Mayor Daniel Lurie campaigned on a promise to open 1,500 shelter beds within six months of taking office and to address the homeless crisis in a systematic, efficient way.
At the six-month mark, he abruptly changed course. That’s when Lurie’s chief of health and human services, Kunal Modi, announced that the administration had chosen to focus on adding the “right” beds rather than seeking a “magic number.”
The “right” kind of beds included those with sobriety requirements, locked treatment beds and beds in psychiatric units. And with limited city funds, beds that provide simple shelter for the homeless — rather than people in acute distress — are of lower priority.
As of April, 16 months into his tenure, Lurie had overseen the opening of 863 new shelter beds, for a total of about 7,500 city-wide. But the city has also closed multiple shelters, with some shuttered due to decisions made before he took office — meaning the the net gain is considerably less.
Under Lurie, San Francisco has only seen a net increase of 403 beds, under 30 percent of his initial goal.
With additional planned openings and closings, that number will drop to just 303 added beds by 2028, if the changes come on schedule.
Many of the new beds are designed to provide compulsory treatment or stabilize people in crisis — for example, someone who is having a mental health episode, or is visibly intoxicated. That is the case with the beds at the Eleanora Fagan Center “respite program” at the Kean Hotel, or the 24-hour medical facility at 822 Geary where police can forcibly take homeless people in need of care.
Shelters focused on stabilization and treatment have increased by 170 percent, according to the mayor’s office’s count.
Along with creating new beds for those in crisis, the Lurie administration has shifted the system toward shorter-term shelter. What happens to people when they leave those shelters is not clear, but at present, the city says, they are connected to other limited housing resources.
Lurie has added or announced 676 new beds in short-term shelters, where residents can stay for a few days or a few weeks.
Some 385 were or will be removed from long-term shelters, where residents could stay for a year or longer. That includes the closure of a 280-bed shelter at 711 Post, as well as the 102-bed shelter at the Monarch.
With a heightened focus on crisis stabilization, Lurie has announced the creation of 343 beds for people in crisis. These sites tend to house people for shorter periods, as does the "police-friendly" medical facility with 16 beds and the sheriff's new sobering facility, or RESET center with 25 reclining chairs.
Lurie opened the city's first sober homeless shelter, Hope House, in September. Since he took office, at least 470 beds have or will have sobriety requirements or a focus on substance abuse treatment.
Up until now, the city has seen a 403 net increase in beds since Lurie took office.
In coming months, over 300 shelter beds at 711 Post and the Fifth Street Apartments will close. Over 100 beds will be added at three locations by 2028: a new behavioral health facility on Treasure Island, locked beds at UCSF's Health Hyde Hospital, and psychiatric wards at San Francisco General Hospital.
The bottom line: With the closures in the pipeline, Lurie will have overseen a net increase of 303 beds.
Forsaking ‘housing first’
The change in priorities has raised concerns among supporters of “Housing First,” a social policy that contends that providing accessible, low-barrier housing to the homeless eases treatment of issues like substance abuse, mental illness or unemployment.
Housing First supporters have been alarmed at the prospect that mental health and substance abuse treatment, while much-needed, may come at the expense of shelters that could serve a wider range of people. For example, the Lurie administration elected to shut down the low-barrier 280-bed shelter at 711 Post, despite consistent reports that it was successfully meeting its objectives.
In addition to shuttering longer-term, low-barrier shelters, the city has reportedly told service providers of plans to shutter multiple permanent supportive housing buildings, where residents pay reduced rent. Lurie’s spokesperson Charles Lutvak called permanent supportive housing “critical,” but said the city needs to “make it work better.”
“I just worry about the push for transitional models without a long-term affordable option for people to transition to,” said Lauren Hall, the co-chair of the Supportive Housing Provider Network. “We can do some diversification of the portfolio, but I think we need to keep all the tools in the toolbox at the ready.”
At the same time, the Lurie administration has expanded the traditional definition of a shelter “bed.”
Twenty four-hour holding facilities for people in crisis, for example, now count as shelter beds. So do the 25 reclining chairs inside the new RESET center, a locked facility near the Hall of Justice that opened on May 4, where law enforcement now detains people picked up for public intoxication for less than 24 hours.
“We actually have a net gain of more clinically intensive beds,” said Emily Cohen, a spokesperson for the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing. She said her department is collaborating more closely with the Department of Public Health to “integrate” services in “a more deliberate way.”
Sharky Laguana, a local businessman who serves on the Homeless Oversight Commission, said the change in direction is because the city is in a “terrible conundrum” budget-wise.
The average homeless person will fare much better mentally and physically if placed in stable housing, Laguna added. “But a fair number of those people are trapped in a cycle where the housing’s not going to make a material difference.”
The Board of Supervisors is considering legislation from Supervisor Matt Dorsey that could allow for the eviction of permanent supportive housing residents if they use drugs. Moving forward, Dorsey and his cadre of co-sponsors on the board hope to bar the city from funding future supportive housing sites where residents can’t be evicted only for using drugs.
Paul Harkin, former director of harm reduction programs at GLIDE, the Tenderloin-based social justice organization, said the city must find a “sweet spot” of offering levels of treatment for those at different stages of recovery, and continue to treat those who relapse.
“There is no other condition where you get kicked out of the hospital when you have a symptom of the condition,” Harkin noted. Addiction, he added, is “a chronic recurring condition, not a moral failure.”
A trial and error playbook
As with the frequent opening and closing of shelter beds, Lurie’s administration has been characterized by announcing programs and strategies to address homelessness and street conditions, and at times, abruptly pivoting.
Some see this as flexibility, others, a high-stakes waste of city funds.
For example, when Lurie took office, he honed in on long-troubled Sixth Street.
In February 2025, he launched a new triage center, a place for law enforcement to bring bad actors in the area and quickly put them into detention, as well as connect homeless people to services. By June, that site closed — Lurie’s office called it a successful pilot — and became an “oasis,” a staffed community space like the one successfully operated by Urban Alchemy in the Tenderloin. That shuttered in January.
Harkin, who is often out in the Sixth Street area doing outreach, has been dismayed to see that conditions on the corridor haven’t improved much since Lurie decided to focus city resources there.
“What were the promises, what was all the money he spent? What went well, if anything?” Harkin asked. “It’s exactly the same as before Lurie came.”
Sources say the mayor’s office is pushing for what it considers to be “high-quality” and more integrated services. This means a continued focus on shelter beds that come in conjunction with treatment, or specialized shelters that focus on groups with specific needs, like youth, seniors, or families.
Nearly a year and a half into Lurie’s tenure, it’s still to be determined which approach, if any, will stick.
“We’ll find out,” Laguana said of the city’s new direction and priorities for homeless shelters and treatment. “Maybe it won’t be right … And maybe, who knows — maybe they’re right.”
Methodology
This article relies on data provided to Mission Local by the Office of the Mayor, the Department of Public Health and the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing and is up-to-date as of April 2026.
Certain shelter categories are based on Mission Local reporting. The “crisis stabilization” shelter category includes beds for those fleeing domestic violence, suffering a mental health episode, or stabilizing during withdrawal from substance use. The “sobriety” shelter category includes beds that Mission Local determined to have sobriety as an explicit requirement of stay, locked healthcare facilities, and drug abuse treatment centers.
Additional data analysis and graphics by Kelly Waldron.