Children still living in Hunters View – better known as West Point – though their housing is some of the most run down in the country, as least have a roof over their heads and a “village” to love and raise them. The dozens of apartments now boarded up, the residents driven from their homes, are testament to the mayor’s lies when he promises that no one will be displaced by redevelopment. Mayor Newsom is privatizing these 267 homes by giving development rights to the notorious John Stewart Co., and, for the record, the Bay View newspaper is dead set against it. We’ve long known that this hillside, where residents enjoy one of the most spectacular views on the planet, is coveted by developers who want to replace their humble homes with mansions for the rich. Unite to fight this travesty!

Hope SF, a city initiative designed to pick up where the federal government left off with Hope VI, and Communities of Opportunity (COO), a program run out of the Mayor’s Office, claims to have been designed to assist the residents of Hunters View. They are in place, say their pamphlets and memos, to “right size” as many people’s existing rent, current police records and standing credit as possible.

When Mayor Newsom spoke on the basketball courts of Hunters View on March 5, he said to those assembled that he wanted to “rebuild the community” and that the city would not, could not, gentrify it. He stressed that Hope SF and COO would facilitate people’s moves, keep them in good standing and guarantee them a home in the rebuilt Hunters View. In the face of the 14-day eviction notices the SFHA has now sent, how successful are those programs turning out to be?

Reading one of the leases of Hunters View is an eye-opening experience. The list of offenses that can lead a tenant to eviction are long and minute. Drug possession, firearm possession and criminal records are grounds for eviction, but so are allowing guests to “loiter” on public property or not living up to the SFHA’s housekeeping standards.

A 2006 lease from the San Francisco Housing Authority was 22 pages long and contained, in Section 14 and Section 16, a total of 40 clauses that, if violated, could result in eviction. Yet, despite all the legal subterfuge, the largest single reason for evictions in Hunters View is still money.

Collectively, the back rent owed by the community to the Housing Authority is thought to be as large as $200,000. One of the major pushes of COO is to put residents on payment plans, complicated programs that attempt to recover some of the debt through a mixture of incentives and threats. Incentives include $150 cash bonuses for repeated on-time rent payments. Threats are that if a tenant is not in “good standing” with the Housing Authority they will not be allowed to move back to Hunters View once construction of the new units is complete.

If these 14-day notices are unopposed, the eviction crisis could become severe. Several groups are working in the area to give residents a chance for legal representation. Bay Area Legal Aid, as well as the Bar Association of San Francisco, are attempting to put residents of Hunters View in touch with lawyers who are willing to take on their cases and to work for free.

Hali Reiskin, a supervising attorney with the Bar Association, claims, however, that “few have signed up for independent advocacy” and that she and other attorneys working with residents of Hunters View are worried that a wave of evictions would result in a “crushing workload for the legal community.” After 14-day notices, the next stage in eviction is an unlawful detainer procedure in Superior Court that can, in contrast to most eviction proceedings, move very quickly.

Residents could have as little as five days to find a lawyer and organize a defense against their eviction. Such a rush would increase the likelihood of residents getting lost in the shuffle and failing to find independent counsel to defend them.
The exact number of notices sent out is at this moment a mystery. The SFHA claims that it has 111 households signed up for its repayment programs, programs that should, in theory, shield its members from eviction. But that number does not make sense compared to caseloads that organizations like the Bar Association are tackling.

There is also a question of whether the programs are working. Employment has been slow to come to the area, so even a household that has had its rent reduced may still find itself behind in payment.

Hunters View is the first housing project that Hope SF and COO is being tested on but it is not the only project that is slated for redevelopment. In fact, Hunters View represents the first domino in a line that City Hall and corporations like Lennar and John Stewart are setting up to be knocked over, one after another.

San Francisco real estate, even in the midst of an economic downturn, is still a huge money making opportunity. Hope SF and COO, if they are not successful in retaining each and every resident of Hunters View who wishes to live there after redevelopment, will have proven themselves nothing more then mayoral and corporate smokescreens for the forced migration of some of San Francisco’s poorest residents.

They will, however, allow City Hall and John Stewart to shrug, say that they tried, and place the blame directly on the shoulders of the very community they just destroyed.

Alan Holt can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

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