A major healthcare conference in San Francisco this week has sparked a debate about the California city’s homeless crisis as wealthy executives and investors complain of feeling 'unsafe'.

The city rakes in $51m (£39m) each year from the annual JPMorgan Healthcare Conference despite growing concerns about the city’s homeless population among attendees of the healthcare industry’s leading conference, according to Bloomberg News.

The nearly 10,000 attendees have regularly criticised San Francisco’s homeless crisis, Bloomberg reported, with one CEO describing it to the news outlet as “the Bill Clinton of cities”.

“San Francisco has squandered its place in the sun,” said John Price, CEO of the genetic engineering company Greffex Inc. “San Francisco is the Bill Clinton of cities. It squandered itself with its flaws.”

Selin Kurnaz, CEO of Massive Bio, also told Bloomberg she has felt increasingly “unsafe” in San Francisco while attending the conference over the years.

“I’ve been coming to JPM for five years, and the homeless situation has gotten much worse,” she said. “I feel unsafe walking around at night, especially as a young woman.”

New Yorkers sleep in Times Square to raise money for homeless charity Show all 8 1 /8 New Yorkers sleep in Times Square to raise money for homeless charity New Yorkers sleep in Times Square to raise money for homeless charity Nearly 1,000 people slept in Times Square on Saturday night. The demonstrators were part of the World Sleep Out, which saw events in 52 cities over the weekend. Anadolu Agency via Getty Images New Yorkers sleep in Times Square to raise money for homeless charity The World Sleep Out raises funds for charity. As demonstrators slept in sleeping bags around the world, the charity group worked to raise its goal of $50m (£38m) in funds to combat homelessness. Anadolu Agency via Getty Images New Yorkers sleep in Times Square to raise money for homeless charity Participants sprawled out on cardboard and yoga mats. “I’m nervous about the rats,” Jeanette Guzman, who came to the sleep out from Queens with her entire family, told The Independent. “But we want to feel what it’s like, and what homeless people go through sleeping on the streets … and also to raise funds.” Getty Images for The World's Big New Yorkers sleep in Times Square to raise money for homeless charity Will Smith met with participants and performed in Times Square. The actor spoke about his film, The Pursuit of Happiness, and performed the hit theme song from his TV series, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Anadolu Agency via Getty Images New Yorkers sleep in Times Square to raise money for homeless charity New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams also attended the sleep out. “I’ll tell you what: if you look around New York City, there are loads and loads of vacant luxury apartments that we didn’t need … while there are 60,000 people homeless”, said New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, who was in attendance at the event and spoke to the crowd about housing being a human right. Getty Images for The World's Big New Yorkers sleep in Times Square to raise money for homeless charity Josh Littlejohn said the city's "can do" spirit helped the event come to life. “To my great surprise and real delight, they signed off on us closing down the entire stretch of Times Square”, he said. “It’s kind of one of those things that’s been happening a lot with this campaign, very serendipitous.” Anadolu Agency via Getty Images New Yorkers sleep in Times Square to raise money for homeless charity Participants came from all over to help raise funds. Joshua Mazediak-Amey, who was from the UK and with a group of interns at the United Nations attending the Times Square event, told The Independent: “I believe it’s important that those who work for the UN show the fact that we’re committed to actually getting on the ground and being with people … that we are willing to come and be a part of things when they’re sort of on-the-ground movements like this opportunity tonight.” Getty Images for The World's Big New Yorkers sleep in Times Square to raise money for homeless charity The group told The Independent nearly 1,000 people slept in Times Square on Saturday night. The World Sleep Out aims to raise $50m (£38m) in donations for charities including the Malala Fund, the Institute of Global Homelessness and more. Mr Littlejohn has also established a new charity called the World’s Big Sleep Out Trust. All of the donations raised in the US as part of the trust would be managed by UNICEF USA. Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

Oracle Corporation, which hosts a premier industry event called the OpenWorld conference annually in San Francsico, announced it would relocate this year’s event to Las Vegas, citing street conditions and hotel pricing.

“My dream would be that they’d see this as an opportunity to reflect on the humanity of others,” Kelly Cutler, an organiser with the Coalition on Homelessness, told the news outlet.

She added: “I feel like it’s a missed opportunity when people are just seeing the homeless as a nuisance and trash and seeing the solution as just sweeping them away.

Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan, told Fox Business in an interview on Tuesday that, while the financial institution would become “deeply involved” in San Francisco, complaints from attendees were “not quite that bad”.

He said those attending the event “know where they’re going” and “plan for it the same time of the year”, while acknowledging the city has faced an increasing issue of homelessness.

Despite city officials launching new efforts to tackle the problem of homelessness — including major initiatives and spending over $300m (£230.1m) in its efforts — San Francisco has housed 27,000 homeless people throughout the past 15 years, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.