Some thoughts on the first 100 days of San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie
“No time to give up on crime, Lurie says,” is the headline, (by J.D. Morris, the Sunday Chronicle, April 13th). The SF Chronicle article is unintentionally hilarious: “Lurie campaigned on bringing down crime and reducing chaos on the city’s streets, and so far trends are on his side. New data shows reported crimes have plummeted across San Francisco, dropping nearly 30% in the first quarter this year, though it’s not totally clear why.” It’s not clear why? I guess even the Chronicle is reluctant to credit Lurie with this. It seems like Lurie had done something but, a little further on, we read, “Lurie’s predecessor, London Breed, was unseated despite her attempts to highlight a similar crime decline last year,” and “ Data shows that car reported break-ins, San Francisco’s most notorious property crime, hit a 22-year low in 2024.” So, crime was declining before Lurie took office and it had nothing to do with him or his policies. No time to give up on crime, indeed. Milk it for all you can, while you can. The SF Chronicle will praise you.
Lurie should never have been elected Mayor; his mother’s money bought the office for him. His billionaire mother and his billionaire friends are exactly what’s wrong with San Francisco, and with the country. Until we get money out of politics, elections will be bought. San Francisco needed Aaron Peskin, someone with experience and knowledge of how the City works. Someone not beholden to billionaires.
Billionaire tech investor Ron Conway was London Breed’s patron and now he’s part of Lurie’s circle, giving $50,000 to his inauguration. That is less than what the billionaire Fisher brothers gave. “Members from the Fisher family, the billionaires behind the Gap, also gave big to Lurie’s transition. John Fisher, the majority owner of the Oakland A’s baseball team, and his wife Laura Fisher, together gave $100,000. William Fisher, the director of the Gap and his partner, Sako Fisher, pitched in another $100,000. And Robert and Randi Fisher, who co-founded the Pisces Foundation, also gave $100,000.” — Here are the wealthy donors to Mayor Daniel Lurie’s $3M transition by Xueer Lu, Mission Local February 6, 2025,
“In fact, Lurie has consolidated the old billionaire-insider influence and continued all of Breed’s major policies. He has kept all but two of the major department heads (he abruptly changed the Director of Public Health, see below, as well as filling a vacancy at SFMTA), made no significant commission changes, and doubled down on Breed’s police crackdown on drugs and her embrace of density as a solution to the “housing crisis” (read “real estate crisis.”) — “Lurie plays small ball while San Francisco faces the abyss,” Lurie plays small ball while San Francisco faces the abyss by Calvin Welch, 48 Hills, April 24, 2025.
In response to homelessness, Lurie is repeating the tried and failed policies of the Breed administration: temporary fixes and reliance on non-profits whose executives and administrators get paid six figure salaries while the homeless remain homeless. In the meantime, the economic situation for the poor continues to grow more dire and the root causes of homelessness remain unaddressed.
“San Francisco supervisors and nonprofits on Wednesday lambasted Mayor Daniel Lurie’s proposed budget cuts to programs for legal aid, financial coaching and “community building,” saying slashing those areas would threaten groups already vulnerable to federal cuts and cost the city more money in the long term… San Francisco is facing an $818 million budget deficit, and Lurie has asked all departments to slash 15 percent across the board. That means cutting programs like those protecting against informal evictions or wage theft from the Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development…” S.F. supervisors, nonprofits sound alarm on Mayor Lurie’s cuts to free civil legal aid by Marina Newman, Mission Local, April 24, 2025.
On a separate, but related, note: “The Drug Policy Alliance, along with Lyon Martin Community Health and the Harvey Milk Club, opposed the bill, noting that: The reality is that recovery from substance use is a complex and often unpredictable process influenced by each individual’s circumstances, and cessation of drug use is one part of the many components of recovery. … The abstinence only model ignores the fact that recovery from substance use is not a linear nor rigid path and forecloses on the continuum of approaches available to support individuals in their recovery journey.” — Dorsey measure that undermines harm reduction moves forward, by Tim Redmond, 48 Hills, April 27, 2025. Dorsey, like Lurie, is all for more police and more arrests.
“So, what’s my strategy? My strategy is to make sure that those streets are clear of people using fentanyl, [and] offering rehab and treatment options, which we do not have enough beds for right now. That is part and parcel of the fentanyl state of emergency. We need to stand up more beds and treat people.” — Interview: Mayor Lurie talks 16th and Mission and how S.F. ‘won’t ‘arrest our way out of this problem, by Xueer Lu and Joe Eskenazi, Mission Local, April 14, 2025. Lurie talks the talk but he doesn’t walk the walk. Where are the plans and the funding for more beds and rehab? Where is the plan to tax the billionaires to provide services and affordable housing? Lurie is Breed 2.0.
“Before he became San Francisco’s mayor, Daniel Lurie spent nearly two decades raising vast sums of money from wealthy people to fight poverty in the Bay Area. Now, he plans to tap into that experience to push his agenda at City Hall.” Lurie could tap network to fund agenda by J.D. Morris and Nora Mishanec, SF Chronicle, Feb. 24, 2025. We can see where Lurie is coming from. He’s beholden to the ultra wealthy because that’s who funds his Tipping Point Foundation. He doesn’t talk about reforming the tax structure so that the ultra wealthy pay their fair share, both in San Francisco and nation-wide. Taxes on the ultra wealthy would hurt his friends and supporters. Let me ask this, if Tipping Point, and the other foundations funded by the “wealthy people” profiled in the Chronicle article, like hedge fund billionaire Paul Tudor Jones’s Robin Hood Foundation, were effective then why are we still in this homelessness and housing crisis? Tipping Point has been around for two decades and has received “tens of millions of dollars” from just Charles Schwab, and his wife and daughters. The Robin Hood Foundation has been around even longer and its founder, Jones, has “donated large sums both to Tipping Point and Lurie’s mayoral PAC… Forbes this year estimated his fortune at $8.1 billion.” Mr. Jones could, single-handedly, erase San Francisco’s budget deficit and not even miss it.
If you hadn’t already guessed, income inequality is the problem. The rich continue to grow richer, in part through tax avoidance, and the poor continue to grow poorer. No matter how many Tipping Points you add to this equation you are not going to solve the problem of homelessness and prevent the crimes committed by people who are poor and desperate; people without even enough money to pay the rent and feed their families.
“At its current pace, San Francisco is on track to see more than 3,700 eviction lawsuits this year. That’s compared with 2,923 cases filed in 2024, according to Tenant Right to Counsel…The rate of eviction is expected to increase even further in the wake of a city budget proposal to cut funding to legal aid for extremely low-income residents… But in March, the office (The Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development) proposed eliminating the entire general civil legal services category, which totaled $4.2 million last year. This category includes programs that help people with extremely low income navigate complex subsidy programs and maintain benefits from sources like CalWORKs, Social Security Insurance and housing assistance.” — Eviction Rates in SF Soar as Legal Aid Faces Deep Funding Cuts by Sylvie Sturm San Francisco Public Press, May 2, 2025
“Keeping people from being evicted is the most cost effective way tp prevent homelessness.” — Eviction Defense Collaborative. Mayor Lurie, if you can’t raise the needed $4.2 million, you and I need to have a little talk.