SF voters all in favor of new tax to help homeless — until they see the cost
Matier & Ross Sep. 12, 2018 Updated: Sep. 12, 2018 11:38 a.m.
View of a homeless box home 16th at Shotwell streets seen on Monday, Aug. 6, 2018 in San Francisco, Calif. Two years after they were shot to death in the box they lived in at a homeless camp on Division Street, there have been no arrests and the homeless camp no longer exists. Photo: Liz Hafalia / The Chronicle
New polling shows a majority of San Francisco voters favor taxing corporations to pay for new homeless services, but they may balk at the costs.
At issue is Proposition C, which would tax large businesses and corporations to raise $300 million a year to house the homeless.
The money would be on top of the $300 million the city already spends.
A “No on Prop. C” campaign poll of 800 likely November voters by EMC Research showed the measure winning 56 percent to 42 percent. Only 3 percent of those surveyed were undecided.
But when voters were told that Prop. C would be the single largest tax increase in San Francisco history and that it would house about 4,000 people over five years at a “cost of nearly a half-million dollars per homeless person,” support dropped 10 points — to 47 percent.
Prop. C was placed on the ballot by a coalition of homeless and housing advocates — among them the Coalition on Homelessness, the Affordable Housing Alliance, the Glide Foundation and the San Francisco Tenants Union.