The path to President ChiuBy Steven T. Jones
How did David Chiu, the supervisor with the least experience in government, end up as president of the Board of Supervisors? And what does it say about the role that ideology and alliances will play in a city that’s wrestling with a dire economic situation?
I have some thoughts on both of those questions, but first, let’s run through how today’s voting went down because it illustrates the political dynamics now at work in City Hall. It’s important to understand that there was a split in the board’s progressive majority, which includes Chiu, John Avalos, David Campos, Eric Mar, Chris Daly, and Ross Mirkarimi.
After the last election in which the first four of those progressives first won their supervisorial seats, Daly (and to a lesser degree, Avalos) privately began to challenge Mirkarimi’s bid for president, for reasons both personal and political. But they pledged to vote for a progressive and began promoting the idea that one of the four freshmen get the job.
That move raised the possibility that Mirkarimi (a Green who was the top supervisorial vote-getter in November and a strong contender for mayor) might look for some moderate votes, or perhaps even support a moderate pick like Sophie Maxwell or Bevan Dufty. That was the stage that was set for today’s vote.
After a moment of levity during roll call, when both Chiu and Sup. Carmen Chu answered “present” to what sounded like their names (geez, this might get confusing), the nominations for president got underway. Daly nominated himself, Dufty nominated Maxwell, Campos nominated Mirkarimi, Chiu nominated Avalos, and Avalos nominated Chiu.
No big surprises there, although it did seem to indicate that the board’s moderate-to-conservative wing, those aligned with Mayor Gavin Newsom, were lining up behind Maxwell. And as the voting got underway, that’s exactly what happened.
Dufty gave the first speech, arguing for “a president that will hear all 10 of her colleagues.” Campos urged support for Mirkarimi because, “I believe it’s important to have someone with the experience of how this body works.” Public testimony yielded no clear favorites, although the crowd offered the loudest cheers for the progressives, not Maxwell.
As the first vote was taken, Michela Alioto-Pier, Carmen Chu, Dufty, Sean Elsbernd and Maxwell all supported Maxwell, as they would consistently do for the next six votes, leaving her with five votes each time. While they later made public appeals for an experienced president, none was willing to vote for Mirkarimi over one of the freshmen.
On that first ballot, Mirkarimi got four votes: himself and all the freshmen except Avalos, who voted for himself. Daly also voted for Avalos, his former board aide. On the second ballot, Mar and Chiu both switched to Avalos, again leaving the vote 5-4-2.
Elsbernd then asked the candidates who didn’t get any first or second place votes to withdraw their names, but none did, with Chiu announcing his commitment to remain in the running as a possible consensus candidate.
The third vote was the same as the second, but on the fourth vote, Chiu got his first vote, from Mar. Then Campos announced that, in the interests of reaching a consensus, he would be switching his vote to Chiu and urging others to do the same. Mar supported the move, telling his colleagues, “To have the first Chinese-American as president of the Board of Supervisors would be an historic occasion.”
Alioto-Pier then gave a speech arguing for the importance of female leadership on the board, but she’s politically isolated herself in recent years and none of her colleagues seemed to care about her opinion.
On the fifth vote, all the freshmen supported Chiu, but Daly voted for himself and then Mirkarimi did the same thing, and the sixth vote played itself out the same way. Clearly, this stalemate couldn’t go on forever, and there was a danger that Daly’s petulance might push Mirkarimi to go with Maxwell.
Before the seventh vote, Avalos announced that he was removing his name from nomination, thereby removing any hope that Daly still might be able to engineer six progressives votes for Avalos, something that was already unlikely given Mirkarimi’s unhappiness with the Daly-Avalos campaign to thwart his presidential bid.
So on the seventh vote, Daly supported Chiu, as did all the freshmen as they worked alphabetically through the supervisors names to Mirkarimi, who gave Chiu the sixth vote he needed to win the presidency.
Afterwards, I spent the afternoon at City Hall doing interviews and will have lots of analysis and quotes in the next issue of the Guardian, but let me just note a few significant aspects of the day for now.
Despite the Daly-Mirkarimi split, there was strong progressive unity on the board, probably more than the movement has displayed in recent years under leaders like Daly, Aaron Peskin, and Matt Gonzalez. Already, newbies like Campos are showing strong leadership traits and progressive loyalties. Similarly, despite claims to progressive credentials by both Maxwell and Dufty, the right side of the board was also unified in trying to deny a progressive presidency.
Do this foretell lots of 6-5 votes in the future? Probably. While both sides and Mayor Gavin Newsom’s office praise Chiu as someone that they can work with, and the progressives pledge cooperation, ideology and allegiance to (or resistance to) Newsom seem to be defining characteristics of the new board. Sure, the historically awful budget mess will foster some reaching across the aisle, but that will probably be offset by supervisors jockeying for political position as they eye the Mayor’s Office and other next steps.
The first big test of Chiu’s leadership will be his selection of committee appointments, particularly on the budget and land use committees. Next, we’ll see whether Chiu follows the lead of his predecessor and mentor, Aaron Peskin, and pushes a package of revenue measures in a June special election, despite objections from Newsom and the business community.
Yup, kiddies, it’s gonna be a big year for political junkies.
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Comments (7)
David Chiu has aged amazingly well. He doesn't look a day over 29.
Posted by Matt Stewart | January 8, 2009 08:59 PM
By the way, I wonder if Chiu is still going to support Newsom's Poverty Court program.
Posted by Matt Stewart | January 8, 2009 09:01 PM
Great report on the maneuvering that led to Chiu's election and the consequences.
Your remark about Alioto-Pier's political isolation gave me a moment's pause. Has she turned into the San Francisco political equivalent of the crazy cat-lady?
Posted by Peter | January 9, 2009 03:08 PM
The board presidency is not that much of a plum. The best thing about it is that president gets to decide what the subcommittees are and who is on them. The first downside is that the president can't participate in debates unless he temporarily surrenders the chair to one of his colleagues. The president also still has to make do with the two legally mandated staffers that all members of the board have. With the additional burden of administration and dealing with the wingnuts who are attracted to the illusion of political power, the job is highly stressful and time-consuming.
Posted by Larry-bob | January 9, 2009 03:24 PM
The ability to determine who sits on Board Committees is an incredible power. A great deal is determined by the make-up and chair appointments of those committees.
Posted by Eric Brooks | January 9, 2009 05:29 PM
Campers,
Tell me you wouldn't have loved it if Chiu had proceeded to take the President's chair ... at the top dais? Talk about a shot across the the bow of the S.S. Alioto.
h.
Posted by h. brown | January 10, 2009 12:34 PM
My own 2 cents...Ross was effectively the kingmaker all along. Anyone he supported would have become Board President, except for himself. Had Ross voted for Avalos, Avalos would have won. If Ross had supported Elsbernd or any of the other mods, they would have won.
Its not clear who Ross' second choice was after himself. It may well have been David Chiu though that isn't clear.
Also, when did Sophie Maxwell become a moderate?
Posted by Manish | January 10, 2009 12:43 PM