You can see all of our 16th Street posts here.
The Mobile Unit Two had not returned to the southwest plaza at 2 p.m. Sunday, but it was hard to say that it mattered.
Unpermitted vending and drug use, as it does every weekend day and often during the week, boomed on the west side of Mission Street and spilled over onto the side streets.
Both vending and drug use thrive, despite the block being home to an early childhood development center and families who live at the 100 percent affordable housing complex, La Fenix at 1950 Mission St.
One father, who walked out of La Fenix on Sunday with his daughter, said he wants out of the complex managed by Bridge Housing. Bridge, he said, is helping him find a new unit elsewhere. He was not happy with their management at La Fenix.
“They have community meetings, but I don’t feel like they do anything,” he said. “The security guards don’t watch the door and I’m tired of hearing people fornicate in the alley.”
He’s ready to move on.
It is surprising how many children, just walking by after a shopping trip or needing to get home, have to navigate the block.
Southwest Plaza and the west side of Mission Street
2:28 p.m 6/15, southwest plaza, Photo by Lydia Chávez 
2:27 p.m 6/15, near the nortwest corner of Mission Street, Photo by Lydia Chávez 
2:28 p.m 6/15, west side of Mission Street, Photo by Lydia Chávez 
2:28 p.m 6/15, west side of Mission Street, Photo by Lydia Chávez 
2:29 p.m 6/15, west side of Mission Street, Photo by Lydia Chávez 
2:29 p.m 6/15, west side of Mission Street, Photo by Lydia Chávez 
2:29 p.m 6/15, west side of Mission Street, Photo by Lydia Chávez 
2:30 p.m 6/15, west side of Mission Street, Photo by Lydia Chávez 
2:30 p.m 6/15, west side of Mission Street, Photo by Lydia Chávez 
2:30 p.m 6/15, west side of Mission Street, Photo by Lydia Chávez 
2:41 p.m 6/15, west side of Mission Street, Photo by Lydia Chávez 
2:41 p.m 6/15, west side of Mission Street, Photo by Lydia Chávez
Sad to mention but looks like the Mayor has simply moved on with the cleansing of San Francisco’$ major drug and stolen articles vending…Yes it was a good start but .. evidently the administration is now …..yawn ..getting sleepy,sleepy, where it goes maybe a miracle will take place ..yawn!
This was always destined to happen. Lurie is a PR hype man.
I can easily recall when the Mission District had no more than about one dozen homeless characters. The worst thing was weekend nights, when people would show up from outside the neighborhood, to act as if they controlled the street parking spaces, and would ask for a donation to look after your car when you were gone; leaving the impression that something might happen, if you didn’t pay something. Now, there isn’t nearly the same level of interests in the clubs, bars, cafes, and restaurants. However, there are one helluva lot more homeless. I wonder if there is some sort of correlation?
Whatever happened to all the opponents of the “monster in the mission”housing development that was stopped at the former Walgreens site?
I can remember the plaza for decades was a perfectly decent area. Now I’m afraid to enter BART on that side and the other side isn’t much better.
Yesterday afternoon a young man overdosed and was being given oxygen while a crowd silently looked on.
I though how things might not have been l se chaotic had the lat monster mixed income developed hmbeen allowed to go forward but the “anti-gentrification”lobby won and now families are afraid to live in the “affordable housing”that was created instead.
IInteresring playing out of the laws of unintended consequences.
The anti monster in mission folks got exactly what they wanted. This is good for lower home prices when junkies are visible on the street. They don’t want the area to get nicer as that would cause gentrification.
I saw a crew offering a guy emergency breathing, a device that was working his lungs, only, the electric pulse was so great that it looked like they were going to do serious damage to the organs. I mean, we all know how people naturally breath, and we know what very extremely pronounced and prolonged contortions look like when we see them.
One literally has nothing to do with the other except location proximity.
You’re trying to make anti-gentrification responsible for mission homelessnes and drug abuse as if that’s how it actually works. The opposite is probably closer to being somewhat accurate but even that is inherently flawed logic. It’s two very different things going on and I guess human beings like to link things when making a political argument without actually researching it.
So you think if the monster in the mission was built, the junkies between 15-16th on mission would still be there?
A shiny new building tends to clean things up around it. That is the benefit of gentrification.
1950 Mission 100% affordable housing is a shiny new building.
One literally has nothing to do with the other.
Conflating things is the hallmark of simple (political) minds that don’t care to explore reality as it actually is, but invent narratives that reinforce what they already thought entirely from scratch. AKA, what you are doing here now.
Only because they hire intimidating security guards.
I am a 44 year old woman that is currently working at a navigation center it seems to me that the people that they are helping don’t want help they house them feed them pay for everything that they need and they continue to do drugs most of them end up dying they give them no type of counseling as a woman that works at a navigation center and is also homeless and can’t seem to get no type of help getting housed I was literally have to quit my job to get help seems backwards to me
The SFPD Station is two blocks away at Valencia & 17th: why aren’t the police foot-patrolling and just -walking- to 16 & Mission? Why all this mobile command business??
Lydia and Mayor Lurie who must read here,
Hope he does anyway.
Skippy and I circled the Armory area picking up trash and buying stolen items I guess from a variety of vendors.
I buy mostly raw honey and coffee and used clothing plus beef jerky for Skippy.
And, bracelets !!
None this weekend as my friend and vendor wasn’t there and I still have enuff for the week I’m sure beyond the stuff I keep hanging for decor.
I do the weave through the crowded vendors like I own the place.
Imagine dragging a luggage cart holding a plastic laundry basket 3 feet high and a dog on a leash and I can’t believe I do this stuff.
Anyway, there are lots and lots of bargains for things that aren’t stolen but simply used or outdated.
I mean, who buys tools with cords on them anymore
There are a hundred available on the street from various vendors who also have wonderful arrays of old hand tools and heavy duty used coats (got my army coat from one at 7 bucks a decade or more back) … the Street Vendors feed off of the crowd from the Weekend regular La Pigue Lita Flea Market in the parking lot just south of the armory and has more of the feel of an outdoor department store with the same people in the same area with varying sized spaces weekly and skippy and pick up trash as we move through there shopping too and after a decade I know pretty much all of the vendors cause I’m the talkative sort and your focus is trees and forest with you looking for everything illegal which misses the Living Life Experience it is just to walk past the collapsed junkies in their own filth lying next to a street kitchen vendor whose patrons sit close on the sidewalk and eat while ignoring the filth and junkies and Fenties who are entirely different tribes of ‘Narco Nomads’ you get to know while putting kitty litter on their shit.
lol
16th and Mission needs a Permanent Security Presence in a Koban style from the European models with one officer always in the Koban and the other two on rotating single officer foot patrols in radius of 2 blocks or so.
Put a little stage next to the Cop Box and a podium for those wanting to share poetry or their love of the good book.
go Niners !!
h.
Mmm hmm, that’s whatever you were talking about.
I’m tired of hearing people fornicate in the alley.’
You all should be used to it now because it’s not going to get better any time soon.
Haha. Sorry.
I live two blocks from 16th & Mission and walk through all the alleys unafraid with hundreds of dollars in my pocket and I never see any of the horrors that I hear about, including anybody fornicating in alleys.
You and yours are a great community. 2 things stand out, closed stores for mixed use and few places for creative arts by the people.
It’s relatively simple. Please forgive me if my tone is immodest or is dismissive. If you want to move junkies and many of the vendors, you gotta move the Hondos. The Hondos are actually quite reasonable. Well, the one’s over age 20. Relocate them and the crowd will follow. Trying to eliminate it totally is futile and is foolish.