Voting for 3 Board of Directors seats, and for the Board President will take place starting August 11 and ending at 5:00 pm on August 18, 2025.
Eligible voters will receive an emailed link to vote.
Each Board seat is for a three-year term.
The President serves for a one-year term.
All terms start Wed., August 20, when our Annual Membership Meeting closes.
- When is the election?
- How are our Board Members selected?
- Why should I run?
- Who should run?
- What is expected of Board Members?
- Who can vote?
- How do we vote?
- How do I run for the Board?
- How do we elect our President?
- How are the votes counted?
- What if I still have questions?
- Who is on the Board now?
What are the important dates for this election?
- May 15, 2025: Deadline to be a member to be eligible to vote.
- Wednesday, July 9: Nominations for Directors and President open.
- Friday, August 8, 5pm: Nominations close.
- Monday, August 11, 6pm: Candidates Night.
- Attend via Zoom at https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84429420461
- Nominees must be members by this date.
- Online voting opens at the end of this meeting.
- Monday, August 11, 7pm: Voting links emailed to eligible members.
- Monday, August 18, 5pm: Online voting closes.
- Wednesday, August 20, 6pm: Annual Membership Meeting.
- Elections results are announced.
- Attend via Zoom at http://us02web.zoom.us/j/84789060820
How are board members selected?
Our Board Members and President, are elected by the organization’s membership.
The Board consists of nine persons, serving “staggered” three year terms, with three seats coming up for a vote each year.
Vacancies on the Board are filled by appointment by the Board only until the following August, at which time someone is elected to serve for the remainder of the incomplete term.
To be eligible to vote, our bylaws require individuals to be members of the District – not just on the mailing list – 90 days before the elections are held.
In 2025, the voting will begin on August 11. Therefore members who joined by May 15, are eligible to vote.
Why Should I Run?
Being a Director of the LEATHER & LGBTQ Cultural District means having a voice in the future of our South of Market neighborhood: helping it thrive during current challenges and remain the vibrant, safe, and uniquely kinky space we love and enjoy.
Who Should Run?
We are encouraging members of the local queer and kink community to nominate themselves.
We are looking for individuals with skill sets to help us improve and grow the queer and kinky community in SOMA. These include, but aren’t limited to:
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- Communications & social media
- Art promotion
- Event production
- Experience navigating city bureaucracy
- Land use advocacy
- Diversity, equity, and inclusion
- Fundraising
- Volunteer coordination
To achieve diverse representation on our Board, we are particularly encouraging the self-nomination of individuals who represent some of these communities and constituencies:
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- Women
- Trans, Non-Binary, and Gender Nonconforming Folks
- People of Color
- Kinky Heterosexuals
- Young People
- Traditional and Non-Traditional Families
- Artists
- Business Owners and Managers
All nominees must be Cultural District members before August 13, 2025. (Membership dues waivers are available.)
To ensure the independence of individuals serving on the Board, not more than one member of an immediate family shall concurrently serve as an officer, Director or employee of the District. For purposes of this subsection, “immediate family” shall include spouse, domestic partner, siblings, children, parents (both legal parents and stepparents), or other comparable intimate relationships. Please do not nominate yourself if your election would violate this policy. If you are in doubt, please disclose any possible such relationships in your Candidate Statement.
This limitation refers only to full, voting Board Members; it does not apply to Committee members, Associate Board Members, Emeritus Board Members, former Board Members, or other volunteers.
What is Expected of Board members?
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- Board Members are expected to attend the annual Board Retreat, and to attend Board meetings as regularly as is possible and practical for them.
- Board Members are expected to join and actively participate on at least one Cultural District committee.
- Board Members are expected to actively participate in annual fundraising, by raising funds and/or by making a personal contribution at a level that is meaningful to them.
- Board Members are encouraged to attend and volunteer at Cultural District events at a level that is meaningful to them.
- Additionally, Board Members are urged to be involved in other Cultural District volunteer activities, such as artist and entrepreneur programs, SOMA Walking Tour Guides, or the Save SOMA Network.
Who can vote?
Persons who are current members as of May 15, 2025 are eligible to vote in this election.
If you are not a current member, become a member now.
How do we vote?
All eligible voters are encouraged to read the Statements of Candidates who have nominated themselves.
There will be a Candidates Night on Monday, August 11, 2025, starting at 6:00 pm, at which candidates are invited to speak and respond to questions. Attend via Zoom at https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84429420461.
Online voting will open at roughly 7:00 pm on Monday, August 11, 2025, and close at 5:00 pm on Monday, August 18, 2025. All voting must take place during this seven-day voting period.
Each eligible voter will receive a link and instructions via email from OpaVote, a secure voting platform. We use ranked choice voting. The voting Web site has a list of candidates; drag the names up and down until your choices are listed in order of preference with first choice at the top and last choice at the bottom. (Ranked choice vote counting details are provided below.)
The list of candidates for President works the same way. (Votes for someone who is not elected to the Board will move to the next choice candidate.)
Results will be announced at the Annual Membership Meeting on Wednesday, August 20, 2025. The Community is encouraged to attend to welcome the new Board, whose terms begin at the end of this meeting.
I want to Run. What do I do?
To nominate yourself, please use:
The self-nomination form includes space for a “Candidate’s Statement” of approximately 350 words or less which will be included in materials shared with voting members in advance of the election. We suggest you include answers to these questions:
1. How have you been involved in the LEATHER & LGBTQ Cultural District? When, and in what capacity?
2. Are you familiar with the LEATHER & LGBTQ Cultural District?
3. Why do you want to be a Board member?
The form asks you to confirm your agreement with our Mission & Vision, and that you meet one or more of the following criteria:
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- Have lived or worked within the boundaries of the LEATHER & LGBTQ Cultural District (the “District”),
- Were born or raised in the boundaries of the District,
- Have a history of activism in alignment with the Organizations’ Mission and Vision,
- Have served reliably on one or more of the Organization’s committees for at least one year.
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The form will also ask which constituency or constituencies you represent:
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- Residential tenants;
- Families (traditional, non-traditional, or extended);
- Artists;
- Youth;
- Elders;
- Businesses headquartered and operating within the boundaries of the District;
- Nonprofits, such as arts and culture organizations, community associations, educational institutions, and community service agencies headquartered or operating within the boundaries of the District;
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Finally, the form will ask you to indicate if you would also like to run for President.
We next encourage you to submit a single photograph and/or a short video, to accompany your Candidate’s Statement. Send it, or a publicly-accessible link to it, to nominations@sflcd.org. (The Nominations Committee reserves the right to determine the appropriateness of the picture or video for this use, and to use the media on its website and elsewhere.)
Self-nomination details are posted as they are received, so the sooner you submit them, the better. In any case, be sure to submit your form before 5:00 p.m. Pacific Time, on Friday, August 8, 2025.
Plan to attend the Candidates Night (via Zoom), starting at 6:00 p.m. on the evening of Monday, August 11. Be prepared to make a short statement, and to take questions from meeting participants. You may also share additional materials, such as a short video (submitted at least 24 hours in advance). If you are unable to attend on August 13, we will read your statement and present your materials for you.
If you are not currently a member of the Cultural District, you must become one before August 11, 2025. (Membership fees are waived on request.)
To better prepare yourself, you may wish to attend the Board meeting on Wednesday, July 16, review the Cultural District’s Vision and Mission Statements, and/or look at our Bylaws.
How do we elect the Cultural District President?
Election of the President of the LCD will also take place using the same online balloting. All persons running for the Board are invited to also nominate themselves for the office of President, and the names of all those nominees will appear on the ballot; voting will be “instant run-off” style; votes for individuals who are not elected to the Board will be discarded and that voter’s next-highest-preference candidate will receive their vote.
Current Directors may also place themselves in nomination for the office of President, by writing directly to nominations@sflcd.org.
All candidates for President are invited to submit a “Candidate’s Statement” of approximately 250 words or less, if they wish.
How Will the Votes Be Counted?
The Nominations Committee has selected OpaVote.com as the platform upon which to run our online election, using Scottish Single Transferable Vote (STV) to elect our Board, and San Francisco Instant Runoff to elect our President. These are both “ranked choice voting” (RCV) methods, meaning that, on the online ballot, voters will drag the names of candidates up and down until their first choice is at the top and their last choice is at the bottom. These systems are recommended because they assure proportional representation; that is, they help assure that minorities are represented according to their support among voters. Although these systems are numerically complicated, the rules are well-established and easily handled by computers. (This page may be helpful in understanding the Scottish STV method of counting votes. To learn more, please visit this page, or explore the entire OpaVote Web site.)
What if I still have questions?
If you have questions or concerns, please write as soon as possible to nominations@sflcd.org.
The Nominating Committee is chaired by David Hyman.
Who Is on the Board Now?
You can view our current Board of Directors here.
Thank you.