San Francisco Sees Competing Proposals to Reform 'Byzantine' City Commissions

A billionaire-backed moderate political advocacy group said it gathered enough signatures to put a measure on the November ballot that would overhaul local government commissions and give the mayor more power.

It’s the latest ballot measure attempt by TogetherSF Action, which in May withdrew another measure specifically aimed at increasing mayoral authority and restricting commissions after it appeared headed for defeat. The announcement also comes as the number of commissions in San Francisco has swelled to more than 100, “which is significantly more than the commission count in larger peer cities and counties in California,” according to a recent San Francisco Civil Grand Jury Report (PDF).

“There is no rhyme or reason on what powers commissions have,” TogetherSF Action Founder and CEO Kanishka Cheng said. “It’s become its own complicated bureaucracy that was intended to be a way to have transparency and oversight and has really fallen short in that effort.”

Such oversight bodies were first created in San Francisco in 1898 to provide accountability and greater participation in government. However, critics say the current commission system has grown ineffective and stymies change.

The group behind the ballot measure has come under increased scrutiny for its close ties to mayoral candidate Mark Farrell. A recent debate hosted by TogetherSF Action was canceled after multiple candidates dropped out, claiming Farrell, a former supervisor and appointed mayor, is too involved with the group.

However, TogetherSF’s ballot measure is not the only attempt to declutter the city’s commissions.

In May, Board of Supervisors President Aaron Peskin, who is running for mayor, proposed a competing measure to establish a process for reforming the commission system by first creating a task force to recommend improvements and developing a charter amendment based on those recommendations.

“This is commission reform done right, in the light of day, with public and expert input,” Peskin told KQED. “Our commission system has evolved over the decades, and there is room to make it more effective and responsive. There are bodies that are no longer needed and could be consolidated. But this should be done with public input. There are many commissions that are remarkably important and effective.”

Peskin’s proposal has been in the works for over a year, he said and would require public input on the charter amendment itself.

Meanwhile, if passed by voters, the TogetherSF ballot measure, called the Cut the Dysfunctional Bureaucracy Initiative, would amend the city’s charter and include slashing the number of commissions by nearly half and capping the total at 65. It would also create a short-term task force to oversee the consolidation of the commissions.

It would also give the mayor more powers to remove appointed department heads and allow appointed authorities to directly hire and remove their commissioners. And it requires each commission to be evaluated every 10 years.

According to a report by the Rose Institute of State and Local Government at Claremont McKenna College that TogetherSF commissioned, San Francisco has a total of 130 advisory committees and commissions, including state-mandated advisory boards, compared to 37 in Oakland, 39 in San José and 49 in Los Angeles. Outside of California, San Francisco still had more commissions than most major metro areas, except for Denver, Colorado, which also has 130 commissions, according to the report.

Supporters of Peskin’s proposal argue the commissions play a critical role in providing government transparency accountability. Margaret Brodkin helped create the city’s Department of Children, Youth and Their Families and sits on the Juvenile Probation Commission.

“This measure takes a sledgehammer to a very important part of the governance of San Francisco that has taken years to put in place,” Brodkin told KQED. “This is backwards, just the process of it is so appalling and a case example of how not to make public policy.”

Mayor London Breed, along with Supervisors Catherine Stefani, Matt Dorsey and Joel Engardio, has endorsed support for TogetherSF’s latest ballot measure.

“Petty and performative politics have created excessive bureaucracy and commissions that must be fixed,” said state Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), who also came out in support of the ballot measure. “As a member of the Board of Supervisors, I witnessed firsthand the unnecessary roadblocks and delays created by our byzantine governance structure.”