San Francisco Mayor-Elect Plans to Declare Fentanyl Emergency on Day 1

Daniel Lurie is a man in a hurry.

He said in his first speech as San Francisco’s mayor-elect on Friday that he would declare a state of emergency on fentanyl on his first day in office in January.

In brief, clipped remarks, he said he intended to shut down the open-air fentanyl markets that had proliferated in the city’s Tenderloin and South of Market neighborhoods and had infuriated many residents.

“We are going to get tough on those that are dealing drugs, and we are going to be compassionate, but tough, about the conditions of our streets, as well,” Mr. Lurie, 47, said at a gathering in Chinatown that lasted just a few minutes.

Fentanyl, a cheap opioid, is responsible for most of the 3,300 drug deaths that have occurred in San Francisco since 2020, killing far more people in the city than Covid-19, homicides and car crashes combined.

Mr. Lurie, a 47-year-old heir to the Levi Strauss fortune who has never held elected office, appealed to an electorate that was tired of rampant drug use and property crime in the city and was looking for a mayor who could revitalize the struggling downtown area. He was effective in getting his message out to voters, spending $8.6 million of his own money on his campaign and receiving another $1 million from his mother, the billionaire Mimi Haas.

Mr. Lurie, a Democrat, addressed reporters the morning after Mayor London Breed, also a Democrat, called him to concede. He did not provide additional details about what his emergency declaration would do.