Mayor touts Pier 80 shelter as ‘good thing’ for S.F.’s homeless

Mayor Ed Lee said Tuesday the answer is Pier 80, the port-owned former home of the Oracle America’s Cup team, which has been converted into an expansive homeless shelter.

The mayor toured the shelter, along with Human Services Agency Director Trent Rhorer, and he said he will seek to get more beds for the shelter and keep it operating beyond the winter rainy season.

On Monday night, 98 people slept at Pier 80 — leaving just two empty beds, according to Margi English, executive director of the St. Vincent de Paul Society, which is running the shelter.

Homeless people can bring all their belongings, as well as their pets and partners, to the site.

Belongings are kept behind a chain link fence off to the side, and sleeping mats are spread in rows on the floor nearby.

The shelter serves three meals a day and features showers and toilets, counseling, a smoking tent outside and basketball hoops provided by the San Francisco Recreation and Park Department.

[...] persuading people living in tents in the center of the city to move to the far-off shelter hasn’t been a slam dunk.

Brenda Meskan, director of the city’s Homeless Outreach Team, said that only about 50 percent of homeless people who are offered a spot at Pier 80 accept it.