Board rejects Mission moratorium after daylong hearing; 7-4 vote fails to pause luxury development

SAN FRANCISCO — The San Francisco Board of Supervisors on June 2 voted down an urgency ordinance that would have placed an interim moratorium on most demolitions, conversions and new construction of market-rate housing in part of the Mission District, after a daylong public hearing that drew hundreds of residents and business owners.

The ordinance, sponsored by Supervisor David Campos, would have temporarily paused permits for projects that create or eliminate five or more housing units within the area covered by the Mission Area Plan, excepting projects that are 100 percent affordable. Campos said his office brought the proposal at the community’s request to “pause luxury development so that we can develop a plan to preserve the remaining land for affordable housing.”

Supporters said the moratorium was intended as a short, legally allowed pause — the hearing focused on a 45-day urgency provision — to give the city time to acquire and preserve a limited number of large parcels that could produce deeply affordable housing. Campos told the board the Mission needs “to build at least 2,400 units of affordable housing in…