Add The California Post on Google San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie on Thursday declared a “rent emergency” and proposed several actions to combat evictions — amid shocking headlines of rents in the city hitting more than $5,000 for one-bedroom apartments.
Lurie said he will support legislative actions to forestall evictions by an additional month, limit the size of rent increases and amp up funding for lawyers on eviction cases.
“Today, most San Franciscans feel our city is finally moving in the right direction, but many are also asking whether they can still afford to live here,” Lurie said in a statement. “Today, we are taking action to tackle San Francisco’s rent emergency head-on and help San Franciscans stay in their homes.”
The declaration won’t actually let the mayor bypass laws and regulations to enact his agenda, but is instead aimed at focusing on providing resources for tenants.
Rents in San Francisco are spiking more than anywhere else in the country, the mayor’s office said. According to Apartment List, the apartment vacancy rate in the city fell to just 2% in August, while rent prices have skyrocketed 26% in the past year.
“This leads the nation and represents the fastest post-pandemic rent growth captured by our model,” the Apartment List analysis said.
Much of the rental price jumps have been attributed to the city’s artificial intelligence boom, driven by soaring valuations and incomes of startups and workers in Silicon Valley.
Part of Lurie’s initiative includes multiple pieces of city legislation that involve putting more money into supporting displaced tenants. For instance, he wants to increase by 25% the amount of required payments to tenants being displaced, factoring out to nearly $3,000 per person,
The city will invest $1 million and partner with private employers to launch a “Know Your Rights” campaign, educating renters and property owners on their legal protections and responsibilities, Lurie said.
Legislation will also be introduced to cap annual allowable rent increases from banked increases and capital improvement charges at 10% for rent controlled tenants.
Many city supervisors and other leaders threw their support behind the mayor.
“San Francisco is facing an eviction crisis, and we’re excited to see the mayor and Board of Supervisors act with urgency to go to bat for tenants,” said Gail Gilman, Eviction Defense Collaborative Executive Director.
But not everybody agrees there is a “rent emergency” in San Francisco.
Oz Erickson, a member of the San Francisco Apartment Association, told the New York Times that the city’s rents are only climbing now because prices fell hard during the COVID-19 pandemic. The real crisis, he said, is the cost of building affordable housing.
