City pitches affordable housing for seniors at Laguna Honda hospital

Similar efforts to bring low-income housing to the area were thwarted by locals in 2016

Laguna Honda Hospital (Laguna Honda Senior)
Laguna Honda Hospital (Laguna Honda Senior)

As the homeless population in San Francisco continues to grow, city leaders are taking another shot at adding more than 200 units of affordable housing near Twin Peaks.

The proposed development, meant for seniors and those with disabilities, will be located on the campus of Laguna Honda Hospital near Midtown Terrace, the San Francisco Examiner reported.

“We all know there is a tremendous lack of supply of affordable assisted living in San Francisco,” Mara Blitzer of the Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development, said. “Most senior-designated units are being built downtown, with a dearth of affordable housing on the west side.”

The project is set to include assisted and independent housing as well as a childcare center for that staff and an Adult Day Health center that would offer services like medication management, transportation and meal assistance.

As part of the Laguna Honda Hospital campus, the new development would serve as an alternate care environment for the elderly patients of the hospital who are ready to be discharged into an environment with more freedom.

Sign Up for the undefined Newsletter

The development would also free up some low-income housing in the city. Disabled and senior San Franciscans currently occupy about 58 percent of the city’s affordable housing.

Efforts to build a similar 150-unit housing development for low-income seniors near the hospital were shut down in 2016 after neighbors in affluent nearby neighborhoods of Forest Hill and Midtown Terrace complained that the project would damage the hillside and change the look and feel of the area, which is mostly single-family homes.

“People often need to move far from their homes to find affordable housing developments,” Blitzer said. “We’re looking for opportunities on the west side to build affordable housing. And large parcels of land are scarce; that’s another benefit of working with Laguna Honda.”

Read more

Residential
San Francisco
Affordable housing could replace long-shuttered Oakland parking garage

[SFE] — Victoria Pruitt 

Recommended For You