When they’re not injecting, swallowing or sniffing drugs, many of San Francisco’s “homeless” spend a lot of their time ripping off retail stores.

Walgreens drug stores have proven a particular target for Druggies, Drunks, Mentals and Bums (DDMBs)—the four groups that make up 90% of the “homeless” population.

As a result, Walgreens has closed at least 11 stores in San Francisco. 

“The clerks say there is nothing they can do. They say Walgreens’ policy is to not get involved. They don’t want anyone getting injured or getting sued, so the guys just keep coming in and taking whatever they want,” a regular customer, Sebastian Luke, told the San Francisco Chronicle.

“Retail theft across our San Francisco stores has continued to increase in the past few months to five times our chain average,” Walgreens spokesman Phil Caruso told the Chronicle in October, 2021. 

“During this time to help combat this issue, we increased our investments in security measures in stores across the city to 46 times our chain average in an effort to provide a safe environment.” 

“Why are the shelves empty?” a customer asked a clerk at a Walgreens store.

“Go ask the people in the alleys, they have it all,” replied the clerk.

One store in the San Francisco area reportedly lost $1,000 a day to theft. 

CVS Pharmacy has instructed its employees to not intervene because the thieves so often attack them.

Many shoplifters then sell their stolen goods on the street—often near the store where they stole them.

Under California law, theft under $950 is considered a misdemeanor, but many prosecutors prefer to free those charged rather than holding them in jail.

The maximum sentence they could get: Six months. 

Low-income and disabled seniors who depend on these disappearing drug stores for prescriptions are especially at risk. 

Some stores in the city are refusing to let themselves be ripped off.

Target’s largest store, at Geary and Masonic, is guarded by armed security from IPS. Its officers wear dark green uniforms resembling those of sheriff’s deputies and carry .40 caliber automatics.

They are unfailingly courteous—but don’t hesitate to restrain anyone who poses a threat to customers or is apparently stealing merchandise.

Of course, corporations aren’t in business to lose money. So costs for such security are passed on to customers.

Many Druggies, Drunks, Mentals and Bums refuse to enter the city’s available shelters. Some claim these places are dangerous—understandably so, since they’re peopled with drug addicts, alcoholics, mentally ill and outright bums. 

But another reason why many of these shelters go unused is: They don’t allow their “guests” to drink up or drug up.

The latest wrinkle in San Francisco’s “be kind to Untermenschen“ campaign is the creation of “Navigation Centers.” These are essentially holding pens for DDMBs until they can be “navigated” to permanent housing. 

But housing is in short supply in San Francisco, and there is no telling how long many of these drug addicts, alcoholics, mentally disabled and bums will stay in them. Or what harm they will wreak on the neighborhoods warehousing them.

Since 2015, eight Navigation Centers have been opened throughout San Francisco; six are in operation.

Among the “amenities” they provide:

• Meals
• Privacy
• Space for pets
• Space separate from sleeping areas
• Laundry
• Access to benefits
• Wi-Fi

Hundreds—if not thousands—of their occupants are meth or heroin addicts. Such people will commit virtually any crime to support their habit. And their crimes of choice are burglary and robbery. 

Thus, pouring large numbers of them into San Francisco neighborhoods via “Navigation Centers” guarantees that countless decent citizens will become targets for desperate criminals.

“Navigation Centers” boast that they ban drug-abuse or drug-dealing on their own premises. But they allow DDMBs to come and go at will. Which means they are free to engage in drug-abuse and/or drug-dealing in the neighborhoods where these centers exist. 

Huge areas of the city are covered in feces, urine, trash and used hypodermic needles. Hospitals overflow with patients that have fallen ill due to the contamination.

The city budgeted $1.1 billion for fiscal year 2021-22 on DDMBs. Dividing that amount by about 7,754 DDMBs provides the figure of about $128,925 per DDMB per year.  

An Untermenschen encampment

And what is the legacy of allowing San Francisco to become a Roach Motel for undesirables? 

• The city’s sidewalks reek of human feces and urine.
• Pedestrians must tread carefully to avoid used hypodermic needles and empty cans or bottles of alcoholic beverages.
• Sleeping bags and tents litter sidewalks, making it hard to pass by—especially for the elderly or those using canes or wheelchairs.
• Elevators in the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) system are often unusable because “homeless” people urinate and/or defecate in them.
• Restaurants have been forced to close because they’ve become havens for DDMBs. A Burger King at Civic Center Plaza recently suffered this fate. So did a McDonald’s in the Haight Ashbury district. 
• Tourists—and residents—are daily forced to sit next to filth-encrusted men and women who reek of urine and/or feces in restaurants and movie theaters, as well as on buses.

It is a recipe for guaranteed disaster. 

Who says that every hardcore drug addict deserves to live in San Francisco—where he can shoplift and/or burglarize to feed his habit?

Who says that every hardcore alcoholic deserves to live in San Francisco—where he can do the same as the average drug addict?

Who says that every ranting psychotic deserves to roam the streets as a potential threat to others?

Who says that every bum who refuses to work for a living has a right to live in San Francisco—and sponge off locals and tourists? 

A typical “homeless” encampment

 Why, the Mayor and Board of Supervisors, of course.

Yes, spend some time—say, an hour or two—in what was once the most beloved city in the United States.

And before you know it, you’ll gain a new appreciation for a little-known German word: Untermenschen. 

Translation: Subhumans.

These are the new untouchables of San Francisco. If you doubt it, consider the following:

If you are a firefighter, police officer, paramedic or schoolteacher, and want to live in San Francisco, forget it.

According to Rent Cafe, which provides apartment listings directly from top property managers: “The average [monthly] rent for an apartment in San Francisco is $2,879.” And “the average size for a San Francisco apartment is 739 square feet.”

So unless you’re a hugely successful IT professional—or narcotics dealer—your chances of being able to afford a San Francisco apartment are lower than Donald Trump’s of winning a “Mr. Congeniality” contest.

But there’s hope for you yet—if you’re a Druggie, Drunk, Mental or Bum (DDMBs). 

Why? 

Because the Mayor of San Francisco—currently London Breed—and Board of Supervisors have deliberately created an Untermenschen-friendly program that actually encourages such people to move to the city.

Run by the city’s Department of Public Health (DPH) it’s called the COVID-19 Alternative Housing Program. And it works in two stages:

Stage 1: Move the “homeless” into the city’s hotels—at city expense.

Stage 2: Provide them with not only free food and shelter but free alcohol, cannabis, and cigarettes. 

According to a May 11, 2020 story in City Journal.org:

“The program’s primary purpose is to keep homeless people, the majority of whom are addicts, out of harm’s way during the pandemic. By getting their substance of choice delivered, the thinking goes, the guests may be more apt to remain in their government-funded rooms.

“Another purpose of the program is to protect the public against the spread of coronavirus. The city doesn’t want homeless people who should be staying in their rooms roaming the neighborhood in search of the substances, potentially infecting others.” 

But the agency doesn’t require that its addict “guests” remain quarantined. It merely asks that they do so.

After news about these deliveries leaked on social media, DPH claimed that “rumors that guests of San Francisco’s alternative housing program are receiving taxpayer-funded deliveries of alcohol, cannabis and tobacco are false.”

Except that the reports weren’t false.

The program is funded by private philanthropists  Nevertheless:

• DPH administers and oversees the program.
• It’s staffed by city workers, including doctors, nurse practitioners, nurses, social workers and security personnel.
• The department manages, stores and distributes the substances.
• Employee time is involved.

Thus, the program is financed by taxpayers, even if an outside group provides some of the funding. 

“Managed alcohol and tobacco use makes it possible to increase the number of guests who stay in isolation and quarantine and, notably, protects the health of people who might otherwise need hospital care for life-threatening alcohol withdrawal,” says DPH spokeswoman Jenna Lane.

Notice the word “guests.” As if San Francisco—or any city—should welcome hordes of drug addicts, alcoholics, mentally ill and outright bums as assets to its community. 

“Many isolation and quarantine guests tell us they use these substances daily,” says Lane, “and this period in our care has allowed some people to connect for the first time with addiction treatment and harm reduction therapy.”

DPH said in a statement that these “guests” are screened for substance addictions and asked if they’d like to stop or have support to reduce their use.

If they say they want to remain alcoholics and/or drug addicts, they’re provided with their substance of choice.

The department also provides methadone for “guests” who are addicted to opioids.

DPH staffers have helped people buy “medical marijuana,” the agency told local affiliate ABC7.

But the agency doesn’t “facilitate purchases of recreational cannabis,” according to the San Francisco Chronicle’s website, SFGate.

When they’re not injecting, swallowing or sniffing drugs, many of San Francisco’s “guests” spend a lot of their time ripping off retail stores.

Walgreens drug stores have proven a particular target for these DDMBs. 

As a result, Walgreens has closed 11 stores in San Francisco. 

“I feel sorry for the clerks, they are regularly being verbally assaulted,” a regular customer, Sebastian Luke, told the San Francisco Chronicle.

“The clerks say there is nothing they can do. They say Walgreens’ policy is to not get involved. They don’t want anyone getting injured or getting sued, so the guys just keep coming in and taking whatever they want.”

When rain comes to San Francisco, it does something that the Mayor and Board of Supervisors refuse to do.

It rids the streets of vermin. Human vermin.

Fifty-five years after Scott Makenzie released “San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair”) the city has mutated from a haven for “flower children” into a hellhole populated by hardcore drug-abusers, hardcore alcoholics, the mentally ill and those who refuse to work.

Or, to put it more simply: Druggies, Drunks, Mentals and Bums (DDMBs).

Decades ago, being “homeless” meant you lost your home due to fire, flood or earthquake. For a few weeks or months, you lived with friends or family as you searched for a new residence. Then you resumed your former life as a productive citizen. 

Today, being “homeless” means living for years—even decades—on the street. Selling drugs, using drugs, getting drunk, staying drunk, living in filth, refusing treatment for drug and/or alcohol addiction, refusing even shelter from the cold, rain and terrors of street life—these are the realities of most of today’s “homeless” population.

In 2022, the San Francisco “homeless” population was officially estimated to be 7,754.  Of these, 3,357 were staying in shelter. Many of those who could find shelter refused to make use of it—or were refused entry due to their rampant drug and/or alcohol addictions.

If it’s a mystery why so many people would prefer to live on the streets—especially during a cold and rainy winter—it’s equally mystifying why so many politicians cater to this population.

Politicians are notorious for “going where the votes are.”

Thus, during his first meeting with Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin (November 28 – December 1, 1943) in Tehran, President Franklin D. Roosevelt said he could not openly support Stalin’s ambitions to conquer Poland.

The reason: The 1944 Presidential election was fast approaching. And Poles made up a substantial portion of the voters FDR needed to win a fourth—and unprecedented—term. He could not afford to alienate them.

Yet drug addicts, alcoholics, the mentally ill and bums are infamous for not showing up at the polls on Election Day. So what can be the reason San Francisco politicians cater so fervently to this population?

In his 2021 bestseller, San Fransicko: Why Progressives Ruin Cities, author Michael Shellenberger provides the answer. 

According to its dust jacket:

“Progressives claimed they knew how to solve homelessness, inequality, and crime. But in cities they control, progressives made those problems worse.

“Michael Shellenberger has lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for thirty years. During that time, he advocated for the decriminalization of drugs, affordable housing, and alternatives to jail and prison.

“But as homeless encampments spread, and overdose deaths skyrocketed, Shellenberger decided to take a closer look at the problem. What he discovered shocked him. The problems had grown worse not despite but because of progressive policies.

“San Francisco and other West Coast cities — Los Angeles, Seattle, Portland — had gone beyond merely tolerating homelessness, drug dealing, and crime to actively enabling them.

“San Fransicko reveals that the underlying problem isn’t a lack of housing or money for social programs. The real problem is an ideology that designates some people, by identity or experience, as victims entitled to destructive behaviors. The result is an undermining of the values that make cities, and civilization itself, possible.”

In December, the Palo Alto-based cloud computing company VMware canceled its contract with the Moscone Center for its 2023 conference and said it would relocate the event.

No specific reason was given. But it’s almost a certainty that the city’s refusal to get tough on the druggies, drunks, mentals and bums who infest its streets and accost its tourists is a major one.

This is only the latest blow to a city that depends overwhelmingly on tourism for its economic prosperity—if not survival.

San Francisco saw the steepest drop of any major metro with a loss of $1.68 billion—or 68.8%—when compared with 2019.

The COVID-19 pandemic has been especially hard on the city. Huge numbers of tech workers who once flooded into San Francisco began working at home. And a great many of them still do.

Thus, those businesses—such as restaurants—who had benefitted from their presence are now desperate to stay afloat.

But even before the pandemic, an exodus of high-profile conventions had already started—such as Oracle’s CloudWorld—which left San Francisco for Las Vegas.

Unlike VMware, CloudWorld did cite the reasons for its departure: Filthy street conditions and exorbitant hotel prices.  

San Francisco’s politicians—its Mayor and the 11 members of the Board of Supervisors—like to think of the city as a city-state. That is: As a power comparable to ancient Sparta or Athens.

Reality proves otherwise.

San Francisco is not an economic powerhouse like New York City. It’s not an entertainment capital like Hollywood. It’s not a political center like Washington, D.C.

Here is what San Francisco is:

• It’s a small (46.87 square miles) city with a relatively modest population (815,201).
• Its largest industry is tourism,
• This generates more than $8.4 billion annually for the local economy and supports over 71,000 jobs.  

And if the tourism industry disappears, so will San Francisco.