by Randy Shaw on March 11, 2024 (BeyondChron.org)
Tents, open drug use in Little Saigon
Abandoning Little Saigon
Last week the Tenderloin’s Little Saigon neighborhood was filled with tents, drug dealers and drug users. City Hall appears intent on keeping it this way.
Why are we allowing the city’s tribute to the Southeast Asian refugees who revitalized the Tenderloin go down the drain? Why are small businesses in and near Little Saigon not getting the city help other neighborhoods are getting?
Many are looking for answers.
My story last November on San Francisco’s failure to protect Little Saigon (See “While City Fiddles, Little Saigon Falls”) got a great response. Many asked why instead of revitalizing the area City Hall was making public safety worse by funding a homeless shelter at the formerly tourist COVA Hotel. This fills the area with dealers and users.
In January we learned that a DPH-funded program was opening a homeless drop-in center in the heart of Little Saigon at the former site of Turtle Tower (See “Little Saigon Fights to Survive,” January 16, 2024). Mayor Breed quickly stepped in to put the plan on hold. It remains subject to the nonprofit securing a conditional use permit for the space.
Worse Than Before
Little Saigon (Larkin to O’Farrell) looks like a neighborhood the city has abandoned. Tents and drug users dominate sidewalks not just outside the city-funded COVA Hotel but on every block of the east side of Larkin.
Where are the police? I virtually never see a police officer in Little Saigon. Why would they be? Chief Scott refuses to provide beat cops in the area or in any other residential part of the Tenderloin. Supervisor Safai sponsored a law to require beat officers in neighborhoods but like a lot of city laws it is not applied in the Tenderloin neighborhood (Tenderloin Station beat cops patrol Market Street and no street north of Golden Gate).
The Chief has officers walking beats in Union Square—which sure hasn’t stopped Macy’s planned closure or the departure of other businesses in the area. Tenderloin small businesses have begged the Chief for beat cops but he refuses to provide them.
Last week’s debate over whether San Francisco is still “progressive” should instead have asked whether denying beat cops to the city’s largest low-income and working-class neighborhood is “progressive.” I think we can agree it is not.
The west side of Larkin had no tents or drug users—but it also had only a handful of people because most of the retail is closed.
Just outside Little Saigon on the 800 block of Larkin a new art gallery is opening next to the soon to open site for the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot play. The area leading to those venues is a park that has monitors. Across the street, however, is a sidewalk packed with drug users.
Reality Check
Allowing Little Saigon to go from a thriving restaurant district to a drug containment zone is a tragedy for San Francisco. I previously suggested that empty storefronts could be helped by the city’s vacant to vibrant program. Representatives of that program have convinced me that it doesn’t fit Little Saigon for many reasons—a major one being that nobody will open a business regardless of economic incentives if they can’t be sure tents and drug activities won’t kill their operation.
There are four tourist hotels within a block of Little Saigon. All get customers saying they love the hotel but don’t feel safe in the area.
Next year is the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War. Will Little Saigon remain a Southeast Asian dining hub? Or will City Hall use the area’s problems to justify converting the entire street to a homeless and mental health drop-in center?
I expect we will find out soon.
Randy Shaw
Randy Shaw is the Editor of Beyond Chron and the Director of San Francisco’s Tenderloin Housing Clinic, which publishes Beyond Chron. Shaw’s latest book is Generation Priced Out: Who Gets to Live in the New Urban America. He is the author of four prior books on activism, including The Activist’s Handbook: Winning Social Change in the 21st Century, and Beyond the Fields: Cesar Chavez, the UFW and the Struggle for Justice in the 21st Century. He is also the author of The Tenderloin: Sex, Crime and Resistance in the Heart of San Francisco
