Daniel Lurie's quick response on the campaign trail promised to establish 1,500 temporary shelter beds within six months. Six months later, his administration abandoned this main pledge without quotes from Lurie in initial reports. His policy chief, Kunal Modi, suggested that focus should shift from quantity to quality of shelter beds, a point made previously. Despite the pivot, Lurie's TV interviews emphasized valuing 'progress over politics,' but did not acknowledge that the politics involved were tied to his original commitment.
"Fifteen hundred, very quickly," interjected the future mayor, clad in a smart white shirt and thin black tie befitting an Apollo-era NASA technician. "I've given myself six months. It shouldn't take us that long."
Moving on from an arbitrary, infeasible and, in the end, counterproductive goal is good. That the mayor wasn't quoted in the first two stories announcing the curtailment of his own key initiative is less good.
Modi, in his op-ed, notes that, rather than an arbitrary number of beds, San Francisco 'needs the right beds.' That's a fair point, and one Mission Local foretold all the way back in April.
To be fair, the mayor took questions about his pivot on live TV; you can see him here, here and here. He told all the interviewers that he valued 'progress over politics.'
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