Before housing, build a bridge between old, new S.F.

A block to the west of a community forum on housing, a 23-unit affordable housing complex is being built. A block to the west of a community forum on housing, a 23-unit affordable housing complex is being built. Photo: Michael Short, The Chronicle Photo: Michael Short, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 4 Caption Close Before housing, build a bridge between old, new S.F. 1 / 4 Back to Gallery

It's time to stop treating the influx of tech companies and tech workers in San Francisco as some sort of force from beyond: whether it's a force for good - "they're here to help us" - or for bad - "they're destroying the city we love."

The fact is, "they" are here to stay. That needs to be understood, as do the implications that flow from it.

The thought occurred to me after attending a community forum, two days after 8 Washington went down to crashing defeat, titled "Can we build our way to housing affordability in San Francisco?" I had written the week earlier, in connection with Tuesday's vote, how "we" need to think about "where San Francisco, with all its glittering prizes, is going."

"We" has to include the folks from Twitter and Google and Facebook and Square, and the hundreds of newer companies and thousands of tech workers moving here.

"These people are going to keep coming here and there's no way to stop them," said one of the forum's panelists, Farhad Manjoo, a technology columnist at the Wall Street Journal, who used to live in San Francisco before moving to the East Bay to accommodate a growing family. "Tech companies are changing the city."

The forum, at the LGBT Center on Market Street - coincidentally one block west of a brand-new, 23-unit affordable housing complex - was standing room only.

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Air of desperation

Besides Manjoo, the panel consisted of a local developer, the head of a nonprofit housing organization, an investment consultant and a longtime community activist. Views differed, sometimes heatedly, particularly over the issue of housing supply, how it should be allocated and who gets to decide.

And there was occasionally an air of desperation to the proceedings. No, we can't build our way to sufficient affordable housing; there's simply not enough land, and the appetite for less-affordable housing is too great. San Francisco may be a center of innovation, but we may have to limit it because the infrastructure doesn't support it.

"Maybe the Twitter folks have to live in Stockton for a while and go on a waiting list," an audience member suggested. Referring to evictions of longtime lower-income residents in the Mission and other parts of the city as real estate becomes the province of the highly paid, Christina Olague, former San Francisco supervisor and Planning Commission president, suggested, exhaustedly, "Maybe it's just time to say no."

That's not an option. Olague knows that. She urged the more fiery progressives to "take a timeout and think about solutions." There were calls for leadership on the issue and stakeholders working together.

An audience member said she knew of young tech workers living in the Mission who "want to be part of the solution." Great, bring 'em in. If, as Tim Colen, executive director of the San Francisco Housing Action Coalition, said, "We've got to think much more aggressively how to get out of this situation," the more the merrier.

Bringing tech to table

Yes, this could all blow over should the tech bubble burst, as it did once before, and a lot of housing suddenly becomes vacant. Or, if tech companies are shoved up against the wall politically to the extent that they decide to leave.

The first seems unlikely - "software developed here is running companies," said Manjoo. And the second not only unlikely but pretty foolish - "San Francisco's at the center of the transformation of the economy," Manjoo added.

But if, as has been said, the cost of housing represents perhaps "the single greatest threat to San Francisco," the tech community must be brought to the table to help alleviate a situation it has become a significant part of - even if unintentionally. Facebook and Google are already doing it around their Silicon Valley headquarters, building and financing market rate and affordable housing, even as more and more of their employees choose to live in San Francisco.

"It's all hands on deck when it comes to housing, and that especially includes the innovation sector," said San Francisco Board of Supervisors President David Chiu, who was not at the forum.

Perhaps it could start by helping the city's nonprofits, which, as editorial page editor John Diaz writes in The Chronicle's Insight section, are being forced out by tech-driven escalating rents. San Francisco Interfaith Council founder Rita Semmel, who has approached tech companies on the matter, said, "We need to make them feel part of their community; this is their community."

Quite right. Other established voices of San Francisco and Bay Area businesses need to do the same, in my view - encouraging tech companies, as major stakeholders, to contribute to the overall welfare of a city.

Right now, Chiu said, "There's not enough dialogue between new-economy residents and other San Franciscans. There is a divide, and there needs to be more bridge building."

By both sides.