• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer
WRAP

WRAP

Western Regional Advocacy Project

  • Donate Now
  • Get Email Updates
  • Contact Us
  • Home
  • About
    • 40 Years of Fighting
    • History
    • Mission
    • Strategy
    • Members
    • Board / Staff
  • Campaigns
    • Business Improvement Districts
    • House Keys Not Sweeps
    • Homeless Bill of Rights
    • Oregon Right To Rest
    • Without Housing
    • Street Outreach
  • Organizing Tools
    • Without Housing Organizing Toolkit
    • Homeless Bill of Rights Campaign Manual
    • WRAP Organizers Manual
    • WRAP Artwork
  • Resources
    • Pipe Dreams and Picket Fences Report
    • Art in Action Power Point Slide Show
    • Hobos to Street People
    • House Keys Book
    • Political Education
    • Legal Research
  • Media
    • Newsletters
    • Blog
    • Hobos to Street People Art Show
    • Street Newspapers
    • Sweeps Gallery Videos
    • Videos
  • Support Us
    • Donate
    • Become a Monthly Sustainer
    • Volunteer
    • Support WRAP
    • WRAP Newsletters & Updates Sign Up

Homeless people make local gains in San Francisco

November 15, 2016 by Jonathan Leave a Comment

Post-Election Op-Ed by Jennifer Friedenbach

Trump isn’t the only surprise winner this election season. Here in San Francisco, homeless people had a major win, despite all the trump style shenanigans coming from our local policy makers.  With San Franciscans top issue being homelessness, there was plenty of opportunity to determine the fate of our most destitute citizenry. The positive results may not be obvious on the surface, but let me explain.

Back in spring, homeless advocates were researching revenue options that would provide the funding to solve these critical issues. We saw this election as a great opportunity to effect change. This work was interrupted by Supervisor Farrell’s insistence on partnering homelessness with transportation and putting a split measure sales tax on the ballot. He insisted he had polling that showed it would win by a large margin. He touted that he had big tent support for the measure, and that this was the only one the Mayor would get on board with. He convinced many of his colleagues that this was the only option that would pass, and ushered people away from the progressive options that he stated would have great opposition. A large and very fragile coalition formed. But he never truly collaborated; he refused to show community members the poll, he never garnered input on how it should be structured from key allies, and then once it was on the ballot, he went on to kick down the big tent and ensure the defeat of the very same sales tax he sponsored.

And kick down the tent he did: The sales tax, Prop K, lost with a massive thirty-point spread. He managed to alienate and anger potential allies quickly when he introduced alongside Supervisor Wiener two anti-homeless measures.  Important colleagues who would have supported the measure or taken a neutral stance were rightly pointing out the sales tax would lose if the anti-homeless measure moved forward.  Big tent coalitions are fragile, and when you go out of your way to push people out of the tent, the tent gets very small, and it falls down. It was clear to everyone that while his tent ban, Prop Q, was pure political posturing that would neither decrease the number of tents on our sidewalk nor result in any solutions, it would deeply damage other efforts. The anti-homeless measures diverted both the campaign chest and the volunteers needed to pass the sales tax. The whole point of a big tent is to have big-tent resources. Many on the ground who would have spent all their time on the sales tax were now forced to spend time defending homeless people against the attacks levied against them in Farrell’s Prop Q.

This is the other way he guaranteed the sales tax demise. He not only put all his resources and fundraising efforts on Prop Q (bringing in over $700,000 to pass it), and did next to nothing for the sales tax measure (funded at half that without Farrells help), but put out two very distinct poisonous messages that killed the sales tax. One was the anti-homeless vitriol. His ads showed a picture of a woman shooting up (likely garnered without her permission) and declared tent encampments unsafe and unhealthy, had a merchant talk about stepping on a needle, focused on stolen goods, and even stooped so low as to use the rape of homeless women as an excuse to tear away their tents.
Since tents themselves are incapable of such acts, you can only read this messaging as: homeless people as a class are unsafe, unhealthy, thieving, needle-waving rapists. Now, who wants to pay for their housing?

The second core part of his message was that there are enough services for homeless people. His rap was that shelter or housing would be offered, but the measure had no additional shelter beds or housing in it. He stated repeatedly that there were vacant shelter beds, failing to mention those beds were not available or only available for one night, and talked up the opening of six navigation centers and hundreds of units of supportive housing. All of this was stretching the truth of course—only two new navigation centers are going to open, and one of those is a replacement for the center that is closing. The hundreds of units of new supportive housing would run out after five years at best, and most of those will be for families with children and vets, still only serving a fraction of the 12,000 units needed. Beyond the lies, this messaging told voters that the city did not need the sales tax, and hacked away at the public’s support.

While Farrell was kicking and punching the big tent he bragged so much about, the Mayor was also screwing our chances for real solutions. For one, he could have stopped Farrell from introducing the anti-homeless measures very easily and in fact gave tacit support for them. Beyond that, Lee put his top guy, Tony Winnicker, and all his money contacts into fighting against the perceived attacks on his power—Props M (creation of housing commission), D (special elections), H (public advocate), and L (MTA appointments), and virtually neglected the sales tax. It got very little priority and very little funding: Three hundred fifty thousand was spent on Props J and K compared to the $2.2 million spent to defeat M,D,H and L.

So where is the homeless victory in all of this? In spite of all this, homeless people and their supporters rose up and took some very powerful and surprising victories. In the end, San Francisco voters told City Hall that they do want the homeless population to be housed and they want a compassionate approach to homelessness. We had the massive defeat of the stinky real estate measures—Props P (32 percent support) and U (35 percent support)—one would have slowed down housing for homeless people and the other would have removed housing for working class San Franciscans. Proposition C passed with a whopping 76 percent and would allow a housing bond to purchase buildings where tenants are getting Ellis Act evicted. Most amazing for post-gentrification San Francisco is for the first time in over 15 years, a politician failed in their attempt to use homeless people as political fodder for their ambitions. Out of two anti-homeless measures on San Francisco’s ballot, one has been defeated, Prop R (neighborhood policing) and the other, Prop Q (tent ban), is too close to call, and certainly is in no way a voter mandate. Farrell’s Prop Q proponents spent almost $800,000 in funding from billionaires to take away tents from homeless people, and they expected to win in a landslide. Opponents, with only $8,000, managed to beat back both Propositions Q and R with a powerful people driven grassroots campaign. These results constitute a major shift in the public’s attitude. Back in 2010, the ban on sidewalk sitting or lying during daytime hours got 59 percent support, whereas Prop R, which would have permanently set aside 3 percent of police to criminalize homeless people and conflated property crime with poverty only garnered 45 percent of the vote.

At the same time, voters did approve Prop J, which asks the city to set aside $50 million for homeless housing, while they chose to reject Proposition K, the funding mechanism. What voters said with this split vote is “We want homeless people to be housed.  Use your budget to pay for it!”. Also on the ballot was a voter-initiated proposition, Proposition S, which would have set aside hotel tax funding to end family homelessness. This measure was a clear voter mandate and received 63 percent approval, but failed to get the two-thirds voter approval required. This measure did not receive Mayoral support. However, the Mayor now has new instructions from the voters: “Find $67 million in your 8.6 billion budget and solve this crisis now!”
It is up to all of us to ensure he does.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Footer

Instagram Feed

FOR MORE INFORMARTION VISIT US AT: http://wraphome FOR MORE INFORMARTION VISIT US AT: http://wraphome.org/developmentdirector
WRAP is hiring a full-time Development Director with at least 2 years of non-profit fundraising management experience. WRAP supports our core members, allies, and others by providing organizing tools and research for each to use in their campaigns fighting the criminalization of houselessness and for affordable housing. We are helping to build a regional /national movement �together and strengthen �connections of WRAP’s priorities with broader anti- racism, classism, neo-liberal capitalism, and criminalization campaigns.
Register here tinyurl.com/Mumia-film for Thursday Register here tinyurl.com/Mumia-film for Thursday night’s online screening of this moving, informative, personal, important, and artfully-made film. Cast includes Cornel West, Angela Davis, Dick Gregory, Alice Walker, Ruben ‘Hurricane’ Carter, and Amy Goodman.
Forty years ago, the federal government slashed af Forty years ago, the federal government slashed affordable housing budgets of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), marking the beginning of the contemporary crisis of homelessness. https://conta.cc/3k4mDpA
Theatre of the POOR presents CRUSHING WHEELCHAIRS Theatre of the POOR presents CRUSHING WHEELCHAIRS 
Sunday 2/12/23 4pm San Francisco 2948 16th St.
Sunday 2/26/23 4pm Oakland 1540 Broadway 
For more information poormag@gmail.com
One of the questions we asked people we love about One of the questions we asked people we love about this continuing forty-year process of addressing the root causes of homelessness in America was recognizing that our comrade Paul has also been fighting this neoliberal bullshit for forty years. In earlier emails people spoke about the importance of WRAP. Here is what some of our friends had to say about Paul’s role over the last forty years. https://conta.cc/3vbUnUx
Next Thursday, the 22nd, at 11am we are having a p Next Thursday, the 22nd, at 11am we are having a press conference as the preliminary hearings begin and need all our allies to show up and call for justice! https://conta.cc/3FyNtgH
A lot of work done addressing oppressions across t A lot of work done addressing oppressions across the country takes place in courtrooms and legislative bodies. This work is not always successful due to the fact that the oppressors are the ones making the laws. But we know you can’t fight a system if you don’t know the ins and outs of how that system works.  https://conta.cc/3VQrVDl
Join the next Public Works Committee Meeting to re Join the next Public Works Committee Meeting to reject the “safe work zone” ordinance that aims to further criminalize unhoused people and their advocates during sweeps.
Monday, 12/12 at 10:30am
bit.ly/oakmtg-1212
Let's Celebrate Chucho Let's Celebrate Chucho
We are raising $40,000 for WRAP’s vital work at We are raising $40,000 for WRAP’s vital work at this 40-year mark, and all donations will be matched up to $20,000 in November and December! Contribute $40, $400, $4,000 to help make sure that mass homelessness is not around another 40 years. https://conta.cc/3VAWHQ8
Load More... Follow on Instagram

Facebook Icon

Facebook Feed

Comments Box SVG iconsUsed for the like, share, comment, and reaction icons
Link thumbnail

Denver, CO. Evaluating Mayoral Candidates’ Houselessness Plans Based on Houseless People’s Priorities - WRAP

wraphome.org

Housekeys Action Network Denver recently released our housing report “Pipe Dreams and Picket Fences”, detailing the findings from our su...
17 hours ago
View on Facebook
· Share
Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Linked In Share by Email
View Comments
  • Likes: 0
  • Shares: 0
  • Comments: 0

Comment on Facebook

Twitter Icon

Twitter Feed

Unable to load Tweets

Follow

YouTube icon

Youtube Code

Our Channel

Copyright © 2023 Western Regional Advocacy Project WRAP · Log in