Controversial political consultant Jack Davis has issued a carefully worded apology for his 50th birthday party last weekend, a bash that featured sex acts performed before many of the city's most powerful figures.
Davis, who is managing the campaign for a new football stadium for the San Francisco 49ers, offered a written apology to the team and to "all of those in attendance that night who took offense" at the X-rated performance witnessed by some 300 guests. "There were some activities on stage that many people found shocking," Davis said in the message sent to the media late Thursday.But political pundits say the apology may be too little, too late, to help the 49ers' sagging campaign for a $100 million bond issue to help build a $500 million stadium-mall complex here. San Franciscans vote on the issue June 3, and polls taken even before the party showed it was in trouble.
"Hopefully, this will help allow everyone to move past the whole party thing, which has nothing to do with whether the city ought to invest in a project . . . for a part of town that's been neglected for 50 years," said P.J. Johnson, spokesman for Mayor Willie Brown.
Brown has campaigned hard for the stadium, saying it will bring jobs to one of the most economically depressed areas of the city and keep the 49ers from leaving.
Sources said Brown and the team's top brass held a meeting with Davis on Thursday, where it was decided the apology would be issued.