In an overall $3 million additional investment to LBGTQ services, Mayor Breed is delegating the lion’s share of that into a $2 million transgender and gender non-conforming (TGNC) city housing subsidy.

Last month, the Chronicle ran an excellent Sunday long-form piece about the first transitional housing shelter in America exclusively for transgender youths, which naturally, is right here in San Francisco. It’s a beautiful Victorian structure in the Upper Haight, operated by Larkin Street Youth Services, that allows stays up to two years, and provides medical support, case managers, therapy services, and more.

The problem? Only six people can stay there at a time. That hardly puts a dent in the city’s trans homeless youth population (estimated at 66 in the 2017 homeless Point-in-Time Count, but sure to increase in this year’s count).

Mayor Breed is now dedicating an additional $3 million of this year’s budget to LGBTQ services and initiatives. According to a Bay City News report in the San Francisco Examiner, Breed announced Wednesday that most of the funds would go to a $2 million housing subsidy for transgender and gender non-conforming people who are at risk of losing their homes.

“Transgender and gender non-conforming San Franciscans are almost 18 times more likely to experience homelessness than the general population in our city,” Breed said in a statement. “Housing subsidies for our city’s trans community will help individuals remain housed and will provide a much-needed safety net for those who are at risk of homelessness.”

The move does not provide any additional shelter beds, but instead the $2 million will be available in subsidies for transgender and gender non-conforming (TGNC) households that may be at risk of eviction or displacement.  

“One out of two TGNC San Franciscans have experienced homelessness and that is a crisis,” director of the Office of Transgender Initiatives Clair Farley told Bay City News. “When TGNC San Franciscans do experience homelessness, there are no safe places for us to go.”

The other million dollars will be spread amongst LGBTQ homeless youths services, new jobs at the Transgender Initiatives office, an LGBTQ Immigrant Fellowship program, and HIV prevention and treatment funding.

Related: SF To Designate Nation's First Transgender Historic District In The Tenderloin [SFist]