As the sun rose over Mission Bay condos on King Street near Interstate 280 on Monday, a couple dozen people who were living under the onramp packed up their belongings as city and state officials moved in with a new approach for dealing with the encampment. Read More
The seemingly never-ending debate over whether to outfit San Francisco police officers with devices capable of shooting 50,000 volts of electricity through the body is recharging once again.
The Police Department’s campaign, which would give stun guns to 103 officers specially trained to handle mentally ill people as part of a pilot program, is kicking into high gear, beginning with a planned Jan. 9 community meeting, Police Chief Greg Suhr said Thursday. Read More
With San Francisco on the verge of passing a law to crack down on recreational vehicles parking on city streets, homeless advocates are decrying the measure as a wrong-headed attack on people who live in their vehicles. Read More
Every night for the past two months, Geneva Carter, her mother and her three young children have spent the night on the floor of an office in an emergency homeless shelter in the Mission. They wake at 6 a.m., roll up the mats they slept on and spend the day trying to find a permanent place to live.
“It’s emotional,” said Carter, 21, who is unemployed and cannot afford to pay rent. “I get overwhelmed to where I can’t think.” Read More
The political fight that erupted over San Francisco’s Care Not Cash homeless program has ended after its would-be reformers backed down following a compromise that will change The City’s shelter system.
Details of the compromise were released Thursday in a statement from Mayor Ed Lee, who thanked supervisors Jane Kim, Ross Mirkarimi and Eric Mar for withdrawing their proposed reform measure from the November ballot. Read More
Assessor-Recorder Phil Ting was one of the first mayoral candidates to lash out at a progressive ballot measure that would change the way Care Not Cash benefits are dispersed when it comes to homeless-shelter beds. Read More
Losing candidates, nonprofit leaders and other political figures are lining up for a chance to serve on an influential task force that could change the political bent of San Francisco’s supervisorial districts.Today, Elections Commission Director John Arntz is expected to officially announce that The City’s 11 supervisorial districts will need to be redrawn based on the results of the 2010 census. Read More
The City’s controversial sit-lie ordinance remains unenforced, but the Police Department hopes to finish training for officers and unveil a public education campaign in the next “couple of weeks,” interim police Chief Jeff Godown said Sunday.The ordinance, which makes it illegal to sit or lie on public sidewalks, with certain exceptions, between 7 a.m. and 11 p.m. daily, was approved by 54 percent of voters in November. Read More
Proponents of San Francisco’s controversial sit-lie ordinance say the law is already deterring aggressive panhandlers in the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood, even though police haven’t started enforcing it.
The Civil Sidewalks law went into effect Dec. 17 but won’t be enforced until mid-February, when the department completes its training and community outreach, police said. The law makes it illegal to sit or lie on a public sidewalk in The City between 7 a.m. and 11 p.m. Read More
