In his first 100 days in office, San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie’s administration has already reorganized the way his office is structured, announced permit streamlining for housing and small businesses, and co-sponsored legislation to reduce costs for converting office buildings to housing and creating new nightlife venues downtown. What should he focus on next? SPUR’s new policy brief, The Next 100 Days: An urbanist decision-making framework for San Francisco’s new mayor aims to help the mayor and his administration set priorities and maintain momentum in the face of complex and evolving challenges.
Part of SPUR’s role is to articulate clear principles and goals for urban policymaking. We believe that a well-functioning city requires fast and reliable public transit, a strong employment base, diverse housing options, policies to prevent and prepare for climate change, and a nimble governance structure designed to solve emerging problems. We spoke to SPUR Chief of Policy Sujata Srivastava about how SPUR’s staff thought through their top priorities and principles for the new mayor and his administration.
This brief begins with a case for reforming the city’s government structure. How does this somewhat obscure topic affect the lives of San Franciscans?
San Francisco’s governance structure affects all of the programs and services the city provides. Over time, the system has gradually become more and more byzantine and redundant. The authority to make decisions is spread out across different offices, which means it takes months or even years to implement policy changes that would improve life for residents. When something goes wrong, the first response is often to create new rules to prevent it from happening again. But adding more and more layers of regulation actually makes it harder for staff and vendors to understand and follow the rules.
Instead of a rules-based system that seeks to prevent every possible misstep from happening, the city should move to a culture of trust-based accountability, making sure that the rules match up with the actual degree of risk. That way, the city can invest fewer resources in the process and more in achieving outcomes for San Franciscans. Rather than developing workarounds to rules, the city should shift its energy to making structural changes that reduce requirements and streamline processes.
As the mayor’s administration looks to revitalize downtown, what is the key idea you’d like them to keep in mind?
San Francisco needs to make strategic investments to bring more activity back downtown. So far, revitalization efforts have focused on specific types of employers, tenants, and projects. We would like to see the city develop financial tools and policy changes that would benefit everyone who lives or does business downtown. Given current budget constraints, the city should take a hard look at its current economic incentives. Will they be fiscally positive over the long run, or are they short-term solutions that may not provide long-term value? It’s also important to understand that Muni and BART are essential for downtown recovery. The mayor needs to be a vocal champion for state and regional efforts to identify new funding for transit.
Your suggestions for housing focus on changing zoning in the city’s western and northern neighborhoods. How does that support the city at large?
San Francisco needs more housing to bring costs down. In past decades, most new development has taken place in the eastern neighborhoods, where zoning changes have allowed higher-density buildings. Meanwhile, because the zoning there is restrictive, the wealthier western and northern parts of the city have not changed in decades and have very few affordable and workforce housing options. So these are the areas where there is the most opportunity to add housing. These areas also have a lot of the city’s higher-income neighborhoods and resources, including parks and schools. All California cities, including San Francisco, have a responsibility under the Fair Housing Act to update land use codes to address historic patterns of segregation. We are very happy the mayor has released a new zoning map that focuses on unlocking housing potential in San Francisco’s wealthier and lower-density residential neighborhoods. As the plan progresses through the Board of Supervisors, the city should keep the codes as simple as possible. The fewer bells and whistles included in the rezoning plan, the easier it will be for builders to use.
You emphasize the urgency to find additional funding for transit. Can’t transit agencies cut costs?
The cost of providing transit service has increased faster than revenue due to the rising cost of health care, electricity, policing, and crisis intervention. The transit funding emergency is immense, and there’s no one solution. The city will need to support strategies at the local, regional, and state levels for Muni and BART to continue meeting residents’ needs. Transit operators should keep looking for ways to reduce costs, but the magnitude of the deficit is a result of structural issues, and short-term efficiency measures won’t make enough of a dent. It's too late to suggest diet and exercise to someone who needs open-heart surgery. Right now, transit needs a significant injection of funding to stay alive.
The brief prioritizes both preparing for climate emergencies and preventing future climate change. Do you feel both are equally urgent?
Yes. Our approach to sustainability and resilience is to mitigate the climate change that can still be prevented and prepare for the change that is already underway, due to decades of past fossil fuel use. We also emphasize seismic resilience because the Bay Area is an earthquake-prone region, and SPUR was founded in response to the impacts of the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake.
Most people don’t think about disasters on a daily basis. But when a flood or earthquake happens, they quickly learn just how important retrofitting and preparation can be. Decision makers often focus on the cost of hazard mitigation and resilience measures — but disasters are much more expensive and disruptive than preparation. Furthermore, there are often energy cost savings for residents when building owners shift from gas-powered furnaces and water heaters to electric pumps. Tools like land use planning, building codes, and emergency response allow a city to go beyond what individuals can do by themselves to prevent damage and disruption.
Advancing these policies is urgent for the city to meet its climate, clean air, and resilience goals. In the long term, this shift will not only make San Francisco clean but also have the potential to reduce costs for residents and the broader community.