Well, I don't wish to be too negative, but SF is really reaping what it sowed. Up to now the problems were just papered over by enough benefits for people working there to outweigh all SF's issues.
The government and people of SF squandered years of opportunity to clean up the city, make it more affordable to live here (is there pride to be had in being the most expensive place to live?), implement sound policies, focus on the right things, and get people to make long term better decisions. They did very little of that preparation. It's like building up points for when hard times come.
Instead, they continued to enable housing restrictions to drive up rents like crazy (acknowledging that this is a California-wide problem I admit), letting entrenched owners interests combine with ridiculous things like rent control and "neighborhood preservation", failing to take a harder line on open air drug use and crime, letting Muni and Bart become public toilets that charge optional admission fees where you also are at risk of getting stabbed, etc. etc. the list goes on and on. Overlooking quality of life issues in favor of being tolerant of anything that someone would object to having restrictions on or less charitable approaches to.
And now, as the reality of the virus situation has exposed what people really prefer to do, they fled, and the impact to local businesses, tax base, etc. will be felt for years to come. Parts of the city are lawless and a danger for people to venture into. Good thing that all the supervisors were concerned with gender neutral bathrooms while fewer and fewer people could afford to live here to enjoy them.
I'm not a conservative. I'm not a Trump supporter. But even I can see that SF shot itself in the foot.
The government and people of SF squandered years of opportunity to clean up the city, make it more affordable to live here (is there pride to be had in being the most expensive place to live?), implement sound policies, focus on the right things, and get people to make long term better decisions. They did very little of that preparation. It's like building up points for when hard times come.
Instead, they continued to enable housing restrictions to drive up rents like crazy (acknowledging that this is a California-wide problem I admit), letting entrenched owners interests combine with ridiculous things like rent control and "neighborhood preservation", failing to take a harder line on open air drug use and crime, letting Muni and Bart become public toilets that charge optional admission fees where you also are at risk of getting stabbed, etc. etc. the list goes on and on. Overlooking quality of life issues in favor of being tolerant of anything that someone would object to having restrictions on or less charitable approaches to.
And now, as the reality of the virus situation has exposed what people really prefer to do, they fled, and the impact to local businesses, tax base, etc. will be felt for years to come. Parts of the city are lawless and a danger for people to venture into. Good thing that all the supervisors were concerned with gender neutral bathrooms while fewer and fewer people could afford to live here to enjoy them.
I'm not a conservative. I'm not a Trump supporter. But even I can see that SF shot itself in the foot.