Sauter’s father, a labor lawyer who represents several labor unions, and his mother, a teacher who runs a community service program at a local high school, volunteered to take him to soup kitchens.
The combination of these experiences “kept me interested in public service,” Sauter said. A nonprofit executive director, community organizer, and political moderate by San Francisco standards, his campaign won the support of moderates seeking a unanimous supervisory majority.
Next January, Sauter will take office to a whole new level as a first-time elected official and the first new superintendent in District 3 since 2015. His district includes the Financial District, as well as the financial district, which is the engine of the city’s economy. These include Chinatown, Jackson Square, North Beach, Fisherman’s Wharf, Polk Gulch, Union Square, and Russian Hills, Telegraph Hills, and Nob Hills.
Sauter addressed issues such as increasing the number of emergency responders for public safety, from police to dispatchers. Clean up your neighborhood. Build affordable housing. Protection of renters. Fill vacant stores. and reduce homelessness. His stance has won support from some tech reformers who see longtime Supervisor Aaron Peskin as a blocker on housing issues.
Mr. Sauter, a 36-year-old native of Columbus, Ohio, began his career in the private sector and moved to San Francisco after college to take his first job. It was there, Sauter says, that he met his future wife at a tech startup.
Sauter said of his marriage, “The company didn’t work out, but it worked out.”
Sauter majored in entrepreneurship and Chinese as an undergraduate at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and went on to co-found and run Bamboo, a digital marketing agency in North Beach, for five years, hiring employees. The number has grown to 58 people.
But in late 2015, Sauter’s life took a turn for the worse as he became more involved with North Beach Neighbors, a neighborhood organization that serves the area where he rents apartments, and served as a board member and past president. It turned around.
Within the group, Mr. Sauter led a successful effort to establish a farmers’ market. The market is self-operated and is usually open on Saturdays at Greenwich Street and Columbus Street.
The experience strengthened Sauter’s desire to become more broadly involved in community issues, he said. Sauter said the creation of the farmers’ market showed how difficult it is to get things done in the city and inspired him to think about eliminating bureaucracy and improving city services.
Sauter began volunteering for political campaigns in 2016, similar to state Sen. Scott Wiener.
He helped count and raise awareness of vacant storefronts in the district, organized street cleaning and volunteer delivery services to support local restaurants during the COVID-19 lockdown, and He lobbied for more protected bike lanes and advocated for more housing first. Sierra Club San Francisco Group Housing Chair.
In August 2019, Sauter left Bamboo, now in Seattle, to become executive director of Neighborhood Centers Together, a nonprofit organization that provides support to eight neighborhood centers in the city.
“I quit my job at an advertising agency and tried to get closer to this world, this world of politics, this world of civic engagement and public service,” Sauter said. “I didn’t know exactly where it was going to lead me, but I knew I needed to be in this world. That was a constant for me.”
Around the same time, Sauter said she began taking Cantonese lessons to better communicate with District 3’s Asian American residents, something she has continued to pursue ever since.
Coach Aaron Peskin speaks at Coach Connie Chung’s re-election victory celebration on the steps of San Francisco City Hall on Tuesday, November 12, 2024.
Craig Lee/The Examiner
Deciding that there was a lack of credible candidates to challenge Coach Peskin in the 2020 election, Sauter jumped to the bottom, and although Peskin won, the final tally of ranked candidates showed that Sauter He finished in second place with 43% of the votes.
This year marks Peskin’s second consecutive term (Peskin’s fifth overall) and is not on the ballot due to an expiring term, and Sauter defeated two candidates Peskin supported.
After five rounds of ranked voting, Sauter received 14,056 votes, or about 55% of the votes, while second-place finisher Sharon Lai received 11,512 votes, or 45%.
Sauter’s victory came despite a concerted strategy by several opponents to form an alliance late in the campaign and encourage voters to place each other’s name above Sauter’s as their second choice. .
Among other things, they disputed Sauter’s involvement with the police force. Sauter opposed increases in police spending in 2020 following the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer and emphasized the need for more mental health and social worker responders. In this election, Sauter said he supports increasing police staffing.
Candidate Mo Jamil also described Sauter, who has been vocal about building more housing, especially high-density housing along commercial corridors, as someone who was “bought and paid by big developers.” , questioned Sauter’s commitment to tenant protections, but Sauter rejected the concerns. Sauter argued that embracing urban density would make San Francisco more vibrant and help meet climate change goals.
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Mr. Sauter received contributions from a wide range of parties, including the real estate industry and the San Francisco Apartment Association Political Action Committee, as well as some of the biggest names in the technology industry and venture capital. Including public funds, a total of $429,211 was raised.
Outside spending supporting Sauter was higher than any other candidate, with the Abundance Network-sponsored committee spending $161,877 and the GrowSF committee spending $161,877, according to city records. The two moderates said they spent $70,910.
Abundance Network, a high-tech housing advocacy group, was instrumental in a gentle takeover of the San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee in March, which in turn endorsed Mr. Sauter.
Diana Taylor, president of the Barbary Coast Neighborhood Association, said Sauter’s experience supporting small businesses will help attract neighborhood-serving retailers to neighborhoods like the one just north of downtown, where she lives. He said he was looking forward to it. He said the area has many vacant storefronts and no functioning commercial corridors.
Taylor said he hopes Sauter will elevate the voice of the community against paid lobbyists who often have undue influence over their opinions.
“As a neighborhood organizer, Danny knows the importance of leveling the playing field in making projects fit into the neighborhood,” she said.
A view of Columbus Avenue from the rooftop of the International Hotel in San Francisco’s Chinatown on Tuesday, May 21, 2024.
Craig Lee/The Examiner
Sauter was optimistic about the future, saying he believes lower interest rates will stimulate the economy.
Although he did not endorse any mayoral candidates, having Daniel Lurie as the new mayor is an entrenched move in The City, which has suffered from negative perceptions fueled by reports about San Francisco’s crime problems in recent years. “It will help eliminate the stigma,” he said. Commercial vacancies and homelessness.
“There was hesitancy to take a chance in San Francisco,” Sauter said. “A new mayor is an important opportunity for us to re-promote San Francisco.”
Sauter said he wants to encourage action in a variety of areas, especially stimulating the resurgence of the downtown economy. We believe that there is not enough “urgency” in this region. Office vacancy rates in downtown San Francisco are at record highs since the pandemic and the rise of remote work.
Sauter, who recently met with Lurie, said the number one thing he would like to work on with the next mayor is “I think anything related to downtown, tourism and hospitality should be at the forefront.” Downtown revitalization. ”
Sauter, like others, said he expects to see a significant number of projects converting underutilized office buildings downtown from office to residential. Mayor London Breed has pushed for regulatory changes to encourage such conversions, and voters in March passed a transfer tax exemption for the sale of converted buildings, but there hasn’t been a rush of proposals.
“Everyone has been talking about this for the last few years, but we haven’t seen much action on it, and I want to understand why that is,” he said.
Sauter cites the example of the former Pfizer headquarters building in Midtown Manhattan, which is being converted to apartments as part of what is billed as the largest office-to-residential conversion in Big Apple history.
“We need to figure out why they can do it and why we can’t,” Sauter said.
One thing Sauter would like to see is for city employees to work directly in the office more days a week, which he argued could particularly benefit the area around the Civic Center.
“This is an area where the city itself should take the lead and say, ‘We’re directly back,'” he said.
At Fisherman’s Wharf, some of Bay Street’s vacant commercial space could be replaced with dense housing, Sauter said.
Advocates want the city of San Francisco to acquire the fire-ravaged vacant lot at 659 Union Street for affordable apartments and space for the future North Beach Central subway station.
Craig Lee/The Examiner
Meanwhile, regarding Washington Square Park, Sauter said he would like to see progress in rebuilding the damaged facade of the apartment complex at 659 Union Street, which was destroyed in a massive fire in 2018. Proposed redevelopment of site including hotel and rooftop restaurant stalls.
Sauter said he would like the city to explore the possibility of purchasing the land for affordable housing and the North Beach Central Subway Station, noting that a tunnel has already been dug to the site. , Mr. Sauter indicated his intention. See the extension from Chinatown to Fisherman’s Wharf. He said there is precedent for such a purchase, as the city purchased land on Stockton Street in 2012 for the Chinatown-Rosepack Central subway station.
“In any case, I hope something is done about that building,” Sauter said. “I want a little more movement. I know my neighbors are doing that. There’s a big hole in the neighborhood.”
