Joaquin Torres

Joaquin Torres is running unopposed for another term as Assessor-Recorder, and SF YIMBY is happy to endorse him again. While this office's core job — fairly assessing the city's roughly $350 billion in taxable property and maintaining public records — isn't a land-use lever, Torres has built a long track record as a reliable pro-housing official.

For 12 years, as President of the SF Housing Authority Commission, Torres led the rehabilitation of over 3,400 units of public housing with roughly $1 billion in improvements, ultimately transferring that housing to affordable-housing operators who could run it better, and grew the number of families served by 20% to over 16,500 households. He stepped down from that role in 2025 after stabilizing what had long been a troubled agency, and his successor inherited a much stronger foundation because of it. Torres has also served on SPUR's executive board, supporting the kind of urbanist research and advocacy that aligns with our own priorities.

Joaquín Torres is San Francisco's Assessor-Recorder and is running for the office in the November 3, 2026 election. Mayor London Breed appointed him in February 2021; he was elected on February 15, 2022 and took the oath for a new term on January 5, 2023. He previously directed the San Francisco Office of Economic and Workforce Development, leading the city's COVID-19 economic relief effort, and served 12 years as President of the San Francisco Housing Authority Commission, stepping down in 2025. Earlier he directed the Invest in Neighborhoods initiative and the Mayor's Office of Neighborhood Services. He is a graduate of Stanford University and NYU's Tisch School of the Arts and lives in the Inner Sunset.