The Weekly Digest (February 16, 2025)

Written By Bill Jackson

Happy Sunday, Brionies! 

Here’s what you need to know about local politics this week and beyond:

San Francisco City Hall 

  • The Board of Supervisors isn’t holding any meetings this week, in observance of the President’s Day Holiday

    • Just for fun, we thought we’d share this passage from the minutes of last week’s Board meeting (paraphrased for brevity, but not by much):

      Supervisor Melgar: Will you do everything in your power to ensure MUNI will survive?
      Mayor Lurie: I will do everything in my power.
      Supervisor Melgar: K, thanks.

      It’s called leadership, people. 

Happenings around town

What we’re reading

  • Back when she was a newly-elected Supervisor, Jackie Fielder tried to convince us that she’d left her “defund the police” days behind. In response to a recent tragedy involving a high-speed chase into a Mission parklet that sent six people to the hospital, however, Fielder seems to be blaming police. In a formal letter of inquiry to SFPD Chief Bill Scott, Fielder asks a bunch of questions about the Department’s conduct, but doesn’t even mention the perps. Perhaps Supervisor Fielder should ask why one of the women charged in the incident was out on the street despite having three outstanding arrest warrants (in three counties!). Or why the second woman (also with an outstanding warrant) was out with this record:  “On July 25, 2024, she was arrested for grand theft in Los Angeles, and on Nov. 22, 2019, for resisting and obstructing a police officer in Oakland. The San Mateo County Sheriff’s Department arrested her for grand theft from a person to another on June 30, 2016. And one month prior, on May 27, 2016, She was arrested in San Francisco for conspiracy to commit a crime, robbery, battery, cruelty to a child by inflicting injury, exhibiting a deadly weapon other than a firearm, grand theft, auto theft, and assault likely to produce great bodily injury.” Memo to Supervisor Fielder: criminals cause crime. Please legislate accordingly.

  • Regular readers of the Digest will read this City Journal piece about how San Francisco and Portland lost the plot on drugs and nod their heads in recognition: we know, we’re living it. But author Keith Humphreys highlights facts about the failed progressive experiment that still shock. For example, did you know that in 2021, a year when more than 500 San Franciscans died of drug overdoses, District Attorney Chesa Boudin did not convict a single person of dealing fentanyl? Boudin is out, fortunately (thank you, 2022 recall team!) but in West Coast (Democrat-run) cities, we’re still dealing with the devastation caused by lax law enforcement, so-called harm “reduction” policies, and misdirected compassion. Humphreys urges policy-makers to take heed of key points. First, progressives and hard-liners need to meet in the middle in their approach to addicts. Progressives must acknowledge that addiction hurts whole communities, while moral scolds should accept that addiction is a health issue. Second, unlike sufferers of other afflictions, addicts don’t always want treatment; policies must take this into account. Third, (and our favorite): “drug-reform activists need to listen more to the poor and working-class communities that experience the bulk of the crime and disorder associated with drugs.” In other words, limousine liberals should stop pushing policies that harm the neighborhoods they don’t live in. 

  • SFMTA announced that Muni would be free this weekend in support of Lunar New Year and the NBA All-Star Game. When challenged about offering free rides while the agency is running a significant deficit, SFMTA countered that the City’s General Fund would pick up the tab. News flash, team: the City has its own serious deficit to worry about. Will this move push the City over the financial brink? No, it won’t. But it’s also unlikely that the $2.75 fare is the reason riders don’t take Muni. We suspect it’s the riders whacked out on drugs shouting obscenities to the heavens.

  • A recent poll of New York City voters found that they want more police, fewer mentally ill people on the streets, and a stronger approach to illegal immigration. Blue city politicians aren’t listening, but we here at the Briones Society have some ideas …

  • We need to set the record straight: In-N-Out, the quintessential Cali burger chain, is not moving its headquarters out of state, despite some ambiguity in this Los Angeles Times headline. The company is opening a new corporate office in Tennessee, but they’re still keeping space in Los Angeles county. In any event, the eastern expansion of In-N-Out should be applauded as a triumph of capitalism. We hope they’ll teach those clowns at Five Guys what a real burger is and how to stop burning their fries.*
    *(Ed. note: Not an official Briones Society policy position.)

Quick hits


Palate cleanser

This week in San Francisco history

  • On February 16th, 1900, the first Chinese-language daily newspaper debuted in San Francisco: Chung Sai Yat Po. 


Bill Jackson
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The Weekly Digest (February 9, 2025)