Q&A: Reelected District 7 Supervisor Myrna Melgar Talks Second Term Goals

District 7 Supervisor Myrna Melgar is in for another four years.

Melgar campaigned in the November general election on housing, transportation and children's services against opponents to her political right in Matt Boschetto, Stephen Martin-Pinto and Edward Yee. The race was called on Nov. 11 with Melgar securing 53.42% of the vote.

“I loved the energy of my campaign and I love it that we mostly kept it positive and that we talked about the issues even though there was so much ‘grrr’ and ‘Great Highway robbery,’” Melgar said, referring to several ads against her candidacy over support for Proposition K, which will close a portion of the Great Highway to vehicles.

During her second term, Melgar plans to finish many projects: creating a sidewalk path behind the City College of San Francisco’s Ocean Avenue campus that leads to the Havelock Bridge, working with newly elected California Assembly member and former District 2 Supervisor Catherine Stefani on a co-op housing initiative and implementing Prop. J, which would create an oversight group to monitor the city’s spending on youth programs and services. She also said her number one goal is to save the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency from fiscal disaster.

While the city enters a time with several new leaders in the political scene like Mayor-elect Daniel Lurie, District 11 Supervisor-elect Chyanne Chen and many changes at the federal level — namely a Trump administration — Melgar wants to focus on building up the city.

“Despite our differences, our diversity, our different agendas, that's what makes [San Francisco] magical,” Melgar said. “I have no doubt that we're going to get through four years of Trump's presidency. It's going to be difficult and we're going to have to make some adjustments to our expectations, especially about our budget and services but I have no doubt we're going to come out great on the other end.”

The Ingleside Light caught up with Melgar to hear her thoughts on being reelected.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

How does it feel to be reelected?

It feels good and vindicating because I don't shy away from tough positions and I get a lot of blowback for it. The things that were most controversial this past year were the West Portal safety improvements, the Frida Kahlo Way bike lane and Prop. K, right? And also the affordable housing on Laguna Honda. I got a lot of blowback from people and just like “We’re going to unseat you” and so it's vindicating to know that most people in the district feel like I'm doing a good job. Four years ago, it was a ranked-choice election and I got 20% of the number one vote and this year I got 47% of the number one vote, so it means most people, even if we disagree, think I'm doing a good job.

But I also feel a little overwhelmed by the moment. We have a brand new mayor who doesn't know a lot about city government. Half of my colleagues are new. We have a hostile federal administration that's going to come after us over our Sanctuary City ordinance, over transgender stuff, over a number of things — and we're broke.

Speaking of the new incumbents, how do you feel about the new class of supervisors?

I feel like people are going to need a lot of support. I'm a mom. I will help everybody. When Joel Engardio got elected to District 4, he and I had run against each other and I still helped him get set up. His staff spends a lot of time in my office so I expect that I will do the same, especially for Chyanne Chen because she's my friend but also this corridor has to be collaborative because it's right there. My staff is pretty senior. Mike Farrah has been at City Hall since the Jordan administration and then Jen Lowe has been in the D7 office now for 12 years. That's who does the work so I expect that my staff will take a leadership role in training the other aides and the people who are new because you know we got to do that.

What is something from your first four years in office that you are taking with you in this next term?

The biggest lesson, which was the hardest — I'm not going to name any names, I'm just going to be general about it — is that just because you support people and you're loyal to them doesn't mean that they will correspond. That's a hard lesson and I’ve learned it but that's not going to change who I am. I think that we are all in this together in San Francisco and we've got to keep working and supporting each other. I don't know any other way to be as a person but it is hard when people don't correspond.

What’s something you are changing or leaving behind in this next term?

I mean the platforms on Ocean Avenue, right? That's a big one. I mean for how many years di we have to change at West Portal to get out of the second train? That’s just crazy. It’s a safety issue because if you go in the morning or the afternoon in front of Aptos Middle School, which is full of wiggly bodies on that platform, you remember how it used to be. It was so unsafe.

There are so many things that I can look around the district and point to and be proud of everywhere: the entrance to Golden Gate Park at Ninth and Lincoln, the mural at Ingleside’s Walgreens, Lakeside Landing and the platforms on Ocean. There's a lot of things that we've done and at the time there was like pushback from people but we did it and things are probably better. There are still things that I'm working on that I hope in four years I can look back and say we did this. The big one is the affordable housing development for seniors at the Laguna Honda site. That was Supervisor Norman Yee’s idea that just got stalled because of the pandemic so I'm going to make sure to get it funded and see it through. Then across the street at 250 Laguna Honda, the affordable housing that we're building there and that's for families, big three-bedroom units so that's something I'm committed to and then also the Balboa Reservoir.

District 7 is big, so what do you want to achieve in this part of the city specifically?

Honestly, the thing that would be the most impactful for the corridor is to have more people. I think building housing on the corridor is super important and people are very divided on it. It's very controversial but you can see where we've added apartments near City College, those businesses are doing better. We have Whole Foods, Pakwan and Philz and as you get closer to Ocean and Faxon avenues where there's lower density. There are more vacancies. These are older storefronts so it takes so much to just open your door. You need electrical, you need ADA accessibility, you need Wi-Fi, you need everything. The single most important thing that we can do is to add housing.

In the meantime, I'm going to be supporting the Ocean Avenue Association because they're coming up for renewal right now. They're talking about expanding it so we are looking at the map and how we're going to do it. The proposal is to go all the way to 19th Avenue which is very exciting because Lakeside has a whole lot of people who are very committed and a lot of energy. It’s going to be great.