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Early election-night results showed Mayor Daniel Lurie’s package of three ballot measures — to expand mayoral power and reduce ballot access — were faring well and on course to win.
Prop. D, which would make it harder for residents, city supervisors and the mayor to put measures on the ballot, has a big 60% to 40% lead.
Prop. E, which would empower the city administrator to reform San Francisco’s contracting procedures, was leading 69% to 31%.
Prop. F, which would give the mayor sole power to hire and fire certain city department heads, was up 65% to 35%.
The measures, which were backed by nearly $14 million from Lurie’s wealthy allies, need a simple majority to pass. They signal a major political victory for Lurie and his approach to governance, which has emphasized cutting institutional red tape and legislative checks and balances.
Prop. D in particular is a sea change for the city’s future ballot measures. It was criticized for favoring the wealthy at the expense of grassroots efforts. The pro-D campaign said it would curtail “special interests” from introducing divisive ballot measures, and shorten city ballots.
But critics, including labor unions and nonprofits, said it instead targeted the minority of city propositions that do not have big-money backing. By quadrupling the threshold signature-gathering from 2% to 8% of registered voters, citizen-led initiatives would suffer but those backed by wealthy donors could still afford to pay to gather signatures, they said.
A Mission Local analysis found that since 2016 most propositions would have been unaffected — our ballots would have been just as long with or without Prop. D. The ones that would have been affected were often tax measures targeting business.
Lurie’s elected colleagues on the Board of Supervisors will now play a reduced role in overseeing city departments. A separate measure, Prop. A, easily passed on Tuesday and will eliminate some city commissions.
The suite of measures was the most expensive item on November’s ballot. Lurie allies like venture capitalist Michael Moritz and crypto billionaire Chris Larsen put in several million, and the heir to the Levi Strauss & Co. fortune tapped his own network for more.
In that Lurie introduced an unfamiliar class of political benefactors to San Francisco, most of whom had never before spent politically on local elections. Many were at some point financial supporters, partners or board members of the anti-poverty nonprofit Lurie founded, Tipping Point Community.
While old-money families like the Hellmans gave $50,000 to Lurie’s charter committee, those sums paled in comparison to money from what some political observers have dubbed a “different type of oligarchy” of tech executives and Tipping Point members.
The measures received token opposition: Labor groups and nonprofits raised just $745,000 to fight Prop. D, saying it will be a future hurdle and expense for grassroots initiatives.
Unions instead focused their energy on backing Supervisor Connie Chan in her congressional race against state Sen. Scott Wiener.
They were subsequently outraised on the Prop. D fight more than 18-to-1.
The last time San Francisco centrists pushed for expanded mayoral power in 2024, the proposed charter changes failed badly. But that 2024 campaign was tied to a polarizing figure who was also running for mayor, Mark Farrell, and floundered despite more than $9 million from billionaires like Moritz.
This time around, Lurie is popular, and he squarely centered himself on the messaging for the three measures, appearing in internet ads and mailers. Since taking office, the mayor has spent at least $1.2 million of his own money on private consultants to burnish his image.
The three measures are the biggest change to San Francisco governance since 1996, when voters agreed to slim down their then-century-old charter.
Separately, voters 72% to 28% for Prop. A, which will move a set of boards and commissions from the city charter to municipal codes, meaning changes to them will no longer require voter approval. It would also eliminate and merge some boards and commissions.
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