D4ward Supports the Recall of Supervisor Joel Engardio
Editor:
D4ward is a grassroots group of Sunset District neighbors working to keep our community a place where regular people can afford to live, thrive and have a say in what happens here. We support affordable housing, stand up to big money influence in SF politics, protect workers, defend our coastline and fight for community needs over corporate interests.
We support the recall of District 4 Supervisor Joel Engardio. Until now, we had not endorsed any previous recalls, or this recall, due to our concerns about the process. However, the results of this recall could mean that Engardio remains in office for up to five more years. We therefore urge District 4 residents to vote “yes” on the recall to make way for a representative who better reflects the community’s priorities.
Our reasons for recalling Supervisor Engardio include:
Alignment with real estate interests.
Engardio is supported by State Sen. Scott Wiener, California’s largest recipient of real estate industry donations, who has consistently sought to weaken environmental protections and open coastal areas, including San Francisco, to unchecked development. Engardio’s development agenda risks transforming Ocean Beach into another Miami Beach.
Ties to developer-backed groups.
As a co-founder of YIMBY developer group GrowSF and ally to billionaire-funded organizations, Engardio has championed luxury and market-rate housing at the expense of existing communities. Wealthy special interests have poured more than $667,000 into opposing the recall as of July 7.
Support for harmful upzoning.
Engardio has backed the mayor’s so-called “family housing” upzoning plan, which could demolish existing rent-controlled housing, displace small businesses, and replace family-oriented neighborhoods with high-rise towers and expensive, small units that do not meet families’ needs.
Failure to advance affordable housing.
Engardio has sponsored two housing expansion measures that include no affordability requirements and no protections for current renters or small businesses. His six-story corner-lot legislation fast-tracks projects while stripping residents of meaningful community input and environmental review. Both this measure and his accessory dwelling unit (ADU) expansion initiative promote market-rate development without addressing affordability.
Broken promises.
Engardio assured residents he supported the Upper Great Highway compromise brokered by his predecessor, only to later introduce a citywide ballot measure to close the Upper Great Highway to cars permanently, blindsiding constituents.
Neglect of environmental concerns.
Despite increased neighborhood traffic, car exhaust, congestion on Chain of Lakes Drive, and strain on the Ocean Beach habitat, Engardio has refused to demand an Environmental Impact Report on the proposed closure of the Upper Great Highway.
District 4 deserves a strong, responsive leader who represents the interests of its residents, not tech billionaires or real estate developers. We urge you to join us in voting “yes” on the recall.
Erica Zweig, recording secretary, D4ward
Categories: letter to the editor
Richmond Review/Sunset Beacon 
Alignment with real estate interests. 🗹
Ties to developer-backed groups. 🗹
Support for harmful upzoning. 🗹
Failure to advance affordable housing. 🗹
Broken promises. 🗹
Neglect of environmental concerns. 🗹
Facts for once! Joel has zero ability to tell the truth on these points.
It’s not even debatable, it’s not gaslight-able, it’s not spin-able.
He sold out deliberately and dishonestly with zero accountability.
This is the theme of his entire term in office. He’s not trustworthy, because he doesn’t care to be and with Billionaire backers he doesn’t HAVE to be.
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This is the most sound argument in support of the recall that I have heard. I voted for K and have generally been opposed to the use of the recall, but D4ward frames the issue in the broader context of the billionaire dominance of SF politics.
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The alternative of having the actual billionaire mayor appoint our supervisor is far worse. Key votes on Lurie’s upzoning are coming up later this year. There is zero chance that Lurie’s appointee wouldn’t rubber stamp any real estate scheme that Lurie and his developer backers want. With Engardio, we at least know he has to listen to the neighborhood on upzoning if he wants to have any hope of keeping his job. Taller corner lots will be the least of our problems if Lurie has his way with the Sunset.
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Let’s be real Engardio is already the worst-case scenario. He broke promises on the Great Highway, disrespected his constituents, pushed upzoning without affordability, and handed city planning to developer groups like GrowSF. He is the mayor’s YIMBY puppet.
If Lurie wants to win re-election, he can’t afford to drop someone worse into D4. The Sunset doesn’t forget. If we recall Engardio, we send a message: betray us and you’re out. That’s how we get better, not worse.
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For anyone who thinks Joel Engardio broke any promises, I encourage you to check out a snapshot of his issues page on July 2022, 4 months before the board of supervisor’s election.
In it, he clearly mentions that he sees the closure of the great highway extension as an opportunity to create a permanent oceanside park and even calls out the NYTimes article that talks about how closing the highway to cars has made it a popular destination.
Anyone who believes he is a “traitor” or “liar” clearly did not read his issues page, the one place a voter should consult before choosing a candidate.
Citation: https://web.archive.org/web/20220727002840/https://engardio.com/parks-environment
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Do you live in the Sunset District? If not, that explains a lot.
When running for the D4 seat, Supervisor Engardio knocked on doors and told residents he supported the compromise. That wasn’t long ago, MANY people clearly remember what he said to get elected. Please don’t gaslight Sunset residents by claiming otherwise.
Engardio has shown he speaks from both sides of his mouth. Many of us already know he lied to win the election. Even some of his former supporters have said he used their free labor after losing three times in D7.
It’s disappointing that he now relies on PR campaigns to attack Sunset residents instead of addressing concerns. You have no right to tell D4 residents their experience is wrong. Stop gaslighting.
I’m voting Yes on A to recall Engardio. He lied to D4, betrayed the Sunset, and manipulated the process.
Sunset D4 deserves better. Engardio needs to go.
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Yes I live in the sunset. Not sure if you read Joel’s issues page before the 2022 election, but I’m just bringing it up because people seem to forget too easily.
Not gaslighting. Literally posting a snapshot of his issues page. The one place a candidate can express their position without interference.
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There’s little point in dialogue with Joel supporters who continue his gaslighting and factless fecklessness online in his stead. They don’t live in reality, they don’t admit the truth, and they don’t face the facts. They want to pretend this is all some pro-car Republican backed hater fest – in reality it’s people who have lived in the Sunset all their lives and strongly resent being lied to by Joel goons. They refuse to admit that the process was deliberately dishonest and flawed and people are paying the consequences with only a handful of daytrippers benefiting, and they refuse to see the gentrification policies and promises abandoned by Joel’s Billionaire backed development campaigns. The Sunset can and will do better, either by this recall or the next election, but meanwhile the impetuousness and infuriating gaslighting by this handful of (paid!) yuppie supporters on the dole truly serves no purpose. Sam Singers and other paid sycophants are not Sunset. They are not interested in compromise either, they want to destroy the district and replace it in their Billionaire image. We aren’t budging, and we don’t accept being lied to by so-called leadership that isn’t.
Get the recall over with and let’s get back to being a district with representation.
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This comment has been posted verbatim more than once word-for-word, like a campaign intern on autopilot. That alone should raise questions about who’s really behind these defenses and why they’re so worried.
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For anyone who thinks Joel Engardio broke any promises, I encourage you to check out a snapshot of his issues page on July 2022, 4 months before the board of supervisor’s election.
In it, he clearly mentions that he sees the closure of the great highway extension as an opportunity to create a permanent oceanside park and even calls out the NYTimes article that talks about how closing the highway to cars has made it a popular destination.
Anyone who believes he is a “traitor” or “liar” clearly did not read his issues page, the one place a voter should consult before choosing a candidate.
Citation: https://web.archive.org/web/20220727002840/https://engardio.com/parks-environment
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Thank you for bringing citations to what has often been a fact-free debate.
It seems like people who vehemently hated the idea of a permanent oceanside park after the great highway extension closed could have simply not voted for the candidate that had the words “permanent oceanside park” on his campaign website for months prior to the election.
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Are you affiliated with Joel Engardio’s campaign?
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No I am not. I am a sunset resident doing my part to reduce the spread of misinformation.
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I believe we have had this conversation in the past. He was talking about the southern extension not the two mile central GH. It seems strange that all these pro Engardio people like to spread misinformation regarding his statements to his constituents. Many, many people have stated that he told them to their faces that he supported the compromise, not shutting down the road. I’m one.
The park is planed for the extension south of Sloat along with a 3200×80 foot sea wall to protect that area from erosion. That also includes sand replenishment as needed.
Another lie that was told is that it would cost 81 million to keep the road (southern extension) open. But they failed to tell you that the true cost of this park is going to be over 200 million. Just love how they manipulate information.
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In your own citation, the first sentence of the first paragraph under Great Highway, Joel Engardio states he supports keeping the Great Highway open to serve commuters on the weekdays.
Before accusing us of not reading, maybe you should take a closer look and read Engardio’s issues page as a whole instead of cherry picking one sentence to try and prove your point.
Engardio DID LIE to us.
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Mary, he didn’t lie. He made it clear he sided with the best option at the time. He opposed Prop I b/c it prohibited the creation of a full-time park.
At one point, we thought leaded gasoline was beneficial because it reduced emissions. We’ve learned and evolved from this perspective, and I think it’s ludicrous that we expect our politicians to act as rigid luddites.
Folks with a functional brain know perspectives evolve over time. Heck, even Obama went from anti to pro marriage equality. A rational person would think: voters sided one way in 2022. Appeals in 2023 and 2024 failed. A democratic vote was offered to everyone in 2024 to provide finality on the issue.
And yet folks are egging to flush more money down the drain on a recall in September 2025, leading to another contested election in June 2026, before regular turnout resumes in November 2026?
There’s no point to any of this. Should Engardio stay, he’ll have his work cut-out for him. But should he be removed, D4 will be stuck with a lame duck and ineffective Supervisor through June or November 2026.
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He absolutely and unambiguously lied.
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Let’s be clear: Joel Engardio’s supporters are trying to retroactively justify his betrayal of voters by pointing to a paragraph on his 2022 campaign website that mentions the Great Highway Extension (GHX) south of Sloat a stretch of crumbling asphalt that everyone agrees is geologically doomed.
But that’s not the issue.
The controversy today is about the Upper Great Highway (UGH) the portion between Lincoln and Sloat which Engardio explicitly promised to keep open to cars Monday through Friday under the widely supported compromise plan. He stated this in debates, campaign literature, and to residents at their doorsteps.
The attempt to conflate the GHX’s erosion-driven closure with Engardio’s policy stance on the UGH is nothing short of intentional misdirection.
Let’s remind everyone:
Joel verbally committed to the compromise during debates.
Joel told voters at their doors that he supported the compromise.
The compromise is what many residents especially those who commute or care for family voted for when they chose Joel over Gordon Mar.
If Joel had been upfront in 2022 that he would fully support permanently closing the UGH to cars, he likely wouldn’t have won.
He didn’t win a mandate to support Sunset Dunes or to turn our critical coastal artery into a “destination.” He won on a promise to balance recreation and access and he broke it.
Let’s talk about the sentence Joel Engardio’s supporters keep pointing to from his 2022 campaign site:
“This is an opportunity to create a permanent oceanside park as we solve the traffic concerns with community input.”
Sounds inspiring… until you realize how vague and politically slippery it really is.
Let’s break it down:
“Create a park” — This isn’t how you propose a real park. You don’t float the idea as a vague afterthought in a paragraph about erosion and traffic.
“Oceanside park” — Where exactly? Is he talking about the doomed extension south of Sloat? Or is he quietly including the Upper Great Highway (UGH) between Lincoln and Sloat — the one he told voters he supported keeping open on weekdays?
“Community input” — What input? The Sunset never got a town hall, a planning meeting, or a vote. Engardio just folded the closure into Rec & Park’s Sunset Dunes agenda — which was never Sunset-led to begin with.
Real park proposals come with:
None of that happened here. Nothing close.
The truth is: this wasn’t a “plan,” it was a bait-and-switch. He campaigned on the compromise keep the Great Highway open to cars Monday through Friday and only now, after winning, is he pretending a vague “park” sentence gave him a mandate to close a major roadway.
If Joel had told voters in 2022:
“I plan to permanently close the Upper Great Highway and turn it into a park,”
he would’ve lost.
Instead, he told voters one thing in person and now claims a vague sentence buried on his website gave him cover. That’s not honesty. That’s spin. And voters in the Sunset know the difference.
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Saw Joel out at the beach yesterday. He was walking on the existing asphalt path. What a concept. Wish he had known about it sooner
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This recall is deeper than the closure of the GHW. It is the recall of an unethical supervisor who betrayed the trust of his constituents on a significant issue to service his own, and special interests. His actions are the cause of the current division and distrust within the district. He continues to fan internal division by justifying his actions, going door-to-door “buying” votes against the recall with a nice-guy personality, self-promotions, etc. The district will likely face other big issues affecting it having to do with re-zoning, construction, housing, infrastructure changes, etc. We need to elect someone ethical and trustworthy to represent local interests.
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