Matt Haney, David Campos Lead Crowded Field In State Assembly Special Election
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — People in some parts of San Francisco are voting on a new state legislative Assembly member in Tuesday's special election, a seat that opened up as a result of a federal public corruption scandal in the city.
The top contenders to replace Democrat David Chiu, who left the state Legislature to become San Francisco's city attorney last year, are tied to San Francisco's Board of Supervisors: current Supervisor Matt Haney and former Supervisor David Campos. They are both Democrats on the party's progressive end.
Illicit drug abuse, homelessness and a lack of unaffordable housing dog Assembly District 17, which covers the eastern part of the city and includes the Mission, Tenderloin and South of Market neighborhoods.
Political watchers doubt either candidate will win more than 50% of Tuesday's vote, which means a likely runoff in April to pick the person who will serve the remainder of the current term, which ends in November. That person will have to run again in the statewide June primary and November general elections to keep the seat for another two-year term, meaning residents of the district could vote on the race up to four separate times this year.
Chiu resigned last year to become San Francisco's city attorney, a job that became available when Mayor London Breed appointed then-city attorney Dennis Herrera to head up the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission after Harlan Kelly resigned in 2020.
Kelly left after federal prosecutors charged him with fraud for allegedly accepting bribes from a permit expediter in exchange for insider information and assistance on a lucrative city contract. Kelly, who is fighting the charge, is one of many city officials and contractors ensnared in the investigation. Former public works director Mohammed Nuru pleaded guilty to fraud last month.
The other candidates, also Democrats, are Thea Selby, a transit advocate and trustee of the City College of San Francisco, and Bilal Mahmood, an entrepreneur and philanthropist who received the endorsement of the San Francisco Chronicle.
Campos, 51, and Haney, 39, agree on many issues but are on opposing sides of a proposed 495-unit high-rise apartment complex in Haney's South of Market neighborhood that supervisors rejected last year.
Haney, who joined the board in 2019, voted for the proposal, saying it would bring desperately needed housing and help alleviate the city's deep shortage of affordable units. Campos, who left the Board of Supervisors in 2016 due to term limits, said he would have rejected it because of fears that gentrification would displace low-income residents in the neighborhood.
Selby, 58, has two adult children and would like to see more public funding for community colleges. She co-founded the Lower Haight merchants and neighborhood association and ran unsuccessfully for the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 2012.
Mahmood, 34, is a political novice and styled himself an outsider with fresh ideas. One idea is to give every family in California earning less than $75,000 a year a guaranteed monthly income of $500. It would be paid for through carbon and wealth taxes.
