Jeff Adachi San Francisco Examiner mayoral candidate questionnaire

1) Please explain your campaign platform in 20 words or less. I will focus on jobs, keeping families in SF, providing independent/effective leadership, integrity, and solving the Citys fiscal crisis.

2) Please list your votes on the local November ballot measures. School Bonds Yes Road Repaving and Street Paving Bonds No Pension reform: Lee supported version No Adachi Initiative Yes Amending Initiative Ordinances and Policy Declaration No Campaign Consultant Disclosures No School District Student Assignment System Yes 3) What is the worst budgetary problem in San Francisco and how will you address it? The Citys most dire budgetary problem is skyrocketing pension and benefit costs for city employees. This year, taxpayers spent one out of every six tax dollars nearly a billion dollars on city employee benefits. Within five years, that number is expected to double. Over the next 12 months alone, The Citys benefits costs for city employees will soar by $100 million, and every year that number will grow. By 2015, these costs will reach $800 million annually. Meanwhile, The City is facing a $483 million deficit in the coming fiscal year. Unless significant reforms are made immediately, The City will have little choice but to divert scarce funding away from education, law enforcement, parks and recreation programs, public health and other basic services in order to pay for city employee benefits. San Francisco needs its next mayor to be firmly committed to solving this problem, even if the face of push-back from powerful interest groups. For the second year in a row, I have been at the forefront of reform. I am the author of Proposition D, the largest fiscal austerity measure ever proposed in San Francisco. In 2011, I set out to reform The Citys pension system because, put simply, escalating employee pension and benefits costs are bankrupting our city. After meeting with members of the 2010 civil grand jury who felt that their calls for reform of pension system had been ignored by elected officials, I urged Mayor Gavin Newsom and the Board of Supervisors to take on this issue, to no avail. Because no elected official had the bravery to push for pension reform, I took the issue directly to the people of San Francisco. While the November 2010 pension and health care reform ballot measure did not pass, it garnered 116,000 yes votes. Taking what I learned from that experience, I retained former San Francisco City Attorney Louise Rennes law firm to help draft Proposition D for the November 2011 ballot. Proposition D improves on the earlier ballot reform measure by exempting lower-paid workers those with salaries less than $50,000 from any increases in retirement contributions, and by setting a 1

graduated contribution rate so that higher paid city employees will contribute to their retirement at a higher rate than lower paid employees. Proposition D also provides a fairer, more sustainable retirement reform system for new hires, and it prohibits pension spiking. Proposition D, if approved, will be the largest fiscal austerity measure in the history of The City. According to the City Controller, Proposition D will save taxpayers $1.7 billion over the next seven years, enabling The City to prevent further cuts to and even restore important city services. Proposition C is not an effective reform measure. When Ed Lee was appointed interim mayor, he pledged to address The Citys growing pension crisis. As a result of several meet and confer sessions with unions, who vehemently opposed any increase in their pension contributions, Lees compromise reform measure does not provide nearly enough cost savings. Heres why: First, Lees plan assumes a 7.75 percent rate of return on investments, which all financial experts, including Warren Buffet, say is unrealistic over the foreseeable future. (The Citys pension fund has never realized more than an average of 5 percent during the past 10 years.) Second, Proposition C fails to cap pensions. Third, it still allows some employees to receive 90 percent of the income they received while working. Fourth, Proposition C does not stop pension spiking. While Proposition C purports to address the pension crisis facing our city, it will save The City much less over the next decade. In short, Proposition C will not result in long-term, sustainable pension reform. The proponents of Proposition C claim that Proposition D would be vulnerable to a legal challenge. Both Propositions C and D raise employee pension contribution rates, thus it is likely that both will be challenged. In fact, City retirees have already said they would challenge Proposition C. Regarding health care, Proposition C addresses the $4.3 billion unfunded liability by requiring city employees to contribute 0.25 percent toward their healthcare costs beginning in 2016. I believe this is insufficient. I would work to decrease The Citys health care costs while requiring a greater contribution, based on income. As mayor, I will propose an employee healthcare cost reform measure that fairly and adequately addresses The Citys rising health care liabilities. Because these competing pension reform measures may be confusing to the voters, I have proposed a series of debates to assist voters in understanding the measures relative merits. For example, Proposition C is 250 pages in the length, while Proposition D is 12 pages in length. Unfortunately, interim Mayor Ed Lee has declined this opportunity to inform voters. Comparison of Proposition D and Propisition Cs terms and effectiveness: PROP D 7.5% (non-safety employees); 10% (safety) Uses 5-year average to determine pensionable compensation PROP C No base contribution Uses 3-year average to determine pensionable compensation

BASE EMPLOYEE CONTRIBUTION ANTI-SPIKING FORMULA

ANNUAL PENSIONS CAP ON PENSIONS CAP ON CONTRIBUTIONS BY EMPLOYEES METHOD OF PAYING CONTRIBUTIONS COST SAVINGS

New plan capped at 75% Lowest of 75% or $140,000 Up to 16% for highest paid employees Uses $10,000 increments to determine what employees contribute $1.7 billion over 10 years

Some employees can still receive 90% of pension $190,000 13.5% for all employees Uses $50K increments

$1.3 billion over 10 years

4) What are your plans to attract and retain businesses in San Francisco? As a mayor who will be taking office in the midst of a deep economic recession, I will work tirelessly to make San Francisco a fertile rather than hostile place to do business by implementing a five-point job growth plan: First, I will revise The Citys business tax structure, including a major overhaul of the payroll tax. The current payroll tax discourages the hiring of new workers and deters lucrative businesses from settling in San Francisco. We are one of the only cities in the nation that has a payroll tax, and its hampering our ability to use the Web 2.0 movement to bring more highpaying jobs and high-growth companies to San Francisco. As mayor, I will eliminate this flawed tax and replace it with one based on net business revenue, with strict prohibitions against underreporting and outright fraud. The payroll tax is not a matter of companies paying their fair share. Companies have a fiduciary duty to their shareholders, which means that they cannot choose to locate in San Francisco if locating just a few miles away could save the company millions of dollars. I support Supervisor Ross Mirkarimis legislation proposing a six-year stock option exemption from the payroll tax for pre-IPO companies that undertake public stock offerings while in San Francisco. This exemption provides much-needed tax relief without adversely affecting San Francisco or its general fund. My proposed alternative to the payroll tax is a tax on companies gross receipts or net business revenue. This tax will provide The City with the same amount of revenue without putting San Francisco at an unfair advantage in a tough economy by unfairly penalizing high-growth startups that create thousands of jobs. Unless we revamp the way The City earns revenue from local businesses, we will find ourselves looking out at gleaming cities in Silicon Valley and on the Peninsula while we suffer high rates of joblessness and under-employment. Second, I will foster a business climate that supports small businesses. For example, I will set aside $40 million each year for investment in micro-enterprise job creation by issuing 1,000 small business micro-loans of $40,000 a piece. In addition to supplying pivotal startup capital for small business entrepreneurs, the program will shepherd participants through the process of creating their own businesses. (For a more detailed discussion of my micro-loan plan, see question six below.) 3

Third, I will ease the daunting barriers to opening new businesses, like stacked licensing fees and bureaucratic mazes, by allowing new small business entrepreneurs to defer fees where hardship is shown. The San Francisco Chronicle recently reported that a small business owner in the Mission district who was planning to build a bowling alley had to pay $44,000 in fees before beginning construction. The owner said that these fees might derail her project altogether. As mayor, I will not let this happen. I will allow owners to defer partial payment of fees until the business is up and running. Fourth, I will develop San Franciscos human infrastructure and job-readiness through apprenticeship and job-training programs that feed directly into public and private sector jobs. This will require better coordination among and between city departments and agencies, particularly those agencies that serve the unemployed, private industry, the nonprofit sector, and local community colleges and trade schools. The apprenticeship and training programs will be responsive to the evolving needs of employers. Fifth, I will create a new and independent economic development organization comprised of decision-makers from both the public and private sectors. Among other job creation and retention strategies, the organization would craft smart reforms of City Halls approach to large and small businesses. 5) Do you support San Francisco giving tax breaks to businesses that agree to locate in economically distressed areas such as the Tenderloin district or Mid-Market area? No, I do not support subdividing San Francisco into tax-break zones and full-taxation zones. Instead, I support scaling back City Halls aggressive regulation and taxation of all San Francisco businesses, no matter where they are located. The need for the Twitter Tax Break arose because The Citys payroll tax has been deterring new businesses from starting in San Francisco and prompting existing, lucrative businesses to move outside of San Francisco. Piecemeal reform efforts like the Central Market/Tenderloin Payroll Tax Exclusion should be scrapped in favor of comprehensive reform measures that will encourage businesses to settle and grow in every San Francisco neighborhood without compromising The Citys commercial tax base. As mayor, I will repeal the stifling payroll tax outright and replace it with a gross-receipts tax. If we foster a business-friendly taxation and regulation climate throughout San Francisco, businesses will naturally locate in blighted areas, like the Tenderloin and Mid-Market. 6) What proposals do you have for creating job growth in The City? Over the past several decades, The Citys approach to economic development and job creation has relied on a failing formula of trickle down economics administered by the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency. Gov. Jerry Brown has decided to cut funding to redevelopment agencies across California because they have not succeeded at creating jobs. As mayor, I will divert scarce public resources away from ineffective programs, like redevelopment agencies, and toward effective job creation initiatives. For example, I will create a $40 million investment program that will offer 1,000 qualifying small business entrepreneurs micro-loans of up to $40,000 a piece. Through micro-financing, The City will make low-risk, modest investments in neighborhood businesses with a very high

rate of return in the form of job creation. Over 90 percent of Californias businesses are small businesses, and 88 percent of all businesses in California (businesses with five or fewer employees) require $35,000 or less in startup capital. Small businesses have a higher percentage of female and minority employees and owners, and they are more likely to be family owned. Using micro-financing to help small businesses grow and prosper in San Francisco will create jobs, put middle- and working-class people back to work, and promote diversity. My micro-enterprise program will mirror successful private sector micro-financing endeavors, like the Womens Initiative (www.womensinitiative.org), which have created hundreds of businesses throughout the Bay Area, including restaurants, beauty salons, and export-import businesses, with an 85 percent loan repayment rate, and a 60 percent business success rate. The program will coordinate the work of city agencies, like the Small Business Administration and the San Francisco Small Business Network, and will be administered through the Office of Small Business. I am particularly interested in spawning new socially-responsible and environmentally conscious small businesses. Because of growing consumer demand for environmentally and socially friendly products and businesses models, these business achieve a triple bottom line economic profit, environmental and social profit, and job growth. 7) Do you support San Franciscos policy of requiring contractors who bid on large public projects to guarantee that a significant percentage (at least 20 percent) of the work will be performed by city residents? I support San Francisco's local-hire laws. Investing in San Franciscans by requiring a practice of hiring residents on city construction projects is simply good policy. The local-hire law achieves many of my mayoral priorities create more jobs for San Franciscans, support lower- and middle-class families, and prevent urban flight. There are currently plenty of capable and skilled San Franciscans to meet the construction hiring needs. To meet the increasing demand for new workers as the local-hire requirement ramps up to 50 percent, I will build public-private joint-venture vocational training opportunities in partnership with trade schools and local community colleges. The local-hire policies will also encourage construction companies themselves to focus their apprenticeship and training efforts on city residents. Like many well-intentioned policy measures the devil is in the details. Already we are seeing that the implementation of this program is faltering and its failing to meet its objectives. As mayor, I will strengthen our local-hire policies and close the loopholes that are hampering the success of this well-intentioned program. It has been only six months since the local-hire laws were enacted and already there are reports of fraud and abuse. As mayor, I will work to eliminate this abuse. First, we must redefine the definition of who qualifies as a San Francisco resident so that it does not include someone who simply demonstrates that they have lived in The City for one week. Second, we need to penalize companies that make fraudulent claims and distort their statistics. For instance, some companies hire San Franciscans for short amounts of time to simply meet their bidding quotas while non-residents do the bulk of the work. Companies should be required

to meet the local-hire provisions for the full duration of the project. Companies that are found in violation should be sanctioned in the form of fines and loss of bidding privileges for future contracts. This approach will go hand-in-hand with a more transparent and tougher review of the bidding process that I will implement for construction projects in San Francisco to avoid corruption and scratch-my-back politics. Critics of local-hire laws claim that the laws are too costly to administer. But the projected $1.6 million annual oversight and enforcement cost will be offset by the economic benefits that flow from the local-hire laws, like job creation, tax revenue, crime reduction, and reduced reliance on social services. Fines levied against violators will also offset the cost of oversight. 8) Over the past decade, growth in the salary and benefits of city employees has forced The City to reduce services in a variety of areas. Are city employees overpaid? Are benefits too generous? If so, what can be done about this? In 2009, the Civil Grand Jury issued a report showing that pension spiking was a problem in the police and fire departments, costing taxpayers $120 million. Additionally, in 2011, the Retirement Fund granted $170 million in bonus cost of living increases to pensioners, even though The City faced a $300 million deficit and the pension fund had lost money. Proposition D will eliminate these abuses under current law. As mayor, I will initiate a comprehensive review of our citys personnel costs and evaluate San Franciscos compensation levels in comparison to those of other high-cost cities, such as New York and Los Angeles. We need to be able to attract the most talented workers to our city and compensate them fairly, while recognizing that we also face a fiscal crisis that will require everyone to make small sacrifices in the short term to improve the long-term quality of life for all of our citizens. 9) The state could soon allow cities and counties to add more local taxes. What additional taxes, if any, would you propose for San Francisco? I have addressed my tax reform proposals at length in my response to questions 4, 5, and 6. I would not support other additional new taxes on business or individuals at this time. However, we should recognize that if Sacramento fails to provide adequate funding for essential services such as public education, we may need to re-evaluate this issue at some point in the future. 10) What should be done to make Muni more efficient? What changes should be made to address the MTAs annual operating deficit? San Francisco is a world-class city that deserves a word-class public transportation system to service its residents and visitors. As mayor, increasing Munis ridership and fiscal efficiency will be my top priorities. I have a straightforward five-part strategy for improving Munis reliability, financial feasibility, and on-time performance: Demand accountability from Muni employees through the implementation of Proposition G and collective bargaining;

Implement the Transit Effectiveness Projects 2008 recommendations, such as increasing service to the busiest routes and reducing service to underutilized routes, eliminating less-used stops, and giving buses priority in heavy traffic corridors; Make Muni a tech-savvy service by providing real-time passenger information systemwide; Increase safety aboard Muni buses and trains by assigning law enforcement officers to crimeprone routes; and Keep Munis infrastructure buses, railcars, stations, and maintenance facilities in a state of good repair, which will keep maintenance costs down and prevent service interruptions. 11) Homelessness still seems to be the foremost topic on the minds of voters. What's your plan to get people off the streets, especially when they refuse help? San Franciscos persistent homeless problem is not intractable. As mayor, I will implement three feasible, cost-effective solutions that will restore decency to The Citys streets while humanely addressing the needs of the chronically homeless, even those who are prone to refuse help. First, I will expand the availability of supportive housing programs, which provide participants with a residence and in-house services. The track record for supportive housing programs in San Francisco and cities across the country is clear: taxpayers save millions of dollars annually when the core homeless population high-utilizers of The Citys emergency rooms, ambulances, and jails is placed into stable housing that addresses the root causes of their homelessness, like mental illness and substance abuse. To increase supportive housing stock, I will work together with nonprofit organizations, like the Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation, and members of the business community to facilitate the leasing, purchasing, and renovation of underused single-room occupancy hotels. I will also create a central coordinating entity that is housed within the Department of Public Health and equipped to organize and streamline a largescale supportive housing network. This entity will periodically measure the financial and human impact of supportive housing on The Citys homeless population. Finally, I will reallocate the taxpayer money that is freed up because we are diverting the chronically homeless away from the public health and criminal justice systems; the savings will be reinvested back into supportive housing programs so that they grow in size and effectiveness. Second, I will revamp The Citys Byzantine shelter reservation system. Currently, homeless San Franciscans wait in shelter lines for hours only to be turned away, while The City reports vacant shelter beds every night. I will implement several reforms, including: lengthen initial reservations to six weeks, with subsequent extensions of up to six months; provide reservation assistance for people with mental disabilities, and allow them to keep the reservation for at least six months; and erect at least one centrally located around-the-clock drop-in shelter with aroundthe-clock reservation capacity. A user-friendly, needs-driven reservation system will move shelter-seeking homeless into available beds and off of city streets. Third, I support local adoption and implementation of Lauras Law, the California statute that allows for court-ordered assisted outpatient medical treatment for individuals with serious mental illness who pose a threat to themselves or others. While implementing Lauras Law, I will bring

mental health advocates to the table to help ensure that the use of Lauras Law does not unnecessarily or unjustifiably restrict the civil liberties of the mentally ill. As a longtime public defender, I have had thousands of clients with a wide array of mental illnesses, including hundreds who were too ill to make reasoned decisions about their own care. While it is important to preserve basic liberties and freedoms of homeless and mentally ill San Franciscans, for many who are suffering from mental illness, court-ordered supervised treatment can be a sound life-preserving option. Lauras Law allows individuals who need treatment to receive it on an outpatient basis, making our communities safer while avoiding the expense and loss of liberty that accompanies inpatient treatment. This approach also allows mentally ill San Franciscans to live more normal and productive lives while they are receiving treatment. 12) In 2010, The City amended its Police Code to prohibit sitting or lying on a public sidewalk in San Francisco between 7 a.m. and 11 p.m., with certain exceptions. Do you support this policy? I did not believe sit/lie was necessary when it was proposed and I do not believe it is necessary now. The sit/lie ordinance prohibits innocent conduct. I believe that we should draft laws as narrowly as possible so that innocent people are not at risk of arrest. Proponents of sit/lie argued the law was necessary in order to prevent people from being threatening, to stop people from obstructing the sidewalk, to deal with hostile people, and to prevent panhandling. All of this conduct was already illegal under existing laws. Obstruction of the sidewalk is prohibited under two separate laws, obstructing a business or a home is illegal, threatening someone is illegal under multiple laws, and solicitation is illegal. After the sit/lie ordinance, sitting on the street and playing a guitar is illegal. Sitting down on a sidewalk and talking with a friend is illegal. Our city has a long history of protecting individual and civil rights. As the Public Defender, I have spent my career fighting for a fairer and freer society. I just dont think this law was necessary. We should enforce the laws that criminalize bad behavior, not enact a law that criminalizes innocent behavior. People also said that the police needed sit/lie because the department did not have the resources to create civil sidewalks without an easier tool. I dont think that was true then or now. The police department has a budget close to a half a billion dollars and definitely had the resources to enforce existing law. The ordinance requires that people cited for violations be assisted in connecting to social services if they choose to. I want everyone who needs these services to get them. Our social safety net has been gutted over the past few years which makes connecting people to services much more difficult and sometimes impossible. We must commit to re-prioritizing our budget so that social services are properly funded. 13) Do you support the Parkmerced and CPMC developments as currently proposed? Parkmerced Redevelopment: San Francisco needs to create more housing that is affordable, state-of-the-art, and meets the needs of current and future San Franciscans. The redevelopment of Parkmerced could

accomplish these goals, but precautions must be built-into the redevelopment plan at the outset to ensure that current residents are not displaced or otherwise adversely affected by the new development. I share the concerns of the San Francisco 2011 Civil Grand Jury, which issued the following warning: "the proposed Development Agreement does not give adequate rent control protection to the residents of the Parkmerced property." The grand jury concluded that the Mayors Office of Economic and Workforce Development is making promises that it cannot keep: under the current development plan, there is no way to legally enforce the developers promise to maintain the same number of rent controlled units. San Franciscos lower- and middle-class residents cannot afford to lose Parkmerceds more than 3,000 rent-controlled units. As mayor, I will work to implement the grand jurys two primary recommendations: First, the Board of Supervisors and Mayor promptly enact legislation that explicitly protects rent control protections for existing Parkmerced tenants who continue to reside in the redeveloped complex. Second, the developer provide replacement units for tenants who are displaced during the redevelopment construction. CPMCs VanNess and St. Lukes Developments: CPMCs current expansion and rebuild proposal should not be approved by the City Planning Commission unless and until the proposal includes the following provisions: Pay the same standard fee for affordable housing that is paid by every major commercial developer; Transit and congestion planning and offset funds; Increase its level of charity care from a deplorable 0.99 percent to the average level for other regional hospitals (2.3 percent); Increase its MediCal acceptance rate; Maintain St. Lukes as an acute care facility with an emergency room for the foreseeable future; and Negotiate with union nurses in good faith. Before CPMCs plans are approved, a citywide public health master plan should be crafted and implemented. I support Supervisor David Camposs legislation to mandate that such a plan be drafted by the Department of Public Health and approved by the Health Commission. With a master plan to guide us, The City will be able to answer important long-term questions when evaluating proposed hospital expansions and rebuilds. For example, how will CPMC's rebuild affect low-income-patient care? How does the project fit in with the new Obama healthcare policies and The City's own Healthy San Francisco program? Will a new hospital on Van Ness increase access to primary and emergency care for residents of the Tenderloin or will they be shuttled somewhere else while the high-end facility caters to better-off patients seeking expensive specialty procedures? While CPMCs $2.5 billion rebuild project is an attractive health care infrastructure improvement, The City should not approve the project until it ensures, first, that CPMCs proposal includes a reasonable community benefits agreement, and, second, that the rebuild serves San Franciscos long-term healthcare needs.

14) Do you support increasing the number of permits to allow the conversion of rental properties into condos? As mayor, I will create solutions that will allow all stakeholders in these issues to work together. Because state law forbids rent control for single family homes and San Francisco cannot mandate new rent controlled housing, the condominium conversion process implicates a wide range of housing issues. The condo conversion proposals that have been proposed so far seem to pit renters against owners. Its inevitable that solutions will be hard to achieve in this environment. A goal of my administration will be the creation of new and affordable housing, so that those who want to buy, can buy, and to preserve and create affordable rental units. Condo conversion does increase the number of residential properties available for sale but it decreases the number of rental units and more importantly rent-controlled units. Many people bought into tenancies-in-common with the hope they could convert their units to condominiums and are realizing that it takes longer than they had planned. I am very sympathetic to TIC owners who have waited much longer than they anticipated. This is an important issue for our city, the owners of the tenancies-in-common, and renters. My overriding goal is ensuring affordable housing for all San Franciscans. Most San Francisco residents rent their homes and its therefore critical that we ensure rental availability. I want people of all economic levels to continue to live here. Maintaining an adequate amount of rental space is critical to keeping an economically diverse group of people in San Francisco. I am committed to finding a solution that ensures availability of affordable rental units and allows for TIC owners to convert their properties to single family homes. A recent proposal to allow for a onetime bypass of the conversion permit limit did not include a plan to increase affordable rental units. This proposal was estimated to raise one-time revenue of $8 million. San Francisco has a $6.7 billion budget and I have proposed saving $1.7 billion over the next 10 years by requiring city employees to pay a higher portion of The Citys of the cost or their pensions. Many politicians cited the $8 million that would have been generated by a condo conversion bypass plan, yet many oppose a measure that would save an additional $450 million over the next decade. With the increased savings from my pension reform measure, we will invest in the creation of affordable housing. 15) Some people in San Francisco think that all tenants should be protected by rent control, regardless of the tenants income or wealth. Other people in San Francisco think that tenants should be protected by rent control only if they are lower or middle class, and cannot afford to pay market-level rents. What is your opinion on this issue? Means testing for rent control would provide few, if any, benefits and the costs of implementing such a policy make it unwise. Property owners re-rent their properties at market rates after a tenant vacates the unit. Because of this, the initial rate that the tenant pays would not change even if means testing were required. And anyone who rents a unit from a building that had its first occupancy after June 13, 1979, is never subject to rent control. This means that if the market for one of those units increases any amount, no matter how large or small, the property owner can increase the rent and means testing is clearly not necessary in this situation.

Additionally, a new bureaucracy would need to assess whether someone was entitled to receive the benefits of rent control. This would be costly and would require people to provide private information about their income. Any benefit that means testing would provide would be very limited. The costs associated with enforcing it outweigh any benefit. 16) In 2009, San Francisco began turning over undocumented youths arrested for felonies to federal immigration authorities for possible deportation. The Board of Supervisors subsequently directed The City not to turn over undocumented youths unless they have been convicted of a felony, rather than simply arrested. What is your opinion on this issue? I agree with the Board of Supervisors city officials should not turn over undocumented youths who have simply been arrested on felony charges. Throughout my career as a public defender, I have been a staunch supporter of The Citys Sanctuary Ordinance. I was the first city official to oppose Mayor Gavin Newsoms policy of reporting undocumented juveniles to federal authorities upon arrest or detention. I oppose this flawed and inhumane policy because it tears apart families, results in the deportation of youths who have little or no connection to their birth country, and penalizes youths who were brought to the United States by their parents. The policy did not promote public safety since the vast majority of juveniles arrested on suspicion of a felony later see those charges dropped outright or dropped to a lesser offense in court. My office vigorously defends against The Citys attempts to deport immigrant youth. I helped draft an ordinance requiring a due process hearing before a youth is handed over to federal immigration authorities. In a time of fiscal crisis, I believe that local law enforcement should allocate its limited resources to ensuring the safety of city residents and visitors rather than taking on the duties of federal agenices, like the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. 17) More than 5,000 children have left San Francisco over the last decade. What's your plan to keep families living in San Francisco? Families are leaving San Francisco because of the scarcity of both affordable housing and highquality public schools. As mayor, I will work tirelessly to increase the stock of housing for lower- and middle-income families and to improve San Franciscos public education offerings. Affordable Housing Housing in San Francisco is among the most expensive in the country. As a result, San Francisco has experienced an alarming decline of middle-income neighborhoods. Skyrocketing cost of housing forces middle-income families to flee in search of affordable housing. Gentrification of neighborhoods creates an unhealthy separation between the rich and poor and results in concentrated areas of poverty. We have seen this occur in the Western Addition, Visitacion Valley, the Mission, Bayview-Hunters Point and in other pockets throughout The City. As mayor, I will pursue a balanced housing strategy that protects existing affordable housing, expands rental and ownership opportunities for people of all incomes, and increases the overall housing supply. As mayor, I will: Maintain strong rent-control and eviction protections;

Protect existing housing and rent-controlled units citywide from being lost to new development; Require that new housing developments sell at least 15 percent of the new units below market rate; Work with the private sector to create affordable mortgage programs; Facilitate the nonprofit purchase and rehabilitation of rental housing to preserve affordability; Create an affordable housing superfund to finance nonprofit housing developers; Fully funding Hope SFs public housing revitalization program; Negotiate effective and fair community benefits agreements before any new housing development is approved. I will find the money to fund aggressive affordable housing programs through equally aggressive fiscal austerity measures, like pension reform, and by making housing a constant priority at City Hall.

Improving Public Education No issue is more important to the future of San Francisco than the education of our children. Until we expand access to high-quality education for all of The Citys children, families will continue to leave San Francisco at an alarming rate. To curb the lower- and middle-class exodus out of San Francisco, we must ensure that our public schools provide top-notch education to all San Franciscans, regardless of wealth, neighborhood, or immigration status. As mayor, I will work closely with the superintendent, School Board, teachers and parents to ensure that our students receive an education that will prepare them for a 21st century global economy. In order to achieve educational excellence in San Franciscos public schools, I will fulfill these 10 objectives in education: 1. Restore funding for 10,000 summer school students. As mayor, one of my first acts will be to provide the School District with $1 million in funding to restore summer school. For the first time in our citys history, because of the fiscal crisis we are experiencing, summer school has been cancelled for 10,000 children because the School District does not have the funding to pay for it. I believe strongly that summer school helps students continue their learning during the summer months and also keeps young people off the streets and engaged in positive activities. 2. Fight for equitable funding. As mayor, I will head a coalition of mayors to advocate in Sacramento and Washington, D.C., for increased funding for K-12 schools in San Francisco and throughout California. I also support increased funding for the San Francisco Unified School District from The Citys Rainy Day Fund, extension of Proposition As parcel tax to provide funding for capital improvements in the San Francisco Unified School District, and approval of Proposition H to increase access to neighborhood schools and facilitate parental control. I will support free Muni passes for students. 3. Attract and retain quality teachers. Recent studies have demonstrated that the most effective way to increase student achievement is by having the best teachers in our classrooms. I will encourage the best talent in the teaching profession to join and remain in the San Francisco school system by encouraging incentive programs to reward successful teachers through 1

performance-based compensation programs. I support reducing the size of our over-crowded classrooms to facilitate quality instruction. I will encourage raising teacher salaries so that the SFUSD attracts the most talented teachers in the profession. I will make teaching in San Francisco more attractive by prioritizing affordable housing programs for teachers, making it easier for our teachers to live in and enjoy the benefits of our word-class city, and by providing supplemental transportation assistance. I will focus on improving safety in our schools to protect teachers as well as students. 4. Support expanded preschool and after-school programs. Studies have demonstrated that one of the most effective ways to enhance student performance and future success in the workforce is through access to preschool programs. I will encourage and support increased funding for these programs through collaboration with community-based organizations. I will also encourage healthy, physical activities for children within after-school and summer school programs. 5. Support supplemental programs and tutoring for low-income students and English language learners. Studies demonstrate that children from impoverished families face greater academic challenges than children from middle-class and affluent backgrounds. Similarly, immigrant children and children of immigrants face greater challenges in educational achievement largely due to language barriers. I will fund supplemental programs to cure these disadvantages, including funding for school meals, tutoring programs, and supplemental language instruction for non-native English speakers. I will support efforts focused on the lowest-performing schools so that every school in San Francisco is an effective school. 6. Provide students with the tools they need to succeed. Without basic supplies, like pens, papers, backpacks, and textbooks, students cannot learn. For the past seven years, the Public Defenders Offices MAGIC Programs have collaborated with dozens of other community organizations to present its annual Back to School Celebration. Every September, we distribute 4,500 backpacks and school supplies to children in underprivileged neighborhoods, like the Western Addition and Bayview-Hunters Point. The backpacks are donated by local businesses and private schools. The event also features literacy programs, recreational activities and other positive activities for children. As mayor, I will expand this back-to-school program throughout The City. 7. Expand language immersion programs. San Franciscos rich cultural diversity is its greatest asset, and the School Districts language immersion programs are in high demand, with demand increasing ever year. As mayor, I will ensure that language immersion offerings expand to keep up with demand. 8. Build effective partnerships between schools and community-based organizations, like the MAGIC programs. San Francisco is home to hundreds of nonprofit community-based organizations that work with youth and children. Meanwhile, many parents and students are unaware of the resources available in their community. Where appropriate, community-based organizations should work directly within schools, since that is where youth spend a good part of their day. In 2004, the Public Defenders Office, together with other community-based organizations, established Bayview-Hunters Point Mobilization for Adolescent Growth in our Communities

(BMAGIC). In 2006, we added a similar program in the Fillmore-Western Addition neighborhood (MOMAGIC). The mission of these programs is to facilitate, coordinate and network community resources and opportunities to advance the educational, economic, and juvenile justice needs of underserved youth and their families. The MAGIC programs meet every month and provide a forum for community-based service providers to work together to improve outcomes for The Citys youth. Both MAGIC Programs produce a resource guide, which is distributed throughout their respective communities. We host annual book fairs and literacy programs that reach over 2,000 children. The MoMAGIC Program has an entrepreneur program that helps teenagers develop and sell products. As mayor, I will expand the MAGIC programs and similar community-based organizations that improve the quality of life, social development, and educational opportunities of our citys most disadvantaged at-risk youth. 9. Encourage private sector involvement. San Francisco and the greater Bay Area are home to some of the most innovative, productive, and profitable companies in the world. I will tap into this unique attribute by encouraging the private sector to become involved in preparing the next generation of workers. As mayor, I will establish internship programs within private sector companies for teenagers. I will also build public-private partnerships that encourage local companies philanthropies to contribute to local public schools. 10. Encourage greater public and private schools collaboration. Nearly half of San Franciscos children attend private schools. I believe that it is important that children in public schools and private schools not be isolated from each other. As mayor, I will encourage dialogue and interactive learning between public and private school students. An example of public-private collaboration is the MAGIC programs Back to School event and backpack giveaway, where we collaborate with private schools, and involve both public and private school students in the planning and execution of the event. 18) What are your plans to curb gang violence in The City? No mayoral candidate has worked face-to-face with as many current and former gang members and affected families and community members as I have during my long career as a Public Defender. I have heard countless first-hand accounts of gang violence from its victims, its perpetrators, and its innocent bystanders. There is no simple solution to San Franciscos ongoing gang violence. History has demonstrated that traditional law enforcement efforts continuously fail to solve the problem. It is therefore time that we look to innovative, collaborative solutions that involve schools, law enforcement, community-based and faith-based organizations, rather than purportedly new solutions that merely enhance police power. To this end, I propose the following 10-part plan of action: 1. Establish a working relationship between the San Francisco Police Department,

Probation Department and community-based organizations that specialize in gang outreach and intervention work. In 2007, Los Angeles saw a 50 percent drop in killings in some South Los Angeles neighborhoods, such as Watts, after police embarked on a new strategy that involved working with ex-gang members to help prevent violence. Rather than trying to suppress violence entirely, this approach minimizes the effects of inevitable flare-ups and retaliatory violence. San Francisco already has a number of community-based programs that employ street outreach workers, former gang members, and youth counselors HOMEY, United Playaz, and Brothers Against Guns, to name a few. The San Francisco Police Department should collaborate with community-based programs to bring warring parties together to resolve differences in a peaceful way and expand street outreach efforts to counsel youth to stay out of gangs. 2. Offer anti-violence curriculum and anti-truancy programs in schools through a partnership with San Francisco Unified School District. According to San Franciscos Violence Prevention Plan 2008-2013, more than 90 percent of San Franciscos homicide victims under the age of 25 are high school dropouts. Negative school-related experiences, like poor academic performance, truancy, and dropping out of school are powerful predictors of future violence and gang activity. According to the 2004 Gang Free Communities Initiative report, schools are common places for gang-driven violence, recruiting and drug dealing. The report also found that youth generally become involved with gangs before age 15. Alliances with educational leaders are critical to keeping kids in school and deterring gang participation. We must incorporate anti-violence curriculum and restorative justice dialogue in classrooms in order to combat bullying, stealing, and other behavioral issues. Programming in schools should incorporate recreational, organized sports, so that young people can channel their aggression. Culturally competent academic programming must be supported to teach youth about their history and foster cultural self-worth in order replace the sense of identity, pride and respect that gangs offer young people. 3. Create peace councils in affected neighborhoods. Law enforcement cannot initiate gang truces. These must come from the leadership of the gangs themselves. However, in the world of gang warfare, where the line between victim and offender is often skewed, gang members find themselves caught in a deadly cycle of retaliatory violence. By encouraging dialogue to address these deep-rooted feelings of anger and pain, Peace Councils can help set warring parties onto a path of resolution and peace. 4. Increase community-based gang-intervention. These efforts must go beyond prevention alone. The Gang Free Communities Initiative Report found that interventions that focus merely on educating youth on the risks of gang participation are likely to fail. The report also found that law enforcement intervention was likely to have little effect on whether a person quit a gang. Instead, interventions should focus on supportive institutions (family, school, faith, recreation, and after-school programs) that supplant gangs in the areas that participants see as beneficial: monetary gain, sense of support, belonging, and fun. According to the report, even in the most impacted neighborhoods, only a tiny percentage of youth actually joins a gang. Identifying at-risk youth and understanding their needs are vital to

successful intervention. Intervention programs must offer language, age and gender appropriate services. Programs must be willing to embrace youth culture and encourage them to communicate on their terms and in the language of their generation. Encouraging parent participation in intervention programs will also serve to break generational cycles of gang involvement. 5. Provide jobs and life skills training to former gang members who agree not to engage in acts of violence. Parents may offer their child a dollar to clean his or her room. Similarly, we can encourage youth and young adults to clean up their acts by giving them access to jobs and a living wage. San Francisco should financially invest in jobs and life skills for at-risk young adults and offer them a viable alternative to street enterprise. This investment will encourage the type of self-worth, pride, and perspective that can only come with self-reliance. Funding for the YouthWorks internship program, for example, should be expanded so that any San Francisco student can have access to a paid summer internship; as Public Defender, I have provided dozens of paid internships to high school student every year. When at-risk students spend their free time in a paid internship surrounding by working adults, they are far less likely to join a gang and far more likely to see themselves as future college students and professionals. 6. Decrease reliance on The Citys gang injunctions because they fail to curb gang violence or promote public safety. A 2007 report by the Justice Policy Institute found that the billions of dollars spent on traditional gang suppression activities, which include the enforcement of gang injunctions, have failed to promote public safety and are often counterproductive. According to the report, in cities like Los Angeles where gang activity is most prevalent, more police, more prisons and more punitive measures have not stopped the cycle of gang violence. Gang injunctions and other heavy-handed efforts by law enforcement inadvertently perpetuate gang membership in two alarming ways: First, gang control policies make the process of leaving a gang more difficult by targeting former gang members long after their gang affiliation has ended. Second, they increase gang cohesion and police-community tensions by generating an us versus them environment. Rather than spend scarce resources on enacting and enforcing gang injunctions, The City should focus its resources on merit-based prevention and intervention efforts, like those suggested in this 10-part plan. 7. Monitor gang-related crimes by neighborhood. Rather than rely on anecdotal evidence and reactionary measures, we should compile comprehensive and detailed crime statistics in neighborhoods affected by gang violence. With crime data at our fingertips, well be able to measure the effectiveness of gang injunctions, other law enforcement intervention, peace councils, and community-based intervention efforts. The data will help us tweak, target, and craft anti-gang efforts in the years to come. 8. Establish objective criteria of gang membership. Currently, local law enforcement arbitrarily identifies gang members. Instead, San Francisco should establish clear, objective criteria to be used to identify alleged gang members. Such criteria may include proof of tattoos indicating gang membership, self-proclaimed gang membership, and convictions for gang-related crimes. These criteria should be made known to community leaders, youth and even gang members themselves.

9. Employ re-entry programs to work with gang-involved individuals in the criminal and juvenile justice systems. Programs that provide job readiness training, job placement, life coaching, substance abuse, anger management, and mentoring to individuals returning to the community from prison or jail are the best defense against criminal recidivism. Giving people the tools necessary to overcome barriers to employment, health, and self-sufficiency provides the ultimate incentive to leave the gang lifestyle. San Francisco has several model programs that could be expanded or replicated in other parts of The City, such as CARECENs tattoo removal service and the Sheriffs Departments No Violence Alliance (NOVA) program, a community-based counseling and case management program for ex-offenders. 10. Adopt measured outcomes for success. There must be a system of accountability and outcomes to measure and evaluate the progress of these efforts. The City, through the Department of Children, Youth and Families, SFUSD, and the Department of Public Health should conduct an inventory of gang intervention services in affected areas, and provide an objective method for measuring positive outcomes for gang involved youth, including school attendance, and remaining arrest and violence-free. The programs should also agree to work with specific gangs, who may not seek services from service providers located in rival gangs neighborhoods. Agencies that have a proven track record of success in reducing gang involvement and violence should be supported and funded. Similarly, the various tools used by local law enforcement and other agencies to combat gang violence should be constantly evaluated and reported to the mayor and Board of Supervisors. This 10-point strategy for gang reduction addresses the root causes of gang involvement, such as the need for positive mentoring, education, models for peaceful conflict resolution, employment opportunities, and vocational programs. It also requires the cooperation and coordination of law enforcement, community-based organizations, businesses, government agencies, elected officials, and residents. San Franciscans demand and deserve to live in a city where they feel safe and secure. Establishing a comprehensive plan, followed by action and accountability, is the first step in realizing this goal.