Officials Yet to Reveal Cause of Hayes Valley Condo Fire

San Francisco still hasn’t determined what caused a fire that torched 14 condominiums under construction by Greenview Planning and Design in Hayes Valley, forcing evacuation of nearby homes.

Local residents are riled by a lack of clarity as to what caused the 4-alarm conflagration at the building site for the Walnut Creek-based developer at 300 Octavia Street, the San Francisco Standard reported.

“I’m pissed,” Jennifer Laska, head of the Hayes Valley Neighborhood Association, told the newspaper after a town hall meeting this week. “We got no answers on anything and no guarantee that someone’s going to reduce the risk of this happening again.”

The early morning fire on Aug. 1 torched the five-story condominium complex under construction at Octavia and Oak streets. About 130 firefighters responded to the blaze, which damaged at least five neighboring buildings and displaced eight people.

The fire came after Laska’s group warned the city about past fire dangers, pointing to where homeless people lit fires in the area to stay warm.

Laska said residents shared photos with her of homeless people on Jan. 17 lighting a fire on the sidewalk under the scaffolding of the Octavia Street building that went up in flames.

The neighborhood association had warned the city about three other fires near the building as well, according to a May 30 letter Laska sent to city officials about fire concerns.

City officials at the town hall meeting spoke with residents about their concerns, but provided no details about who or what had caused the fire. They said an investigation was ongoing.

Officials were also ambiguous about how the city plans to prevent such fires from happening again.

Neither Supervisor Dean Preston nor Supervisor Matt Dorsey attended Monday’s meeting, nor did any of their aides. During the meeting, police echoed comments made by Mayor London Breed about the city’s limited authority in dealing with homeless encampments.

“The cause of yesterday’s fire in Hayes Valley is still under investigation,” Breed tweeted last week. “While there is always a rush to judge what the cause may be, we must allow our investigators to do their jobs. However, I want to address concerns raised by the neighbors about nearby encampments.”

A representative from the San Francisco Fire Department suggested that Greenview Planning would need to demolish the building before the city can open the street to traffic. Greenview, founded in 2017, is led by Xiao Jing Si, according to state business records.

— Dana Bartholomew