Feb 9, 20224 min read

letter to a friend

to Lucy, Mandy, Hillary, connie.chan, Catherine.Stefani, Aaron.Peskin, gordon.mar, dean.preston, matt.haney, Ahsha.Safai, DPH, letters, Santiago, board.of.supervisors, Cityattorney, (POL), MelgarStaff, demian.bulwa, DHSH, Mission, myrna.melgar, rafael.mandelman, shamann.walton, taylor.brown, Jennifer.Li-D9@sfgov.org, laura, Mayor, hknight, yesenia

My neighbor, Lucy, asks politicians (above) why she has to pick up human feces all the time. Here is my response to her and said politicians:

Hi Lucy, et. al. Sadly politicians do not care about you or your life. Obviously, the policy of taking 12 to 24 hours to remove human feces puts people and pets in our neighborhood at risk, but they just don't care. We are collateral damage in their failed agenda. I just walked down 26ht between Mission and Shotwell and it's a disaster. Trash everywhere. I took BART today and the plaza is filled with criminals fencing stolen goods. The encampment on Shotwell and 26 is growing every day. The encampment dweller stacks a ton of trash at the corner every day to be picked up by dpw in the event someone calls 311. Many people hang out there and do drugs and deal drugs. She has dogs that bark and whimper for hours and through the night disrupting everyone's sleep. This is a person who was too disruptive to stay in the Safe Sleeping Area across the street and the city and our supervisor thinks it's perfectly fine for them to be in front of our houses. The encampment is a complete nuisance, but me and my neighbors don't fit into San Francisco's unsheltered persons policy. They only care about the people who decide to appropriate our sidewalks-- these are the sacred cows of San Francisco. Laws don't apply to them and they have free reign to do whatever they want outside of directly and violently hurting people. The Encampment on 25th and Shotwell is growing too. This encampment is attached to a house and could go up in flames taking the house with it. It often blocks the sidewalk. In fact, encampments surround the blocks close to the Safe Sleeping Area. Hillary Ronen blocked housing on 26th and Shotwell Streets with no plan what to do in its stead. She then turns this property into shelters and promises we will have tents in the shelter not on the sidewalks. She then allows enormous encampments to proliferate on the sidewalks all over our neighborhood. Our community has been exploited and lied to. We have had our sidewalks trashed, shit on, and peed on. We have had to endure huge encampments for years, and when we protest, we are dismissed and our voices are blocked (I am blacklisted-- she has not responded to emails or phone calls from me for months). I have been blacklisted because I don't tow the party line. Instead, I ask questions. Questions that for years, I have never gotten answers to. For example, why are the ordinances on San Francisco's city government website not enforced? Enforcing these is not perfect, but it would go a long way in making the lives of exploited neighborhoods like mine better. Why are the CDC recommendations on not removing tents enforced, but the Safe Sleeping Guidelines mentioned above not? People in encampments move around, they don't wear masks, they have people coming and going, they do drugs in front of our homes and children, yet they can't be touched.They can put an encampment anywhere: under your window, attached to your house, and they can take over your block without restrictions. But more importantly, why is it ok for San Francisco and Hillary Ronen to destroy the fabric of communities by allowing people to squat on our sidewalks? How is this not seen as degrading a neighborhood, causing harm to residents, and disrespecting the dignity of people trying to raise their children, go to work, and live in what any American deserves-- a well functioning and clean neighborhood where politicians try to improve our lives instead of throwing us under a bus of failed policies. Here are some photos in my neighborhood I took while running errands today. This is what we confront everyday when we step out our front door. It is no less than criminal negligence on the part of the mayor and supervisor Hillary Ronen. Huge encampment on Cesar Chavez and South Van Ness just a half a block from Safe Sleeping Area:

Drug users on Cesar Chavez and South Van Ness 1/2 a block from Safe Sleeping Area. There is another encampment directly across the street from the SSA not shown:

encampment at 25th and Shotwell abuting a wooden house:

A huge encampment at Shotwell and 26th Street that has now taken over the public street (taking a whole parking space) as well as sidewalk. Check out the mattress that was arbitrarily thrown on top of the whole thing: