Why are San Francisco Supes Meeting on Election Day?

As a former elected official, I was shocked to hear that the Board of Supervisors was meeting tomorrow. When I was a Commissioner on the Berkeley Rent Board, we routinely canceled our Monday night meetings when they were on the eve of an election. The reason was obvious – all of us were planning to put up door-hangers the next day at 4:00 a.m. to remind people to vote. We weren’t a bunch of politicians delaying “the people’s business” to satisfy our own partisan agendas. We passionately cared about making sure people vote, believed that good old grass-roots organizing was the way to expand the franchise, and let’s be honest – what was on one meeting’s agenda could wait another two weeks. It wasn’t going to be the end of the world.

Incredibly, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors has had a Full Meeting on every Election Day for the past three years except one. All of the meetings had perfect attendance – except for the December 9, 2003 meeting, where then-Supervisor Gavin Newsom was “excused.” Ironically, Newsom was elected Mayor on that day when he defeated his colleague, Matt Gonzalez, who was chairing the Board meeting. This year, four Supervisors are up for re-election. Now that we have district elections, shouldn’t they be in their districts talking to constituents? Is it fair that they have to work on that day while their challengers are out campaigning?

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