By Christin Evans, HANC Board

At our January 14th meeting, the Haight Ashbury Neighborhood Council will kick off the new year with its first member meeting focused on an update on the Politics of Affordable Housing.  With so many recent victories, including from 2018's Proposition C delivering $300M annually in new revenue through a gross receipts business tax, 2019's Proposition A authorizing $600M for affordable housing and 2020's Propositions A and I delivering even more funds, the question now is how quickly can those funds be pressed into service to bolster the city’s stock of permanent affordable housing.

HANC will host a representative from the Our City Our Home (OCOH) Committee to provide an update on the immediate needs disbursement of funds authorized by the Budget & Finance Committee in December.  We'll also learn about the OCOH Committee’s agenda for planning the expenditure of an additional $400 million in collected funds this year. 

Other presentations will include an update on the Federal, State and Local politics of affordable housing policy.  We will have a representative from Proposition I available to discuss the use of the funds from an increased transfer tax for assisting renters to stay in their homes if they’ve fallen behind on rent due to Covid-related loss of personal income. 

Additionally, we will have an update on the immediate goals to house homeless individuals in the SIP hotels, some of which could be purchased for long-term use.  As well, there will be as a presentation from the Hotels Not Hospitals campaign which is privately funding hotel rooms for homeless individuals during the pandemic.