SF Mayor Daniel Lurie made good on a campaign promise to tap wealthy donors in order to help the city address two of its most entrenched problems, homelessness and behavioral health.
It's called the Breaking the Cycle Fund, and it's a public-private partnership, Lurie annoucned, aimed at increasing treatment and shelter beds, and getting more people off the streets. In total, to date, Lurie says he's raised $37.5 million — $11 million of which comes from the foundation he started nearly a decade ago to address homelessness, the Tipping Point Community. (Incidentally, Tipping Point just had its annual benefit at the Armory last week, at which it raised $20 million.)
"This work is about so much more than money alone," Lurie says in a statement. "It’s about breaking away from failed strategies and building more effective systems and services to break the cycles of homelessness, addiction, and government failure— and reclaim San Francisco’s place as the greatest city in the world."
Other sums for the Breaking the Cycle Fund have come so far from the Charles and Helen Schwab Foundation ($10M), billionaire Michael Moritz's Crankstart Foundation ($10M), Keith and Priscilla Geeslin ($6M), and the Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation ($500,000).
Lurie said that the $37.5 million starting funds will help the city "step up and set up the right kinds of beds to meet people where they're at." He mentions that these could include stabilization beds, mental health and drug treatment beds, and tiny homes to serve as transitional housing.
As the Chronicle notes, "While the funds are not insignificant, they aren’t transformative," given that the city already spends around $700 million annually on homelessness, and is currently facing a two-year $818 million deficit.
But, to start, the mayor suggests these funds will have to do, and could fund some vital new programs. Lurie tells the Chronicle, "We must learn to do more with less, and that's going to require an unprecedented all-hands-on-deck approach — an effort designed to reach across sectors and silos and one that brings to bear all the talents, innovation and expertise of this incredible city."
The fund, which can take donations up to $10 million from private donors, was approved by the SF Board of Supervisors in early February as part of Lurie's Fentanyl State of Emergency ordinance.
We'll see how quickly the Break the Cycle Fund manages to do some good. Lurie says the aim is to "rapidly increase interim and treatment bed capacity," and to bring more people indoors and connect them with care — both things that the city's Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing has been trying to do since its founding nine years ago.
As of the last point-in-time homeless census in 2024, San Francisco had 8,300 homeless people, roughly half of whom were unsheltered. A survey of homeless individuals connected with the census found that 7% said they had become homeless due to mental illness, while 18% said they were addicted to drugs or alcohol.
Related: Daniel Lurie Gets His ‘Fentanyl Emergency Ordinance’ Passed In Landslide Board Vote
Top photo via Daniel Lurie/X
