by Jordan Wasilewski
In 2020, one of my earlier Street Sheet pieces focused on two material issues relating to permanent supportive housing (PSH) and SROs that were especially relevant at the moment: The lack of air conditioning or cooling systems for tenants during a heat wave and no WiFi during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The pandemic is over for a vast majority of people. Senior & Disability Action are still pushing for WiFi in SROs and permanent supportive housing, and the unseasonable heat wave the Bay Area experienced in March 2026 shows how overheating persists a threat for tenants.
This hot spell served as a stark reminder that neither California nor San Francisco has any ordinance mandating cooling systems in apartments and SROs. The City noted in a 2023 report that San Francisco has the lowest rate of air conditioning in the nation, forcing its most vulnerable communities to endure the heat in buildings with little or no heat resilience.
Many formerly homeless tenants placed in older buildings in the Tenderloin or the Mission suffer from the urban heat island effect. The combination of SROS being built before climate change and in their specific locations create intolerable conditions for heat-sensitive individuals.
Though the City lacks heat-resilient housing, it addressed a lack of heating after the San Francisco Chronicle ran Warren Hinckle’s exposé in 1982, which revealed that tenants were freezing in SRO hotels. This report led to tough new heat and hot water laws, and as a bonus, the creation of the Department of Building Inspection, which has the ability to hold negligent landlords accountable.
Under the law, apartments are required to be equipped with a system that maintains a minimum temperature of 70 degrees Fahrenheit from a point three feet off the floor, except for bathrooms and hallways. For SROs, the system must maintain the unit at 68 degrees during certain hours of the day.
Though California would later require a 70-degree minimum temperature in all habitable rooms, there has not been a statewide requirement for maximum temperatures in apartments and SROs. Some localities in the Coachella Valley, such as Palm Springs and Indio, have air conditioning requirements because of their desert locations. One major dynamic in California is that, even within the same city, low income/subsidized housing/working-class neighborhoods are often located in hotter inland regions away from the coastline and often lack tree cover. It’s shocking that in California, where most areas have brutally hot summers, these maximum temperature requirements haven’t been considered until very recently.
On October 10, 2025, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 655 into law, which asks various agencies to consider maximum indoor temperatures when changing regulations, but stops short of setting a hard and fast maximum temperature requirement or even requiring air conditioning. This legislation reads like virtue signaling that gives little incentive to do anything.
Meanwhile, some of our most vulnerable tenants are suffering. Many permanent supportive housing residents are older or disabled, and have health conditions that are more likely to be complicated by excessive heat. Historically, San Francisco’s older housing stock for PSH has worked to its advantage, but the City must act quickly to adapt it for climate change.
The California Department of Housing and Community Development recommends laws requiring that cooling systems maintain a maximum temperature of 82 degrees. On this issue where the state acts as a paper tiger, The City must add and show some teeth in defending vulnerable tenants.
Jordan Wasilewski (she/they) is a long-term permanent supportive housing and SRO tenant advocate, former commissioner, and affordability activist. You may follow her at @sfpshsro on Instagram.
