Leland Yee to run for secretary of state POLITICS

Senator Leland Yee speaks with the media in his office on Tuesday, October 25, 2011. He was announcing that a SF resident has been paid by Mayor Ed Lee's campaign or one of his independent expenditure committees. less Senator Leland Yee speaks with the media in his office on Tuesday, October 25, 2011. He was announcing that a SF resident has been paid by Mayor Ed Lee's campaign or one of his independent expenditure ... more Photo: Susana Bates, Special To The Chronicle Photo: Susana Bates, Special To The Chronicle Image 1 of / 1 Caption Close Leland Yee to run for secretary of state 1 / 1 Back to Gallery

State Sen. Leland Yee, a San Francisco Democrat who has made voter access and open government among his main priorities as a lawmaker, will run for secretary of state when he is termed out of the Legislature in two years.

Yee, a former San Francisco supervisor who ran unsuccessfully for mayor last year, plans to announce his candidacy Monday morning. The secretary of state is California's chief election officer and oversees the state's campaign disclosure database, maintaining records of all lobbying and election spending in the Golden State.

Current Secretary of State Debra Bowen, who is also a Democrat, will be termed out in 2014. Yee's San Francisco Senate district was eliminated in new legislative districts drawn by an independent citizens redistricting commission, and will disappear when his term expires in 2014. There are no other declared candidates for the statewide position.

"Given the fact that I am termed out in two years, I looked long and hard at the options available," Yee said. "Given the work I have done on voting, on transparency and on open government accountability, I thought the secretary of state position would be a nice fit for me."

Yee has pushed a number of pieces of legislation aimed at making it easier for Californians to register and vote. Among his successful initiatives was a 2011 law creating an online voter registration system, which was implemented just weeks before the deadline to register for the November election and is thought to have helped Democrats win a number of tight races and initiative campaigns. More than 780,000 people were added to the voter rolls through that online system, the majority of whom were first-time voters younger than 35.

Yee has also been critical of high executive pay at the state's public universities and has pushed for greater transparency at both the University of California and California State University systems. He has angered some fellow Democrats in the Capitol in years past for refusing to support deep cuts to education and social services, even when the state faced tens of billions of dollars in budget shortfalls.