Incumbent school board president Phil Kim celebrated a sweeping victory on Tuesday night: He led his closest rival for the seat, teachers union pick Virginia Cheung, 63 to 25.
That will allow him to keep his seat, at least until the November general election. Kim’s seat, along with two others, will then be up for grabs again.
Cheung, who stood outside City Hall on Tuesday with supporters of congressional candidate Connie Chan, was already talking about the next contest.
“I’m definitely thinking about November,” Cheung said. “I fill a niche for folks who don’t feel represented by the other candidates.”
Kim took a decisive lead from the first drop of results at 8:45 p.m. on Tuesday night. He declared victory minutes after the votes rolled in. As the night wore on, he maintained his lead over Cheung and Brandee Marckmann, who ended the night in third place, with 12 percent of the 125,000 votes counted.
Standing outside the 16th Street BART station on Tuesday morning, Marckmann described her campaign as a grassroots effort against an establishment-favored candidate. She, too, will run again in November.
“It’s always tough to be against a lot of big money,” said Marckmann. “But we feel like we have an advantage,” she said, referring to her team of over 80 volunteers, who had stationed across the city.
Marckmann also had the advantage of money. She outspent her opponents by nearly $84,000. The majority of her spending was self-funded — Marckmann contributed nearly $136,000 to her own campaign. Most of the money was spent on campaign consultants.
It was a decidedly difficult year for the San Francisco school board — and for San Francisco parents.
San Francisco’s historic four-day-long teachers strike in February led to growing animosity against the school board, and Cheung and Marckmann both built support off of the backlash from the strike.
But Kim’s supporters credit him with seeing the strike through. Sara Eisenberg, a personal friend of Kim and a parent of two children in the San Francisco school district, said that Kim had done “fantastic” in a “really thankless job.”
“I’m so thrilled that someone as smart and as passionate as Phil would continue to do this,” she said.
November’s election will have three open seats, not just one, and multiple candidates have already thrown their hats in the ring: Alongside Kim, Cheung and Marckmann, there’s Laurance Lee, Reina Tello, and Ryan Hazelton, among others.
Tello, Hazelton, and Cheung have already won the endorsement of the teachers’ union, which led the strike.
Kim, for his part, ended his election party on Tuesday night relieved to have secured his seat for the next five months.
At Cafe Flore in the Castro, the crowd whooped and hollered as the first election results dropped early in the night, congratulating the school board president. “It’s been a really challenging year,” said Kim, balancing on one of the cafe’s seats to address the crowd. “This win means a lot to me, and for me personally, it’s a moment of affirmation.”
Before Kim ended his speech, and the crowd filtered out of the venue, Kim added, “I’ll see you again in November.”