While the stories are like this Han Li’s last in SF Standard While it provides a nice overview of Propositions D and E, what is sorely missing is context – why is TogetherSF spending close to $10 million to pass a bureaucratic reform measure? Here’s a hint: It’s not about bureaucracy.

Last summer, the U.S. Supreme Court, in a completely partisan vote, gave the American president nearly unlimited power. Supporters of Proposition D are now trying to do something similar in San Francisco by trying to take away the tools we use to check executive power.

TogetherSF is working on a six-year plan to take over the San Francisco government from top to bottom, according to internal TogetherSF documents leaked by The Phoenix Project in September. The plan is twofold: get their candidates elected to open seats and pass ballot measures that would fundamentally reshape the power structure of San Francisco government. Proposition D enters the second part with another charter change that would move precinct-based elections citywide. Combined, these changes will effectively consolidate San Francisco’s power at the top.

Democracy, whether in a country like the United States or a city like San Francisco, is based on a handful of basic principles. One of these principles is responsibility. A government or a chief executive who cannot be held accountable to its citizens can never be fully democratic. For decades, San Francisco has held its government and mayor accountable through both the Board of Supervisors and healthy commissions that exercise a form of soft oversight over executive agencies.

Proposition D is pitched by its wealthy donors as being about eliminating bureaucracy and red tape, but this is misleading. Proposition D is about reducing accountability and therefore democracy in our city.

He faces a very competitive race for mayor of San Francisco. Among the leading candidates is a conservative financier who has benefited from TogetherSF’s support and whose opponents have dubbed him the MAGA Brand. Another candidate was the leader of progressive San Francisco for a generation. Although Mark Farrell, Aaron Peskin, or other leading candidates like incumbent London Mayor Breed or billionaire Daniel Lurie win this divisive race, supporters of the other candidates know the mayor will be held accountable and his authority limited by commissions and laws. Supervisory Board. This information means that all groups will continue to have a say in city government. Another name for this is democracy.

Shared power can sometimes be time-consuming and complicated, but it’s better than a regular system that gives too much power to the mayor, especially at a time when unprecedented amounts of money are flowing into politics.

These tens of millions of dollars are alarming not just to so-called “progressives,” but to all San Francisco residents who believe their government should be open and accountable to community interests. San Francisco has had a tug-of-war between downtown corporate interests and organized neighborhood residents for nearly 150 years. These fights defined both the 1932 City Charter, which radically consolidated power in the hands of elites, and the 1976 Charter Amendments, which introduced district elections for supervisors and shifted some power back to neighborhoods.

TogetherSF, as a political pressure group, is more than a new player in this struggle. Under the guidance of corporate billionaire backers like co-founder, board member and top funder Michael Moritz, TogetherSF and similar organizations like Neighbors for a Better San Francisco and GrowSF are bringing more money to downtown, corporate and real estate interest than ever before. They also understand that they have little chance of winning as long as San Francisco’s democracy remains strong, so they are trying to change the rules of the game.

I hope and believe that San Franciscans will succeed in this new iteration of the corporate power grab.

Jeremy Mack is the managing director of The Phoenix Project.