Ed Lee wins San Francisco mayor's race

San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee reacts as his wife, Anita, looks on during his election day party in San Francisco, California November 8, 2011.

(Reuters) - Ed Lee won San Francisco's mayoral race on Wednesday, becoming the first elected mayor of Chinese descent in a city steeped in Chinese American history.

Lee, who has been San Francisco's acting mayor since January, received 61.2 percent of votes after several rounds of votes from Tuesday's ranked-choice election system had been tallied, according to San Francisco's department of elections.

Lee was appointed mayor after former Mayor Gavin Newsom won election last November as California's lieutenant governor.

Lee was San Francisco's city administrator at the time of his appointment and had the support of prominent city political figures in the mayor's race, which he officially entered in August.

Lee, who faced off against 15 other candidates in the mayor's race, counted an agreement with the city's unions on a pension reform measure as the signature achievement of his 10 months in office and voters endorsed it on Tuesday over a competing measure.

In other prominent San Francisco races, voters elected appointed District Attorney George Gascon to a full four-year term to the office and tapped Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi as sheriff.

(Reporting by Jim Christie)