The Haight Ashbury Neighborhood Council Board of Directors is taking a stance against politically motivated recalls. In the October Voice (https://www.hanc-sf.org/24-home/643-what-are-recalls-all-about) it was written recalls should be more difficult:

“It's expensive. It could be called an excess of democracy, and undermine the independence of elected officials. It can be abused. More recalls are organized by business than by ordinary citizens (the BOE recall has raised $1m from people who also supplied dark money in the last D5 Supervisor race), and often with less than a year before the next election... In SF, recalls can place even more power in the hands of the Mayor. The school board issues appear to be matters of policy, not rising to criminal acts.”

Overturning Election Results

Historically recalls typically have fewer voters because most off-season elections have low voter turnout. These low turnout recall elections can be used by a minority as a way of over-turning the high turnout election they didn't win. In addition, recalls distract office holders from doing the job they were elected to do.

While Governor Newsom has many shortcomings as a leader, we were against the recall despite the harm he caused while a supervisor and Mayor of San Francisco. This recall was little more than an attempted power grab by dark money backers taking advantage of COVID19.

District Attorney Chesa Boudin was elected to implement criminal justice reform, a long talked about issue never seriously explored. It is something that takes a generation, not a year. While the media likes to claim crime is out of control, the data actually shows crime is lower. The Chronicle even featured Kimberly Guilfoyle in a January 2020 op-ed attacking then-new DA Boudin. It isn’t easy in San Francisco, especially for small businesses, but we are not in the dystopian nightmare that the backers of this recall claim. A recall is petty politics by those with sour grapes.

Finally, Board of Education… no criminal acts were committed by those targeted for the recall. While some may disagree with their positions on various policies, all three, Moliga, Lopez, and Collins, are up for re-election in November 2022. The recall folks originally stated they would recall the entire board, but oddly only Moliga, Collins, and Lopez are targeted despite all of the board being eligible for recall. Much of the recall money comes from charter school folks and people who funded Astro-turf organizations attacking Supervisor Preston in the last D5 election. The HANC Board does not support a politically motivated recall that will result in additional costs to an already underfunded school district.

Let us not allow SF to further descend into a rabbit hole of petty disagreements. VOTE NO ON THE 2022 RECALLS.  protect democratically elected politicians.