4:30 PM: The San Francisco Board of Supervisors today re-elected David Chiu as president of the board.
Chiu, 40, was re-elected to the position this afternoon in an 8-3 vote. The board president serves a two-year term and is charged with making committee chair and member appointments and running meetings of the full board.
Four new members were sworn in to the city’s 11-member legislative body today: Mark Farrell from District 2, Jane Kim from District 6, Scott Wiener from District 8, and Malia Cohen from District 10.
Supervisor Carmen Chu from District 4 was sworn in to a second term.
Chiu used his re-election as a call to action for the new board, which will have to work with interim mayor Ed Lee–whom the board is expected to approve Tuesday–in dealing with a budget deficit estimated at nearly $400 million. The city is also facing ballooning pension and health care benefits for city workers.
“We need to figure out fast how to do this,” Chiu said.
Chiu said the new board cannot afford to simply take up positions opposing the policies that come out of the mayor’s office.
“None of us were voted into this office to take positions,” he said. “We were voted into this office to get things done.”
Chiu is considered among the board’s progressive members but as board president, worked with moderate Mayor Gavin Newsom on a number of issues.
He pledged today to try to build consensus among the differing opinions that may arise on the board and asked board members to work to “carry out our shared progressive values.”
Chiu had been nominated by Kim, who called him “an effective bridge-builder” and an “experienced leader.”
Supervisor John Avalos, considered to be among the board’s more progressive members, had challenged Chiu for board president, but in the end he only had three of the six votes needed to win.
Supervisor Sean Elsbernd, a moderate with considerable budget experience who has at times clashed with the progressive-dominated board, bowed out after the first round of voting, having received four votes.
Elsbernd, the board’s senior member, warned that he had seen discord develop in prior drawn-out elections for board president that had lingered throughout the president’s term.
He said his decision to step aside after one round of voting was in the spirit of collaboration and “setting aside personal ambition and really focusing on why we are here.”
Wiener and Farrell had initially voted for Elsbernd, and Kim and Cohen for Chiu. All four ultimately voted for Chiu.
“I am really touched by what Supervisor Elsbernd did,” Chiu told reporters after the meeting. “It was a little unexpected.”
In 2010, the city closed a $483 million deficit. Chiu warned this year’s budget situation was even more dire because the city would not receive federal stimulus money and likely would not be able to raise fees to help trim the deficit, as it had already done last year.
“We are going to be looking at very basic services,” including policing, fire, public health and social services, Chiu said. “It’s going to be very difficult, I don’t want to mince words about that.”
1:26 PM: The San Francisco Board of Supervisors today reappointed David Chiu as president of the board.
Chiu was reappointed to the position this afternoon in an 8-3 vote. The board president is charged with making committee chair and member appointments and running meetings of the full board.
Four new members were sworn in to the city’s 11-member legislative body today: Mark Farrell from District 2, Jane Kim from District 6, Scott Wiener from District 8, and Malia Cohen from District 10.
Supervisor Carmen Chu from District 4 was sworn in to a second term.
Ari Burack, Bay City News
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