Non-profit founder seeks to bring bold leadership to City facing major safety, health, and affordability crisis
Special to the Vanguard
San Francisco, CA – On Tuesday, surrounded by family, friends, and San Franciscans from every corner of the city, Tipping Point Community founder Daniel Lurie announced his candidacy for Mayor of San Francisco.
“We are facing a crisis of leadership, and the direction that we are headed leaves me deeply concerned that the next generation will not love and care for San Francisco as we do,” said Daniel Lurie, a father of two, non-profit founder, and lifelong Democrat. “This moment demands a new era of leadership from the outside. I have a proven record of building diverse teams, challenging bureaucracy and political obstacles, and delivering results on the issues most important to San Franciscans.”
Daniel made the announcement today in front of more than 300 people at the Potrero Hill Neighborhood House after pulling papers at the Department of Elections making his candidacy official. In his remarks, he shared his plans to change a broken system that has fundamentally failed San Franciscans, pledging to instill a culture of accountability, coordination, and public service while stopping the excuses, finger pointing and backstabbing that has obstructed progress on the city’s biggest challenges.
“When I opened the Bayview Child Health Center, I needed partners who would not shy away from the hardest parts of that work. That was Daniel,” said Nadine Burke Harris, pediatrician and former Surgeon General of California and Tipping Point grantee. “Daniel’s unique combination of humility and commitment to this city have created measurable change in San Francisco. It is for these reasons, and so many more that I am proud to support his candidacy for 
Mayor.”
Daniel Lurie was born and raised in San Francisco. He founded Tipping Point Community in 2005. Under his direction as CEO, Tipping Point has raised over half a billion dollars to help house, employ, educate and support hundreds of thousands of Bay Area families. Last year alone Tipping Point provided over six thousand people with services that either helped them transition out of homelessness or prevented them from experiencing it.
Former Mayor Ed Lee selected Daniel in 2013 to lead the San Francisco Bay Area Super Bowl 50 Host Committee, an effort that brought over $240 million in economic impact to the region. Following the devastating fires in the North Bay in 2017, Daniel and Tipping Point partnered with 90 Bay Area business and community leaders to organize Band Together—a benefit concert that raised $17 million for those hardest hit by the deadly fires. In total, Tipping Point’s Emergency Fire Relief Fund raised over $34 million.
Lurie, as indicated, is a San Francisco native and lifelong Democrat. He lives in San Francisco with his wife Becca and two school-aged children.
From homelessness to housing, Lurie, age 46, has delivered results on the issues San Franciscans care about most. In 2022 alone, as indicated, Tipping Point provided over six thousand people with services that either helped them transition out of homelessness or prevented them from experiencing it. Daniel also led efforts to construct an 100% affordable housing development with union labor on Bryant Street that came in on-time and under budget. Last year, he co-founded the Civic Joy Fund, an organization that aims to increase civic engagement and assist in the economic recovery of San Francisco.
“Tipping Point wasn’t created to write checks, our mission was to ensure our community partners would succeed,” added Lurie. “To do that and ensure results we held them and ourselves accountable. That meant cutting funding to those organizations that weren’t delivering so we could double down on those that were. We’re seeing the opposite at City Hall, where the system serves itself instead of the public. That must change, and it will.”
While Mayor Breed has sought to scapegoat the pandemic, city supervisors and the courts for San Francisco’s struggles, the city is experiencing challenges far greater than most other cities. The city has had the weakest Covid-19 recovery in the nation and small businesses are struggling to open their doors in spite of the urgency created by the retail exodus that has famously hollowed out the Financial District. In spite of the economic fallout, the city remains one of the most unaffordable in the nation with an acute and infamous lack of affordable housing. Property crime rates are the highest of any city in the state, open-air drug markets invite national scorn, San Francisco officials estimated that as many as 20,000 people would experience homelessness at some point last year, and overdose deaths are on track to shatter records this year.
During his remarks, Lurie committed to confronting a dysfunctional criminal justice system and slumping police morale by ending the revolving door from our jails back to our streets. Notably, 300 officers have left SFPD since Breed became Mayor in 2018. The Mayor famously announced she was defunding the police before changing course in the face of criticism. To reduce dangerously slow response times, end the era of open-air drug markets, and deter smash-and-grabs and auto burglaries, Daniel promised to fully staff the police department through an aggressive recruitment and retention campaign. He also pledged to enhance cooperation across law enforcement agencies and advocate for investigations that prove the conspiratorial nature of these organized crimes–a tactic known to increase the likelihood that judges will detain offenders pretrial.
Daniel further distinguished himself from the current administration by committing to quickly erecting the beds necessary to offer shelter to every unhoused San Franciscan. The move would enable the city to clear out encampments on our streets rather than push the problem from one block to the other while blaming a court ordered injunction for inaction. He also pledged to retool and revitalize the Street Crisis Response Team, increase the number of psychiatric emergency services beds, and committed to commission reform. Much like he did at Tipping Point, he also promised to cut and redirect funding for non-profits that are not delivering results. Daniel further discussed his plans to expedite permitting for small businesses and housing across income levels.
Importantly, Mayor Breed has accomplished less with more resources and more control over city functions, as the city has a record budget of $14.6 billion. The Mayor has unparalleled control on city operations having appointed two members of the Board of Supervisors, three members of Board of Education, a District Attorney, and countless department heads and commissioners. Nonetheless, Breed is constantly at war with the Board of Supervisors and her own appointees.
“City Hall is so focused on business as usual it can’t possibly stare down the very real problems we face,” said Lurie. “San Francisco’s biggest challenges cannot be solved by a Mayor so deeply entrenched in a system that allowed our homelessness and public safety crises to fester and spiral out of control. We cannot afford ten years of an administration that offers excuses and finger-pointing when San Franciscans deserve accountability and results. The San Francisco comeback starts now.”
Lurie is a strong challenger for Mayor. Both Breed and Jenkins need to be fired by the voters of San Francisco. They have demonstrated an unprecedented level of incompetence. [edited]
My first thought was Daniel Lurie was the son of Bob Lurie, the former owner of the S.F. Giants. So doing a Google search I found that he is no relation, but I did find that Daniel Lurie was heir to the Levi Strauss fortune. That might have been somewhat important to the article but I found no mention of it, maybe I missed it.
Right now any change in the leadership of S.F. is a good thing, how could it be any worse. Well unless of course we were talking about Chicago, where they went from the frying pan to the fire.
I recently read where three more Target stores are closing in San Francisco. The doom loop continues.
Unless someone else better comes along, I say vote for Lurie and often. It can’t be any worse than it is now.