The Facts

City-funded nonprofits may soon have to disclose lobbying at City Hall. Supervisor Matt Dorsey is drafting an ordinance that would also require nonprofit speakers to identify their affiliations during public comment, closing a local exemption.

San Francisco's 2014 lobbyist amendments exempted officers and employees of many 501(c)(3) nonprofits, and some 501(c)(4)s, from registration and reporting when speaking for their organizations.

The Context

City Hall paid nonprofits $1.63 billion in 2025, up from $809 million in 2019, according to J.D. Morris and Hanna Zakharenko at the Chronicle. The Ethics Commission already oversees lobbyist registration and disclosure for other interests, so Dorsey's proposal is about extending transparency rules to a much larger slice of City Hall influence.

The GrowSF Take

This is a sensible transparency reform. If an organization takes public money and then organizes pressure campaigns at City Hall, the public should know who is speaking, whom they represent, and how much advocacy is being funded.

San Francisco has a non-profit accountability problem. Many nonprofits do valuable work, but taxpayers still deserve clear disclosure when publicly funded groups lobby the officials who oversee their contracts.