Interim San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee's Broken Promise
Submitted by annie on Mon, 08/08/2011 - 13:22
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KPFANewsRunEdRun.mp3
KPFANewsRunEdRun.mp3
KPFA Weekend News: 08.07.2011
Interim Mayor Ed Lee with former Mayor Willie Brown at his swearing in.
On the evening before interim San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee broke his promise not to run for mayor, KPFA Weekend News broadcast this summary of ethics allegations against the Run Ed Run campaign to draft him:
1) exceeding campaign spending limits,
2) using employees of the City garbage collection contractor, Recology, to collect signatures for the campaign,
3) using employees of the Chinatown Community Development Center, a social service agency receiving City funds, to staff the campaign,
4) encouraging recipients of City housing and food subsidies delivered by the Chinatown Community Development Center to volunteer for the campaign.
Here's the paragraph we didn't have space to include, as we cut to make room for Syria, Somalia, and Afghanistan:
BAY CITIZEN INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER GERRY SHIH: I’d like to point out that most of the allegations and criticisms are coming from Lee’s opponents, who know that the mayor, who’s pretty popular, will become the frontrunner in the race as soon as he announces. And quite a few have benefited from all the scrutiny on Lee in recent weeks. As someone who has been doing a lot of digging on Ed Lee recently, I can say that the controversy around him is sucking the oxygen out of the room. A lot of us reporters are so preoccupied looking into the mayor’s connections that a lot of the other leading candidates who have serious question marks in their records are so far able to skate under the radar. Is what Lee’s supporters are doing questionable? Sure. But, having watched campaign politics from the presidential level on down, I can tell you there are a lot of shadier things happening under our noses right now that aren't being aired.
