London BreedVerified account

Last week announced our first Safe Sleeping Village in Civic Center to address the rise in tent encampments in the surrounding area. Today we're announcing we'll be opening the next site at the former McDonald's lot on Stanyan. Here's a thread on why we're willing to try this:

During normal times, two of the main ways we help people out of homelessness are shelter placements and homeward bound, where we connect people with a relative or friend willing to take them in. Because of COVID-19, both of these have been severely limited, tying our hands.

Upon taking office I set out to add 1,000 new shelter beds. But settings like shelters are now easy targets for this virus. The largest outbreak in SF was in a shelter. We've had to reduce capacity in shelters by 76% for social distancing and stop taking in new people.

Homeward bound is also a challenge. Many people don't want to take someone in for fear of contracting the virus. Additionally, bus routes have been severely reduced, so even getting someone home is difficult. In January, 50 households used homeward bound. In April, only 2.

Add to this the fact that a number of people tend to live on the brink of homelessness, often couch surfing or finding other temporary housing that people are now uncomfortable with because they're trying to shelter in place.

As a result, we're seeing tent encampments pop up again throughout the City. We're following the guidance from the CDC, which is to encourage distancing in encampments, but the situation is getting out of hand. It's not fair to anyone, especially the residents in these areas.

So while in normal times I would say that we should focus on bringing people inside and not sanctioning tent encampments, we frankly do not have many other options right now. Having places with resources serving people in the neighborhood is better than unsanctioned encampments.