Mission Local is publishing campaign dispatches for each of the major contenders in the mayor’s race, alternating among candidates weekly until November. This week: Ahsha Safaí. Read earlier dispatches here.
It was classic summer San Francisco weather in the Excelsior on Sunday — gray and foggy with gusts of wind every so often.
It may not be the ideal weather for campaigning, or any outdoor activities for that matter, but one could find traces of virtually every single important candidate at the Sunday Streets event on Mission Street.
Volunteers held signs from major mayoral campaigns. District 11 supervisorial candidates set up their booths. Also making appearances were District Attorney candidate Ryan Khojasteh, Sheriff Paul Miyamoto for Sheriff and school board candidate Laurance Lee.
Ahsha Safaí, the District 11 supervisor and mayoral candidate, moved among others competing for attention from residents walking down Mission Street between Avalon and Geneva streets with their bikes, strollers or dogs.
In a navy jacket and white Adidas sneakers — a casual turn for the often suited-up supervisor and candidate — Safaí walked to the event from his house after dropping off his daughter at a two-week summer camp in the East Bay.
Along the seven blocks of activities on Mission Street, it was convenient for Safaí to point out his achievements as District 11 supervisor.
“This was a funeral home,” said Safaí, pointing to a newly sprouted housing complex next to the Safeway at France Avenue.
“Originally it was proposed for about 90, 95 units, but we got it up to 130 units. Then we got a free health clinic at the bottom,” Safaí said. “I’m very, very proud of that.”
He kept walking. “You see this building coming up?” Safaí pointed to a housing project next to the Mission Child Care Consortium. It used to be a one-story commercial space, he said. Under the Home-SF program Safaí co-sponsored, it added additional height in exchange for hitting 25 percent affordability.
Sometimes an achievement walks up to Safaí, unprovoked.
“Ahsha Safaí! Ahsha Safaí!” A young man, Harold, in a bucket hat, sunglasses and a North Face puffer vest walks up to Safaí, yelling his name from a distance.
He knew Safaí as someone who helped raise money for high school kids to go to Washington, D.C. some 15 years ago.
“That’s the first time I’ve been on a plane! After that I went to South America. I went to Europe. I went to Hawaii,” Harold said. Harold seemed to be a man who says everything with exclamation points. “You told me anything is possible in the Excelsior!”
He took a picture with Safaí, even though his phone battery was at 1 percent. Harold didn’t say yes to a window sign though — he was on his way to a party.
But it wasn’t all love and support, even from Safaí’s own district.
“What are you gonna do about the building on Russia and Mission?” Aristide Cisneros stopped Safaí and asked. He did not greet him, seeming upset. “They have been there for years, for f—g years. What are you going to do about it?”
The building in question is 4801 Mission St., an apartment building that seemed almost finished but has remained that way for years.
It obtained its planning permit in 2008 and has changed hands multiple times since then, documents show. Neighbors complain on social media that it is usually full of trash and graffiti, becoming an eyesore.
Safaí, to his defense, said he had reached out to Public Works and Department of Building Inspection many times. He called the architects recently, who told him that because of a shared garage with the adjacent building, they are coordinating the final work on the sidewalk to “get signed off once and for all.”
It was unclear how long it would take, yet Safaí reassured his interlocutor: “I want to see that project done before I leave office, which is another six months.”
For Cisneros, who works at Catholic Charities with homeless families, it pained him to see a property like this sitting vacant, while he had to turn unsheltered families with little kids away because there’s no place for them to stay.
At the Excelsior Sunday Streets, Safaí’s interactions skewed more welcoming than dismissive. He hugged longtime residents and supporters. He spoke in Spanish with a vendor family who was packing up for the day, and ending up giving out multiple window signs and a possible field job for the vendor’s son. He sat down at Korner Store, a Korean bar and restaurant for some Yuzu Jalapeño boneless chicken, chatting with the owner who appreciates him for supporting her business.
The welcome he received here, though, might not extend to other neighborhoods in the city. And Safaí knows that well.
“If this were any indication of the mayor’s race, I would have it locked up,” Safaí said to a resident, with both bursting out laughing. “This is my neighborhood. If I’m not winning here, I have no business running.”
