(NewsNation) — Hundreds of employees from the San Francisco Department of Health and Human Services are being asked to work from home due to significant safety concerns from rising crime throughout the city.
Erica Sandberg, an independent journalist covering crime issues plaguing San Francisco, says the city’s lawmakers are sending a message they have no confidence in their abilities to keep San Francisco residents safe.
“We’re talking (about) government officials who have failed, and it really does show that the people who are actually working for the city, that they don’t have faith. That is absolutely appalling. It’s an embarrassment,” Sandberg said.
In a memo sent to government employees this month, officials from the San Francisco HHS Department are requesting hundreds of staff members at the Nancy Pelosi Federal Building to work from home “in light of the conditions” outside of their place of employment.
Sandberg says she has seen the extent of crime and open drug use near the building firsthand.
“Right now, fentanyl is the game,” Sandberg said.
She said people using fentanyl in the area often pass out or are in “that sort of zombie state where it’s really kind of shocking.”
“How are these people even functioning? How are they alive? And you see it all around the federal building,” she said.
Last month, Sandberg took photos of a drug bust happening on the streets right outside the building where government employees once worked.
In June, two men were charged on the suspicion of drug dealing after they were caught on surveillance video from this same location.
“It is extremely lucrative to sell drugs here on the streets of San Francisco,” Sandberg said. “The markup is huge. The desire to purchase the drugs is huge. We’re getting drug tourism.”
According to the San Francisco Chronicle’s 18-month investigation into the drug trade in the bay area, successful dealers can make up to $350,000 a year. That’s more than the $211,000 base salary of a senior software engineer at Google based in San Francisco.
Sandberg said it’s essential for the city to disrupt the open air drug market.
“How do you do that? How do you get more people out on the street, more law enforcement officers out on the street? That means hiring more people, training more people, and flooding the area, making arrests, making prosecutions,” she said.
In June, California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office announced the State Highway Patrol seized more than four kilos of fentanyl in the immediate area of San Francisco. They say it was enough to kill the entire city’s population three times over.
On the federal level, San Francisco was approved this year for designation in “Operation Over-Drive” – a program to target high-level drug traffickers. But, according to Sandberg, real change is going to come from local officials.
“Lawmakers, politicians, turned a blind eye to reality. And citizens weren’t engaged. They didn’t see the connection between who they were voting for and the policies that they were supporting, and what the impact would be having in their communities,” Sandberg said.
San Francisco residents appear to be taking notice with the rise in crime. Less than 30% of respondents to a poll earlier this year say they feel safe visiting the city’s downtown area at night and 77% say they believe the city is “on the wrong track” to address these problems.
People or families of individuals facing mental and/or substance use disorders are encouraged to call the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration helpline at 800-662-HELP (4357). The hotline is free, confidential, and provides treatment referral and information service 24/7, 365 days a year. The administration also welcomes people to visit their online treatment location or send their zip code via text message to 435748 to find help.