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December 1, 2003
SF Mayoral Candidate Gavin Newsom
The Newsdesk.org interview
Interview conducted by Josh Wilson
Photography by Gabriella Marks
Listen to the interview audio archive. (MP3)
Introduction: Candidate background.
Public Health: Hospital services and fiscal crises
Urban Living: Transportation, public power, greenbelts, the arts
Youth & Public Schools: Charter schools, privatization, school board, gangs, drug trade
Homelessness: Origins and solutions
Parties & Politics: Ideology and party loyalty
Environment: Environmental justice in San Francisco
INTRODUCTION
What are your political origins and motives?
Motives ... I don't know about motives. No ... I'm actually a 5th generation San Franciscan, grew up in the Marina District in San Francisco, my great-great-grandfather came here in the mid-1800s, and was a carpenter and later became a police officer, so I've got strong ties to San Francisco. I've had the privilege of growing up, as I said, here, and privilege of having strong ties as well to the Democratic party, my grandfather was very involved in Truman's campaign, and of course was one of Pat Brown's closest friends, ran his campaign for district attorney, before Pat Brown became governor of the state of California, so I've always grown up around political life, with strong Democratic traditions and roots.
PUBLIC HEALTH
At a time of crisis for healthcare nationally, there's a funding crisis here in San Francisco: Two of the city's major public hospitals, San Francisco General and Laguna Honda, are faced with major expenses over seismic rebuilding, and providing general health services and facilities.
Do you see city health services growing or being reduced in the future?
I see if we continue to do what we've done, they're going to be reduced. We cannot allow that to happen. Your question is absolutely right, there was a [state] Senate bill passed a number of years ago, SB 1953, which requires by 2007, 2008 to have plans in place to seismically retrofit our public health institutions, Department of Public Health's number-one asset, that's San Francisco General Hospital.
I've been very proud to advance the cause of universal health care in San Francisco, by supporting Healthy Families, Healthy Kids, which, for the first time in our city's history, we're providing universal health coverage for those 18 years or younger earning up to 300 percent of federal poverty level.
I was proud to have actually supported the budget that funded that, unfortunately my opponent did not support the budget that actually funded the program. But I'm gonna take it a step further by advancing the cause for 19 to 24 year-olds, many of those listening in your audience, 19-24, of which 44 percent of us, of those who are 19-24 are uninsured in San Francisco, and we need to advance the cause of universal health care by taking that next step. We found the funding to do it, we're going to make it happen within 18 months, if I'm privileged enough to be mayor of San Francisco.
I want to continue to invest in public health, I think it's one of the most critical functions of city government is investing in people, investing in people that are suffering from drug and alcohol addiction, suffering because of bipolar disorders, schizophrenia, paranoia, those obviously that need the support because of their HIV or AIDS status, we are proud in this city of our traditions of public health.
I think that's what truly distinguishes this city, and I'm going to invest aggressively in advancing it, in investing to further expand the kind of quality, culturally competent services that make San Francisco special.
How do you propose to fully fund the city's health care needs?
Well we need to obviously look at the size of this bureaucracy. We've got a $4.8 billion bureaucracy, its one of the largest in the United States of America, in terms of per capita. We have to invest in culturally competent, direct services, we cannot continue to grow our bureaucracy at City Hall, we need to invest in people in the communities, into our public health institution. Clearly we're gonna have to streamline city government, clearly we're going to have to reduce the size of city government, without cutting services directly to those most in need.
We've got an economic plan, we've got a small business plan, we've got strategies to go out and get more philanthropic dollars, more corporate dollars, more foundation dollars, more state and federal grants, we're putting together a resource development office where I'd like to begin to aggregate all of those functions so we can be more aggressive in reaching out.
We left a lot of Ryan White CARE dollars out, we have over $36 million in Ryan White CARE dollars for HIV and AIDS, we lost about $3.5, $4 million because we were not aggressive enough in going out at getting those federal dollars.
We lost money for mental health and behavioral health in San Francisco as well, and we need to do a better job at that, and also, something I'm very proud of is my early support for Darrell Steinberg, who's got an initiative that will be on the ballot next year that I hope all of us can support, which is a tax increase on those earning over $1 million, it's a one-percent tax increase on all those earning above $1 million, to set aside $600 close to $700 million dollars for mental health funds for the state of California. Again, this is something I hope every one supports, it'll be on next year's ballot as a way, again, to backfill some of the cuts at the state level and find new resources for public health.
URBAN LIVING
What are the goals of public transportation in San Francisco? How can those goals be achieved?
I'm very proud, in fact, at USF, I actually worked and we created the first student pass, actual discount for USF students, to get a discount in terms of their monthly cost to use MUNI, so again it was a model program, I was very proud to sponsor that effort, also to sponsor Proposition B, which is MUNI reform, about five years ago.
Hardly perfect, MUNI, I recognize the problems, but much better than system it was four years ago, so not only do I have a track record, literally and figuratively, but we've got some new ideas to advance it even further.
Again, not a knock on my opponent, it was an amazing admission on transportation, he said the other day that we ripped off the region in terms of public transportation dollars. I don't know, to me it's utterly foundationless, but it also sends a chilling message because he's saying basically, we shouldn't take as much of the state and federal dollars that we have been, and I think that could truly put our public transportation system at risk, he hasn't backed off on that statement, and I don't know exactly what he means, and I don't believe it passes the test of facts.
Course you can't take transportation dollars that are earmarked from the federal government, and use them for other services, as he was suggesting we should move them for social services away from transportation.
I believe we need to invest in the Third Street Light Rail, Chinatown Central Subway, we need to continue to invest in enhancing better service for MUNI, and we need to make investments as ways to safety, and I want to continue this Fast Pass motion, this student pass, I want to do it at San Francisco State and I want to continue it at other universities around San Francisco.
Should the city be in the public power business, and if so, how should it proceed?
Well we need to first tear down Bayview Hunters Point, that's a number one priority. And in order to do that, we'll begin the process of moving towards renewable energies, cogeneration, and focus on what I see as a real emerging industry, which are clean technologies around energy.
I see that as the great next growth sector in our economy. San Francisco needs to be in the forefront of that, forefront of solar, forefront of wind, forefront of unique energy creators like tidal energy, which I know my opponent is a strong supporter of. And I don't necessarily disagree with him on that, I think we see eye to eye.
I wanna move to energy independence in San Francisco and I do believe ultimately the goal should be public power. I got a renewable energies plan we put into writing, and I ask all your listeners to look at our website, take a look specifically at how we're going to begin that process, how we're going to tear down that plant, how we're going to advance the cause of renewable energies, [I've] got a strong record of support for solar in particular, and wind, and I want to continue to advance, and I want San Francisco to be a model city as it relates to energy. And we will be, through our administration.
What is your policy on community gardening, composting and urban greenbelts?
We'll I've got a -- It's interesting you bring that up -- I'm a great fanatic of what's happened in cites like, well, we're seeing it increasingly, what's happened in Chicago. Mayor Daly is being now called the "Martha Stewart" of mayors because of his green thumb.
And his whole notion of a visionary city, taking an old industrialized city, Chicago, and greening it, taking the hard-edged urban landscapes, the median strips, the platforms around the entrances and exits to cities, and greening them with bushes and flowers, and softening up the edges, building a sense of community and pride, which I think really has an intangible, in terms of advancing the cause of bringing the people together.
I've got a clean and green initiative, that we again put in writing, its available at [gavinnewsom.com], on our website, I hope people take a look at that, as it relates to composting, I'm a restaurateur, I was initiated initially as one of the first restaurants to sign up for our composting efforts as it relates to getting all the old food waste and obviously converting that into nutrients that can be re-used.
These are things that I think really make this city a special place, is that we've advanced those causes in the last eight years, and we need to do more in the next four.
Name five things you will do that will increase neighborhood-by-neighborhood access to, and creation of, music, art and literature.
I've always believed that music and art are really the gateway to literacy, if you can connect people. Not all of us, I was pretty severely dyslexic, in fact I had a difficult time getting into college, and I got out of college, with the challenge of dyslexia, having to take courses literally my entire life, Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, gotta get supplemental education. And for me sports and athletics really got me out of the shell.
I go to places like Alvarado elementary school and I see music and art in particular getting kids out of their shell, taking one of the lowest-performing elementary schools and now making it one of the highest-performing elementary schools.
We are very proud in this city to have made the investment when I was a member of the board, in the year 2000, and establishing a precedent for the city to invest in public education, by using general fund moneys for arts and music programs. I actually supported an initiative that Supervisor Ammiano's put on the ballot -- my opponent opposes it, rejected it -- that would substantially enhance arts, music and athletic funding, as well as universal preschool in San Francisco.
I truly believe we need to do a better job, particularly as it relates to public art. Again using, ironically, Chicago as an example. They have an extraordinary public art program. We have the most talented and creative people in this city anywhere on the planet, literally, on the planet. We need to unleash them, and we need to excite people and enliven their senses. I want art and music back on the streets.
I want to take risks as it relates to public art by not having politicians get in the way, and I want to expose people to the extraordinary beauty of art, and how it unites us, and how it enlivens us, and how it can empower us and make us more creative as well. So, that's something I'm totally committed to, and we're going to advance it not just in public schools, as I've already committed too, but also on our streets.
YOUTH/PUBLIC SCHOOLS
I have some friends who, after nine years in the city, are moving to Boston because, among other reasons, they say the schools will be better for their kids. Are San Francisco public schools properly funded? If not, how do you propose to achieve full funding?
Hear hear, back to my point. Supervisor Ammiano deserves a tremendous amount of credit in his efforts around public education. He put together a framework for the next five years where San Francisco goes beyond that -- over ten years -- but how San Francisco in the next five years can advance the cause of making contributions to K-12 education, and how we can begin the process of investing, not just talking about our problems but really investing in our young kids.
I agree with the premise of the question, I know so many families who are moving out of the city because of public education. We've got to improve it. It's a system of haves and have-nots.
People can afford -- the 31 percent of the kids in this city that can afford to go to private school -- and the rest of the city, 90 percent represented by minorities, where African American students are graduating with a 1.8 grade point average, a D grade point average, from our K-12 education system. Where Latinos and Latinas have the highest truancy and dropout rates in the state. It's a disgrace.
And we had an opportunity, again, my opponent, to walk his talk and to make the investment, and to find the money from the city's $4.8 billion bureaucracy, and find over the course of the next five years $10 million next year, 20, 35, 45 and get up to $60 million a year contribution, for arts programs, music programs, after school programs, preschool programs, and athletic programs.
We had a chance to demonstrate that and the next mayor needs to make sure that initiative passes in March, and my concern is my opponent opposed it, and as mayor, I think it's going to be difficult to pass an initiative in a city where the mayor is opposed to something I think he should be supportive of, which could finally follow-through in terms of your question on how we're going to pay for it and how we can support our public school system in San Francisco and support our kids.
What is your opinion on charter and privatized schools?
Hate for-profit charters. But I think nonprofit charters, like KIP and others, are creating great opportunities, particularly in the Western Addition and Bayview/Hunters Point. You know, I was out there in a couple of meetings with some of these charter schools, and the kids, the parents, were so excited to give their kids alternatives to this K-12 education system.
And I think we should give our kids an alternative, if I'm a parent and I'm going to an underperforming school, and I can't get into Lowell, Lincoln or Washington, my heart is broken because my kid's education is at risk.
And a nonprofit charter -- nonprofit charter -- comes around and says "We're going to give you some hope," boy I'd jump to that opportunity. And that's why San Francisco has got some of the best nonprofit charters in the country, and I think that's a good direction to go.
Do I believe in vouchers? Absolutely not. Do I believe in privatizing public education? Absolutely not. I don't think education should have any for-profit motive. But nonprofit charters are doing what the public education should be doing. And I hope that nonprofit charters go out of business [sic.], and that the public education system recognizes that you can't have industrial-age high schools with two or three-thousand students.
We gotta have schools within schools, secondary schools within schools, small school redesign, an initiative that this current superintendent has been pushing for, superintendent I support, and someone I think we need to work closely with in order to advance the cause for public education.
Is the school board well-managed, cost-efficient and responsive to the community?
I think we have some ideologues on the school board, and I don't see the school board right now, particularly three members, working at all very well with our superintendent. I think that's a major problem. You cannot advance the cause of educating your kid from an ideological perch. We gotta get back to basics. And that means getting people ready to read.
You know 36 percent of kids in our public schools in San Francisco are proficient in English language arts? Only 36 percent? And so we're sitting there and talking the way the world should be on the school board right now, our kids are suffering and literally now they're dying.
In the last few weeks the violence we've seen, in MUNI buses and after school, it's a disgrace. And I think we need real leadership on this, not someone who's going to tell the superintendent that she needs to be reminded who her boss is, as it relates to some of the school board members.
So I answer your question, I don't the school board is being well managed or operated right now, and I think it's time we have a mayor that works collaboratively and not in an accusatory manner with our current superintendent who I think is on the right track, she just needs our support, not our condemnation.
How will you address gangs and youth violence, especially related to the violent underground drug economy?
You know I think our war on drugs is an abject failure. I think it's a national disgrace, the fact that in this country, we are incarcerating African Americans disproportionately because of race-based laws. That are further perpetuating inequalities in this country. You can get busted for 5 grams of crack cocaine, it's a five year minimum mandatory sentence. It takes five hundred grams of powder cocaine to have that same five year minimum mandatory sentence. That is a race-based law, that is devastating our communities, and I'm foursquare against this failed war on drugs.
That's why I've been so aggressive in advancing the cause of treatment on demand in San Francisco, providing the first of its kind methadone access waiver, the first time in the history of this country, this city of San Francisco is now a national model, where we're allowing methadone to treat those with severe heroin addiction, allowing methadone maintenance to be prescribed, not in methadone clinics but by private physicians, community based physicians.
Even those of course that can't afford it are given the opportunity to have it in a more holistic way -- their private physicians prescribe methadone not in the usual environment that has all the strings attached.
So these are examples of where we can advance the cause to deal honestly with this drug problem, but remember we're the number one drug-addicted city in America, we're number one in meth, we're two in LSD, and we're now fourth in the United States of America in heroin addiction. No one's talking about it, or at least I'm the only one talking about it in this campaign. We got some specific ideas and we're going to do a better job.
I support Propisition 36, I support medical marijuana, I'm sick and tired of our aggressive prosecution of these ridiculous laws, that are promulgated on us because of the federal government.
And I've been standing tall on this, I'm part of a Boston University fellowship called Join Together, have been for six years, trying to advance the cause of sanity as it relates to this outrageous conduct of our federal government on this war on drugs. This is something that again transcends politics, this is something I've been passionate about all my life and will continue regardless of what happens with this mayors' race.
How do you propose to address this issue of youth violence as related to the drug problem?
So much of this crime, gang related crime, is so much not only just turf, but it also comes down to the pettiness in the economy, the underground economy of drugs; look, we gotta invest in our kids, we've got to invest in alternatives to incarceration, we've got to give people something to be for as opposed to somebody to be against.
People are looking for respect, people are in need of self-esteem, that's what this gang violence is all about, that's what this drug use and abuse in this country is all about. It's about people not feeling good about themselves, not feeling that they matter, not feeling that people care about them.
And you know if you can find that identity through a gang, where people do care about you and they do say you matter, then inevitably you're going to follow in the wrong path. We need to give I think kids opportunity to feel good about doing something of substance, something that adds value, and that's why again, the investment in after school programs -- you know, in San Francisco 70 percent of the teenage pregnancies occur between the hours of three and six. And an equivalent amount, remarkably similar, just over 70 percent, of violent crimes occur, three to six.
Well, if you know when the problem's occurring, then you better put your resources accordingly. And that's what again, we have an opportunity do as it relates to this initiative on the March ballot. And again my opponent did not support, and explains it away, says we don't have the money.
Hey, you had a chance to put up the money, you had a chance to follow-through on your commitment, you didn't do it. And that's what we need to do, we need to invest in alternatives, we need to invest in children, we gotta give them the kind of programs, the mentorship, and peer-to-peer mentorship, we need adult mentorship, we need to have people ready for the workforce, because not everyone's going to graduate high school and go to USF or Stanford or Columbia University or all these other places.
Many people can't afford to go there, they can't afford to even get student loans because their family needs them to make money, because they can't otherwise afford to raise their family. And that's an area where I think we need to do more, and I've got again an education plan that's online, people can take a look at it, we've got this plan on March ballot.
We're going to put some money in to actually implement these strategies, and I'll be very aggressive in trying to reach out, particularly to communities in Bayview and Western Addition, and people in Bayview and these communities that are just -- I mean this has got to stop, this is a small 49-square-mile, 47-and-a-half square mile city, people shouldn't be killing each other, day in and day out, retribution, 15-year-old getting killed, Deshon Johnson, 6 week old kids getting killed, you got a 21 year old killing a 22 year old, back to back just in the last two nights, that's a bloody disgrace. I mean, it's ridiculous.
We need to reach out to faith-based community, CBO, community based organizations, we need a mayor that's going to get out there and say "enough," and I'm going to be that mayor, I'm going to be aggressive on this, not going to happen we got to stop this in San Francisco, and I know we can do more.
HOMELESSNESS
What is the origin and nature of homelessness?
I think it's very complex, it's very nuanced, I think in this country we've abandoned through HUD, our aggressive investment in housing in this country, that's a big part of it. But I think we need to be honest, that's the broader issue of homelessness, is a housing housing housing problem, but chronic homelessness is altogether something different. And this is an area where this city fails unlike any major city in the country.
And chronic homelessness is disproportionately, not exclusively, may I repeat that, not exclusively but disproportionately represented by people with bipolar disorders, schizophrenia, paranoia, and, increasingly, and, or, those suffering from drug and alcohol addictions. That's not just a housing housing housing problem.
The origin of that is more complex, and it goes back to the '40s and '50s, and the advent of psychotropic drugs like thorazine and lithium, when we really began the process of deinstitutionalization, and then it was exacerbated by communities, and rather states. going to put the burden on the federal government with the advent of SSI, and the advent of Medicaid which became Medi-Cal.
And so you saw in the '60s and '70s further de-institutionalization, there was a pivotal point in the mid-1970s of Conner vs. Donaldson, again I'm giving you the origin of the issue from my perspective, that was the beginning of the civil libertarian movement, that you can't be incarcerated in a mental institution against your will. And then finally exacerbated by the tax-revolt years, the Reaganomic years, the trickle-down years, but it's much more complex than just blaming one person, used to blame Jimmy Carter on the civil liberties side, and then you blame Ronald Reagan for cutting the money.
Well, that's right, but it's more complex than that. So I think it's a combination, the lack of investment in behavioral health and mental health, obviously a lack of investment in a historic context, with housing, and an inability in this country to deal honestly with the challenges of chronic homelessness, and in a city, like San Francisco, that refused for many many years, till 60 percent of us recognized that the failure of our cash-based system that was fueling and exacerbating the problems of chronic homelessness, needed to change.
And I appreciate my opponent finally came on board, on this, took him years, but he finally came on board after 60 percent of San Francisco said, "It's time to move away from a cash based system." He says he didn't like my program, I appreciate that, he didn't have an alternative, but he supported another colleague of mine, Chris Daly's alternative, which, verbatim, took Care Not Cash, verba- every word and inflection, and removed just one word, shelter, so I applaud my opponent for finally recognizing the wisdom of moving away from a cash-based system of care, and supporting it in construct, and just removing one word from my, redacted from the corpus of my document, one word, shelter.
So I think we're finally moving in the right path: Supportive housing, if there's one answer in terms of solution, is key, housing with support services, behavioral health services, drug and alcohol treatment services, vocational service, educational services, holistically and culturally competently dealing with the unique needs of individuals, because one-size-fits-all homeless policies will never work.
That's why I got 34 proposals. Care Not Cash was one. With guarantees that no one would be left behind, you get a service or you get the same amount of cash, if the service doesn't exist, don't worry, we can implement the program, that 's why it's a 12- to 18-month implementation schedule.
We're going to do this, we're going to do it right, and as you may have seen in the paper the other day, I reached out to one of my opponents, someone that's been very involved aggressively in the whole homeless issue, and that's Angela Alioto, because I want to make sure everything we do is done in a passionate way where no one's left behind and we truly fulfill the promise and the expectation that the people of San Francisco put ... in the elected family of San Francisco.
How can we effectively address the related issues of poverty?
Well, it's investing in people. Its investing notably in education. You know, the precursor for economic opportunity is making sure you have educated people that can then enter the workforce and not make minimum wage but earn a living wage. We need to invest in people and it starts pre-K. It starts with adolescence, and those that are zero to two. It starts right there, toddlers and adolescents. It then focuses on those three to five, and universal preschool, again my opponent was absent when it came to funding these efforts.
And it will be on the March ballot and as mayor I hope to advance that cause. We start pre-K, because we know early childhood development zero to five is critical, you set up for success or failure. That's the core to me, poverty, focused there disproportionately. Educating kids K-12 and not just as-ing everyone's going to go to higher institutional learning, so you have to also focus not only on academic literacy, civic literacy, because I think all of us have an obligation to give back -- and that's why I've been very involved in mentorship programs, etcetera -- and then workforce literacy.
We've got to invest in our workforce. You cannot have an economic plan to get people out of poverty, unless you have a workforce plan, and I'm very proud that we've got specific strategies to partner with community college and our state system to begin to advance the cause of educating our young kids and our new workforce and our emerging workforce.
PARTIES & POLITICS
To what degree is this election about party loyalty and political ideology?
Well my opponent said, he was in fact quoted, front page of the chronicle, maybe second page, saying that this is a campaign of ideology, and, boy, I would hope it's a campaign of ideas, bringing people together, I mean if it's about ideology it's about power, it's about purity of a cause, it's not about reaching out per se -- per se -- of course ideologues believe they're always reaching out, and I respect that ... it's about getting things done, it's about bringing people together, it's about making a difference, not identifying problems and explaining them away, it's not about being opposed to everybody.
You know the easiest thing, I remember when I was young -- I'm the youngest guy in this race, I just turned 36 a few weeks ago -- I had the sense of purity, "This is the way the world should be, damnit, it's gonna be." And you know what I got in elected office I felt way, and then I saw 130 people die in the streets, and then I saw 150 people die in the streets, and then last year we had 169 homeless die in our streets, and our shelters and emergency rooms.
And I watched as my ideology said, "Well, the answer to the problem is to just put more money in the system," and you know what, we doubled direct-investment in homeless services and alcohol and drug treatment, we added more money for rental eviction and rent subsidies, and I was proud to support all of those budgets.
But I realized it's not just an ideological theory, it's reality, you gotta deal with reality, so what's at stake in this race is, I'm running a campaign of ideas, I'm interested in evidence and results, and I don't care if it's a Green Party member that's got a great idea, or god forbid, a party which I never want to associate myself, except in the context of trying to reach out and build partnerships, the Republican Party.
I want good ideas, that's what matters. I want to educate our kids, I don't want to talk about it. I want to make sure we stop the violence, I don't want to talk about it. I want to deal with root causes at the same time deal with reality, it's not an either or, and oftentimes when you have an ideological debate it's either or. And there's no such thing.
I talk about the tyranny of "Or" vs. the genius of "And." Learned that during my college years. And the genius of And is saying, underline and deal with the pervading problems. Deal with both simultaneously, that's how you execute a plan, that's how you administer a city. This is not student government. Yo know, I wish it, I participated in student government, the consequences weren't there.
The consequences in this city are real. People are killing each other, people are dying in the streets, there's a lot at stake in this election, and I'm not going to run [from] an ideological perch, because that's theory, I'm about practice and getting things done. It breaks my heart, because it's so much easier to run against institutions and people. Isn't that the easiest thing in the world? "I'm against his plan. I'm against the incumbents. I'm against this power elite, I'm against corporations."
Well wait a second, maybe some of these corporations are bad and they should get, the WorldComs, let's go after 'em. But you know, I'm a corporation. I have a two-person wine store in Noe Valley. I'm a corporation. I'm an S-corporation. I don't think we're mean spirited, in fact we do a lot of work with the community ... we actually created jobs, you can't be anti-business and pro-jobs. All your students listening want work. Where do they get it? Unless they work for the city and county of San Francisco, that's a public job, it requires businesses, to be formed, entrepreneurs, women, minorities to invest, take risks, and employ people.
We're all in this together and I'm running a campaign that tries to unite -- you know I got 52 labor endorsements. 52. Working, the lowest paid San Francisco employees supporting my candidacy ... I believe in collective bargaining, I believe in card-checked neutrality, I believe in advancing the cause of wages, real wages not just minimum wage. Advancing the cause of benefits and retiring, so people can live and grow and raise a family in this great city. But you need to reach out to the private sector. Because you can't redistribute wealth you don't have.
You want to invest in drug and alcohol treatment and homelessness, you gotta have a vibrant economy, you can't just attack business, saying they're not doing enough. Fine, they're not doing enough, work with them, but don't make public pronouncements so you can get applause during campaign debates, and rally the troops. That's not leadership, leadership is much more complex. I wish it wasn't, and I hate to admit this, because seven years ago I thought that's all leadership is about. "I'm against this, I'm against you," and I was purity, but it's more complex, it's tough, I hate dealing with reality so often, you know, and I've had to deal with it.
I've been elected office for many many years, and it's tough, I don't compromise my principles, no, and I have the same ideals, but you need someone to practically implement ideals, and I think that's the real choice in this election.
The San Francisco Chronicle wrote on April 29, 2001, that Mayor Willie Brown oversaw a "patronage army." How will your administration address the issue of contracting city business and services?
With absolute integrity, I've authored legislation that's pending in front of the Board of Supervisors to go after all these sole-source contracts. We have 89 sole-source contacts that haven't been reviewed in over ten years in San Francisco. We got legislation to weed that out.
I don't support patronage, I believe in performance politics, not patronage politics, I've got specific ideas and what that means ... I'm very proud, I started right out of college, 23 years old, and I got 13 people, I was able to get, most money I got was $7,500 from a well-known family, and people love to criticize my relationship with that family, got $7,500, took a risk out of college to open a small wine store down in the Marina District.
And for three years literally opened and closed that place every single night and had one part-time employee, barely made it, and finally got ahead, and from there I've been able to create 12 other businesses, over 500, on a seasonal basis because I'm in the resort business up in Tahoe, we have a small little hotel. We get upwards of 700 people in the peak times of the year, we employ many of the students that go to the universities, not just USF but all the universities in San Francisco.
Lemme just say something. That I think when I reflect back at every person that I've ever hired, I don't think this, I know this, I hired them all on their ability to perform, not whether or not they were a friend of the family's. My point is this, I will run this city exactly like I've run my businesses from the perspective that I'm about results and performance, I'm not about relationship with so and so, to do this, to pay back a political appointee.
I am not -- I am not -- and should not be accused of being incumbent mayor of San Francisco as my opponent is trying to make me. I am not Willie Brown. I am my own independent person. And I've agreed to agree with the mayor, and I've agreed to disagree with the mayor. The difference is I don't try to destroy a human being who is out front in the progressive community in the 50s and 60s before progressive people in this town even knew what progressive meant. When he's out front on gay and lesbian and bisexual issues, when he's out front on African American issues as relates to civil rights, when he stood tall as relates to women's issues and advanced that cause.
It's so easy to attack Willie Brown, but I'll tell you, I think it's time [for] this town to unite and attack the problems, and remind themselves, Willie Brown is termed out, his career in politics is now over, we're electing a new generation of leadership, and I've learned from, but I didn't necessarily follow this mayor. And I do not believe in patronage politics, I believe in performance politics, and rest assured, that's how our administration is going to operate.
ENVIRONMENT
How would your administration address issues of public health and pollution?
Well again, first and foremost, number-one priority's get rid of the most polluting power plant, one of the most polluting in the state of California and I would argue the country, and that's the Bayview Hunters Point plant. We're going to get that thing down in 2005 -- worst case 2006. I look forward to getting out there with a demolition team and getting that thing down.
We have a hundred brownfields in San Francisco and I've got a brownfields plan to begin the remediation of toxicity, etcetera. I established as a member of the board the first dioxin control policy in the city and state's history. I am so proud of that, I've got aggressive record as it relates to environmental justice.
I recognize on that basis -- and also going after mold and mildew, and incidences of asthma, which is disproportionate in Bayview Hunters Point, cervical cancer, prostate cancer and breast cancer rates that are disproportionate in Bayview.
We need to reach our to our elected family at the federal level. Now my opponent, for whatever reason, and again not a knock, it's an observation, was the only member of the board to reject a resolution commending Nancy Pelosi, the first leader of the democratic party, a woman leader, in history -- who got over $118 million for San Francisco just to reform our housing authority, and get rid of six sites, getting under Hope 6 funding, who is principally responsible for advocating with the Navy, to make sure that when the navy allows us to take over that land out there in Hunters Point for redevelopment, that it takes care of all the environmental remediation.
It's Nancy Pelosi who needs to lead that charge. Rather than insulting her, I'm proud to have her endorsement. That's how you work to deal honestly with the environmental injustice that's out there. We need the state and federal government to help us, because we can't do it on our own. The costs are extraordinary, but the opportunities are in front of us. Our brownfields plan, take a look at it, talks about how we can get community folks involved in the economic opportunities of dealing with environmental remediation.
And there are a lot of good things happening out there and we got some strategies to do that, but I am committed to this issue. As someone who just lost her [sic.] mother to breast cancer let me tell you, recognizing that four times greater likelihood of breast cancer in Bayview Hunters Point in the African American community.
That's a national disgrace, and that's gotta be turned around, not with ideology, not with rhetoric, not with people that burn bridges at the state and federal level, but someone that's going to work together with people from all walks of life, try to unite this city and try to produce some real results for an underserved community that's been underserved for way too long.
