U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development

Drugs, Booze Cause Homelessness, Says America

SF Weekly Exclusive -- It's Official: San Francisco Repeats as Soweto USA

By Matt SmithFor the third year running San Francisco has managed its public housing as the equivalent of a Third World slum. New information from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development confirms that San Francisco's Housing Authority -- which oversees 6,400 apartments, housing 35, ... More >>

Paper Trails

By Matt SmithFor the third year running San Francisco has managed its public housing as the equivalent of a Third World slum. New information from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development confirms that San Francisco's Housing Authority -- which oversees 6,400 apartments, housing 35, ... More >>

Paper Trails

By Matt SmithFor the third year running San Francisco has managed its public housing as the equivalent of a Third World slum. New information from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development confirms that San Francisco's Housing Authority -- which oversees 6,400 apartments, housing 35, ... More >>

The Making of the Mayor 1995

In which Jack Davis repents, Clint Reilly froths, Roberta Achtenberg has a vision, Angela Alioto has an attitude, and the voters are the pigeons

Paper Trails

In which Jack Davis repents, Clint Reilly froths, Roberta Achtenberg has a vision, Angela Alioto has an attitude, and the voters are the pigeons

Mayoral Web

In which Jack Davis repents, Clint Reilly froths, Roberta Achtenberg has a vision, Angela Alioto has an attitude, and the voters are the pigeons

Rooms With a View

Hunters View residents stand up to the Housing Authority in the name of self-governance

Shelter Skelter (Part II)

In 1984, four women living in city housing projects said they wanted to get out. Only one made it.

Dog Bites

In 1984, four women living in city housing projects said they wanted to get out. Only one made it.

That 'Damn Lesbian' Roberta Achtenberg Thinks Now May Finally Be the Time for Executive Order Barring Sexual Discrimination

CSU-San Luis Obispo Public AffairsRoberta AchtenbergYou can't bar the disabled from federal housing. Ditto that for racial or religious minorities, the aged, or nearly any other group -- but homosexuals. Amazingly, in 2009, one can still be barred from a place in federally funded housing based upon ... More >>

Four Steps to Success for Gavin Newsom

CSU-San Luis Obispo Public AffairsRoberta AchtenbergYou can't bar the disabled from federal housing. Ditto that for racial or religious minorities, the aged, or nearly any other group -- but homosexuals. Amazingly, in 2009, one can still be barred from a place in federally funded housing based upon ... More >>

Letters to the Editor

Week of 5-23-2007

Letters to the Editor

Week of 05-16-2007

Flip That Housing Authority

Local officials are resisting a federal takeover of the Housing Authority. They should stop.

Letters to the Editor

Week of 3-21-2007

Aim Low

The nation's biggest player in the apartment rental business has found huge profits in low-income housing

What Lies Beneath

Brain and stomach cancer. Asthma and bronchitis. Miscarriages and stillbirths. All are health problems suffered by residents of Midway Village. Why won’t authorities close it down?

S.F. Hosing Authority

City government promised Katrina victims a haven, then it gave some of them the shaft

What's Really Wrong With the Lower Fillmore?

Could it be the activists who claim they're trying to rebuild it?

Letters to the Editor

Week of Wednesday, January 21, 2004

A Moving Experience

Delays and mismanagement endangered a $20 million federal reconstruction grant for North Beach Place. So the Housing Authority tried to speed the project up -- by tricking longtime, elderly residents into leaving.

Most Sparkman invective is resereved for the Chron's touchy-feely columnists.

Waffling With Authority; Will the Chron Get Us All Killed?

Letters to the Editor

Letters from January 24, 2001

The Great Minnow Hunt

Why did the U.S. Attorney's Office angle for fingerlings -- and apparently ignore trophy catches -- during its corruption investigation at the San Francisco Housing Authority?

The Affordable Housing Disaster

How a cozy alliance of government bureaucrats and nonprofit developers spends tens of millions of dollars building almost no housing for the poor

It's the Housing, Stupid

Don't re-elect supervisors who've done nothing -- zero, zip, nada -- to address our housing shortage

Habitat for Inanity

Charity unwittingly sucked into fight over housing low-income elderly

No Place Like Curb

So many San Franciscans live in cars, vans, campers, and buses that the city wants to create a "vehicular community" where they could legally park. But if we build it, will the "houseless" come?

Midway to Nowhere

The residents of Daly City's Midway Village wonder if their environmental concerns will ever be addressed

Crime and Patronage

For more than a decade, three different mayors have let one man dole out government jobs to alleged murderers, crack dealers, and other serious felons. The question, obviously, is why.

The Housing Authority's Dirty Dozen

Twelve convicted drug dealers and other major felons have recently been employed by the San Francisco Housing Authority. But are there even more criminals on the public payroll?

Seven Steps to Nowhere

Twelve convicted drug dealers and other major felons have recently been employed by the San Francisco Housing Authority. But are there even more criminals on the public payroll?

The Grid

Twelve convicted drug dealers and other major felons have recently been employed by the San Francisco Housing Authority. But are there even more criminals on the public payroll?

Ghetto Blasting

A cop's doodle travels to Washington, D.C., and returns as a warm-and-fuzzy crackdown on S.F.'s projects

Dog Bites

A cop's doodle travels to Washington, D.C., and returns as a warm-and-fuzzy crackdown on S.F.'s projects

Judging Matthew Rothschild

Why is the Democratic Party elite backing an underqualified party operative for the local judiciary?

Achtenberg's Third Act

Roberta Achtenberg bristles when anyone dares say that Williw Brown is the one who gets things done. "I have gotten things done my entire life, right?" she says, citing when her accomplishments as a law school dean, her 800-page book on sexual orientatio

Paper Trails

Roberta Achtenberg bristles when anyone dares say that Williw Brown is the one who gets things done. "I have gotten things done my entire life, right?" she says, citing when her accomplishments as a law school dean, her 800-page book on sexual orientatio

Maimed Brothers Flee San Francisco Violence

Roberta Achtenberg bristles when anyone dares say that Williw Brown is the one who gets things done. "I have gotten things done my entire life, right?" she says, citing when her accomplishments as a law school dean, her 800-page book on sexual orientatio

Whither Skippy? Will Man Profiled in SF Weekly Cover Story Have to Give Up His Service Iguana?

Joe EskenaziCosmie Silfa and Skippy​Our more fervent readers may recall a June SF Weekly cover story titled "Service with a Snarl" exploring the city's intriguing rules and regulations regarding service animals. Yes, it was the one with the maniacal Chihuahua on the cover. One of the service anima ... More >>

Iguana Man Optimistic He Won't Have to Give Up His 'Service Lizard'

Joe Eskenazi Cosmie Silfa and Skippy​Yesterday we reported that Cosmie Silfa was at risk of having to give up his doctor-prescribed "service iguana" Skippy. Today, however, Silfa is optimistic he won't have to surrender the arm-sized, green lizard his psychiatrist describes as "an essential compon ... More >>

The Yes Men Fix the World is a cheerful quest for social justice

Joe Eskenazi Cosmie Silfa and Skippy​Yesterday we reported that Cosmie Silfa was at risk of having to give up his doctor-prescribed "service iguana" Skippy. Today, however, Silfa is optimistic he won't have to surrender the arm-sized, green lizard his psychiatrist describes as "an essential compon ... More >>

Newsom Announces Mid-Market Revitalization Plan -- From Upscale Wiener Joint

Joe EskenaziGavin Newsom, hot dog buns, face the press​With throngs of media temporarily distracted by a sausage bursting into flames on the grill, Mayor Gavin Newsom this morning announced plans to "dust off" a failed redevelopment plan for the blighted mid-market area in a press conference held ... More >>

New City Program Helps Homeowners Slash PG&E Bill

Look! Green! Green!​But Some Consumers May Be Better Off Looking Elsewhere To Fund Green Home Improvements, Program's Architect AcknowledgesMayor Gavin Newsom this evening will hold an "Internet town hall" to tout a new program helping property owners pay for energy-saving improvements. Dubbed Gre ... More >>

Larry Bush, HUD Spokesman, Sues Agency: Claims Violations of Anti-Secrecy Laws

​Larry Bush, a former aide to San Francisco Mayor Art Agnos once known as The Dark Prince of City Hall has sued his current employer, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The 64-year-old veteran San Francisco politico claims he was instructed by a supervisor to violate federal ope ... More >>

S.F. Housing Authority Given Deadline to Improve Section 8 Housing

San Francisco's own money pit​It has been well documented over the years that San Francisco's Housing Authority is in shambles; it can't collect rent on time, it can't keep records on file, and it hasn't been training its staff. And while federal authorities -- every year -- issue  reports de ... More >>

Help Craft Federal Policy on LGBT Housing Discrimination

Grant WoodWill you need to look like this to live in federal housing?​In federally funded housing programs, it's illegal for landlords to discriminate based on race, ethnicity -- or even against the guy who says his pit bull keeps him from having panic attacks.But against homosexuals or the transg ... More >>

Homeless Veterans' Housing Grant Isn't Enough

What would a voucher get you in San Francisco?​There are more than 136,000 homeless veterans in the U.S., and California has more than a quarter of them. So while the Housing and Urban Development (HUD) is patting itself on the back for handing over more than $4 million in grant money to the Bay A ... More >>