. Many restaurants even tack a 3-5 percent surcharge onto customers’ bills, making it essentially consumer fraud.

“It’s important for us to take a stance on the issue and say that what the mayor did was wrong,” Campos told us. “It’s a defining issue for us in City Hall.”

Then there’s OccupySF. Nobody knows for sure, but it’s likely that a majority of San Franciscans are at least somewhat sympathetic to the group’s message. And Lee has so far avoided the public relations disaster of Oakland’s crackdown.

But the left is unhappy with Lee’s constant threats to clear out the encampment, and the right is unhappy that he hasn’t sent in the cops already — and even the San Francisco Chronicle has denounced his lack of decisiveness.

Lee put the police on high alert and had them moving around in buses, ready to move in — than at the last minute changed his mind. “What this shows,” said former Supervisor Aaron Peskin, “is that we don’t have a mayor with a firm hand on the tiller.”

Most observers expected that the Chronicle would join the San Francisco Examiner and endorse Lee. But the paper came down on the side of Supervisor David Chiu. Chiu is still running well behind in the polls, and not that many voters follow the Chron’s advice, but the endorsement was a huge boost to his campaign.

“Ed Lee’s had a bad couple of weeks, and some of the others have had a good couple of weeks,” Cooks said.

 

RANKED CHOICE

Ranked-choice voting puts an interesting twist into all of this. Several consultants and election experts I talked to this week said that Lee would be far more vulnerable in a traditional election. “He would lose a runoff against almost any of the top challengers,” one person said.

But every poll that’s tested the ranked-choice scenario — even recent polls that show Lee faltering — still put him on top after the votes are all tallied and allocated. That’s in part because supporters of candidates who are lower in the pack — Chiu, for example — tend to put Lee as a second or third choice. The Bay Citizen/USF poll showed that when Chiu was eliminated, most of his votes wound up going to Lee.

“Ranked-choice voting clearly favors incumbents,” Cook told me.

And, people walking precincts say, there are still some Herrera and even Avalos voters who put Lee second or third. And the only way Avalos — or anyone other than Lee — can win the election is if progressive and independent voters stick to a clear “anyone but Lee” voting strategy.

Avalos is doing well in recent polls; in fact, one shows him ahead of Herrera in first-place votes. Herrera does better when seconds and thirds are counted. Michela Alioto-Pier gets a fair number of first-place votes, which isn’t surprising since she’s one of only three women in the race, the only woman with citywide name recognition — and the only real credible conservative.

Yee and Chiu are both in the running, and Yee has come out strong attacking Lee and is running hard for progressive votes. He showed up at OccupySF the night a police raid was threatened and has been the leading critic of the alleged voter fraud.

Cook says a scenario where somebody beats Lee is still “an inside straight” — but it’s not at all impossible.

If Lee gets 30 percent of the first-place votes, most observers (including his opponents) agree that he’s going to cruise to victory. But if his first-place total is closer to 20 percent, and one or more of the other candidates are within five points, it’s going to be a lot closer.

Here’s the bottom line: If you don’t want to see a repeat of the late 1990s, when Willie Brown was mayor and City Hall was for sale to the highest bidder, vote for anyone but Lee — and use your three votes strategically. If you like John Avalos, put him first — but give your second-place vote to Herrera, who seems positioned right now to be the other strongest challenger. If you like Herrera, give your second to Avalos. If you like Leland Yee or David Chiu, make sure that Avalos and Herrera are also on your slate.

Fill out all three votes. And get your friends and family to the polls. Because turnout is projected to be low, which helps Lee — and the race may well be decided on the basis of who shows up November 8th.

On Guard!

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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4
On Guard!

news@sfbg.com

 

VICTORY’S MUDSLINGING

Hit pieces are common in San Francisco politics. So, sadly, are negative mailers funded by outside independent expenditure committees that can raise unlimited money.

But it’s highly unusual for an organization devoted to electing queer candidates to fund an attack on a candidate who is endorsed by both leading LGBT organizations and is, by all accounts, an ally of the community.

That’s what happened last week when the Washington-based Victory Fund — the leading national organization for LGBT political candidates — sent out a bizarre mailer blasting City Attorney Dennis Herrera for taking money from law firms that do business with the city.

The Victory Fund has endorsed former Sup. Bevan Dufty, who is the most prominent LGBT candidate in the mayor’s race. That’s to be expected; it’s what the Victory Fund does.

But why, in a race with 16 candidates, would the fund go after Herrera, who has spent much of the past seven years fighting in court for marriage equality? Why try to knock down a candidate who has the support of both the Harvey Milk Club and the Alice B. Toklas Club?

It’s baffled — and infuriated — longtime queer activist Cleve Jones, who is a Herrera supporter. “I have long respected the Victory Fund,” Jones told us. “But I’ve never seen them do what they did here. And it’s going to undermine the fund’s credibility.”

Jones dashed off an angry letter to the fund’s president, Chuck Wolfe, saying he was “appalled that this scurrilous attack, in the waning days of a mayoral campaign, would go out to the San Francisco electorate under the name of the Victory Fund.

“You really screwed up, Chuck, and I am not alone in my anger.”

We couldn’t get Wolfe on the phone, but the fund’s vice president for communications, Denis Dison, told us that the mailer “is all about fighting for our endorsed candidates.”

So how does it help Dufty, in a ranked-choice election, to attack Herrera? (In fact, given the dynamics of this election, the person it helps most is probably Mayor Ed Lee). Dison couldn’t explain. Nor would he say who at the fund decided to do the attack mailer.

But there are a couple of interesting connections that might help explain what’s going on. For starters, Joyce Newstat, a political consultant who is working for the Dufty campaign, is active in the Victory Fund, sits on the board of the fund’s Leadership Institute, and, according to a March 24 article in the Bay Area Reporter, was among those active in helping Dufty win the Victory Fund endorsement.

But again: Supporting Dufty is one thing. Attacking Herrera is another. Who would want to do that?

Well, if there’s one single constituency in the city that would like to sink Herrera, it’s Pacific Gas and Electric Co. And guess what? PG&E Governmental Affairs Manager Brandon Hernandez chairs the Victory Fund’s Leadership Institute. PG&E’s corporate logo appears on the front page of the fund’s website, and the company gave the Victory Fund more than $50,000 in 2010, according to the fund’s annual report.

Dison insisted that neither Hernadez nor anyone else from PG&E was involved in making the decision to hit Herrera and said the money went to the Leadership Institute, which trains LGBT candidates, not directly to the campaign fund.

Maybe so –- but the folks at the private utility, who are among the top three corporate donors to the Victory Fund, have to be happy. (Tim Redmond)

 

 

HERRERA HIT BACKFIRES

Herrera was also the target of another attack on his LGBT credentials last week, this one by the San Francisco Chronicle, which ran a front page story on Oct. 26 in which anonymous sources said he raised doubts in private City Hall meetings about San Francisco’s decision to issue same-sex marriage licenses in 2004. It was entitled, “Fight turns ugly to win gay votes in mayor’s race.”

Despite trying to couch the hit in passive language, writing that ” a surprise issue has emerged” based on accusations “leveled by several members of former Mayor Gavin Newsom’s administration,” it was clear that it was the Chron that made it an issue, for which the newspaper was denounced by leaders of the LGBT community from across the political spectrum at a rally the next day.

“Those who are saying this now anonymously are as cowardly as Dennis and Gavin were courageous back then,” said Deputy City Attorney Theresa Stewart, the lead attorney who defended San Francisco’s decision in 2004 to unilaterally issue marriage licenses to same-sax couples, in defiance of state and federal law, which eventually led to the legalizing of such unions. “We can’t have our community turn on us for petty political gain.”

“WTF, Chronicle?” was how Assemblymember Tom Ammiano began his speech, going on to lay blame for the attack on surrogates for Mayor Ed Lee. Ammiano also called out the mayor for campaign finance violations by his supporters, for undermining the Healthy San Francisco program that was created by Ammiano’s legislation, and for repeatedly ordering police raids on the OccupySF encampment.

“How about some fucking leadership?!” Ammiano said.

Cleve Jones, an early gay rights leader who marched with Harvey Milk, also denounced Lee and his supporters for cronyism, vote tampering, money laundering, and the “fake grassroots” efforts of the various well-funded independent expenditure campaigns, which he said have fooled the Chronicle.

“To the Chronicle and that reporter — really? — this is what you do two weeks before the election? You should be ashamed of yourself,” Jones said. “How stupid do you think we are?”

Yet Chronicle City Editor Audrey Cooper defended the article. “Clearly, I disagree [with the criticisms],” she told the Guardian. “I personally vetted every one of the sources and I’m confident everything we printed is true.” She also tried to cast the article as something other than a political attack, saying it was about an issue of interest to the LGBT community, but no LGBT leaders have stepped up to defend the paper.

Beyond criticizing the obvious political motivations behind the attack, speakers at the rally called the article bad journalism and said it was simply untrue to suggest that Herrera didn’t strongly support the effort to legalize same-sex marriage from the beginning.

“I can tell you that Dennis never once shrank from this fight. I was there, I know,” Stewart said, calling Herrera “a straight ally who’s devoted his heart and soul to this community.”

Sen. Mark Leno, who introduced the first bill legalizing same-sex marriage to clear the Legislature, emphasized that he isn’t endorsing any candidates for mayor and that he didn’t want to comment on the details of the article’s allegations. But he noted that even within the LGBT community, there were differences of opinion over the right timing and tactics for pushing the issue, and that Herrera has been a leader of the fight for marriage equality since the beginning.

“I am here to speak in defense of the character and integrity of our city attorney, Dennis Herrera,” Leno said, later adding, “I do not appreciate when the battle for our civil rights is used as a political football in the waning days of an election.”

Molly McKay, one of the original plaintiffs in the civil lawsuit that followed San Francisco’s actions, teared up as she described the ups and downs that the case took, working closely with Herrera throughout. “But this is one of the strangest twists I can imagine,” she said of the attack by the Chronicle and its anonymous sources. “It’s ridiculous and despicable.”

Representatives for both the progressive Harvey Milk LGBT Democratic Club and fiscally conservative Alice B. Toklas LGBT Democratic Club also took to the microphone together, both saying they often disagree on issues, but they were each denouncing the attack and have both endorsed Herrera, largely because of his strong advocacy for the LGBT community.

Sup. Scott Wiener called Herrera, “One of the greatest straight allies we’ve every had as a community.”

When Herrera finally took the microphone, he thanked mayoral opponents Joanne Rees and Jeff Adachi for showing up at the event to help denounce the attack and said, “This is bigger than the mayor’s race. It’s bigger than me.”

He criticized those who would trivialize this issue for petty political gain and said, “It was my pleasure and honor to have been a part of this battle from the beginning — from the beginning — and I’ll be there in the end.” (Steven T. Jones)

 

 

BUYING REFORM

UPDATE: THIS ITEM HAS BEEN CHANGED FROM THE PRINT VERSION TO CORRECT INACCURATE INFORMATION DEALING WITH WHETHER PAST INIATIVES CAN BE CHANGED

October yielded tremendous financial contributions from real estate investors and interest groups for Yes on E, feeding fears that the measure will be used to target rent control and development standards in San Francisco.

Sup. Scott Wiener has been the biggest proponent for Prop E since May 2011. He argues that the Board of Supervisors should be able to change or repeal voter-approved ballot measures years after they become law, saying that voters are hampered with too many issues on the ballot. Leaving the complex issues to city officials rather than the voters, makes the most sense of this “common sense measure”, Wiener calls it.

But how democratic is a board that can change laws approved by voters? Calvin Welch, a longtime progressive and housing activist, has his own theory: Wiener is targeting certain landlord and tenant issues that build on the body of laws that began in 1978, when San Francisco voters first started adopting rent control and tenants protection measures. Yet the measure will only allow the board to change initiatives approved after January 2012.

“That is what the agenda is all about — roughly 30 measures that deal with rent control and growth control,” he said. Critics say  the measure will leave progressive reforms vulnerable to a board heavily influence by big-money interests. Although Wiener denies Prop E is an attack on tenants, who make up about two-thirds of San Franciscans, the late financial support for the measure is coming from the same downtown villains that tenant and progressive groups fight just about every election cycle. High-roller donations are coming straight from the housing sector, which would love a second chance after losing at the ballot box.

Contributions to Yes on E include $15,000 from Committee on Jobs Government Reform Fund, $10,000 from Building Owners and Managers Association of SF PAC, another $10,000 from high-tech billionaire Ron Conway, and $2,500 from Shorenstein Realty Services LP. Then — on Oct. 28, after the deadline for final pre-election campaign reporting — the San Francisco Association of Realtors made a late contribution of another $18,772, given through the front group Coalition for Sensible Government.

Prop. E is organized so that the first three years, an initiative cannot be subject to review. However after four years, a two-thirds majority vote by the board could make changes, and after sevens years, a simple majority could do so.

 (Christine Deakers)

Lee benefits from vetoing health care reform

Sasha Cuttler
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25
Lee benefits from vetoing health care reform

Downtown groups that pressured Mayor Ed Lee to veto legislation that would have prevented businesses from raiding their employees’ health savings accounts have been funneling big bucks into independent expenditure campaigns formed to keep Lee in the Mayor’s Office.

Meanwhile, the Board of Supervisors today strengthened a weak alternative to the vetoed legislation by Board President David Chiu, which it then continued for two weeks. The amendments by Sup. Malia Cohen were unanimously approved by the board, but her five allies in supporting the vetoed legislation – David Campos, John Avalos, Ross Mirkarimi, Jane Kim, and Eric Mar – preferred that the measure be returned to committee for more analysis, losing on a 6-5 vote.

“We need more time to understand the implications of the amendments. We’re not sure if it actually closes the loophole,” Campos, the vetoed measure’s sponsor, said of provisions in the Health Care Security Ordinance – the city’s landmark measure that required employers to provide some health coverage to employees – that allowed businesses last year to pocket more than $50 million from health savings accounts they created for their employees.

One Cohen amendment specifically addressed one of the more egregious violations – restaurants that charge customers at 3-5 percent surcharge for employee health care and than pocket that money at the end of the year – which Chiu had addressed only by calling for more scrutiny of the tactic by the Office of Labor Standards. She also would require businesses to keep two years worth of contributions in the account, rather than the one year sought by Chiu to address the so-called “January problem” of businesses draining the account at the end of every year and leaving nothing for employees who get sick or injured at the start of the year.

It was perhaps a sign of the heat that Lee took from labor and consumer groups for his veto that he quickly issued a press release today praising the supervisors for addressing the issue. “I applaud President Chiu, Supervisor Cohen, organized labor, small business owners, and the Department of Public Health for finding the solutions to this important public policy that can strengthen our City’s landmark Health Care Security Ordinance. By closing the loophole through these proposed amendments, we can increase access to health care, protect jobs in our small businesses and protect consumers while growing our economy at the same time,” it read.

But Lee appears to have already benefited from heeding the demands of downtown – particularly the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce and Golden Gate Restaurant Association (GGRA) – who made defeating the Campos legislation a top priority, casting it as a new “fee” that would drain $50 million from the local economy.

The San Francisco Alliance for Jobs and Sustainable Growth PAC, created by notorious downtown bagman Jim Sutton, is the best-funded on the four independent expenditure groups that are supporting Lee, taking in $390,000 this fall, including $27,000 from the GGRA and $25,000 from the Chamber’s SF Forward group. Both groups also support the Committee on Jobs, which kicked in $110,000 to the Alliance campaign. GGRA also gave another $10,000 to the pension reform campaign that Lee is pushing, support the Chamber had threatened to withhold if the Campos measure was approved.

GGRA Executive Director Rob Black denied this was pay-to-play politics, noting that the Alliance is also supporting DA George Gascon, Sheriff candidate Chris Cunnie and two ballot measures. “But absolutely, the mayor’s name is on there and the organization voted to endorse him,” Black said.

GGRA voted in August to endorse Lee, Chiu, and Michela Alioto-Pier for mayor. Black said the organization is “generally supportive of Sup. Chiu’s approach to reforming the Health Care Security Ordinance,” and Black specifically said it supports improving requirements that businesses notify employees about the health savings accounts and how to use them.

The GGRA led the original fight against the HCSO in 2006, which was sponsored by then-Sup. Tom Ammiano, who lined up a veto-proof majority on the progressive-dominated board and eventually persuaded then-Mayor Gavin Newsom to support it. The measure created the Healthy San Francisco program and required employers to spend a minimum amount per employee on health care, although federal ERISA law bars cities from prescribing how that money is spent.

GGRA challenged the employer mandate all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court on the grounds that it violated ERISA, losing the case. Many of its members restaurants then opted to use health savings accounts rather than paying into Healthy San Francisco or private health insurance, even though health experts say such accounts are the worst option.

Campos and his allies have maintained that money in these health savings accounts belongs to employees and that businesses that use and raid them gain an unfair competitive advantage at the expense of their employees, customers, and city taxpayers, who are often forced to foot the bill for the uninsured.

Campos and the coalition that supports him has said they may take this issue to voters if the Chiu/Lee legislative fix doesn’t address their concerns.

SF supervisors support OccupySF’s 24/7 encampment

Sasha Cuttler
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56
SF supervisors support OccupySF’s 24/7 encampment

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors today approved a resolution supporting Occupy Wall Street and the right of OccupySF to maintain a 24/7 encampment in Justin Herman Plaza, although sponsors of the measure narrowly lost a fight over amending the measure to allow police to use force if “there is an objective threat to safety or health.”

The sponsors of the measure – Sups. John Avalos, David Campos, Eric Mar, and Jane Kim – noted that heath and safety concerns were used as a pretext for both police raids on OccupySF and for last week’s violent police crackdown on the Occupy Oakland encampment, something San Francisco officials uniformly say they want to avoid here. Those four sponsors were joined by Sup. Ross Mirkarimi in opposing the amendment by Sup. Scott Wiener, which passed on a 6-5 vote.

But the overall measure – which urges Mayor Ed Lee to drop his opposition to tents and other camping infrastructure and not order another police raid on the camp – was then approved on an 8-3 vote, with Sups. Mark Farrell, Carmen Chu, and Sean Elsbernd in dissent. Farrell and Chu both expressed support for the movement’s call for addressing severe economic inequities in the country, but they oppose the tactic of occupation.

Board President David Chiu, the swing vote on allowing the resolution to be watered down, said his vote was an effort to get as much support for the measure as possible. “For me, it was important to build consensus here at the board,” he said, praising the work that city officials and OccupySF participants have done to resolve their differences. “I have been very impressed with the behavior of individuals involved in this movement.”

Wiener had made a number of amendments to the resolution that Avalos accepted without objection, drawing the line only at the change that would specifically allow for police to use force to dislodge the protesters. While the nonbinding resolution doesn’t compel any action by Lee or the SFPD, Avalos praised the mayor for meeting privately with OccupySF members after he seemed to take a firm public stand again allowing camping.

“I do want to thank the mayor for coming to the table on how our public spaces can be used,” Avalos said. Kim echoed the point, noting that, “A ton of progress has been made.” The Mayor’s Office has not yet responded to Guardian requests for comment on the resolution or his current position on OccupySF, but we’ll update this post when we hear back.

Wiener and others also thanked Avalos for taking the lead role in addressing this issue. “I want to thank Sup. Avalos for being so open and collaborative,” Wiener said, noting that he’s been very impressed with how OccupySF has handled itself throughout the standoff. “I’m very supportive of OccupySF…It’s been incredibly peaceful and people have been friendly and passionate.”

Vote for three but not Ed Lee

Andrew Lam
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16

OPINION Halloween 2011. Next week San Francisco will choose a new mayor. Is this a masquerade? Who is behind Mayor Ed Lee’s mask?

I’ll call it exactly how I see it: I am disappointed in Ed Lee. I’ve known him since before I was first elected to the Board of Supervisors in 2000. I wanted to be hopeful, but I actually can’t say that I’m surprised. Ed Lee has always been a go-along-to-get-along bureaucrat who has moved up the feeding chain by doing the bidding of former Mayor Willie Brown and Willie’s loyal lieutenant Rose Pak. I had a fantasy that maybe Ed would rise to the occasion, become his own person, and emerge as an independent leader free of those that orchestrated his appointment to “interim” mayor.

But in the first year since appointment (in one of the most masterful political plays since Abe Ruef got Eugene Schmitz installed as mayor in 1902), Ed has consistently sided with the powers and their “City Family” that “made” him. Even I was astounded when Ed moved legislation to displace hundreds of hotel workers at San Francisco’s Fairmont Hotel. And I was actually shocked when he did the bidding of the right-wing Restaurant Association and vetoed common-sense legislation to stop the exploitation of local restaurant workers.

His list of disappointments grow. He orchestrated the demolition of more than 1,500 units of rent controlled housing at Park Merced. Then he had the audacity to laud Pacific Gas and Electric Co. as a “great local corporation” on the anniversary of the lethal San Bruno pipeline explosion.

Several pols have been credited with the statement that “money is the mother’s milk of politics.” Well, Willie and Rose and their friends at the Chamber of Commerce got milk! Willie Brown is fundraising for three different committees to get Lee elected, Rose Pak started two different fundraising committees of her own, and right-wing Republican billionaires like Ron Conway and right wing corporations like Pacific Gas and Electric are lining up to throw money into the coffers.

Why? Because Ed is their guy.

The proof is right in front of us. All of Willie’s trademark slights of hand are resurfacing in Ed Lee’s friends’ bag of tricks: money laundering, pay to play politics, allegations of voter fraud. These are all hallmarks of Brown and his cronies, all executed under the visage of the supposedly humble Ed Lee. And voters shouldn’t fall for it. Because if we do, we’ll go back to the days before Gavin Newsom when backroom deals, self-dealing, cronyism and out-and-out corruption were the rule of the day.

It is no coincidence that in a year gripped by the divide between the 99 and 1 percent, the latter is working feverishly to elect Lee. If you don’t believe me, look it up on the Ethics Commission website (sfgov.org/ethics). PG&E alone has contributed at least $50,000 to one such “independent” committee.

I know this is the first race for mayor with ranked choice voting—and it is confusing. That’s a concern. But frankly, at this point all I care about is that voters understand not to mark Ed Lee anywhere on their ballot.

The good news? The outcome of the Mayor’s race is far from a foregone conclusion. San Franciscans are seeing through the millions of corporate dollars being spent on behalf of Lee.

You have a choice—three, in fact. And you should use them strategically, because you can make a difference by voting not just with your heart, but also with your mind. That means making sure you do your research and vote for three candidates who represent your values—and have a chance to win.

The Guardian has endorsed three candidates—Avalos, Herrera, and Yee—who have demonstrated enough of a commitment to progressive values and an aversion to the powers of the once-dormant machine that, like a vampire, is attempting to rise from the crypt. These three candidates also happen to have the best shot to beat Lee. Your votes for all three—in any order—are your best guarantee not to elect Ed Lee.

Vote for three and don’t vote for Lee!

Aaron Peskin chairs the San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee.

 

Editor’s notes

Andrew Lam
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0

tredmond@sfbg.com

One cool October day in 1985, when I was a young reporter at the Guardian, a friend who was visiting from New York where she was working with Gay Men’s Health Crisis, called me with an urgent message:

City employees were out with water hoses, trying to force a couple of HIV-positive men from camping in front of a federal office building at U.N. Plaza. I ran down there; she had photos. I talked to the men, who were tired and wet, but determined not to leave — and within a few days after my story ran (“AIDS vigil under attack,” 11/6/85), they were joined by dozens more.

And as the months passed, the AIDS vigil grew and grew. It raised awareness of the federal government’s criminal lack of attention to the epidemic. It became a tent city, a small community in the middle of San Francisco with donated food and supplies. Every once in a while, a politician or a media celebrity would spend a night there.

The feds backed off with the hoses and the city figured out that the encampment was no danger to anyone and was making an important political statement. And it remained there — with tents and tarps — for ten years.

I was at the OccupySF camp Oct. 3rd to do a live KPFA broadcast with Mitch Jeserich, and the place was clean, peaceful and well-organized. A couple of cops walked through while we were on the air; they were smiling and chatting with the protesters, who were negotiation with the Department of Public Works about vacating the grassy areas to allow watering. I saw none of the filth that the daily newspapers have talked about.

The only real health and safety problem was the lack of portable toilets — the seven on site weren’t enough for the number of people there. So if the city wants to keep things sanitary, Mayor Ed Lee ought to send in some more. Oh, and the medical tent needs supplies, particularly ice packs and sterile gauze.

A woman from Occupy Vancouver was down visiting and showing solidarity; she said that protesters all over the continent were looking to San Francisco and Oakland for inspiration.

This is a good thing. The protests may not have an agenda, but they have a message, and it’s getting to big and too loud to ignore. I hope it doesn’t take ten years for politicians at the local, state and federal level to respond — but as long as nobody’s addressing economic inequality, OccupySF is and ought to be here to stay.

Survey shows Lee aligned with tenant advocates only half the time

Sasha Cuttler And Mary Magee
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The results of a mayoral candidates’ survey created by the Council of Community Housing Organizations (CCHO) offered some surprises. Based on candidates’ responses, venture capitalist Joanna Rees, one of the more conservative contenders, came across as a stronger advocate for affordable housing and tenants’ rights than interim Mayor Ed Lee, who previously defended tenants as an attorney with the Asian Law Caucus.

The survey posed 25 yes-or-no questions to mayoral hopefuls, formulated by CCHO, the San Francisco Tenants Union, and the Housing Rights Committee. A “Yes” answer meant the candidate was aligned with the housing advocates’ standpoint, a “No” response was frowned upon as contrary to advocates’ housing agenda, and a “?” signified the response, “I’ll consider it.”

All told, Lee responded “No” to six questions, “I’ll consider it” to seven questions, and “Yes” to 12 questions, demonstrating consistency with the housing advocates’ agenda about half the time. Rees, on the other hand, responded “No” to three questions, and “Yes” to every other question.

Other respondents included Public Defender Jeff Adachi, Sup. John Avalos, green party candidate Terry Joan Baum, Board President David Chiu, former Sup. Bevan Dufty, City Attorney Dennis Herrera, and Sen. Leland Yee.

Candidates who answered in the affirmative to every survey question were Avalos, Baum, and Yee. Dufty responded “No” to eight questions, and “I’ll consider it” to one. Chiu responded “Yes” to most questions and “I’ll consider it” to four questions, though there was some confusion as his response wasn’t listed every time.

There you have a summary of the scorecards. So what were the questions?

Every single candidate answered “Yes” to this one: “To make up for the huge State and Federal cutbacks in affordable housing funding, will you commit to placing a dedicated affordable housing funding measure on the November 2012 ballot of at least $100 million?”

So no matter who’s elected, housing advocates will have an opportunity to advance this idea.

Among the more divisive issues was the question of reforming condo conversion laws to regulate tenancies-in-common conversions, in order to stem depletion of affordable housing stock. Lee, Rees, and Dufty responded that they would not seek such reforms; Yee, Avalos, Adachi, and Baum said they would. Herrera declined to answer.

Candidates were also divided on whether the San Francisco Rent Board, which mitigates disputes between tenants and landlords, ought to be reformed to “increase tenant representation and balance appointments between the Mayor and Board of Supervisors?” Yee, Lee, Dufty, and Adachi rejected that idea.

And Lee stood alone in answering “no” to this question: “Will you enforce a balance between market-rate housing and affordable housing that fulfills the City’s adopted housing goals, even if such a linkage slows down the overproduction of luxury condos until a minimum level of affordable and middle income housing catches up?”

All others said they would, except Chiu, who said, “I’ll consider it.”

View the full results of the survey here.

Superviors and labor leaders challenge Lee’s OccupySF stance

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Superviors and labor leaders challenge Lee’s OccupySF stance

Mayor Ed Lee has put the city and its police force on a collision course with not only OccupySF, but also several members of the Board of Supervisors and top labor leaders who support the movement and want the city to allow its encampment to continue.

They spoke at a special hearing of the City Operations and Neighborhood Services Committee that was convened by Chair John Avalos this morning, supporting a resolution that Avalos created to allow OccupySF to have tents and other infrastructure that Lee opposes. The resolution – which is co-sponsored by Sups. Eric Mar, David Campos, and Jane Kim – was approved by the committee and is set to be considered by the full Board of Supervisors tomorrow (Tues/1).

“It is something I am wholeheartedly supporting because it is an expression of great frustration and concern about the economic system,” Avalos said. “We need to speak with a greater voice about changing our economic system so it works for the many and not just the few,” Avalos said, explaining why he is “wholeheartedly supporting” the OccupySF movement.

But Avalos said he’s been frustrated that Lee and the police have raided the camp twice and are threatening more, something that Avalos has been trying to mediate since the first raid on Oct. 5. He also said the city should learn from Oakland that using the police force to stop the movement only makes it stronger.

“If we were to try to stop it from happening, it would just encourage more people to take part in it,” he said, noting that more midnight raids are dangerous for both police and protesters. “We have to figure out as a city how we’re going to facilitate, encourage, and accommodate this movement.”

But instead, Avalos said Lee’s stand against allowing tents or an kind of encampment, while claiming to support the message OccupySF, has created a tense standoff. “I’ve seen very mixed messages come out of this administration,” Avalos said, adding that nobody believes police statements that the massing of SFPD cops in riot gear on Oct. 26 was only a training exercise.

Mar said OccupySF deserves tremendous credit for holding the space and being responsive to the health and safety concerns raised by city officials. “I’ve seen a transformation in the movement in the last three weeks that is truly impressive,” Mar said. “I’ve also seen, during the General Assemblies, an incredible exercise in democracy.”

He also disputed accusations that the camps are dirty and that the movement is unfocused. “Don’t believe the hype from the mainstream media but look at the messages coming out of this movement,” said Mar, who was wearing a “We are the 99 percent” sticker.

“We should allow OccupySF to do what they’re doing,” Campos said. “It’s good for San Francisco.”

Campos also called out Lee and Oakland Mayor Jean Quan for ordering violent raids on the peaceful encampment, disputing the idea that “somehow it’s okay for us to spend the limited resources we have on these kinds of police actions…I hope we don’t have Mayors Quan and Lee wasting resources that could be better spent elsewhere.”

During the public comment portion of the hearing, each of the more than two dozen speakers supported the resolution.

“What this resolution does is it calls on the other supervisors and the mayor to decide how they want to deal with OccupySF,” said Gus Feldman of SEIU Local 1021.

Representatives of several labor unions and the San Francisco Labor Council that have voted to endorse OccupySF spoke at the hearing, include Ken Tray with United Educators of San Francisco, who gave a rousing speech in support of the movement.

“The times have changed and the political landscape has shifted,” Tray said, ticking off a long list of reasons for supporting the movement, from San Francisco’s long tradition of advocating for progressive change to the fact that “the schoolchildren of San Francisco are being denied resources because the 1 percent refuse to pay their fair share.”

Frank Martin del Campo of the SF Labor Council displayed the bruises on his arm inflicted by police during the raid on the Occupy Oakland, saying “this was an attempt to criminalize dissent…It represents the politicization of the police.”

Labor Council Executive Director Tim Paulson said, “I just want to be clear that we are the 99 percent….We want Occupy San Francisco to be there 24/7.” He and others say the Occupy movement is highlighting deep economic inequities that the labor movement has long been raising as well. “OccupySF has called the question on really important issues we’ve been struggling with for years,” said Gabriel Haaland of SEIU Local 1021

“Here is a peaceful protest being answered with violence,” said Pilar Schiavo of California Nurses Association, which has been supporting the occupations. This is an important political struggle, she said, and “It’s time for the mayor to decide what side he’s on.”

Many speakers focused their criticism on Lee, such as Brad Newsham, who said, “Any official who would send in the riot police to deal with this camp does not deserve to be mayor of San Francisco.” He said the city should set an example for the country by formally allowing the encampment to continue, and he turned to the young protesters in the room and said, “Hold your ground and we’ll try to get your back.”

Sean Semans, an active member of OccupySF since the beginning, thanked Avalos and the other progressive supervisors for “saving us when nobody would,” and he expressed frustration with the Mayor’s Office.

“The mayor still doesn’t recognize us, he won’t come down and see the work we’re doing,” Semans said. “We can do all kinds of work when we’re not fighting to protect our First Amendment rights.”

He was part of an OccupySF delegation that met with Lee last week, and Semans said the mayor offered to help get the protesters rooms in SRO hotels or meals from local soup kitchens, showing that he has a fundamental misunderstanding about what this occupation is about.

As Semans said, “It shows what we’re dealing with here.”

CHP menaces the Halloween Critical Mass ride

Sasha Cuttler
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The California Highway Patrol seems to be on high alert and itching to fight the people in the street, at least if a bizarre incident at last night’s Critical Mass is any indication. And that’s a scary prospect in the Bay Area, where the ongoing standoffs between police and the Occupy movements in San Francisco and Oakland are potential powder kegs that require cool heads on both sides.
Critical Mass was rolling through the warm streets of San Francisco, as it’s been doing on the last Friday of the month for 19 years, and it was a glorious night. The weather was nicer than it’s been in years for the Halloween ride and most of the large crowd wore costumes, many of them playing off Occupy Wall Street themes, from zombie bankers to the Glass Seagull (a reference to the gutted banking regulation Glass-Steagall Act).
Best of all, the San Francisco Police Department seemed to be standing down and allowing the ride to self-regulate, which it did with a minimum of conflicts with drivers. The mood was buoyant and many riders said it was the best Critical Mass they’d been on in a long time.
Then suddenly, as the ride headed up Market Street toward the Castro, crossing Octavia Boulevard, about a dozen CHP officers on motorcycle rapidly descended on the ride, aggressively cutting the dense ride in half to clear Octavia. Some used their motorcycles to push the cyclists back and tensions flared.
Angry words were exchanged back-and-forth between the cyclists and cops, some of whom seemed to be itching for a fight. One in particular pursued the cyclists up Market Street, playing the provocative tough guy or using his motorcycle to try to corral and menace the ride, long after the standoff had ended with enough green lights for the ride to get past Octavia and his fellow officers left.
This battle over public space and freedom of assembly isn’t going away anytime soon. There are resentments building and there will be bad apples on both sides of the barricades in the days and weeks to come. That’s one reason why Mayor Ed Lee is playing a dangerous game by threatening to raid OccupySF at any moment, and why the SFPD’s approach to this ride was far better than the CHP’s.
Just stand down and let the people police themselves.

LGBT leaders denounce attack on Herrera by the Chronicle

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LGBT leaders denounce attack on Herrera by the Chronicle

Leaders of the LGBT community from across the political spectrum yesterday denounced the San Francisco Chronicle and the anonymous sources it relied on to question City Attorney Dennis Herrera’s early support for legalizing same-sex marriage, calling the paper’s front page article a thinly veiled political hit piece designed to hurt Herrera’s mayoral campaign.

That strong showing of support in the LGBT community and the view offered by many that the attack came from supporters of Mayor Ed Lee – including top former Newsom Administration officials, some of whom now work for Lee – could not only mitigate damage from the article but further sully a Lee election effort that is already marred by allegations of vote tampering, money laundering, and deceptive campaign tactics.

“Those who are saying this now anonymously are as cowardly as Dennis and Gavin were courageous back then,” said Deputy City Attorney Theresa Stewart, the lead attorney who defended San Francisco’s decision in 2004 to unilaterally issue marriage licenses to same-sax couples, in defiance of state and federal law, which eventually led to the legalizing of such unions. “We can’t have our community turn on us for petty political gain.”

“WTF, Chronicle?” was how Assemblymember Tom Ammiano began his speech, going on to lay blame for the attack on surrogates for Lee. Ammiano also called out the mayor for campaign finance violations by his supporters, for undermining the Healthy San Francisco program that was created by Ammiano’s legislation, and for repeatedly ordering police raids on the OccupySF encampment.

“How about some fucking leadership?!” Ammiano said.

Cleve Jones, an early gay rights leader who marched with Harvey Milk, also denounced Lee and his supporters for cronyism, vote tampering, money laundering, and the “fake grassroots” efforts of the various well-funded independent expenditure campaigns, which he said have fooled the Chronicle.

“To the Chronicle and that reporters – really? – this is what you do two weeks before the election? You should be ashamed of yourself,” Jones said. “How stupid do you think we are?”

Yet Chronicle City Editor Audrey Cooper defended the article and disputed the political motivations of its sources. “Clearly, I disagree [with the criticisms],” she told the Guardian. “I personally vetted every one of the sources and I’m confident everything we printed is true.”

Beyond criticizing the obvious political motivations behind the attack, speakers at the rally called the article bad journalism and said it was simply untrue to suggest that Herrera didn’t strongly support the effort to legalize same-sex marriage from the beginning.

“I can tell you that Dennis never once shrank from this fight. I was there, I know,” Stewart said, calling Herrera “a straight ally who’s devoted his heart and soul to this community.”

Sen. Mark Leno, who introduced the first bill legalizing same-sex marriage to clear the Legislature, emphasized that he isn’t endorsing any candidates for mayor and that he didn’t want to comment on the details of the article’s allegations. But he noted that even within the LGBT community, there were differences of opinion over the right timing and tactics for pushing the issue, and that Herrera has been a leader of the fight for marriage equality since the beginning.

“I am here to speak in defense of the character and integrity of our city attorney, Dennis Herrera,” Leno said, later adding, “I do not appreciate when the battle for our civil rights is used as a political football in the waning days of an election.”

Ammiano also noted that even if Herrera raised doubts in early meetings, that was entirely appropriate given his role as city attorney. “Even if there are some questions, they’re about helping, not hurting,” he said, expressing disgust at the Newsom Administration officials for turning on someone who was instrumental to defending the decision: “In my day, you valued your friendships.”

Molly McKay, one of the original plaintiffs in the civil lawsuit that followed San Francisco’s actions, teared up as she described the ups and downs that the case took, working closely with Herrera throughout. “But this is one of the strangest twists I can imagine,” she said of the attack by the Chronicle and its anonymous sources. “It’s ridiculous and despicable.”

Representatives for both the progressive Harvey Milk LGBT Democratic Club and fiscally conservative Alice B. Toklas LGBT Democratic Club also took to the microphone together, both saying they often disagree on issues, but they were each denouncing the attack and have both endorsed Herrera, largely because of his strong advocacy for the LGBT community.

Sup. Scott Wiener called Herrera, “One of the greatest straight allies we’ve every had as a community.”

When Herrera finally took the microphone, he thanked mayoral opponents Joanne Rees and Jeff Adachi for showing up at the event to help denounce the attack and said, “This is bigger than the mayor’s race. It’s bigger than me.”

He criticized those who would trivialize this issue for petty political gain and said, “It was my pleasure and honor to have been a part of this battle from the beginning – from the beginning – and I’ll be there in the end.”

Progressive group stands out as the lone Lee endorser

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Progressive group stands out as the lone Lee endorser

Mayor Ed Lee’s support by the wealthy power brokers and his checkered history with the Willie Brown administration has caused most progressive groups to shun him in this election, with one notable exception. San Francisco Rising Action Fund, a grassroots organization for working class people of color, gave Lee its second place endorsement, right after progressive favorite John Avalos. It’s the only slate that the two political opposites appear on together.

The San Francisco Democratic Party, Sierra Club, San Francisco Labor Council, the Bay Guardian, and other progressive groups have all issued endorsement slates that generally include Avalos, Dennis Herrera, and sometimes Leland Yee. But Lee has been almost entirely shut out on the left – except for a third place endorsement by the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, which is generally left but mostly single issue – making SFRAF the rare exception.

Alex Tom, one of the directors of SFRAF, clarified that its endorsement “ is not about Ed, but about the larger progressive movement.” Going against the endorsement grain, he said SFRAF consolidates the Asian, Latino, and Black communities— a strategy to compensate the divided nature in the political left.

“We need to step back in general and have a conversation with how people of color engage with politics and the progressive movement,” Tom told us.

Like many liberal groups, SFRAF is at the front lines of OccupySF and supports progressive bills like the Health Care Security Ordinance, which was the subject of Lee’s first veto this week, angering progressive groups who sought to close a loophole that lets businesses raid the health savings accounts of their employees.

But Tom points out that “there is an assumption in SF that to get progressive things passed you need to go to District 5, 6, and 9— you don’t go to the Southeast,” or other lower income neighborhoods. SFRAF is trying to reframe the broad spectrum of progressives, to “civically engage [voters of color and lower incomes] and [include them] in the electorate.”

Voters of color don’t engage in the same spaces that other progressive do. “We are not insiders, we are not even inside the progressive circle,” Tom says.

SFRAF’s Board of Directors includes Joel Aguilar, who recently left SF Day Labor Program; Chelsea Boilard with Coleman Advocates for Children and Youth; Antonio Diaz of People Organized to Demand Environmental and Economic Rights; Ariana Gil of Mujers Unidas y Activas; Adam Gold of Causa Justa: Alex Tom with the Chinese Progressive Association; and Steve Williams of People Organized to Win Employment Rights (POWER).

The Directors promote Ed Lee’s platforms on local hire, summer school, fight against wage-theft, and facilitating equitable budget process. Lee’s a viable candidate for a new type of progressive, says SFRAF, who doesn’t “agree with the insider game” in regards to Rose Pak and Willie Brown, Lee’s closest associates.

SFRAF doesn’t believe the company Lee keeps makes him untrustworthy. While many progressives see a politician’s connections as good indicators of their future actions and allegiances, SFRAF doesn’t seem to place much emphasis on this. Indeed, Lee seems to be an obstacle to much of the group’s agenda.

Take the SFRAF’s 10-point platform, which is diametrically opposed to many of Lee’s recent actions. In the matters of health care, SFRAF’s promotes, “policies that require employers to provide quality, affordable healthcare coverage to their employees and their families,” something that Lee’s recent veto seemed to weaken, letting businesses take about $50 million per year that city law required them to set aside for employee health care.

The next day, Lee faced the same groups he voted against— at a labor union rally— and explained his veto was an act of diligence to protect jobs. But the sponsor of the vetoed legislation, Sup. David Campos, said the veto was an setback for workers’ rights and consumer protection. “It’s a defining issue for us at City Hall,” Campos told us.

But Tom disagrees with progressive assessments that “pay to play” is a major force in City Hall politics, although to did say it is important to “acknowledge your power structure.” To SFRAF, the progressive sector cannot duplicate a city run by a few insiders— a fear SFBG expects to be a reality with Ed Lee as mayor. Instead, he says a progressive City Hall must bring a “multi-sectored” people into the decision-making process.

And he think Lee will be an ally in doing so.

Steven T. Jones contributed to this report.

Mayor Lee still moving toward showdown with OccupySF

Sasha Cuttler
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Mayor Lee still moving toward showdown with OccupySF

Mayor Ed Lee continues to insist that OccupySF break down its encampment in Justin Herman Plaza and threaten to send in riot police if that doesn’t happen, even as this week’s violent police raid on Occupy Oakland has sparked international outrage, condemnation, and solidarity with other occupations.

Reporters packed into the Mayor’s Office for a photo op with a good samaritan who recently helped rescue an injured truck driver, clearly waiting for the chance to interview Lee and Police Chief Greg Suhr about last night’s aborted police raid on the OccupySF encampment, asking repeated questions seeking to clarify Lee’s confusing political doublespeak before his communication staff shuffled him out of he room after about 10 minutes.

“I, like all of you, were watching in somewhat of very big deep concern as I saw things unveiled in Oakland, certainly in constant communication with not only our chief of police, Chief Suhr, but also all of our departments to say that’s not what we want to happen in San Francisco,” Lee began. “We’re trying to enforce all the laws here, and of course it’s public health stuff that we’re emphasizing. We need to make sure our public spaces are clean and healthy, and to protect their First Amendment rights. But we didn’t want to get into a situation where we’re just busting heads because then it’s all lost.”

Yet neither Lee nor Suhr could articulate why they think Oakland’s raid turned so violent or how to guard against a similar fate here in San Francisco, particularly because they reiterated their position that the encampment must go and held open the possibility that another police raid – there have been two so far, the second more violent than the first, and the camp has only grown in size since then – could come at any moment.

They also offered shifting explanations for last night’s massing of SFPD troops in riot gear in buses on Treasure Island, which protesters believe was turned back only because of the huge presence in the camp, which included five members of the Board of Supervisors and various labor leaders, a group that Lee says he would be meeting with shortly after the event (“We’re seeing if they’d like to propose some additional solutions,” Lee said).

When asked about plans for yesterday’s raid, Suhr initially said it was simply a normal Wednesday evening training exercise. “There were that many police amassed last Wednesday, there will be that many police amassed next Wednesday. Wednesday is a standard training day for the Police Department,” Suhr said.

But when reporters expressed skepticism – many aware of the busloads of police in riot gear massing on Treasure Island, the last minute changes in police staffing schedules, and the notices of possible police activity sent to businesses around Justin Herman Plaza – Suhr said police were preparing to either assist in Oakland or deal with trouble from OccupySF.

“Out of deference for what was going on in Oakland, we felt that the more pressing need was whether we needed to assist Oakland and/or whether that situation was going to come to us,” Suhr said. “I didn’t say it was a training exercise, we took advantage of the presence on what was training day and to train to what we may have to do down the line.”

Lee also raised the concern that violent agitators might come to San Francisco: “They had to get ready for what they saw in downtown Oakland. They had to get ready for hundreds of people coming to San Francisco, either walking over the bridge or coming through the BART system. So they were trying to get ready for that particular activity because we didn’t know what was going to happen. We saw a lot of anger and a lot of frustration by people who wanted to come over to San Francisco and we didn’t know what their intention was.”

But reporters noted that Lee ordered OccupySF to take down its encampment two weeks ago, that he told reporters this week that they must do so “within days,” and that Suhr circulated a memo in the camp yesterday entitled “You are Subject to Arrest” if they didn’t heed city codes regarding overnight camping. Given all that, we again asked if there was any intention to go into the camp last night?

“That was not our intention, but I’ve always asked the chief to be ready. I’ve been insistent that we have to be ready to enforce our laws so he’s been under that instruction for quite some time. But the tactical decisions are the chief’s responsibilities,” Lee said.

Yet later in the press conference, after Lee had left the room, Suhr made it clear that the decision about if and when to stage another raid on OccupySF is the mayor’s. “Make no mistake about it, Mayor Lee is in charge of this situation,” Suhr said.

In fact, when we asked Suhr about this constant threat of a violent police raid in the middle of the night hanging over the protesters – which is a wearying distraction from the main economic justice purpose at best, and at worst what some protesters told us was akin to psychological warfare – Suhr said that even he didn’t know when a raid might come.

“There’s nobody more anxious that I am because I don’t know when the raid is coming either, so I can attest to the fact that it makes me anxious. We are working painstakingly and patiently to make sure that area is safe and sanitary,” Suhr said.

But while Lee insists that dialogue and compromise could still avert another crackdown, he refuses to accept that occupation is a tactic that protesters aren’t likely to abandon anytime soon. So Lee’s insistence that the camp be broken down seems to be putting the city and OccupySF on a collision course that most members of the Board of Supervisors – including those sponsoring resolution urging the city to allow overnight camping – fear could be a disastrous stain on the city.

“Our message to OccupySF is we’re still wanting you to comply,” Lee said. “That’s been the consistent message we’ve been sending clearly these last couple weeks…We’re trying to ensure that [the ban on] overnight camping is still enforced, but also respecting their rights to protest.”

I and other reporters tried to push Lee on the potentially harmful standoff he was creating, and he tried to make it sound as if the OccupySF movement could avoid another police crackdown, something he said depends on protesters submitting to his demands.

“It’s optimistic on our part that we would get some sensible minds who want to help us find a way to clean up the area, because that ultimately what we want to do,” he said.

But for all his statements of support for the Occupy Wall Street movement and stated desire to avoid the violent confrontation in Oakland, he refuses to allow tents on the site.

“There’s a fine line between occupying public space within your First Amendment rights and sleeping overnight and causing health conditions that we’ve been very concerned about. So we’re going to take it step by step,” Lee said. When asked about whether tents would still be allowed if the camp was clean and otherwise compliant, he said, “We’re still saying no tents.”

So then when and how will you be enforcing that, reporters kept asking.

“Let’s see what can voluntarily be done through the dialogue that trying to establish. We’ve given them a lot of notices. I want to be sure that if we have to do things to enforce our laws, that we’re quite justified and that everybody knows,” Lee said.

Yet that was the same stance that Oakland Mayor Jean Quan took, and it’s one that she is reportedly backtracking on in the wake of the violence and international condemnation. And Lee couldn’t explain how a crackdown might go differently in San Francisco, particularly none that OccupySF has grown larger and more empowered by defying Lee’s edict for so long.

“Everyone agrees that we don’t want to Oakland situation to happen here,” Lee said, at which point Press Secretary Christine Falvey said he would take only two more questions.

“We’re putting a responsible burden on the occupiers to work with us so we can avoid situations like Oakland,” Lee said. “They have to take responsibilities for what they’ve done.”

“Frankly, it sounds like you’ve said nothing, and I think some other reporters are feeling the same way,” KCBS reporter Barbara Taylor, the senior journalist stationed at City Hall, said with a tone of exasperation. “So can you just outline, when you say to do the right thing, what is the right thing? Do you expect them to voluntarily take down the tents, clean up the camp, only be there within certain hours?”

“Yes. The right thing for them to begin showing responsibility,” Lee responded.

“But what does that mean?” Taylor persisted.

Lee said they need to clean up the camp, saying that “cleanliness has been our number one concern….They have to show signs that they’re willing to work with us.” But the protesters have been diligent about regularly cleaning the camp, and they have complied with other city requests such as no open flames. And when the city refused to make porta-potties available at night, supporters of the camp rented four of their own after the city and its daily newspapers complained about public urination and defecation.

“I’ve said all along that public safety is our number one concern,” Lee said.

Fire Chief Joanne Hayes-White reinforced Lee’s point, complaining about open flames, car batteries, and generally “unhealthy and unsafe conditions.” When we noted that the protesters have already addressed and abated many of these issues in recent days, she admitted that she hasn’t been to the site recently, but said, “The tarps and the tents are not something we’re going to tolerate.”

Suhr made it clear that police action would be done in support of other city departments who ordered hazards to be abated. As for when and how officers would do so: “If we believe we could go into the camp safely, if we think we can go in and support the agencies that will be doing the cleanup, without having to go past a measured response, we would do that,” Suhr said. “That opportunity did not present itself last night.”

And so the standoff continues.

Big victory for OccupySF, Occupy Oakland reconvenes after crackdown (VIDEO)

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(UPDATED/CORRECTED AT 11:30 AM)The Occupy movements in San Francisco and Oakland reportedly scored big victories last night, with huge numbers of people overcoming police crackdowns and the shutdown of public transit stations, turning back city efforts to clear the OccupySF encampment and voting in the General Assembly in Oakland to call a general strike for Nov. 2.

We’ll have a full reports later today. Occupy Oakland protesters showed up outside a cordoned-off Frank Ogawa Plaza to figure out how to respond to the previous day’s aggressive police raid, which made national news and left Iraq War veteran Scott Olsen in the hospital with a fractured skull after apparently being hit by a tear gas canister or some other projectile fired by police.

In San Francisco, Mayor Ed Lee and the SFPD threatened to shut down the OccupySF encampment over alleged public health problems – which the movement tried to address by bringing in their own porta-potties because the city refused to provide them at night – but the camp swelled with supporters. Among them were mayoral candidates John Avalos, Leland Yee, Jeff Adachi, and David Chiu, as well as Sups. Jane Kim, Eric Mar, and David Campos.

Video by Rebecca Bowe

They spoke to the crowd around 2 a.m., expressing their support and saying that neither police nor Lee had responded to requests for information about the city’s intentions. Other notables on the scene included writer Rebecca Solnit, SF Democratic Party Chair Aaron Peskin, Shawn San Liu of the Chinese Progressive Association, and local labor leaders Tim Paulson, Gabriel Haaland, and Mike Casey. Spirits were high, and protesters were ready to link arms and form a human blockade in the event that police showed up.

SF police reportedly massed nearby in the early morning hours, preparing to clear Justin Herman Plaza, and there were rumors that hundreds more were on the way. BART stations in the area were shut down to prevent more arrivals, while police in Oakland also reportedly stopped protesters there who tried to cross the bay to support OccupySF. But the raid was then reportedly called off because police were outnumbered and possibly to avoid a repeat of the violence and mass arrests that have plagued Oakland since the decision to clear the encampment there, and protesters sent out jubilant messages of victory.

Check back later for video and eyewitness details of what went down, from the the Guardian’s Rebecca Bowe (who contributed to this report) and Yael Chanoff, as well as information on what comes next. Or follow the Oakland live stream here or San Francisco live stream here.

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