News and updates

On Wednesday, January 22nd, DSA SF voted to endorse Jackie Fielder for State Senate. Jackie is a longtime DSA SF member and managed our chapter-endorsed and successful No on H campaign, which defeated a dangerous use-of-force policy by the Police Officers Association despite being outspent five-to-one. Now, Jackie is running against none other than Scott Wiener. There will be a primary in March, and the top-two vote getters — regardless of party affiliation — will face off in the general election.

Jackie is an Indigenous (Two Kettle Lakota and Hidatsa), Mexicana, and queer educator and organizer. She was raised by a single working-class mother in an under-resourced community, graduated from California public schools, and earned a place at Stanford University. After earning a BA in Public Policy then a Masters in Sociology, Jackie joined the fight of her relatives and their allies against the Dakota Access Pipeline in her ancestral territories, and organized internationally for Indigenous Rights and Climate Justice.

That battle led her back to San Francisco with a vision to take on the banking industry. As the co-founder and lead organizer of the San Francisco Public Bank Coalition, Jackie took on Wall Street lobbyists to pass statewide legislation legalizing public banking and won sponsorship from a veto-proof supermajority to sponsor a local ordinance to create the first municipal bank in the country. This will allow San Francisco to divest our multi-billion dollar budget from destructive ventures like fossil fuel companies and private prisons, in favor of investment for public goods, such as infrastructure and affordable housing.

After successfully running the DSA campaign to defeat the Police Officers Association, Jackie was tapped by Black Lives Matter co-founder, Alicia Garza to take over her Race, Women, and Class course at SF State.

Jackie’s opponent has consistently contradicted the voters of his own district and the work of DSA SF. During the No on H campaign Jackie managed, Weiner sided with the Police Officers Association and Republican Party, both of whom were shot down by more than 60% of San Francisco voters. Later that year, he opposed another DSA SF-supported effort to pass a small tax on the biggest corporations to fund housing and services for our unhoused neighbors (Our City Our Home). In contrast, Jackie has proposed a detailed, socialist alternative in California Homes for All, as well as a comprehensive platform for Economic and Social Justice, and a Green New Deal for California.

Jackie represents a new wave of openly democratic socialists, both locally and across the country, running and winning against the status quo. Our movement is succeeding, and we need to keep elevating our cause to the highest seats of power.

In addition to our endorsement, Jackie has been endorsed by Supervisor Dean Preston, Supervisor Gordon Mar, the SF Tenants Union, the California Teachers Association, the United Educators of San Francisco, a majority of the Board of Education, ILWU Norcal District Council, #BLM co-founder Alicia Garza, among others.

Join the movement and sign up online. If you are able, make a donation here so Jackie can continue paying her DSA staff a living wage!

San Francisco is considering legislation which will disincentivize gas infrastructure in new building developments. At stake are at least 72,000 new residential units and numerous commercial buildings. This legislation follows similar “reach codes” adopted by San Jose and other Bay Area cities. Ultimately, the City will need to adopt a separate gas ban ordinance as soon as possible to comprehensively halt the expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure for new projects, followed by an equitable plan to retrofit all existing buildings.

The recent decision to ban natural gas in Berkeley and other cities was based on three major factors: decarbonization, health and safety, and the economics of electrification. Natural gas leaks and combustion represents approximately 35% of San Francisco’s greenhouse gas emissions. While gas stoves are often considered a luxury, the health impacts of burning methane are significant. Burning natural gas indoors releases carbon monoxide, formaldehyde, and other pollutants in confined spaces. Gas combustion also pollutes outdoor air. 

In September, DSA SF’s Ecosocialist Committee signed on to a letter to the Mayor and Board of Supervisors outlining the reasons to ban natural gas in new buildings. Despite the fact that fully electric units are cheaper to build, the majority of developers want to keep gas as a luxury selling point, or simply because they aren’t familiar with all-electric design.

 While the details of a Berkeley-style gas ban ordinance are being debated at City Hall, the crucial point which cannot be ceded is that in the interim any new developments featuring gas must not only be more efficient than code, but also be electric-ready, i.e. feature sufficient electrical capacity, conduit and wiring to facilitate future electrification. Such a provision would simplify electrification retrofits and be a major incentive for developers to choose all-electric infrastructure before a full ban can be enacted.

The vast majority of new buildings in the construction pipeline will feature fossil fuel infrastructure unless we intervene now. Without action, we could see an increase of up to 18% in fossil fuel infrastructure in the building sector. This increase complicates the investment that the SF Department of the Environment says we need to retrofit the existing stock of fossil fuel units at a rate of 3% per year. Why approve obsolete new fossil fuel buildings if we know they need to be all-electric, if not electric-ready, today?

Join us at the Board of Supervisors Land Use and Transportation Committee meeting on December 9, 1:30 PM at 1 Dr. Carlton B. Goodlett Place, Legislative Chamber, Room 250 to pressure the Board to amend the reach code ordinance to include an electric-ready provision and ban gas in new buildings to meet San Francisco’s climate goals.

You may also email your comments before the meeting (File #190974 in the subject line) to Erica Major, Clerk of the Committee: erica.major@sfgov.org. Please also sign the petition to ban gas in SF: https://sfgasban.org/. 

Interested in joining the Ecosocialist Committee? Email ecosocialist@dsasf.org.

During  the General Meeting on November 20th, DSA SF passed the resolution to work on the Bernie 2020 primary campaign. DSA SF will coordinate with the local Bernie 2020 campaign to support him leading up to the March 3, 2020 California Democratic primary. DSA SF aims to use Bernie’s campaign to reach out to local Bernie supporters, grow membership, and spread support for a socialist form of government. 

The resolution recognizes that “Bernie calls for policies in line with DSA SF’s values, including those that directly tackle climate change, massive healthcare costs, high housing costs, mass incarceration, corporate greed, rising right-wing oligarchy, the war on drugs, and so much more.” All other candidates are vocal capitalists, while Bernie is a self-proclaimed Democratic Socialist. 

Working with the local campaign, DSA SF will host Bernie 2020 events and have contingents at official Bernie 2020 events, including debate watch parties, canvasses, and phone banks. DSA SF will also connect the Bernie 2020 campaign with our endorsed candidates in down-ballot races in 2019 and 2020, any endorsed state propositions or local measures, and any other nationwide campaigns (e.g. Medicare for All). California is the largest state in the country with a primary election on Super Tuesday, making the outcome potentially decisive in determining the nomination. 

In order to assess the impact of the endorsement and coordination, DSA SF will create a series of five (5) metrics, including hard targets surrounding chapter membership growth, engagement of current members, diversity of representation from our working groups and committees, and DSA name recognition in San Francisco. 

DSA SF will determine these metrics at the Electoral Committee meeting on Tuesday, December 3, 2019 during its regular meeting at 7:00 p.m. in the DSA SF office, located at 350 Alabama Street, San Francisco, CA. Interested members and prospective DSA SF members are welcome to come and participate (although non-members cannot vote). Once metrics are selected, the Electoral Committee and the campaign can pinpoint key activities to serve the dual goals of supporting Sanders and growing membership. 

Please reach out to the Electoral Committee at electoral@dsasf.org to get more involved.

After several days of counting votes and waiting for a concession in a close race, DSA SF member Dean Preston will officially become District 5’s next Supervisor. 

Preston, nicknamed “Extreme Dean” by his opposition, will join the Board of Supervisors on behalf of District 5 after unseating incumbent Vallie Brown. Preston ran on a platform to fight for more affordable housing and free MUNI. He also vowed to oppose homeless sweeps, rogue landlords, and mass incarceration. DSA SF endorsed Preston’s campaign early on, and DSA SF comrades showed up en masse to canvass for Preston throughout his campaign.  

Preston began his career as an attorney representing victims of police misconduct before moving on to full time housing work. Preston was a staff attorney for the Tenderloin Housing Clinic in San Francisco, where he defended tenants against evictions, substandard conditions, and fought for rent control. In 2008, he founded Tenants Together, a statewide tenants’ rights organization. Last year, Preston was one of the principal architects and advocates of San Francisco’s Proposition F. Proposition F passed last year, guaranteeing all San Franciscans facing eviction the right to counsel. He also provided seed funding and support for Proposition C, which secured funding to double housing and mental health care for our houseless population. Brown conceded the race to Preston on November 14. 

Asked about the incredible win in the District 5 race, Preston’s campaign manager and DSA SF comrade Jen Snyder stated: 

“We are so happy to have ran an unapologetically Democratic Socialist campaign and have been victorious. Dean called himself a Democratic Socialist in the intro of every single debate and forum. Most of our staff is DSA, and our platform is centered around the democratization of resources, universal rights, and equal access to power. The fact we won without ever compromising or telling voters anything but the honest truth about our platform has made us so hopeful for what we can do in the future. This campaign was a branch and continuation of so many other DSA SF projects, and that’s what it will continue to be in City Hall.”

Want to be part of the movement? Join the revolution today!

On Tuesday, October 22, members of DSASF’s EcoSocialist committee gathered at the California Public Utilities Commission’s (CPUC) offices in San Francisco. Members, who were there with the Utility Justice Campaign, rallied not only to criticize PG&E’s shutoffs, but also to demand accountability from PG&E for its actions in causing last year’s deadly wildfires. At the rally, members voiced opposition for the proposed California law, AB 1054, which would authorize a $21 billion fund to shield PG&E and other major California utilities from wildfire costs. The wildfire fund would be bankrolled by a mandatory surcharge on PG&E customers’ bills. TheEcoSocialist committee and other Utility Justice Campaign members oppose the charge as a bailout plan for PG&E.

During the rally, the group also called for a democratization of energy in California, via a community takeover and control of energy resources. According to the Utility Justice Campaign, the electricity shutoffs are not an inevitable consequence of climate change. Rather, they are a consequence of a utility like PG&E being a private company that places returns on shareholder value above the needs of its public ratepayers. The utility giant has been accused of continually deprioritizing maintenance of the vegetation around its power lines, as well as failing to invest in infrastructure, in order to maximize profits.

Members of the EcoSocialist committee also attended an October 24 CPUC meeting in Redding, California. After nearly two hours of public comments, the CPUC voted to approve the rate increase and AB 1054. Unfortunately, this means there is much work to be done to stop the bailout of PG&E. For those interested in joining the EcoSocialist committee in demanding community control over our natural resources and accountability from PG&E, you can reach the EcoSocialist committee at ecosocialist@dsasf.org. You can also learn more about DSASF and our many other active committees here.

Members of the San Francisco chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA-SF) will be doing a survival kit distribution to unhoused neighbors this Sunday, October 6 from 3pm to 6pm, beginning at our headquarters at 350 Alabama St #9, and continuing to our houseless neighbors across the city. The action was organized as a joint effort by the Homelessness Working Group as well as the Socialist Feminist Working Group within the organization, and each kit contains socks, food bars, water, and various hygienic items, including Maxi-pads for those who may need them.

According to Tiffany Chan, vice-chair of the DSA-SF Homelessness Working Group, “The solution to San Francisco’s homelessness crisis is housing, not criminalization. We demand an end to City Hall’s violence perpetrated towards our unhoused neighbors in the form of police brutality, sweeps, lack of adequate shelter, and hostile architecture. Our purpose with distributing survival supplies is to show solidarity with marginalized members of our community while fighting alongside them for housing as a human right.”

“In London Breed’s San Francisco, menstruation supplies are stolen from houseless people in sweeps; any feminist should be disgusted by this behavior. Socialist feminism stands for dignity for all, whether housed or unhoused.” according to Cara Hurtle, co-chair of DSA-SF’s Socialist Feminist Working Group.

As socialists, we stand in solidarity with and work with formerly and currently homeless folks to effect structural changes, incremental and deep, to address the homelessness crisis in a way that provides housing without strings attached and ends the criminalization of our unhoused neighbors, while providing mutual aid for immediate needs. The city chooses to respond to our housing crisis by forcing unhoused people to the margins and destroying their belongings, including IDs, medicine, as well as cherished photos and heirlooms. Our actions show that while the city takes, the community gives.

The Global Climate Strike upon us! Join us on Friday September 20th as a contingent in the Global Youth Climate March.

It’s no longer enough to wait for our politicians to act. As Greta Thunberg told Congress on Tuesday: “you’re not trying hard enough”. But we will. It’s time to strike. To shut the economy down again and again until radical action is taken.

San Franciscans understand the importance of our ecology. Nowhere does a large and influential urban center protect its land in such a hefty percentage. The nine county greater Bay Area has one of the most viable matrixes of park systems of the world. Our region remains one of the glowing bastions of the world in ecological protection and climate action. As citizens of the Bay Area, let’s show the world where our priorities are!

There is no Planet B. In a world of increasing human impact, the survival of all species, including ourselves, rely on our actions and our sacrifices. Join us now and forever in protecting the natural world that isn’t just ours. We must fight because it is a sanctuary for all living beings, both present and future.

March details:
Saturday, March 20th at 9 AM
Meet at the DSA SF office: 350 Alabama St.

Contact the Ecosocialist Committee, ecosocialist@dsasf.org for more details.