LGBs in SF Dem Party Posts Decrease

In another sign of the LGBT community's diminishing political clout in San Francisco, the number of LGB people overseeing the local Democratic Party is set to decrease.

There are currently 11 lesbian, gay, and bisexual members - there are no elected transgender members - on what is known as the Democratic County Central Committee, or D-triple-C for short. The body exerts significant influence on city politics, as it endorses candidates in local races and often is used as a steppingstone to running for elected office.

Yet the outcome of the race Tuesday for 24 elected seats on the body will see the number of LGB members drop by three and has thrown into doubt the electoral chances for several out DCCC members with ambitions to be elected to supervisor seats.

Also, for the first time in four years, the DCCC will not have an HIV-positive person serving on it, based on the unofficial election returns Wednesday morning. Castro resident Gary McCoy, who is HIV-positive and in recovery due to a meth addiction, conceded Tuesday night.

"As a first time candidate, I feel like it was a successful run. I got my message out, and had the opportunity to speak about many of the issues important to me and so many others," McCoy wrote in a Facebook post.

He had been seeking one of 14 seats representing the 17th Assembly District covering the city's eastern neighborhoods. A number of out candidates fell short in their bids for DCCC seats in AD 17, including Frances Hsieh, a lesbian who is a legislative aide to District 11 Supervisor John Avalos; gay Sunshine Ordinance Task Force member Shaun Haines; bisexual union organizer Alysabeth Alexander; gay former DCCC member Arlo H. Smith; and gay party activists Michael Edward Grafton and Rick Hauptman.

Incumbent lesbian DCCC members Library Commissioner Zoe Dunning and attorney Rebecca Prozan, who currently works for Google, as well as gay mayoral spokesman Francis Tsang all lost their re-election bids.

On her Facebook page Wednesday morning, Prozan wrote, "I'm happy I had the chance to serve on the DCCC and look forward to what's to come, including making sure we keep the White House blue, officially calling Kamala Harris our next senator, and doing big things during the day."

In the race for 10 DCCC seats in Assembly District 19, gay DCCC appointee Joel Engardio failed to win his bid for a full term on the body. His loss makes it highly unlikely he will be able to oust from office this fall District 7 Supervisor Norman Yee, who landed in second place in the AD 19 DCCC race.

The lone out DCCC member from AD 19 will be Keith Baraka, a gay black firefighter who has served as an alternate on the body. He was in eighth place Wednesday morning with 100 percent of precincts reporting.

LGB Dems Win Big in AD 17

In the AD 17 race, LGB candidates won half of the 14 elected seats on the DCCC, with gay incumbent District 8 Supervisor Scott Wiener landing in first place based on the unofficial results. His opponent in the race for the city's state Senate seat, District 6 Supervisor Jane Kim, came in third place.

(Should Wiener win his state Senate bid, it is now questionable due to Dunning's defeat if Mayor Ed Lee would tap her to fill the vacant D8 supervisor seat. She has long been mentioned as a possible candidate to succeed Wiener.)

In second was gay former Assemblyman Tom Ammiano and in fourth place was gay District 9 Supervisor David Campos. Rounding out the top five was gay former D8 Supervisor Bevan Dufty.

Incumbents gay college board president Rafael Mandelman and lesbian Police Commissioner Petra DeJesus won re-election to their DCCC seats, coming in 13th and 14th place respectively. Newcomer Kaiser OB-GYN Dr. Pratima Gupta, a queer married mother who also serves as the volunteer medical director of the St. James Infirmary, a clinic for sex workers and transgender individuals, took 12th place.

Rounding out the list of straight winners in AD 17 were Supervisors Aaron Peskin (D3), London Breed (D5), and Malia Cohen (D10); former D10 Supervisor Sophie Maxwell; state Democratic Party Chair John Burton; and Planning Commissioner Cindy Wu.

In the AD 19 race, the first place finisher in the primary was former Supervisor Angelo Alioto; current Supervisors Eric Mar (D1) and Mark Farrell (D2) landed in third and fifth place, respectively. In fourth was school board member Sandra Lew Fewer.

DCCC incumbents Tom A. Hsieh, current party chair Mary Jung, and Kat Anderson won re-election. In 10th place was school board member Rachel Norton, who this week revealed for the first time she had been raped in college in response to the outrage over a lenient sentence given to a former Stanford swimmer convicted of raping a woman.

The defeat of DCCC AD 19 appointee Marjan Philhour in her bid for a full term also raises doubts about her ability to defeat Fewer in their race to succeed Mar on the Board of Supervisors. And the defeat of Joshua Arce in the AD 17 DCCC race is certain to raise questions about his chances this fall in the race for Campos' D9 supervisor seat.

Who will become the next chair of the local Democratic Party when the new DCCC members are seated in July is also unclear. While progressives won more seats on the DCCC in Tuesday's primary over more moderate candidates, it isn't certain that they will have a majority of votes on the reconfigured body.

Democratic state officeholders also have voting seats on the panel, and when they are added to the list, it appears moderates may hold a one-vote majority on the panel.

Wednesday morning the elections department announced it still had 78,000 ballots to count, so the final results of the DCCC race could change in the coming days.