Tonight, the San Francisco Tenants Union will picket a landlord fundraiser for District 3 candidate Joe Alioto Jr.—where Jim Sangiacamo of Trinity Properties, Brook Turner and the Professional Property Management Association will ask their guests to contribute the maximum legal contribution of $500. Real estate interests initially funded Claudine Cheng for this Supervisor race; but as her campaign fails to gain traction, landlords have shifted their allegiance to Alioto. Tomorrow morning, Republican businessmen Don Fisher and Warren Hellman will host a $500-a-piece breakfast for Alioto’s campaign. Joe Alioto Jr. is the brother of District 2 Supervisor Michela Alioto-Pier, who has the most anti-tenant record at City Hall—despite representing an area that is 73% tenant. District 3 also has a big renter population, and speculator evictions have devastated North Beach.
“Three key Supervisor races in swing districts (1, 3, and 11) will determine whether the next Board is pro-landlord or pro-tenant,” said Ted Gullicksen of the SF Tenants Union. “We want to begin highlighting how landlords are trying to buy this election with a series of pickets and other events—and this will be our first. Alioto has time for cocktails with his landlord donors, but has no time to answer questions about the concerns of renters in District 3—where Ellis evictions and soaring rents have become rampant.”
What’s interesting about the District 3 race (which includes Chinatown, North Beach and the Barbary Coast) is how landlords and real estate interests have shifted their financial allegiance as they view which of their candidates are viable. Claudine Cheng was the first candidate of the campaign season to break the spending cap—after an explosion of downtown real estate money flooded her campaign. But private polls now show Cheng’s numbers on the low end—with the front-runners being David Chiu, Denise McCarthy and Alioto.
The latest public finance records—which only go up to June 30th—show that real estate interests are now more heavily funding Alioto. Contributors in that reporting period included Pier 39 Limited Partnership, folks at Egan Properties, and Steven Kay from Kay & Merkle.
More revealing Alioto donors include the law partner of TIC attorney Andy Sirkin, and Craig Lipton of Maven Investments. According to Rent Board records, Lipton did an Ellis Act eviction of an 11-unit property in SOMA. His company also created the largest TIC conversion to date—17 units, on Sacramento Street. No Ellis eviction was filed on the latter property, although the building was previously rent-controlled.
Why is this important? Because North Beach—which Alioto hopes to represent—has been hit hard by Ellis evictions, where mass speculators purchase buildings for the purpose of converting them to TIC’s. District 3 Supervisor Aaron Peskin has led the charge to protect tenants losing their homes in his district. Alioto’s sister—Supervisor Michela Alioto-Pier—has sided with landlords and speculators on every major piece of tenant legislation to address this problem. Given Alioto’s contributors, it’s fair to conclude he would vote more like his sister.
Now Jim Sangiacamo of Trinity Properties—whose father, Angelo Sangiacomo is known as the “father of rent control” for his huge rent hikes in the late 1970’s—is hosting a big donor fundraiser for Alioto. Brook Turner of the Coalition for Better Housing (a large landlord advocacy group) and the Professional Property Management Association have also co-sponsored the event. “Landlords make up a small minority of San Franciscans,” said Ted Gullicksen of the SF Tenants Union, “but they are trying to use their wealth to subvert the electoral process.” Approximately 80% of District 3 residents are tenants.
But it’s not just landlords who are watching the political winds and siding with Alioto. Gap CEO Don Fisher and billionaire Warren Hellman both initially contributed to Denise McCarthy. Tomorrow morning, however, they are co-hosting a $500-a-piece breakfast reception for Alioto. Other event sponsors include Mary Murphy and Jonathan Nelson.
In related news, BOMA (Building Owners Managers Association)—who represents commercial real estate interests—has already reported over $24,000 on independent expenditures on behalf of District 3 candidates Joe Alioto Jr., Claudine Cheng and Republican Mike DeNunzio. Billboards have already started popping up in Chinatown urging voters to support these three candidates via ranked choice voting, suggesting a strategic effort by real estate interests to pool their resources.
After the new Ethics Commission reports come due on September 30th, we’ll see exactly how much these interests are funding Alioto.
