Families Demand Affordable Housing Solutions in Bold Protest Rally

by Yessica Hernandez

photos by Leon Kunstenaar

On February 11, homeless families and their allies rallied and marched to San Francisco City Hall, demanding more affordable housing and critical changes to the family shelter system. The rally, which started from Hamilton Family Shelter, called for immediate action to restore the waitlist for housing, ensuring that families living in hotels or doubled-up situations can access shelter and support.

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An Open Letter To Daniel Lurie On PSH, Corruption, the Drug Crisis, and Everything in Between

by Jordan Davis

Dear Mayor Lurie,

Congratulations on winning the mayor’s race. I certainly did not vote for you or anyone else for mayor, because I believe San Francisco’s strong mayor system needs to be scuttled. However, as you are now in office, there are some things you should know.

I know that you want to focus on shelters as a homelessness response.

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I Manage SF’s ‘Pit Stop’ Program—Here’s Why Public Bathrooms Matter

story and photo by Hollie Garrett

A Pit Stop toilet in downtown San Francisco. Photo by Hollie Garrett.

Disclosure: Hollie Garrett works as a manager for San Francisco’s Pit Stop program.

San Francisco’s Pit Stop program is a public restroom program that also provides used needle receptacles and dog waste bags. The program has become a critical component in addressing public sanitation and a safer environment for both the city’s homeless and local residents.

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A Win for Youth Housing at 1174 Folsom St.

by River Beck

On December 4, a diverse coalition of housing advocates in San Francisco succeeded in toppling a series of obstacles facing a 42-unit housing project for transitional-age youth in the city’s South of Market neighborhood. The permanent supportive housing (PSH) project, which will support LGBTQ+ young adults, is a critical step towards solutions desperately needed to avoid chronic homelessness. 

The intergenerational and multi-racial bloc of residents,

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Supervisor Introduces Legislation to Extend Rapid Rehousing Support to Homeless Families

In response to the alarming rise in family homelessness, Supervisor Hilary Ronen, with support from the Coalition on Homelessness, introduced new legislation at the San Francisco Board of Supervisors meeting on October 22 to extend critical housing subsidies for families in need. The proposed ordinance amends the City’s Administrative Code to provide up to five years of rapid rehousing assistance for eligible families, addressing the increasing number of families at risk of returning to homelessness due to short-term housing subsidies.

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PSH Proposal Shames One Drug Culture While Ignoring Another

by Jordan Davis

At the September 24 Board of Supervisors meeting, Supervisor Matt Dorsey pulled yet another policy out of his rear end that sounds reasonable on the surface, but in reality further stigmatizes permanent supportive housing (PSH) residents. 

Hot off the heels of his proposed legislation to stifle PSH development unless a certain percentage is dedicated to drug recovery housing, Dorsey announced that he was requesting that legislation be drafted that would require that PSH disclose so-called “drug-tolerant”

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Sometimes, Chaos Ensues in Awarding City Contracts to Housing Nonprofits

by Jordan Davis

Within the past year, there have been several scandals involving nonprofits who contract with the City. Kyra Worthy is facing federal charges for misusing over $700,000 in funds from the public safety nonprofit SF SAFE.  More recently, Sheryl Davis, the head of the Human Rights Commission and the Dream Keeper Initiative, had to resign her post over allegations of fiscal improprieties.

Why does this matter,

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Meth, Death and Abuse: Inside the Private Security Forces Patrolling the Homeless

By Lauren Hepler/CalMatters

Wendy Powitzky thought she’d finally found a way off the street in Orange County.

The former hairdresser had spent years sleeping in her car and parks around Anaheim, near the suburban salons where she used to work. One day a social worker told Powitzky about an old piano shop recently converted into a shelter.

She just had to clear security to reach her new twin bed.

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Op-ed: Let’s House PSH Tenants

by Jordan Davis

About a year ago, District 5 Supervisor Dean Preston, who represents the majority of permanent supportive housing tenants in San Francisco—including myself—introduced and passed a resolution calling on the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing (HSH) to fill vacant PSH units. Given that the Supreme Court’s recent decision in the Grants Pass case makes it easier to sweep unhoused individuals, and that Mayor London Breed is now trying to bus homeless people out of town,

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“Aggressive” Sweeps Loom in SF After Grants Pass

A tent is in the center of the frame. In front of it is what looks like a white dollhouse, laying flat on the ground. The image is in Black and White

On a rainy day in 2021, I witnessed San Francisco workers throw away a woman’s leukemia medication during an encampment sweep. They also forced her to move without offering her a shelter bed, in violation of City policies and an ordinance requiring the City to offer shelter before it can clear encampments.

When the Coalition on Homelessness filed a lawsuit against the City in 2022 over this practice, we provided documentation that San Francisco had cited and arrested more than 3,000 unhoused people without first offering shelter and illegally trashed their belongings,

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