To solve The City’s housing-affordability crisis, listen to voters

A grassroots coalition of San Franciscans assembled recently in Dolores Park to kick off a signature-gathering effort to put a measure on the November 2026 ballot.

The measure, the Affordable Housing Guarantee Act, builds on progressive wins of the past to commit City Hall to a future in which working people can afford to live in San Francisco.

This measure continues a vision that San Francisco voters have repeatedly endorsed at the ballot box.

In 2020, voters overwhelmingly passed a tax on the ultrawealthy to fund social housing. A whopping 74% of voters demanded 10,000 units of social housing through Proposition K, and they also decisively passed Proposition I, a tax on sellers of skyscrapers and mansions, in order to fund that vision.

At the time, the Board of Supervisors unanimously passed legislation to use the tax revenue for housing. The plan was hatched by my office and the local chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, and, for the first two years, it worked remarkably well.

We moved more than $200 million into innovative solutions to the affordability crisis. We launched the biggest local rent-relief program in US history, stopping 20,000 evictions. We acquired five sites for the development of more than 500 homes, funded the development of another 60 affordable homes for educators, invested $20 million in public-housing repairs, committed $10 million to fix broken elevators in permanent supportive housing, and made an unprecedented investment in community land trusts that stop displacement and provide permanently affordable homes for San Franciscans.

For a time, Prop I was working as voters intended. But after two years of considerable progress, billionaires and cynical politicians sprung into action to prevent those successes from being scaled up.

In 2023, City Hall stopped using Prop. I funds for housing and diverted them to other priorities, squandering hundreds of millions of dollars that could already be working to make San Francisco more affordable. Earlier this year, the Board of Supervisors dissolved the oversight body tasked with guiding the investments into social housing.

The real estate lobby interests and the very wealthy would love to repeal the tax. Unfortunately for them, Mayor Daniel Lurie and Supervisor Bilal Mahmood’s attempt to do so has proven politically unviable.

The so-called BUILD Act — which would have overturned the Prop. I tax increase — was announced back in February, but it died last week without ever receiving a hearing. The groups that would have benefited from such a tax break are hard at work pushing similar fare in Sacramento. They’ll try it again in San Francisco in a heartbeat if only they can convince the public it’s something it isn’t.

The transfer-tax increase initiated by Prop. I only affects those who sell property for $10 million or more: corporate landlords, billionaires, and, increasingly, private-equity firms. The same billionaires and corporations that have benefited from tax reductions under the federal One Big Beautiful Bill Act would get a further tax sweetener if Prop. I were repealed.

But this isn’t just knee-jerk tax avoidance. It’s an attempt to nullify a competing vision of the city before it gains momentum. If San Francisco successfully builds social housing at scale, rents will finally come down as a result. That would be good news for everyone — except this tiny group of extremely wealthy investors, who much prefer the current situation in which they alone dictate how much new housing is built and what it costs to live there.

And if San Francisco solves its massive and enduring affordability crisis, other jurisdictions would be keen to follow, as Los Angeles did by passing a similar tax program after the passage of Prop. I. That poses a threat to the continued growth of private equity in the residential real-estate market and the viability of real-estate speculation as a sector — once again, great news for everyone but billionaires.

The Affordable Housing Guarantee Act would preserve the transfer tax on billionaires and dedicate every penny to the housing that working-class San Franciscans desperately need, guaranteeing that San Francisco acts on the vision its residents have voted for. The transfer tax raises far more money than any other pending proposal. It is the only revenue stream that isn’t limited to traditional housing models, but can fund innovative alternatives such as mixed-income social housing.

And it is precisely the sort of direct democracy that San Francisco would lose if Mayor Daniel Lurie’s charter amendment to raise the threshold for ballot qualifications passes this fall: volunteer-led, funded through non-corporate donations, and contesting the dominant power structure in City Hall.

City Hall has committed to securing 46,000 new affordable homes by 2031, but has no actual plan to do so. Preserving Prop. I and dedicating the funds to housing should be a no-brainer. Combined with the expansion of the Housing Trust Fund recently announced by the mayor, we have an opportunity to finally solve this crisis once and for all.

Prop. I has already raised over $500 million. It’s projected to raise another $350 million in the next three years. We can ensure that City Hall uses those funds to scale up social housing and make San Francisco a city for all, not just the wealthy.

San Francisco voters can end the pattern of begging the for-profit real-estate industry to fix a housing crisis it has no financial interest in solving and make certain that working-class people — bus drivers, nurses, teachers, nannies and artists — can afford to live and raise families here.