Aaron Peskin, Candidate For Mayor, Answers Reader Questions

The Ingleside Light gathered questions from the community and posed them to the District 7, District 11 and mayor candidates in advance of the Nov. 5 election.

Here are the responses from President of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors Aaron Peskin. Peskin has spent nearly two decades participating in the city’s rigorous policy-making sessions. Now, he’s running for mayor with a campaign focused on affordable housing initiatives like expanding rent control, establishing community policing and finding strategies to address homelessness.

Peskin is running against current San Francisco Mayor London Breed, District 11 Supervisor Ahsha Safaí, founder of Tipping Point Community Daniel Lurie, former interim Mayor Mark Farrell and others.

Responses have been lightly edited.

How do you plan to be consistently involved in the neighborhood once in office?

I started as a neighborhood leader and have never forgotten where I came from. As mayor, I would look (as I always have my entire career) to neighborhood leaders, including those at the Ingleside Light, for guidance in policymaking. I will be a mayor who listens to our neighborhoods, works with our neighborhoods, not against them and I hope you will be a thought partner going forward.

What is one issue in the neighborhood that you see ignored? How would you tackle this issue?

For too long, our neighborhoods have lacked a voice in the mayor’s office. It’s what has led to the ruinous upzoning policies being pursued by this mayor along commercial corridors like Ocean Avenue. These plans will drive out neighborhood businesses and existing residents in favor of real estate speculator profits and while the other candidates stand with these developers over our neighborhoods, I will fight to make sure the voices and needs of communities like the Ingleside are the center, not an afterthought, of the policymaking process in this city.

Will you commit to fully funding the Dignity Fund in this and future years to meet the growing number and needs of older adults and people with disabilities?

Yes.

In many ways, City College of San Francisco was the beating heart of the neighborhood, a source of jobs and customers for local businesses. But its troubles have led to a 60%+ decline in enrollment which has precipitated other issues. How will you work with the college community to turn it around?

We need transformative investment and a new approach to City College that centers the needs of teachers and students to revitalize this critical community resource. I’ve fought to pass many CCSF bonds and would support another. I was a proud sponsor of the Free City program that’s helped so many San Francisco residents take advantage of CCSF and would fight hard to protect and even expand it. As I have in the past, I will continue to stand with CCSF in accreditation battles. We also need to transform the enrollment process to make it more accessible to our community, especially those without high English proficiency, and make sure that we maintain programs for seniors and lifelong learners.

City College of San Francisco projects groundbreaking for its long-awaited Diego Rivera Theater — which will prominently feature Rivera's fresco Pan American Unity — in December 2024. How will you work with the college community and the city's tourism sector to make it an attraction that boosts the economy and puts Ingleside on the map?

I fought to protect and confer landmark status on the city’s other two Diego Rivera murals and am thrilled that CCSF is making progress on finally bringing the Pan American Unity fresco to its new facility on the Ocean campus. As mayor, I promise to trumpet the culture and vibrancy of the Ingleside neighborhood and will work diligently to make both the Diego Rivera Theater and the neighborhood a draw for both residents and tourists across our city.

The SFMTA has big plans to speed up the K Ingleside and M Ocean View light rail lines that include boarding island modernization and consolidation, red lanes and more. How will you increase ridership in the neighborhood?

I support SFMTA’s plans to speed up light rail lines across our city — especially in the OMI area — but we need to make sure that all infrastructure upgrades are done with proper accountability to our neighborhoods. When they were building the Central Subway in Chinatown, I secured millions for small businesses impacted by construction and we need to make sure that constant delays and lack of communication with neighborhood and impacted businesses (like what happened on Taraval) isn’t repeated with these projects. As mayor, I’d work closely with SFMTA and our communities to hold them accountable for impacts and make sure they stick to their timelines and promises made to neighbors.

The tree canopy could be a lot better in this part of town — and citywide. What will you do to improve it?

The environment and enhancing our urban tree canopy is deeply important to me. I have worked at a number of environmental nonprofits starting with the Trust for Public Land in the 1980s. My foray into neighborhood organizing and later local politics began with a Friends of the Urban Forest (FUF) tree planting in North Beach in the 1990s where we planted hundreds of trees. As a member of the Board of Supervisors, I helped pass legislation to provide baseline funding for the Bureau of Urban Forestry to enhance our tree canopy and have held hearings on improving outcomes. As a member of the Transportation Authority, I ensured that would be ongoing funding in our half-cent sales tax renewal which the voters passed.

Our city can do so much better to improve our canopy cover, especially in neighborhoods like the Ingleside. While we must continue to expand city urban forestry staff and partnerships with nonprofits like FUF we also need to work better with homeowners and local communities to aid in this effort. While I pushed to help get $12 million in federal funding for tree planting the city sadly missed out on critical IRA funding for climate initiatives. As a result, I passed legislation calling on the City Administrator to aggressively apply for IRA funding. We can’t afford to miss these opportunities and unfortunately, we have an administration more focused on politics and self-image than the hard, detail-oriented work required to really improve our neighborhoods.

The Balboa Park Area Plan studied many major and minor projects, including decking the Interstate 280 freeway, realigning freeway ramps, etc. What outstanding elements will you pursue while in office?

One of the primary objectives of the Balboa Park Area Plan was to expand economic opportunity and vibrancy along the Ocean Avenue commercial corridor. I’ve always fought for neighborhood small businesses and am currently co-sponsoring a measure to cut business taxes for local small businesses with gross receipts of less than $5 million per year. As mayor, I will work to make it easier to open and operate a small business, as well as preserve our cherished Legacy Businesses.

What will you do to breathe new life into the neighborhood's commercial corridors? Please list 10 concrete proposals.

Reform SF’s business taxes for small businesses with under $5 million in yearly gross receipts which is Proposition M on this November’s ballot that I helped craft
Enforce the commercial vacancy tax that I authored and the voters approved to encourage landlords to lease space, not hold it vacant
Cut red tape and permitting timelines for new businesses
Expand legacy and anchor business protections and programs
Protect existing businesses from the ruinous upzoning plans of our current mayor, preventing what we’re already seeing in areas like Upper Fillmore
Community policing with language and culturally competent beat officers on Ocean Avenue, like I did in Chinatown
Build middle-income affordable housing to allow workers and small business owners to continue to live in the communities they work in
Expand the urban tree canopy cover to keep streets cool and create a more vibrant, welcoming urban landscape
Expand public transit along commercial corridors, including 49 and K lines
Continue and build upon the First Year free program for new businesses

What does adequate community policing look like for the greater Ingleside neighborhood and its diverse communities?

I have always said public safety is a progressive value and have been one of our city’s strongest advocates for community policing during my 17 years as supervisor. I firmly believe that it is the quality, not just quantity of policing that matters. When I was elected in 2000, hardly any of the beat cops in Chinatown spoke Cantonese. I worked with the community and Central Station to recruit and terrain officers from the community, who spoke the language and knew the shopkeepers and residents. We need to realize true community policing citywide, with officers who walk the beat and know the people they protect. That is the focus of my new College to Community Policing program to provide forgivable student loans for new officers recruited from our diverse communities that attend local colleges and join the force after graduation and we know we’ll have succeeded when all of our residents aren't just safe but feel safe in every neighborhood in our city.

Do you support the renewal and expansion of the Ocean Avenue Community Benefit District? If so, why and how will you work with its leadership to make sure it delivers the best results for all stakeholders?

Yes. I am the author of the original legislation that enabled Community Benefit Districts to be established and have been a strong advocate for CBDs. I believe that they are good tools to increase the vibrancy and resiliency of neighborhoods in our city. I’m the most pro-neighborhood candidate for mayor, and it is my responsibility and style to listen to, learn from and work with neighborhood leaders and the leadership and members of CBDs. In my district, I work closely with the Downtown, Fisherman’s Wharf, Lower Polk and Middle Polk CBDs and as mayor would do so citywide.

Will you support the Recreation and Parks Department in achieving the completion of Phase 2 of the Geneva Office Building? If so, how?

Yes, and I will work with Rec and Park, as well as the other departments involved in the Car Barn project, to see it fully to fruition. I have a long history with this project and am committed to finally seeing it through. I plan to hold my departments accountable and make good on the renovations and community upgrades our neighborhoods need and deserve.

What will you do about our waste collection monopoly?

I fought long and hard to hold Recology accountable and created the SF Rate Administrator’s office. I sponsored the ballot measure that vastly reformed the rate-setting process and now holds Recology truly accountable. I also made sure that SF residents were compensated for being overcharged millions as part of one of our city’s worst corruption scandals. I have spent my career fighting for the residents of San Francisco and as mayor, would work tirelessly to make sure that Recology has the oversight, transparency and accountability it needs to properly serve SF residents.

How will you incentivize landlords to rent out long-vacant units and thus increase the housing stock?

I was a strong proponent of Prop. M (aka the Empty Homes Tax) which is aimed at addressing exactly this issue. Now that it’s gone into effect (and we’re starting to see improvements in vacancy rates) we need to be judicious about enforcement. Additionally, I just passed the nation’s first ban on the use of price-fixing algorithms that were allowing landlords to price fix and collude in holding units of the market to artificially inflate rents.