Interview with SF Mayor Candidate Daniel Lurie
Daniel Lurie is a philanthropist and the founder of Tipping Point Community. He is running for mayor of San Francisco.
Levi’s
Max Raskin: I guess the obvious place to start: what kind of Levi’s do you have?
Daniel Lurie: The ones I wear most often are 511’s.
MR: That's your workhorse?
DL: Workhorse.
MR: How many pairs of them do you have?
DL: Not as many as you might think. Probably four or five pairs that I go to. Then I'll stay wearing one pair for a week or two straight.
MR: What are the rules about washing? I’ve heard people put them in the freezer. Wash, don't wash. Telling some people you wash your jeans is like telling people you wash your cast iron with soap. I washed my cast iron with soap and I’m still alive.
DL: Yeah, but you might not be as strong as you were before.
You really don't want to wash your jeans very much. I'll go weeks and weeks if not months before washing, but maybe the people I'm trying to get votes from, don't want to hear that. Yeah, don't wash your jeans often. And if you do wash them, definitely don't dry them.
MR: Why not wash them?
DL: They're jeans. It breaks down the fabric and you just don't. They're meant to be…you’re meant to live in 'em.
The former CEO just stepped down, Chip Bergh — he said he'd go months and months without washing his.
North Star
MR: Who is your political role model?
DL: Listen, if you go way back into history, you go RFK and JFK, that's sort of a no brainer.
I like what Bloomberg did in New York. I loved what Bill Bradley stood for. Probably not the strongest candidate, but a great man. Had a North Star.
MR: What about Paul Wellstone? Did he influence you?
DL: Yes, but I only got to know him really through Bradley. I only saw him maybe once in person, but talk about having a North Star and someone that was committed to serving.
Anyone that's committed to serving the people is what gets me. Some of those people I mentioned probably had other reasons for running, also. They might have liked having the power, but they inspired people.
MR: We’ve talked about Dan Doctoroff — did you study Doctoroff? Was he important in your thinking about cities?
DL: I'm talking to him next week, so that's exciting. I lived in New York, '01 to '03, so I saw Bloomberg in his first couple of years as mayor and how he got hold of that city after 9/11 — how he kept driving us forward and helped rebuild that city.
MR: Do you like how he organized his office like an open bullpen?
DL: I love the bullpen setting. At Tipping Point, I made sure that when we moved into our new offices we were always in a bullpen setting. I would try as much as possible to be out in the bullpen.
MR: If you become mayor, would you try to incorporate that?
DL: 100%.
MR: Do you read a lot of history?
DL: I've read a lot of books on Roosevelt. I'm not going to sit here and say I've been reading a lot recently. There isn’t a lot of time on the campaign trail.
Downtown
MR: So we met through my friend Ian who is investing in real estate in the city and he always says that San Francisco is New York in the 70’s not Detroit in the 60’s. Why do you think that is?
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