SF Mayor Daniel Lurie began making layoffs this week, as promised, in order to address the city's ongoing budget woes, and over 100 workers across 18 departments got their layoff notices Monday.

127 San Francisco city workers received their pink slips Monday, with some getting 30 days notice, and others getting 60 days notice of their positions being eliminated. Mayor Daniel Lurie said in a statement, "The steps we’re taking today are a painful but necessary continuation of the work we’ve been doing since last year to manage taxpayer dollars responsibly and deliver the best possible services for San Franciscans."

Lurie added, "That work will continue as we prepare a responsible budget that sets up our city for a broad and durable economic recovery," and he said that the city had to "take action now or be forced to do twice as much in the coming years."

As KALW reports, Lurie is trying to cut $400 million out of the city's budget, part of which will be achieved by eliminating 500 jobs. Lurie has said that he intends to reduce salary and benefit spending in the city's budget by $100 million.

This means that around 370 more layoff notices are likely to come in the near future. But, as the Chronicle notes, the number may come down after negotiations over the budget take place with the Board of Supervisors.

Last year, Lurie announced his intention to cut 150 jobs, plus over 1,000 positions that were unfilled at the time, and in the end, only 40 filled positions were cut.

The city's public-sector unions responded today, emphasizing their support for Prop D, the so-called "overpaid CEO act," which is intended to tax local companies more if their top executives are paid 100 times or more of the salary of their average workers, in order to fund more of the city's budget. Lurie has expressed his opposition to Prop D.

"Our solution, Proposition D the overpaid CEO act, which will be on the June ballot, is a fair solution in the long-term, and then in the short term reserves have been set aside in our local budget for this exact moment," said Bianca Polovina, president of IFPTE Local 21, in a statement.

IFPTE Local 21 and SEIU 1021 both issued statements denouncing the layoffs as "drastic."

In addition to layoffs, Lurie has said he plans to put a hiring freeze on 2,000 other positions across city government.

San Francisco employs around 30,000 people and has an annual budget of around $16 billion.

Previously: Mayor Lurie Says He’s Laying Off 500 SF City Hall Employees, Which Will Not Endear Him to the Labor Unions

Photo by Unma Desai