What The New Yorker gets wrong, and right, about homelessness in San Francisco
We know the problem. It's what to do that is vexing
The fenced-in “sleeping village” at Civic Center, is a first attempt at urban camping for homeless tent dwellers. It is next to the public library.
So now The New Yorker has weighed in on San Francisco’s homeless problem in the June 1 issue. Spoiler alert, the headline is “A Window onto an American Nightmare.”
So it is not exactly a salute to success.
But you knew that. The homeless problem is open and out there. Everyone sees it. A stat from the story says that between 2013 and 2017, 311 calls about homeless concerns went up 800 percent. (One reason for the increase might be the city’s popular 311 cell phone app, which launched in 2013 and makes it easy to report broken street lights, graffiti and tent encampments.)
But the real takeaway is that we may be headed into uncharted territory. The old, familiar memes — tech wealth squeezing out low income, lack of shelter bed availability and no space for tents — don’t apply. At least now.
The pandemic has not only shut down the country, it is raising the real possibility of members of the tech industry changing to virtual commuting. Critics may get their wish. Tech may largely leave San Francisco.
The problem is they will take their income and tax revenue with them. That would mean less funding for all programs, including getting the homeless housed.
As for shelter beds, COVID-19 concerns have cut the total in half. And that’s in a city that had nowhere near enough to begin with. Currently there are about 3,500 shelter beds. Twice that number, over 8,000 people, are estimated to be living on the city streets.
And finally, the city has finally given in to the idea of a “safe sleeping village,” where tents can be set up, at a safe distance, for housing. I’ve was there this week, and will have more to say in a minute, but the important point is this first effort is housing just 130 people. Not enough.
Now, there are some quibbles with The New Yorker. Hopefully Supervisor Hillary Ronen has given her publicist a raise. Ronen is quoted extensively, and she is given credit for creating “Hillary Ronen’s navigation center.” Actually, navigation centers were the late Mayor Ed Lee’s idea and while Ronen helped to find space for one in her district, she also made sure to promise in a neighborhood meeting that it would only be in that location for six to nine months to make way for affordable housing.
Former mayor and now Gov. Gavin Newsom is dinged for “sit-lie” legislation (which I supported). But he wasn’t given credit for “care not cash,” which was his innovative program to get social service payments for the homeless and then use part of that money to pay rent on a single room occupancy residence.
Granted, San Franciscans are touchy about outsiders parachuting into town and lecturing the locals about what’s wrong with the city.
A better approach would be to take what’s true in the story, and unpack that a little. For example, it says 71 percent of homeless people previously had housing in San Francisco, “so most of the city’s homelessness is homegrown.”
But as an official at City Hall says, if the population on the street is around 8,000, twenty-nine percent of that is over 2,300 arriving each year. (Remember in 2015 the state of Nevada was sued by San Francisco for sending nearly 500 psychiatric patients from a state-run hospital to California with one-way bus tickets.)
And another official says that while the every-two-years one-night count of homeless hovers around 8,000, the number of people they see for services is more like 15,000. Twenty-nine percent of that is over 4,300 a year.
Imagine if the city was dealing with 4,000 fewer people who need housing.
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Combine that with the stat that the story says San Francisco spends $330 million a year “on homeless solutions.” More per capita “than nearly any other U.S. city.”
The NYer author wonders how that can be. But those of us with a front row seat for 30 years or more, know the answer.
San Francisco is the master of the half measure.
Technically, New York City has a larger homelessness problem than SF. But NYC has created enough shelter beds to house almost everyone. (Granted, those shelters have their own problems, but people are off the street.)
We create shelter beds, but nowhere near enough. Navigation centers work, but when one was proposed for the Embarcadero the outcry was vociferous and discouraging. Supervisors who try to get constituents to agree to a navigation center in their neighborhood are met with anger and lawsuits.
And recently in a decision SF officials called “shocking,” the Federal Highway Adminstration revoked approval to build a 200-bed center on land it controls in the Bayview. Pause for face-palm. That’s such a San Francisco thing to happen.
Frankly, I was prepared to dislike the “sleeping village” in front of the public library. I thought the fence around it would make it seem like an internment camp. Instead, by limiting access to one entrance and exit, it seems orderly and well run.
Urban Alchemy, a public service group, is manning the door 24/7, signing people in and out. When I was there a woman rushed out, only to be called back to sign the ledger. After some “Oh man, c’mon,” huffing and puffing, she did. Safe and secure.
Members of the public service ground Urban Alchemy are at the gate of the “sleeping village” 24/7. They check residents in and out — cheerfully — and maintain order
The problem? There’s only one village. Another is proposed out in the Haight, but the tent encampments are so out of control now that Hastings Law School joined Tenderloin residents and businesses in a law suit to get them moved.
Let’s face it, this is no vision of a shining city on a hill. The economic shutdown will surely leave the city with a budget deficit. Deep cutbacks in stores, restaurants and bars with inevitably push paycheck-to-paycheck workers out of housing.
And, when the need is the greatest, the pandemic has cut the available beds nearly in half.
And we didn’t have enough to start with.
A nightmare indeed.
Back from your second walk yet? Me too. Now I am just looking for something to read. And, if you read this far, you are probably thinking, ‘I know someone who would like this.’ Well don’t hold back, send them this newsletter. Just hit the button.
The joys of virtual interviews with 49ers
Nobody really knows what is going to happen with the NFL season this year. There’s a huge push from the owners to get the games back, but football isn’t golf. There’s a lot of up-close physical contact.
So for right now everything is in limbo. No games. No practice. No in person interviews.
So the 49ers, to their credit, have gone all out with Zoom interviews with players. And as I wrote in Sunday’s column for the Santa Rosa Press Democrat, they have been surprisingly fun. We get to hear from the players, appearing from all over the country, in a relaxed atmosphere.
Frankly, some players are better Zoomers than others. But that’s also enjoyable.
And the best part is peeking over their shoulders to see the background. Some, like Jimmy Ward, have the computer skills to put up a background of the Golden Gate Bridge. And some, like Nick Bosa, give you a little look at home (and his dogs barking) in Ft. Lauderdale.
And you can tell that some of the players are getting into the virtual spirit. Here’s a fun video of fullback Kyle Juszczy channeling his inner Rocky for a DIY workout in the snow
Contact C.W. Nevius at cwnevius@gmail.com. Compliments and comments gratefully accepted. Complaints not so much. Twitter: @cwnevius
no mention in your article about the fact that we are not arresting and prosecting dealers, and the biggest cause of homelessness is drug addiction. People flock here because we allow deals to go unabated and open street use