The East Cut Community Benefit is a proud member of the CleanSafe365 Coalition, a newly formed coalition of businesses, merchant groups, civic organizations, community benefit districts and property owners committing to advocating for and supporting sustainable solutions to keep San Francisco streets safe and clean every day of the year.
To coincide with the launch of the CleanSafe365 Coalition on Tuesday, April 24th, the coalition ran an OpEd in the San Francisco Chronicle stating the Coalition’s priorities and goals.
Our next mayor must clean up San Francisco’s degraded street environment.
Increasingly, our streets are unsafe and dangerously dirty, forcing residents and guests to step carefully over human waste, broken glass and discarded syringes. It is a daily risk for residents, an impediment to maintaining and growing businesses and is eroding San Francisco’s global reputation.
We, and the other CleanSafe365 coalition members, represent tens of thousands of employees and thousands of businesses who proudly serve as city ambassadors, many of whom are longtime San Francisco residents. They understand the difficult job San Francisco faces to find a lasting solution, but they are frustrated with the recipe of more funding, more programs and more taxes that isn’t working.
In fact, our streets have gotten worse in recent years despite the hundreds of millions of dollars San Francisco spends on programs, policing and clean-up.
As longtime contributing community partners, we have hands-on experience with the city’s service providers addressing the needs of people who are homeless, mentally ill and addicted. Our coalition members and our employees need the next mayor to:
Declare a crisis on San Francisco’s streets. This would generate the urgent attention our city needs from the mayor, our city’s service providers and the Board of Supervisors.
Enforce laws protecting residents, visitors. We no longer can ignore those that are a threat to themselves and to our residents, employees and visitors.
Increase accountability for results. We need transparency about resources spent, actions taken and improvements generated by taxpayer-funded service providers.
CleanSafe365 members are willing partners for the next mayor, the next administration and the City of San Francisco. On behalf of our businesses, merchant groups, civic organizations, community benefit districts and property owners, we’re committed to finding and supporting sustainable solutions.
Without strong leadership to produce immediate and ongoing results, our city’s businesses, employees and visitors undoubtedly will follow the path of so many who have left for safer locations. Yes, our economy is good and our businesses remain resilient and determined, but the prolonged effect of what our employees, visitors and customers confront daily on the streets of San Francisco risks our city’s future and can no longer go unresolved.
We need to fix this crisis now. City Hall’s top priority must be a solution. We’re tired of being apologists for the city we love. We will continue to be a strong partner for San Francisco, but we implore the next mayor to deliver to San Francisco Clean and Safe Streets 365 Days Each and Every Year.
