San Franciscans raise $46,000 to stop homeless shelter in wealthy area | Hacker News Reader

San Franciscans raise $46,000 to stop homeless shelter in wealthy area

theguardian.com

45 pointsar034 comments

We're heading for a showdown in San Francisco between the homeless and residents.

For those of you not from this area, it'd be hard to believe just how bad the SF homeless situation really is, and how it's tied to drug use and mental illness.

SF has a lot of resources for homeless people, so functional homeless folks who want help can get it. Shelters and low income housing up and down the peninsula don't allow drug use, don't allow people with criminal records, and some don't allow men. Cold weather shelters make exceptions, but those are very temporary. Those conditions exclude a lot of the homeless who would like to use them. Then, you have the issue of the homeless who are heavy drug users, mentally ill, or simply don't want to be in a shelter. These three groups are most of the homeless you see in the streets. San Francisco (and San Jose's) big homeless problems are exacerbated by the fact that peninsula cities crack down on homeless people by buying a bus ticket to SF or SJ, whichever is cheaper, and police escorting them to the bus.

So, as someone who's lived in the area for over twenty years, I'm sick of San Francisco's lack of action on this problem. On one side you have shelters, but on the flip side is utter lack of enforcement of loitering, since being on public land isn't illegal. These people need help, rehab, or even institutionalization, but you can't force that, and nobody's willing to pay for it. It's a mess, and the more money SF throws at homeless people in the form of food, shelters, and safe injection sites, the more homeless people it "hires" from abroad.

edit: That article is disingenuous. The homeless on the streets of SF are not due to displacement by tech, though I'm sure that contributes. They come from all over for the perks. The weather is mild, food is available, police turn a blind eye to minor crimes and shooting heroin on Market street, so as far as being homeless goes, it's not the worst place to be.

> Shelters and low income housing up and down the peninsula don't allow drug use, don't allow people with criminal records, and some don't allow men.

So they're explicitly designed to not shelter the majority of people needing them, that seems counter-productive. Is smoking crack in the shelter somehow worse than doing it in the street? Are they supposed to work out their addiction problem while they've got no where to live and no job?

If you're going to run shelters like that then they're just a feel good measure to make people think there's help available and nothing more.

> Is smoking crack in the shelter somehow worse than doing it in the street?

Certainly it is going to be a lot worse for the politician who approved/backed this shelter, once this is packaged into a nice little media story like „X pays for smoking crack“.

There are not many politicians out there willing to do the right thing and being prepared to handle the expected uninformed outrage.

True, but when I said "feel good measure" I was referring to the voters that will be swayed by that sort of crap. It's a societal problem not a political one.

"...peninsula cities crack down on homeless people by buying a bus ticket to SF or SJ, whichever is cheaper, and police escorting them to the bus"

You have evidence of this?

Other than talking to the San Jose police chief, no, nothing that I can link.

I find it really unlikely that Eddie would admit to illegal actions in a casual conversation. It's not only illegal within CA, but out-of-state entities like Reno city services have been successfully sued over it.

Haha, no, it was Larry, his predecessor at a community meeting addressing the homeless issues in downtown San Jose. He wasn't admitting to doing it, but bemoaning that San Jose has to deal with with homeless folks from up and down the peninsula.

It may be illegal within CA, but apparently it happens. I happen to believe him.

You wrote in the present tense; Larry's been gone for over 3 years.

NIMBYism in its purest form.

Navigation Centers are far more than homeless shelters. They take people in as they are (pets, belongings, partners, etc.) and provide on-site services. Unlike traditional shelters, occupants are not forced back on the streets in the morning just to wait in line for a bed that night.

I have one in my neighborhood. I took a tour with a few other neighbors last year. I can’t imagine how you can argue that it would be better for the people I saw to be living outside on the streets.

Every district in San Francisco should have at least one Navigation Center.

Oh I'm sure everybody agrees that they're fantastic and the there definitely should be more of them. Just, not right here. Over there would be a much better place for one.

But if these places take homeless people in, what will the rich assholes donating to this kickstarter complain about? /s This is literally a big part of the solution to homelessness but these people would rather complain and fight it in court than see anyone helped. Then they complain that homeless people are in the street when actions like this keep them there. Unbelievable how cruel some people are.

The headline is click-baity and tailored to create outrage.

If you don't live here, you probably don't know that the Embarcadero area is, as the article says, right by the bay bridge. Heavily tourist-y area. The "wealthy people" of San Francisco actually live a mile or so away, in Russian Hill, Pacific Heights, Lake District (by Bakers Beach) etc. Embarcadero is also right by the FiDi / downtown area where Salesforce, Affirm, BlackRock, Lending Club and several other startups and major Corps have offices. So it's also a safety concern for the workers in downtown as the homeless population in SF is generally more aggressive than in the rest of the country.

A lot of homeless people in San Francisco also are drug users. It's not common to walk in downtown and step on a used needle. So building the housing in the downtown, touristy area is only going to deter people from coming to San Francisco, and deter companies from holding their conventions[1]. There's already 1 such example of a major medical convention cancelled from Moscone cos they were concerned with safety of their attendees due to homeless person crimes. That area has a lot of homeless people around there, many of who are quite aggressive, mentally ill etc.

This is not a case of NIMBY. It's far more complex than that.

I'm just calling it as I see it.

[1] Major medical group cancels San Francisco convention due to safety concerns => https://sf.curbed.com/2018/7/3/17531240/convention-moscone-c...

I'm not sure I buy the whole "homeless person crimes" angle. I've lived here for about four and a half years, in a real sketchy part of the city (SoMa, south of mid-market) and I've never had a problem with homeless people. Yes they sleep in doorways or in tents on the sidewalk, and yes you see people shooting up without trying to hide it. Sometimes they yell at night when I'm trying to sleep and it's annoying.

But I have a real hard time making the mental leap from "these people are an eyesore" to "I think we should force these people to leave." They're just living their lives, trying to make it day to day. They're people. I pass the same homeless people on the way to work and back every day. They're as much a part of the community as I am.

The crime angle seems transparently like dog whistling for people who are really concerned with property values, or for people who turn up their nose at the powerless and wish they'd go be someone else's problem. A few decades ago "crime" and "safety" were euphemisms deployed against urban youth who made middle-class white people nervous. It's depressing to see another generation of the same prejudice, now applied to a different marginalized group.

I find a lot of criticism and hate of homeless people in our tech world. Which I kind of don’t get because a lot of tech people are quite liberal. I would expect a softer heart to follow as well as concern for these (and all) people.

There are different types of homelessness, and different levels of visibility and effects on the community.

On one end of the spectrum, temporary homelessness typically garners the most sympathy, and brings the least trouble in terms of drug use and other petty crime.

On the other end, the chronic homeless are harder to deal with. My ex who worked with the local metro homeless population was frustrated by these, who through mental illness and / or drug use were simply not capable of dealing with the responsibilities needed to maintain a home or apartment; things like getting a job and not getting evicted for various bad behavior reasons. The hardest to deal with were those who refused to get help; no medicine, no job training program, no finance management couse, nothing accepted but food and cash.

These are the ones who are often the most visible- defecating on sidewalks, drugs, harassing people who are just going about their day.

You can have the biggest heart in the world, and you still won't be able to help them short of bringing back forced institutionalization, which no one wants either.

A good start might be a requirement to be an SF resident, homeless or otherwise, for some period of time, say 1 year, before being eligible for homeless benefits. It'll keep the area's homeless from flooding in from less generous cities.

It's an interesting idea, but I have no clue how to establish a person's residence when they don't have a street address to receive mail, utility bills, etc. Practically by definition, the homeless do not have residence.

People who recently have become homeless would qualify, assuming they could provide mail or something from a year ago, but even that seems like a stretch for most people, I think.

Also, I don't know about SF, bit quite a few of the services provided here in the Midwest are privately run (I.e. in association with churches or otherwise non-profit), and I don't know that such a ban could be imposed on them.

That's illegal (well established in case law).

Many tech people may come across as being socially liberal but they aren't necessarily financially / economically liberal.

They also aren't necessarily liberal when it comes to their personal safety.

This is social liberalism though! Creating programs for all to survive and thrive and have a shot at a decent life. It’s the same thing with the NIMBY (not in my backyard) movement. Everyone wants to complain about high housing costs, but as soon as they themselves get a house they want to protect their wealth by blocking new housing developments. I find the contradictions frustrating

There are many people who are only socially liberal because of the popularity of that viewpoint. Obviously when it comes to taking action they turn out to be anything but.

Once you realize that the vast majority of the bay area is there to maximize their own financial advantage, not to change the world, the bay area makes a lot more sense.

I think we're working with different definitions of social liberalism. My understanding is that people are socially liberal when they are in varying degrees okay with lifestyle choices of others that differ from their own, as long as those choices don't impede on their own lives (too much).

In my experience, there's no correlation between someone's kindness and their politics.

People are individuals--watch what each individual does.

A lot of tech people seem to be libertarian and don't like paying for public services that might go towards actually helping these people. In my experience people are not really that left wing in the valley when it comes to money.

Unpopular opinion: there are a lot of other locations than the heart of the SF waterfront.

...the father of a two-year-old who lives two blocks from the proposed site ... against the project out of concerns for his family’s safety.

"Family safety" has to be the most overused euphemism for "property values".

Not true. Family safety is much more important than property value and is not a stand-in for "property value". I'm surprised to hear you claim that it is not being legitimately used.

Easily proven by asking people who have small children but are renters, not property owners.

I am truly surprised by what's happened to San Francisco.

It will be interesting to see how it unfolds. I imagine the city will either find a way to return to greatness or descend into further dystopia. Which will it be? How will it be accomplished? Truly amazing.

I'd love to see someone with social media skills ramp up a campaign in "solidarity" with these residents and "help" them hit 10x their stated goal.

Makes sense. One of my personal rules is to only give money to the homeless in other people's neighborhoods.

Absolutely disgusting. How can someone be so cruel as to spend money to stop a project meant to help people and save people's lives? It's just unbelievable how cruel and nasty people with even a little money can be towards others. There should be a way for state governments to counter such nimby actions when it's in the best interests of society. This also includes local zoning and all the other stupid nimby shit that makes the bay area unlivable.

The state needs to step in a lot more. Hopefully this is starting.

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