By Lisa Awbrey, HANC Vice-President

For nearly six years, our community (comprised of local business leaders, 3 community groups, service providers for Transitional Aged Youth/TAY and unhoused people, seniors and parents of young children) has robustly participated in the plans to build 100% affordable housing at 730 Stanyan.

I cannot overstate the value (and rarity) of partnership among local residents working with their electeds and city departments to find solutions for San Francisco’s chronic problems.  Neighborhood workers and residents understand our neighborhoods best and, consequently, are a critical part of local problem solving. So why then does it seem that some at City Hall and the Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development/MOHCD aren’t partnering with us? 

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By Christin Evans, HANC Board

This past month, the SF Reinvestment Working Group voted unanimously to submit two business plans, each over 50 pages each, to the Board of Supervisors. The group’s year-long work to detail the capital and operational requirements of a municipal bank concluded with final reports prepared by city funded consultants HR&Advisors and the Findlay Group. The first plan details the precursor entity called a Municipal Financial Corporation (MFC) which would operate in the first three years and establish the lending track record required by bank regulators before approving the creation of an SF municipal bank. The second plan details the operations and prospective lending priorities and products of the SF Public Bank once it receives regulatory approvals. The Board of Supervisors will take up consideration of the two plans at a Government Audit & Oversight committee scheduled for July 2023. The full plans can be accessed at: https://sfgov.org/lafco/reinvestment-working-group.

By Tes Welborn, HANC Board

Money, Money Money! Tim Redmond called on the city to set up a 10 year Revenue Plan, as deficits will only be getting worse. The empty office buildings are going to ask for reassessments and lower property taxes, and that's about half of the city budget. Supervisor Connie Chan, heading the Supervisors' Budget Committee, tells us 2008 was worse! There are some hopeful signs at the state and federal levels of funds for more affordable housing. She'd like to see the proposed two-year budget in December, rather than May. Debbi Lerman, representing the Human Service Network, says nonprofits are struggling and they are often the first responders. They often struggle these days to find staff who will work for $17/hour. The mayor has spoken of cutting community and human services. Ms. Lerman proposes three rules for budget work: 1] don't cut life and death services, 2] don't cut items with other, dependent funding, and 3] don't cut services that will be hard to rebuild later. She noted that the city only funds the nonprofits 70%, of their budgets, even though they do much of the city's work, and only after the fact! So nonprofits have to spend time raising funds and struggling to have enough money to even start the year's work.

By Christin Evans, Calvin Welch, and David Woo, HANC Board

This month at HANC we will present a panel on policing in our neighborhood and citywide.  The panel will include Police Commissioner Max Carter-Oberstone, Legislative Aide to the District 5 Office Melissa Hernandez, and Park Station Police Captain Jack Hart.

To offer some context for the meeting it is important to remember that in the 1970's the Haight- Ashbury, now among the most wealthy neighborhoods in the City, with the City's largest number of Airbnb's catering to upscale tourists and visitors, was considered the "hell hole" of San Francisco and far more disparaged in the media than the Tenderloin is today. In story after story in the City's THREE daily newspapers and six or seven TV stations, public nudity and moral depravity, dope smoking and acid consumption in plain view, and the brisk sale of both on every street corner on Haight Street was reported. Sixty Minutes and the New York Times sent reporters to walk Haight Street to report that our neighborhood was the precursor, not simply of the fall of San Francisco, but of the entire western world as we knew it. Didn't happen, the media was wrong (again).

But what did happen and was rarely reported was the community response: the Diggers, the Free Medical Clinic, Westside Community Mental Health, The Haight Ashbury Community Alcohol Treatment Program (yes alcohol!), The Haight-Ashbury Community Development Corporation, the Food Conspiracy and the community based battle to keep Park Police Station open and local.

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By Teresa Palmer, MD, Geriatrics/Family Practice (Attending Physician at Laguna Honda 1989-2004)

A final reprieve from closing Laguna Honda Hospital and Rehabilitation Facility (LHH), our 780- bed public nursing home, was given by the federal government (CMS-Center for Medicare and Medicaid services) on May 18. This was just one day before evictions of all residents was scheduled to start.

CMS gave the reprieve reluctantly due to a serious citation (“immediate jeopardy”) that appeared after staff was supposedly trained to avoid these. (This deficiency in resident care was: having no plan for monitoring a known suicide risk.)

Evictions and closure now start Sept 19, 2023. Funding by the federal government (80% of LHH cost) stops March 19 2024. Since CMS shut down new admissions in April 2022, only about 530 residents are left at LHH. Between April and July 2022, 12 of 57 residents who were evicted died.

LHH may apply for recertification (and re-opening to admissions) as early as July of 2023. This would prevent evictions and closure. However, LHH will only be recertified if its house is in order. Delays past September are likely. Evictions may resume in the interim.

For Laguna Honda to be recertified (and to avoid closure and evictions), CMS has very detailed and strict requirements, as detailed in a May 18 letter from CMS which can be downloaded here:  CMS Laguna Honda Letter.  

The requirements include adequate support by the State (California Department of Public Health, along with the following:

   1. A Certified Nursing Home Administrator must be hired by June 26.

   2.There can be no more “immediate jeopardy” citations.

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(Presented at HANC's April 2023 Meeting)

By Joe Wilson, Executive Director, Hospitality House

Recent media coverage of the struggles nonprofit organizations face in fulfilling contractual obligations has renewed the public's call for more accountability. Hospitality House fully embraces accountability, openness, and oversight in monitoring the use of public funds, and we welcome public scrutiny as a catalyst for constructive dialogue and improved performance. We express full support for our partner organizations needing resources, assistance, and capacity to meet contractual obligations – while holding them accountable for the use of public funds. Hospitality House does not and will not excuse misuse of public funds.

Human service organizations largely came into being to fill gaps - to augment gaps that have widened over time because of racial, ethnic and gender inequities, America's disappearing safety net, and systemic retreat from our social contract. In communities of color in San Francisco, these needs have deepened because of the COVID pandemic, seismic shifts in the national economy, and widening inequality. Millions of America's low-income renters live in substandard housing.

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By Danielle McVay, HANC Board

The April 13th HANC meeting was a coming together of San Francisco non-profit royalty. First, we had Coalition on Homelessness Executive Director Jennifer Friedenbach, followed by Lydia Bransten, Executive Director of The Gubbio Project, and to close the evening was Joe Wilson, the Executive Director of Hospitality House.

During Jennifer Friedenbach's time she shared something very surprising to the crowd: that there are 90,000 calls to 911 annually that are related to homeless people. She was clear that these calls are only related to the "presence of a homeless person" and not related to safety issues. She is working with members of the Board of Supervisors to work toward a compassionate care response. She discussed the lawsuit against The City due to continued sweeps/destruction of property of homeless persons despite this being against federal law, the lack of effective services and police response to homelessness. The lawsuit it to demonstrate The City is violating the law, to push them to follow their own policies and step up to treat homeless folk with dignity.

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By Calvin Welch, HANC Board

This month HANC will focus its general membership meeting on the city budget. Three guests will join us to go through the key issues presented by this budget: Supervisor Budget Chair Connie Chan from District 1, Debbi Lerman, Director of the San Francisco Human Services Network, a coalition of some 50 faith and community based non-profit health and human services providers, and Tim Redmond, Editor and Founder of 48 Hills, who has reported on San Francisco politics, including budget politics for some 40 years.

In March, a Joint Report from the Controller, the Supervisors’ Budget Analyst and the Mayor’s Budget Director reported to both the Mayor and the Board that the City's revenue outlook had deteriorated from its initial January report of this year’s projected budget deficit of some $200 million to $290 million and the projected five year deficit to a whopping $1.3 Billion . Last year the Joint Report estimated an $80 million surplus for this year when the City passed its current $13.8 billion budget.

The expected shortfall was reported BEFORE the Mayor proposed and the Supervisors passed a$27 million supplement the Police Department’s current $713 million allocation to cover police overtime AND a new labor contract that will cost the City an additional $167 million over the next 3 years, providing a 10% increase in pay for the police. For every other department the Mayor has asked for a 10% CUT.

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