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Ahsha Safaí

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Ahsha Safaí
Image of Ahsha Safaí
Prior offices
San Francisco Board of Supervisors District 11
Successor: Chyanne Chen
Predecessor: John Avalos

Elections and appointments
Last election

November 5, 2024

Education

Bachelor's

Northeastern University

Graduate

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Personal
Profession
Political director
Contact

Ahsha Safaí was a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in California, representing District 11. He assumed office on January 8, 2017. He left office on January 8, 2025.

Safaí ran for election for Mayor of San Francisco in California. He lost in the general election on November 5, 2024.

Although elections for the San Francisco Board of Supervisors are officially nonpartisan, Safai is known to be affiliated with the Democratic Party.[1]

Biography

Email editor@ballotpedia.org to notify us of updates to this biography.

Safai earned a B.A. in political science and African-American studies from Northeastern University and an M.A. in city planning from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.[2]

As of his 2016 run for the board of supervisors, Safai was the political director for Service Employees International Union Local 87 and the principal at Kitchen Cabinet Public Affairs.[3] He also served as an assistant to the deputy director of intergovernmental affairs in the Clinton White House and worked with the San Francisco Housing Authority, the Mayor's Office of Community Development, and the Department of Public Works.[2]

Elections

2024

See also: Mayoral election in San Francisco, California (2024)

General election

General election for Mayor of San Francisco

The ranked-choice voting election was won by Daniel Lurie in round 14 . The results of Round are displayed below. To see the results of other rounds, use the dropdown menu above to select a round and the table will update.


Total votes: 390,184
Candidate Connection = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.

Endorsements

Ballotpedia did not identify endorsements for Safaí in this election.

2020

See also: City elections in San Francisco, California (2020)

General election

General election for San Francisco Board of Supervisors District 11

The ranked-choice voting election was won by Ahsha Safaí in round 3 . The results of Round are displayed below. To see the results of other rounds, use the dropdown menu above to select a round and the table will update.


Total votes: 31,350
Candidate Connection = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.

2016

See also: Municipal elections in San Francisco, California (2016)

This is the final round of voting. To view previous rounds, click the [show] button next to that round.

San Francisco Board of Supervisors District 11, General Election, 2016, Final Round
Candidate Vote % Votes Transfer
Ahsha Safai - Winner 51.9% 9,236 0
Magdalena De Guzman 0% 0 0
Francisco Herrera 0% 0 0
Berta Hernandez 0% 0 0
Kim Alvarenga - Eliminated 48.1% 8,558 0
Write-In 0% 0 0
Exhausted 2,776 0
Total Votes 20,570 0
Note: Negative numbers in the transfer total are due to exhaustion by overvotes.


Legend:     Eliminated in current round     Most votes     Lost






This is the first round of voting. To view subsequent rounds, click the [show] button next to that round.

San Francisco Board of Supervisors District 11, General Election, 2016, Round 1
Candidate Vote % Votes Transfer
Ahsha Safai - Most votes 38.2% 7,815 0
Magdalena De Guzman 11.9% 2,445 0
Francisco Herrera 10.1% 2,076 0
Berta Hernandez 6.3% 1,282 0
Kim Alvarenga 33.5% 6,858 0
Write-In - Eliminated 0% 0 0
Exhausted 94 94
Total Votes 20,570 94
Note: Negative numbers in the transfer total are due to exhaustion by overvotes.

Endorsements

Safai received endorsements from the following in 2016:[4]

  • Carpenters - Local 22
  • Firefighters - Local 798
  • International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees - Local 16
  • International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers - Local 6
  • International Longshore and Warehouse Union - Local 10
  • The International Union of Operating Engineers - Local 39
  • Janitors - Service Employees International Union - Local 87
  • Laborers - Local 261
  • National Union of Healthcare Workers
  • Painters and Glaziers - Local 12
  • San Francisco Building and Construction Trades Council
  • San Francisco Police Officers Association
  • SEIU - United Service Workers West
  • Sheet Metal Workers - Local 104
  • Sign & Display - Local 510
  • Teamsters Joint Council 7
  • Teamsters - Local 350
  • Teamsters - Local 665
  • Teamsters - Local 856
  • Teamsters - Local 2010
  • Teamsters - Local 2785
  • Unite HERE - Local 2
  • United Association Plumbers & Pipefitters - Local 38
  • United Food and Commercial Workers - Local 5
  • United Food and Commercial Workers - Local 648
  • Alice B. Toklas Democratic Club
  • Community Tenants Association
  • Bay Area Reporter
  • San Francisco Chronicle
  • Sing Tao Daily
  • U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.)
  • U.S. Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.)
  • California Lieutenant Gov. Gavin Newsom
  • California Attorney General Kamala Harris
  • California Sen. Mark Leno
  • California Board of Equalization Chair Fiona Ma
  • California Assemb. Rob Bonta
  • California Assemb. David Chiu
  • California Assemb. Phil Ting
  • California Democratic Party Chair John Burton
  • San Francisco Supervisor Mark Farrell
  • San Francisco Supervisor Katy Tang
  • San Francisco Supervisor London Breed
  • San Francisco Supervisor Jane Kim
  • San Francisco Supervisor Norman Yee
  • San Francisco Supervisor Scott Wiener
  • Former San Francisco Supervisor Bevan Duffy

Campaign themes

2024

Ballotpedia survey responses

See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection

Ahsha Safaí did not complete Ballotpedia's 2024 Candidate Connection survey.

2020

Ahsha Safaí did not complete Ballotpedia's 2020 Candidate Connection survey.

2016

Safai's 2016 campaign website listed the following goals:

1. Revitalize the commercial corridors on Mission Street, Geneva Avenue and Broad Randolph. To accomplish this, we need concerted investment of both public and private funds and must put together a Community Benefits District for these corridors to facilitate this process.

2. Revitalize and fully rehabilitate the Geneva Car Barn. We have to get the Mayor and Rec and Park staff to agree to put this historic gem in the 2018 Rec and Park Bond as this building could become one of the City's premier performing art and cultural spaces.

3. Create a moratorium on medical marijuana dispensaries (MCDs) along our district commercial corridors and require that they reinvest in their neighborhoods. There are currently 3 MCD's that serve D11, which is sufficient for our district. Over the last decade, I have organized hundreds of neighbors to fight against four new pot clubs from coming into our District.

We have spent far too much energy stopping additional clubs from opening, rather than focusing on attracting restaurants and family serving businesses to the area. We need to create a local tax that requires MCD's to invest 25% of their profits in the immediate neighborhoods that they are located in as well as require owners to have lived in San Francisco for at least the past 5 years. This will work to mitigate some of the impacts of these businesses.

4. Create a citywide and city funded universal pre-school program for children age 4-year-olds. To truly address the achievement gap for African-American and Latino students we must invest in early childhood education as well as work to make San Francisco more family friendly. This can be achieved with the passage of a few of the revenue measures on the November ballot, such as the soda tax and the property transfer tax.

5. Create a citywide program to address the housing crisis for working families - those making between 55%-120% of Area Median Income (AMI). To realize this goal for this income range, we need to 1) offer density bonuses 2) allocate some of the affordable housing bond money already passed 3) mandate that private developers offer housing for this income range 4) increase the allocation of downpayment assistance for those wishing to purchase their own home.

6. Host a Traffic and Parking Summit with SFMTA to increase the number of parking spaces within our district through reconfiguring parking and traffic calming through speed bumps, bulb outs and roundabouts. We have to address this concern as thousands of people are frustrated that they can't park in front of their homes and are constantly in fear of accidents and people speeding through their neighborhood streets.

7. Increase annual funding for San Francisco's Department of Public Works (SFDPW) to address the myriad of problem areas in the district that experience illegal dumping, overgrowth and lack of landscaping and street paving. Street-tree maintenance will be funded if we pass the initiatives that are on the ballot this November, but in case they are not, we need to allocate money from the general fund as well as consistently contribute to SFDPW's budget to enhance cleaning and greening services in our neighborhoods.

8. Open a District office. I will find a way to open an official office to make City Hall more accessible to all citizens of District 11.

9. Create more shelter beds, navigation centers, med/psych hospital beds and supportive housing for the chronically homeless. There are multiple initiatives on this November's ballot that will increase funding for homeless individuals and we need to prioritize getting people out of encampments and off of the streets so that supportive services in all forms can be provided to them.[5][6]

See also


External links

Footnotes

Political offices
Preceded by
John Avalos
San Francisco Board of Supervisors District 11
2017-2025
Succeeded by
Chyanne Chen