Daniel Lurie is getting budget-rolled by his own bureaucrats
How can so many departments reject the mayor's demand for budget cuts? It's all part of the typical City Family playbook.
Editor-at-large
The San Francisco Standard
Published Mar. 10, 2025 • 6:00am
San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie has lost the first round in a cost-cutting bout with his own government. It’s a battle he literally can’t lose — the city’s charter requires a balanced budget — but how he gets there will determine his effectiveness as mayor.
Since his campaign last year, the neophyte politician has been saying that tough cuts were needed. In an otherwise cheerful inaugural address Jan. 8, he told supporters that the “largest budget deficit in the history of our city … requires us to make some painful decisions.” And in mid-February, when the city controller issued a report detailing the $840 million, two-year gap between projected spending and revenue, the mayor’s response hit familiar notes. Rightsizing the city’s finances “will require some extremely tough decisions,” he said, “but I know we are up to the challenge.”
So far, there is ample evidence that the City Family — the collection of entrenched bureaucrats who operate the vast and expensive municipal machinery — is failing to rise to the occasion. Worse, beyond a few banal and increasingly rote admonitions, Lurie hasn’t offered specific direction on what cuts are needed.
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