For San Franciscans preparing to head to the polls for the November 4 election, the Bay Area Reporter endorses the incumbents running for supervisor. All have served the city well in their first terms, authored and passed significant legislation, and aim to continue that work.
Malia Cohen, District 10
Supervisor Malia Cohen, who represents Bayview Hunters Point, Visitation Valley, and other neighborhoods in southeast San Francisco, is the clear choice for District 10 voters. And while she has the strongest opponent of any of her colleagues facing re-election, she has a solid record of accomplishment and has worked hard for the residents of her district, who are among some of the poorest and most vulnerable in the city.
Cohen doesn't consider her main opponent, Tony Kelly, a serious challenge, even though he also ran four years ago and nearly won. Cohen, who when she was sworn in was the only African American member of the Board of Supervisors, won a narrow victory due to ranked choice voting.
District 10 has undergone significant changes in the last four years. It is now one-third Asian, one-third Hispanic, and one-third African American, Caucasian, and other groups. A solid working class district, it has also seen an influx of gay people, mostly because housing is relatively less expensive than in other parts of the city.
Cohen has been a strong ally of the LGBT community, and told us in a recent editorial board meeting that she coined a phrase, "beyond Castro," to indicate that LGBTs live all over the city, including District 10, and are not confined to the gay neighborhood, which itself has had a lot of straight people move in.
"They love the neighborhood, they love the edginess, they're not afraid," Cohen said of the gays who call District 10 home. She added that an online community called Gayview is also active, hosting mixers and other events at small businesses.
One of the issues Cohen is involved with is healthier eating habits and she noted that parts of District 10 are considered a food desert because of the lack of a major supermarket. It gained a Grocery Outlet in Visitation Valley but lost Fresh and Easy in the Bayview. Cohen said she is working to get a farmers market in the location of the former store. One thing she has done is partnered with Southeast Food Access to get liquor stores, which are plentiful, to stock more fruits and vegetables, and foods unique to the district.
Cohen is also supportive of so-called big box retail, noting that the district doesn't have many such businesses.
"We need to fill that gap and need something to bring foot traffic for small businesses," she explained. "We got Lowe's in and they're a great partner, but it took 12 years."
On housing, Cohen is a strong supporter of on-site affordable housing, mostly because it would be built at the same time as the development. In her district three-bedroom units are needed for families, she said, and there has been some success providing larger units in the Pier 70 development that's also on the ballot this fall. Public housing projects in the district are also being rebuilt.
In a second term Cohen said she plans to continue focusing on housing and infrastructure, as well as jobs for residents. District 10's unemployment rate, at a little over 12 percent, is still much higher than the rest of the city. She'll also keep working to curb violence in the district, and has a good working relationship with the San Francisco Police Department.
In short, Cohen has delivered real solutions for District 10 in a number of areas, and is poised to continue that leadership. We recommend her for re-election.
Scott Wiener, District 8
In last week's B.A.R. we endorsed incumbent Supervisor Scott Wiener for a second term. If you missed it, you can find the editorial here: http://ebar.com/openforum/opforum.php?sec=editorial&id=510.
Jane Kim, District 6
Supervisor Jane Kim has accomplished much for District 6, which like District 10 includes many poor and vulnerable residents, particularly in the Tenderloin. But District 6, which includes South of Market, also has luxury housing and many tech companies. It's a vibrant district that has undergone tremendous change since Kim was first elected four years ago. Kim has embraced many of the changes, while remaining true to her progressive values. She also has a knack for compromise and working with community groups, which in the case of artists at 1049 Market Street and people living with HIV and seniors at the I Hotel, led to agreements to keep them in their apartments.
Kim's priorities include equitable land uses and affordable housing, reforming the city's broken homeless shelter system �" at which LGBT residents, especially trans women, have been harassed and discriminated against �" pedestrian and bicycle safety, fair access to top quality jobs, and neighborhood capacity building.
Regarding shelters, city officials were surprised last year when a point-in-time survey of homeless people revealed that 29 percent of respondents identified as LGBT. Kim said the figure "rang true" of the "anecdotal experience I had knocking in our [single-resident occupancy] hotels and spending time in our homeless shelters." There are now plans for a queer shelter project in District 6 (not to be confused with the ongoing effort to locate a similar shelter in District 9). It's expected to open soon at A Women's Place with a staff dedicated to addressing the unique needs of the queer homeless population, Kim said in her questionnaire submitted to the B.A.R.
On the cultural side, Kim is working to establish the city's first LGBTQ/Leather Social Heritage District as part of the Western SOMA Community Plan. She worked with the property owner and community advocates to preserve the Eagle Tavern as a central hub of queer culture, and, as we reported this week online, developed trailing legislation so that Heklina's Trannyshack has a permanent home on 11th Street.
We would like to see Kim advocate more forcefully for a study of infection rates for community-based groups that distribute crack pipes to drug users as a way to help prevent transmission of HIV. She did tell us that she met with safe injection site advocates her first year in office, but that there's a constitutional barrier to publicly funding such a site. With studies in Vancouver showing such sites can reduce infections, it's something that's worth pursuing. The city's HIV Prevention Planning Council has recommended such a review.
Overall, we're impressed with Kim's first term and recommend her to District 6 voters.
Katy Tang, District 4
Supervisor Katy Tang, who represents the Sunset district, is unopposed and we endorse her re-election. Tang was appointed in January 2013 to the seat when Mayor Ed Lee selected Carmen Chu as assessor-recorder. Tang ran last fall to complete Chu's term on the Board of Supervisors and is running this year for a full four-year term.
Tang is an engaged supervisor who grew up in the district. Since joining the board, Tang has spearheaded the first-ever district-wide strategic planning effort, called the Sunset District Blueprint, to identify short- and long-term initiatives to improve the neighborhood.
In her B.A.R. questionnaire, Tang said that she successfully passed legislation to provide the city with additional enforcement tools over massage establishments serving as potential fronts for human trafficking. She also serves on the San Francisco Collaborative Against Human Trafficking, where she works with city agencies and partners to end human trafficking through education, outreach, advocacy, and supporting survivors.
Tang has been an ally to the LGBT community. This year she supported backfilling the budget for HIV/AIDS services after federal funds were cut. She said that she would take future requests into consideration "along with the context of the rest of the city's budget."
As the city continues to experience a housing crisis, Tang is working with the Mayor's Office of Housing and Community Development to increase down payment loan assistance to middle and moderate-income individuals and families. She also is working with the planning department to identify opportunities to create middle-income housing in the Sunset.
Mark Farrell, District 2
We did not endorse Mark Farrell four years ago, but he has demonstrated an ability to bring together opposing views and has been a strong ally for the LGBT community. We recommend that District 2 residents vote for Farrell in the November 4 election.
Farrell is being challenged by one candidate, but is campaigning hard for his re-election. He's holding house parties virtually every night and is focusing on neighborhoods and families. Those issues also include the LGBT community, as it was Farrell who in early 2013 spearheaded legislation covering the tax costs LGBT city employees incurred for their same-sex spouses' or partners' health care coverage provided by the city's Health Service System. At the time, only two other municipalities in the country had adopted similar policies, although it was more common in the private sector. Just a few months later, however, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a key provision of the Defense of Marriage Act. Federal agencies, including the Internal Revenue Service, quickly brought their policies up to date, taking into account federal recognition of married same-sex couples. Farrell deserves credit for addressing the issue, which at the time was an inequity for married same-sex couples.
During an editorial board meeting, Farrell spoke quite a bit about housing; he maintains that the crisis is largely the result of underdevelopment for years and years. Like his colleague Malia Cohen, Farrell favors on-site affordable housing because "the project is going up right now" so those units would be built at the same time, meaning people could move in sooner. He also said that more density generally doesn't bother him, but it needs to be strategic, like around transit corridors.
One example of Farrell's ability to work with those with whom he doesn't always agree was the recently passed Laura's Law. In the spring Farrell announced legislation to fully implement Laura's Law, a state law that provides for requiring severely mentally ill people to undergo treatment against their wishes. The law was passed in 2002 but allows individual counties to implement it. Farrell was able to work with Public Defender Jeff Adachi, long an opponent of the law, after Adachi softened his stance and said such forced treatment could be effective if the services are there. Farrell was able to secure board approval, rather than putting the measure on the ballot, and crafted a law that former opponents could support. (The law is named after Laura Wilcox, a mental health worker in Nevada County who was murdered by a man who had been refusing treatment and opened fire in the county's behavioral health offices.)
A San Francisco native, Farrell is accessible and will continue to address the city's housing affordability crisis and rising cost-of-living.