San Francisco’s Next Mayor Talks Local Focus While Trump Looms

Published Dec 13, 2024, 4:38 PM

As liberal-leaning cities gird for potential antagonism from the Trump administration, San Francisco’s incoming mayor Daniel Lurie is vowing to prioritize local issues over national political battles. He speaks with Bloomberg's Caroline Hyde. 

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Okay, so let's go to some of the necessary efficiencies. Let's call it you. So, you can't cut your way out of this, but you are doing a reorganization, particularly of your role in the administration. How does that look like? What does that achieve?

Yeah?

No, just to be clear, we can't only cut our way out of this, but we have to make sure that we get efficient We need our departments talking to each other, communicating, collaborating, making sure that we do get efficiencies across departments. We have fifty six different departments here in San Francisco that report up into one chief of staff. Yesterday, I announced that we are going to be changing the Office of the Mayor's governing structure. We're going to have four chiefs that will help organize and make sure that those departments are run more effectively, more efficiently, and that we cut out the waste.

Let's talk about the growth then. Is it about getting workers back in the offices five days a week. How do you galvanize people spending in the city.

Well, listen, I have said that my office and all the employees that I oversee at city Hall, we are going back five days a week. Now, I am not a mayor that is going to dictate to private industry what they should do.

I would, of course.

Encourage companies to come back as many days a week as possible, whether that's four or five days a week. We're going to be working with companies starting on January eighth to ask them to bring their employees back downtown. But that's incumbent on me then, to make sure that public safety is at the core of everything that we do here, especially in downtown, that we get people off the street that are suffering from mental health issues or drug addiction into the treatment.

That they need.

We need to be better for those that are suffering on our streets. Once we create the conditions, we believe that people.

Will want to be back downtown. That's what we need to do.

I'm here in your beautiful San Francisco office on the Pier Ferry Building. Is here when things are moving here in San Francisco, when the sun is shining here in the city, there is no better place to come to work than downtown San Francisco.

It hasn't been that way, but we will get back to it.

What's interesting is you have actually brought back tourists and that's almost akin to pre COVID levels. But why aren't hotel taxes back to where they used to be. How can you ensure that that part is running more efficiently, more effectively, more growth.

Well, it's a great, great point.

Tourism is our number one industry and we need to invite the tours back from Asia, from Europe. We have seen an uptick. Listen, San Francisco is on its way back. There's not a question in my mind. But we have to be inviting to people and we have to tell our story of safety and security for those that come here. The story is out there that you know San Francisco is down on its luck. We have to change that narrative and we will.

Jenerator.

AI has changed a lot of narratives. And you're like in Epicenter, how of you bringing on board Sam Altman, for example, open AI leader and you're having him advise you. What are some of his arguments for what you should be doing?

Well, Listen, Sam Altman has been great as a transition code chair. We are committed to leaning into being the home of AI. We have historic investments already here in San Francisco.

We're going to continue to lean.

In not only AI, not only technology, but really once again being the epicenter for business again. There is no better place to do business on the globe than San Francisco. When we're at our best, we have to get back to that. It does not have to be complicated. So this is what I'm calling CEOs around the country and saying, we want your business back here in San Francisco. We want you to bring your conferences here. But it's not just about business. It's about bringing our arts and culture back to San Francisco, because that's where people.

When people think of San Francisco, they.

Think of culture, they think that everything starts here. Yes, AI started here and we wanted to grow here, but we kind of want the best of everything coming back to San Francisco. Had a great conversation with Jamie Diamond a couple of weeks ago. We had a conversation with the NBA Conditioner Commissioner Adam Silver about the NBA All Star Game coming here in February.

We have so much to look forward to.

We just have to get that story out there, and that's what I plan to do.

I mean, you're someone who knows well how to make cultural events bound together, Big cultural movement benefit concert raise seventeen million dollars. You've done other philanthropic work, but you're also from a business dynasty of Levi and what parts of industry do you want to cultivate here? You just mentioned financial services, there, you mentioned sports, but it's got to be broader than that.

Absolutely, we are calling healthcare executives, biotech ai. We want real estate thinking that San Francisco is a place that they want to invest in again. Because when you get these business leaders back, what that tells me is that we get the small businesses back to San Francisco back thriving again. Our small businesses have been dying on the vine here in San Francisco for a variety of reasons, but most of on most of which we talked about earlier, and that is that people are not coming downtown like we'd like them to be.

We invite these companies back.

That's good for our small business community, it's good for our arts and culture institutions. It's a flywheel that we have to get going again. We're seeing green shoots and I'm telling you San Francisco is on its way back, and there is no better place to be if you are a big business or a small business than San Francisco.

I promise you that.

Do you think you can align the new administration from the White House on that as well? Because in the Mayor's budget summary it says that Trump's policies will have quote unknown future impacts.

Listen, you know the current mayor has put out a guidance to department heads. What I got elected on with a mandate was to get results for the people of San Francisco. It wasn't to you know, start talking about national politics. We have our own issues right here in San Francisco. They are solvable. That's what people elected me to do, and that's what I'm doing right now during this transition period, and I'm telling everyone here in San Francisco that I am going to be laser focused on making sure that we get our budget under control, that we grow our economy, that we keep people sick, and that we get results for the people of San Francisco.

Once again, do you think, though, that as a new kid on the block in the world of mayors, you will be able to have a more positive relationship with the next administration than perhaps some are factoring in.

Listen, I plan where we can find a common ground to work with anybody, and that's my focus. That's why I plan just here locally. We have eleven supervisors and there is usually a tendency to try to divide politicians and elected officials here here in San Francisco, and I've told everybody I plan to work with all eleven supervisors, no matter where they fall on the political spectrum. I need to bring people together during this time. There is so many people that want to divide us. But when San Franciscan's work together, we can get big things done.

Daniel Luri joy to have you. Thank you very much.

Indeed, San Francisco, thank you for having me.

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