by Randy Shaw and Darshil Devdhara on August 4, 2025 (BeyondChron.org)
July 29, 2025 Report 10-11:50am
Public drug use in the Tenderloin has reached post-COVID highs. Consider: our July monitoring found many Tenderloin sidewalks had over 20 drug users per day. Some routinely had over 30. Why does City Hall allows this? 20 drug users would not be allowed for an hour on most city sidewalks; they have been allowed to take over Tenderloin blocks for years!
We undertook a painstaking, granular block by block analysis because our local politicians promote “stronger data-driven accountability.” The Tenderloin deserves accountability for what is happening on its sidewalks. New City Hall leadership in January raised expectations for change on the ground. After seven months, here is what we found.
Our Project and Methodology
Darshil Devdhara is a student at St. Ignatius High School. He worked as my intern for the month of July. Devdhara went out every weekday to count the number of people sitting or lying on sidewalks in the Tenderloin.
We could not confirm that every person sprawled out or sitting on sidewalks with those openly using drugs/alcohol are themselves illegal substance users. But their negative impact is the same. We also accounted for the distinction between SRO tenants going outside for a smoke break or fresh air and people involved with drugs; we did not count the former.
Too many Tenderloin sidewalks force families with children, seniors, and/or disabled residents to choose between walking by troubled people–often with dogs— or avoiding them by walking in the street. Small businesses suffer as customers eat elsewhere instead of walking by drug users to dine in the Tenderloin.
Our Findings
Here is Devdhara’s account:
“In July 2025 I walked throughout the Tenderloin weekdays for 4 weeks. It’s unbelievable how much drug usage I saw. There are little kids and seniors walking in this neighborhood next to innumerable numbers of drug users. I was offered drugs on a daily basis.
Ellis & Jones continues to be one of the worst intersections in the city. The intersection repeatedly had over 20 daily drug users with a high of 38 on July 31. People openly use in front of the permanent supportive housing at the Mentone Hotel and across the street. It’s been completely taken over by drug/alcohol-users despite being only a block away from Tenderloin Police Station.
Also out of control is Golden Gate and Leavenworth Street outside the TNDC-owned Kelly Cullen Center. I routinely saw 20 users/dealers with a high of 28. This activity also borders permanent supportive housing. It is the most common vehicle entry point into the Tenderloin. The open air drug market really hurts the neighborhood’s image.
I never saw police intervene in either drug-user filled location. The Tenderloin feels like a neighborhood which is lawless because there are no boundaries being enforced. I saw police presence during my walks a few times and they cleared the sidewalks of people. Greater police visibility made a difference.
Myrtle and Shannon alleys got worse through the month. They typically had at least 5 drug users and often more. It’s very obvious that they are home to open-air drug markets which are active everyday.
I was told when I began that Eddy and Hyde was deemed by the New York Times as far back as 2018 as the city’s worst drug corner. This July coincided with the most sustained police visibility on that block that has since occurred. As a result, on some days I saw 0 users/illegal vendors on the corner. But many other days had 12 users or more. And a block up from Hyde on Ellis averaged over five users a day throughout the month. That brought the average total for that stretch of Hyde to roughly 17 users—which is why most people not in the drug trade avoid the west side of the 300 block of Hyde.
I was asked to particularly focus on drug activity near the Hibernia Bank at McAllister and Jones and the adjacent Boyd Hotel, 41 Jones. There were routinely over 10 drug users impacting an historic site now used as an event space. Sometimes the users/dealers were across the street from the Hibernia, still visible to those deciding whether to hold events at the site.
As a high school student I felt badly that students in the Tenderloin must cope with the additional stress of their neighborhood. They have enough school issues to worry about without having to be exposed to crime and people shooting up on their sidewalks near their home.
July 21-23 had a three-day police visibility on Leavenworth between Turk and O’Farrell which completely cleared the area of illegal drug activity. It was great to see. But once the police visibility ended some of the drug activity returned. It seemed that the prior users and dealers moved down Leavenworth between Golden Gate and Turk, where the drug trade operates with impunity.
The police presence showed me that the city is capable of clearing open air drug use. It just hasn’t decided to do so in the Tenderloin.
Drug users also dominated virtually the entire north side of the sidewalk on Golden Gate next to the Golden Gate Theater. There were so many people lying flat on the ground clearly suffering from the drugs. I counted as many as 22 users in that one small block alone.
Taylor Street from Eddy to Ellis was filled with drug activities. Over 5 users were consistently present and one day had over 20 users at the Ellis/Taylor intersection.
The Tenderloin is more than just a neglected neighborhood. It’s a community of resilient people who deserve safety and support. Isolated increased police visibility actions have shown the effects of reliable police presence. An effort between law enforcement and social services to restore safety to the neighborhood can slowly diminish the drug activity in the Tenderloin.
There should be no instance where residents in the Tenderloin should feel unsafe in their living spaces. There should be more attention focused on the horrible state of open-air drug markets in the Tenderloin where kids have to roam around feeling scared.”
Blocks walked by Urban Alchemy and other ambassadors typically had no dealers. I could not understand why these ambassadors were not on the sidewalks filled with drug users.”
Isn’t This A Crisis?
In the 1980’s the city said there was no point targeting drug users on a Tenderloin corner because they would just move to nearby blocks. Leroy Looper, longtime owner of the Tenderloin’s Cadillac Hotel, had a great response. Looper suggested we get a van to bring the drug users to Union Street. We would then see how long they would be allowed to remain there. Guesses ranged from 15 minutes to an hour.
The city would not tell Union Street merchants that there was no point removing these drug users because they would just relocate to nearby Chestnut Street. They wouldn’t tell that upscale community that removing drug users sitting on sidewalks was not a priority. Nor would the city justify its inaction by asking “where else would the dealers and users go?”
Looper and all of us understood that once the police removed our van full of drug users from Union Street, they would be warned never to return.
That’s not the message City Hall sends about the Tenderloin.
Dealers and users on Union Street are deemed a crisis. City Hall would respond to their presence as it would to a fire or other emergency.
But the city has completely normalized sidewalk drug and alcohol use in the Tenderloin. It has been a containment zone for years. Mayor Lurie pledged that the containment zone strategy would end. But after seven months there has not been a consistent effort from City Hall to change this.
See Part 2: Why is City Hall Worsening Tenderloin Drug Crisis?
