Sunset Dunes Endorsement Explanation
On the measure to allow private vehicles on the Great Highway in Sunset Dunes Park, the Sierra Club recommends a No vote
San Francisco voters have already answered this question. In November 2024 they passed Proposition K, closing the Upper Great Highway to cars and creating what is now Sunset Dunes Park. The park has repaid that decision many times over. Thousands of people visit every day, on foot, on bikes, on skates, with strollers and wheelchairs, along an oceanfront that for decades was mostly accessed by car. The Sierra Club endorsed the measures that established and protected this park, and members will remember that we opposed a similar attempt to shut down the park in 2022, which voters also rejected decisively. This November's measure is the same idea in a new coat of paint, and our position is the same.
The measure would put private vehicles back on the Great Highway on weekdays, reducing Sunset Dunes to a weekend-only park. Backers call this a compromise. It is not. A dune system cannot be restored two days a week. Sunset Dunes can only enable environmental improvements if the pavement no longer functions as a highway. When permanently car-free, sand and native vegetation can reclaim the corridor. Habitat can be expanded and restored. And we can manage sensitive coastal areas the way Crissy Field and other parts of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area are. Five days of traffic ends that restoration the same as seven would, while returning the noise, the emissions, and the danger to shorebirds, other wildlife and people that made the old Great Highway a barrier between the Sunset and its own beach. The ballot measure is a park removal. We will no longer have a park because all park amenities (benches, playgrounds, exercise equipment, coastal restoration project staging, etc) will be removed if the measure passes (at a cost to the city of over $10M), not to mention the return of cars to the beach.
The case for putting a highway on the beach is thin. Official studies found that closing the road added roughly three minutes of peak-hour travel time on weekdays for trips that once used the Great Highway and now divert to streets like Sunset Boulevard. We do not dismiss the frustrations of some westside drivers, and the city should keep improving the surrounding intersections and transit connections. But trading a flourishing coastal park, its habitat, and a safe walking and biking route used by thousands of people a day to shave minutes off some car commutes is exactly the bargain Sierra Club transportation policy tells us to refuse.
There is also a question of respect for the voters. This is the third time in five years that San Franciscans have been asked to decide the Great Highway's future, after rejecting the reopening in 2022 and approving the park in 2024. The park's opponents are entitled to keep asking, but the city's need for this coastline has only grown clearer since the last vote, as thousands of daily visitors have made the park part of their lives. A No vote protects both the park and the principle that a decision made by the voters, twice, should be given the chance to keep succeeding.
Sunset Dunes is what coastal recovery looks like. Keep the park whole.
Vote No on the measure to allow private vehicles on the Great Highway in Sunset Dunes Park.
SF Housing Trust Fund Endorsement Explanation
On San Francisco's Affordable Housing Trust Fund measure, the Sierra Club recommends a Yes vote
Building homes in San Francisco is a climate issue. Housing in the region’s urban core, near Muni lines, BART stations, and walkable corridors makes car-free life possible, and means households aren't pushed into long commutes. That is why national Sierra Club policy calls dense, mixed-use communities "an essential strategy for reducing urban related carbon emissions." It’s also why the Club supported the Family Zoning Plan. Zoning changes alone, however, don’t get housing built. Public funding to accelerate the construction of additional affordable housing is critical, but San Francisco's main source of that money, the voter-created Housing Trust Fund, was built for a different time.
This measure updates it to meet today’s needs. If passed, it would expand the Housing Trust Fund from $52 million to $125 million a year and extend it for thirty years, dedicating more than $3 billion to building and preserving affordable housing in San Francisco. The expansion is funded by setting aside a portion of future property tax growth, which it expects to see thanks to the recent upzoning. As new homes rise and property values climb along transit corridors, some of that new revenue is captured and returned to the neighborhoods as permanently affordable homes. And because the measure is a charter amendment, the funding cannot be redirected in a future budget season.
Support for the measure is broad. All eleven members of the Board of Supervisors voted to place it on the November ballot, and Mayor Lurie has championed it alongside Supervisor Melgar. In a city whose housing politics are famously divided, a unanimous board and a mayor pulling in the same direction is rare, and it demonstrates how good policy can meet needs across the income spectrum. It needs only a simple majority of votes to pass.
The measure is not a cure-all, and the Club's support comes with clear eyes. Dedicated funding means these dollars are unavailable for other city purposes, and there are many competing demands on San Francisco's budget. More fundamentally, the measure adds money without addressing why affordable housing in San Francisco costs so much to build (roughly $1 million per unit, among the highest in the country). More funding for affordable housing in San Francisco is good for the environment but more money also will likely push construction costs higher still. Therefore, the Sierra Club will keep pressing for reforms to make each of these new affordable housing dollars go further.
This measure is an essential step in reducing greenhouse gas pollution. A city that has committed to growing must also commit to keeping room for the people growth can push out, and this measure writes that commitment into the charter. It is the strongest affordable housing investment San Francisco voters have been offered in years, and it deserves the Sierra Club's strong support.
Vote Yes on the Affordable Housing Trust Fund measure this November.
D10 Endorsement Explanation
For District 10 Supervisor, the Sierra Club endorses J.R. Eppler as our first choice and Theo Ellington as our second choice. Voters should rank both of them.
District 10 sits at the center of the Club's priorities in San Francisco. Its industrial legacy means it faces the City’s worst soil and air pollution. Sea level rise threatens its parks and shoreline. And underinvestment in transit and safe bike lanes has led to some of the longest commutes and highest levels of car dependency anywhere in SF. Transportation and buildings generate 90% of San Francisco's greenhouse gas emissions, so the next supervisor's decisions about transit, streets, and housing in District 10 are critical climate decisions. Two candidates in this race warrant the Club's support, and we encourage voters to rank both.
J.R. Eppler is our first choice because his record and positions best align with the Sierra Club. As president of the Potrero Boosters Neighborhood Association he led efforts to establish (or re-establish) the 55 and 15 bus routes, advocated for the Safer 17th Street protected bike lanes, and he would push SFMTA to implement the Biking and Rolling Plan’s North Start map by 2028. In his interview he gave specific, detailed answers to questions about how to increase transit access and quality in D10, including signal priority for the T Third and an infill Caltrain station at Oakdale.
Eppler has also supported building the kind of transit-oriented housing that allows more residents to access the district’s schools, shops, and parks without a car. He backed large new housing developments at Pier 70, the Power Station, and the Mason on Mariposa, and supports the Family Zoning Plan. He also supports expediting the construction of existing projects so residents can benefit from their climate resilience elements before the worst effects of climate change occur.
Finally, Eppler was also the only candidate we interviewed to support the State Water Board's Bay Delta Plan, which would restore flows to the Tuolumne River and the Bay-Delta ecosystem. The plan is a Club priority that is currently opposed by the City’s Public Utilities Commission. Having a District 10 supervisor willing to publicly push back here matters.
Theo Ellington receives our second-choice endorsement. Ellington has deep roots in the district. He grew up in Bayview-Hunters Point and lives with his young family at the Shipyard. He participated in litigation over falsified soil testing at the Shipyard, which is the kind of cleanup accountability the Club has long called for. He’s also endorsed by multiple Bayview environmental justice advocates, reflecting his commitment to these issues and support from the people and groups that have been working on them the longest.
Ellington has also backed several environmental transportation and housing priorities. He supports congestion pricing, the Family Zoning Plan, and the Biking and Rolling Plan, and he has worked to fund transit, backing regional and local transit funding measures and speaking out publicly in support of 2024 Prop L to fund Muni. He worked with the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition on bicycle access during the Chase Center development. He unfortunately does not support the current Bay Delta Plan, preferring a voluntary agreement, does not oppose the CalTrans proposed highway widening and does not support removing Uber, Lyft and Waymo from Market Street.
The Sierra Club also considered candidate DJ Brookter but unfortunately he opposed the Sierra Club on roughly a dozen topics.
Rank J.R. Eppler first and Theo Ellington second for District 10 Supervisor.
D8 Endorsement Explanation
For District 8 Supervisor, the Sierra Club endorses Gary McCoy
Much of the Club's agenda in San Francisco runs through District 8. It contains some of the city's most beloved slow streets, key pieces of the Biking and Rolling Plan, the proposed Safer, Better 17th Street bike lanes connection to the Castro, and has neighborhoods well suited to more homes near transit. Gary McCoy’s strong record and environmental positions made the choice in this race clear.
McCoy has a long history of support for sustainable streets and transportation projects. He spearheaded the early "Healthy Saturdays" expansion at the Recreation and Park Department, years before voters made Car Free JFK permanent. He led the Golden Gate Park Traffic Safety Project with SFMTA, worked to lower speed limits through the park, advocated for daylighting and raised crosswalks as Vice Chair of the Pedestrian Safety Advisory Committee, and managed the 2014 Proposition B campaign that ensured the city's transportation funding would rise when population grows.
His commitments to the district are also specific. McCoy backs the Safer, Better 17th Street proposal including the parking removal it requires, and wants the D8 segments of the Biking and Rolling Plans’ North Star network completed by 2030. He pledged to keep every current slow street, to defend the permanent car-free Sunset Dunes from the November ballot measure targeting it, and to expand automated speed and red-light camera enforcement beyond current plans. He has publicly endorsed both November transit funding measures, and supports congestion pricing and a TNC tax to fund Muni. He also supports the State Water Board's Bay Delta Plan to restore flows to the Tuolumne River, a Club priority.
On housing, McCoy agrees with the Sierra Club that where San Francisco builds matters greatly for climate. He supported the Family Zoning Plan, the March 2024 Proposition C conversion incentives, and waiving impact fees on downtown office-to-housing conversions. He believes that building homes near transit, rather than pushing working families into long car commutes from outside the city, is one of the most powerful emissions tools the city has.
We respect Manny Yekutiel's prioritization of small business, joy, and civic vitality, and he holds environmental views on a number of topics including congestion pricing, a TNC tax to fund Muni, the Family Zoning Plan, and both transit funding measures. However, his prioritization of small business and niche, car-centric demands leads to significant divergence from environmental priorities on several key topics - despite the fact that walkable bikeable neighborhoods are good for both the planet and small business. He voted against Slow Chenery while on the SFMTA Board, declined to take a position on either the Bay Delta Plan or the K-Ingleside Rapid Project, supports converting the 280 shoulder into an HOV lane, accepts Waymo, Uber, and Lyft on Market Street, and supports striking the independent Environment Commission from the City Charter.
Michael Nguyen, who formerly led Livable City, hold environmental views on transportation and water positions nearly across the board, but his opposition to the Family Zoning Plan, the March 2024 Proposition C, the office-to-housing fee waivers and his support for adding thousands of new parking spots in driveways puts him at odds with the Sierra Club on multiple key priorities central to the Club's work in San Francisco.
Vote Gary McCoy for District 8 Supervisor.
D6 Endorsement Explanation
For District 6 Supervisor, the Sierra Club endorses Matt Dorsey
No district in San Francisco is better positioned to show that dense, transit-oriented city living works than District 6. SoMa, Mission Bay, South Beach and the East Cut sit near the richest concentration of transit in Northern California. The district also carries historic burdens that make the Club's agenda urgent there, from the freeway ramps and wide one-way arterials that make SoMa streets among the city's most dangerous for people walking and biking to a shoreline, including all of Treasure Island, exposed to sea-level rise. Many of the key questions central to climate change in San Francisco get answered first in District 6, and Supervisor Dorsey has been addressing them well.
Dorsey's voting record backs that up. On the Club's 2024 legislative scorecard he supported the Sierra Club position on 9 of 11 votes and ballot measures, tied with district 7 Supervisor Melgar for the second-highest score on the Board. In 2025 he voted for the environmental position on every vote where the Sierra Club took a public position. He voted for stronger environmental window standards, for building electrification standards for major renovations, to confirm environmentalist nominees to the SFMTA Board and the Public Utilities Commission, to fund Muni through the Proposition L tax on Uber, Lyft, and Waymo, to sustain the veto of downzoning in transit-rich northeastern San Francisco, to improve the City's ADU policies, and for the affordable housing, street safety, and rental subsidy measures the Club endorsed. He also co-sponsored the ballot measure that created Sunset Dunes Park, putting his name behind a lasting piece of coastal restoration and oceanside park expansion.
Where Dorsey stands out most is the housing-transportation-climate connection. He doesn't own a car. He gets around his district by transit, bike, and foot, and his legislative record makes that green and lower cost way of living more attractive to more San Franciscans. He introduced the fee relief for downtown office-to-housing conversions that helped make the November 2024 Proposition C incentives real, voted for the Family Zoning Plan and this year's group housing legislation, and backed legislation in 2025 adding housing capacity in SoMa and the East Cut. He has endorsed both November transit funding measures, the local parcel tax and the Bay Area regional sales tax, that will keep that transit running. And he has worked with us directly: he meets with the Club regularly, and when we, along with vocal residents, raised the issue of pedestrian and bike safety near the new Mission Bay school, he got the County Transportation Authority to draft recommendations and an important first step street design safety project near the school was recently completed.
There is still room to lead. Mission Bay has lost two young children in crosswalks in barely a year, and we need Supervisor Dorsey to put sustained pressure on the SFMTA to deliver street safety improvements across the whole neighborhood, not just around the school. And we would welcome his leadership on water. He was not among the supervisors urging the City to drop its lawsuit against the EPA's Clean Water Act protections, and the Club hopes he will champion the Bay Delta Plan's restoration of Tuolumne River flows.
Dorsey pairs a strong environmental record with a race in which he faces no significant opposition. The Club is glad to have a partner in District 6 and expects to ask more of him in his next term.
Vote Matt Dorsey for District 6 Supervisor.
D4 Non-Endorsement Explanation
For District 4 Supervisor, the Sierra Club is making no endorsement
District 4 has a lot at stake for the environment this November. Sunset Dunes, the coastal park voters created in 2024, runs the length of the district's western edge, and the ballot measure to put cars back on the beach thus closing the park will be decided by the voters including those choosing their district 4 supervisor. We wanted to endorse in the district 4 race but after reviewing the candidates, we could not find one worthy of endorsement.
Supervisor Alan Wong has taken some valuable environmental steps. He voted for the Family Zoning Plan on his second day in office, a brave move when opposing it would have been the easier politics in the Sunset, and he co-sponsored the charter amendment expanding the Affordable Housing Trust Fund. Both advance critical climate work in San Francisco. Homes near transit mean households that are not pushed into long commutes, and thus emissions reductions follow. But Wong is also a leading backer of the measure to put cars back on Ocean Beach, and the environmental cost of that position is enormous. Weekday traffic would halt the return of the dunes and the restoration of coastal habitat, bring vehicle emissions and noise back to the shoreline, and take away a safe walking and biking route that thousands of people now use every day. As a Community College Board Member Wong also opposed the Frida Kahlo Way protected bike lanes. One of his first acts after being appointed Supervisor was to push SFMTA to create many more on street parking spaces in the already parking heavy and transit/bike light Sunset district. Wong did not return a questionnaire which would have provided more information on his other positions.
Albert Chow's platform carries those environmental costs even further. He led the recall campaign against environmental champion, former Supervisor Joel Engardio. Supervisor Engardio had the best environmental record of any Supervisor for the calendar year prior to the recall. The recall’s central grievance was that Engardio had supported the creation of Sunset Dunes Park. Chow is a chief proponent of putting cars back on the beach, and his signature transportation proposal is a new automobile tunnel under Golden Gate Park. Each of these moves the district in the same direction: more driving, more emissions, and public space and habitat sacrificed to traffic flow. His opposition to the Family Zoning Plan compounds the problem, keeping new homes away from the transit corridors where they do the most climate good. Like Supervisor Wong, Albert Chow also failed to return a questionnaire and thus we do not have information on his other positions.
Jeremy Greco has taken a number of good environmental positions, far more than the other district four candidates. He is the one candidate who supports keeping Sunset Dunes a permanent, full-time park, and he supports the Bay Delta Plan and a TNC tax to fund Muni. Unfortunately he does not support the reusable foodware ordinance to reduce plastic waste, the Family Zoning Plan nor waiving some transfer taxes and downtown housing conversations. Sierra Club endorsement criteria also require a reasonable chance of electoral success. Given Greco’s weak performance in the June special election against the same opponents he does not appear to be a viable candidate in this election.
We look forward to working with past, present and future candidates for district 4 toward a vision of sustainability for San Francisco.
The Sierra Club makes no endorsement for District 4 Supervisor.
D2 Endorsement Explanation
For District 2 Supervisor, the Sierra Club endorses Stephen Sherrill
The Sierra Club is proud to endorse Supervisor Sherrill for District 2 Supervisor this November. Covering the northern neighborhoods of San Francisco, District 2 is home to some of San Francisco’s most iconic parks and vistas. The low-lying marina and waterfront also put large parts of it at significant risk of sea-level rise and its commercial corridors and residential streets are the places where important decisions about safer streets, transit, and new homes near jobs and shops will be made. In just his first 18 months Supervisor Sherrill has built up a strong environmental record, and the Sierra Club is excited to help him extend that into a second term.
In 2025, Sherrill voted with the Sierra Club on every vote where the Club took a public position. He voted for stronger environmental window standards, for building electrification standards for major renovations, for key SFMTA board appointments, for the Family Zoning Plan, for street safety policies that make walking, biking, and transit safer and more convenient, and for two separate improvements to the City's ADU policies. Where San Francisco builds and how its buildings run are central to the Club's climate work, and Sherrill has been a reliable vote on both.
In 2026 he also stepped up on transit funding, the backbone of San Francisco’s plans to cut transportation emissions. Sherrill endorsed both the local transit funding parcel tax and the Bay Area regional transit funding sales tax measures the Club supports. And he has engaged with us directly: he has met with the Sierra Club, sought our input, and made clear that he wants the Club as a partner in his next term.
That said, there’s always opportunity to do more, and there are places where we would like to see him lead. He should push for completion of a protected bike lane on Arguello Boulevard; a project that is funded and just needs a political push to get implemented. And he should support bolder parking reforms in the Marina. Though there’s sometimes opposition to these kinds of efforts, they’re critical for reaching our environmental goals and are where we’d like him to spend some of the political capital he’s earned.
District 2 voters have already weighed in once. In the June special election they returned Sherrill to office decisively, with 69% of the vote. The choice this election is clear, and we are proud to make it.
Vote Stephen Sherrill for District 2 Supervisor.
CA-11 Endorsement Explanation
For CA-11, the Sierra Club endorses Scott Wiener.
With Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi’s planned retirement, the CA-11 Congressional seat is open for the first time since 1987. The next Congressperson will tackle critical environmental issues: defending public lands from fossil fuel extraction, protecting and expanding investments in clean energy and transit infrastructure, strengthening our democracy against the influence of corporate polluters, and mitigating the impacts of climate change on American families and communities. Senator Scott Wiener, with his prolific legislative history and bold, detailed agenda, is the climate champion we need. The Sierra Club is proud to endorse him.
Sen. Wiener has championed numerous Sierra Club priorities over his 9 years in the California Senate. He had an excellent environmental voting record and he has sponsored key bills including SB 467, which sought to ban fracking and end neighborhood oil drilling; SB 253, requiring large corporations to publicly disclose their greenhouse gas emissions; SBX1-2, linking social justice for immigrant communities to environmental justice; and SB 71, authorizing a solar roof mandate for most new buildings in California. His recent work includes permitting reform for rooftop solar and authoring legislation to hold Big Oil accountable for their role in wildfires. Critically, Wiener has jumped into the fray three times in three years to save the Bay Area’s public transit systems from financial collapse, including authoring the law that authorized the Connect Bay Area regional funding measure. Named a TIME100 Climate Champion in 2023, he has regularly met with Sierra Club representatives and remains a consistent voice for environmental priorities large and small.
Sen. Wiener’s policy positions in this race reflect his bold and diligent approach to legislating. His platform includes dozens of pages of detail on clean energy, corporate polluters, public lands, permitting reform, public transportation investment, and more. Freshmen in Congress often spend their first term learning the ropes, perhaps making inroads on one or two issues. But if ever there were a Californian who could ramp up quickly in a new institution and make an early impact, it would be Wiener, based on his record doing exactly that in first the SF Board of Supervisors, then again in the CA Senate. He keenly understands the role of the representative from San Francisco in staking out bold stances on stagnant issues. His past legislative wins have come from his pattern of building creative, effective, results-oriented coalitions. As a policy wonk, his positions are as thoroughly-researched as they come; as a legislative operator, his effectiveness is unmatched.
Supervisor Chan’s past legislative record and stated future policy positions on environmental issues taken together are disappointing for a San Francisco elected official. Some of her positions have been outright oppositional. Compared with Scott’s three separate core environmental policy pillars, Chan’s brief online policy platform makes only buried passing mentions, if that, of key climate priorities - she plans to endorse the Green New Deal, reduce fossil fuels, and expand the CleanPowerSF utility model. Where Wiener nerds out with great detail and passion, in policy proposals and in-person interviews, Chan fails to offer specifics. Her track record opposing key environmental priorities, unfortunately, speaks for itself. In 2024-2025, she voted with the Sierra Club on only 10 of 16 topics, and she has consistently opposed efforts to build climate-friendly infill housing and reduce commuter emissions. Her lack of support this year for the critical Connect Bay Area transit funding campaign is particularly troubling given how central public transit is to reducing climate changing pollution.
The environmental choice in this race is crystal clear. The Sierra Club is proud to endorse Scott Wiener for Congress.
BART D8 Endorsement Explanation
For BART Board of Directors, District 8, the Sierra Club endorses Sara Barz
BART is the lynchpin of the Bay Area's climate ambitions. Every trip the system carries is a trip not taken on a freeway, and no local election this November matters more to regional emissions than who governs it. And this election comes at a critical time. Voters will also decide the Connect Bay Area regional funding measure, the region's answer to the fiscal cliff that has hung over transit since the pandemic. If it passes, the next board must spend that money credibly, keep the independent financial oversight the measure requires, and deliver the service riders were promised. District 8's stations, Glen Park and Balboa Park, sit in neighborhoods that need that delivery most. They are busy transfer points where getting to the train on foot or by bike still means navigating some of the city's least forgiving streets.
Few first-time candidates for any office arrive this prepared. Barz is a transit professional who has worked inside the San Francisco County Transportation Authority, the City of Oakland, and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, and now works as a transit product manager. She co-founded Seamless Bay Area, the organization pushing the region's two dozen transit agencies to act like one network, and was an original author of SPUR's 2015 "Seamless Transit" report that started that conversation. She serves on the SFCTA Community Advisory Committee, and in 2024 Mass Transit Magazine named her one of its 40 Under 40 transit professionals. Club members know her as one of our own. She served on the SF Bay Chapter Executive Committee and has been a leader in KidSafe SF, the Car Free JFK campaign, and the effort that turned the Great Highway into Sunset Dunes park.
Her platform is refreshingly concrete. Before any megaproject, she wants the basics: reliable trains, working elevators and escalators, and capital dollars steered toward replacing fifty-year-old track switches and signals; investments riders feel, not ribbon-cuttings. She wants station areas treated as front doors, with the lighting and upgrades that worked at Oakland's 19th Street station brought to San Francisco, and pedestrian and bike safety fixes at Glen Park and Balboa Park paired with clearer connections to Muni. And she would carry her Seamless Bay Area work onto the board itself: building on Clipper 2.0's transfer discounts, expanding and simplifying the Clipper START discount program, and pursuing regional fare policies so that fares stop being a barrier for the riders who depend on BART most.
Barz also understands that BART's long-term health is a land use question. She supports maximizing housing on BART's own properties, because people who live near stations become the system's most regular riders, and she argues that decades of expansion toward the region's edges have left San Francisco's west side behind. She wants the next few years of Link21 planning to produce shovel-ready proposals for rail to Stonestown and other westside corridors. A rare chance, in her words, to bring high-quality transit to the urban core rather than squander another planning cycle.
The Club's relationship with Barz is long and direct. We endorsed her for the DCCC and supported her nomination to the SFMTA Board of Directors. She is running unopposed. With the future of Bay Area transit on the same ballot, we want its most capable advocate campaigning with our full support.
Vote Sara Barz for BART Board, District 8.