By Lisa Awbrey, HANC Board Member
On August 20, 2020 the Chinatown Community Development Center (CCDC) and the Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation (TNDC) development teams, and the design teams, along with the Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development (MOHCD) hosted a second online Zoom presentation to share information with the community about future development at 730 Stanyan. The meeting lasted an hour and 45 minutes with a short presentation from the developers and design teams, followed by a lively Q & A. Approximately 100 people attended the session. More information on future development for the project is posted at this website: www.730stanyan.org .
Current information on the website describes the project: “730 Stanyan will be a new affordable housing construction of 150+ units of rental housing to house low income families as well as families who have experienced homelessness.”
Current design plans show 12,000 square feet of ground floor commercial space for five planned tenants. Consideration of possible tenants for the retail space will be focused on the neediest of local vulnerable groups: a drop-in center for transitional aged youth/TAY, a low cost child care center for residents and neighbors, a jobs training center, a senior services and community center, and a low-cost healthy fast food service offering or cafe.
The presentation by the project managers focused solely on housing for “families and formerly unhoused families and Transitional Aged Youth/TAY,” with no mention of housing for seniors. TNDC’s Emily Van Loon stated “We were directed by MOHCD to focus on transitional aged youth and not seniors.”
21 people spoke during the Q & A session. Over half of the speakers had questions about the current plan’s failure to include dedicated senior housing in the development at 730 Stanyan. There was ample discussion of the subjects of job training for transitioning folks to include not just tech training, but restaurant, food service and training for workers at local neighborhood businesses. Many speakers stressed the need for low cost, healthy food options at the proposed food service provider site.
13 members of the public questioned the “either or” attitude regarding housing for seniors or TAY, with the exclusion of housing for seniors by project developers and MOHCD. The public repeatedly asked presenters why dedicated units for senior housing were not in the current plan, and were told that MOHCD has urged the designers to prioritize the 2 other groups over seniors. The oft repeated reason for the exclusion of senior housing @ 730 Stanyan was: MOHCD asserts that there are many units of senior housing “in the pipeline” of future development.
Date Does Not Aupport Assertions by Developers
Regrettably, current data does not support MOHCD’s assertion. In District 5 for the year 2019, the current population is 84,973, including 24,982 seniors or 29.4% of D5’s population. By 2030, D5’s senior population is projected to increase by 1/4th to 26,231 or to 33% of the population. [Source: District 5 Housing Opportunities Report, SF Planning Department, December 2019].
The Haight Demographics file shows SF has over 117,000 seniors city-wide, 9,915 seniors in District 5, and almost 4,500 seniors in the Haight (main zip code 94117).
There are 1,932 District 5 Very Low income seniors (below 50 per cent of HUD Bay Area Median income) --- 19.5 % of all seniors in District 5.
The 2019 Housing Inventory report from SF Planning shows (on p.36) that in 2019, of all new construction citywide, only 6.4 % was senior units (93 out of 1122).
Also (on the same page) for the 5 years from 2015-2019, only 279 senior units were built out of 3403 total new units (roughly 8%).
At the community meeting, many residents were strongly supportive of the inclusion of all three low income groups (seniors, TAY and families) in the design and development of the 730 Stanyan site.