
Ask HN: What's your take on the homeless crisis of San Francisco? - baby
Hey HN. I&#x27;ve been wanting to see some discussions on HN about poverty in San Francisco. I&#x27;ve been planning to move to San Francisco for a lot of obvious reasons, but the current state of the high number of homeless in the streets and safety in the city has been making me think a lot about this decision.<p>I wanted to know how poverty is perceived in SF and the bay area, and what are the different organizations that are set up to help. I wanted to know if this is a problem that has sprouted start ups or involvement from big tech companies.<p>Also, is this problem a state problem or a federal one? Is there a solution being planned? Or is there already something in place that sets to reduce the number of homeless in the region on a 5&#x2F;10-year period?<p>Thanks!
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ardit33
There is no true political good will to reduce the number of homeless people
in SF.

It takes a two pronged approach, both 1) advocating compassion and help, and
also 2) enforcement of laws.

Help must be in the form of guarantee of food and some sort of basic shelter
for people into a tough spot, and enforcement for people that regularly break
laws, sleep/urinate/defecate on the streets, etc....

Non-profits are not inclined to do anything about 2, and often will decry-
hamper any effort to fix this. Here is some food for thought: Why does San
Diego, which has much better weather than SF, has a much lower level of
homeless people?

TLDR: Non-profits, and radical liberals, have created an environment where
homeless folks are encouraged to move into SF and nothing is truly done for
their condition. As the joke goes: If you are homeless, move to SF, as your
friends are already there. Most of homeless folks are people that came from
other states, and not Bay Area locals, which means SF has become a collection
point (or dumping point), of most homeless people from all other cities of the
west coast.

The cynic would say follow the money: and if you follow it, non-profits have
no real incentive to fix the problem. On the other hand, building more housing
is so tough that this situation is guaranteed to get worse/or stay the same,
and never improve in the near or mid term.

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justboxing
San Francisco resident since 2006 here.

I love it here, but your observations are correct, the homelessness situation
has gotten out of control.

The homeless population is largely 'contained' within the Tenderloin
District[1] of downtown. By contained, I literally mean that you'll find cop
cars parked at the corners and edge of that district (see map). This area
contains a majority of the homeless population and the cops patrol it along
the edges day and night in an effort to 'contain' crime and violence within
that 10 block area.

I used to volunteer at San Quentin to help non-violent offenders find jobs
when they re-enter society. Almost all the ones that were getting paroled
would end up in the Tenderloin. I was told that there are about 60 Liquor
stored in that area. Add to that drugs, it's a recipe for re-offending and
coming back to the Big House.

The homelessness has been a problem even before the tech boom. The media and
the non-techie residents like to blame the tech scene for it, cos it's a nice
big juicy target.

The situation has been exacerbated by Nevada dumping 500-ish mentally ill
patients into San Francisco.[2]. So you'll find a lot more homeless people who
are also mentally ill, and acting it out in public. I recently had an incident
where a mentally ill person claimed my motorcycle was his, and pulled a knife
on me when I tried to leave. He even quoted some random VIN number. Had to
call cops, prove that I was the owner, and then had him arrested.

That said, it was the single incident in over 10 years, so I think I've
generally been safe with the homeless population around me. YMMV. Because of
the mentally ill homeless population, you may sometime find yourself in the
middle of sidewalk with some nutty guy yelling on the street or generally
acting crazy, and that un-nerves some people. Also, in the summer if
temperatures go over 70 degrees ( somewhat rare), the whole downtown smells
like a giant urinal, from the homeless people defecating on the streets,
sometimes even in the public transport [ BART ] stations [3]

Regarding 'solution being planned', I've found that the current Mayor(s) and
Supervisors just kick the can down the road, leaving it for the next Mayor or
Supervisors to deal with. They make new building and Condos designate a
specific set of units as BMR (Below Market Rate) but even a BM 1 BR 600 Sq Ft
or so costs over 300K, so not really affordable even to qualified working
people.

[1] Tederloin District Map:
[https://www.google.com/maps/place/Tenderloin,+San+Francisco,...](https://www.google.com/maps/place/Tenderloin,+San+Francisco,+CA/@37.7839295,-122.4174298,16z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x8085809068ae37cb:0xb65a70d852b4620a!8m2!3d37.7846598!4d-122.4145058)

[2] SF reaches $400K settlement proposal in Nevada patient-dumping case:
[http://www.sfexaminer.com/sf-reaches-400k-settlement-
proposa...](http://www.sfexaminer.com/sf-reaches-400k-settlement-proposal-in-
nevada-patient-dumping-case/)

[3] Human waste shuts down BART escalators
[https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Human-waste-shuts-
dow...](https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Human-waste-shuts-down-BART-
escalators-3735981.php)

