As reported earlier this month by voiceofsandiego.org, Mayor Jerry Sanders' second quarter fundraising resulted in zero dollars (pdf). This, presumably, was at least partly to do with a perceived lack of credible challengers for next year's mayoral race. But after two weeks of being picked apart over his role in the illegal Sunroad project and his apparently dishonest defense, things may be changing. The Union Tribune is reporting that Mayor Sanders' two major challengers from last time, City Councilwoman Donna Frye and businessman Steve Francis, "champing at the bit" over the prospect of a rematch. So what's going on?
This Thursday, at 7:00PM we will be having a campaign meeting at Cafe Du Soleil which is located at the corner of Filmore and Waller St. As a mayoral candidate, I plan to run a campaign dedicated towards building a model for participatory democracy and I can use your help making it a reality.
We'll be discussing general campaign strategy and how we can move forward to establish greater visibility and really reach out to the people of San Francisco so that they can become more involved in planning the future of our city. The next three months are going to be a lot of fun, but it's also going to be a lot of work, and I know that our impact will be much greater if each of you get involved and lend a hand.
So there were some bloggers who might have spent a good part of the day discussing the professional use of social lubricants. And uh, the rumor by the end of the night was that if Matt Gonzalez doesn't get off his ass and run for Mayor there are two new candidates.
Luke Thomas and Krissy Keefer have both theoretically agreed to shell out $5K and run for Mayor if Matt doesn't. And on that front, it is still all rumors. A whole bunch of bloggers headed to the bar where his brother's band was playing yet Gonzo didn't show and we escaped with only one altercation and two new candidates.
It might seem a bit weird to bring this up now, as he hasn't yet announced anything. But I have my reasons. Well, not anything so secretive really, I got a polling call centered around a hypothetical matchup between Gavin Newsom and Art Agnos. Because SF is a city of people from other places, Agnos is an enigma for many San Franciscans.And hey, Art, if you (or a friend) is reading this, contact me. I'd be happy to do an interview.
At this point, even Chris Daly has admitted Gavin Newsom will be re-elected. It is too late to mount a credible campaign. So the question becomes who would be best to throw themselves on the sword. I agree with Mr. Brown on Sheriff Mike Hennessey:
Mike was my first choice for Mayor and I stand by that. The guy's an unpretentious giant.
I agree, any Sheriff who starts his speech by saying he wants everyone to know he agrees with everything the Public Defender said rocks, yet he'd never do it. But what about....
Ouch. Talk about anti-climatic. Speech after speech on how it is critical to challenge Gavin Newsom and elected after elected unwilling to run. It was surreal.
Dana, what irks us with Mayor Pulido is his lack of accessibility and what seems to be a lack of willingness to lead. The LA Times did an article about three years ago which discussed his nickname "The Invisible Mayor." Gustavo "The Mexican" Arellano has nicknamed him the "Howard Hughes of Orange County." All this goes back to his lack of accessibility. Until this last election cycle, virtually the only times we ever saw Mayor Pulido was every first and third Monday of the month. He was often a no show at dozens of community events, it is almost like he is bored of his duties as Mayor. When Santa Ana was being taken over by unruly protests in March of 2006, he was nowhere to be found. His job that day was to be a leader and once again he was MIA. None of it involved marching or protesting. The topic of the protests was immigration, but when the city is on the verge of a riot, it is not a federal issue, it is a local one. Exactly how is that "behind the the scenes" leadership?
That's Claudio Gallegos in today's Orange Juice, responding to Dana Parson's recent profile of Santa Ana Mayor Miguel Pulido in The LA Times. I guess he's taking issue with Dana Parsons' assertion that those of us who decry Pulido's lack of leadership are doing so just because Pulido isn't "Latino enough". No, it's much more than that. It's the crappy state of our roads, closing libraries, lack of parks, and much, much more.
Follow me after the flip as we examine why people in Santa Ana really are irritated with the Mayor...
When I was filling in the tags, I realized that there really is nothing this story is missing. First, it has Dan Noyes:
But, from reading the twelve hundred page final report from the internal affairs investigation into the video and the officers behind it, it turns out [San Francisco Police Officers Association President Gary] Delagnes was the one who blew the whistle on the officers involved in the video.
Waukeen McCoy wants to depose the mayor about his admitted alcohol abuse that came to light in January during the City Hall sex scandal. The attorney says he also wants to question Newsom under oath and on camera about cocaine use, and release the tapes to the public.
When the cops dropped their youtube attack ad I figured this might get interesting, but the more that comes out the crazier the whole thing gets. In other news, in conjunction with Chris Daly's Convention, there will be an entire Film Festival for youtube hit jobs against the mayor.
June 2nd is going to be a huge day in San Francisco politics. Gavin Newsom is kicking off his signature gathering with a rally and Chris Daly is holding is "convention" to try and force somebody to make it a race. At last night's fundraiser, I heard from two very knowledgeable progressive supervisors about the state of the race. One insisted that Matt Gonzalez was going to run and make it a re-match. The other insisted that there was no way in hell Matt Gonzalez was going to run. In unrelated news, a reliable source told me that Alex Tourk was seen having dinner with former Mayor Willie Brown last night (BTW, section 3.101 of SF Code says, "There shall be no limit on the non-successive terms that a person may serve"). Could be an interesting race...
As for running against Newsom? "Not me,'' [Chris] Daly said.
Not likely [former mayor Art] Agnos either, he added, but "hopefully we'll have someone within the next couple of weeks."
"Either that or there won't be anyone," Daly said, "because it will be just too late to mount a run."
Since Chris Daly totally failed to find somebody by his own deadline (and is too chicken to do it himself), I nominate SFist Elaine of the dreaded CrackBerry Chronicles.
Why you ask? Why not?
Since there seems to be zero interest from elected officials and the campaign is likely to be a complete joke, let's at least go with somebody who is funny. In 2007, vote fabulous!
It looks like 2007 may be an intereting election year in San Francisco after all. The Fog City Journal is reporting that former Supervisor Matt Gonzales is considering a rematch with a weakened Gavin Newsom and is shopping around for a campaign manager.
