San Francisco Mayor Rises From ‘Bureaucrat’ to Twitter’s Savior

A month after being named San Francisco’s interim mayor, Ed Lee was ushered into a small conference room at Twitter Inc. headquarters, his first visit to a technology company. The social networking startup, which had about 400 employees and was planning to add at least 2,000 more, was considering leaving the city, its executives said.

Lee, who’d never held political office before being promoted from city manager, looked at Dick Costolo, Twitter’s chief executive officer, Ali Rowghani, then the chief financial officer and Jack Dorsey, its chairman. They told Lee that while they wanted to stay in San Francisco, a city tax based on the size of the company’s payroll would erode Twitter’s growth, so they’d found space in a nearby community.