Nativist?

Jeremy Stoppelman tries, and fails, to make his personal attacks stick.

On or about June 22nd someone shared an email with me from the Office of Supervisor Joel Engardio. It was an invitation to a “listening session” event to be held on June 26th, hosted by the Office of the Supervisor (i.e. not a campaign event).

The invite was circulated around among a circle of friends and local activists. At some point someone asked, “is anyone going to attend?” I raised my hand, figuratively anyway, and said, “I will.” There is a point here about me that needs to be shared. I have, for over 40 years, held to a standard that when an elected official comes to my community to hold any kind of public event, particularly one to talk about an issue of importance to me. I make every effort to attend.

My theory is, if you want to come to my community and talk to local residents, then you need to be prepared to talk to me, even if you are on the other side of a campaign, issue or political party. It’s my community, shared with those that live in it with me, deal with it.

So, I raised my hand, dutifully registered for the event, followed the instructions and prepared my questions. June 26th was the day of event — “A Cup of Joe with Joel” is how they billed it. Cute, albeit a bit clunky on the naming.

I showed up at Galinette Bistro on Taraval a little before 10:30 a.m., took a seat, was served a cup of coffee, selected a truly lovely and delicious pain au chocolat and waited for the meeting to start.

We started on time (10:30 a.m.) and for a little more than an hour everything went smoothly. I asked the questions that I had prepared as per the meeting registration requirements. My questions were about playgrounds — Playground Justice Redux — because that is an issue that is important to me and also probably not the issue that Supervisor Engardio was expecting to hear about from me. Keep ‘em guessing, I thought.

As we were coming into the homestretch — the last 15 minutes or so — the controversial thing happened. Although the controversy was deferred, like all that maintenance at the Rec & Park playgrounds.

Supervisor Engardio fielded a constituent question from a somewhat new resident of The Sunset, moved in about 18 months ago she said. Her question was, “What is all the concern regarding the closure of the Upper Great Highway about? Why don’t people like the park?”

I had no idea who she was, so I was a little caught off-guard by the question. The same was true for Engardio. And he did a funny thing here, he actually turned me as if to defer to me to answer. No way that was going to happen, so he took a stab at it.

Engardio gave an uninspired answer, mostly focusing on how he believed he had “little or no choice” about introducing Prop K and the subsequent 24/7 closure of The Great Highway. Engardio wrapped up his answer by saying, “and in another 3 or 4 years I don’t think there would be any controversy about the highway closure or the park.”

The woman who asked the question pressed on that point. “Why is that” she asked? Engardio explained, “because the demographics of the Sunset are going to change.”

Engardio explained, “because the demographics of the Sunset are going to change.”

My one and only thought was, “wow Supervisor, you just told her that you want to gentrify The Sunset, and in 3 or 4 years to boot.”

Engardio’s comment has been reported and discussed broadly. But I am reporting on it here from my personal experience. This is not a report of something that someone told me. I was there and that is well documented. And he said what he said. I have never equivocated about that, nor will I ever. And Supervisor Engardio has been asked about it but has never explained or denied saying it.

There have been many comments and conversations about Engardio’s statement since that day. Here is one that I think captures the sentiment of virtually everyone that I have spoken with about it — Patricia Arack endorses Engardio Recall

But this is the one — Albert Chow Endorsement—Recall Engardio! — that turned the controversy for Recallers and other residents of The Sunset into a fit of pique from the narcissistic, racist, YIMBY, tech-bro crowd.

Jeremy Stoppelman, centi-millionaire tech-bro and Yelp! CEO, got things really rolling on X with this gem —

Jeremy Stoppelman is, in addition to the things I listed above, as outright narcissistic, elitist, YIMBY and racist as they come. Also, he has donated $175,000 to the $ave Joel campaign… I mean, the Stand with Joel Campaign. He does not know Albert Chow, nor does he know or care to know anything about him, The Sunset community, District 4 or any of us that live here. I thought about writing more oppositional arguments to Jeremy’s bullshit, but I think it better if you all just head over and read the comments on X in response to his attack on Albert because a bunch of District 4 residents and Recall Engardio supporters did a really good job of slicing and dicing Stoppelman up there.

This was one of my favorites:

I’ll close with this. I do know Albert Chow. Albert is my friend, and I am his. I am proud to say that because Albert is one of the kindest, most decent people I have met since moving to The Sunset. I am a newcomer here, but Albert has always made me feel welcome. Albert is not a “nativist,” whatever Jeremy means by that. Nor is he racist, homophobic or anything of the kind. Moreover, everyone who knows him knows that Albert is none of the things that Jeremy claims, everyone, which is a whole lot of people. Frankly, Albert is better known and more beloved, especially here in The Sunset, than either Jeremy or Joel Engardio could ever hope to be.

Jeremy, and Joel, both of you — the next time you want to dox and target someone in the Recall Engardio Campaign you better come for me because Albert is out of your league… john

Recall Engardio!