(a) San Francisco is experiencing a housing crisis of historic proportions that has led to a major humanitarian and public health crisis in large-scale homelessness for which the City has insufficient resources to address.
(b) The Homelessness Gross Receipts Tax will fund the “Our City, Our Home Fund.” Consistent with the analysis of the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing (“HSH”) it is the intentions of the voters in adopting Article 28 to house at least 4,000 homeless people and expand shelter beds by 1,000 within five years, fund legal assistance and rent subsidies to keep San Franciscans housed, and fund intensive mental health and substance abuse services to move the City’s most severely impaired individuals off the streets.
(c) In December, 2017 Donald Trump signed the “Tax Cuts and Jobs Act” into law which reduced the federal corporate tax rate from 35% to 21%, a 14% reduction. By comparison, this measure would be an average of less than a half of a percent tax for the gross receipts of San Francisco businesses over $50 million.
(d) The San Francisco 2017 Homeless Count & Survey found that over 7,000 people in the City experience homelessness at any one time. According to HSH, as of April, 2018, the City has approximately 2,500 temporary shelter beds for the homeless population and there have been over 1,000 people on the waitlist for shelter each night. The intent of the voters in adopting Article 28 is to eliminate the waiting period for shelter.
(e) For years San Franciscans have witnessed individuals with severe mental illnesses wandering City streets. One purpose of this Article 28 is to fund intensive mental health care and substance abuse treatment facilities linked to housing placement to ensure severely mentally ill and drug addicted people are able to exit homelessness. The intent of the voters in adopting Article 28 is to provide care sufficient to move all those San Franciscans with severe behavioral health issues out of homelessness.
(f) Multiple studies have shown significant cost savings when cities invest in permanently affordable housing, thus reducing needs usage of hospitals, jails, and inpatient treatment facilities. The intent of voters in adopting Article 28 is to reduce overall costs for the City.
(g) According to HSH, one in twenty-five public school students in San Francisco is homeless. This has a devastating effect on their educational outcomes and development. This Article 28 is intended to reduce family homelessness by more than 85%.
(h) Approximately half of homeless people became homeless when they were less than 25 years old, according to the San Francisco 2017 Homeless Count & Survey. The intentions of voters in Article 28 is to ensure young homeless people are able to move into stable housing and avoid becoming chronically homeless adults.
(i) This crisis of homelessness affects both homeless people and their housed neighbors. San Franciscans should not have to step over homeless people or walk out their doors and see tents on sidewalks, and homeless people should not be forced to live in these conditions. The intent of voters in adopting Article 28 is to significantly decrease the visible presence of homeless people and tent encampments on City streets by eliminating chronic homelessness.
(j) HSH recently released a strategic framework describing its five-year goals for reducing street homelessness and ending family homelessness and has instituted a new system to coordinate services. According to HSH, the City needs increased revenue both to achieve these important goals and to address the problem more completely.
(k) The Housing First model creates a foundation of stability for formerly homeless individuals by providing permanent supportive housing as a springboard for resolving and treating issues that may have precipitated a person’s first encounter with homelessness, or which may have come as a result of being forced to survive on the street. The intent of voters in adopting Article 28 is to provide the resources to implement a Housing First model.
(l) It is the intention of the voters in adopting Article 28 to ensure that (1) homelessness funding for existing and future programs continues at the current base year levels without utilizing monies or resources from the Our City, Our Home Fund, and (2) tax proceeds from the Homelessness Gross Receipts Tax be used to fund the programs set forth in Section 2810.
(Added by Proposition C, 11/6/2018, Eff. 12/14/2018, Oper. 1/1/2019)