San Francisco officials are allowing construction of a 10-story apartment building at the site of a deadly fire over the impassioned opposition of residents, a move that some of those leaders say is a sign of how California housing laws have changed development and land use politics.
The city Planning Commission voted 4-3 to allow property owner Hawk Lou to move forward with the 181-unit residential development at 2588 Mission St. Neighbors in the historically Latino Mission District have nicknamed the project “La Muerte de la Misíón,” or "The Death of the Mission." It's a reference to a fire that broke out there a decade ago, killing a tenant, injuring six people and displacing 60 tenants and 26 businesses, as well as to fears that the Mission neighborhood is succumbing to gentrification. The approval marks the final step in the permitting process, with the developer next expected to obtain a building permit.
Dozens of residents spoke out against the proposed building this month at a Planning Commission meeting. A number of them said they had long-held concerns about gentrification in a neighborhood that’s been held up by critics as a symbol of ways in which the tech industry and other economic forces have contributed to displacing families and small businesses in traditionally working-class neighborhoods in San Francisco.
The plan calls for 19 of the 181 apartments in the building to be priced as affordable, a number that Mission residents — and even some policymakers — said was too low. A handful of community groups had appealed the development, saying they hoped an environmental study would block the project and make way for a more affordable one to move forward.
For years, anti-gentrification activists have stymied the development of market-rate projects in the neighborhood, including ones they dubbed the “Beast on Bryant” — a two-building complex with nearly 400 units — and the 380-unit “Monster in the Mission,” both of which developers eventually scrapped. Both sites were later approved for 100% affordable housing projects.
This project, however, is moving forward as San Francisco has fallen behind on satisfying its state mandates for new housing, with the city required to plan for 82,000 units by 2031. In 2024, just over 1,200 units were completed, according to city data, about half the 2,593 homes produced in San Francisco in 2023. The supply-strapped San Francisco Bay Area has average rents of $3,256 per month, among the most expensive in the country and nearly double the national average.
Local governments across California in recent years have scrambled to stitch together plans that collectively meet a statewide goal of 2.5 million new units by 2031, as state leaders work to address what they call an affordability crisis that has sent residents to cheaper states.
'Deserves better'
Several planning commissioners — including some who voted to approve the proposed 2588 Mission St. building — said that they would have preferred to see a 100% affordable housing development at the site, but that the law did not permit them to reject the development.
“This community deserves a lot better,” said Planning Commissioner Gilbert Williams, citing what he characterized as the negative fallout of the city’s lack of affordable housing on lower-income longtime residents of the Mission District. “To me this whole project is about equity … this project represents more of the same … it hurts the residents.”
California has in recent years passed laws designed to give developers the power to win streamlined approvals even if they face widespread neighborhood opposition. California’s density bonus law and the Housing Accountability Act are designed to prevent anti-development forces from holding up developments in lengthy environmental review processes and other types of red tape.
David Blackwell, an attorney for Lou, stressed that under the law commissioners could vote against the project only if they prove it would have “a specific adverse impact on public health or safety.”
Blackwell added that “at the end of the day, there is only one standard that applies here, and if you are going to follow state law you have to approve this project. The state law is crystal clear about what the standard is.”
Commissioner Sean McGarry said before voting to approve the project that it was “going to happen one way or the other. We don’t have somebody who’s going to step in and make this 100% affordable. That’s the reality,” he said. “We have to move on one way or another.”
Dozens of residential tenants of the mixed-use building that caught fire in early 2015 later sued landlord Hawk Lou, accusing him of failing to maintain the building and provide working smoke alarms. The lawsuits resulted in settlements of undisclosed sums. United to Save the Mission — a coalition of neighborhood groups — blocked previous proposals by Lou to redevelop the long-vacant property, which is now covered by a carpet of green grass.
Lou did not respond to a request from CoStar News to comment beyond his lawyer's statements.
Not enough housing
Members of the public assembled in the packed meeting room this month clapped and booed throughout the hearing, despite repeated admonitions by city staff, who threatened to call the sheriff twice in an effort to restore order.
United to Save the Mission organizer Larisa Pedroncelli argued that the development violates a different set of housing laws that require communities to “affirmatively further fair housing."
City staff members said that efforts had been made to explore a deal that would enable affordable housing on the 2588 Mission St. site but that those efforts had failed. Media reports in recent years said efforts by the city to acquire the property had stalled because the parties could not agree on a price.
Grow SF, one of a handful of political action groups that have cropped up in San Francisco in recent years with backing from members of the tech industry, said on its website that the project represents a step toward solving San Francisco’s housing shortage.
The group wrote that “there's a long history of anti-development activism in the Mission based on the false belief that new homes cause gentrification, drive up rents, and displace existing residents. In reality, new homes help meet demand and lower prices for everyone, while also ensuring people have access to high quality housing. This project meets all the requirements and has been through multiple rounds of public hearings and revisions."