America’s decaying downtowns where vultures circle zombie office buildings and locals are scared to venture

California’s largest urban areas are crumbling under the weight of homelessness and drug addiction, drying up a vital part of the economy.

Cities like Los Angeles and San Francisco have made numerous headlines since the pandemic about their drug-ridden streets, where businesses are quickly retreating due to high crime rates and low consumer transit.

But for people like Matt Haney, a Democratic Assembly member from San Francisco – who lives in the terrorized Tenderloin District – these deteriorated inner cities are vital to a city’s survival and community building.

“The clock is ticking,” Haney said The Los Angeles Times. “With each month and year that passes – and things keep getting worse – it becomes harder for cities to dig out the challenges they face.

“We cannot leave our downtowns to the vultures to tear them apart as they fall into disrepair. That would be a catastrophic failure.”

Haney is a big supporter of downtown, telling LA business leaders that it “impacts people’s lives in so many positive ways.”

“Like all of you, I love downtown, and I, like all of you, will not accept giving up our downtown,” he told them.

The councilman is on a mission to visit nine of the state’s largest urban centers, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose and Sacramento, to hopefully find a solution to their stagnation.

But for people like Matt Haney, a Democratic Assembly member from San Francisco (pictured) – who lives in the terrorized Tenderloin District – these crumbling urban centers are vital to a city’s survival and community building and must be remade. are built up.

“We cannot leave our downtowns to the vultures to tear them apart as they fall into disrepair. That would be a catastrophic failure,” he said

In Long Beach, he ate potato wedges near the city’s convention center. In San Diego, he walked the streets full of empty storefronts. In San Jose he visited student housing built in a former hotel.

In his hometown, he visited the famous Union Square, where the major Macy’s location is about to close.

Haney, chairman of the Assembly’s Downtown Recovery Select Committee, plans to introduce legislation next year that will hopefully turn disaster areas into something profitable and inviting for locals, he told The Times.

Haney’s hopes for a thriving downtown may be a hard-fought battle, as many local residents fear neighborhoods are in decline and office vacancy rates are at record highs. Los Angeles has about 25 percent of its offices empty, while San Francisco is closer to 35 percent.

It stems from the COVID-19 pandemic, which saw office workers pack up their desks and start working from home, causing a significant drop in consumer activity in the once-busy downtown area, leaving room for the homeless and addicts to take up residence.

For Haney, there is an urgent need to restore the rotting areas.

“The pandemic has made us aware of the tremendous lack of resilience in our downtown,” Steven Pedigo, assistant dean at the University of Texas at Austin, told The Times.

Pedigo believes the decline of vibrant downtowns is due to cities like Sacramento relying heavily on government workers and San Francisco having technology workers, all of whom have been slow to return to office.

The assemblyman is on a mission to visit nine of the state’s largest urban centers – including Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose and Sacramento (pictured) – to hopefully find a cure for their ailments

Haney, chairman of the Assembly’s Downtown Recovery Select Committee, plans to introduce legislation next year that will hopefully transform the disaster areas into something profitable and inviting for locals (Photo: San Diego)

He wants to see more activity at the state level. Last year, Governor Gavin Newsom (pictured) vetoed a bill that would encourage developers to renovate older buildings by relaxing zoning laws. Haney plans to reintroduce the bill

For Haney, this means bringing people back downtown.

“Inner cities cannot survive without people,” he told The Times.

He wants to get Proposition 1 passed, a $6.4 billion bond that will fund treatment and housing for homeless people with mental illness or addiction issues.

“One of the things that came up during some of these visits is that these cities don’t always talk to each other,” he said. “They don’t always have strong support or connections to the state as a whole.”

He wants to see more activity at the state level.

Last year, Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed a bill that would encourage developers to renovate older buildings by relaxing zoning laws. Haney plans to reintroduce the bill.

“Many of these buildings and many of the developers are controlled by much larger investment forces, so civic pride or local connection is not as prevalent as it used to be,” he told The Times.

‘Buildings must be more than just a number [a] spreadsheet.’

He also thinks big cities, like LA, could learn from smaller cities, like Downey and Paramount, which are revitalizing their “small downtowns” to make them attractive to residents.