Peskin Passes the Baton
By Luke Thomas
July 2, 2008
District 3 Supervisor and Board President Aaron Peskin yesterday delivered a passing of the baton speech to a new crop of candidates vying to replace him in November.
“The future of this town is in all of our hands,” Peskin said to an audience of Harvey Milk Club members during a candidates forum held at the LGBT Center in San Francisco. “As District 3 goes, so goes San Francisco.”
Peskin discussed why he decided to run for public office, crediting Supervisor Tom Ammiano’s urging of him to run for the Democratic County Central Committee (DCCC).
“The year was 2000 and the streets were being paved with gold,” Peskin said, “and all of our friends were getting kicked out of their apartments and out of this town. And we had one of the most incredible, most powerful, omnipotent chief executives Willie Brown… a once or twice in a century event started brewing.”
After winning a seat on the DCCC, Peskin said he “stupidly” ran for District Supervisor in 2000, a seat he went on to win.
“We kicked the bums out,” Peskin said referring to the incumbents that were ousted in 2000. “It was actually a very profound thing, because the face of San Francisco was changing, the diversity that we love was changing… we were losing the soul of this city.”
Peskin said that he believes District 3 is “swing district” and expressed a hope that his replacement remained progressive on affordable housing and revenue issues, as well as supporting progressive measures on the November ballot related to payroll tax, real estate transfer tax, preservation of the 911 fee, and maintaining San Francisco General Hospital as “the crown jewel in the City and County of San Francisco.”
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It’s unfortunate that David Chiu couldn’t be more forthright about who he will support for head of the DCCC. I wonder if this has anything to do with the fact that Scott Wiener appointed him to the DCCC and has endorsed him for Supervisor. If it really boils down to this, then I question whether I should have donated money to David’s campaign.
As Marc has pointed out, there is a major problem when politicians base important decisions more on personal relationships and patronage rather then what is right. I’d still vote for him, though.
This race was Chiu’s to lose and it looks like he is doing a good job of it.