Examples of the Pay-to-play System

Before the public campaign financing program went into effect in 2002, the influence of pay-to-play politics in San Francisco was well documented in the local print media. It was a system that cost the city tens of millions of dollars in corrupt contracts and gave unfair influence to campaign donors. It reduced the faith of citizens in the government and hurt our democracy.

Fortunately, due to our work, mayoral and Board of Supervisors elections now have a system of partial public financing in place, though we still have a long way to go. Below is a small sampling of some of the scandals involving pay-to-play politics before these programs were implemented.

In all the examples below, those involved in corrupt practices, and who went unpunished in almost every case, were contributors to the politicians who were supposed to be regulating them.


Gusher of 'soft money' a bonanza for former S.F. mayor

Lance Williams, Chuck Finnie, 5/2/2001

"...In 1999, while Forest City Enterprises was angling for a lucrative development deal, 13 company executives donated $500 each to former Mayor Willie Brown's re-election campaign, the most they were allowed to give under the city's campaign-finance law.

Then Forest City pumped $50,000 in unregulated "soft money" into a political action committee that was electioneering for Brown. Public records show the company also donated $10,000 to help fund Brown's 1999 Summit for Women, a civic event that provided the mayor a showcase during the campaign.

A year later, with Brown re-elected, Forest City's plan to develop the old Emporium department store into a downtown hotel and shopping complex featuring Bloomingdale's got its own financial boost: a $27 million subsidy from the mayor-appointed Redevelopment Agency board..."


The Making of a Political Insider

Lance Williams, Vanessa Hua, Bill Wallace, San Francisco Chronicle, 8/15/2004

"...An immigrant who became a multimillionaire from real estate deals on the city's west side, she contributed $274,712 to the campaigns of Mayor Willie Brown, Secretary of State Kevin Shelley and many other politicians while raising tens of thousands more to benefit the causes and candidates she favored...

In response to her aggressive fund raising, critics say, the politicians provided many benefits to Julie Lee, 57, a Sunset District real estate agent and president of the city's Housing Authority Commission.

Insider access at City Hall. Fast-track approval of her zoning and building permits. Grants and contracts totaling $698,998 for a new Sunset District community center she promoted but never built. Government jobs for her son, Andrew, a former rapper whom Lee promoted as a budding political star...."


S.F. panel kills contract that would have paid $32 million to mayor's fundraiser

Chuck Finnie and Lance Williams, San Francisco Chronicle, 11/21/2000

"A Board of Supervisors committee pulled the plug on a controversial $32 million airport contract involving a company formed by a friend and political fund-raiser for Mayor Willie Brown..."


Donations flowed to key state officials in deal for S.F. piers

Cecilia M. Vega, San Francisco Chronicle, 6/25/2000

"A company that sought state approval for a lucrative development deal on the San Francisco waterfront contributed tens of thousands of dollars to the campaigns of politicians who held the fate of the project in their hands, records show.

..The contributions fall within the legal limits of state campaign finance laws, and the Virginia company said they were part of a legitimate strategy to win influence in California. Some political watchdogs, however, said they created the appearance of impropriety.

"In a sense, it's legalized bribery," said Bob Stern, who helped draft the state's Political Reform Act of 1974 and now heads a reform group, the Center for Governmental Studies. "They expect that their money will get them something..."


Bechtel's $45 million screw job

Savannah Blackwell, San Francisco Bay Guardian, 9/12/2001

"...Out of nearly $8 million the PUC has agreed to pay Bechtel for its first year of work, at least $5 million is a complete and total waste of money, senior-level PUC employees say. In some cases the waste is astonishing: for instance, Bechtel took a city database of projects, resorted the information, transformed the data into a different format – and sold it back to the city for nearly $500,000.

...Until very recently, the PUC didn't challenge any of Bechtel's expenses: 'The word from the top was not to question anything Bechtel did,' one PUC staffer, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity, told us..."


Behind FBI Probe of S.F. Contracts
Allegations of cronyism, bribery that undercut minorities, women

Yumi Wilson, San Francisco Chronicle, 8/20/1999

"...Several minority contractors say that an old-boy network made up mostly of large white-owned firms has found some ingenious ways to circumvent the city's affirmative action requirements in winning lucrative contracts.

...Some believe that the investigation could lead all the way up to Mayor Willie Brown, who appoints members of the Human Rights Commission and has been linked to several African American contractors named in connection with the probe..."


Donations to Shelley Smell Like Budget Pork Gone Bad

By George Skelton, Capitol Journal

"In 2000, when the state treasury was overflowing with a $12-billion surplus, then-Assembly Majority Leader Shelley (D-San Francisco) snagged a $500,000 grant for the San Francisco Neighbors Resource Center to help build a community center.

Like most budget pork, the grant was handled by the state parks department, which routinely wrote the nonprofit center a check after holding back its standard 1.5% "administrative fee." That's supposed to cover auditing.

The project was never built. But the San Francisco Chronicle reported on Aug. 8 that the nonprofit - run by political player Julie Lee - paid $108,000 for construction-related services to four people and companies. Shortly afterward, these check recipients contributed roughly similar dollar amounts to Shelley's 2002 campaign for secretary of state..."


How S.F.'s mayor built a city based on 'juice' politics

Lance Williams and Chuck Finnie, San Francisco Chronicle, 4/29/2001

"...But among the 3,000 supporters who packed Yerba Buena Gardens for his January 1996 inauguration were some whose dreams were far more personal.

They were lawyers, lobbyists, campaign donors and political players -- Brown's "juice clientele," as one state legislator described them at the time - - the mayor's cronies, as they came to be known.

These insiders would form the core of Willie Brown Inc., a Sacramento-style political machine in which influence with the mayor has been the trump card in quests for hundreds of millions of dollars in contracts, land deals, favorable regulatory rulings and jobs..."


San Francisco says it was defrauded by construction giant Tutor-Saliba, but a whistle-blower charges that city officials share the blame

A.C. Thompson, San Francisco Bay Guardian, 12/24/2003

"...The City Attorney's Office is seeking $30 million, plus punitive damages, and a court order barring the company from working on any city-funded San Francisco public works jobs in the future.

According to Herrera's 56-page legal complaint, the Los Angeles County-based firm, which has ties to outgoing mayor Willie Brown and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, submitted "false and inflated pay applications to Airport," cooked its books "to hide its grossly inflated and fraudulent profits," and ran roughshod over the city's affirmative action system, which sets aside public works contracts for minority- and women-owned businesses..."


Time and again, Brown's allies win the bid - Many contractors have 'juice' with mayor -- critics say it's no coincidence

Lance Williams, San Francisco Chronicle, 05/01/01

"Not long after San Francisco acquired Treasure Island, a development firm called Treasure Island Enterprises pitched the city on a deal to build and run a 400-slip marina on the decommissioned U.S. Navy base.

The problem was that two other companies also submitted bids, and, according to a city budget analyst, their proposals would pay the city $1 million more than the Treasure Island Enterprises proposal over the life of the lease.

But Treasure Island Enterprises had something the other bidders lacked: "juice" with Mayor Willie Brown…

…Time and again, they say, business interests that have influence with the mayor -- obtained via personal relationship, political loyalty or campaign donations -- have won lucrative contracts and development deals worth hundreds of millions of public dollars…"

 



 
Campaign contributions per resident in the 2003 S.F. Mayoral Race
(Organized by zip code)




Note: The darker areas in the upper-right area of the map include the financial district, South Beach, and China Basin, areas with large amounts of big business and/or real estate development.