San Francisco leaders fear over deteriorating circumstances within the Mission: ‘Neighborhood in chaos’

As San Francisco focused much of its attention in recent months on drug sales and homelessness in the Tenderloin, street conditions in the nearby Mission District continued to deteriorate.

The neighborhood’s number of tents and other inhabited street structures has grown from a little more than 70 last June to about 100 now, according to periodic counts conducted by the city. Sidewalks along Mission Street, particularly near its BART stations, have become flourishing markets for unregulated merchandise sales. Residents are also concerned about trash and a series of fires, one of which recently displaced 22 people and damaged a popular taqueria.

Now, community leaders in the mission and local officials are attempting to help the neighborhood’s growing unhoused population while placing tighter controls on street vending and garbage, among other efforts.

“This is the overall feeling of a neighborhood in chaos,” said Supervisor Hillary Ronen, who represents the Mission and recently crafted a plan to address what she has called “unacceptable” street conditions.

Ronen said she was, in part, trying to redirect some of the San Francisco government’s attention from the Tenderloin, where Mayor London Breed declared a 90-day state of emergency that expired this month. Though Ronen supported that declaration, she wants to do what she can to prevent the Mission from following in the Tenderloin’s footsteps.

The encampments in Ronen’s district are not as numerous as they were when she first took her seat on the Board of Supervisors five years ago, she said. But the population of those living on the streets has grown recently, as have the ranks of street vendors. In her view, the problem was compounded when San Francisco directed much of its focus squarely on the tenderloin and its long-running crises of homelessness, public drug sales and opioid overdoses.

The confluence of all those events “made the Mission a disaster again,” Ronen said.

“I just feel so much sympathy and so much anger for all of my constituents: the businesses, the housed residents and the unhoused residents,” Ronen said. “We are failing the people of the mission. It’s unacceptable.”

Ronen’s plan for the mission includes recently passed legislation on street vending as well as various objectives to move more unhoused people inside, increase trash pickups and prevent street fires.

After talking to Ronen’s office, the city’s Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing in April plans to reopen 53 shelter beds in the Mission that were previously closed due to COVID-19. The Healthy Streets Operations Center, a citywide effort to address encampments, has started visiting Mission encampments weekly, trying to get unhoused people placed into shelter or a long-term home.

Public Works is stepping up its power-washing of trash cans around Mission Street BART plazas and educating merchants about how to properly dispose of cardboard so it doesn’t litter streets and become a fire hazard. Ronen’s office is also talking to Recology about how to keep the streets cleaner and working with public safety officials on other ways to prevent fires.

Another issue affecting the neighborhood is street vending. People have long set up on the neighborhood’s sidewalks to sell flowers, fruit and other things to passersby. But community leaders say the scene grew much more crowded after the COVID-19 economic blow that was hardest on low-wage workers who lost jobs.

Dennis Romero (l to r), makes a purchase from Jerome Allen, El; who is navigating homelessness, along the sidewalk on Mission at 24th Street on Thursday, March 24, 2022 in San Francisco, Calif.Lea Suzuki/The Chronicle

Some people who felt like they had no other options may have turned to street vending. Rising homelessness contributed to the problem.

But while many sellers are legitimate, others may be hawking stolen goods. And merchants say the rampant amount of unregulated vending has been hurting their businesses. The city recently passed an ordinance to require vendors to get a permit and maintain proof of ownership or other authorization to sell goods.

“Vending in our community is part of its makeup. It’s part of the flavor that we’ve always had,” said Susana Rojas, executive director of the Calle 24 Latino Cultural District. “Because of the pandemic and the economic downturn, we have people who are vending other items and who are not necessarily fully connected to the community.”

William Ortiz-Cartagena, a San Francisco entrepreneur who was born and raised in the Mission, is planning to soon open a storefront on Mission Street where 20 to 30 vendors can come off the streets and sell their goods inside. Clecha, a nonprofit founded by Ortiz-Cartagena, already has an agreement with a vacant store’s owner to launch the project, he said.

He envisions it looking like an indoor flea market, filled with people selling their wares but also tables in the back that offer services for small businesses and local residents.

“It’s basically a garage sale,” Ortiz-Cartagena said. “In the suburbs, nobody is out there penalizing people for setting up shops in their driveway. If you want to look at it through that particular lens, we’re doing the same thing.”

One of numerous people selling goods next to the 24th Street BART station recently was Jerome Allen El, 54, to an unhoused man who said he was sleeping on the street about one block away.

Laid out on the sidewalk by his feet was a cornucopia of items: shoes, jeans, moisturizer, even a fan and a flashlight. Everything was available for purchase, much of it for as little as $1.

Allen El, a longtime San Francisco resident, usually leaves the plaza each day with about $20 or $30 in his pocket, after paying people who help him out. He said he typically buys the goods from others or receives donations, and his proceeds help him meet basic needs such as food and clothes washing.

“I’m not trying to get rich,” he said. “I’m just trying to get by.”

Rojas’ organization, Calle 24, has been trying to inform the community about the new city law on street vending. But she and other local leaders knowing the neighborhood won’t see enough improvement by focusing on street vending alone.

“We can give all of our vendors a permit, but what’s going to happen to the people who are struggling the most?” Rojas said. “We can’t just continue to punish them and forget that they’re humans and that they’re part of our community (too).”

The street-vending increase has been hard on some of the Mission’s stores. Ronen, the supervisor, has spoken about business owners who have called her in tears because the influx of street vendors were obstructing sidewalks, deterring customers and in some cases selling the same items for much cheaper prices.

Street vendors and customers crowd the sidewalk around the 24th St. Mission BART Station on March 24.

Lea Suzuki/The Chronicle

Ryen Motzek, the president of the Mission Merchants Association, who has worked in the neighborhood for 20 years, said he’s never seen anything like the current street conditions.

“Every neighborhood has its challenges, but this is a whole other level,” Motzek said. “It’s really affecting the mom and pop businesses the hardest. It’s devastating.”

Capt. Gavin McEachern of the San Francisco Police Department’s Mission Station acknowledged that quality-of-life issues in the neighborhood are widespread, which he partly attributed to consequences of the pandemic.

“It’s pretty bad,” McEachern said. “Not only visually, but I just think the sheer volume of things that we’re seeing is pretty daunting … It doesn’t look comfortable in the district and it doesn’t feel comfortable.”

McEachern said his officers’ work in the Mission is hampered partly by low staffing levels — a problem throughout SFPD. The station is down about 12 officers since October, when McEachern took the helm temporarily before assuming the role permanently in January.

“Traditionally, Mission Station is one of the biggest-staffed stations,” he said. “I don’t know if it’s ever been this low.”

McEachern said he has also been sending some Mission-based police officers to the Tenderloin, often through voluntary overtime but sometimes using on-duty personnel if no one steps up. On Wednesdays, when Mission Station is at maximum staffing levels, a handful of officers go to the tenderloin as a matter of course.

As Ronen and her office push the city to shift more of its focus back to the mission, local community groups aren’t waiting for the government to fix everything. Rojas said Calle 24 plans to have quarterly trash cleanups within the district’s boundaries, set to the north and south by 22nd Street and Cesar Chavez Street and to the east and west by Potrero Avenue and Mission Street. The first cleanup is scheduled for May 7th.

To Rojas, it’s part of her belief in the interconnected nature of the issues facing the Mission and San Francisco overall.

“It all goes in a cycle,” she said. “If we really look at the root of what’s going on, we can address core issues and find better, sustainable solutions.”

JD Morris is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jd.morris@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @thejdmorris