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Comment by diogenescynic | Hacker News Reader

I think a more accurate description would be that San Francisco chooses chaos. I've never lived anywhere more unreasonably governed. It's like the government is actively sabotaging quality of life and squandering its budget. One example--the city spent $15.5m to tear down a McDonalds in the Haight and turn it into a homeless tent camp.

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Hmmm. There was a lot of local support for the city to get rid of that very-problematic McDonalds, as the police were being called there on an average of once per day over drug dealing, shootings, etc. And the lot is slated to be developed into high-density housing, which is typically a popular notion in the HN crowd.

https://sf.curbed.com/2018/4/2/17188892/haight-steet-mcdonal...

Sure, but a homeless tent camp is a far cry from high-density housing. How long do the locals have to deal with a tent camp and all the associated problems? If you don't understand why spending $15.5m to actively make the lives worse of the locals and not really solve the problem--then I think you're missing why SF has budget problems.

>For some nearby residents, the decision was met with dismay and frustration and a feeling of futility after they had spent weeks pleading with Preston’s office to find an alternative, like parking lots owned by the school district or City College and even Recreation and Park Department property.

>“There are all of these large parking lots not being used that would be so much better than plopping this down in the middle of a residential area — an area we’ve struggled for decades to get control of on this end of Haight Street,” said Ted Loewenberg, president of the Haight-Ashbury Improvement Association.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/SF-to-open-sanct...

For as long as it takes. We should turn civic center into a giant homeless camp sitting as a painfully constant reminder outside the windows of city hall, the courthouse, the department of public health, and the state buildings.

While I don’t disagree that SF is a mess, your example is completely wrong. That lot will become low-income housing and is temporarily being used as that.

https://sfmohcd.org/730-stanyan

"Temporarily" according to who? And still $15.5m and $XXm still to be spent on the new development, and for now it's a massive tent camp---this is why SF has budget problems is my point. They're squandering the resources they have and not even solving the problems, they're actually making it worse in most cases. Tents tripled in the city in the last few months: https://abc7news.com/homeless-coronavirus-san-francisco-hous... SF could house these people instead of leaving them in tents somewhere else, but we have this ridiculous idea we have to house them in the most expensive city in the country where there's no new supply. We're spending nearly $1m per affordable housing unit.. who is paying for this? It's doomed to fail.

There is now bidding for developers of the site. Here is a link to some better journalism about this topic: https://socketsite.com/archives/2019/09/city-seeking-develop...

The first comment on your story says it all:

>I mean, the Geneva Towers work, right? Sunnydale Housing is a pleasure to visit and is really well-kept.

>What we need is more government-owned, city-run housing. That’ll make things better.

Show me an example where the SF government has ever done this successfully and affordable. SF government is pretty clearly incompetent and probably fraudulent/criminal.

Where do you suggest housing these people. What if they refuse accommodations.

Not sure if sf can legally just ship them to say Modesto where housing is cheaper

I don't have all the solutions, but I'd probably find a working model from another country and try to find a way to apply it here rather then this nauseating, arrogant, and ineffective strategy of just dumping money down an unaccountable hole and never demanding any results. SF voters are to blame ultimately for enabling this behavior.

See country = federal government.

If California has a perfect homeless solution that it’s peer states don’t share in. California will see immigration of homeless from other states.

Not necessarily... SF could copy a policy from Amsterdam or Copenhagen. My point is just look for a working example and model it off that. You're look for an arbitrary semantic difference to invalidate it. SF has the budget of some small countries and California has a budget bigger than actual countries. The money isn't the issue--it's how it's squandered and wasted on unaccountable half-brained solutions.

The fact that it's only a temporary homeless tent camp doesn't do a whole lot to make the situation better. I think you're not recognizing how absurd this sounds to outsiders; most people would not live in a city that formally sanctioned tent camps in residential neighborhoods.

but his point about SF funds being squandered, definately has a lot of truth to it. There are a lot of ways to build high density housing in a cost effective manner that are not being used. The city constantly fights against anyone that tries to build any kind of cost effective housing. I've talked to SF residents (even the very people who work in Nonprofits that supposedly help the homeless), and they'll make any excuse they can against building any kind of cost effective housing: i really don't get it.

SF problems come from its people and wild economic and cultural swings. Government would love to have more influence, but it really doesn't.

The McDonalds you refer to was a huge problem for a long time and right now the only argument is about exactly how big an apartment building to put there.

I think saying SF problems are due to "cultural swings" is borderline veiled racism. Sounds like something Hillary would say for sure. No, SF problems come from incompetence. No other city in the country spends as much per citizen and gets as poor results. Quality of life stinks here for the cost.

And no, you're erasing the voices of many locals who don't want more tent camps in residential areas when there are other city lots they could put them in.

Question--do you ever hold the city accountable for its vast and egregious failures? Look at how much money we spend and the results. It's pathetic.

I’m not sure how you get race from “cultural swing” in the context of SF Bay Area. The latest cultural swing is to techies with high salaries leading to gentrification, housing disparities, google bus protests.

The government is what tells where and what things can be built. As, as long as that's the case, then gov is almost 100% responsible for this mess. Sure, the geography of SF is limiting.

Look at cities that let people build where there is need to build, they don't have the kind of housing problems SF does.

SF is wealth deprived (wealth is not money, wealth is your ability to Shelter/food/water/necessities etc). It has so much money and yet, 100K income isn't near enough for a family to live there. The homeless rate is nearly 2%! The bottom 20% is at risk of being homeless. The other 70% can barely afford to make rent.

Compare this to Houston, a city that allows things to be built when it needs to be built. Homeless rate is just 0.2%. The bottom 20% is able to afford to live there and so is everyone else. Look people, there's nothing about hot weather that makes it easier to build buildings. It's the attitude of the people. People in SF need to seriously learn something about supply and demand, and the nature housing.

And, let's keep in mind, Houstons yearly growth rate is much faster than SF, it has added over x4 more people to its city per year than SF! and still is able to handle all that, whilst creating a ton of jobs in the process.

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