The ADEMs ("Assembly District Election Meetings") elect delegates in each assembly district who collectively set priorities for the CA Democratic Party. CA is controlled by the Democratic Party and this is an opportunity to influence its state level priorities. I'll consider it a success if I can convince you to register to vote, and to vote, regardless of whether you vote for me!
If I were elected, I want to influence:
who becomes Governor (who appoints the Commissioners overseeing the utility companies) among other powers
who becomes the Insurance Commissioner (who oversees the body that regulates property insurance)
legislation and political endorsements that would support public funding of access to civil justice ("legal aid") (Check out the work of Open Door Legal in SF)
More broadly, I want to help elect pro-climate and pro-civil justice officials.
I'm a candidate to be a delegate in Assembly District 17.
Assembly delegates shape the state-level priorities and legislation of the CA Democratic Party. Specifically, delegates:
vote to choose the leadership of the California Democratic Party.
vote on endorsements for various state-level positions, including:
Governor, Lieutenant Governor, Attorney General, Secretary of State, Treasurer, Controller, Insurance Commissioner, and Superintendent of Public Instruction.
State Assembly and State Senate candidates.
endorse candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives.
participate in drafting and adopting the party's platform, outlining policy positions and priorities.
I grew up in New Jersey, and I have lived in NYC, Chicago, Boston area, and Asia. I moved to SF In early 2023. One big reason I moved is to get to know the outdoors. I enjoy being outside. I like indoor and outdoor rock climbing, skiing, and looking at birds.
College was a formative time for me, when a desire for economic justice was ignited in my faith community. I decided to get a PhD in economics because I was concerned about economic justice. I could also describe myself as a recovering neoliberal.
My priorities are to influence policies at the state level that will lay down long-term infrastructure to protect our communities and environment. I would advocate for legislation and appointments that promote smart and equitable property insurance regulatory reform, energy efficiency policies, decarbonization of our energy system, and public funding for civil justice (legal aid) for all, particularly vulnerable individuals and households, that are effective for reducing homelessness , preventing deportation, and reducing intimate partner violence.
I am also excited about the other progressive candidates running in AD17 and all over California who are committed to defending the civil and economic interests of communities under attack by the current presidential administration. I encourage you to also consider their candidacies (Here is a list of the other candidates running to be an assembly delegate in District 17 and document with their candidate statements.)
Would you consider registering to vote, and voting for me to be one of 14 delegates for SF’s Assembly District 17? (Even if you're already a registered Democratic voter, you need to fill out this form to vote in the ADEM elections)
Below are more details about how to check your voting eligibility, how to update your voter registration to list party affiliation, and the logistics of how to vote in person on Sat Feb 22 or Sunday Feb 23.
In these uncertain and troubled times let’s support and trust each other. Let’s take stock of the little and big ways in which we have power and influence over what happens in our city, state, and nation. One way to exercise that is to vote in local and state elections!
One in six minimum-wage workers in California have their wages stolen every year, resulting in billions of dollars in assets are being stolen from poor and working-class Californians simply because they cannot get access to legal aid. Meanwhile, millions of women suffer from domestic violence and around 1 in 4 of the U.S. homeless population languishes on CA streets. (citations below)
Research has shown that access to legal aid can dramatically address all these issues. Unfortunately, the Democratic party has not made expanding access to legal aid a priority and that's partly why it's losing the faith of the working class. I want to change that. Together, we can make universal access to justice a reality and dramatically reduce poverty and homelessness. (citations below)
I also want to focus on the longer-term risks facing our communities, particularly the existential risks posed by climate change that are actually affecting us right now -- rising rents driven by rising property insurance premia, rising food prices due to environmental degradation or climate disaster domestically or abroad, climate-related migration that are triggering budget crises for both the sender and receiver localities. I want to advocate for climate resilience policies and legislation that will secure the long-term economic futures of all Californians.
For example, California's FAIR insurance program turns out to be an unfair tax on all CA renters and property owners that subsidizes the property purchases for a small share of people who insist on living in areas with high fire risk. While there are many renters and owners living in relatively safe urban areas, such as urban centers, the costs of funding the FAIR program are passed on to all private insurance companies operating in CA and these costs are passed through to insurance premia. Just recently the CA state insurance commissioner decided to assess $1 billion to FAIR member insurance companies to help cover the shortfalls from the LA wildfires -- and up to half of this will be paid by policyholders, which means it will be paid by owners and renters in CA!
At the national level, I believe that the current assault on democracy, minorities, immigrants, civil servants, workers and unions, is less about the strength of the current President's movement and more about the misguided strategy of the Democratic Party over the past decades. The Democratic Party brand needs to transform its identity from being a party of elite, urban-focused corporate-friendly centrists that is more focused on market stability than mass democracy.
What is Assembly District 17?
Assembly District 17 is the part of SF represented by State Assemblymember Matt Haney and covers the FiDi, Chinatown, North Beach, SoMA, Mission, Potrero Hill, Dogpatch, Bayview-Hunters Point neighborhoods.
You can check whether you are eligible to vote in SF Assembly District 17 by entering your address.
The first step is to check whether you are eligible to vote in SF Assembly District 17 (fill out your address). There were recent Assembly District changes, so if you live in SF, double check!
The second step is to check your voter status to see if you already have a “Democrat” party affiliation. If not, you can re-register online as a Democrat here (https://registertovote.ca.gov/) or go in person to SF City Hall Department of Elections (1 Dr. Carlton B. Goodlett Pl.
City Hall, Room 48, Office Hours Mon-Fri 8am-5pm) to fill out the forms.
Then, register to vote in the ADEM elections by filling out a short form here (in person only).
Once you’ve registered to vote in person, you can go vote in person at any of the polling locations in CA on Feb. 22-23. The caveat is that each polling location is only open at specific times during Feb 22-23. See below for details
There are only 2 polling locations in SF, and they are each open only at specific times. (Sigh, these folks are making it hard to vote in person!)
There’s only 1 polling location in District 17 and it’s only open Sat Feb 22, 1pm-5pm:
International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers Local 21
1155 Mission St
San Francisco, CA, 94103
916-442-5707
Voting open only Sat February 22, 2025 1:00pm-5:00pm
The only other polling location in SF is
Ortega Branch Library
3223 Ortega Street, San Francisco, CA, 94122
916-442-5707
and it's only open Sun February 23, 2025 at 1:00 pm to 4:30 pm
You can find other voting locations here.
When you register to vote in the ADEM elections, you’ll have the opportunity to not only vote for me, but also up to 13 other delegates to represent Assembly District 17. The other candidates may be focused on other issues that you care about, and I encourage you to check them out. Here is a list of all the candidates running to be an assembly delegate in District 17 and their candidate statements will be published soon
Are you running with a slate?
No, I’m not running with a slate. I contacted a couple people about joining their slates but their slates were full. I consider myself a progressive ally and would be supportive of the priorities of other progressive delegates.
Is your name listed first on the ballot? Why is your last name spelled incorrectly?
Yes I am listed first, and yes my last name is misspelled due to an election worker typing in my info wrong during my initial voter registration.
Why are you a candidate in Assembly District 17 (AD17) when you currently reside in Oakland?
The ADEM rules require that I be a candidate in the same assembly district that I voted in during the Nov 2024 elections, which is AD 17. Meanwhile, I moved to Oakland a week before I registered to be a candidate in the ADEM elections. If I were to be selected to be a delegate, I would re-establish my residence in SF.
ElectionBuddy opens Saturday, February 1st, at Noon. The website to vote is CADEM.ORG/ADEMBALLOT. Voters will be receiving letters in the mail with their PIN and a Password to vote on ElectionBuddy. Voting will remain open until February 23rd at 6pm. Ballots must be submitted prior to that deadline. Open ballots not submitted by the deadline will not be accepted.
ADEM Voters, whose email they used to register for ADEM voting, matches the email in the Political Data Inc. Voter File, will have their ballot emailed to them from ElectionBuddy, in addition to receiving their ballot in the mail. Only emails that match the voter file email will be sent a ballot from ElectionBuddy for security purposes.
In the California Democratic Party’s Assembly District Election Meetings (ADEMs), each voter can select up to 14 candidates on their ballot. These 14 positions are divided equally between genders, aiming to elect 7 self-identified female delegates and 7 other-than-self-identified female delegates from each Assembly District.
Here is a list of all the candidates running to be an assembly delegate in District 17 and their candidate statements will be published soon.
Program these numbers into your phone! They are your new venting buddies.
Find your Congresspeople if you don't live in SF, or use these numbers for SF folks: Alex Padilla: (415)981-9369; Adam Schiff: (202)224-3841; Nancy Pelosi (415) 556-4862. For State Senator Scott Weiner, I couldn't find a phone number, here is his meeting scheduler. Here is Matt Haney's SF number. (415) 557-3013
Wage theft
You can see in this study from the Economic Policy Institute, table 1, 19.2% of minimum wage workers experience wage theft per year, with about $2B in earned wages not paid to workers in CA annually.
Also from the economic policy institute, this study estimates that for all forms of wage theft and all workers, it costs workers up to $50B per year in lost income. (see press release).
The administrative law agencies charged with enforcing wage laws are completely dysfunctional. For example, here's an audit of the CA labor commissioner. Even if the staffing issues were fixed, the admin agencies are not structurally set up to advocate for workers. The only hope for workers is to get legal assistance and file lawsuits (or even go to small claims), but then the state doesn't provide practically any funding for legal aid for workers.
Domestic Violence
According to the Georgetown Women, Peace, and Security Index, 6% of American women suffer domestic violence each year. This is one of the highest rates in the developed world. See table 1, "intimate partner violence" column.
Increasing access to legal aid is proven to reduce the domestic violence rate. One study found that it was the only intervention related to a decrease in DV rates. Other relevant studies include:
Unfortunately, the state provides practically no funding for legal aid for survivors.
Homelessness
According to the 2024 HUD report to Congress on homelessness, there was 771,480 people experiencing homelessness throughout the US according to the most recent point in time count - the highest ever recorded and an 18% increase from 2 years prior. Of these, 187,084 were in California - about 1 in 4.
Unfortunately, all the state's funding for legal services for homelessness prevention was 1-time and has expired.