Peter Byrne
June, 1997
from The San Francisco Investigator

Dear Reader,

Ray Ratto said it best on the sports page of the SF Examiner, the day after the amazing “upset” of our June 3rd election. Ratto wrote: Were the elections held in Chicago, we would have been able to write it off to election fraud and been in bed hours ago.”

Ratto has been the only print media voice to use the “F” word. The rest of the media is pretending that it is normal for a 23 percent lead in the polls to be overturned in the last hour of a vote count: in defiance of the statistical laws of the universe.

It does not matter whether you voted “yes” or “no” on the half-billion dollars (with interest) that we just handed over to City Hall: Every San Franciscan needs to soberly consider the meaning of the election “irregularities.” We list a few interesting facts:

* On May 30, the Housing Authority suddenly requested the Registrar to set up polls in the projects, for the first time ever. SFI has obtained a copy of a check from the Housing Authority to the Registrar for $2,000 to deliver this service. This is an ineligible use of Federal funds, at the very least. These polls were opened for three days preceding the election–in defiance of State Law.

* Residents of Bayview Hunters Point, in particular, were outraged that the 49ers refused to sign a binding MOU for jobs and, contrary to media spin, were very vocal in opposition to the stadium/mall.

* Precinct analysis shows that the “spike” occurred immediately after ballots from the Bayview Hunters Point and housing projects were delivered to the Registrar of Voters at 11:00 P.M., two hours after the rest of the ballot boxes had been returned. Hundreds of late “yes” votes from BV/HP and the projects put the stadium/mall in the lead.

* Witnesses saw a Delancey Street Foundation truck deliver a red metal ballot box to the Registrar at 11:00 P.M. Before the election, the 49ers donated, at least, $3,000 to Delancey Street Foundation, an organization controlled by the Brown machine.

* Four boxes of ballots mysteriously got “wet,” inside their sealed, water-proof containers. Registrar Germaine Wong had them micro-waved, as Delancey Street delivered the last box. Wong then failed to make precinct “maps,” showing reported precincts, after the spike.

* Political staff from the Mayor’s office, such as Steve Nelson and Georgia Dunne, had substituted themselves in Registrar Wong’s place and were supervising election workers. Nelson was videotaped operating a vote-counting machine.

* Many unanswered questions regarding voting procedures have been raised by voters who had their strangely formatted ballots snatched out of their hands and read by poll workers wearing 49er colors.

Voters who wish to report irregularities may call 386-4934. A law firm specializing in elections is reviewing all reports.

copyright: Peter Byrne, 1997.

If you don’t know Peter Bryne and the San Francisco Investigator, you don’t know San Francisco. Peter’s newsletter contains the best reporting on the realities of what goes on in city hall – bar none.

Recently, one of his actions put a halt to the gross misappropriation of $68 million in bond money raised in 1995 by Proposition A. You can read about it in the Examiner.

The facts described in the Examiner opinion piece (it was their lead editorial in the Sunday paper) were lifted straight from Peter’s original research. And not only did Peter conduct the investigation, he and another citizen also filed the lawsuit which has apparently put a stop to the latest in city hall’s seemingly endless schemes for looting the treasury.

I strongly recommend Peter’s newsletter which is only $49 per year. You can get a sample copy by calling 415-285-7418. It’s a great read and one of the last remnants of the spirit of “the city that knows how.” (Maybe if we all read it, we can help bring it back.)

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