"This shows the problem of trying to build a movement around an individual,'' he said. "There was hope after (Supervisor Tom) Ammiano (ran for mayor in 1999), but the movement fell apart. Now with Matt leaving, unless he re-emerges in a different role, it will happen again.
"People are always more energized by individuals than by issues ... but it's a strategy that can't sustain itself.''
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/04/05/ PROGRESSIVE.TMP&nl=top
S.F. leftists warily ask if Newsom is for real His progressivism, Gonzalez's exit leave them adrift
John Wildermuth, Chronicle Political Writer Monday, April 5, 2004 San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom's surprising start -- and the surprise decision by Board of Supervisors President Matt Gonzalez not to run for re-election -- has left the city's most left-leaning activists wondering what to do next.
"Newsom has built up some real political capital on the left,'' said Rich DeLeon, a political science professor at San Francisco State University who has long written about the city's liberal activists. "A lot of progressives are slowly letting their guard down, since they were braced for problems based on Newsom's campaign (for mayor).''
Even the Green Party activist who served as spokesman for Gonzalez's mayoral campaign against Newsom gives the new mayor credit for his early moves.
"Gavin Newsom's stand on gay marriage made us all proud,'' said Ross Mirkarimi. "But it's early in his administration, and the jury is still out as to what will happen next.''
It has been a long, strange four-month trip for the city's progressive activists, who in December fell just 15,000 votes short of giving Gonzalez, a Green Party member and former public defender, a stunning victory over the more moderate Newsom, a millionaire businessman who was the choice of San Francisco's Democratic establishment.
The unexpectedly tight race fired up Gonzalez and his backers, who promised to be almost a government in exile rather than a loyal opposition. Supporters like Supervisor Gerardo Sandoval suggested that Gonzalez, as leader of the board's progressive majority, would hold the reins of power in the city.
"We didn't win, but we didn't lose, either,'' Gonzalez said in his election-night concession speech. "When Mayor Newsom is wrong, we'll be there to oppose him.''
The opposition wasn't long in coming.
"I was walking to my office on Dec. 10, the day after the election, when I saw my first 'Recall Newsom' poster,'' said Eric Jaye, one of the mayor's political advisers.
But after taking office in January, Newsom quickly demoted acting Police Chief Alex Fagan, fired some of former Mayor Willie Brown's more notorious political appointees, proposed a $150 million bond to build supportive housing for the homeless, and cracked down on crime and quality of life problems in the Bayview-Hunters Point neighborhood.
Then, in February, Newsom ordered the city to begin issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Suddenly even some of his loudest detractors, like the progressive-oriented Bay Guardian newspaper, found themselves reluctantly supporting the mayor.
The man who had been accused during the campaign of bringing a right-wing agenda to City Hall was now being called "the most liberal mayor in the United States'' by the London Telegraph.
That easing of election-year tension between Newsom and the city's progressives is showing in the mayor's improving popularity. After he collected 53 percent of the vote in the December runoff election, a mid-February survey by David Binder, a local Democratic pollster, showed Newsom with a 69 percent approval rating.
"Newsom has earned the respect of many progressives and liberals,'' Binder said. "He's caused a lot of his opponents to say, 'Let's take another look at this guy.' ''
The same progressive supervisors who planned last December to spend four years steamrolling the mayor and his newborn policies also know how to read a poll. As Newsom's numbers have soared, they've been less willing to scuffle publicly with the mayor. Instead, they've been happy to work with Newsom on popular issues like easing the homeless problem and improving the Bayview, and willing to disagree quietly on issues such as workforce housing.
Supervisors such as Sandoval, Aaron Peskin and Jake McGoldrick also are facing re-election in November and know that full-out opposition from an increasingly popular mayor would make their races a lot tougher.
Many of the city's progressive leaders don't know what to make of Newsom's populist leanings. They aren't sure whether he is operating from principle or politics when he repeats many of their own lines.
"The fear is that (Newsom is) building up some credibility on the progressive side, and then in a year or so the hammer will come down on groups like us,'' said Ted Gullicksen, executive director of the San Francisco Tenants Union.
What people are seeing now is the real Newsom, not the conservative straw man that was set up by his opponents and battered in the harsh back-and-forth of a typically contentious election campaign, Jaye said.
"Gavin Newsom isn't co-opting anyone's positions,'' he said. "Now he has an opportunity to communicate where he stands and what he believes with less distortion than in a campaign.
"He's able to let people take a look at his real views.''
According to studies by Binder, about 25 percent of San Francisco's voters call themselves progressives. These voters are younger, more ideological and farther to the left than the 30 percent of the city's voters who bill themselves as liberal. In December's mayoral election, the progressives went strongly for Gonzalez, while the liberals, who include many old-line Democrats, split their votes between Newsom and Gonzalez.
But the contest brought out thousands of new voters, many of them young, excited and anxious to work for the changes Gonzalez promised. Progressive activists were confident a charismatic leader like Gonzalez could keep those people involved and pave the way for future victories.
With Newsom's popularity on the upswing among liberals and progressives, however, Gonzalez couldn't have picked a worse time to pack his political bags.
Gonzalez refused to be interviewed, but friends said they tried fruitlessly to talk him out of leaving the board.
"Contrary to my advice, he decided not to run (in November), and I think that's a mistake,'' said Mirkarimi. "He understands what it is to build a movement, and he was riding high. I would like to see him continue.''
While Gonzalez made it clear that he was just leaving the Board of Supervisors and not getting out of politics entirely, that's easier said than done. As president of the board, Gonzalez is in the middle of San Francisco's political life, with both a voice and a vote in every controversy. As an out-of- office politician, it's hard to be anyone's rallying point.
"I expected to see (Gonzalez) organize, if not a machine, an effective, coherent organization for the left,'' said DeLeon, the San Francisco State professor. "There was a lot of hopefulness after the election, but there's now a sense this can all fall apart.''
It's disappointing to see, admitted Gullicksen, a longtime housing activist.
"This shows the problem of trying to build a movement around an individual,'' he said. "There was hope after (Supervisor Tom) Ammiano (ran for mayor in 1999), but the movement fell apart. Now with Matt leaving, unless he re-emerges in a different role, it will happen again.
"People are always more energized by individuals than by issues ... but it's a strategy that can't sustain itself.''
Despite their problems, San Francisco progressives aren't ready to concede the field to Newsom. The mayor angered Supervisor Chris Daly and tenant activists by vetoing legislation last month that would have banned demolition of large apartment buildings. He supported Proposition J, which would have eased the way for construction of housing aimed at families making more than $100,000 a year. And faced with the need to close a $350 million budget deficit, Newsom is going to have to make choices likely to anger people all over the city.
"It's hard to see how you pull off those hard decisions without making someone mad,'' Binder said.
"We appreciate all the attention he's paying to our neighborhood, but it has to have some substance,'' said Willie Ratcliff, publisher of the San Francisco Bay View newspaper and a Gonzalez supporter. "That's the measuring stick out here.''
Some of Gonzalez's backers also have started the Progressive Voter Project, designed to sign up voters on the left for the permanent absentee ballots that Newsom's campaign used so effectively last year. By working art openings, political talks and anti-war rallies, the group already has collected 2,000 absentee applications, said activist Richard Marquez, and hopes to have 15,000 for the supervisors' elections in November.
Grassroots efforts like that are part of the day-to-day task of doing what needs to be done to build a political movement, with or without a highly visible leader, Mirkarimi said.
"These are things we should have been doing for years,'' he added. "Politics is a long-distance race, and we have to keep looking ahead.''