District 9 leaders hope that Supervisor Jackie Fielder will stay on the job, even after she said on Friday that she plans to resign. Mission District, Bernal Heights, and Portola leaders said there is little trust that if Fielder were to step down, Mayor Daniel Lurie would appoint someone representative of what the district wants.
“For us in the Mission, we’re supporting Jackie. We’re waiting for her recovery, and she has not resigned,” said Tracy Gallardo Brown, an executive committee member of the Latino Task Force and lifetime Mission District resident. Gallardo Brown said neighborhood organizers do not want an appointee “imposed on” the district.
“We definitely do not want anyone else, because it’s going to be someone we will not agree with,” she said. The Latino Task Force, the San Francisco Parity and Equity Coalition, and Calle 24 — groups that represent a broad array of Mission District nonprofits — issued statements saying they hope to continue working alongside Fielder when she recovers.
Fielder told Mission Local in a phone call Friday that she was in the hospital and planned to resign. Her staff said she was undergoing an “acute personal health crisis.” There was no update on her condition as of Saturday evening.
The Board of Supervisors clerk has not received formal notice of a resignation, and Fielder may yet stay on. “Supervisor Jackie Fielder is prioritizing her health,” read a statement from her office. “She has not officially resigned and is taking time to recover while considering her next steps.”
If Fielder does step down, however, Lurie would have the power to appoint her replacement, who would then run for the seat in November.
Mission Local spoke to half a dozen leaders in District 9, which includes the Mission, Bernal Heights, and Portola. All said they hoped Fielder would take time to make a full recovery, and stay in office.
“I want to see her back in City Hall,” said Amy Beinart, a longtime Bernal Heights organizer and the former president of the neighborhood’s Democratic club. “That’s what I’m hearing most from people.” Beinart called Fielder a “fantastic supervisor” with neighborhood chops who has been critical of Lurie — and, in so doing, has reflected the district’s stances.
“I really don’t want to guess who he’d cast about for and find who would rubber-stamp what I’m seeing as a push towards centralized mayoral power,” Beinart said of a Lurie appointee.
Aaron Peskin, the former District 3 supervisor who ran unsuccessfully against Lurie in 2024, said he did not have faith Lurie would tap a candidate progressive enough to win in the district if it meant that appointee would vote against Lurie’s agenda.
“I don’t think that Lurie is politically facile enough to go, ‘I’d rather have someone who’s with me 40 percent of the time,’” he said. “That’s Willie Brown thinking.”
Yensing Sihapanya, executive director of the Family Connections Center, a nonprofit that has provided early childhood services in Portola for 35 years, said even in that more moderate-leaning neighborhood, her neighbors want Fielder to stay.
“There’s just no denying how hard working she is,” she said. Portola residents often feel ignored by District 9 supervisors. Sihapanya, who has been at the Family Connections Center for the last 14 years, said that Fielder “has probably been, in the last 14 months, more active [in the Portola] than a few supervisors combined.”
Fielder was elected handily in 2024, winning at a 60-40 tilt against her moderate opponent, Trevor Chandler.
Graph by Kelly Waldron. Data from the San Francisco Department of Elections.
District 9 is far to the left of Lurie. Since district elections started in the 1990s, the area has always elected progressive supervisors. Along with Haight-Ashbury, it is one of the bastions of left-wing politics in San Francisco. In 2024, district voters overwhelmingly backed Aaron Peskin, Lurie’s progressive rival, for mayor.
“District 9 is always going to be the most progressive district in the city,” said David Campos, the district supervisor from 2008 to 2016. Campos said Fielder should take “time and space” to recover, and that he also hopes that she “doesn’t resign.”
2024 election results before ranked-choice voting. Map by Kelly Waldron. Data from the San Francisco Department of Elections.
“She has been a critic of the mayor, and I think that is in many respects where the district is,” Campos said. If Fielder does step down and Lurie appoints a replacement, Campos said he is “not too concerned” about that appointee winning in November, when a special election would be held for anyone to fill out the remainder of Fielder’s four-year term — he said it would likely be a long shot.
“A mayoral appointment has not always meant winning at the ballot box,” he said.
Christina Olague was appointed to District 5 by then-Mayor Ed Lee in 2012 but lost her election that year to London Breed; Julie Christensen was in 2015 appointed by Lee to District 3 but lost to Peskin; Jeff Sheehy was picked by Lee to represent District 8 in 2017 but lost to Rafael Mandelman; and Vallie Brown was tapped by Breed for District 5 in 2018 but lost to Dean Preston.
The fates of appointees Stephen Sherill in District 2 and Alan Wong in District 4, tapped by Breed and Lurie respectively, will be determined in a June special election.
“If there’s an appointment that doesn’t reflect where District 9 is, the voters of District 9 will make sure that person is not successful,” Campos said.
Names are bouncing around City Hall but no shortlists have been made, according to several City Hall insiders. Publicly, Lurie has said he hopes Fielder makes a “speedy recovery” and can continue to be a “dedicated advocate for her community.”
Some of the names being tossed around include:
- Santiago Lerma, the former legislative aide for Fielder’s predecessor, Hillary Ronen. Lerma is currently the city’s lead for Mission District “street teams,” coordinating different groups that patrol the neighborhood to conduct drug and homelessness outreach, reverse overdoses, treat open wounds, and more. He was a favorite to replace Ronen in the 2024 election but pulled out of the contest because of his infant son’s health.
- Josh Arce, president of the Public Utilities Commission, leader with the Northern California District Council of Laborers, and a longtime London Breed ally. Arce ran unsuccessfully for the District 9 seat in 2016 against Ronen.
- Moisés Garcia, the mayor’s community liaison and former LGBTQ outreach staffer on Lurie’s campaign. Garcia is one of the few Latinos in Lurie’s administration and has some years of experience in Mission District groups.
- Roberto Hernandez, longtime Mission organizer, leader of the annual Carnaval festival, and CEO of Cultura y Arte Nativa de las Americas. Hernandez ran unsuccessfully against Fielder in 2024.
But most said talk of a mayoral appointment is premature — Fielder has not officially resigned.
“She’s still our supervisor until she says otherwise,” said Stephen Torres, who ran against Fielder in 2024. Torres is now the president of the Bernal Heights Democratic Club.
“Why don’t we wait till Jackie tells us, until we hear directly from Jackie?” Torres said. “That seems like the best course of action.”
Disclosure: This reporter briefly worked with Jackie Fielder in 2018 at The Worker Agency, a communications firm.