Bike Advocates Endorse Staunchly Anti-Poor Candidate

An open letter to People Power:

Dear People Power,

As a dedicated cyclist, I have supported your organization for over a decade, including five years serving on the steering committee, and working as the bookkeeper and membership coordinator. I very much value the work you have done and continue to do. However, I have always had mixed feelings about your endorsements of candidates including in the past individuals like Mike Rotkin, who last time you endorsed him in 2008 was clearly lining up against poor people through policies like opposing a living wage, and supporting the City's call for people to literally call 911 on people picking cans out of the garbage to scrape by a living.

At the time I was first invited to be more involved, I expressed this concern and got the response that the group agreed with me and such endorsements were not necessary. This year however People Power has endorsed and continues to support a much-worse candidate in David Terrazas. Even in the realm of transportation, he has a mixed record, sometimes clearly coming down on the side of sustainable transportation, but other times not. He also voted with the Council majority to not restore the program of distributing the City's unclaimed bikes to youth, but instead to ignore the shady dealings that led to that change, and make disparaging comments instead about the Bike Church.

More importantly, in his first term on Council Terrazas has constantly voted for repressive and ineffective policies. Going along with the conservative majority that we've had over the last four years (especially since 2012), he supported sending police to raid homeless camps, without offering anywhere for people to go, to further criminalize being poor downtown and in parks, and to restrict the needle exchange which all studies have shown to reduce both disease transmission and littered needles. This Council majority has also tried to ban street performers downtown, opposed a proposal to limit campaign spending, and pushed through a hotel development that violates zoning law, heritage tree law, and the input of neighbors.

Because transportation planning is just one of many issues that concerns me, I am therefore quite dismayed to see an organization I support helping to elect someone I find so deeply disturbing. For that reason I have decided that so long as People Power continues to endorse candidates for elections, I am no longer willing to support the organization.

Best regards,

Steve Schnaar