San Francisco has avoided the worst of the coronavirus pandemic so far with rigorous social distancing rules, school closures, and other measures.
But thousands of its homeless citizens have had little chance to shelter in place because they have no shelter, or they bunk down in shelters every night with little chance to keep safe distances from others.
The effort to move homeless people into hotel rooms has now borne some fruit, with 1,000 rooms potentially available by tomorrow.
The update came Wednesday from Trent Rhorer, the head of the city’s Human Services Agency, which is running the negotiations to lease hotel rooms. Rohrer said 479 rooms were currently leased, and another 576 should be signed into lease tonight.
There are 123 people now occupying hotel rooms, and 94% of them are homeless, Rhorer said.
[UPDATE: The city’s homelessness and supportive housing agency said Thursday morning that a person staying at one of the city’s Navigation Centers tested positive recently for COVID-19 and is staying in one of the hotel rooms. The person is in “good condition,” according to the statment. It did not say when the person tested positive or was moved to a hotel.]
Another hotel, adding 1,500 rooms to the mix, could be available by Saturday, Rhorer said. The city will not name the hotels, he added.
The news comes a day after the Board of Supervisors voted for broader, faster action — even to use emergency powers to comandeer rooms, if necessary. The resolution calls for at least 1,500 hotel rooms for people currently in “congregate” or group shelters, and at least 3,500 rooms for people currently on the streets.
Their resolution was nonbinding. It’s still up to Mayor London Breed’s administration to secure the rooms. The administration has been negotiating with hotel owners for at least two weeks with stakes growing higher to move people, especially those over 60 and with underlying medical conditions.
As of Wednesday morning, San Francisco has reported 434 cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by novel coronavirus infection, and 7 deaths. There’s also growing alarm about the growing number of cases, 12 at latest count, at Laguna Honda Hospital, which is now on near-lockdown.
“We are thrilled that vulnerable unhoused people and people in shelter are eligible for hotels and don’t have to wait until they are sick,” said Jennifer Friedenbach, executive director of the Coalition on Homelessness. “However, the rooms don’t mean anything unless they city is ready to fill them.”
“Fiscal prudence”
Homeless advocates’ patience has been wearing thin, and a majority of the public comments during yesterday’s Board of Supervisors’ meeting, held online, demanded hotel rooms for the homeless, even if the city has to exercise emergency powers.
“We’re urging broad discretion” of those powers, Joe Wilson, executive director of the shelter Hospitality House and cochair of the Homeless Emergency Service Providers Association (HESPA), told The Frisc yesterday. “We hope they use them.”
So far it seems they have not. Rhorer even added a note of caution today about going overboard on hotel rooms. The city is discussing the lease of several thousand more, but he said the number needed is “difficult to project. We’re attempting to balance the needs of our medical system and the need to quarantine, as well as fiscal prudence. We don’t want to rent 3,000 rooms that sit empty for a couple weeks.”
That caution didn’t sit well with one shelter provider. “It makes a lot more sense to pay about $80 a room now” — which District 5 Supervisor Dean Preston, separate from the city’s efforts, has arranged for a few dozen people at the Oasis Inn — “than it does to wait for an outbreak and pay the tremendous human costs of it later,” said Mary Kate Bacalao, director of external affairs and policy at Compass Family Services. (Bacalao is also cochair of HESPA.)
At last count, the city had potentially close to 10,000 homeless people (depending on the counting method). Advocates for the homeless, including the supervisors who drafted the resolution, have urged the city to get as many of them into hotel rooms as possible. The city has more than 30,000 rooms vacant. Bacalao, whose organization shelters homeless families, says it will still be a “big battle” to get families into hotel rooms: “The public conversation tends to erase families or relegate them to the bottom of the hierarchy of needs.”
More group shelters
Meanwhile, the city is moving on another front to expand and spread out shelter space by turning the Moscone Center West convention hall and at least two other sites into group shelters that will adhere to strict social distancing and hygiene rules. They should provide space for roughly 900 people. (The Chronicle reported yesterday that the city has negotiated with the Bay Club for its South of Market tennis courts.)
Even with hotel rooms and more shelter space opening up, shelter operators and others need clear guidelines to prioritize their clients. The top priority, Rhorer said, are people being discharged from hospitals who are homeless and COVID-positive and have nowhere to shelter in place.
Beyond them, those at highest risk of COVID-19 complications — over 60 and with medical conditions — will have priority. The city also is reserving rooms for health workers and other first responders who need to quarantine.
It will not test shelter workers or occupants for COVID-19 if they aren’t showing symptoms, Department of Public Health director Grant Colfax said today: “Basic supplies that we need, as well as are needed across the nation, are the rate-limiting step. I’m literally waiting for more swabs.” For now, Colfax said, testing will be limited to symptomatic people, those in close contact with COVID-19 patients, healthcare workers and first responders.
Among the homeless, only people who can “self-care” will be moved to hotel rooms, where meals and limited healthcare will be available. People who need help with physical, mental health, or substance abuse issues could be moved into trailers and RVs that the city is setting up, or might end up staying in shelters.
While extending shelter-in-place to May 3 and tightening the rules yesterday, the city’s health officer Tomás Aragón did not specifically require private rooms for homeless people. Instead, Aragón’s order continued to exempt them from shelter-in-place requirements, “strongly urging” them to seek shelter and for the city to provide it. The order also focuses on social distancing within group shelters and on the streets:
The first shelter-in-place order on March 16 offered scant guidance for people who had nowhere to go, leading to a variety of smaller efforts to help, such as a neighborhood drive two weeks ago in the Haight-Ashbury to collect tents and sleeping bags so people on the streets could have their own spaces.
Alex Lash is editor in chief of The Frisc.