If you’re homeless in San Francisco, it may help not to identify as male or female.
Yesterday, the mayor announced a new project. San Francisco will be the first U.S. city to commit to ending transgender homelessness.
Never mind that total homelessness is at levels unseen just 10 years ago. Forget about the drug crisis and overdose deaths that have reached record highs in recent years, accounting for 82% of the city’s homeless deaths during the COVID lockdown. The mayor has a plan.
San Francisco Mayor London Breed announced yesterday that her two-year budget proposal will include $6.5 million to end transgender homelessness by 2027. Of this, $6 million will go directly toward short-term rental subsidies, financial assistance, and funding for “non-profit providers serving TGNC residents.”
Also included in the proposal are 150 long-term housing subsidies; a new “Permanent Supportive Housing” site for TGNC, LGBT, and transition-age youth; and $500,000 for TGNC “behavioral health services.”
The mayor’s office estimates there are 400 transgender and gender non-conforming homeless residents. In total, there are 7,754 homeless individuals in the city, 4,397 of which are unsheltered, according to numbers released on May 16.
Apparently, the significantly larger segment of gay, lesbian, and bisexual homeless individuals, which totaled 1,054 in 2019, also don’t qualify. To benefit from the mayor’s plan, you must be transgender or gender non-conforming.
Why is the mayor funneling so much money into one small segment of the population, only around 5%, excluding the majority of homeless people?
San Francisco did see the only small decrease in homelessness in the Bay Area — which as a whole increased by 9% over the past three years — declining 3.5% since 2019. However, the city’s Healthy Streets project counted 537 tents and structures in March 2022, while there were 381 in April 2019. Visible encampments have increased.
The problem remains pressing, and residents deal with it on a daily basis. Sixty-four percent of residents say the Bay Area is heading in the wrong direction, according to a 2022 Bay Area Council poll.
When residents are still walking past homeless encampments outside their doors and seeing people overdosing on the street, funneling taxpayer dollars into this project is just another example of incompetence.
No wonder people are fleeing the city. The mayor would rather invent issues than work toward solving real ones.
Katelynn Richardson is a Summer 2022 Washington Examiner fellow.
