San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
City will be further off track if transit, street measures lose
San Franciscans, understandably, are frustrated about the state of the city and angry at the people who run it — or fail to run it, as is often the case.
Just a few days from the city’s fourth — fourth! — election of the year, voters are confused, checked out or just plain over it, several people trying to get out the vote told me. I mean, how many times in one year can we elect Matt Haney to the state Assembly?
When people are tired, ticked off or tuned out, they tend to vote no. But when it comes to a couple of city propositions that would shape San Francisco’s streets and the way we move around them, voting no could prove devastating to the city’s effort to give pedestrians and bicyclists space to move safely and strengthen its public transit system. Recent polling shows bad news for both Proposition J to preserve car-free JFK Drive in Golden Gate Park and Proposition L to change the way the San Francisco Municipal Transportation
Agency can spend sales tax funds. A truly progressive, forward-thinking, transit-first city would support both, but increasingly, San Francisco seems to be none of those things.
“Look at the city. People are right to be upset,” Jeffrey Tumlin, executive director of the SFMTA, acknowledged in an interview about Prop. L. “I think most voters know that voicing their frustration by cutting government funding will exacerbate the problems they’re complaining about, but still.”
The pandemic obliterated the SFMTA’s parking and fare revenue and took many of its workers off the job because of illness. That meant slashing service, particularly on the less-dense west side of the city, angering voters who rejected the agency’s Prop. A bond measure in June. Seeing repeated cost overruns and delays in major projects like the Central Subway surely didn’t help. Now, voters appear poised to reject Prop. L on Tuesday.
“If we’re lucky, it’s neck-andneck,” said Supervisor Rafael Mandelman who’s co-chairing the Prop. L campaign. “There’s just this unhappiness in the land that could tank it, which would be really bad.”
Wade Rose is president of Advance SF, a new business group that aims to improve the economic climate in the city. He shared polling his group commissioned last month that shows Prop. L has 62% support. It needs two-thirds to pass. EMC Research conducted the online poll of 417 likely voters.
Tellingly, the same poll found 62% of respondents have a negative view of the overall quality of life in San Francisco.
“There’s a general feeling of unease about the city’s future,” said Rose, noting that voting against Prop. L might feel good, but would actually make the city’s future worse. “It’s obvious how important Muni is to the well-being of the city.”
Proponents of Prop. L, though, haven’t done a great job explaining what the measure would do and why it’s so important.
The measure extends an already-existing half-cent sales tax for 30 years to fund transportation projects. I just learned this week, though, that the sales tax isn’t expiring anytime soon and will continue to be collected for another decade regardless of whether it passes.
Really, the measure is just asking permission from voters to spend the money on the SFMTA’s real needs. Voters in 2003 extended the sales tax and set limits on how much funding each category could receive. Categories that are already exhausted include buying new light rail vehicles to replace a decrepit fleet and providing the required county subsidy for Caltrain. Categories that will soon be exhausted include installing speed bumps and funding para-transit for people with disabilities.
Passing Prop. L would allow the city to continue to spend the tax money on those important items, some of which otherwise have to be paid for with general funds. That would mean, you guessed it, slashing more regular Muni service, clogging our streets with more cars and frustrating more voters.
The sales tax would also provide the money required to seek major transportation matching grants from the state
and federal government.
Tumlin said he understands voters’ complaints and is trying to make the agency better. For example, the Central Subway and Van Ness Bus Rapid Transit projects both took way too long and went way over budget. He said the agency is running its current project to remake the L-Taraval line differently, breaking it into smaller parts to attract more bids from small, local construction firms.
“When only a very few, large contractors can do it, they can play cities like ours to make a fortune through change orders,” he said, referring to the industry term for an amendment to a construction contract. “This project is on-time, on-budget and not making headlines.”
Car-free JFK Drive has been making headlines, however, for decades. After years of fights over the fate of 1.5 miles of pavement, the Board of Supervisors in the spring approved closing it to cars permanently.
But proponents of putting cars back on the road placed Prop. I on the ballot to revert both JFK Drive and the Great Highway to their pre-pandemic configurations. They overshot, though, by also including a requirement to preserve the Great Highway Extension, which runs between Sloat and
Skyline Boulevards, despite erosion and rising sea levels making that increasingly improbable.
Preserving the Great Highway Extension for cars would require building a seawall that would cost up to $80 million, according to the controller’s office. Ignoring the reality of climate change is burying your head in the Ocean Beach sand.
In response to Prop. I, fans of car-free JFK Drive placed Prop. J on the ballot to preserve it as a car-free promenade. If they both pass, whichever gets more votes wins. If they both lose, both roads stay the way they are now. Not surprisingly, voters are befuddled.
“Everyone is so confused,” said Marta Lindsey, spokesperson for Walk SF, a pedestrian advocacy group that supports Prop. J and opposes Prop. I. “This is going to be incredibly close.”
Those running the Prop. J campaign are keeping polling numbers hush-hush — who wants to blast that they’re losing? — but I privately saw the results of a poll conducted in late October that show it’s not looking good. Sadly, the best outcome Prop. J fans can probably hope for is both measures losing.
The Corporation of the Fine
Arts Museums, which includes the de Young in Golden Gate Park, has spent more than $402,330 to pass Prop. I and defeat Prop. J. Socialite Dede Wilsey, former chairperson of the Fine Arts Museums board, has tossed in another $200,000. Together, that could have paid for 40,155 general admission tickets to the museum.
Thomas Campbell, director and CEO of the Fine Arts Museums, is adamant that seniors and disabled people cannot access the de Young despite an 800-space garage that has elevators directly connected to the museum. He said in a statement that attendance remains low.
“It’s critical that the civic and cultural institutions that draw visitors to San Francisco are easily accessible for all,” he said.
Interestingly, the California Academy of Sciences across the Music Concourse is not fighting car-free JFK Drive and is seeing better attendance rates than the de Young. So maybe ticking off fans of car-free JFK Drive isn’t the way to win back visitors.
Joe Arellano, spokesperson for Prop. I, said the campaign is seeing a surge of support from older people and people with disabilities. He dismissed Prop. J as “awash in tech money” from people who want to “joyride through the park on their $5,000 e-bikes.” He pointed to a new $50,000 donation to Prop. J from Uber and $300,000 from Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman.
Robin Pam, campaign manager for Prop. J, said voters are very confused and she’s worried about the outcome Tuesday. Asked to give her closing pitch, she said, “Do we want to live in a city where we have safe parks and safe roads and a functioning public transportation system?”
To me, the answer is obvious. The good news? These outcomes aren’t predetermined — not even close. As of Thursday, just 18% of registered San Francisco voters had cast a ballot, according to the city’s elections chief, John Arntz.
You have until Tuesday, folks. Get moving and go vote.