“Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose (The more things change, the more they stay the same”)
” – Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr
The usual deluge of the election season, the series of slick, glossy election pamphlets and mailers, became an avalanche this year shoveled in by a ghoulish group of corporate executives, real estate developers and other moneyed interests pinned their hopes on the power of print. Less than a month before the November 3 election, over $5 million streamed into the city pooling at a new political action committee (PAC), “Neighbors for a Better San Francisco”. This money bought them thousands of colorful campaign mailers joining others as the unwanted, tethered plastic bouquets left at the doorstep of the city’s housed residents.
While the money was new, the messaging was very much the same. Tents; the polyester proxy for San Francisco’s unhoused.
At the declaration of a shelter-in-place (SIP) order and as the COVID-19 pandemic began to take root in San Francisco and across the country, London Breed’s administration was praised for its swift response in mainstream media and press, but its piecemeal approach to street homelessness and those living in the city’s 2,000-bed shelter system undermined the Mayor’s newfound stardom. Shelters were decompressed by 75% after a devastating outbreak at MSC-South, hotel rooms for the unhoused were legislated for but ultimately, Breed decided to open only 35% of those rooms, opting instead for mats, a steel chair and taped rectangles in the massive congregate setting of Moscone Center West. That plan was quickly dropped after a chorus of critiques and outrage when this paper broke the story. The pandemic may have changed the approach, but the outcomes stayed the same. Amidst the chaos and embarrassments, organizers at the Coalition on Homelessness, housed allies, members of the Democratic Socialists of America and others began raising and collecting money for tents to provide a moment of safety to the over 6,000 San Franciscans who remained on this city’s streets during a pandemic, extreme weather and days upon days of dense, dangerous smoke.
The rebuke was immediate and hostile. Peering down from their condos or scrolling through one of the many anti-homeless and anti-tent Facebook groups or Twitter accounts, tents became the focus of vitriol and hundreds of news articles and Change.org petitions.
Homelessness and unhoused San Franciscans have been a political wedge in this city for nearly 40 years. Even in years without an election, the blame for their existence, for the policy failures, for the wasted money is bandied around City Hall, news media, social media and everywhere in between. It was unsurprising then that homelessness — and specifically anti-homeless rhetoric — came to dominate the 2020 election in San Francisco. Only this time, the pandemic had driven housed people into their homes, bubbled up long-standing ideas and stereotypes around hygiene, sanitation and viral spread, and made street homelessness inescapable through the over 6,000 seeking minimal refuge in tents. This time, over $5 million was ready to flood the city’s political landscape and potentially upend the competitive odd-numbered supervisor district races and progressive tax measures with images of tents and unhoused San Franciscans.
San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors features representatives from each of the City’s 11 districts carved through neighborhoods, offset by election years focused on either the even or odd districts. 2020’s races were odd not only in their district numbers, but also in that the COVID-19 pandemic brought door-to-door campaigning to a halt and forced campaigns to reimagine events through Zoom, on social media, and — for those with money to spend — on shiny, plastic campaign mailers. These restrictions did little to impact District 9 Supervisor Hillary Ronen, who earned 99.78% of the vote, and fourth-termed (spread over 19 years) District 3 Supervisor Aaron Peskin, who largely swatted away his challenger ultimately securing 56.51% of the vote.
While COVID restrictions may not have impacted Ronen or Peskin, they were at least a point of contention between District 11 candidates Ahsha Safaí and John Avalos. In an election in which many initially believed Safaí to be vulnerable, Avalos was defeated by 7%, the Union organizer and former Supervisor hamstrung from what could have been his candidacies’ strongest suit — in-person campaigning. Moreover, Safaí’s brand of moderate politics stitched together with labor support built a robust enough coalition in District 11 to stave off Avalos’ progressive challenge. Two progressives and a moderate re-elected, suggesting a balance on the Board.
These results in District 3, 9 and 11 left competitive races in District 1, 5 and 7. Races which could have added three political “moderates” to the Board of Supervisors dramatically altering policy and the board’s relationship to Mayor Breed.
124 votes
In San Francisco’s ranked-choice voting system, votes are funneled to other candidates as voters intended by listing, or not listing, a ranked series of candidates. In District 1, major candidate Connie Chan — the progressive endorsed by numerous Board members, Vice President-elect Kamala Harris and various political clubs — squared off against the moderate Marjan Philhour, a former senior adviser to Mayor Breed and the vanquished candidate from the 2016 race against now-retiring Supervisor Sandra Lee Fewer.
Throughout 2020, the race remained close in the imagined consciousness of San Francisco’s politicos. Polling seemed scarce, the pandemic made scouting in-person campaign events moot, and no one really seemed to know the temperature of San Francisco voters. Were we pent-up, angry at the unhoused, fearful that progressive taxes would damage businesses and the city’s recovery? Or would the pandemic’s exacerbation of existing, profound inequities in our society inspire a consolidation around left policies and support for expanded taxes on San Francisco’s wealthiest to ensure funding for programs? The candidates sparred over many issues, but again and again returned to the tents sprouting around the Richmond.
Philhour highlighted her efforts in displacing unhoused residents living near the Alexandria Theatre on a campaign mailer and attempted to tap into the cause célèbre for moderates and anti-homeless voters in the district. Save Our Amazing Richmond (SOAR), an anti-homeless group rooted in District 1 that had worked to displace the Alexandria residents and those at the La Playa Safeway, were dutiful foot soldiers for the Philhour campaign spreading the racist and sexist attack of “Commie Chan” towards the Hong Kong-born candidate. Outside money trickled into the district, and while both candidates denounced it, the mailers strongly opposed Chan and deployed tents to incite animosity towards Chan and the unhoused people living in the district.
As results came in after November 3, the vote tally swerved from Chan to Philhour and moderates began to imagine a massive pick-up on the board and an ally for Mayor Breed. However, as the counts continued over the next few days, Chan ultimately surpassed Philhour and won with 124 votes. From one progressive supervisor to another one. Carry on.
While District 1 saw its share of anti-homeless discourse and some outside money, the bulk of the $5 million was reserved for Democratic Socialist Supervisor Dean Preston in a rematch with former Supervisor Vallie Brown and Preston’s Proposition I. But while outside money was spent at eye-boggling amounts, the anti-homeless sentiment, social media content and organizing is almost difficult to quantify or qualify.
‘Fight club’ mailer
Twitter accounts stealing people’s images from the internet to post anti-Preston memes; lawsuits from Amoeba Music, Escape from New York Pizza, and others against the city sanctioned tent encampment at 730 Stanyan; the prickly “Safe and Healthy Haight” social media group which pushed a recorded fight on Haight Street as a “fight club” amongst San Francisco’s unhoused.
In the 2020 election, the corridor to the “Summer of Love” turned to a valley of vile. And in the vacuum of moderate and anti-homeless leadership arose former Supervisor Brown, who had previously been more amenable to unhoused San Franciscans. Nevertheless, she pounced on the opportunity to utilize the exceedingly vocal minority of moderate and anti-homeless District 5 voters in an attempt to return to the seat she’d lost by 187 votes less than a year ago. Integral to the Brown campaign’s messaging were the tents that Preston had donated to shelter the homeless neighbors he was portrayed as catering to.
On top of the Brown campaign’s messaging, Better Living Hayes Valley, a group of business owners and housed residents who wanted a “tent-free zone” in their neighborhood, the sustained legal and messaging attacks on the city sanctioned tent encampment at 730 Stanyan, and the worst-kept secret of UCSF, Preston seemed to be another vulnerable incumbent, and as the only Democratic Socialist on the Board of Supervisors would have been a feather in the cap of moderates and those outside moneyed interests. But in a smashing victory, Preston and Prop. I (transfer tax on wealthiest property sales) and Prop. K (authorization for public housing) all won, setting the better part of the outside $5 million on fire and returning to his seat by a margin of 11%. A socialist went into the campaign and a socialist came out of the campaign. If you’re still keeping score, nothing has really changed.
District 7, much like its yacht boating brethren to the north District 2, is viewed as one of the more conservative districts in the city. The luscious greens of Balboa Terrace and Merced Manor encircle San Francisco State University — currently functioning as a ghost town due to distance learning — and West Portal serves as safe passage away from the imagined goblins that skip down Turk Street or the young, gay kids trying to survive on the Castro’s streets. Norman Yee, the affable progressive board president, was termed out, and moderates eyed District 7 as an absolute must-win and a potential flare to the other districts of moderates’ viability in the 2020 election. At the same time, District 7 was overwhelmed with candidates that represented the various factions within the district. Perennial candidates Joel Engardio and Ben Matranga were joined by misogynist bomb-thrower Stephen Martin-Pinto. Progressives Myrna Melgar and political newcomer Vilaska Nguyen battled it out for the vote of more left-leaning voters, while Japanese-American Dr. Emily Murase attempted to offer a palatable alternative to Melgar, Nguyen and Engardio. Martin-Pinto attacked unhoused San Franciscans online and trafficked in anti-homeless rhetoric shared by the legion of accounts dedicated to filming and photographing street homelessness in the most morally vapid way. Engardio, journalist and vice president of Stop Crime SF, ran multiple fliers that centered on tents from the pandemic, stating that they weren’t “a solution” and to “get the basics right.” But it was Nguyen who drew all the attention and outside money in an effort to torpedo his soaring campaign. Nguyen campaigned as an unabashed progressive in one of the enclaves of NIMBYism. On November 3, Engardio jumped out to an early lead (23.57%), followed at his heels by Nguyen (21.01%) and Melgar (20.04%) as the moderates plotted for at least one win in the six races. However, over the coming days, as more votes were tallied and candidates were peeled away, Melgar surged past all others ensuring another progressive would replace another progressive.
On January 8, the new Board of Supervisors will be inaugurated, and at the inauguration — after the millions upon millions spent, after the disdain that dripped through news and social media for unhoused San Franciscans, after all the shiny, plastic mailers that ultimately slipped into our blue cans and bins — the ideological composition of the board will be exactly the same as before. The progressives have a supermajority and can continue to legislate as such. One more battle may follow right after that — who will replace the aw-shucks President of the Board? It won’t be a moderate, that much I can guarantee.
Ch- ch- changes? Don’t want to be a richer man in San Francisco’s 2020 Election
By Keegan Medrano
“Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose (The more things change, the more they stay the same”)
” – Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr
The usual deluge of the election season, the series of slick, glossy election pamphlets and mailers, became an avalanche this year shoveled in by a ghoulish group of corporate executives, real estate developers and other moneyed interests pinned their hopes on the power of print. Less than a month before the November 3 election, over $5 million streamed into the city pooling at a new political action committee (PAC), “Neighbors for a Better San Francisco”. This money bought them thousands of colorful campaign mailers joining others as the unwanted, tethered plastic bouquets left at the doorstep of the city’s housed residents.
While the money was new, the messaging was very much the same. Tents; the polyester proxy for San Francisco’s unhoused.
At the declaration of a shelter-in-place (SIP) order and as the COVID-19 pandemic began to take root in San Francisco and across the country, London Breed’s administration was praised for its swift response in mainstream media and press, but its piecemeal approach to street homelessness and those living in the city’s 2,000-bed shelter system undermined the Mayor’s newfound stardom. Shelters were decompressed by 75% after a devastating outbreak at MSC-South, hotel rooms for the unhoused were legislated for but ultimately, Breed decided to open only 35% of those rooms, opting instead for mats, a steel chair and taped rectangles in the massive congregate setting of Moscone Center West. That plan was quickly dropped after a chorus of critiques and outrage when this paper broke the story. The pandemic may have changed the approach, but the outcomes stayed the same. Amidst the chaos and embarrassments, organizers at the Coalition on Homelessness, housed allies, members of the Democratic Socialists of America and others began raising and collecting money for tents to provide a moment of safety to the over 6,000 San Franciscans who remained on this city’s streets during a pandemic, extreme weather and days upon days of dense, dangerous smoke.
The rebuke was immediate and hostile. Peering down from their condos or scrolling through one of the many anti-homeless and anti-tent Facebook groups or Twitter accounts, tents became the focus of vitriol and hundreds of news articles and Change.org petitions.
Homelessness and unhoused San Franciscans have been a political wedge in this city for nearly 40 years. Even in years without an election, the blame for their existence, for the policy failures, for the wasted money is bandied around City Hall, news media, social media and everywhere in between. It was unsurprising then that homelessness — and specifically anti-homeless rhetoric — came to dominate the 2020 election in San Francisco. Only this time, the pandemic had driven housed people into their homes, bubbled up long-standing ideas and stereotypes around hygiene, sanitation and viral spread, and made street homelessness inescapable through the over 6,000 seeking minimal refuge in tents. This time, over $5 million was ready to flood the city’s political landscape and potentially upend the competitive odd-numbered supervisor district races and progressive tax measures with images of tents and unhoused San Franciscans.
San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors features representatives from each of the City’s 11 districts carved through neighborhoods, offset by election years focused on either the even or odd districts. 2020’s races were odd not only in their district numbers, but also in that the COVID-19 pandemic brought door-to-door campaigning to a halt and forced campaigns to reimagine events through Zoom, on social media, and — for those with money to spend — on shiny, plastic campaign mailers. These restrictions did little to impact District 9 Supervisor Hillary Ronen, who earned 99.78% of the vote, and fourth-termed (spread over 19 years) District 3 Supervisor Aaron Peskin, who largely swatted away his challenger ultimately securing 56.51% of the vote.
While COVID restrictions may not have impacted Ronen or Peskin, they were at least a point of contention between District 11 candidates Ahsha Safaí and John Avalos. In an election in which many initially believed Safaí to be vulnerable, Avalos was defeated by 7%, the Union organizer and former Supervisor hamstrung from what could have been his candidacies’ strongest suit — in-person campaigning. Moreover, Safaí’s brand of moderate politics stitched together with labor support built a robust enough coalition in District 11 to stave off Avalos’ progressive challenge. Two progressives and a moderate re-elected, suggesting a balance on the Board.
These results in District 3, 9 and 11 left competitive races in District 1, 5 and 7. Races which could have added three political “moderates” to the Board of Supervisors dramatically altering policy and the board’s relationship to Mayor Breed.
124 votes
In San Francisco’s ranked-choice voting system, votes are funneled to other candidates as voters intended by listing, or not listing, a ranked series of candidates. In District 1, major candidate Connie Chan — the progressive endorsed by numerous Board members, Vice President-elect Kamala Harris and various political clubs — squared off against the moderate Marjan Philhour, a former senior adviser to Mayor Breed and the vanquished candidate from the 2016 race against now-retiring Supervisor Sandra Lee Fewer.
Throughout 2020, the race remained close in the imagined consciousness of San Francisco’s politicos. Polling seemed scarce, the pandemic made scouting in-person campaign events moot, and no one really seemed to know the temperature of San Francisco voters. Were we pent-up, angry at the unhoused, fearful that progressive taxes would damage businesses and the city’s recovery? Or would the pandemic’s exacerbation of existing, profound inequities in our society inspire a consolidation around left policies and support for expanded taxes on San Francisco’s wealthiest to ensure funding for programs? The candidates sparred over many issues, but again and again returned to the tents sprouting around the Richmond.
Philhour highlighted her efforts in displacing unhoused residents living near the Alexandria Theatre on a campaign mailer and attempted to tap into the cause célèbre for moderates and anti-homeless voters in the district. Save Our Amazing Richmond (SOAR), an anti-homeless group rooted in District 1 that had worked to displace the Alexandria residents and those at the La Playa Safeway, were dutiful foot soldiers for the Philhour campaign spreading the racist and sexist attack of “Commie Chan” towards the Hong Kong-born candidate. Outside money trickled into the district, and while both candidates denounced it, the mailers strongly opposed Chan and deployed tents to incite animosity towards Chan and the unhoused people living in the district.
As results came in after November 3, the vote tally swerved from Chan to Philhour and moderates began to imagine a massive pick-up on the board and an ally for Mayor Breed. However, as the counts continued over the next few days, Chan ultimately surpassed Philhour and won with 124 votes. From one progressive supervisor to another one. Carry on.
While District 1 saw its share of anti-homeless discourse and some outside money, the bulk of the $5 million was reserved for Democratic Socialist Supervisor Dean Preston in a rematch with former Supervisor Vallie Brown and Preston’s Proposition I. But while outside money was spent at eye-boggling amounts, the anti-homeless sentiment, social media content and organizing is almost difficult to quantify or qualify.
‘Fight club’ mailer
Twitter accounts stealing people’s images from the internet to post anti-Preston memes; lawsuits from Amoeba Music, Escape from New York Pizza, and others against the city sanctioned tent encampment at 730 Stanyan; the prickly “Safe and Healthy Haight” social media group which pushed a recorded fight on Haight Street as a “fight club” amongst San Francisco’s unhoused.
In the 2020 election, the corridor to the “Summer of Love” turned to a valley of vile. And in the vacuum of moderate and anti-homeless leadership arose former Supervisor Brown, who had previously been more amenable to unhoused San Franciscans. Nevertheless, she pounced on the opportunity to utilize the exceedingly vocal minority of moderate and anti-homeless District 5 voters in an attempt to return to the seat she’d lost by 187 votes less than a year ago. Integral to the Brown campaign’s messaging were the tents that Preston had donated to shelter the homeless neighbors he was portrayed as catering to.
On top of the Brown campaign’s messaging, Better Living Hayes Valley, a group of business owners and housed residents who wanted a “tent-free zone” in their neighborhood, the sustained legal and messaging attacks on the city sanctioned tent encampment at 730 Stanyan, and the worst-kept secret of UCSF, Preston seemed to be another vulnerable incumbent, and as the only Democratic Socialist on the Board of Supervisors would have been a feather in the cap of moderates and those outside moneyed interests. But in a smashing victory, Preston and Prop. I (transfer tax on wealthiest property sales) and Prop. K (authorization for public housing) all won, setting the better part of the outside $5 million on fire and returning to his seat by a margin of 11%. A socialist went into the campaign and a socialist came out of the campaign. If you’re still keeping score, nothing has really changed.
District 7, much like its yacht boating brethren to the north District 2, is viewed as one of the more conservative districts in the city. The luscious greens of Balboa Terrace and Merced Manor encircle San Francisco State University — currently functioning as a ghost town due to distance learning — and West Portal serves as safe passage away from the imagined goblins that skip down Turk Street or the young, gay kids trying to survive on the Castro’s streets. Norman Yee, the affable progressive board president, was termed out, and moderates eyed District 7 as an absolute must-win and a potential flare to the other districts of moderates’ viability in the 2020 election. At the same time, District 7 was overwhelmed with candidates that represented the various factions within the district. Perennial candidates Joel Engardio and Ben Matranga were joined by misogynist bomb-thrower Stephen Martin-Pinto. Progressives Myrna Melgar and political newcomer Vilaska Nguyen battled it out for the vote of more left-leaning voters, while Japanese-American Dr. Emily Murase attempted to offer a palatable alternative to Melgar, Nguyen and Engardio. Martin-Pinto attacked unhoused San Franciscans online and trafficked in anti-homeless rhetoric shared by the legion of accounts dedicated to filming and photographing street homelessness in the most morally vapid way. Engardio, journalist and vice president of Stop Crime SF, ran multiple fliers that centered on tents from the pandemic, stating that they weren’t “a solution” and to “get the basics right.” But it was Nguyen who drew all the attention and outside money in an effort to torpedo his soaring campaign. Nguyen campaigned as an unabashed progressive in one of the enclaves of NIMBYism. On November 3, Engardio jumped out to an early lead (23.57%), followed at his heels by Nguyen (21.01%) and Melgar (20.04%) as the moderates plotted for at least one win in the six races. However, over the coming days, as more votes were tallied and candidates were peeled away, Melgar surged past all others ensuring another progressive would replace another progressive.
On January 8, the new Board of Supervisors will be inaugurated, and at the inauguration — after the millions upon millions spent, after the disdain that dripped through news and social media for unhoused San Franciscans, after all the shiny, plastic mailers that ultimately slipped into our blue cans and bins — the ideological composition of the board will be exactly the same as before. The progressives have a supermajority and can continue to legislate as such. One more battle may follow right after that — who will replace the aw-shucks President of the Board? It won’t be a moderate, that much I can guarantee.
