District 9 candidates compete for 4,000 “underserved” Chinese votes.

Candidates running for supervisor in District 9 have long focused on their Latino voters in the stronghold that is Mission, the district’s most populous neighborhood.

But this year, they’re also making an unprecedented effort to woo another voting bloc: Chinese residents, an overlooked electorate that includes about 4,000 voters, many of whom live in Portola.

The three main candidates, Jackie Fielder, Trevor Chandler and Roberto Hernandez, have won the support of Chinese organizations. They all have Chinese names, photos with Chinese grandmothers, and lead volunteer teams of monolingual Cantonese-speaking aunties to call the bank or knock on doors. At least two of them have sat—and lost games—at the mahjong tables.

La Portola, a small community tucked under the arm formed by the 280 freeway that curves into the 101 freeway, is one of the city’s largest Asian neighborhoods: 53.2 percent of its residents are Asian.

They generally speak Cantonese and come from multigenerational, working-class Chinese American households living in what Feng Han, Fielder’s campaign manager, described as “a neglected part of District 9.”

Jon Wu, Hernandez’s campaign consultant focused on Chinese voters, echoed Han. “The problem with D9 is that everybody thinks Mission, everybody thinks Bernal. But Portola rarely comes up in the conversation,” he said.

In addition to concerns about public safety, which are shared by the city’s Chinese voters, Portola residents worry about opportunities for their children, Han said. Residents renting a three-bedroom home with four family members want to know how to protect their children from their home prices.

Fielder’s more progressive platform doesn’t appear to be an impediment to courting Chinese voters, known for being relatively conservative in recent elections. Portola’s working-class residents, many of whom built lives as city workers, cleaners or hotel custodians, are open to his message, he said.

“A lot of (Fielder’s) platform is focused on working-class people, that goes across ethnic lines,” said Han, who is originally from Singapore and learned enough Cantonese to say “vote” on the campaign trail ( Cantonese he learned from his mother, he said).