Last week, when the Commonwealth Club canceled a mayoral debate, organizers cited Mayor London Breed’s decision not to participate. Breed’s rationale was that the debate’s sponsors — a public pressure group called ConnectedSF, and the new nonprofit outlet Voice of San Francisco, which is led by the former Marina Times editor Susan Dyer Reynolds — had “already committed their support to Mark Farrell,” her campaign rival.
It turns out that a formal ethics complaint is alleging the same.
An anonymous complaint filed earlier this year alleged that Reynolds is a de facto operative of the Farrell campaign. The complaint cites a 2022 payment of $100,000 that Reynolds took from Neighbors for a Better San Francisco, a public pressure group that endorsed both Farrell and Daniel Lurie in the mayor’s race.
In the Voice of San Francisco and online, Reynolds rails against crime, homelessness, and drug use and often proposes punitive solutions. She frequently castigates some candidates for mayor — Board of Supervisors President Aaron Peskin is a “failed leader”, Daniel Lurie is “naive to politics,” and Breed is “a Willie Brown creation” — and is unsparing in her criticism of progressives.
But a review of her posts found she exempts Farrell from criticism, and she has written favorably of him in the Voice of San Francisco.
“Waffler Safai should drop out of the race,” she wrote in February. “@MarkFarrellSF will destroy him in the debates.”
Reynolds voicing her opinion would not, on its own, violate campaign finance law; that would require payments made to lobby for a candidate, and a subsequent failure to disclose those payments. San Francisco law requires that expenditures made to benefit candidates for office be clearly disclosed.
In a series of emails on Aug. 8 and 9, Reynolds denied the allegations in the ethics complaint.
“You probably filed the ‘ethics complaint,’” she wrote on Thursday in response to this reporter’s questions. No one from Mission Local filed the complaint.
“I am not a paid consultant for Mark Farrell, or anybody else,” Reynolds continued. “If I were, I would be making 10 times what I’m making as a nonprofit reporter. Thank god I kept all that Apple stock, and have zero interest in taking a big paying political gig.”
“This is the first I’ve heard of an ‘ethics complaint filed earlier this year,’ so you clearly filed it, or know who did,” she wrote in a subsequent email sent 13 minutes after the first. In a third email sent an hour later, Reynolds declined to say whether her outlet, Voice of San Francisco, was taking money from Neighbors. Personally, she said, she was not.
The complaint was filed on May 16 anonymously by an “Armstrong Williams.” The name is a tongue-in-cheek reference to the conservative TV commentator and syndicated columnist who in 2005 admitted to receiving $240,000 from the Bush administration to promote the No Child Left Behind Act.
The complaint calls the $100,000 payment made to Reynolds in 2022 “a significant sum to pay to a self-described ‘independent journalist’ who receives compensation to a corporation she controls … and therefore the term for her services may extend for several years.” The complaint alleges that the past payment may indicate Reynolds or her outlet is still on the payroll of Neighbors for a Better San Francisco.
“I’ll let our CEO and Publisher Earl Adkins handle the finance part of your question … As for me, no I haven’t ‘taken’ anything from any organization of any kind since [Gotham by the Bay] started,” Reynolds wrote, referencing her newsletter, which had accepted the 2022 payment from Neighbors.
Adkins did not respond to requests for comment. The Farrell campaign said Reynolds is not a consultant for its team. In a statement, Jay Cheng, the Neighbors executive director, said the complaint was “ridiculous and patently untrue.”
“Neighbors contributed to Gotham By The Bay to support its strong independent journalism, which is backed by veteran local reporters … and we have never discussed any candidates, mayoral or otherwise, with anybody from the organization.”
Allegations involve moneyed group Neighbors for a Better San Francisco
In an email dated July 24 and obtained by Mission Local, Ethics Commission staff indicated that they would proceed with investigating the complaint “within the next couple of weeks” to begin “gathering preliminary evidence.”
Any individual can submit an ethics complaint, and an investigation is not an indication of guilt.
The complaint, sent to both the San Francisco Ethics Commission and the Internal Revenue Service, notes that Reynolds took the $100,000 gift from the deep-pocketed Neighbors for a Better San Francisco, a pressure group responsible for the vast majority of the funds spent to recall then-District Attorney Chesa Boudin in 2021 and 2022. Neighbors is largely backed by Bill Oberndorf, a hedge-fund manager and big-time Republican donor.
In 2023, a year after the recall, Reynolds said the money from Neighbors was used on “boring actual necessities that every mainstream media employee has at their fingertips.”
“As an independent journalist, I am grateful for those who see the value in my work,” she continued, writing from the Marina Times account that she still controls.
Neighbors in June endorsed Farrell and Lurie as its top two choices, and said Breed should be ranked third. The San Francisco Chronicle reported in April that Neighbors’ executive director, Cheng, represented himself as a decision-maker on Farrell’s team. The group was also recently hit with a $54,000 ethics fine for failing to disclose payments related to the Boudin recall.
The complaint points to Neighbors’ amity with the Farrell campaign, its past underwriting of Reynolds, and Reynolds’ public statements as evidence that Reynolds “should be required to file as a campaign consultant under San Francisco law and have to register with the Ethics Commission.”
In April 2024, Reynolds founded the Voice of San Francisco with Adkins, the former publisher of the Marina Times, who is listed as co-founder and publisher. Reynolds is listed as a co-founder and editorial director. Filings submitted to the California attorney general’s office show the newsroom received 501(c)(3) status last year, making donations to it tax-deductible. Such nonprofits are also barred from candidate electioneering.
In its application to the Internal Revenue Service for tax exemption, Voice of San Francisco reported $250,000 in revenue in 2023, and anticipated revenue of $340,800 for 2024 and $544,900 for 2025.
As the former District 2 supervisor, Farrell has a long history in the Marina and has known Reynolds for years; his wife has written a column for the Marina Times since 2012.
“Cheng works for Mark Farrell’s campaign for mayor, and Ms. Reynolds has demonstrated a bias in favor of Mark Farrell,” reads the complaint. “Therefore … we request an investigation into whether Susan Reynolds must register as a campaign consultant and attach disclosures to her social media, Substack and media platforms indicating who is behind the paid content.”
“It is both a fraud and an affront to real journalists everywhere — let alone a violation of the law — to allow paid mercenaries to hide behind the veneer of objective journalism,” the complaint continues.
The complaint adds that “Reynolds’ social media posts should include a disclaimer indicating that they were ‘Paid for by’ Neighbors For A Better SF.”
So Neighbors for a Better San Francisco, a group that endorsed both Farrell and Lurie, paid Reynolds $100,000 in 2022 to badmouth Lurie two years later?
Nothing stinks to high heaven as much as “an anonymous complaint.”
Although I don’t often agree with Susan Dyer Reynolds, I enjoy reading her. I can’t imagine her failing to abide by high ethical standards.
Ms. Reynolds is a tiger. She calls them as she investigates them. This City is in
a free fall and she is a classical muckraker. Good for the community.
I’ve always felt embarrassed for Marina denizens over their neighborhood rag. The Marina Times seems far below the intelligence of this highly educated population.
To be fair, I don’t think that SDR ever lived in the Marina. When she lived in SF, she lived in the Haight. She simply purchased a neighborhood newspaper and used it, fraudulently representing herself as a Marina resident, as a vehicle for her own ends.
Susan Dyer Reynolds is a pernicious troll who uses the power of her megaphone to spread fear of crime and loathing. She makes stuff up and personally targets individuals and democratically elected office holders with whom she disagrees. She is vile. This will not end well.
It’s a shame. Susan has done some great work on behalf of pitbulls in the city but I just can’t with her hit jobs in the various articles she posts.