by Randy Shaw on June 29, 2026 (BeyondChron.org)
Mayors Don’t Tell Full Story
Last week, New York City voters turned the city into Mamdani Land. Longtime incumbent Democrats were defeated by more progressive challengers. The huge DSA-backed election wins offered a sharp contrast with San Francisco, where the left is faltering politically. But while San Francisco has never had a DSA mayor, is New York City really more progressive?
We think not. Here’s why.
SF’s Stronger Tenant Protections
I see the core definition of “progressive” as supporting policies that allow low-income, working-class and middle-class people to live in a city. A city can pass progressive laws for transit, parks and public safety but if its housing prices prevent the non-affluent from living there it is not progressive.
I described in Generation Priced Out how even under progressive New York City mayor Bill de Blasio tenants in vulnerable communities like Crown Heights faced displacement and gentrification. Tenants were threatened with the loss of their homes under circumstances where San Francisco’s laws would protect them. New York City still maintains a loophole for renovation evictions that do not happen in San Francisco. Tens of thousands of New York City tenants are impacted.
Non-affluent tenants remain in San Francisco because the city has the strongest rent control and just cause eviction laws of any major city. New York City still has a way to go.
Mayor Mamdani recognizes that tenants need greater protections. He created a Mayor’s Office to Protect Tenants and appointed Cea Weaver as its first Director. Weaver was the Crown Heights organizer featured in my book. She is a tireless and savvy advocate for tenants. Backed by the mayor, she will make a huge difference.
Mamdani’s New York City has already begun ncreasing tenant protections. Last Thursday the Rent Guidelines Board froze rents on one and two year rent stabilized leases. It was an historic victory for New York City tenants. Sumathy Kumar, the executive director of New York State Tenant Bloc, told the popular news site Hell Gate that “Mamdani ‘popularized the call’ for a rent freeze. He took up the call that tenants had been making for a really long time, and exposed thousands, millions of people to it.’”
The title of the Hell Gate story says it all: “Tenant Hell Has Frozen Over.”
SF Better Protects SRO Tenants
San Francisco also better protects SRO tenants. On May 21, 2026 it was reported that longtime SRO tenants in a Bowery hotel were being forced out by illegal demolitions and renovations. San Francisco has not seen a similar pattern of conduct since the mid-1980’s.
According to the story:
Over the past decade, the number of SRO units in Lower Manhattan—and specifically on the Bowery—have […] plummeted. There was the former Sunshine Hotel at 245 Bowery, which now houses a cocktail bar and office spaces, and the Whitehouse, at 340 Bowery, which has been converted into a micro-boutique hotel. SROs are endangered partly because landlords have found new ways to evict tenants and convert their buildings into properties they can rent out at market rates. If a tenant vacates the unit, the landlord may rent it to transient hotel guests at whatever price they set.”
I spent years getting laws passed and filing lawsuits for the Tenderloin Housing Clinic to protect San Francisco’s supply of residential SRO’s and SRO tenants. In San Francisco, legal hotel conversions must give lifetime leases to existing tenants.
San Francisco doesn’t allow residential SRO’s to become boutique hotels without meeting very steep conversion requirements. Which is how San Francisco maintained its residential hotel stock whereas New York City has not.
SF Allows Local Ballot Measures
San Francisco’s strong, progressive tenant protection laws were primarily passed by voters. Giving voters a chance to set policy may be the best example of San Francisco offering a more progressive version of democracy than New York City. New York City prevents voters from gathering signatures for local initiatives.
Ballot measures have made San Francisco a more inclusive city. And a more progressive city. Voters raised the city’s minimum wage, expanded free child care and earmarked hundreds of millions of dollars to address homelessness. It was voters who put a cap on unrestricted downtown development with Prop M in 1986.
The ability to circumvent politicians and go directly to voters has been a driving force behind a more democratic and progressive San Francisco. But San Francisco “moderates” are now trying to limit voter-initiated ballot measures. They claim to want to address an allegedly overcrowded ballot. The real goal is to choke off a vehicle for progressive policies. One that New York City has sorely lacked.
Electing Politicians vs. Passing Laws
New York City easily outpaces San Francisco when it comes to electing self-proclaimed progressive mayors. Labor-backed Bill de Blasio was elected in 2013 with over 73% of the vote. Despite constant media attacks on his leadership, the left-wing de Blasio was re-elected in 2017 with over 66%.
The only reason moderate Eric Adams won in 2022 was the left’s failure to field a strong consensus candidate. When they remedied this in 2025, Zohran Mamdani got slightly over 50% of the vote in a three-way race.
San Francisco has not elected a self-identified progressive mayor since Art Agnos in 1987. Matt Gonzalez would have given San Francisco a Green Party mayor but narrowly lost to Newsom in a 2003 runoff despite being massively outspent.
Mayors Willie Brown and Ed Lee backed many progressive laws and policies. In most cities their policies would have placed them solidly in the progressive camp. But in San Francisco neither were considered “progressive.” Nor was Gavin Newsom, despite opening the door for marriage equality.
San Francisco’s initiative process has brought progressive change without “progressive” mayors. New York City’s lack of an initiative process has slowed progressive policies despite electing progressive mayors.
Where NYC is More Progressive
Ironically, one area where New York City is more progressive than San Francisco is in its network of bike lanes. And that was brought about by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, not a progressive.
To be clear, Bloomberg’s greatest legacy as mayor was upzoning neighborhoods to facilitate displacement and gentrification while downzoning affluent neighborhoods. But he fully backed Janette Sadik-Khan’s creation of a top-notch bicycling infrastructure.
Bloomberg also promoted New York City’s far superior use of public spaces. Compare New York City’s incredibly active Bryant Park to San Francisco’s far less busy Civic Center Park. Both have a history of being dominated by public drug use. But since being cleared Bryant Park is regularly filled with people and Civic Center Park is not.
New York City also gets credit for a vastly superior subway system, network of public pools and many high quality public parks. This progressive infrastructure goes back to the New Deal.
The contrast between New York City’s Mayor Mamdani and San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie is striking. But for now, when it comes to city policies and laws, San Francisco is more progressive.
Randy Shaw
Randy Shaw is the Editor of Beyond Chron and the Director of San Francisco’s Tenderloin Housing Clinic, which publishes Beyond Chron. Shaw’s new book is the revised and updated, The Tenderloin: Sex, Crime and Resistance in the Heart of San Francisco. His prior books include Generation Priced Out: Who Gets to Live in the New Urban America. The Activist’s Handbook: Winning Social Change in the 21st Century, and Beyond the Fields: Cesar Chavez, the UFW and the Struggle for Justice in the 21st Century.
