Meet Rafael Mandelman
Rafael Mandelman has represented District 8 on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors since 2018. District 8 includes the Castro, Glen Park, Noe Valley, Cole Valley, Diamond Heights, Twin Peaks, Duboce Triangle and Mission Dolores. Supervisor Mandelman is the only elected LGBTQ member of the Board of Supervisors.
He currently serves as Vice-Chair of the Rules Committee and as a member of the Government Audit and Oversight Committee of the Board of Supervisors. He serves as Chair of the San Francisco County Transportation Authority and represents San Francisco as a member of the Executive Board and Regional Planning Committee of the Association of Bay Area Governments and as Vice-Chair of the Transbay Joint Powers Authority Board of Directors. As part of the City’s COVID-19 response, Supervisor Mandelman served on the Economic Recovery Task Force. He previously served as a member of the Board of Supervisors Budget and Finance Committee and Budget and Appropriations Committee and was chair of the Public Safety and Neighborhood Services Committee.
On the Board, Supervisor Mandelman’s priorities are:
Addressing the City’s mental health, homelessness and substance abuse crises
Tackling climate change
Increasing affordable housing opportunities
Supporting small businesses and vibrant neighborhood commercial corridors
Serving as a champion for the LGBTQ community
Prior to his election to the Board, Supervisor Mandelman served as a Deputy City Attorney for the City of Oakland and as an elected Trustee on the City College of San Francisco Board of Trustees. As a Deputy City Attorney, Supervisor Mandelman practiced primarily in the areas of real estate, economic development, and affordable housing.
Supervisor Mandelman has been active on a variety of public and nonprofit boards, having served as a commissioner on San Francisco’s Building Inspection Commission and Board of Appeals, a member of the Bay Area Jewish Community Relations Council, president of the Board of Directors of Livable City, and Co-Chair of the San Francisco LGBT Community Center Board. A past president of the Noe Valley and Harvey Milk LGBT Democratic Clubs, Supervisor Mandelman has been an elected member of the San Francisco Democratic County Central Committee since 2006. He joined the Equality California Institute Board in 2020.
Supervisor Mandelman lives in the Mission and grew up in San Francisco, attending Brandeis-Hillel Day School and Lick-Wilmerding High School prior to earning a B.A. in History from Yale College, a Master of Public Policy from Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government and a law degree from UC Berkeley’s School of Law.
Rafael and his grandmother, a holocaust survivor, at Rafael’s graduation from Lick-Wilmerding High School
Rafael and his mother
Rafael, his mother and his grandmother
