The Budget Committee of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors will decide this week whether to add back funding for the city’s only program that provides free legal representation to tenants facing Ellis Act evictions. Run by the Tenderloin Housing Clinic, publisher of Beyond Chron, the $125,000 program was slated for elimination by the Human Services Agency, and funding runs out tomorrow. HSA has indicated a willingness to continue funding, and the program has drawn strong support from the San Francisco Tenants Union and a number of Supervisors on the Committee. The decision on the continued funding of Ellis Act defense comes amid reports that Mayor Gavin Newsom will veto tenant protection measures recently passed by the Board with seven votes. The potential combination of a veto and a defunding of Ellis Act legal representation would be a major blow to the pro-tenant Supervisorial majority — and a great boon to the real estate speculators who prey on the city’s elderly, disabled and longterm tenants.
