Housing

 

San Francisco as well as the entire State of California are facing a housing affordability crisis. We don’t have shelter for those who need it. What housing is available is too expensive, whether it be to rent or own, with ownership now out of reach for most Americans. If public officials don’t build housing, and developers do, how do I, as your elected representative, ensure that you can access the housing you need? Here is what I propose:

 

• Break the binary. Nothing is ever one solution or another. It is frustrating for everyday folks like you and me to constantly be told the only way to create housing is only one way or the other, when it is often both. As supervisor, I commit to advocating and legislating paths to housing accessible to all income levels by using multiple approaches to ensure maximum efficacy from tenants protections to common-sense and sustainable development of new housing to rent and own.

• Reset the balance. Relying on only market rate housing is not viable and has only resulted in our current crisis. Although it works for developers and the real estate industry in the short term like a get-rich-quick scheme, it doesn’t pencil out for everyday people or the market in the long term. State measures like Proposition 33 have the potential to rest the balance, by putting the power to protect renters, unlock housing stock, and keep rents affordable back in the hands of you and me. If Prop 33 passes, we can immediately expand these controls.

• Hold departments and partners accountable. We currently have both unused city-controlled housing stock and housing under the jurisdiction of the Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development in which renters have no protections and “affordable housing” is hovering dangerously close to market rate while site conditions even in newer developments deteriorate. I will immediately set to work on taking an inventory of the conditions of these sites, the quality of life of renters, and hold departments and partner organizations accountable.

• Accountability & regulation. Although legislators have deregulated away multiple controls local residents and leaders had in their toolbox to ensure that any new projects and development made sense in their communities, I would look for every way to ensure that new development continues to make sense and match our city. On a smaller scale, we have seen how poor implementations with no public determination or oversight can be- the Valencia Street Bike Lane is a good example. The risk presented by unfettered development on a much larger scale stands to have disastrous consequences on our environment, culture, and local small businesses, that now have very little standing between them and the developers wrecking ball.

• Build & invest. Whereas market rate housing development doesn’t need any advocacy to survive, affordable and low income housing does. I will immediately set or work to find cost neutral paths forward for publicly financed, tenant protected housing development and acquisition for already approved sites like 2205 Mission Street while holding property owners accountable at sites like 2588 Mission. Through strategic use of leveraging state laws on behalf of communities instead of developers, political will, and strengthening community power, las Casa Adelantes, 1979 and 3300 Mission can be less anomalies and more the norm.

• Sustainable living. Building housing does not ensure that it is accessible to the most in need, that it fits within a community, that it is environmentally sustainable, or adequately prepared for emergency situations. I will work to implement laws ensuring that new developments are rent-controlled, seismically safe, do not contribute to heat islands or other negative environmental impacts, and contribute to our district instead of extract.

• Protect the Interests of property owners. Many of the most recent legislation passed at a state and local level seemingly expands the ability of property owners to maximize income without the burden of onerous regulations and bureaucracy. Many are now facing the prospect of losing their insurance coverage due to increased cheek-by-jowl construction, and increased potential of wind and seismic liability due to increasing mixed height developments. I will look for ways to increase property owner education and resources, hold state and city departments accountable to landslide, fire, flood and seismic mitigation to protect homes, and look for ways to defray the impact of climate change on homeowners, landlords, and renters.

• Treat homelessness like the crisis it is. Whether it is an everyday resident navigating an encampment in their street, or the United Nations, most have correctly assessed that homelessness in this city is at crisis level and a violation of human rights. Not every humanitarian crisis happens as a result of conflict, natural cataclysm, or a worldwide pandemic. Yet all of those have called us to action and we have met these challenges before, whether it was in 1906 or 2020. I will immediately demand that we declare a state of emergency that will allow us to meet this crisis for what is and not as blight or crime. We must employ a comprehensive triage approach to homelessness that reflects the emergency situation we are in. Designated and supervised tiny cabins. Designated and supervised campgrounds and motor parks. Short and long term affordable housing. Emergency rent relief. Work with other municipalities to develop regional strategies instead of current state directives that pit us against each other.

• Work to ensure housing for all students. Thousands of students from preschool to college are homeless. I will work to find funding and build political will to ensure safe housing and services for students.

• Protect undocumented renters and refugees. Work with federal and state agencies to protect renters and those seeking asylum from exploitative slumlords while prioritizing safe housing placement. We must expand our outreach in ways that are accessible and culturally competent. Build and expand the efficacy of OCEIA.

• Look out for our elders. Many of the newly homeless are seniors. We must create safety nets for our elders who are becoming increasingly isolated and may find themselves in crisis before they realize it.

• Development of sustainable mixed income social housing model. Prioritize City acquisition of real estate for social housing. Re-structure small sites programs to reflect tenant’s economic realities through mandatory tiered rents according to income allowing for mixed income.

• Prioritize housing for city workers, first responders, and essential workers. Acquisition and funding of city owned and run sites are not enough. We must prioritize the very people who allow San Francisco to thrive from nurses, to first responders, to service workers.

 

Urban Environmental Cohabitation

 

• Work to fund and implement CAP recommended hardscape removal and habitat restoration in remaining open spaces and reclamation of unused industrial sites. Flood, fire, and seismic safeguarding as well as ambient temperature regulation  of neighborhoods can all be achieved through greening of public streets, canopy expansion, open spaces restoration, and interurban bay estuary and waterway restoration

 

• Increased public access to sustainable open spaces and parks

  • Advocate to move away from privatization of parks under Recreation & Parks and find sustainable funding alternatives.

  • Push for legislation ensuring that recently decommissioned highways are returned to truly public open space and habitat restoration in lieu of exclusive private development.

  • Expand property acquisition for open space and bay, estuary, and habitat restoration.

  • Advocate for the creation of recreation and amusement express lines within MTA to link underserved and vulnerable communities with direct access to public spaces no longer served by autos.

  • Prioritize and legislate for the implementation and protection of native plant and animal species in urban and open space implementations and the protection of culturally significant flora and fauna for legacy communities.

 

• Advocate for freeway / city artery negative impact mitigations. The Central, John F. Foran, and Bayshore Freeways as well as major auto arteries have all had negative infrastructural, environmental, physiological, and sociological impacts on the District- respiratory illness, seasonal flooding, and loss of homes and communities to name a few. I commit to working with our community, the City and State to find solutions that improve our quality of life in the face of climate change.

  • Community advisory bodies to inform and to identify visions for a future that mitigate negative impacts of these arteries in ways that do not compound these impacts.

  • Explore the implementation of tunnel top open spaces over the three major highways that reduce noise and air pollution and reconnect neighborhoods for communities and wildlife with wetlands, recreation, new bike routes, urban farms, and transportation. 

  • Explore aerial lift and bike corridors along areas currently occupied by freeways.

  • Work with SFPUC to expand swales and rain gardens to line all major city arteries as pollution buffers, pedestrian and cyclist protection barriers and water diversion areas to mitigate neighborhood flooding and support stormwater projects already underway.

 

• Address increasing seismic, flood and fire risk for District 9 residents.

  • Find sustainable and safe alignment within state and municipal housing development mandates while protecting tenants and homeowners from losing their current insurance policies.

    • Ensure that current development incentivization and deregulation is sustainable for both property owners and renters who are encouraged to increase their residential capacity in terms of fire, flood, and earthquake insurance coverage as the industry continues to pull coverage for current housing stock. 

      • Support better education for landlords and property owners about potential financial impacts associated with any new development in an age of climate change. In particular with liability coverage associated with wind, fire, flood, and earthquake.

  • Advocate for neighborhoods facing landslide activity especially in Bernal and Portola, and work with State and City departments to stabilize these areas.

  • Push for aggressively combat invasive grasses and trees that are currently threatening homes with increased fire risk through habitat restoration as well as increased financial costs of negative health impacts to people and pets.

  • Advocate for more wetland restoration and land reclamation efforts over costly unsustainable sewer vault expansion projects.

  • Explore potential liability to both City and property owners caused by heat islands, seismic sustainability and wind velocity when adding several stories to current low rise neighborhoods, especially areas with high infill and prehistoric sand deposits.

  • Advocate for increased studies on impacts of serpentine rock excavation and impacts of asbestos released by development in these areas.

  • Better fund and support DEM in its efforts to educate and prepare San Franciscans for all emergency events. In particular to match guidances in other international areas impacted by flood, fire and earthquake who are comprehensive in their approach.

  • Legislate prohibiting the use of construction materials that compound toxicity in the case of fire.

  • Work with the City,  State, EPA and Recreation and Parks to identify former industrial sites and land currently under freeways, city arteries, and viaducts for wetland restoration and flood diversion in alignment with and expanding upon CAP and federal San Francisco Bay watershed programs underway. This would affect the Dolores-Mission, Precita, and Islais Creek watersheds.

 

• Increase Community Resilience, Education and Self Reliance in the Face of Climate Change

  • Explore opportunities for City acquisition of private parcels for the implementation of community farms and education of residents on home garden sustainability as major inland agricultural areas continue to suffer environmental collapse.

  • Expand and meet food scarcity challenges through street and brick and mortar public markets.

  • Education for sustainable and environmentally conscious pet stewardship.

  • Creation of programs and conservation corps to support community resilience and environmental sustainability.

  • Look for ways to increase growth of environmentally sustainable light industry. SF once had  industries like box factories, metalworks, and glassworks that supported small businesses that were undercut by large scale distribution companies and petrochemicals. As we make more eco-friendly demands on small businesses, it is our duty to provide them with affordable alternatives to expensive internationally shipped materials.

  • Banning the use of plastics and other petrochemical products and education on sustainable alternatives. From take-out containers, to baby clothes, to even our multi-use water bottles, petrochemicals have successfully found alternatives to gasoline to ensure their financial bottom line in perpetuity and that their products will last forever, even in our blood.. If the City can hope to culturally shift our communities away from plastics, it must implement bans at a City level first and take an aggressive approach to educating San Franciscans on the dangers of plastics especially for our kids.

  • Increase environmental education and programs for youth and elders.

 

• Comprehensive and sustainable energy solutions instead of political pandering

  • Commons sense approaches to heating and cooking.  We must make sure that any shift from natural gas does not negatively impact the communities it purports to support. Ensure conversion programs take into account financial and cultural impacts.

  • As we move away from petroleum as an energy source, ensure that we are looking to a future that is comprehensive and sustainable in energy production.  No alternative fuel source can sustain unfettered development, production of products dependent on electricity, or societies dependent on either.

  • Continue to advocate for the decommissioning of dams and restoration of waterways sacred to first Californians. The delta and most tributaries to the bay are currently impounded somewhere along their course and this has caused exponential coastline erosion and decimation of our fishing industry.

  • Looking at a future without the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir before that decision is made for us by climate change.

  • Recharging of SF aquifers through hardscape removal, water reclamation, rain water harvesting, and desalination to prepare for potential water crises already being felt in other international cities like México and Cape Town.

  • Education and subsidization of small scale energy capture for individual property owners to defray reliance on greater power grid.

  • Legislate ambient city lighting solutions that  are low impact without increasing reliance on plastics like historically and culturally supportive neon and non plastic diode LED.

  • Implementation of sustainable energy projects that are deferential to, supportive and do not imperil first Californians and other communities. 

  • Truly pushing for safe and sustainable public transit.

  • Pedestrian protected and centered streets and bikeways.

  • Strict enforcement, regulation, and progressively taxation of all private transit companies.

 

• Truly environmentally supportive housing solutions and mitigations

  • Passage of legislation and measures that unlock and regulate rental housing at affordable levels

  • Push for reform of commercial rental protections

  • Ensure development projects are made of sustainable and non-forever, synthetic materials that could cause long term harm or in the case of cataclysm. Low impacts to communities, heat islands, and watersheds.

  • Temporary and interim and permanent housing solutions to meet the humanitarian crisis that is homelessness. Unpermitted and unregulated encampments contribute to negative environmental impacts and can lead to preventable events like urban and rural fires or loss of life in riparian encampments due to winter flash flooding.

    • True regional collaboration with other municipalities to meet this crisis head on instead of promotion of sweeps and dumping of human lives on each other’s door steps.

 

Preservation & Sustainable Living

I will advocate for the following policies and positions related to preserving and maintaining our built environment and cultural legacy while integrating smart, sustainable growth.

 

• Expansion, strengthening and subsidizing of Cultural Districts as well as Historic Districts and designations in collaboration with ongoing efforts of City Planning.

• Championing "Cultural Continuity": I’ll advocate for preserving the cultural spirit of our historic buildings, allowing us to adapt and innovate while keeping the unique character that defines District 9.

• Smart Growth with Historic Districts: Our historic districts show we can achieve density without losing the human scale. We can grow without towering high-rises that disrupt our community’s fabric.

• Expanding Preservation Incentives: I’m committed to making tax incentives like the Mills Act more accessible, so we can preserve and repurpose our historic buildings, keeping them vital parts of our district.

• Supporting Legacy Businesses: I’ll strengthen the Legacy Business Registry to protect the cultural and historical identity of our neighborhoods, ensuring these beloved institutions continue to thrive.

• Balancing Growth and Tradition: I’m focused on smart, sustainable growth that respects our history and keeps development in transit-rich, established neighborhoods, supporting our district’s future.