This seems perfectly normal: San Francisco Supervisor John Avalos tells the San Francisco Chronicle that he and his aides contacted Harvey Milk's ghost regarding a vote on a non-binding resolution to name a Navy ship after slain gay rights activist. How so? Using an Ouija board, of course. Avalos explains: more ›

After holding out for those uncounted ballots for a couple days, the Avalos for Mayor camp has finally given up the ghost. This afternoon, Team Avalos released a concession letter of sorts. Observe: more ›

Despite every daily paper calling this Mayor's race for interim Mayor Ed Lee, John Avalos continues to stick it to the man, as it were. Although Lee promised to call every one of his opponents personally, Avalos shot first, leaving the mayor a message acknowledging yesterday's numbers but also showing his determination to wait for the more than 30,000 outstanding mail-in and provisional ballots to be counted. more ›

Our second Pieces candidate (!) John Avalos has a rabid fan base compared to the other mayoral contenders. The notably progressive supervisor represents District 11, which consists of Crocker-Amazon, Excelsior, Ingleside, Oceanview, and the Outer Mission neighborhoods. more ›

Not that we generally traffic in these types of paparazzi-esque photos, but here's District 11 Supervisor and candidate for mayor John Avalos with the Avalos for Mayor Party Bus outside The Cinch in Nob Hill for grown-up Halloween on Saturday night. What do we think he was going as? Marilyn Monroe in a guayabera? more ›

After finally getting to the bottom of what Occupy Wall Street wants last week, Keith Olbermann turned his attention to the movement's expansion to San Francisco's Financial District last night. To lend some color to the via-satellite bit, Olbermann brought in mayoral hopeful and District 11 Supervisor John Avalos, who has been doing a great job riding the coattails of Occupy SF, to act as the movement's telegenic mouthpiece. more ›

The current population of Occupy SF campers down in front of the Federal Reserve on Market Street appear interested in shifting things uptown a bit -- the Examiner reports on a request put in by some campers to move the party to Civic Center Plaza. One 22-year-old protester, Nicole Ghanbarzadeh says that the group, or some organizational force therein, had made the request to mayoral candidate and Supervisor John Avalos, but Avalos says he never received it. more ›

Supervisor and mayoral candidate John Avalos released a statement following last night's Occupy SF tent city closure by SFPD. Avalos was at the brouhaha, and negotiated with authorities to keep the tent city open, but was surprised and saddened to hear that cops shuttered the encampment soon after leaving the scene. In part of a written statement, Avalos said, "This is not the San Francisco that I know. This is not the San Francisco I love. This City has served as a sanctuary for free speech and assembly for generations, and we must protect that legacy." more ›

Jeff Adachi, John Avalos, David Chiu, Bevan Dufty, Dennis Herrera, Joanna Rees, Phil Ting, and Leland Yee will all sport their finest bikinis (or not) during this Saturday's fundraiser car wash for McKinley Elementary School. No word yet if frontrunner Ed Lee will show up for some sudsy fun in the sun, but a boy can dream. Anyway, here are the rules: more ›

In a move that surprised absolutely nobody, the San Francisco Bike Coalition endorsed visibly progressive candidate John Avalos for San Francisco mayor. In a press release sent out to media, SF Bike Coalition beams, "As an avid cyclist who regularly commutes to work on his bike, Avalos believes that improving the bike infrastructure in the city will reduce traffic and pollution, increase physical activity and provide people with a viable transportation alternative." more ›

The most popular story on the 'Gate right now? That would Matier and Ross's column about the wheelchair ramp to the Board President's chair, currently being constructed in the Board of Supervisors chamber, whose total cost looks to be topping out at about $700,000 after design and construction. It's kind of a symbolic ramp, is the thing, with Chiu -- who doesn't require a wheelchair -- defending the project by saying "San Francisco has been at the forefront of access issues, and it's important the board reflect that." John Avalos was the only supervisor to vote against the project, which, because of issues surrounding the historic room, etc., was originally estimated to cost $1 million. more ›

Last night, the San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee voted on their party's official endorsements for November's local elections and judging by the results, the DCCC wants to put some fresh meat in the seats in the offices of Mayor and District Attorney. The club voted to name the great progressive hope, John Avalos as their #1 pick for Mayor of San Francisco. Dennis Herrera, the man with the Muni plan, follows at the club's suggestion for your #2 vote in the upcoming ranked-choice election. In a snub against any one of the other Dems in the race, the DCCC declined to pick a third-choice candidate. more ›

The already stupidly crowded to become Mayor of San Francisco just got more crowded, as the Ex reports on the candidacy of Emil Lawrence, a San Francisco cab driver who paid the $5,000 to get on the November ballot on Friday, since he had not collected the necessary 10,000 signatures. Lawrence seems to be a one-issue kind of guy, and he's most pissed off about how the city has been treating cab drivers of late. He's also been a frequent speaker on the subject at Board of Supervisors meetings, and obviously his anger is such that he's willing to spend $5K in a seemingly futile attempt to take control of the situation. (See the almost official candidate list below.) more ›

Tomorrow night, popular retro-dive hangout The Knockout is getting a special guest DJ. According to the Examiner and the event's Facebook page, D11 Supervisor/Mayoral hopeful John Avalos will be taking a turn in the Knockout's tiny DJ booth to win support from all 35 people that fit in the place. Last time we were in the Knockout on a Friday night the winsome crowd looked like they were too consistently hungover to bother with San Francisco voter registration, but Oldies Night should be a good fit (stylistically speaking) for the vocal Bob Dylan fan. Just don't show up expecting any Progressive House beats. And while we're at it, here's the great prog hope's cover of The Times They Are A Changin': more ›

Venture capitalist Joanna Rees, that's who. According to an excellent article in the Examiner published today, one that "broke down the voting history of the mayoral hopefuls," the Jason Lewis-approved candidate missed most city elections. Behold: more ›

Arriving late to the Pier 38 offices of Automattic yesterday evening for a mayoral candidate forum on Open Government, we caught the tail end of opening remarks from a panel comprised of the nine candidates for mayor that people actually take seriously. The polite debate that followed ostensibly focused on the vague topic of technology, but actually drifted everywhere from Treasure Island development to smartphone apps for Muni Operators. Mostly it was an opportunity for these candidates to see who could toss around the most buzzwords without sounding like a complete tool while their media team set their thumbs on fire tweeting updates and pull-quotes to loyal Internet followers. more ›

John Avalos: While the progressive's top choice for mayor won't be in attendance, you can check out the first in a series of (presumably pro-Avalosian) SF Bay Guardian-sponsored mayoral forums starting tonight. "The idea is to get a discussion going on what a progressive agenda looks like, what issues the candidates ought to be talking about and how that could be implemented." This evening's gathering goes from 6-8 p.m. at the USF Lone Mountain campus, room LM 100. "[W]e'll have vans to help people with mobility issues get up the hill," notes SFBG. Details. more ›

The Examiner's Ken Garcia might be bored by the Mayor's Race, but over at the Chronicle the mud has started to fly. After last week's news that some city officials will be getting pay raises despite a budget deficit, former Marina supervisor, current mayoral hopeful and St. Helena homeowner Michela Alioto-Pier has called on city officials to turn them down. Fellow mayoral hopeful, board president and North Beach supe David Chiu already offered to give his back, but on the left progressive candidate and current 1998 Honda Civic owner John Avalos wants to make sure everyone sees this for what it is: Avalos called Alioto-Pier's request "pure, base pandering to the lowest common denominator of the electorate," while explaining to the Chronicle that he is "scraping by" and that his aforementioned Honda Civic is "making a lot of funny noises right now." Car troubles aside, Avalos told the Chronicle he is also prepared to turn down the $2,000 raise. more ›

District 11 Supervisor John Avalos, 47, will announce today his plan to run for Mayor of San Francisco. A California native (a rarity within progressive circles), Avalos was born in Wilmington in Los Angeles. He graduated (with honors!) from UC Santa Barbara where he studied English Literature. After making it to San Francisco in 1989, the budding Supe worked as an English teacher and cafe barrista "before finding his calling in the human services and community organizing fields." Champion of the local hiring law, "Avalos was elected as supervisor and chaired the Budget and Finance Committee after he served as former Supervisor Chris Daly’s legislative aide," reports SF Examiner. more ›

Part of yesterday's Neighborhood Services Committee meeting included supervisors Wiener and Avalos' joint hearing on J-Church and 14-Mission service. During the hearing, the two supervisors called on SFMTA Transit Director John Haley to speak before the committee and answer for agency's crimes against the ridership. Also: people are pissed about switchbacks on the 14. more ›

Interim Mayor Ed Lee, as many of you know, only took the job on the promise that the law could be changed allowing him an exception from the rule that says that mayors and supervisors can't be given government jobs for one year after holding office. The Board quietly withdrew the proposed rule change from the June ballot this week, promising instead to get this done by legislative means. more ›

New legislation, proposed by Supervisors David Campos and John Avalos and inspired by a fight over a new cell phone tower in Bernal Heights, may make it more difficult to place a call in some neighborhoods of S.F. as more and more people buy smart phones and try to play Words with Friends simultaneously on the bus at 5:30 p.m. As noted by Matt Baume over at NBC Bay Area, "As a result [of this proposed legislation], more parts of the City may become like AT&T in the Upper Haight: impossible to place a call unless you walk several blocks north or south." more ›

Supervisor John Avalos has a plan to help fund cash-strapped San Francisco. He wants to tax alcohol. According to SF Examiner, Supervisor John Avalos plans to ask our city attorney to draft legislation today that would "impose a fee on alcohol," a small fee that could "offset city costs related to the consumption of alcohol in San Francisco." While he couldn't say what the exact amount would be, he's thinking of possibly tacking on "5 cents for a beer, a larger fee on a bottle of wine, and an even more for hard liquor." more ›