Newsom Moves to the Right

During his seven years as a Supervisor, Gavin Newsom consistently backed the Chamber of Commerce’s agenda and offered little in the way of progressive legislation. But after becoming Mayor, Newsom took several actions that changed his political identity, increasing his support among gays and lesbians, organized labor, and progressives overall. Since 2006 began, however, Newsom has quickly moved back toward espousing the agenda of his downtown/real estate base. Last week, the Mayor accused members of the heavily African-American transit workers union of stealing on cable cars, appeared unconcerned about the closure of primarily African-American schools, and refused to slow the exodus of families from San Francisco by his late Friday afternoon veto of the first of two pieces of legislation designed to protect tenants from Ellis Act evictions (the Mayor has already pledged to veto the other). Add the Mayor’s opposition to a local version of the employer health care mandate conceived by ex-Senator John Burton and the state Democratic Party, and can readily conclude that Newsom’s courting of progressives is over.

During his first two years as Mayor, Gavin Newsom legalized gay marriage, supported the hotel workers boycott, put a housing bond and business tax increase on the ballot, increased funding for children’s services, created Project Homeless Connect, and appeared to be following the political evolution of his role model, Robert F. Kennedy.

But a different Mayor Newsom has emerged in 2006, one closer to Supervisor Newsom than to Robert Kennedy.

Virtually every policy position endorsed by the Mayor this year echoes that of the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce and the San Francisco Association of Realtors. These constituencies elected Newsom to do their bidding, and, after two years of business interests complaining that Newsom had deserted them, he has apparently returned to the fold.

Consider the following:

• After two years as Mayor, Newsom continues to ignore the harm caused by escalating Ellis Act evictions. The Mayor told San Francisco magazine that “I want people to know that we’re thinking about the problems, that we’re working on the problems and that we have ideas to try to solve the problems.” But the Mayor has offered neither ideas nor solutions to the working families and seniors forced out of their homes pursuant to the Ellis Act.

While the Mayor avoids the problem, seven members of the Board of Supervisors passed legislation requiring sellers of TIC’s to disclose to prospective purchasers that the building was vacant due to evictions of seniors or disabled tenants. Although this mild measure gave the Mayor an easy opportunity to show his concern about Ellis Act evictions, he nevertheless vetoed it.

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