John,

My proposed budget makes fast, significant investments to address San Francisco’s major homelessness crisis. Unfortunately, as is so often the case, these solutions face the slow pace of government. We create too many rules and regulations that hinder our ability to deliver funding and services to those who need it most – right away.

That is why I am pushing for changes to our local laws that will allow us to deliver homelessness funding faster and more efficiently. The chart below shows specifically how many shelter beds we will add if the Board of Supervisors passes my legislation and how many people will remain without shelter if they don’t.This new shelter and housing capacity is only possible if the Board of Supervisors approves both my budgeted investments in this area and my proposed legislative changes to the City’s Homeless Gross Receipt Tax (Our City, Our Home/Proposition C). Proposition C has specific restrictions on how funds can be spent in each category (ie. housing, shelter, prevention, mental health); because of these restrictions the City currently has Prop C resources collected that will remain unspent. 

Amending these restrictions requires the approval of eight members of the Board of Supervisors. If the Board does not approve my requests, the City will see fewer shelter beds and more people will remain on the street. We need to move urgently and smartly to expand our shelter capacity, not leave money sitting in an account, helping no one right now.

Here are 2 things you can do to help:

1. Sign our petition urging the Board of Supervisors to approve these changes. We need your voice to show the Board of Supervisors that you demand action on this critical issue. Your signature will support removing restrictions on how we spend dollars collected by our homelessness tax, enabling us to direct funding to specific needs and to adapt to changes as they arise.
   
   
2. Call or email your Supervisor. Tell them to support my proposed budget investments and legislative changes to fund 600 new shelter beds; 545 new permanent housing placements; and 1,650 new prevention and problem-solving placements to help rapidly re-house individuals who do fall into homelessness.

If you don’t know which Supervisor District you live in, you can look up that information here.

Together, we can be the San Francisco that works, not the San Francisco that sits on taxpayer money and leaves people on the street.

Sincerely,

Mayor London Breed

P.S. Read my Medium piece on this issue.