In next week’s election, San Francisco voters are being asked to approve a $300 million affordable housing bond that supporters say is desperately needed, but critics worry won’t be efficiently used.
Proposition A promises to create more than 1,600 new homes and apartments for low-income residents of San Francisco, including housing specifically for seniors and survivors of domestic violence. The measure requires a citizen’s oversight committee to audit how the bond money is spent annually. It needs a two-thirds supermajority to pass.
Supporters — including Mayor London Breed, the San Francisco Labor Council and the Council of Community Housing Organizations — say the funding is critical to meet the state’s mandate of building 46,000 affordable houses and apartments by 2031. Critics, however, point to the almost $1 billion in affordable housing bonds voters approved over the past decade that they say has done little to solve the city’s housing crisis.
General obligation bonds are a type of municipal bond that allow the city to borrow money at a fixed interest rate. Though cities sometimes increase property taxes through these kinds of bonds, San Francisco’s policy requires the city to issue new bonds only as prior bonds are paid off, and if property taxes were to rise, they could only rise to 2006 levels.
San Francisco Board of Supervisors President Aaron Peskin, who recently rallied in support of the measure, told KQED he’s fairly confident Proposition A will get voter approval.
San Franciscans have voted on — and approved — a bevy of measures to fund affordable housing over the past decade. In 2015 and 2019, voters approved $310 million and $600 million bonds, respectively. Then, in 2016, voters also passed a $260 seismic safety bond, which was partly dedicated to funding the preservation and rehabilitation of existing affordable apartments. And, although it wasn’t a bond measure, voters in 2018 also approved Proposition C, which imposed a tax on individuals and businesses that earn more than $50 million in annual income to fund services and housing for people experiencing homelessness.
But in the years since those measures passed, the housing crisis has worsened, and residents are expressing frustration over how long it has taken to build more affordable housing in the city. Peskin said he and other elected officials are working hard to ensure Proposition A passes.
“These are complicated times,” Peskin told KQED. “People see a $300 million bond, and even though it doesn’t cost them any additional money, doesn’t raise their taxes, people are in a cranky mood these days.”
