Candidate for
Mayor; City of San Francisco

MATT GONZALEZ was born in McAllen, Texas in 1965. He graduated from Columbia College in New York City in 1987 where he studied Political Theory and Comparative Literature. In 1990 he received his JD from Stanford Law School where he was an editor of the Stanford Law Review and a member of the Stanford Environmental Law Journal. Gonzalez also worked in the school's East Palo Alto Community Law Project on immigration law matters and worked for the California Appellate Project, which directly handles or supervises all death penalty cases pending in California.

After law school Gonzalez worked for a decade at the Office of the Public Defender in San Francisco. He handled all types of felonies and successfully defended many serious cases, including numerous life-in-prison matters. He was twice jailed for contempt of court -- and ordered arrested a third time -- for his advocacy. In each instance, the contempt findings were overturned on appeal.

In 1999 Gonzalez ran an impressive campaign for District Attorney where he focused on issues largely ignored by the other candidates, including the need to prosecute illegal evictions, environmental crimes, and political corruption. He finished third in a field of five candidates, receiving just over 11% of the vote (20,153 votes). A political novice at the time, Gonzalez surprised many by winning the support of a number of community and political organizations and was endorsed by the SF†Bayview Newspaper, the New Mission News, and SF†Bay Times.

In 2000 Gonzalez was named "Lawyer of the Year" by the La Raza Lawyers Association and during the summer taught an undergraduate Evidence class at New College of California. From early 2000 through 2001, Gonzalez served as a board member of Intersection for the Arts, the oldest, independent, non-profit art and theater space in San Francisco.

On December 12, 2000, Gonzalez became the first member of the Green Party to win elective office in San Francisco, winning over 65% of the vote in a run-off election. He was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors representing District 5, which includes the Haight, Western Addition, and Inner Sunset neighborhoods.

Since being elected, Gonzalez has been a solid progressive vote. He has supported transgender health benefits for city employees, the acceptance of matricula consular ID cards for immigrant workers, expanded whistleblower protections for city employees, and he was a cosponsor of the successful municipal solar bond. He is working on the creation of a local Community Land Trust, establishing a local minimum wage, creating early voting in each of the supervisorial districts, and on strengthening the Office of Citizen's Complaints which investigates complaints against Police Officers. He is also working on Saturday closure of JFK Dr. in Golden Gate Park.

He has been involved in successful ballot measures changing how Planning Commissions are appointed, creating an Elections Commission, reforming the Ethics Commission, and adopting Instant Run-off Voting for all municipal elections.

On January 8, 2003, after seven rounds of voting, Gonzalez was elected President of the Board of Supervisors by his colleagues.