Political Scientist at SF State Univ (Race, Voting & Elections, Urban Politics).
Feb 13, 2021 • 12 tweets • 4 min read
The elected school board in SF has been the subject of much discussion lately as it has made several controversial decisions (renaming schools & lack of planning to re-open schools). This is an issue of public accountability. Is the school board accountable for its decisions? 1/
I have heard two proposals for increasing school board accountability: 1) Make board members appointed rather than elected; 2) Elect school board members by district-based elections rather than citywide at-large elections. 2/
Nov 3, 2020 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
My question: will we see total turnout rates increase this year compared to 2016? Not so sure. In 2016, 80.7% turnout of reg. voters; 414,528 votes, or 63.5% of those were mail ballots. As of this morning, SF had issued 536,667 mail ballots, and 333,783 had been returned (62.2%).
For the 2020 turnout rate to be 80.7%, there would need would be 433,090 total votes cast, and 99,307 elex day voters (18.5% of total registered). In 2016, there were 151,437 votes cast on election day (30% of registered). Possible. Likely? No idea.
