Bay Area

Mayor London Breed Announces Plan to Reform City’s Small Sites Housing Acquisition Program

“Our Small Sites program is an important part of our overall strategy to make housing affordable to all San Franciscans,” said Mayor Breed. “Preserving rent-controlled housing helps keep people in their homes, protects against displacement and evictions, and creates more stability in our neighborhoods as we make crucial decisions to build more housing in all neighborhoods. We are committed to working with our non-profit partners to reform and strengthen this program so we can make impactful investments in our upcoming budget and support the long-term viability of the Small Sites program.”

Published

5 years ago

December 5, 2021

Oakland Post

Supporting capacity in the City’s non-profit partners to make small sites deals and ensure that the buildings are financially sustainable.

Improvements made in partnership with non-profits that help administer the program will ensure long-term success of important housing preservation and anti-displacement program

Mayor London N. Breed and Supervisors Myrna Melgar and Ahsha Safaí announced on Tuesday the next steps to strengthen and reform San Francisco’s Small Sites Program, which preserves rent-controlled buildings and prevents tenant displacement.

First launched in 2014, the City has helped acquire 47 buildings (368 units of affordable housing) through the Small Sites Program.

The Small Sites Program is run by the Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development (MOHCD), which works to acquire and preserve at-risk rental housing with three to 25 units.

The program was created to establish long-term affordable housing in smaller properties throughout San Francisco that are particularly vulnerable to market pressure that results in property sales, increased evictions, and rising tenant rents.

In the face of the increasing pressure, the Small Sites Program helps San Franciscans avoid displacement or eviction by providing loans to non-profit organizations to successfully remove these sites from the market and restrict them as permanently affordable housing.

While the program has been an important tool, challenges have impacted implementation and acquisition. Mayor Breed sat down with non-profit partners who work with the City on administering the program and agreed to a plan to reform over the coming months to ensure the long-term viability of the Small Sites Program. Those commitments include:

Undergoing a study on how to make the program more efficient and the model more applicable. This study will be conducted by the Housing Accelerator Fund (HAF), which partners with the City on housing preservation and acquisition efforts. HAF’s recommendations are due in January.
Considering reform recommendations from the City’s housing partners.
Implementing programmatic reforms by the end of March 2022.
Supporting capacity in the City’s non-profit partners to make small sites deals and ensure that the buildings are financially sustainable.
Modernizing and reforming programming rules to ensure broader applicability geographically, including in neighborhoods currently left out of the program because of income limitations.
Ensuring that vacant units are immediately filled.

“San Francisco’s vitality is dependent on keeping our current residents stably housed. The Small Sites Acquisition Program has so much untapped potential to save our diminishing rent-controlled housing stock and to keep our communities intact. We need to be bold and shift the way we have been doing things to meet this moment. Our City’s economic recovery is dependent on investing in the residents and businesses that are struggling to stay here,” stated Supervisor Myrna Melgar.

“The Small Sites program preserves existing affordable units for working families here in San Francisco through acquisition,” said Supervisor Ahsha Safaí. “Together with Mayor Breed and Supervisor Melgar’s leadership – we have renewed our support for this vital program and San Francisco’s middle-income families. We are committed to working with our local non-profit partners and I’m proud to help lead this process to increase affordable housing options for San Francisco’s working families.”

“We thank the Mayor for renewing her commitment to the City’s housing acquisition and affordable preservation program,” said Malcolm Yeung, executive director of the Chinatown Community Development Center. “While this has been a critical tool in preventing displacement of our most vulnerable residents, it has not always worked as planned. Not only do we have to expand accessibility to a broader range of San Franciscans, especially our lowest income, we have to make the program sustainable for the organizations that are doing the work of acquiring, rehabbing, and operating the housing.”

“MEDA is firmly committed to the proven, targeted approach of the City’s Small Sites Program to fight displacement. Since 2014, our nonprofit has made 33 critical acquisitions, keeping in their longtime homes hundreds of families and dozens of commercial businesses,” said MEDA CEO Luis Granados. “Our Community Real Estate team has been maintaining and growing the program throughout the pandemic, building our own capacity and that of our nonprofit peers so that we are all best positioned to continue to purchase Small Sites apartment buildings. In partnership with the City, we look forward to acquiring additional critical buildings as we further strengthen the program to ensure all properties are financially stable and that every unit becomes home to those most in need of affordable housing.”

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Oakland Post: Week of September 2 – 8, 2026

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of September 2 – 8, 2026

Published

5 days ago

September 7, 2026

Oakland Post

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Youth-Led Black August Event Brings Past to Present at East Oakland Boxing Association

The mission of Youth Alive! Is to “break the cycle of violence, heal trauma, and uplift a thriving community of leaders, to save lives in Oakland and beyond” by serving “as mentors, youth leaders, counselors, case managers, intervention specialists and violence interrupters,” working “to help violently wounded people heal themselves and their community.”

Published

2 weeks ago

August 29, 2026

Post News Group

Dawna Williams, EOBA executive director speaks to attendees at the Black August Eperience on Aug. 21. Photo courtesy of Carolyn Flynn of EOBA.

By Jana Lang Propel Youth Reporter

Youth-Led Black August Event Brings Past to Present at East Oakland Boxing Association

The East Oakland Boxing Association (EOBA) and Youth Alive! came together on Aug. 21 to share with their community all that Black August means to them.

Held on EOBA’s patio at 816 98th Ave. in Deep East Oakland, the two organizations hosted their second annual Black August Experience, featuring a food tasting, financial literacy and mindfulness workshops, and voter registration with the League of Women Voters Oakland (LWV).

Black August is known as a time to uphold the legacy of prisoners who protested their conditions by fasting, fighting, and educating themselves on the economic and political circumstances that contributed to their incarceration.

According to its website, “EOBA is a multi-service youth and community development hub that goes far beyond the ring. While rooted in the discipline of boxing, for nearly 40 years EOBA has also integrated robust programs in workforce development, food justice, afterschool enrichment, financial literacy, mentorship, and wellness.”.

The mission of Youth Alive! Is to “break the cycle of violence, heal trauma, and uplift a thriving community of leaders, to save lives in Oakland and beyond” by serving “as mentors, youth leaders, counselors, case managers, intervention specialists and violence interrupters,” working “to help violently wounded people heal themselves and their community.”

Through Coro California, another leadership organization serving young people across the state for 80 years, they gained a broader understanding of Black August.

EOBA Executive Director Dawna Williams spoke about how much she learned about Black August from the youth who created it. “I let them educate me,” she said. Instead of talking about prison reform and mass incarceration, Williams and youth interns found that Black August meant so much more. “We would have done a disservice if we had just focused on who the people were and what their situation was…We tried to take their message from back in the day and make it relevant to the young people today. What do they need to know?”

Youth interns created and placed posters around the patio to help participants understand how traditional Black foodways, civic engagement, financial literacy, and the power of education are relevant to Black resistance today.

An EOBA member described Black August with Youth ALIVE! as “a whole vibe. “This year we added the Fun Zone for the kids, because you really cannot go wrong with a Fun Zone. I also loved seeing everyone chillin’ in the outdoor lounge, catching some Vitamin D and just enjoying a Friday evening together.”

The food tasting, a popular event from last year, featured traditional Black foods such as black-eyed peas, johnny cakes, and fried chicken. Led by Williams, the tasting included a talk about how these traditional foods were made and why they are forms of Black resilience.

The “‘Plate of History’ was a favorite of the online writers. “Fun, educational, and did I mention delicious? Our Taste of History cook, Angela Southall, served up some good eats while connecting food to history and culture.”

The writer also commended the “League of Women Voters Oakland for their civic leadership and for getting our young people informed, ready, and registered to vote.”

Overall, it was a “good Friday event in East Oakland,” the writer said.

Upcoming Black August events: Building Opportunities for Self-Sufficiency (BOSS), will host “Black August: The Arc of Liberation” at Oakland City Hall on Sat. Aug. 29, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

The websites for East Oakland Boxing Association, Youth Alive! and CORO are sources for this report.

Jana Lang is an Oakland resident, teacher, gardener and poet participating in the Propel News Initiative.