Housing
Pictured: A row of front doors and stoops on a city block. Tenants of the Plaza East public housing complex in the Western Addition complain of leaky pipes, pests and mold.

Developer, Housing Authority Reconsider Future for Plaza East

05.14.2021
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The company that owns and manages the Plaza East public housing complex in San Francisco’s Western Addition neighborhood says it does not currently have a plan to tear down the property. The shift in the firm’s message comes after the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development did not approve a $320 million request from the company and the San Francisco Housing Authority, which owns the land, to demolish and rebuild the existing public housing complex and potentially add hundreds of units.

Housing
Protesters hold a sign listing demands, in English and Spanish, regarding San Francisco's rent assistance program.

Nonprofit Obstructing Rent Aid for Thousands of San Franciscans

04.23.2021
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A local group that worked with San Francisco on a public program to allocate rental relief funds is keeping a list of thousands of applicants from city staff, an official confirmed Friday. That has made it impossible to follow up with the applicants and give them additional help.

Q Foundation created the web application tool for rent assistance through San Francisco’s Give2SF COVID-19 Response and Recovery Fund.

Housing

State’s Rent-Relief Program Neglects Vulnerable Communities, Groups Say

04.13.2021
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California’s program to alleviate rent debts — and prevent a wave of evictions in July — makes it tough for some of the state’s most vulnerable residents to request financial aid, community groups in San Francisco say. The way the system is designed prevents many people from applying, including those who live in informal housing arrangements, those who do not speak English and those who lack digital proficiency, according to staff at local organizations helping tenants and landlords file applications.

Housing
Many members of San Francisco's Latino community work in restaurants, such as this Mission District taqueria, and other service industry jobs, and have suffered lost income due to COVID-19 shutdowns.

81% of Residents Receiving Housing Help From S.F. Are Black or Latino

12.30.2020
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More than four of every five San Franciscans receiving rental assistance from the city have been Latino or African American residents, the groups hit hardest by COVID-19 infections, public records show. Philanthropic donors have poured $31.4 million into the Give2SF Fund, $6.3 million of which is targeted at helping people cover housing costs, according to the fund’s most recent progress report. To date, 1,443 households have been allocated as much as $5.8 million in housing assistance, with the average grant being $4,000.

Homelessness
Tents line Golden Gate Avenue while nonprofit and city workers discuss hotel placements with unhoused residents in July 2020.

Should Windfall Create Homelessness Solutions or Help Balance the City’s Budget?

12.14.2020
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Facing the high costs of pandemic response, San Francisco officials are making a play for a pile of cash that voters created through a 2018 ballot measure. But many of their proposals for that money lose sight of what voters had in mind when they passed Proposition C, says the measure’s author. That was to finally turn the homelessness crisis around. Proposition C established a gross-receipts tax on large businesses, netting hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue that was locked up in court until September. City staff last week appealed to the fund’s oversight committee, requesting money to cover recent expenses and expand existing programs, including a pharmacy run by the Department of Public Health. But these are hardly the types of results that voters expected, said Jennifer Friedenbach, who wrote the ballot measure and is the executive director of the Coalition on Homelessness.

Homelessness
This Navigation Center in the Mission, opened in March 2015, was one of the first to serve San Francisco's homeless population. In early 2019, development began on a plan to turn the site into 157 affordable-housing units.

Surge in S.F. Homelessness Funding Could Be a Game Changer

09.23.2020
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San Francisco will soon spend previously unthinkable sums on the fight against homelessness. The massive influx of cash — nearly $600 million over the next year collected thanks to a voter initiative, combined with hundreds of millions of dollars in expenditures by the homelessness department — could be a game changer.

Housing
San Francisco Mayor London Breed Tuesday extended her eviction moratorium through the end of November. For many tenants, that will delay displacement — a longstanding political issue in the city, as exemplified by this demonstration at the 2014 Pride Parade.

Breed Extends Eviction Moratorium to Dec. 1

08.26.2020
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Mayor London Breed Tuesday gave San Francisco tenants an additional month to figure out how they will cover rent and avoid eviction, in light of economic hardships resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. Now, the soonest landlords could legally evict for nonpayment of rent is Dec. 1. That’s a month later than the previously announced eviction moratorium was set to end. The information was initially made public in a web post from the Housing Rights Committee of San Francisco. The San Francisco Public Press received confirmation of these changes from Hugo Ramirez, a staff member at the Mayor’s office.