Since its founding in 1980, THC’s core mission has been improving living conditions for tenants.  In December 1982 we worked with Warren Hinckle of the SF Chronicle to expose the heatless hotel crisis in SRO hotels. The story brought local and national media attention to the fact that thousands of SRO tenants across the city were living without heat. The scandal led to the passage of tough new heat and hot water laws.

The heatless hotel crisis was part of a larger problem: San Francisco’s Bureau of Building Inspection (BBI) was systematically failing to enforce the housing code. Landlords could flagrantly violate the health and safety of tenants without paying a penalty. This caused THC to lead a citywide campaign to expose the lack of code enforcement. The campaign soon confirmed that protecting tenants was not a BBI priority and never would be. The many archived articles from 1993 became the backdrop for THC sponsoring a ballot measure with the Residential Builders Association (RBA), Prop G, replacing BBI with a new department and commission. The two daily newspapers went all out to defeat Prop G in November 1994, identifying THC as a “special interest group.” Our special interest was code enforcement. Voters approved Prop G and the commission soon adopted the nation’s toughest code enforcement procedures by 1995. San Francisco is now a national leader on housing code enforcement.