SF Supervisor Joel Engardio Recall Growing Following Controversial Support Of Sunset Dunes

The movement to recall San Francisco Supervisor Joel Engardio continued to move forward on Thursday following the announcement by supporters that it has turned in just under 11,000 signatures to the Board of Elections, with 9,911 being needed to bring the issue to a vote.

Engardio, a former journalist and a Supervisor since 2023, has faced immense ire from the public of the city and his own constituents since last year when he became a supporter and primary of Proposition K. The proposition, which called for the closure of the Upper Great Highway in San Francisco in order for it to be turned into a park, was swiftly opposed by well over half his constituents. The closure of the stretch of highway was already semi-permanent going into November 2024, with the highway there being closed on weekends and holidays, with supporters saying that natural erosion would have made highway closure inevitable anyway, and that it makes the park more safe.

However opponents countered that the closure is inconvenient, sends too much traffic onto neighborhood streets, and creates a safety issue for them. Despite their concerns, Engardio became of the key people behind moving it forward, even being one of the decisive votes in placing Prop K on the ballot. While Prop K passed in November with 55% of the vote, two-thirds of of the voters in his district voted against it. Supporters subsequently formed a recall effort against Engardio, with Engardio stating that he was confident that they would not get enough signatures. When the park, now named Sunset Dunes, opened last month, Engardio himself cut the ribbon and dismissed local opposition once again.

“It’s like the Golden Gate Bridge,” he told the crowd at the grand opening in April. “‘Too ugly,’ people said. That it looked like an upside down rat trap. Imagine the social media posts if they had Nextdoor in 1937.”

This seemingly invincible attitude was dealt a major blow on Thursday when supporters announced that they would be submitting 10,700 of the 14,000 signatures collected to the Board of Elections. If accepted an no more than 7.4% of signatures are discarded, it would mean that Engardio would face a recall election later this year.

“Joel Engardio ignored our community’s needs and kept pushing policies and propositions that hurt us and all San Franciscans,” said recall campaign volunteer Selena Chu while speaking at the signature turn-in rally outside of the San Francisco City Hall.

“Frontline workers or nurses like myself who can’t afford to be stuck in traffic for an extra 40 minutes a day,” nursing student and Chinese American Democratic Club member Julia Quon. “Not only is this affecting how people get to work, but it’s like how our elders get to the doctor, how people drop off their kids at school.”

Engardio and the Recall attempt

Meanwhile Engardio, who was a notable supporter of both the recall of the 3 San Francisco Board of Education members in early 2022 and of DA Chesa Boudin in June 2022, remained confident on Thursday that the recall attempt would simply pass, despite his anti-recall effort failing to stop this number of signatures from being collected.

“Recalls are a part of our democracy and people do have the right to pursue a recall,” explained Engardio on Thursday. “I’m hearing from a lot of people in the Sunset who do not think this rises to the occasion of a recall. I joined four other supervisors to put something on the ballot so everyone could have a voice and decide what to do with their coast, because the coast does belong to everyone.

“These past four months, this issue has been on people’s minds. But I’m confident that a majority of Sunset voters will reject this recall. Why? Because they liked the park, and the traffic was not as bad as people expected it to be. It’s too soon to know if the recall has qualified for the ballot.”

He has also gained powerful supporters, including Senator Scott Weiner (D-San Francisco), to help back the anti-recall effort.

“The recall is becoming a NIMBY effort to stop the positive progress at City Hall,” said Weiner. “If this recall succeeds, that’s exactly what will happen.”

With 10,700 signatures in, pre-screened from an initial 14,000 by supporters, the vast majority of the signatures will need to be accepted by elections officials, with 9,911 being needed to trigger a recall election. However, supporters of the recall also have a lawsuit to overturn Proposition K currently going through court, creating yet another avenue to fight back against the park.

News on if the recall is approved to go to the ballot is likely to come in the next few weeks as officials count and verify the signatures.