PULLING RANK ON PHIL: New San Francisco Assessor-Recorder Phil Ting won’t have time to settle in before facing Supervisor Gerardo Sandoval, in a special election this November. A loss would embarrass Mayor Gavin Newsom, who is already starting to refer to Ting as “San Francisco’s only citywide Chinese American elected official.” The battle-tested Sandoval has won re-election twice as supervisor, including last November under ranked choice voting. With RCV in play this November for Assessor-Recorder, Ting ironically will have to face the challenges of campaigning on RCV, a system his Asian Law Caucus advocated for and tried vainly to implement in the APA community.
WIN IF SANDOVAL WINS: It’s not all bad for Newsom if Sandoval wins. That creates an opportunity to appoint an Asian Pacific American for supervisor. That also increases the possibility for a Filipino American to run and win in Sandoval’s heavily APA 11th District (Excelsior, Ingleside and Outer Mission). … Picking another supervisor vote only helps Newsom, who has no majority to advance his agenda. As evidence: Two weeks ago Newsom flubbed the veto deadline on a Lawrence Lui waterfront hotel that supervisors scaled back and stymied. The vote showed the mayor had the 4 of 11 votes required for a veto of a locally-owned APA business: Michela Alioto-Pier, Bevan Dufty, Sean Elsbernd and Fiona Ma.
CHIU-ING HER OWN WORDS: Mayor’s deputy press spokesperson, Darlene Chiu, was in a weird position having run Ron Chun’s campaign for Assessor-Recorder in 2002 out of his law office. Chun was interviewed for the appointment, but Ting got the nod and Chiu issued the press release. … And now former Deputy Assessor Chun is joining Sandoval and Issac Wang in challenging Ting for the job.
AFTER MA: Ting’s appointment helps clear up the messy field for District 4 Supervisor’s race in November 2006. Ting had moved into the Sunset and taken papers out to run for the potential vacancy if incumbent Fiona Ma wins her March election for Assembly. Police Commissioner Doug Chan, along with Ma’s aide, Jaynry Mak, and former candidate/anti-utility bill hiker Ed Jew are all in the mix. … If Ting loses the election to retain his Assessor’s appointment, his showing in the heavily APA District 4 will be key to whether he rejoins the race to succeed supervisor Ma.
CIVIL RIGHTS VACUUM: With Chinese for Affirmative Action losing Brian Cheu and on its fourth director in less than 3 years, and Ting vacating ALC, that creates a major civil rights leadership vacuum. Both CAA and ALC are recovering from major changes in leadership, nasty internal fights over direction in the past few years. … The vacuum elevates the non-partisan Chinese American Voters Education Committee, where Executive Director David Lee became Newsom’s appointment to the Recreation and Park Commission. CAVEC’s board and staff already consist of Police Commissioner Chan, Jing Xu Lee (David’s wife) on the Status of Women Commission and Sup Ma. … CAVEC has been winning the argument against the CAA-ALC axis in demonstrating that ranked choice voting and local supervisor reapportionment have hurt APA representation. In 2000, 3 of 11 supervisors were APA and after the 2004 elections, only 1 is still supervisor.
Samson Wong can be reached at (415) 321-5886, faxed at (415) 397-7258 or e-mailed at swong@asianweek.com.