SAN FRANCISCO—The San Francisco Board of Supervisors convened a special outdoor meeting at the United Nations Plaza on May 23 to address the elephant in the room, the open-air drug crisis.
President of the Board Aaron Peskin said he hoped the dialogue “focuses some urgency around the crisis on our streets, and the need for an effective plan to address it.”
“What we are doing is not working,” Mayor London Breed said in the meeting. “And in fact, our local resources have increased, but it has not dealt with the problem based on the magnitude of what we’re experiencing.”
“We have to make the kinds of decisions that are going to allow for people to get the help and the support they need, but [also] to not allow things to continue in the way that they have for far too long,” Breed added, with the latter referring to drug dealing not getting deserved punishment.
Although the crowd booed when the mayor started to speak, they applauded when she asked the question, “Why should someone else’s rights be put before their needs and their safety and what they deserve in a place like San Francisco that claims to be so compassionate [and] liberal?”
While agreeing the drug problem is not new, Peskin also emphasized, “It is one that has become so visible that many San Franciscans do not feel safe, even though San Francisco in most of its neighborhoods is as safe or safer than it was prior to the pandemic.”
“I think we all acknowledge that there is a crisis and we need to treat it like a crisis.” Peskin added. He had previously accused Breed of not calling the problem a crisis.
The meeting was quickly recessed to the usual chamber in City Hall due to protesting. A woman who allegedly threw a brick towards the front of the crowd was arrested by police officers.
San Francisco resident Tom Wolfe told The Epoch Times, “I think San Francisco is at a crossroads right now; which direction [do] we want to go?”
While calling the outdoor meeting “a circus” and “a media spectacle,” Wolfe also admitted, “The fact that they were out there in front of the public was good.”
“We need a public health approach, and we need a target-specific law enforcement approach for the organized drugs.” Wolfe said, “If we can find a way to put those two things together ..., then we can see real change.”
200 people died from drug overdoses in San Francisco in the first quarter of 2023, nearly a 41 percent increase from the 142 deaths reported for the first three months the prior year.
Drug dealing and deteriorating street conditions have exacerbated the humanitarian crisis on the streets of San Francisco; officials are now openly expressing concern about the issues.
Peskin has called for collaboration between multiple departments and agencies to clear the open-air drug market in the Tenderloin district within 90 days.
But San Franciscans are crying for more to truly stop the drug crisis. Shelter worker Charie Pittman, who held a banner saying: “Fentanyl nazi war camp. Stop killing us for money.”, called for policy change.
“It’s turning into a funeral home over fentanyl,” said Pittman. “They’re sending people into the shelter allowing them to do fentanyl.”
Pittman said the funding for shelters went to pacifying the drug addicts, “We will give you the aluminum foil, we will give you the straws, ... they’re not saying hey, you cannot bring it (fentanyl) in here.”
Resident Carlos Law expressed his thoughts to The Epoch Times about the city’s approach during the fentanyl epidemic. “We [have] a sanctuary policy, and a sanctuary policy is protecting the criminals [who are] accused of bringing the drugs over here.”
