San Francisco Government is Secretly and Illegally Operating an Illicit Drug Use Site
City officials are overseeing fentanyl smoking at taxpayer-funded site
By Michael Shellenberger and Leighton Woodhouse
San Francisco Mayor London Breed generated national news media coverage last December when she announced a sweeping crackdown on open air drug use and drug dealing in the downtown Tenderloin neighborhood. Shortly after, she announced a “linkage center” aimed at connecting homeless street addicts with drug rehab facilities. Breed’s announcement came in the midst of a local, state, and national debate over whether the city should open a “supervised drug consumption” site as a tactic for reducing drug overdose deaths.
In fact, the illicit drug consumption site has been up and running since Tuesday inside the linkage center, which is located at 1172 Market Street. The linkage center is located in the United Nations Plaza, the city’s largest open air drug market. The supervised drug consumption area is an outdoor fenced section of the linkage center.
There is an unresolved national debate over the efficacy of supervised drug consumption sites and a local debate over whether to open one in San Francisco. Mayor Breed and members of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors have advocated a supervised drug consumption site, and purchased two properties in the Tenderloin to serve people suffering from addiction.
But the city never approved the creation of a supervised consumption site at the linkage center and the site is in violation of state and federal laws.
We are the first to report on the operation of the illegal supervised drug consumption site at the linkage center. The two of us witnessed a half-dozen people smoking fentanyl in an outdoor area on the site, and two people passed out at a table. An employee of a city contractor at the linkage center told us that two people had overdosed and been revived since the site opened on Tuesday.
Here is what else we discovered:
Linkage PR Official Denied Existence Of Supervised Drug Site But Other Employees Confirmed It
Mayor Breed and the San Francisco Board of Supervisors approved an agreement to purchase buildings at 629 Hyde St and 822 Geary St, both in the Tenderloin, with the stated intention to open a supervised drug consumption site in one or both of them. However, the Board did not authorize the creation of a site anywhere, much less in the linkage center. As such, the supervised drug consumption site is operating in violation of local, state, and federal laws.
When confronted with evidence that the linkage center housed a drug consumption site, spokespersons for Urban Alchemy and for Mayor London Breed declined to comment.
The linkage site is operating under the supervision of city employees and large city contractors including HealthRite360, Glide Memorial, and Urban Alchemy.
An employee of Urban Alchemy repeatedly confirmed to us that the outdoor area was a supervised “consumption site.” But a public relations official on site denied to another reporter, Erica Sandberg, that there was a consumption site at the linkage center.
Sandberg first learned of the supervised consumption site when she visited on the afternoon of Tuesday January 18. She visited again two days later, shortly after we arrived on site.
Sandberg said that after Dr. Deborah Borne, a Senior Physician Specialist with the Department of Public Health, discovered that Sandberg was interviewing Ronald Ahart from Urban Alchemy about the site, Borne interrupted the conversation and called over a public relations person with the city’s Department of Housing and Homelessness Services.
According to Sandberg, the public relations official denied that there was a supervised consumption site at the linkage center. “The PR people said, ‘No, we do not do that because it's illegal,’” reported Sandberg.
When confronted with evidence that the linkage center housed a drug consumption site, spokespersons for Urban Alchemy and for Mayor London Breed declined to comment.
City Contractors Glide Memorial Church And HealthRite360 Photographed Supervising Fentanyl Use
The Urban Alchemy employee who gave us a tour did not ask our names or if we were reporters and seemed accustomed to giving tours. The city supervisor who represents the Tenderloin neighborhood, Matt Haney, toured the facility on Tuesday and tweeted a photo of the site saying “They've already connected a number of people to needed services.”
The Urban Alchemy employee was about to show us a room where he said there were bunk beds and cages for pets when Kim Bowman, Assistant Deputy Director of San Francisco’s Division of Emergency Services, abruptly ended our tour, explaining that they were “limiting visits” because they couldn’t spare staff, and that we could arrange a tour at a later date.
A recovering addict who lives in the Tenderloin and asked that we withhold her name told us her friend went into the linkage center to smoke crack and that when she asked an official if there was a drug consumption site inside she was told there was not. “Well, that's just bullshit because the girl just walked up to me and she said, ‘You can smoke right there.’ She showed me through the mesh. She said, ‘You see that area right there.’”
We identified two senior employees of city contractors on site. Gary McCoy, the Director of Public Policy and Public Affairs with city drug treatment service provider HealthRite360, and a recovering homeless addict himself, was at the consumption site and watched as people smoked fentanyl in front of him. Also supervising open drug use inside the consumption site was Paul Harkin, the Director of Harm Reduction Services at Glide Memorial.
McCoy is an outspoken advocate for supervised consumption sites. On December 11 he tweeted, “Your friendly reminder that bars are supervised consumption sites for alcohol use.” The next day he tweeted, “Sign our petition here to be involved in ongoing efforts in San Francisco to immediately open supervised consumption sites to save lives and connect folks to care.”
There were other officials with badges present in the consumption site while people were using drugs. There is a large tent and tables directly in the outdoor consumption center that appear to be staffed by city employees or contractors.
The linkage center is divided from the street by a chain link fence covered with semi-transparent mesh. The consumption site is directly inside a sprawling open air drug market in the United Nations Plaza on Market Street. When we visited on Thursday afternoon, there were hundreds of people openly dealing, smoking and injecting drugs on the plaza. A San Francisco police cruiser rolled past but did nothing.
Sandberg had a similar experience on Tuesday. “They were very warm and welcoming,” she said. “I didn't even ask about drugs. The Urban Alchemy practitioner [employee] told me. He was very enthusiastic. He said, ‘Here's the room for the Department of Public Health, here's the room for housing. Then he shows me the outside where people get their water and he said, ‘There is for people to use.’ I said, ‘What do you mean people to use?’ He said, ‘It's a consumption site. A place for people to do drugs safely.’
Sandberg asked if there were nurses on staff and said the man said there were not. She said she asked how to determine if someone is sleeping or has overdosed, “Because there was a guy sleeping on the table, and he said, ‘Well, we try and wake them up. And if we can't wake them up, then we'll administer Narcan [which reverses overdoses].’ I was shocked.”
We witnessed multiple drug sales directly in front of the linkage center, and many people smoking fentanyl, meth, and injecting drugs. There were at least a dozen young men within a two block radius of the linkage center who appeared to be selling drugs.
On Tuesday McCoy tweeted that he was, “Having conversations with folks all day today here at the Linkage Center, talking about resources and providing basic needs, has been amazing. The rewarding part — having folks go out of their way to thank us as they leave, and saying they’ll be back tomorrow for other services.”
The Urban Alchemy employee told us that they took the locks off of bathroom doors to prevent addicts from barricading themselves inside.
Last November, Mayor Breed introduced legislation to allow safe drug consumption sites in San Francisco, a goal she has pursued for years. State Supervisor Scott Weiner introduced a bill in the state legislature to legalize such sites for San Francisco, Oakland and Los Angeles.
New York City recently established two safe consumption sites, in East Harlem and Washington Heights. The sites are illegal under federal law, but to date the Biden administration has taken no action against them.
On Tuesday Mayor Breed issued a list on her web site of the services available at the linkage center; they did not include a supervised consumption site. Mary Ellen Carroll, the Executive Director of San Francisco’s Department of Emergency Management, which is operating the site, did not mention the supervised consumption site in her description of the linkage center’s services on Tuesday.
Carroll told the San Francisco Chronicle this week, “We are absolutely trying to send a message that open-air drug use is not something that is going to be acceptable in the Tenderloin moving forward.”
This is one of things that makes sense in my head but if I were to actually see it I'm not so sure.
The whole point of this is to be in a position to help people as they are (support).
Then I think of the infrastructure that comes with addiction (exploitation, crime etc) and I worry if that part is being accounted for.
I guess this all sort of has a underpants gnomes element to it. Ok open use sights go up, then something happens then those who are addicted get better.
Excellent reporting, that can be a dangerous beat. Stay safe.