SF Mayor Lurie to tech CEOs: 'How can we get you back?'

https://techcrunch.com/2025/04/05/sf-mayor-lurie-to-tech-ceos-how-can-we-get-you-back/

by rntn • 1 year ago

45 50 1 year ago

"We want our entrepreneurs starting businesses and then staying here," said Lurie. "That means streamlining permitting, making it easier to start a restaurant, a bar, or a startup."

I really wish the emphasis was on high-tech manufacturing startups, and the degree of automation isn't really that important. Prototype shops, specialty manufacturing, etc. should all be encouraged.

toomuchtodo3• 1 year ago

SF is not the place for that, from a shipping and logistics perspective (imho). Memphis, TN or Louisville, KY is where you’d want to be (FedEx and UPS primary hubs, respectively). This enables having output in the hands of consumers or partners in <24 hours from completion.

mvdtnz• 1 year ago

Manufacturers don't need direct shipping access to consumers.

mitthrowaway2• 1 year ago

I think it's important for tech entrepreneurs to be able to interact with the manufacturing process, in order to:

a) understand how to design their products to leverage manufacturing processes, and

b) develop technologies that improve manufacturing itself.

So either that means more manufacturing in San Francisco, or more tech startups in Louisville.

robocat• 1 year ago

manufacturing startups

Oxymoron? VC money chases high growth, high margin businesses.

How would a manufacturing business fit the VC funded model?

Aside: article with an interesting take on VC -- unfortunately however with an extremely long-winded intro. https://pivotal.substack.com/p/making-markets-in-time

janalsncm• 1 year ago

Announcing initiatives and proposing laws is a good start. Unfortunately these problems are decades in the making and won’t be fixed overnight.

JumpCrisscross8• 1 year ago

Housing. Like, deregulate permitting for residential construction for ten years.

Every entrepreneur I know who lived in and loved San Francisco had to move out because of the cost of housing and private schools (apparently the middle schools are either super competitive to get into or lined with metal detectors).

MostlyStable• 1 year ago

That's gonna be a tough row to hoe given where they currently are:

https://x.com/sp6runderrated/status/1879257360344199255

JumpCrisscross8• 1 year ago

Which is why I suggest deregulating permitting, not permitting reform. You need automatic permitting as long as state building codes are met, and even then, let the state enforce them. The human cost of the housing crisis is worth the risk that a dodgy developer puts up a Millennium Tower.

arcticbull7• 1 year ago

I am once again advocating for federalized zoning rules. The federal government should invalidate all local punitive zoning regulations under the dormant commerce clause. Housing is interstate commerce. This is the same basis that enables the Fair Housing Act, and of course, the FCC's ruling on Chicago satellite dishes.

Individuals should have a right to build exactly what they want on their own property, and to charge whatever they want to tenants.

If your neighbors object, they can buy you out.

If the city thinks we need rent controlled housing, they can buy you out, put up a tenement and charge exactly what they want.

This whole city council telling you how much you can list your place for and what color your facade can be is wild. If it meets code, you should have a right to build it, and charge whatever you want.

The regulatory capture by existing landowners has to end. It's utterly un-American.

nradov3• 1 year ago

There's no need for the federal government to get involved. It's already way too large and intrusive; giving it more power and authority would be utterly un-American. Zoning problems can be completely fixed at the state government level, and the optimal solutions are likely to be different in each state.

shreddit• 1 year ago

Tell me you want overpriced shoeboxes without telling me you want overpriced shoeboxes.

Some things just don’t work, because people are greedy. That’s mostly why we can’t have nice things.

lukev• 1 year ago

Zoning needs to be a little more nuanced than "build whatever you want."

I'd be happy to see multi-family dwellings in my neighborhood but there's a few steps between that and buying out my neighbors to build an ammonia processing plant.

archagon8• 1 year ago

By what twisted logic is housing “interstate commerce”? It’s local commerce by definition.

If the city thinks we need rent controlled housing, they can buy you out, put up a tenement and charge exactly what they want.

Eliminating rent control would likely force me and my friends out of a city we’ve lived in for years. You bet your ass we’d fight anything like this tooth and nail. (Fortunately, the policy you describe would be illegal while we still have democracy.)

jjav• 1 year ago

Individuals should have a right to build exactly what they want on their own property, and to charge whatever they want to tenants.

You say individuals, but this would get abused by megacorporations buying up everything and building whatever is most profitable, which might not be what you think. It would be quite the dystopia.

nradov3• 1 year ago

In addition to housing, most parents of school age children also hate the school lottery system. Even if you can afford a home there's no guarantee that your child will be able to attend the closest public school. There's a reason why SF has more dogs than children.

kacesensitive• 1 year ago

Relevant.

https://sfstandard.com/2022/09/13/how-san-francisco-makes-it...

surume• 1 year ago

This makes no sense. CEO’s are inherently capitalist, but SF is a communist city, so her appeal is absurd on its face.

tyre• 1 year ago

This doesn't matter.

Look, SF voters are not going to vote for this. It's not going to happen. The people you're courting—by definition—don't live there. The existing economic base is fine.

Well-paid tech employees aren't civically engaged and their salaries are enough to cover their housing. Until they aren't, like when starting a family, at which point many move out of the city and no longer have a vote.

The major, high-turnout voters are _home owners_. They do not want cheaper permitting because it will drive down their property values. That's the whole point!

It's the same as the homelessness epidemic in SF. Everyone theoretically supports it but in a strong council system, no supervisor (their equivalent of a city council member) will support it for their district. "I support homeless shelters and de-regulation, just not in my district" is the prevailing take, which means neither will ever pass.

archagon8• 1 year ago

Support for entrepreneurs and small businesses is great, but the last thing I want is for the CEOs and VCs who hate our city and gleefully put us in our current political predicament to make a triumphant return from their Texan silos.

Keep them out or get voted out. Let them go build their Network State or whatever-the-fuck somewhere else.

cadamsdotcom• 1 year ago

A good friend of mine bought an apartment in Hayes Valley 6 or 7 years back. They’ve had their doorbell stolen, trash left in the street, and just yesterday had to call 311 because a man was in their street yelling and they couldn’t leave.

Yesterday here in Sydney it was a nice autumn day - I walked down the hill from home and took a nap on the sand of Bondi Beach with my phone and my stuff in a bag next to me. Was napping a good hour in the sun, never thought twice about my phone. Got home and my car had not been broken into. In fact I don’t know anyone in Australia who has ever had their car broken into. Not one.

I lived in SF 2013-2019. Mid-Market & Tenderloin is hard to explain but makes sense once you live there. SF has pockets that are stunning, but nowhere offers the quality of life I found by moving away. Sad to be further from the epicenter of tech, but your day to day happiness and stress levels have to take priority.

To the latest mayor promising to do better: we see you, we know you are doing your best. Thankyou for caring - unpicking this knot of social problems is going to take a long time of consistently caring.

x3n0ph3n3• 1 year ago

The homeless problem, rampant petty crime, and the school district are why I will never move my family into SF. Life is much better further down the peninsula.

zzgo• 1 year ago

I'll never understand why they put the jobs on land surrounded by a moat on three sides. I had a supervisor 10 years ago who had a then-new 2 bedroom apartment in Mission Bay with her husband and child for $4900/mo. That's great if you're earning engineering manager money and your spouse is _also_ an engineer, but for those of us with children less than $200K household income, it's unaffordable.

What I want to hear about is startups surrounded on all 4 sides by affordable housing and decent public transit dropping you off within two blocks of work. Waking up in the morning and getting on that screeching BART train sucked away my will to put in 100% every day.

4d4m• 1 year ago

Improve the quality of life for everyone equally. When policies end up deteriorating the living experience of the taxpayer base and making business more difficult, people and businesses flee.

SF Mayor Lurie to tech CEOs: 'How can we get you back?'

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