City and County of San Francisco
Ethics Commission

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In February of 2025, the Ethics Commission prioritized a review of the City’s rules regarding major developers, campaign consultants, recusals, expenditure limits for candidates receiving public funds, contribution limits, and the reporting requirements for candidates in trustee elections.

In June of 2025, Staff presented the Commission with a series of recommendations stemming from the Commission’s ongoing Streamlining Project. This project evaluated various programs and policies administered by the Commission to determine if they are effective, efficient, add value to the City, and furthering the Commission’s mission of promoting the highest standards of integrity in government. This project is part of the Commission’s duty to regularly evaluate whether programs are achieving their intended goals, operating efficiently, up-to-date, and continuing to provide meaningful value to the public.  This project generated recommendations that would scale back certain programs and policies, streamline and simplify various processes, and make important updates to the City’s rules.

These recommendations were presented as two items during the Commission’s June meeting. The first item covered findings and recommendations regarding campaign consultants, supplemental recusal notifications, major developers, and trustee candidate reporting requirements. The second item covered proposed changes regarding expenditure ceilings and the candidate campaign contribution limit. All these recommendations, except for those involving the trustee candidate reporting requirements, require joint approval by supermajorities of both the Board of Supervisors and the Ethics Commission.

The recommendations from this project led to the creation of three ordinances, two of which would amend the Campaign & Governmental Conduct Code. At the Ethics Commission’s meeting on Friday, September 12, the Commission unanimously (5-0) approved the following two ordinances.

• File No. 250867 would enact the following changes:
  • Discontinue the registration and reporting requirements for campaign consultants and instead require consultants to supply their clients with the information necessary to report the consultant’s activities through the campaign committee’s other existing campaign finance disclosures.
  • Remove the City’s requirement to file supplemental recusal notifications with the Ethics Commission but retain the existing recusal procedures that occur during the meeting in which the recusal is made.
  • Discontinue the disclosure requirements for major developers and instead, if a developer is paying a nonprofit for lobbyist services, require the developer to provide the lobbyist with the information they need to register and report as a lobbyist under the City’s existing rules.

• File No. 250868 would enact the following changes:
  • Streamline how expenditure ceilings apply to candidates by having ceilings apply consistently to all participating candidates in a race and establishing a process for then removing the ceiling in a race based on spending by third parties and non-participating candidates. This would replace the current process of applying unique ceilings to individual candidates, which are then adjusted indefinitely throughout the election.
  • Increase the City’s campaign contribution limit from $500 to $1,000 to adjust for inflation since the previous limit was set in 2000 and establish a clear mechanism for future updates to the limit.

Both ordinances above are currently under consideration by the Board of Supervisors.

Legislation Regarding Trustee Elections

In June, Staff presented findings and a recommendation that the campaign reporting requirements currently imposed on candidates for the Health Service Board, Retirement Board, and Retiree Health Care Trust Fund Board be discontinued. These elections are not open to the public and only $78.60 in campaign spending has been reported under this program since 2018. Strict reporting requirements for candidates in these seats imposes an administrative burden on both the candidates and City staff, without providing any meaningful benefit to the City.

The Commission voted in June to authorize the Chair and the Executive Director to send a letter to the Board of Supervisors requesting the Board introduce and enact legislation that would discontinue the reporting requirements for these candidates.

This led to the introduction of the third ordinance connected to this project. File No. 250928 would eliminate the disclosure and reporting requirements for candidates seeking election to the Retirement Board, Health Service Board, and Retiree Health Care Trust Fund Board and eliminate third-party disclosure requirements for persons or entities making independent expenditures to support or oppose such candidates.

As this recommendation only involves changes to the City’s Administrative Code, no additional action is needed by the Commission. However, Commission staff will remain available to assist the Board of Supervisors on this legislation should the Board desire.

Links Related to this Policy Project

Interested Persons Meeting Announcements to Discuss:

• Potential Changes to City Rules Regarding Major Developers, Campaign Consultants, Recusals, and Other Programs – 03/11/2025 and 03/13/2025

Staff Reports & Resources:

• Policy Report: Streamlining Project Preview – 6/13/2025
  • Presentation: 2025 Streamlining Project Presentation
• Policy Report: Streamlining Project Preview: Independent Expenditure Ceiling – 6/13/2025
  • Presentation: IEC Streamlining Project Preview Presentation
• Ethics Commission Letter Regarding Trustee Elections – 7/14/2025
• Staff Memo on Legislation Related to Ethics Commission Streamlining Project – 8/8/2025
• Staff Memo on Legislation Related to Ethics Commission Streamlining Project – 9/12/2025

Legislation:

• File No. 250867 regarding campaign consultants, supplemental recusal notifications, and major developers.
  • Status: Under consideration by Board of Supervisors.
• File No. 250868 regarding expenditure ceilings and contribution limits.
  • Status: Under consideration by Board of Supervisors.
• File No. 250928 regarding the disclosure and reporting requirements in trustee elections.
  • Status: Under consideration by Board of Supervisors.

Key Commission Meetings:

• June 13^th, 2025: Presentation, discussion and possible action on a preview of recommendations that Staff are developing regarding various programs and policies administered by the Ethics Commission. The Commission authorized the Chair to sign a letter on behalf of the Commission to the Board of Supervisors regarding legislative changes to the trustee election disclosure requirements. ( Agenda | Meeting Minutes | Summary )
• August 8^th, 2025: Presentation and discussion of the Staff recommendations regarding the streamlining of various programs and policies administered by the Ethics Commission. Staff presented draft legislation that would enact those recommendations. ( Agenda | Meeting Minutes | Summary )
• September 12^th, 2025: Discussion and Possible Action on Legislation Related to Ethics Commission Streamlining Project. The Commission approved the two ordinances (File# 250867 and File# 250868) by a vote of 5-0. ( Agenda | Meeting Minutes | Summary )

For updates on this policy project, subscribe to the Commission’s meeting notices and agendas by joining our Interested Persons E-mail List. Additionally, all policy and legislative items the Ethics Commission considers are posted to an agenda prior to the public meeting in which they are discussed and acted upon.

Please contact Policy and Legislative Affairs Manager Michael Canning at Michael.A.Canning@sfgov.org for more information about this project or the Commission’s other policy efforts.