THIS WEEK AT THE VOICE FOR THURSDAY, JULY 9, 2026
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by Mike Ege
Editor in chief, The Voice of San Francisco
Is there really a “Nonprofit Industrial Complex?”
District 6 Supervisor Matt Dorsey is uncomfortable with the term. “But I’ve also been frustrated to go to the budget committee and see so many employees of nonprofits spending their day there lobbying for more money,” he told The Voice in a recent interview. Which is why Dorsey says it’s time to level the playing field by requiring more transparency from city-funded nonprofits that lobby.
He went on to describe a budget committee meeting back in May where employees of the San Francisco Pretrial Diversion Project testified one after another in favor of the Sheriff’s Department continuing to contract with the agency despite enough doubts about their services that the San Francisco Superior Court proposed that they be handled in-house by the city’s Adult Probation Department instead.
“I asked my intern, ‘Could you count who’s doing the public comment on this item,” Dorsey related. “It turned out that 18 out of 30 who testified were employees or board members of the Pretrial Diversion Project.”
San Francisco’s Campaign and Governmental Conduct Code requires most individuals and groups seeking to influence legislation and policy to register with the Ethics Commission and file regular activity reports. Nonprofits are famously exempt from the rules. The SOMA supervisor wants to introduce legislation that would remove that exception.
City Hall watchers are familiar with the infamous “addback day” during the budget process, which routinely features hours of public comment dominated by nonprofit groups and their allies. The point is simple: lobbying by nonprofit service providers has made them influential players in shaping San Francisco’s social policy, especially when they are seeking to maintain the city contracts they depend upon for their existence.
Prior to the mid-20th century, most welfare services in the United States were provided by churches, settlement houses, mutual aid societies, and charitable organizations. Governments primarily funded public schools, infrastructure, and the police, and provided limited poor relief. That changed by necessity with the Great Depression; the response was the New Deal, which dramatically expanded the federal government’s role through Social Security, unemployment insurance, and other programs.
Subsequent administrations of different ideological persuasions, from the Great Society to Reaganomics to Welfare Reform, alternatively increased or decreased the scope of government services, and increased reliance on community groups to provide them. Public benefit groups became contractors, and governments found the new model convenient because it provides greater flexibility, savings from lower labor costs and philanthropic partnerships, and, ideally, better service due to local expertise and lived experience. It’s become a defining feature of the modern U.S. social safety net.
San Francisco is no exception, and the percentage of the city services budget pie that goes to nonprofits has ballooned in recent years, in part thanks to ballot measures approved by voters in 2018 that created special taxes meant to raise funds for homelessness and child care programs, which also set a precedent for lowering the voter approval threshold for enacting such taxes.
But with the contracting process comes political fights over budgetary table scraps. The larger point is that attempts to reform social policies that don’t work often run into “limited good” arguments from contractors who depend on government contracts for their lifeblood but pose as altruistic political actors in the legislative process. It’s something you see play out over and over again in policy domains ranging from homelessness and drug rehab services to restorative justice.
“I have been surprised at the degree to which some nonprofit partners are real combatants on public policy,” Dorsey told us. “In the discussion over drug-free supportive housing, in the recovery-first ordinance, some city-funded nonprofit partners decided to weigh in, like they’re not even engaging in a good-faith kind of policy-making effort, to delegitimize and misrepresent what the policy is about. It was much more like negative campaigning than serious policy engagement.”
Ostensibly altruistic community groups act increasingly like industry lobbyists, and their interactions with elected officials look increasingly like clientelism — most recently when District 10 Supervisor Shamann Walton was fined by the Ethics Commission for accepting a custom portrait of himself from one nonprofit organization, and reimbursement for travel costs from another. The pattern reinforces the case for greater transparency.
“When I see permanent supportive housing providers and their employees showing up at public comment, it’s not lost on me that, literally, anything they would be doing at the buildings they manage — sweeping the sidewalk, doing an ambassador patrol- would be a better use of time than sitting in budget committee.”
Dorsey has sent a drafting request to City Attorney David Chiu for legislation to eliminate the lobbying loophole for nonprofits, in which he describes the current situation as a “troubling combination of factors” that “argues for greater transparency.”
“If there was a time when such a broad exception for nonprofit lobbying once made sense, it makes no sense now,” he writes. “Closing this loophole on nonprofit lobbying — like lobbying regulations more generally — is more essential than ever to restore public confidence in the investments we make in nonprofit partners, and to assure the responsiveness and representative nature of San Franciscoʼs government and institutions.”
Needless to say, nonprofit leaders aren’t very hot on the idea. Asked by the Chronicle what he thought, Tenderloin Housing Clinic director Randy Shaw balked, saying that nonprofit lobbying “wasn’t on the list of top 10,000 problems” in the city.
Well, it’s certainly on the list now.
“Let’s see where the political support and opposition are going to be. Then people can weigh in as we’re working on this,” Dorsey told us. “If we can introduce it in September, I don’t see any reason that we couldn’t have this enacted by the end of the year.”
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Top News
LAW AND ORDER
Exclusive: Parole officer says supervisor told him to leave sex offender alone
Agent told to return electronics and meth to registered sex offender who then tried to kidnap his trans girlfriend
by Susan Dyer Reynolds
When Ches Fry retired as a Parole Agent I with the California Department of Corrections Division of Adult Parole Operations, the job had become increasingly difficult, in part because of the city’s lenient reputation. “I’ve had many conversations with parolees, like drug dealers who all lived in Oakland. They said they came to San Francisco to deal because they don’t get arrested. They didn’t go past the San Francisco County line; they didn’t like going south. They get prosecuted there,” Fry said in an exclusive interview with The Voice.
TRANSPORTATION
San Francisco supervisor seeks inquiry into July 4 traffic gridlock, Waymo failures, Muni planning
A city supervisor submitted an inquiry to city departments to review traffic gridlock, Muni delays, and stalled Waymo vehicles after Fourth of July fireworks.
by Jerold Chinn
REYNOLDS RAP
Striking similarities in sexual assault allegations against Manny Yekutiel and Shahid Buttar
Both were accused during political campaigns by common members of three groups: The Harvey Milk LGBTQ Democratic Club, the SFBerniecrats, and the San Francisco Democratic Socialists.
by Susan Dyer Reynolds
Quote of the week
“Free and accessible archives of the government’s words and actions keep the people in a democracy from ignoring history and the leaders from distorting it for their own purposes.”
— John Trasviña on the threatened closure of the San Bruno National Archives Center, in “Threatened closure of San Bruno federal archives center has deep implications”
Nomi toon
In Case You Missed It
LAW AND ORDER
Newsom says crime is down after ordering parole agents to ignore violations by dangerous felons
He also directed state agents to prioritize parolee voter registration over mandated duties.
by Susan Dyer Reynolds
OPINION
A.D. 251: Welcome to the first year of the rest of America’s life
As bad as the country’s shape is today, we have the opportunity and the responsibility to . . . let’s say “make it better again.” That starts now.
by John Zipperer
A&E
For-Site presents ‘Andy Goldsworthy: Red Flags’ at Fort Mason
A monumental installation of 50 flags, stained with red earth from every state invites visitors to ask what truly unifies the United States.
by Sharon Anderson
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EVENTS
Out and about July 9–15, 2026
What to do this weekend and beyond.
By Lynette Majer
Managing Editor, The Voice of San Francisco
There’s lots of music inside and outside in the next several days as well as festivals and more. Read on for some options for how to spend your free time.
Thursday, July 9
The Merola Opera Program’s production of La Tragédie de Carmen is a condensed adaptation of Georges Bizet’s Carmen that more closely aligns to the original novella, Prosper Mérimée, on which Carmen is based. Focused on the tension between Carmen’s insistence on absolute freedom and Don José’s obsessive control, the opera is an intimate tragedy driven by desire, jealousy, and fate. 7 p.m. at San Francisco Conservatory of Music Caroline H. Hume Concert Hall. Tickets: $75.
Friday, July 10
West Side Story fans won’t want to miss the original 1961 film with live accompaniment from the San Francisco Symphony performing Leonard Bernstein’s score. 7:30 p.m. at the Symphony Hall. Tickets form from $135.
Saturday, July 11
Today is One City Day, and everyone is invited to participate in meaningful service projects, from picking up trash to beautifying your local park, or just showing up for your neighbors in need. Pick your event and sign up here.
Enjoy a block party with live music and line dancing, tacos and ice cream, lots of family fun, and more at the Dogpatch Music Series. 2 to 5 p.m. at the Minnesota Flyover (Mission and 20th streets). Free admission.
Sunday, July 12
Ferry Fest is happening today, at you guessed it, the Ferry Building. Enjoy all kinds of fun, including live music, family activities, wine tasting, art-making, and more. Free (festival), $23 (wine tasting); reserve here.
Listen to our podcasts
- July 4 should have taught us a lesson: Planning is critical to our future
- Joseph Amster a.k.a. Emperor Joshua Norton
- Charter reform in San Francisco, Hilton versus Becerra on health care in California and more
- The lesson of July 4th must be a warning for all of us
- Plus more (and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music/Audible or everywhere else you get your favorite podcasts)
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