“Affordable and Teacher Housing Now” ballot measure

The city estimates that meeting San Francisco’s need for affordable housing would require building 1300 units per year. Currently we build an about 300. YIMBY Action is running a ballot measure that would help the city build enough supportive housing to meet our needs.

The average affordable housing development takes five to seven years from start-to-finish, and only 18 months of that time is spent in construction. Neighborhood groups aren’t always supportive of affordable housing proposals. Their abuse of the permitting process means the public has to pay more for less housing, and SF residents have to wait longer before the housing is finished.

For example, at 88 Broadway the Barbary Coast Neighborhood Association successfully lobbied to decrease the amount of housing for low income residents. Forest Hill residents are actively opposing low income senior housing in their neighborhood. The Haight Ashbury Neighborhood Council explicitly states that their priority for the proposed housing at the McDonalds site at 730 Stanyan St. isn’t to build the maximum amount of housing possible, “…we want a design the neighborhood can be proud of, regardless of what height produces the biggest bang-for-the-buck from the housing subsidies that will fund it.”

Our ballot measure helps get more affordable and teacher housing built in the city by:

• Preventing one or two loud people from stopping or delaying projects for years, ensuring that Affordable housing gets built quickly in every neighborhood
• Speeding up the approval process from several years down to months
• Letting the SF Unified School District build housing for teachers on school-owned land and stopping neighbors from blocking the project

This measure will be on the ballot in November.

For more info, check out frequently asked questions and press coverage.