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While I think @hknightsf & @RafaelMandelman genuinely do care about people not getting the services and treatment they need, the connection this article draws between this specific tragedy and conservatorship is a dangerous. Here's why. https://twitter.com/hknightsf/status/1336330205783191552
Readers of the Chron and many of @RafaelMandelman 's constituents are not concerned about making sure people get the care they need based on the best clinical evidence. They just want them out of sight, and if that means treatment or locked up or shipped away, it's all the same.
For every one person who is "unable" to accept services that are offered, there are many people on the streets that want services and can't get them. Even if the conservatorship program was implemented aggressively, we're talking about maybe 200 people of the 8000 on the streets.
Yes there are people who are a danger to themselves and others who are genuinely unable to accept services, but no one should think that putting ALL of them into conservatorship will make a visible dent in people living on the streets. It may save money because they're expensive.
What expert direct care providers like @NCSchoenfeld & @EsteenJennifer tell me is that there is some evidence that conservatorship can be effective with mental illness, but there is not evidence that it works with addiction, which is what actually killed Mary.
What nonprofit directors like @vitkaE tell me is that they can't provide the drug treatment and behavioral health services anywhere near the scale of the need in the City because the City doesn't give them contracts that let them pay workers enough to recruit.
So yes this is one of many tragedies on our streets. Contrary to some of the less compassionate elements on Nextdoor in District 8, homelessness and mental illness and addiction are not all the same thing and are not all dangerous or violent and are not all refusing services.
SF's homeless is 37% Black. The streets are the last Black neighborhood in a City that is about 4% Black and falling. If #BlackLivesMatter 
in San Francisco, we would give people who want services what they need, which we don't. Fix that shit.
in San Francisco, we would give people who want services what they need, which we don't. Fix that shit.
