Glossy mailers from Mayor Daniel Lurie’s “Clean Up City Hall” campaign have arrived in city mailboxes. They urge San Franciscans to vote Yes on Propositions D, E and F, three ballot measures that would give Mayor Lurie extraordinary power.

A September 8th flyer, quotes from the San Francisco Examiner, decrying a “lack of corruption standards.” Another cites the 28 corruption charges levied against City officials including the $1 million bribe that sent former Public Works Director Mohammed Nuru to prison. Yet a third calls out the “maze of red tape” that had created obstacles to conducting business at City Hall. 

Not a single word explains how D, E, or F will fix any of it. 

Together “Clean Up City Hall” — the Props D, E and F campaign — has raised a staggering $11 million to date from a handful of wealthy donors, making them the most expensive measures on the November 2026 ballot. Together, the three propositions have collected more money than the rest of the city measures, combined. Among their donors are two billionaires long active in local politics: Venture capitalist Michael Moritz and crypto chief Chris Larsen. 

The two have a history of funding conservative candidates and ballot measures: Moritz spent more than $9.5 million on a November 2024 measure that proposed to “unclog City Hall” by concentrating power in the mayor’s office. Larsen, a generous supporter of Lurie’s predecessor London Breed, has spent the 20 months since she was replaced by funding the new mayor’s pet projects, among them the San Francisco Police Department’s online surveillance system. In addition, he is on track to be the largest donor in the upcoming election, backing Lurie’s ballot measures — much as he bankrolled Breed’s.

Together, Props D, E and F would amend the San Francisco charter to further empower the mayor. Investing authority in a single elected official is deeply problematic: During the Progressive Era of the early 1900s, numerous U.S. cities, mostly in the west, shifted away from a strong-mayor form of government in response to widespread corruption. According to a recent study, municipalities in which decisions are disbursed are 57% less likely to be corrupt than those in which they are centralized in the chief executive.

Here are the details: Prop D would make it far more difficult for measures to make it onto the local ballot. Currently, four members of the Board of Supervisors are required to qualify a proposition for the ballot. Should Prop D pass, six Supervisors — a majority of the board — would be needed. More troubling, are the changes to the number of signatures to get a citizen-led initiative before San Francisco voters. Today, 2% must sign on to secure a place on the ballot. With Prop D, that number becomes 8%, or roughly 40,000. A well-funded campaign would be able to do that but it would be almost impossible for modestly funded grassroots efforts to gather the necessary signatures.

Prop E would grant the City Administrator greater control over government contracts, by allowing the City Administrator to make contracting rules for all city departments. Moreover, fewer contracts would be subjected to review by the Board of Supervisors. At the same time, it would extend the term for the City Administrator from 5 to 10 years. The proposed lack of oversight would seem to create the very conditions that allow for corruption.

Prop F would give the Mayor unilateral power to fire and hire most department heads. Currently, some commissions participate in the process,  providing  the mayor a list from which to choose a new department head. Prop F would also allow public commissioners to be removed by the official that appointed them without cause. Finally, it allows the Mayor more power to unilaterally reorganize departments and to appoint deputy mayors — that report to the Chief Executive and not the Board — to oversee department heads. 

All the while, Lurie’s “Clean up City Hall” initiatives ignore the corrupting influence of money in local politics. As an example, voters need look no further than OpenGov, the permitting software that received a $5.9 million contract from City Hall. Mayor Lurie’s right-hand man Ned Segal overruled city staff that had rejected OpenGov both for its cost — a competing program with more robust features was available at a fraction of the price — and for its technical flaws. OpenGov was founded by Palantir co-founder and Trump ally Joe Lonsdale, along with Zac Bookman, two longtime contributors to Lurie’s Tipping Point nonprofit. (Bookman also donated to Lurie’s mayoral campaign.) More damning, the Lurie’s family has invested in OpenGov. 

Lurie has welcomed the participation of San Francisco’s wealthiest through public-private partnerships that give the most privileged a say in how San Francisco governed. Not surprisingly, the Mayor’s policies reflect their priorities, among them an interest in a more authoritarian style of city governance. Props D, E, and F are a power grab disguised as reform and Mayor Daniel Lurie and his wealthy friends are hoping voters won’t read past the slick mailers.