Mission Bay affordable housing honors Mayor Ed Lee

An affordable housing site in San Francisco’s Mission Bay broke ground Thursday morning that will house homeless veterans and low-income families.

City officials joined Mayor Mark Farrell in the groundbreaking at 1150 Third St., in which Farrell dedicated the new housing site to former Mayor Ed Lee, who died last year in December:

“Mayor Lee made housing a central platform, but it just wasn’t talk, it was action.”

Farrell said the new housing development will achieve Lee’s goal of building and rehabilitating 30,000 housing units by 2020.

The housing project is a partnership with The City’s Office of Community Investment and Infrastructure (OCII), Swords to Plowshares and the Chinatown Community Development Center.

Once completed in November 2019, the site will have a total of 119 affordable units, 62 for homeless veterans, and 56 for low-income families.

The development site will also include a community room, computer lap, a community space for teens, a space for children to play and on-site supportive services for its veteran residents.

Supervisor Jane Kim, who represents the Mission Bay neighborhood, said:

“This is type of model neighborhoods that we want to continue to build here in San Francisco.”

Nadia Sesay, executive director of OCII, said she was excited that the housing development project will include dedicated housing for homeless veterans:

“These individuals who have served our county should not have to worry about a place to sleep at night.”

The 1150 Third Street project is OCII’s fourth fully funded project in the Mission Bay Neighborhood, said Sesay.

Michael Blecker, executive director with Swords to Plowshares, said in a statement that he was grateful for Mayor Lee for making the land available to the organization to help homeless veterans:

“Collaborative efforts to ending veteran homelessness have led to a significant reduction in the number of chronically homeless veterans. This project is another critical step to getting our most vulnerable veterans housed.”

Some of the early contributors in the pre development phase of the project include Ron Conway, Marc Benioff, Peter Thiel, Sean Parker and the Golden State Warriors.

Jerold Chinn

Jerold serves as a reporter and San Francisco Bureau Chief for SFBay covering transportation and occasionally City Hall and the Mayor's Office in San Francisco. His work on transportation has been recognized by the San Francisco Press Club. Born and raised in San Francisco, he graduated from San Francisco State University with a degree in journalism. Jerold previously wrote for the San Francisco Public Press, a nonprofit, noncommercial news organization. When not reporting, you can find Jerold taking Muni to check out new places to eat in the city.