Meet the District 8 candidates: Should S.F. use conservatorships to force drug treatment?

Welcome back to our “Meet the Candidates” series, where District 8 supervisor candidates respond to a question in 100 words or fewer. Answers are published every Wednesday.

District 8 includes neighborhoods in the center of the city, including the Castro, Noe Valley, Glen Park, Twin Peaks, Duboce Triangle, Dolores Heights, Parnassus Heights, Ashbury Heights, Corona Heights and Diamond Heights.

As the city has worked to address drug use on San Francisco’s streets, it has attempted to expand the use of conservatorships, where someone struggling with mental health or addiction becomes a ward of the city and is compelled into treatment. 

But expanding conservatorships is easier said than done. The city currently does not have enough “locked beds,” a treatment bed in a hospital where the patient receives services and cannot leave, to handle a significant increase in conservatorships. 

Because of that, the number of conservatorship cases has yet to significantly rise in San Francisco. In May 2025, Mayor Daniel Lurie announced that the city had received $21.3 million from the state to replace 97 treatment beds at SF General’s Behavioral Health Center with 57 new “locked” beds for people under conservatorship. 

Here’s our first question: Do you support San Francisco’s efforts to expand the use of conservatorships?

Mission Local color codes the answers to yes/no questions. A green background means the candidate answered yes, a red background means no, and a yellow background means that the candidate answered ambiguously.

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Gary McCoy

• Job: Former staffer to Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi and former vice president of policy and public affairs at HealthRIGHT 360
• Age: 48
• Residency: Renter, has lived in San Francisco for 24 years and District 8 for 15 years
• Transportation: Driving, biking, public transit and walking
• Education: Former City College of San Francisco student, certified phlebotomy technician from Bay Area Medical Academy
• Languages: English

Conservatorships are a complicated, though sometimes essential, tool to protect highly vulnerable people who can’t care for themselves. That said, taking away someone’s autonomy is one of the most serious things a government can do, and S.F. doesn’t currently have the budget, treatment capacity or beds to properly support those in its care. 

We need to continue to expand sub-acute treatment beds and intensive case management programs so that conservatees can access specialized care. But I don’t support expanding conservatorships without more beds and more funding, or without proper guardrails to ensure people don’t get trapped in a broken system.

Endorsed by: Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi, Supervisor Matt Dorsey, San Francisco Labor Council, Alice B. Toklas LGBTQ Democratic Club, Harvey Milk LGBTQ Democratic Club, San Francisco Tenants Union … see more here.

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Michael Nguyen

• Job: Patent attorney
• Age: 44
• Residency: Renter, has lived in District 8 since 2006
• Transportation: Driving, public transit and walking
• Education: Bachelor’s degree from Southwestern University, law degree from University of California Law San Francisco
• Languages: English, some Spanish, some Vietnamese

I view conservatorship as an extreme last resort, not a substitute for real services. I’m wary of expanding it while we have ongoing sweeps that push people block to block without a genuine offer of shelter, housing, treatment or case management. The city should engage encampments with sustained outreach and real choices. 

San Francisco has had a legal mandate for “treatment on demand” since Prop. T passed in 2008, but it still hasn’t been delivered. I’d only support conservatorship once every alternative has genuinely been exhausted, with strict due process, independent judicial review, and an actual bed and discharge plan.

See Nguyen’s full answer here.

Endorsed by: GLBTQ+ Asian Pacific Alliance, Harvey Milk LGBTQ Democratic Club (#2), San Francisco Green Party, former supervisor Dean Preston … see more here.

Darshini Patel

• Job: Former DoorDash employee, worked on the 2012 Obama campaign and the 2024 Harris campaign, former Obama staffer
• Age: 38
• Residency: Homeowner, has lived in District 8 for 10 cumulative years since 2010
• Transportation: Public transit, walking and biking
• Education: Bachelor’s degree from Wellesley College
• Languages: Gujarati, English

Yes, but only as a last resort when it leads to actual treatment. San Francisco already has emergency psychiatric holds for people in immediate crisis. Conservatorship is a longer-term loss of liberty, and evidence that coercive treatment produces lasting benefits is weak. 

Any expansion should be clinically driven and respect individual rights: minimally restrictive care settings, guaranteed counsel and prompt judicial review, regular reassessments, and public reporting on outcomes.

Most critically, it requires appropriate treatment beds, which San Francisco still lacks capacity to provide, especially for the most complex patients. Coercion should be a safeguard, not a substitute for care.

Endorsed by: N/A

Manny Yekutiel

• Job: Founder and owner of Manny’s, co-founder and former executive director of Civic Joy Fund
• Age: 36
• Residency: Renter, has lived in San Francisco since 2012 and District 8 since 2013
• Transportation: Driving, public transit and walking
• Education: Bachelor’s degree from Williams College
• Languages: English, Hebrew

Yes. Conservatorship should be a last resort, but when someone is truly unable to care for themselves and voluntary treatment has repeatedly failed, we need to step in. It needs to be easier to intervene in those cases, as well as easier for people to regain their independence once they stabilize. 

More broadly, the City needs enough psychiatric treatment capacity to actually bring people into care. That means giving DPH the tools and resources to stabilize people in crisis, secure longer-term holds when necessary, and greatly expand treatment beds.

Endorsed by: District 8 Supervisor Rafael Mandelman, Assemblymember Catherine Stefani, former Mayor Willie L. Brown Jr, Supervisor Bilal Mahmood, Jane Fonda, Senator Cory Booker, Grow SF, Abundant SF, San Francisco Apartment Association … see more here.

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Candidates are ordered alphabetically and rotated each week. Answers may be lightly edited for formatting, spelling, and grammar. If you have questions for the candidates, please let us know at io@missionlocal.com.  

Election Day is on Nov. 3, 2026. You can register to vote via the sf.gov website.