A Little Lot for a Lot of Help: Despite Disputes, the Embarcadero Navigation Center Debuts

by Silas Valentino

If your tickets to the Giants game are in sections 126 through 135 at Oracle Park, then you might meet Joanna Shober. 

She’s worked in guest services for the Giants the last eight seasons, guiding people to their seats and offering her assistance as needed. In between baseball seasons, she’ll take similar jobs at the Chase and Moscone Centers.

“I help people,” she said succinctly, seated at a lime green table last winter with a Giants ballcap shielding her from the sun and a Fitbit wrapped over her left wrist that she found one day on the street.

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San Francisco Drags Feet Moving Tenderloin Residents into Shelter-in-Place Hotels

by Quiver Watts

While the Tenderloin Plan began to be implemented on Thursday, only 16 people were moved into hotels, a mere 5% of the 300 person goal.

Friday, June 12th — Early Thursday morning, San Francisco’s Health Streets Operation Command (HSOC) arrived in the Tenderloin under the pretense of placing at least 300 of the Tenderloin’s unhoused residents into Shelter-in-Place Hotels. Clutching their lists of names, city workers scrambled down Turk street struggling to locate some of the people on their list that they would be moving into a nearby hotel,

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Life Under Quarantine: Unhoused, Sheltered in Place

by TJ Johnston

Already normalized by COVID-19 “shelter in place” conditions that were prompted by the pandemic, housed and unhoused San Franciscans alike found themselves beset by a curfew that Mayor London Breed imposed on City residents for five nights from May 31 through June 4.

Through demonstrations and vocal outcry, community members rebuked the City’s response to nationwide protests against the killing of George Floyd and countless African Americans slain by police officers as part of the nation’s systemic and social racism.

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California’s largest shelter outbreak: A case of government malfeasance

by Jennifer Friedenbach and Chris Herring

Doctors, public health experts call for testing and housing all shelter residents in hotels 

Yesterday, California experienced its most widespread outbreak of COVID-19 in any homeless shelter to date where nearly half of 144 shelter residents tested positive. For some perspective, the outbreak in this single shelter of 70 shelter guests comprises 8.5% of all positive cases in San Francisco, which total 857 as of Saturday. 

When looking back on the lead-up to this catastrophe we see a series of policy missteps that got us here. 

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Mayor Breed Opts for Mass Indoor Camps

by Quiver Watts, Street Sheet editor

UPDATE: Our coverage of this outrageous plan prompted a shift for the city. Get the latest coverage HERE

A look inside the new Moscone Center congregate “Shelter”

While hundreds of advocates have been desperately contacting Mayor London Breed imploring her to place homeless people in hotel rooms and vacant units, it seems she has her own plan for addressing poverty during the pandemic: opening indoor camps to further concentrate vulnerable people.

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Safe Parking Site opens: Community Raises Questions About Implementation

by Quiver Watts

By Ben Baczkowski

On December 11, 2019, San Francisco city officials officially announced the opening of the Vehicle Triage Center (VTC) located on San Jose Avenue near Balboa Park BART station. The yearlong pilot program will provide a secure parking location and targeted services for folks living in their vehicles, and is the first safe parking facility of its kind in San Francisco’s history. The site includes up to 30 parking spaces with mobile blackwater pumping services,

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Violence Against Homeless People

by Quiver Watts
Pink background, black text reading "Hate Has No Home Here"

by Tracey Mixon

Recently, San Francisco has decided to add two new navigation centers, scheduled to open up later this year, in the Embarcadero and the Bayview. Both of these sites have strong opposition. The Embarcadero SAFE Navigation Center has been at the center of controversy since its inception. It was approved by the San Francisco Port Commission in April of this year, despite an appeal by Embarcadero residents that was denied. These residents have now gone on to file a lawsuit and temporary restraining order to block it from being built.

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Why There’s a Homelessness Crisis Among Transgender Teens

by Quiver Watts

Reprint from NextCity/Street Spirit

by Sarah Holder

The decision to leave home wasn’t easy for Greyson. After his mother was deported to Mexico, he’d been almost single-handedly taking care of his two younger sisters and his father, who was addicted to drugs. When he was 15, the family made plans to move from California’s East Bay down to Mexico, too. As a trans person, Greyson was scared. He had heard horror stories of beatings and assaults of LGBTQ people.

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45 Empty Beds

by Quiver Watts

by Darnell Boyd

Why did S.F. officials intentionally leave 45 beds meant for people with mental health issues empty? How dare they leave our most vulnerable population on the streets? They had 45 beds, yet they complained about homeless people screaming in Union Square, Market Street and Sixth Street. These officials went home to their comfortable beds every night for months knowing that there are 45 warm beds that is sitting empty and staff lied about those beds.

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THE TRANSITION FROM NAVIGATION CENTER TO PERMANENT HOUSING

by Quiver Watts

By Shyhene Brown

June 1, 2019

I can remember the first time I went to the navigation center. It was a long process getting documents ready to working with my case manager and going through the whole process. Yes, it was hard at the time, but now I’ve got keys to my own place.

It’s a big change from the navigation center. Like the navigation center, I can come and go when I want — the only thing is I have to check in after three days.

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