Nine Years After Approval, Only 1 Percent of San Francisco’s Housing Units Built. Approximately nine years after San Francisco officials approved the construction of 25,700 housing units to address the city’s housing shortage, only 350 homes – 1.3 percent of the total – have been built, the San Francisco Chronicle reported January 16.
“San Francisco lawmakers approved three historic, neighborhood-transforming redevelopment proposals during the 12 months leading up to summer 2011 …,” the Chronicle reported. “Even as housing prices have skyrocketed and developers have scrambled to build condos and apartments, progress at the three mega-developments has languished. … At a time when housing is needed as soon as possible to stem the tide of displacement and homelessness, at least 75,000 units in the Bay Area are part of mega-developments – mostly on former industrial or military sites – that are frequently sidetracked for years or even decades due to long approval processes, high infrastructure costs, complicated environmental cleanup issues and financing difficulties.”