By Nate Horrell, HANC Vice President

HANC’s May general membership meeting took up the state-mandated upzoning and its implications on small businesses, tenants and the future of the Haight. Attendees heard presentations from Joseph Smooke representing the Race and Equity in all Planning Coalition (REP-SF), and Katherine Petrin representing Neighborhoods United San Francisco (NUSF).  The meeting was well attended by neighborhood residents from all established sides of the debate as well as many folks who were new to the issue and seeking more information.

Your humble narrator kicked off the session by going over the math behind the state mandate: that although the city has approved 58,000 housing units which languish in the pipeline, the city is required to zone for an additional 36,000 units in order to meet the 82,000 units identified in the regional housing need assessment, and that the majority of those units are supposed to be affordable to tens of thousands of low-income and moderate income people in order to meet our (affordable) housing needs. Unfortunately, the City’s upzoning plan almost exclusively facilitates market-rate units which will not meet the identified affordable housing need. Since there are very few undeveloped sites in the City, the rezoning focuses on commercial corridors and targets single-story commercial buildings in particular for redevelopment, putting many small businesses in the firing line.

Joseph Smooke provided further context on the regional housing math, highlighting that the City has previously far exceeded its market-rate and above-moderate-income housing growth but has never met its affordable need. He emphasized that the City has no plan for achieving the affordable units, and has largely given over its local tools to state control to facilitate market-rate development at the expense of affordable units. REP provided a list of policy positions in favor of zoning for and funding affordable housing, as well as protecting tenants and neighborhood-serving small businesses from displacement.

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By Tab Buckner, HANC Board

As Mayor Daniel Lurie’s FY (Fiscal Year) 2025-26 budget proposal is expected in early June, many are bracing for constraints on critical resources that serve some of the community’s most marginalized residents. San Francisco has one of the nation’s largest populations of people living with HIV, comprising approximately 15.000+ individuals. Despite a decline of new HIV diagnoses in San Francisco during the past decade, ongoing challenges persist with disparities in HIV prevalence and viral suppression rates among communities that include African American women, Latino men, unhoused individuals and people who inject drugs. The vast majority of San Franciscans living with HIV are over 50 and experience the additional health-related issues of aging. The ability to stay safely housed in a city as expensive as San Francisco remains an ongoing challenge for many residents living with HIV/AIDS. The Trump Administration’s budget plan that favors slashing healthcare for low- income people adds to the stress.

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By Christin Evans, HANC Board

Both the San Francisco Planning department and advocacy group Small Business Forward have forecasted significant displacement of small businesses due to the city’s upzoning plans according to presentations made at the April 17 meeting of the Planning Commission.

Preliminary estimates from the city’s planners indicated approximately 5,600 businesses are registered in the NCDs (Neighborhood Commercial Districts) where Mayor Lurie’s latest upzoning proposal concentrates the greatest increases in height limits.  City planners said over 1,000 businesses are located in single or double story buildings most likely to be attractive to real estate developers. Of those, they estimated that approximately 53 small businesses on average per year would be at risk for displacement from development, putting the total number of businesses that could be forced to relocate in the next ten years over 500.

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By Nate Horrell, HANC Board

HANC’s May general membership meeting will cover the topic of the state-mandated upzoning, and its implications for small businesses, tenants, affordable housing and the Haight Ashbury. HANC has invited representatives from the Race and Equity in all Planning (REP-SF) coalition and Neighborhoods United San Francisco (NUSF) who have been closely tracking and pushing back on the city’s policy proposals, to present.

Because of a maelstrom of changes to state law led by Scott Wiener, the city is required to build 82,000 new housing units by 2031. This mandate was created and inflated during the apex of the 2010s Bay Area tech boom, and was seriously far-fetched even under those conditions. While San Francisco already has over 56,000 approved and entitled units sitting ready for a developer to decide that market conditions, i.e. rents, are high enough to justify development, the City still must upzone for an additional 36,000 additional units to meet our unrealistic and unachievable mandate.

Although our “Regional Housing Needs Assessment” identifies that the majority (57%) of these 82,000 units should be affordable to very low income, low-income and moderate income residents in order to meet our housing needs, the proposed rezoning entirely facilitates the development of market-rate housing, except for the small portion which is required to be affordable through inclusionary zoning (15% on site, or developers can pay a fee and build no affordable units on site, only for buildings of ten units or more). Unlike every previous upzoning in the City, this upzoning proposes to grant investors additional development rights, without making any attempt to capture that increased value for public good: affordable units, transportation funding, infrastructure, etc.

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By Calvin Welch, HANC Board

On Tuesday, April 22nd the Board of Supervisor passed an ordinance amending the Planning Code to require mailed notice to be sent to all affected property owners affected by the up-zoning proposal of Mayor Lurie.  The upzoning proposal will cover substantial portions of the Haight- Ashbury, and may well result in the demolition and displacement of more than 20 businesses on Haight Street. The measure would, according to the City attorney:

"...require notice of rezoning intended to comply with Housing Element law;... affirming  the recipient list to include notice to all property owners, residents and commercial lessees of all affected parcels and parcels within 300 ft of affected parcels.  This notice includes the date, time and location of the hearing, instructions for how to submit comments on the proposed project to the hearing body, and an explanation as to why the hearing is required."

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By Calvin Welch, HANC Board

HANC presented its position on future MUNI funding and announced its membership in Muni Now, Muni Forever (https://muniforever.org/about ), a citywide coalition gearing up to fight MUNI cuts which will be certain to be part of Mayor Lurie's budget. Jaime Viloria, Outreach and Organizing Manager of the San Francisco Transit Riders, a fellow member of Muni Now, Muni Forever, presented a time line and possible set of revenue proposals being discussed by the SFMTA.  Most of these SFMTA proposals center on increasing parking fees, property tax increases and a parcel tax. All are waiting for the SFMTA Board to pass a budget.  Few are hopeful given the fact that the Board has already voted to cut services (see last month’s Voice for lines and cuts).  These cuts will seriously affect the Haight-Ashbury as consolidation of the 6 and 21 is proposed as well as ending service for the 6 and 7 at Market Street.

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By:  Teresa Palmer MD, Family Medicine/Geriatrics, Laguna Honda 1989-2004; Board member SF Gray Panthers

Testimony at the S.F. Health Commission March 10 hearing convincingly indicated that Laguna Honda Hospital and Rehab Center (LHH) is once again, a state-of-the-art skilled nursing facility (SNF).

San Franciscans who need a bed are encouraged to apply for one. As of Feb 28 2025, less than 460 beds are occupied, leaving over 200 empty available beds.

LHH admissions department is open to inquiries.  LHH has about 1/3 of all SNF beds in SF, and there is a city-wide shortage of beds, especially for those in Medi-Cal.

LHH has, over the decades, generally offered superior care. I am proud to say that I worked there as a ward physician for 15 years and learned best practices. 

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By Nate Horrell, HANC Board

In November of last year, we the voters defeated Proposition D, which would have automatically removed dozens of city commissions and shifted power permanently in all remaining commissions to the mayor's office, an effort bankrolled by billionaire Michael Moritz and the since disbanded TogetherSF. The voters also passed Proposition E, which created a taskforce to study and recommend changes to the city’s commissions system, which will then go before the Board of Supervisors or the voters for any changes to the city charter.

At its most recent meeting, the new commissions streamlining taskforce heard from Corey Cook of St. Mary’s College who presented an analysis comparing San Francisco’s commissions and oversight to other cities, and SPUR who previously wrote a report that largely encourages further expansion of mayoral power. Public participation has been scarce so far on this somewhat esoteric topic. HANC board member Calvin Welch helpfully reminded taskforce members that although everyone is very concerned about efficiency, the purpose of commissions is to provide much needed oversight of the city bureaucracy.

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