An nameless reader shared this report from the nonprofit journalism website, the San Francisco Customary:
The San Francisco Board of Supervisors on Tuesday accepted laws that goals to shore up town’s beleaguered Downtown by filling empty storefronts and expediting the conversion of underused workplace buildings into housing. The invoice is a serious element of Mayor London Breed’s restoration agenda. Co-sponsored by Board President Aaron Peskin, it amends town’s planning code to broaden residential makes use of and Downtown workplace conversions. It additionally streamlines the overview of sure initiatives, amongst different adjustments…
Even with speedier mission approvals, changing San Francisco workplace buildings to housing stays a expensive endeavor; few builders have explored the choice to this point. At an April 3 listening to of the board’s Land Use Committee, lawmakers outlined the necessity for a number of reforms to make conversions economically possible; Supervisor Dean Preston voiced considerations that even these reforms wouldn’t accommodate low-income housing. Many say San Francisco’s Downtown is presently caught in a “doom loop” pushed by financial knock-on results of the pandemic, together with an workplace emptiness price approaching 30% and trophy workplace towers altering palms at deep reductions…
The invoice handed Tuesday is one in all a number of legislative efforts to help Downtown and town’s general economic system. Initiatives have included laws to delay tax will increase for retail, meals service and different companies hit onerous by the pandemic, an “Workplace Attraction Tax Credit score” for brand spanking new firms opening within the metropolis and a program known as “Vacant to Vibrant,” which supplies grants to companies which open “pop-up” retailers and artwork areas in Downtown’s empty storefronts.
