Nothing is Simple in San Francisco Politics...More on the Special Election

Constant Readers,

Sooooooo....today is my birthday and I don't want to talk about it. (heheh. Obviously.) Actually, the "birthday" part is fine to discuss, it's the "age" part that bothers me.  I have a relationship with my age as complicated as the anti-wrinkle peptide, copper-infused, Retinol, firming, albino baby seal eye-extract serum on my face right now.  I vacillate between telling people I'm younger than I am and telling people I'm older than I am (this way they have to compliment how good I look for my age: "My you look lovely for a septuagenarian!" "Why thank you," I blush).

Oh, and did I mention my BFF just referred to me as her "number one spinster" on SFGate? Oy. I don't even have a cat. Or plants. (Unless you count the old Thai takeout in the fridge. Or the flowers I just got from the President of my Fan Club. Yay!) Needless to say, it's gonna be "a day." 

But that's no reason to neglect my CRs.

Let's talk some more about the special election, shall we?

So, you may have read some (perfectly nice) people reporting that Mistermayor "vetoed the Board of Supervisors' decision to hold a special election to raise taxes." Well, yes and no. Allow me to get waaay too technical here because there are at least three moving parts to the calling of a special election in June.

1. Declaration of Emergency - A June election means waiving or changing lots of City election code provisions - and that can only be done when we are officially in a state of emergency, which requires 8 votes at the Board. (SF Charter sec. 2.107.)  The declaration has to state specifically what the emergency is and what measures will be taken to address the emergency. (This is why we have the list of possible tax increase measures and also why other fun stuff won't be allowed on the June ballot. No hookers or war protests, just revenue measures, I'm afraid.)

The first declaration of a state of emergency was passed on January 27 (ordinance number 090009). That's what Mistermayor just vetoed on Friday. 

Also on January 27, Supervisors Avalos and Elsbernd proposed amendments to 090009. Now, Supervisor Elsbernd basically said he couldn't support 090009 unless his own amendments were approved. Since those amendments couldn't be voted on until the next meting on February 3, Supervisor Daly did something called "duplicating the file" which just made a carbon copy of 090009 (under another number) to be voted on at the next meeting. This allowed the Supes to go ahead and pass 090009 on January 27 (thus getting the ball rolling) and also to consider Avalos' and Elsbernd's amendments at the February 3 meeting. Number 09009 plus the proposed amendments = 090106. And 090106 was passed on February 3.

So, to recap: we now have two declarations of emergency: 090009 and 090106. The latter is slightly different from the former. Notably, 090106 allows paid arguments on either side - something 090009 prohibits.

2. Calling for a Special Election - Once a declaration of emergency is in place, the Board can then call for a special election. It only requires a majority vote to pass. And they did call for a special election on February 3 in a resolution numbered 090010. Last Thursday when I wrote that on February 13, Mistermayor will veto the Board's resolution calling for a special election, this is what I was referring to.

Now, I should point out here that every one of these bills (090009, 090106, 090010) got eight votes at the Board - enough to override a veto. Only Supervisors Alioto-Pier, Chu and Elsbernd voted against them.

When the Board meets tomorrow, they will consider Mistermayor's veto of 090009 and they will override it. Will he also veto 090106, which has better terms for transparency and civic dialogue than 090009? To do so would also put the better law up for re-vote, which would probably be fine, but you never know...it would only take one person to sink the amended measure.

At any rate, even though 090009 will remain intact after tomorrow, the fight over whether there will be a special election is not over.

I'm off to play shuffleboard....

-Melissa 

For your reference, here are the files: Download 090009, Download 090106, and Download 090010

Comments

[njudah]

I don't see how this is going to work out well for the proposed taxes they want to put on the ballot. We have nothing even defined yet, and by the time something is written down and legal-ified and such, it'll be what, early March at best?

So then we have 10 weeks to go from nothing, no money, no campaign, no outreach, no nothing to passing something that's controversial even under the best of times.

I understand why some are advocating it and get it, I'm just looking at how the political physics of all this is going to work and it seems to be one with a lot of strikes against it. Ouch.

[Sweet Melissa]

@njudah - I've been saying for awhile now that I don't think the special election is going to happen - for many of the reasons you cite. March 6 is the deadline for the Board to elect to put particular measures on the ballot. The budget and finance committee is taking up some of the proposals this week, but whether there is enough political will behind this to warrant spending $3.5 million to hold an election where 2/3 of voters have to endorse any measure is at least doubtful.

[Beth Spotswood]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!
I guess you're technically not a spinster, but I don't want to be one alone, so you're stuck with it/me.
IUJU!!!

PS: Ring me up later to schedule next month's canasta. I'm not hosting again unless you return my tupperware and Eunice stops cheating...

[Mr. K.]

Happy Birthday to you dearest. You are puppies and thunderstorms all the way down. May you be nothing other than just yourself.

You are wonderful.

Mr. K.

[Mousqueton]

Best wishes on your birthday and may God keep you for ever fresh, beautiful, intriguing, smart, unpredictable and perfect as you are today.

[V. Hill]

Happy Birthday! Mel!!!! We have to come out West to visit! I see your doing great things!!