CONVERSATION
In 2015, frustrated by the lack of challengers to the left of Ed Lee, homelessness activist Amy Farah Weiss ran for mayor. Lee won re-election handily, but Weiss, a Bay Area native, won 12 percent of the vote, a notable number for a first-time candidate who had moved to San Francisco in 2007.
Lee’s death in December 2017 spurred a new election to fill out the rest of his term. Weiss decided to run again.
Crowded out by high-profile progressive candidates Mark Leno and Jane Kim, she garnered less than 1 percent of the total, a big comedown. Weiss is a self-declared democratic socialist, and she got a nod from local Berniecrats. But other progressives didn’t take her seriously. At the progressive candidates’ debate, she barely got a mention in the staunchest progressive media outlet in the city.
Odd, that. Weiss, who runs the nonprofit St. Francis Homelessness Challenge, was the one candidate with daily on-the-street experience dealing with San Francisco’s homelessness crisis, which voters agreed was a top priority.
She had a specific three-part fix:
1) Treat homelessness as a civil emergency, as if the city were reeling from an earthquake with thousands of displaced people — a concept also endorsed by the GOP candidate during the campaign.
2) Build temporary villages of mini-houses and provide social services. These “safe organized spaces,” as she calls them, would be meant as a transition to permanent housing. (She’s already worked on a one-house pilot project here.)
3) Pay for it by reallocating tens of millions of dollars from the city’s whack-a-mole efforts to clean the sidewalks and sweep encampments from neighborhood to neighborhood.
Impossible? Seattle’s been building villages with tiny homes like these for years (with bumps along the way). The idea is intriguing not only because it has real-world precedent, but also because it cuts diagonally across San Francisco’s political factions.
In some ways, Weiss does too. She doesn’t shy away from using terms like “cost-effective” and “pragmatic” when talking about homelessness solutions, terms that her fellow social democrats sometimes view with suspicion. She also says she’s open to changing state conservatorship law, as moderates like Breed and state Senator Scott Wiener advocate, to make it easier to take extremely troubled people off the streets who pose a threat to themselves or others.
“It’s not enough for progressives or social democrats or activists to complain,” she says. “We have to come up with solutions, and they have to be pragmatic and measurable.”
With the next election around the corner (hello, November 2019), Mayor London Breed must make headway on homelessness and other key issues to show that she deserves a full term. The next election could hinge on the condition of our streets. That’s one reason it’s worth checking in with Weiss now, who says she’s willing to give Breed “three to six months.” But it’s been two months since the inauguration, and she’s growing impatient.
We caught up with Weiss on the back patio of the Arlequin Cafe in Hayes Valley to ask her about Breed, San Francisco’s political tribes, homelessness, housing, election strategy of the past two elections — and the one upcoming, as well. We began by assessing the new mayor’s actions so far.
(The following interview has been edited and condensed.)
Amy Farah Weiss: During the mayor’s race, homelessness was a top issue. Although I disagree with certain aspects of London Breed’s approach, I found it intriguing she said she would take a crisis-response approach. It would be a zero-tolerance approach to tents, but there would be a place for everyone to go.
I’m closer to Jane Kim and Mark Leno in terms of ideology, but I wasn’t hearing from them or other candidates that enough would be done to take the crisis seriously. It’s interesting, this idea of political spectrum. Richie Greenberg was running as a Republican, and he was saying as well that he would treat homelessness as a crisis, with a FEMA-style response to a natural disaster.
The Frisc: He was talking about homes or trailers at Candlestick Point, wasn’t he?
AFW: Right. It’s actually part of our sustainability strategy if we have a Big One. We would have transitional villages to go to for safety. If we were to implement safe organized spaces, it would give us a blueprint how to react to a large earthquake, a model for people experiencing crisis conditions.
It’s not enough for progressives or social democrats or activists to complain. We have to come up with solutions, and they have to be pragmatic and measurable. Kim was saying she wanted to add something like 1,000 to 1,500 shelter beds. Leno was focusing on activating empty SRO units. There are 3,500 living in crisis conditions on the street. I didn’t feel anyone was taking the right comprehensive approach to solutions.
Breed said she would have a crisis-response approach and a place for people so they wouldn’t have to be in tents on the street. I’m all for giving an adequate amount of time to implement these new strategies, but enough is enough.
TF: It’s only been a couple months since her inauguration. Are you saying nothing’s happened yet, or that there hasn’t been an articulation [of a plan]?
AFW: There hasn’t been an articulation of a crisis-response approach. I want to get some signal that it’s going to happen. And I’m disappointed that Mayor Breed isn’t supporting Prop. C, a less than 1% tax on the wealthiest corporations of San Francisco who have $50 million or more of gross receipts, after these same corporations just enjoyed a huge federal tax reduction from 35% to 21%.
TF: What would be the most feasible thing to do, whether Prop. C money is there or not?
AFW: First you say it’s unacceptable for people to live on our streets without access to basic needs being met. If we agree, we activate public and private land for safe organized spaces. With 3,500 people, you can take that number and divide by 100 sites, 150 sites, 200 sites, each could be as small as for 5 people or up to 75 people at a site.
These transitional shelters we create cost $1,000 each if on caster wheels, $2,500 if built on a trailer. My main argument for the triage approach is that we currently we spend about $30 million on just the Department of Public Works and the SFPD shuffling people around.
I’ve created a model, $30 million for 3,500 people to get support. We could actually do it in a cost-effective way, and guess what: we’re not going to give all these things away to people. It’s a social contract. I expect something back from you. It’s very Marxian in that way; to each according to their needs, from each according to their ability.
I’ve designed the safe organized spaces to be as autonomous and [having] as little restriction as possible. As long as you go to the weekly village meeting and once a month check in around your housing goals, and you don’t cause anybody problems, you’re good. If security becomes an issue, then we talk about creating more structure.
TF: Homelessness isn’t static. People living here become homeless, and people arrive here all the time. As we build more humane, livable shelters, do we need to prepare for more influx? Should we think of this like the freeway expansion problem: The more capacity you build, the more cars arrive to fill it?
AFW: The “magnet theory” is an important issue to unpack. According to the most recent point-in-time count, 70% of San Francisco’s unsheltered population were living in San Francisco before they became homeless. As I see it, San Francisco’s government is responsible for creating adequate infrastructure and programming … for the approximately 3,500 unsheltered people on our sidewalks and streets, but it also makes sense for San Francisco to focus our limited resources on people who have longtime connections to our City. I support the policy to prioritize opportunities for individuals who became homeless in San Francisco, who have been chronically homeless in San Francisco for years, and who have serious physical and mental health issues.
TF: We can’t even build affordable senior housing without neighborhood opposition. How would we quickly set up homeless villages without neighbors going ballistic?
AFW: We would follow the model Seattle’s been using since 2015. Instead of conditional use required to activate that site for a transitional village, if you do everything required, the community can’t stop the project. In Seattle, they found out the people who are most reactionary to a transitional village in their neighborhood were told, well, you can get involved then. Make sure it’s rolled out effectively. Generally those people turn around.
We would also focus the sites on [neighborhoods] that are already impacted by encampments.
TF: Even if you had been the one sworn in two months ago, it doesn’t sound like any villages could be set up, say, a year from now.
AFW: I disagree. It’s a crisis, and we’d treat it like one. We have the tools in place but our leadership balks at that. London Breed has the power citywide. Look what Oakland did. It’s already used that power.
TF: The first time we talked, you also seemed open to changes in state conservatorship laws that Mayor Breed, State Senator Scott Wiener, and new District 8 Supervisor Rafael Mandelman all support.
AFW: Of the hundreds of unsheltered residents I have worked with the past few years, only a handful I can think of truly needed expanded conservatorship. I personally called emergency response when a person was walking into traffic, naked in the street, making verbal threats, or even punching someone, but they are often back on the street within hours or days. Sometimes the crisis response team won’t take action even when there is a significant threat, which I think is mostly due to a lack of resources.
I agree with Supervisor Mandelman, Mayor Breed, and Senator Wiener that San Francisco should be working with advocacy groups to pilot a new humane approach to conservatorship because the current system is failing the well-being, safety, and health of both individuals and the community, and I agree with human-rights advocates that we need a recovery-based model with adequate supportive housing and care resources.
‘Because of Kim and Leno, people were feeling they had an established politician to get behind. I was making the argument, “Where were you in 2015?” I didn’t feel inspired by the choices.’
TF: There’s also a housing crisis. Should we declare it an official crisis and suspend or streamline some of the review process for new housing?
AFW: I wouldn’t be for suspending review. It’s apples and oranges to me. We’re talking people living in a tent or without any structure, and saying this is a transitional structure we’re building. It meets certain standards for safety. But I wouldn’t suspend requirements for new, larger developments.
I’ve been adamant about support for ADUs. [Editor’s note: Accessory dwelling units, sometimes called in-law units or carriage houses, are the extra spaces behind garages or in backyards that many cities including SF are encouraging as a new source of housing. But in SF, few are being built.] Breed picked that up, she’s speeding up that process. That’s good.
TF: Thanks to Prop. F that just passed, San Francisco now pays legal fees for anyone threatened with eviction. Does more need to happen to limit evictions?
AFW: In some cases there’s foul play with “renovictions” to displace people, sometimes it’s to maintain the building. The idea that if you’re getting evicted, you have the right to meet with a lawyer is a good thing. That was huge, so at this point let’s see what happens over the course of a year.
TF: Let’s talk about the election. You received a much lower vote count this time.
AFW: In 2015 I got 12% because people like Jane Kim and Mark Leno were scared to run against Ed Lee. I was in there offering a value-driven, pragmatic-based campaign. Together [the progressive candidates] got 35% of the votes: myself, Francisco Herrera, and Stuart Schuffman.
This time, because of Kim and Leno people were feeling they had an established politician to get behind. And everyone kept talking about how the only people who matter are established politicians. I was making the argument, “Where were you in 2015?” I didn’t feel inspired by the choices. I felt I needed to promote an agenda I’d started in 2015.
I was promoting ranked-choice voting [with the slogan “Vote 1–2–3 for Equity”]. The No.1 slate for voters was Kim, Leno, Weiss. Over 15,000 voters chose that. Voting for London Breed alone got the second most amount.
[Editor’s note: The slate data come from Dana Sniezko, a private citizen and tech worker who analyzed election data at Weiss’s request. They were not corroborated by the city’s election department.]
TF: So you went with a 1–2–3 strategy, urging voters to also vote for Kim and Leno. Do you think now you should have talked more about the differences between you and them?
AFW: I’m about outcomes over egos. I preferred Kim and Leno over Breed as mayor. So if there had been another person in that mix, let’s say David Campos had run, I wouldn’t have run and detracted from that slate. Or If I felt that Mark or Jane would have championed the same things I was championing, and worked with me, I probably wouldn’t have entered.
TF: Leno and Kim teamed up only a month before the election. Did they split the progressive votes and give Breed a path to victory?
AFW: It would have been different if they’d run right out of the gate together. But it was so late in the game, it didn’t have the same resonance.
TF: Are you going to run in 2019?
AFW: Oh gosh. The city should give the mayor a chance to deliver, especially in the first 3 to 6 months, then let’s talk whether she’s making gains on campaign promises. We’ll see where things are at.
Alex Lash is editor in chief of The Frisc.
