No on Proposition I
San Francisco November 2022 election
Published October 21, 2022
No on Proposition I
TopClose JFK Promenade, spend $80 million to move sand
What is it?
Proposition I is a citizen signature initiative ordinance which will require the City to allow car traffic on the pedestrian-only JFK Promenade in Golden Gate Park and end the popular Great Highway "weekend compromise", instead mandating vehicle traffic 24/7.
It will also require the City abandon its preferred implementation of the Ocean Beach Climate Change Adaptation Project. Prop I will make it impossible for the City to pursue its preferred approach and force the City to use an alternate plan which could add as much as $80 million to the project. The City's preferred project shuts down the Great Highway south of Sloat due to beach erosion, improves public access and recreation at Ocean Beach, and constructs a low-profile seawall to protect a wastewater treatment plant and homes near the beach. Prop I puts all of this in jeopardy.
Fiscal impacts
The City Controller estimates a substantial increase in the cost of government should Prop I pass. Not only will allowing vehicle traffic on JFK require undoing lots of infrastructure built during Covid-19, it will require the city spend as much as $80 million to implement an alternative to the long-planned Ocean Beach Climate Change Adaptation Project.
Why is this on the ballot?
Donors spent over $200,000 to get the 10,000 signatures necessary to get this measure on the ballot. The measure must be approved by voters with a simple majority of 50% + 1.
- Placed on ballot by: Signature collection
Why vote No?
Proposition I will shut down the extremely popular JFK Promenade in Golden Gate Park, which is enjoyed by thousands of families, seniors, and children every day.
Rather than being a place for children and families to enjoy Golden Gate Park safely, Prop I will require cars use this pedestrian space. Children will no longer be able to learn how to ride bikes safely, young couples won't be able to have peaceful and safe dates, adults and the elderly will no longer have a safe place to enjoy the sun or get some exercise, and people with mobility impairments or other disabilities will lose a unique, safe, and peaceful space for outdoor recreation.
Prop I will also force the city to spend up to $80 million because it mandates that the Great Highway south of Sloat remain operational, despite the city's long-existing plans to close this stretch of road due to beach erosion and rising sea levels. In 2012 City planners acknowledged mounting evidence of sustained coastal erosion over the next several decades and the risk it posed to a critical wastewater treatment plant. In response to this, the City created a plan — the Ocean Beach Climate Change Adaptation Project — to shore up the beach and protect vital infrastructure, which necessitated the closure of Great Highway south of Sloat. Prop I throws these plans out the window and orders the city to figure something else out — spending up to $80 million over twenty years in the process, according to the City controller.
Prop I is the worst of all possible worlds: it shuts down a popular new park space, it denies the reality of climate change, puts water treatment infrastructure at risk, and it may force the city to spend $80 million it otherwise wouldn't.