SAN FRANCISCO (CN) — San Francisco Mayor London Breed announced a partnership with the city's public health department on Tuesday to introduce laws that will simplify the process of getting treatment for people suffering from mental illness or drug dependency.
The proposed ordinance would streamline the lengthy request-for-proposals process that the Department of Health now requires to contract beds for public health use in third-party facilities.
By waiving the RFP process, the city hopes to reduce wait times for beds; expand to working with bed providers who would otherwise not participate because of red tape; and provide more flexibility for people who have specific placement needs.
San Francisco has to compete with a litany of health care systems and other counties for the small amount of available beds across the Bay Area. Breed and the Department of Health say the city’s bidding process doesn’t help, causing the city to lose out on beds.
“We have been working to expand services for those struggling with mental health and addiction, and this legislation will allow us to move even faster to get people the care they need,” Breed said in a press release.
“People are in crisis, and we can’t allow delays and bureaucracy to get in the way of getting people help. Our goal is to be able to deliver services as quickly as possible, and by removing these barriers, we can be ready when there are opportunities available to add beds to our system.”
The proposed ordinance announced Tuesday is limited in scope; it only waives the RFP process for public health beds, including those for residential care and for isolation and quarantine. It would waive the process for five years — but the Department of Health would still need to adhere to checks and balances to ensure all providers comply with federal, state and local contract monitoring recruitments.
Two members of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, Rafael Mandelman and Hillary Ronen, are co-sponsoring the legislation with Breed.
Dr. Hillary Kunins, director of behavioral health services and Mental Health SF at the Department of Health, said in a press release that it's vital to provide timely, appropriate care for people with "serious mental health or substance use disorders."
"Waiting for that care can adversely affect their health and our community,” Kunins said.
In January 2021, Breed partnered with the city health department in a separate initiative to add 400 new beds for public health use. The initiative has added 350 so far. The city currently offers approximately 2,550 behavioral health treatment and care beds.
Breed, who is up for re-election in November, has weathered criticism as the city grapples with homelessness, a housing crisis, property crime and fears of a doom loop downtown.
Last year was the city's deadliest year ever for overdose deaths, with 752 residents dying. One-third of those people were considered homeless and more than 80% of those deaths were attributed to fentanyl use.
The crisis prompted the city to test wastewater for presences of drugs to assess drug use trends.
Breed has also cracked down on drug users and open-air drug markets in the city’s hardest-hit neighborhoods in the past year, leading to the arrests of hundreds of dealers and users, despite health experts warning that those arrests could lead to worse outcomes in the long run for unhoused people with mental illnesses or substance abuse disorders.
Governor Gavin Newsom appointed a task force in October 2023 to help the city deal with its fentanyl problem.
And Breed recently proposed Ballot Measure F, which would require welfare recipients with a substance abuse disorder to enroll in treatment programs to continue to receive benefits. That measure will be voted on in March.
Among Breed's attempts to alleviate the homelessness crisis, the city adopted a plan in January 2023 to add 82,000 new homes by 2031 — but a searing report from Newsom revealed that San Francisco’s housing approval process takes 10 months longer than anywhere else in California, and that many of the city’s practices were out of compliance with California law. The report included 18 required actions and an additional 10 recommended actions with implementation plans for the city.
The city eventually implemented the recommendations in early December 2023.
The ordinance announced Tuesday will sit before the Board of Supervisors for 30 days before it is voted on next month. It requires majority approval by the board in order to pass.
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