Mission Local

Mission Local News from San Francisco's Mission District

The Budget and Finance Committee Wednesday couldn’t bring itself to take a formal stance on a proposed $33 million contr...
09/03/2026

The Budget and Finance Committee Wednesday couldn’t bring itself to take a formal stance on a proposed $33 million contract extension for a controversial permitting system that’s still grappling with basic tasks and lacks a clear plan for phasing in more complex ones. ⁠
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Supervisors Danny Sauter, Chyanne Chen and Matt Dorsey opted unanimously to advance the vote on locking in OpenGov through 2031 to the full board without an up or down recommendation. ⁠
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The three supervisors were largely in agreement that they supported Lurie’s effort, in the abstract, to overhaul an archaic and redundant permitting system fragmented across multiple departments. ⁠

“There is not enough data that demonstrates [OpenGov] works as intended,” Chen said.
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PermitSF director Liz Watty, who has overseen OpenGov’s implementation, acknowledged myriad lessons learned from the first year of the software and its selection process. ⁠
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But she insisted on greenlighting the $33 million extension without a full roadmap of milestones and deliverables — a lingering concern among city staffers Wednesday, who raised an option of reducing the extension amount to $12 million.⁠
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📸: Brandon Pho

Proposition G, the November measure that seeks to re-open the area now known as Sunset Dunes Park to cars on weekdays, h...
09/02/2026

Proposition G, the November measure that seeks to re-open the area now known as Sunset Dunes Park to cars on weekdays, has cleaved the two San Francisco congressional candidates: Sen. Scott Wiener is against the measure, and District 1 Supervisor Connie Chan is for it.⁠
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Prop. G is a favorite on the Westside, where over 60 percent of voters in the Richmond and Sunset neighborhoods, opposed the 2024 proposition that closed the Great Highway to cars and turned it into a permanent park.⁠
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But the congressional race is citywide, and there Wiener may take the advantage: San Franciscans voted 55 to 45 in favor of the park two years ago. ⁠
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Wiener is embracing the difference. He has authored the official argument against the measures, which will be printed on the information pamphlet sent to every voter, and spoke at the No on G campaign’s Aug. 16 kickoff. ⁠
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Chan is more reticent. She supports Prop. G, according to her campaign, but has not publicly interacted with the Yes on G campaign. The measure’s opponents, in fact, did not realize Chan had taken a position until they were contacted by Mission Local.⁠
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📸: Junyao Yang

Last week, San Francisco’s Board of Appeals ruled 4-0 to stop the Department of Public Works from removing a healthy, de...
09/02/2026

Last week, San Francisco’s Board of Appeals ruled 4-0 to stop the Department of Public Works from removing a healthy, decades-old sycamore in Potrero Hill. ⁠
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But it may be one of the last times the board is able to do so: Mayor Daniel Lurie’s proposed street-tree ordinance would eliminate Board of Appeals review for trees classified as hazardous, giving Public Works sole jurisdiction, and accelerate the timeline for other city-initiated removals.⁠
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Public Works officials have argued that the appeals process can leave dangerous trees standing longer than they should. ⁠
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Josh Klipp, a certified accessibility specialist and former vice chair of the San Francisco Urban Forestry Council, appealed the removal. ⁠
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“Part of the reason I was able to do such effective advocacy is because I had the time to do a records request and write a thorough brief,” Klipp told Mission Local. Under a compressed process, he said, “we don’t get to have those informed conversations.”
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Public Works did not submit a brief responding to Klipp’s appeal to the board. But at the appeal meeting, Public Works accessibility coordinator Kevin Jensen disputed Klipp’s assessment. ⁠
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📸: Google Street View

San Francisco police officers did not issue dispersal orders immediately before arresting 18 people at the “Stud Alley” ...
09/02/2026

San Francisco police officers did not issue dispersal orders immediately before arresting 18 people at the “Stud Alley” party over Pride weekend, according to internal police documents and body camera footage. ⁠
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A dispatch log shows that 18 people were arrested on Washburn Street between 11:52-11:54 p.m. Two dispersal orders were read afterwards, at 12 a.m. and 12:04 a.m., the log shows. ⁠
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These documents contradict the San Francisco Police Department’s initial report, which said two officers issued dispersal orders at a second location on Washburn Street ahead of the arrests. ⁠
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“These charges are just completely nonsensical,” said Rachel Lederman, an attorney who is representing two Stud Alley arrestees. “This is really just an act of harassment against the trans and q***r community.” ⁠
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The San Francisco Police Department, for its part, noted that dispersal orders were issued at the first location on Kissling Street, where two people were arrested, and stood by their original messaging. ⁠
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The 18 defendants will next appear in court on Thursday, Sept. 3 for their arraignment. ⁠
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📸: Screenshot from San Francisco Police Department body-cam footage

SNAPS of the week: 3DR AVE ⁠⁠📸: Scott K.
09/02/2026

SNAPS of the week: 3DR AVE ⁠
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📸: Scott K.

Four murals in Clarion Alley, the iconic Mission District’s passage with over 50 murals connecting Mission and Valencia ...
09/02/2026

Four murals in Clarion Alley, the iconic Mission District’s passage with over 50 murals connecting Mission and Valencia streets, were painted over last week.⁠
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A representative from Clarion Alley Mural Project, which manages the alley, said the murals can be restored, but the cost is unclear. ⁠
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A neighbor witnessed a man painting over the murals. Doug Rhodes, an artist who has a studio on Clarion Alley, said that by the time he saw the man, he was on his fourth mural. ⁠
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“My boss told me to,” the man said to Rhodes.⁠
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A representative from Clarion Alley Mural Project said that the organization reached out to Makras Real Estate, the company that manages the building where the murals were painted over, and received an email stating that the property owner ordered an employee to paint over some reported “graffiti.”⁠
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Rhodes later painted over the blank space “Mural In Progress” while the murals get restored. ⁠
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📸: Oscar Palma

Of the 5,400 or so San Francisco addresses with elevators registered with the state, half — about 2,800 buildings — have...
09/01/2026

Of the 5,400 or so San Francisco addresses with elevators registered with the state, half — about 2,800 buildings — have just one, according to public records obtained by Mission Local. ⁠
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City law requires landlords of buildings higher than 50 feet — generally four to five stories — to maintain at least one working elevator, but sets no deadline for fixing one when it breaks. ⁠
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Among San Francisco’s nearly 2,800 single-elevator buildings, records show more than a third haven’t had a recorded inspection in more than three years, and nearly 20 percent haven’t been inspected in more than five years.⁠
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“It’s called being in prison. It totally interrupts your life,” said Raymond Levy, 77, who lives at 57 Taylor St. in the Tenderloin.⁠
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Olga, 81, has lived on the top floor of 545 O’Farrell St. for more than 21 years. She has to climb 10 flights of stairs several times a day. “I didn’t see three steps and fell all the way down to the second level,” she said. ⁠
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Mission Local has reached out to corporate landlords Mosser and Veritas for comment on the 545 O’Farrell St. and 57 Taylor St. properties, but did not hear back. ⁠
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📸: Hamza Fahmy

Supervisor Jackie Fielder will introduce legislation Tuesday to set a minimum amount of unpaid rent that can justify an ...
09/01/2026

Supervisor Jackie Fielder will introduce legislation Tuesday to set a minimum amount of unpaid rent that can justify an eviction in San Francisco, a means to “provide renters some breathing room in the midst of unprecedented affordability and housing crises,” she said. ⁠
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San Francisco’s Rent Ordinance allows evictions for any nonpayment of rent, regardless of how much is owed.⁠
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Fielder’s ordinance would allow eviction only if a tenant owes more than a month’s rent, defined by the “fair market rent” that the federal government says a typical apartment of a certain size costs for one month in San Francisco.⁠
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The legislation is “not going to erase a tenant’s debt to a landlord or enable tenants to permanently live rent-free,” Fielder said. ⁠
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Co-sponsors include supervisors Myrna Melgar, Shamann Walton, Connie Chan, Bilal Mahmood and Chyanne Chen.⁠

“This legislation will give much-needed stability to renters across our city, but it must be a first step,” Mayor Daniel Lurie said in a statement. “We are continuing to identify additional steps to support families so we can build a city that makes it easy for them to put down roots.”
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📸: Zoe Malen

In October 2025, Mayor Daniel Lurie’s office awarded a $5.9 million contract for an ambitious overhaul of the city’s arc...
09/01/2026

In October 2025, Mayor Daniel Lurie’s office awarded a $5.9 million contract for an ambitious overhaul of the city’s archaic permitting system to OpenGov, a largely untested tech firm with connections to his former nonprofit, Tipping Point. ⁠
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Since then, OpenGov has missed key deadlines by several months to roll out basic permits. ⁠
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The software Lurie championed still has limited functionality and, city workers say, is still only being applied to simpler tasks. ⁠
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Nevertheless, the mayor’s allies want to extend the OpenGov deal — currently set to expire Sept. 30 — by five years to 2031 for an additional $33 million. A preliminary vote is set for Wednesday. ⁠
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“Without a contract extension now, the project of modernizing permitting would stall and we would have to unwind all the permits we’ve launched this year,” wrote Liz Watty, the head of the permit streamlining initiative PermitSF, in a statement to Mission Local. ⁠
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“The city is still phasing this thing in, trying to make it work in our department,” said one city staffer. “We’re building the plane while flying it.” ⁠
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📸: Zoe Malen

After announcing plans to shutter earlier this month, SF Camerawork, the nonprofit gallery that has supported the work o...
09/01/2026

After announcing plans to shutter earlier this month, SF Camerawork, the nonprofit gallery that has supported the work of experimental photographers for more than 50 years, is snapping back to life.⁠
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On Aug. 10, Camerawork’s then-board of directors announced plans to shut down the 52-year-old institution. Within days, Hal Fischer drafted a plan to save it. ⁠ ⁠
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Fischer, 75, a renowned San Francisco photographer-turned-art-world-professional, is now the nonprofit’s board president, with an all-new board. The gallery is set to reopen on Sept. 9. ⁠
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Fischer joins six other new board members, including photographer Alex Ramos and City College of San Francisco photography department chair Erika Gentry. ⁠
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“Our goal is to stabilize it and to get it up again,” said Gentry. ⁠
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Fischer said the nonprofit will maintain its lease at Fort Mason Center for Arts and Culture, where it has been since 2022. ⁠
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📸: David Lee/Creative Commons

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