When Brad Chapin first alleged that Manny Yekutiel had assaulted him at a party, a lot of folks either refused to believe him or (more likely) just decided it didn’t matter: Yekutiel was the candidate of Big Tech, and all of the so-called “moderates” on, for example, the Democratic County Central Committee just went along. I am reminded of Donald Trump saying he could shoot someone in Times Square and people would still vote for him: If you are the candidate of Real Estate and Big Tech, the Democratic Party, controlled by those interests, will support you no matter what you do.
It’s not even over: A senior partner at Y Combinator just posted on X that he and his friends are still voting for Yekutiel: “What a mandate that would be.” I mean: Unbelievable.
Meanwhile, as we go through what should be a serious civic reckoning, here is a list of the people on the DCCC who voted to endorse Yekutiel despite the first allegation. (Some of them, I am reliably told, knew there were other instances that might come out.)
Here are, according the SF Ethics Commission, some of the wealthy people who as late as September gave money to either an IE for Yekutiel or a PAC that gave $50,000 to the IE: Peter Wendell, Sierra Ventures, $50,000. Andrew Schwab, 5AM Venture Management, $10,000. Catarina Schwab, Catalyst Advising, $10,000. Elizabeth Fisher, private investor, $20,000. Robert Fisher, Pisces Inc, $24,000.
So far, not one of the elected officials or big donors who stuck with Yekutiel has apologized, to the survivors or to the public. Nobody has said: Sorry, Brad, I should have believed you.
That’s where San Francisco politics stands today.
Mayor Lurie has, of course, declared a renter emergency, which is lovely, but doesn’t do anything to help people who can’t pay the rent. It’s not as if he doesn’t have options: Former Sup. Dean Preston lists five things the mayor could do, now, to protect renters.
He could, for example, freeze the rent.
The City controls the allowable annual rent increase. It would be even easier for Mayor Lurie to freeze the rent than it was for Mayor Mamdani. That’s because Lurie doesn’t need independent Rent Board commissioners to do it. As the SF Standard acknowledges, the Mayor and BOS can simply introduce an ordinance freezing rents on rent controlled units.
He could also fund emergency rent relief, Support Prop. I, and work to repeal the Ellis Act and Costa Hawkins. He could treat this a real emergency, an economic earthquake that he created by rolling out the red carpet for AI companies.
Let me suggest another approach: One of the biggest threats to rent-controlled tenants these days is the prospect of a no-fault eviction. That is, a greedy landlord who wants to get rid of a tenant so they can jack up the rent makes up an excuse (“my daughter is going to move in”) or uses the Ellis Act to evict all of their tenants, usually to flip the building.
The Ellis Act is a favorite of speculators, who buy up rent-controlled buildings, evict everyone, and flip the place either as tenancies in common or to another speculator.
The problem with owner-move-in evictions is simple: Nobody ever checks. The tenant is forced out, the landlord (in many cases) never moves in a relative and rents the place out at a much higher price … and unless the tenant does an investigation and reports the cheater, nothing ever happens.
Lurie could direct the Rent Board to hire ten investigators, who would visit every OMI property after three months, six months, and a year, determine if a relative is truly living there, and prosecute landlords who used fraudulent means to get rid of a tenant. The supes could pass a law mandating that a tenant evicted for illegal reasons has the right to move back at the old rent.
The Ellis Act is tougher. Former Sup. David Campos managed to pass legislation requiring that landlords who use the law pay every evicted tenant fair compensation, but the landlords sued and the courts sided with them.
But the real motivation for these evictions is speculative cash. So maybe the city could increase (dramatically) transfer taxes for buildings that are sold within two years of an Ellis Eviction. That would include TIC sales.
The money could be used to help the displaced tenants afford rent in a new apartment.
Would that stand up in court? We’ll never know unless we try.
If this were a real emergency, the mayor would take real action to address it.
Sup. Jackie Fielder has a measure that would help tenants avoid evictions, and it’s at the Land Use and Transportation Committee Monday/5. The measure would ban evictions if a tenant is less than a month behind on the rent—in other words, if the tenant has paid most of the month’s rent, but not all of it. These are the classic situations where a struggling renter is trying to keep up but has fallen just a little behind, and is working to resolve the situation. (If Lurie funded rent relief, this wouldn’t be a problem.)
To no surprise, the San Francisco Apartment Association is opposed.
The LUT committee is made up of Sups. Myrna Melgar, Chyanne Chen, and Matt Dorsey. The meeting starts at 1:30 pm.
