Mark Farrell

Farrell was born in 1974, the only child of Lena (née Ewoldt), a former flight attendant from Probstei, Germany near Kiel and John Farrell, a former Air Force pilot, and attorney, who grew up near the Palace of Fine Arts on Broderick Street in the Marina District.

Farrell spent his summers at his cousin's family farm in Probstei.

Farrell attended both Stuart Hall for Boys and Saint Ignatius College Preparatory, and subsequently received a B.A. in 1996 from Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, an M.A. from University College Dublin in Ireland, and a J.D. in 2001 from the University of Pennsylvania Law School in Philadelphia.

Prior to being elected to San Francisco's Board of Supervisors, Farrell practiced law as a corporate and securities attorney at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati in Silicon Valley, then joined Thomas Weisel Partners as an investment banker.

He subsequently co-founded Quest Hospitality Ventures, a San Francisco-based venture capital firm focused on the hospitality and travel sector.

Prior to his election to the Board of Supervisors, he served as a mid-level director of Quest Hospitality Ventures, now Thayer Ventures a venture capital firm.

Farrell was elected in November 201 to the 2nd district seat on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.

He was subsequently re-elected in November 2014.

The legislation was a matter of heavy debate, and was ultimately passed by the Board of Supervisors in 2014 and took effect in 2015.

Farrell introduced an ordinance in 2015 that required gun store owners to video record all transactions and give weekly updates on ammunition sales to the police department.

High Bridge Arms, the only firearm retailer in the city, closed after the ordinance was passed.

Farrell told the San Francisco Chronicle, "From my perspective, if the last gun store in San Francisco wants to close its doors because of my legislation, so be it."

On the board, Farrell served as chair of the Budget and Finance Committee, a founding member of the 2016–17 Super Bowl Bid Committee, and on eight other local and state boards and committees.

Farrell is regarded to be a political moderate.

After his election to the Board of Supervisors, Farrell ushered through a two-year city budget that reformed the way San Francisco paid for retiree health care benefits and passed small business tax credit legislation so the city's small businesses could hire more employees and create more local jobs.

In addition, Farrell created a public-private partnership between the San Francisco non-profit Kiva.org and San Francisco's Office of Small Business.

He also became the first elected official in California to endorse Kiva borrowers on the platform personally.

Farrell was an advocate for the passage of Laura's Law, which established a program to compel mentally ill people to seek treatment, both voluntarily and through court-mandate.

In June 2016, Farrell was ordered to repay $191,000 in unlawful campaign funding after the City ethics panel voted, 5-0, to uphold the original 2014 decision of the San Francisco Ethics Commission that he should have to forfeit back to the City the amount raised from just two donors and used late in the 2010 election by Common Sense Voters, an independent expenditure committee, with improper communications from a campaign consultant.

Farrell was exonerated by the California Fair Political Practices Commission, although the campaign consultant Chris Lee and Common Sense Voters were found to be in violation of federal campaign finance laws, but a further complaint was filed with the City commission by Janet Reilly, who lost to Farrell by 256 votes.

City law, stricter than state law, holds candidates personally responsible for staff as well as themselves, whether they knew about the illegal communication or not.

In an unusual move, Farrell responded with a lawsuit against the City in May to prevent further collection efforts from the Treasurer's office, and settled with the City for $25,000 in October 2016.

After Mayor Lee's death on December 12, 2017, by virtue of her office as president of the Board of Supervisors.

Breed launched a campaign in the special election to fill the office permanently.

Three weeks after Lee's death, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted to remove Breed and appoint Mark Farrell as acting mayor.

This vote was contentious.

Those supporting Breed's removal argued that it presented a conflict of interest for her to continue to serve as a member of the Board of Supervisors while also acting as mayor, and that it would be present unfair advantage for her to enter the special mayoral election with pseudo-incumbency.

Opponents of her removal alleged that there were racist and sexist motivations for removing Breed, who is a black woman.

After the vote, the mayoral oath of office was administered to Farrell by City Attorney Dennis Herrera.

In order to accept his appointment as mayor, Farrell resigned his seat on the board of supervisors.

On January 30, Farrell appointed Catherine Stefani to his former seat on the Board of Supervisors.

Mark E. Farrell (born 1974) is an American politician and lawyer who served as the 44th Mayor of San Francisco from January 23 to July 11, 2018.

Before his appointment as mayor, he served on the Board of Supervisors for nearly two terms, representing District 2 (the Marina, Cow Hollow, Pacific Heights, Seacliff, Lake District, Presidio Heights, Jordan Park, Laurel Heights, Presidio, and part of Russian Hill).

In 2018, Heather Knight of the San Francisco Chronicle described date collected on the first two years the program as demonstrating success.

Farrell was appointed as mayor by the Board of Supervisors on January 23, 2018, succeeding acting mayor London Breed.

Farrell did not seek election in special election held on June 5, 2018 to elect a new mayor to fill the remainder of Lee's unexpired term.

Breed won that election, and was sworn in on July 11, marking the end of Farrell's mayoralty.

and served out the remainder of Lee's uncompleted term into January 8, 2020.

To assuage conflict of interest criticisms, Farrell took a leave of absence from Thayer Ventures during his time as mayor.

Farrell authored an $11 billion city budget.