3 days Ago By Luz Pena
SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie has vowed to take on the city's drug crisis in an effort to build a better Bay Area. Nearly 200 people have died this year from overdoses, but San Francisco has a plan it says is working. The program is called Restore and it gives anyone struggling with addiction an automatic shelter bed if they agree to a treatment plan.
Restore was introduced a year ago with 35 beds and on Wednesday, the city announced plans to expand that number to 70. MORE: San Francisco reports first overdose death from new street drug medetomidine Every day, two people are dying in San Francisco from drug overdoses. The medical examiner confirmed 192 deaths in the first three months of 2025.
"As a department, we are not content nibbling around the edges looking at these overdose numbers - we have an epidemic before us and we are going to tackle it as such," said Daniel Tsai, director of the San Francisco Department of Public Health. Part of their plan is the expansion of a voluntary recovery program run by the city's Department of Public Health at the Adante Hotel; 35 beds there are specifically offered to people ready to get off drugs. "The Restore program is meant to be an immediate stabilization sort of program.
Getting someone lugged into treatment one, two, three weeks initiated on treatment and work with that individual with daily case management and other treatment supports to help get to the next step of their treatment journey," said Tsai. MORE: SF nonprofits to stop providing drug paraphernalia without treatment under new city policy Since March of 2024, the program has had 340 clients. The city confirmed that about 50% of them have moved on to other city provided services, like residential treatment, housing, shelter, or withdrawal management.
"We can do it basically in real time and immediately. That is what is so powerful and exciting about this model," said Tsai. On Wednesday's budget and finance committee meeting, supervisors approved leasing the Adante Hotel for one more year with the program in mind.
Supervisor Danny Sauter, who represents the district where the hotel is located, said they will be watching the progress closely. "The provider at the site has to actually do rounds every single hour on the surrounding block to make sure that no one is loitering, no one is causing concern or problems in front of the property, so we have a robust good neighbor policy," said San Francisco supervisor Danny Sauter. "There are concerns and struggles with people doing drugs in shelters all over San Francisco.
I know that myself, the Lurie administration, other members in the board want to stop that. We want our services to move towards rehabilitation." MORE: Finding 'The Way Out': How Joseph McFee Center in SF helps recovering addicts rebuild their lives While some floors inside the Adante Hotel have been used for the Restore program, the rest of the hotel is being used as a shelter.
Multiple sources confirmed drug abuse still happens in those areas. "People have gotten so accustomed to doing what they want to do. They want to continue to do it but it is at everyone's expense, even at their one.
That is why we are losing so many livers," said Cedric Akbar, Westside Community Services director of forensics. Akbar is urging the city to not only take up more beds inside this hotel for the Restore program, but to turn the entire place into a drug-free space. "We need more beds, and we need more accountability beds.
Not just taking people off the streets and put them in a bed and leaving two days later, returning to the street and keeping that recycling process going," said Akbar. The San Francisco Department of Public Health said it's actively looking into other locations to add more beds throughout the city. Tsai believes they will need anywhere between 150 to 200 beds.
The latest expansion of 70 beds is set to happen in the next three months..
-1745121369054_v.webp)