On the last day in May, Mayor Breed announced her 2019-2020 fiscal year budget to a crowd of over 350 people gathered in the Sunnydale neighborhood. Attendees at the event walked past broken down bunker style public housing apartment homes and assembled on a basketball court overlooking a freshly cleared building site. Beyond this, scaffolds rose up around the new construction of a new affordable apartment building, the first new construction by Mercy Housing and Related Companies of California in Sunnydale.

Mercy Housing and Related Companies of California are revitalizing the Sunnydale neighborhood by replacing 775 existing dilapidated public housing apartments with over 1,000 homes to create a mixed-income community around a community hub. By choosing to make her budget announcement inside this long-neglected neighborhood, Mayor Breed made her priorities clear and highlighted the needs of this community.

“We need to acknowledge the past and make a commitment to a brighter future,” said Mayor Breed, who reinforced the symbolism of new growth rising from decay throughout her speech. She spoke about her childhood, growing up inside public housing, and the difficulties that many of the people who live in communities like Sunnydale are facing every day. “San Francisco is a city with a heart, but we also need to be a city with a memory.”

Sunnydale residents sitting in the front row responded with cheers and encouragement. Some of these residents are also employed at the new construction sites. They posed with Mayor Breed after the event in their construction gear.

Before the speech, Mayor London Breed took the Board of Supervisors and other local dignitaries on a tour of a few of the homes in Sunnydale, meeting with residents. They were able to witness in-person the reasons that Mayor Breed proposed that $150 million out of a $600 million housing bond be used to rebuild public housing.

View the photo gallery from the event here.

To learn more about the proposed budget, check out this article in the Examiner.