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San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee dies at 65

Waldemar Zboralski
/
Wikimedia Commons
San Francisco Mayor Edwin M. Lee, 1952-2017

LISTEN: With the sudden death of San Francisco Mayor Edwin M. Lee in the early hours of the morning, KALW News Director Ben Trefny reprises the story and clips from a conversation with the mayor during his re-election campaign.  

"He won a four-year term in 2011 and Twitter of course became an anchor tenant in a revitalized mid-Market; in fact, it became a symbol of a tech industry that many thought was taking over the city. Mayor Lee was an advocate for the needy, and it hearkened back to his days as a housing-rights activist back in the '70s and '80s. But in 2015 when he ran again, he ran against a slate of little-known candidates who criticized him as doing more for tech leaders than for poor people."

Ben joined KALW in 2004. As Executive News Editor and then News Director, he helped the news department win numerous regional and national awards for long- and short-form journalism. He also helped teach hundreds of audio producers, many of whom work with him at KALW, today.