Even after the bandanna-wearing, rock-throwing, fire-starting fringe demonstrators took over a downtown Oakland building and blocked off a street late Wednesday, Mayor Jean Quan did not want police to intervene.

Instead, Quan asked that police hold off on any confrontation until daylight - or, barring that, send in negotiators to try to work out a peaceful resolution.

"She didn't want to incite the anarchists any more than they already were," said one source who was in the city's emergency operations center when Quan stunned the assembled staffers with her comments.

Finally, interim Police Chief Howard Jordan, with the backing of City Administrator DeannaSantana, made the call for police to take action. Both were in the emergency center with Quan.

The following day, at a press conference with Jordan and Santana, the mayor praised police for their handling of the situation, while a stone-faced chief and city administrator stood by her side.

Quan's command center call was the latest example of the mayor's resistance to using police force on demonstrators, a position that is being reinforced both by her closest advisers and her family.

In fact, eyewitnesses say Quan's husband was among the banner-wavers blockading the port in a nonviolent action earlier Wednesday.

Since the disastrous finale to Occupy Oakland's general strike, Quan has become more vocal about the nonstop protest movement's economic drain on the city. She now says the camp might have to move from City Hall.

Meanwhile, the tents remain.

Even City Council members who were initially sympathetic to the campers are starting to change their tune - leaving the activist mayor more isolated than ever.

Quan said at a press briefing the day after last week's riot that she was still hoping for a "peaceful resolution" to the Occupy encampment outside City Hall.

But when asked what her idea of a peaceful resolution was or how it might be achieved, Quan said, "I don't know."

Overkill: Union leaders are sending out the troops for a final push to pass San Francisco's pension reform Proposition C - and with good reason.

Labor's million-dollar campaign to kill Jeff Adachi'srival Proposition D appears have hurt both measures' chances of passage.

Polls show Prop. C "ahead at 51 percent, but we are definitely not in the safe zone," said union spokesman Nathan Ballard.

Shocked, shocked!With so many candidates screaming for attention, the campaigns for mayor, district attorney and sheriff in San Francisco have spent the final furious weeks digging up and dishing out every bit of "outrage" they can find.

For instance:

-- City Attorney Dennis Herrera, long a champion of tenants' rights, was part-owner of a 36-unit Section 8 apartment complex in Richmond, according to documents turned up by his rivals.

And while he was a part owner, four tenants were evicted - including a woman who owed $380 in back rent.

-- Former Board of Supervisors President Matt Gonzalez cut an eight-minute video for his boss, Public Defender Jeff Adachi, in which he complained that nine other candidates took more than $4 million in public financing "rather than allow this money to be used for schools and parks and other city services."

Not mentioned: Both Gonzalez and Adachi endorsed the reforms that allowed public dollars to be used in the first place.

-- Mayoral candidate and Supervisor John Avalosshowed up for a rally in support of a Bayview resident as she took back her home last week in defiance of a court-ordered eviction.

Not mentioned: According to KGO-TV's Mark Matthews, since taking out a $525,000 mortgage in November 2006, the owner never made a payment and had filed for bankruptcy protection multiple times.

Cyber safe: One of the more interesting items in Oakland's $1 million-and-counting price tag for hosting Occupy - the $100,000 the city has spent to protect its computer system from a cyber attack.

Ranked out: The confusion over ranked-choice voting does have its lighter moments.

For months, San Francisco mayoral candidate Bevan Duftyhas been asking voters who don't make him their top choice to please "make me your No. 2 or 3 pick."

The other day, he says, a voter told him, "I appreciate your strategy, and I gave you one of my three No. 2's."

Dufty paused, visualizing the guy's ballot being shredded for improper voting, and said, "Thanks."

EXTRA! Catch our blog at www.sfgate.com/matierandross.