Rent Control & District Elections Prevail in SF

The best news from San Francisco is that the foundation of the entire progressive community of San Francisco, namely rent control, has been successfully defended with the defeat of Prop R, the Rent Control Repeal measure, with 61% voting No. Prop R was by far the most important measure on the San Francisco ballot because if Prop R had passed, the workingclass and its progressive vote would have left San Francisco.

The second most important San Francisco ballot measure was Proposition J, the increase in supervisors salaries, which passed with 56% of the vote. This affirms the progressive majority on the Board of Supervisors, who were elected by district elections. Prop J changes the definition of the supervisor’s job to a fulltime civil service position, eligible for fulltime salary set by the Civil Service Commission and the Commission’s cost-of-living raises.

Further evidence of the strength of the importance of the tenant vote was the re-election of Supervisor Chris Daly with over 51% of the vote, defeating 8 challengers and avoiding a runoff. District 6 includes the Tenderloin and part of the Mission District, two of the most workingclass districts of San Francisco, filled with tenant voters. Democrat Daly and Green Party member Supevisor Matt Gonzales of District 5 (who was not up for election this time) are the most responsive to the needs and interests of the workingclass on this Board of Supervisors.

The Chamber of Commerce, through its Committee on Jobs, paid for Props N and R, and lost R for now, and will lose on N, as they have no services to deliver. The progressive community has proposed the Continuum of Care program designed by a coalition of people in San Francisco which will solve the homeless problem, and will reintroduce it in January.

So long as we have rent control, we not only have our homes, we have a strong progressive base from which to defeat all attacks by the Chamber of Commerce, mouthpiece of the capitalist class.

Once again, rent control has been proven to be the biggest motivator of the workingclass to vote and the surest way to maintain a progressive community in San Francisco.