In the days leading up to Daniel Lurie’s swearing-in, political types about town said that, in order to be a successful mayor, he’d have to lead differently than he campaigned. As Mayor Lurie, rather than Candidate Lurie, it would no longer be enough to present broad and vague messaging. A mayor, at some point, has to say not just what they’re going to do but how they’re going to do it. 

Last week saw the introduction of Lurie’s first piece of legislation, which ostensibly aims to combat fentanyl and mental illness on the streets, boost law-enforcement hiring and other laudable goals by speeding up contracting. But, beyond speeding up contracting, there are no specifics about how this plan would actually accomplish its underlying goals. As such, all this plan is missing — is a plan. 

But there’s plenty of stuff in here about stripping away oversights of whatever it is the city chooses to spend money on. It was not until Board President Rafael Mandelman asked for it that the Board of Supervisors was given any say — at all — in the rapid-fire assignment of contracts worth scores of millions of dollars.

What’s that mean? It means that Lurie, who has never before worked in government and, prior to his swearing-in, had never held conventional employment, was calling for no oversight whatsoever for his department heads to enter into an unlimited number of no-bid contracts. You could call Lurie’s ask “audacious” — if you were generously inclined. 

Of note, Mohammed Nuru, Tom Hui, Barbara Garcia and Sheryl Davis were all department heads in San Francisco. And now they aren’t. Nuru, of course, is in prison. It’s a bit mind-boggling that he’s the only one.

So, it’s all a bit on the nose, really: It’s exactly like Lurie’s campaign. Not only is it broad and vague, it’s expensive. The contracts he proposed to be ratified sans oversight could be for up to 10 years and up to $50 million; with this kind of money the city could re-sign Klay Thompson.

As a means of shedding oversight and allowing department heads to expediently enter into good-sized pacts or leases, this legislation is a great plan. It’s ingenious if I understand it correctly. It’s a Swiss watch. But you’d expect it to be: This is what you get when you have an experienced government savant like Ben Rosenfield on your mayoral transition team. 

Rosenfield is great at what he does, but — and this is important — it wasn’t his job to specify where the money should go or, more fundamentally, where it’s going to come from. Yes, there are waivers in here that would allow Lurie et al. to privately fundraise, but that’s not likely to cover more than a sliver of the money needed to rapidly expand shelter beds, treat street drug-users or any of the other goals herein. San Francisco’s deficit is hovering a shade under $1 billion and, guess what? Donald Trump is getting sworn in today and could stiff San Francisco or claw back some $415 million in reimbursements for FEMA money that we’ve already spent.

Government-watchers with long institutional memories have told us that they can’t think of a precedent for a mayor to ask for significant new powers, as Lurie has done, without offering any specifics on what they will be used for. 

But here’s the thing: They’ll be granted. It’s likely that Lurie will essentially get what he wants.

We’ll have to wait and see if the board, or anyone else, asks about the scant details that we do know. Thus far, they’ve brought about more questions than answers. 

Bolstering law-enforcement hiring is a goal of the mayor’s legislation, but it’s not immediately clear what private fund-raising or no-bid contracting could do about that. It’s not as if the beaver fur top hat will be passed among the city’s wealthy elites to supplement cops’ salaries. The more intuitive steps would be outsourcing background checks or the hiring of recruiters — but the city already does this. In recent years, in fact, the city has done an awful lot and put significant resources into recruitment and retention. And yet, here we are: San Francisco has not quite 1,600 sworn officers and the most recent academy class graduated 11 officers of an initial 45 recruits — an alarming 75 percent attrition rate 

(It warrants mentioning that the city’s crime rates are at near-historic lows. Also, accidental overdose death numbers are at a five-year low. But it seems nobody’s in the mood to hear about this.). 

Lurie also wandered off the map when he last week told reporters that San Francisco could “add beds” to General Hospital — which left actual medical professionals at General Hospital gobsmacked. In fact, the Department of Public Health has already submitted half a dozen applications to get up to $140 million in state money for behavioral health beds. But adding these 180-odd beds — at half a dozen or more sites citywide, not just at the General — would require mounting significant procedural, logistical and political hurdles. And, also, it would require that money, from the state. That’s coming on the state’s dime and on the state’s time — that is, not fast. 

These are all major challenges, which is why Lurie’s job is majorly challenging. Yet, barring unforeseen lunacy, his initial legislation will pass. And now all that remains is saying what he wants to do. And how he intends to do it. 

Following pushback, there is now a provision in here that the board has 45 days to review a potential contract and vote it up or down. Without that, the board had zero input. So the supes hve that going for them. Which is nice.

Truth be told, the board, which must approve city contracts of $10 million or more, does not spike all that many of them — or, for that matter, reject all that many mayoral appointments. But the oversight provision, in and of itself, can serve as a deterrent for corruption or ineptitude. Put another way: Does anyone think it’s a grand idea for the city to begin rapidly spending lots and lots of money while specifically telling all parties ahead of time that nobody is going to be doing any front-end oversight? Hopefully nobody who reads the news would say that. 

So that’s kind of a big deal — and to cast that obligation to the wind would’ve been a wholesale abdication of the board’s responsibilities. Expect more pushback, starting at the Budget Committee. Expect board members to call for reductions in the 10 years and $50 million limits for the no-bid contracts. 

But nobody is going to try to derail this. Nobody wants to open up the board to charges of obstructionism.

That seems wise, at least politically. With 45 days to review a contract, anything egregious ought to be bird-dogged by the supervisors. Concerns about abandoning competitive bidding are somewhat mitigated by the fact that the sorts of outfits that can minister to drug-users or oversee shelter beds are not great in number — and, more likely than not, are already here and already have city contracts. No one is pushing to bring Halliburton in to do this work.  

The Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing, meanwhile, already has license from the Board of Supervisors to ignore competitive bidding requirements on contracts regarding homeless services (A cynic would note “and here we are.”). Lurie’s legislation would expand that ability to other departments. 

When all is said and done, the board will retain one of its core raisons d’être. If time and money limits are reduced, its members can claim they mitigated the potential damage if and when things go sideways. And Lurie can claim the political win after the board passes what he and his people continue to — unfortunately — refer to as a “state of emergency” ordinance.

But is this going to actually help solve the problems? Will this make things better? Those do seem to be the $50 million questions. 

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) — TikTok restored its service on Sunday after a temporary shutdown Saturday night that left 170 million American users unable to access the app. The outage also disrupted many influencers who rely on the platform for their livelihoods.

San Francisco content creator Anna Brown, known to her 2.4 million TikTok followers as “AnnaTwinsies,” says the ban was worrisome. Her content often shows her daily life with her two sets of twins.

Brown tells ABC7 News she earns between $5,000 and $20,000 per branded post and 90% of her income comes from TikTok.

“The last couple of weeks, everyone has been talking about it,” Brown said. “But I was literally thinking they will figure something out to prevent it. Some say maybe a VPN will work, or you could have someone abroad manage the account, but no one for sure knows what’s going to happen.”

TikTok thanks Trump after it begins restoring service to US users

Brown noted that she has a backup plan if TikTok becomes unavailable.

“Luckily for me, my Instagram account started taking off this year,” she said. A check of her Instagram shows over one million followers. “I would probably be able to make it without TikTok.”

TikTok released a statement thanking former President Donald Trump, who is expected to issue an executive order delaying any potential ban for 90 days. However, the details of such an order remain unclear. The law allows for a president to do that as long as Tiktok’s Chinese owners are in the process of selling. But parent company ByteDance has said it will not sell.

Trump previously issued an executive order in 2020 aiming to remove TikTok from U.S. app stores, citing national security concerns.

On the eve of President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration, thousands gathered at Civic Center Plaza in front of San Francisco City Hall on Sunday, vowing to resist.  

But unlike the mass demonstrations that accompanied Trump’s first term in office — the largest in U.S. history, which brought out millions of ordinary Americans less accustomed to taking streets — Sunday’s march was led by socialist groups and featured a hodgepodge of leftist issues. 

Speakers led “Free Palestine” chants, railed against deportations, and even called for a unified Korea without U.S military bases. Trump was a through line, but not always the focus of the march.

The many in the Bay Area who voted against Trump, for the most part, stayed home. Although it did draw more people than Saturday’s march focused on immigrant and reproductive rights as well as climate change.  

“We come together, as we always do, when there’s a heightened threat of more war, poverty, sexism, racism, homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia and environmental destruction” said Ramsey Robinson, who spoke on behalf of the Party for Socialism and Liberation. “We fight back,” he added.  

The rally was organized by a coalition of leftist organizations, including Mission Advocates, the Colectiva de Mujeres, and unions including the United Educators of San Francisco and Unite Here Local 2, the hospitality workers’ union. 

Speakers voiced their concerns for issues beyond concerns about Trump: namely, climate change, the Israeli occupation in Palestine and immigrants’ and workers’ rights. 

“We know that the cease fire is the bare minimum, and we know that the fight ahead is long,” said a speaker for the Palestinian Youth Movement.“It is only just beginning, and we need to continue to show up for Palestine.” 

Most participants who spoke to Mission Local were involved in activism and organizing in some capacity; few were attending a protest for the first time. While at least hundreds attended, the size crowd was a far cry from the protests that took over the city in 2016 when Trump was first elected. 

“I wish there were more [people]” said Jason Capili. “I feel like more people are resigned. It’s worrisome because this time we need to get up twice as hard.” 

Others shared the same sentiment.

“Some people are fired up,” said Donna Wallach, a participant who traveled from San Jose to attend the rally. “Others feel hopeless and powerless,” she added.  

Greg Shore, another participant, echoed the same concern that some people are more complacent now. 77 million people voted for Trump, he said, “It’s beyond comprehension.” 

Bao, another participant who happened to stumble upon the event while heading to the library, was concerned about how voters are informing themselves. Trump is a convicted felon, they said. “Did people know? If they did, then all hope is lost right?” they added. 

Bao decided to pick up a sign advocating for reproductive and trans rights. “Let’s keep protesting,” they said. 

The rally eventually mobilized and marched down Market Street, chanting. “When people’s rights are under attack, what do we do?” speakers shouted over the microphone. “Fight back” the crowd cheered.