One of San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie's newest ideas for dealing with the city's street drug epidemic is being set up in a South of Market parking lot.
Lurie said the fentanyl triage center is a new approach to a deadly problem in the streets, but not everyone is supporting the idea.
"I want people of San Francisco to know that we are moving quickly," Lurie said. "We are going to try new things because the old way of doing things is not working."
Tents were already seen going up on Wednesday at Jessie and Sixth streets in the South of Market neighborhood. Public works crews set up the bare bones of what will soon be a multi-departmental effort.
The center is being set up so quickly that the district's member of the Board of Supervisors, community advocates, and even some city departments did not have all the details on Wednesday as public works crews began erecting tents.
According to the mayor's office, the triage center will be a place for San Francisco police to send people after being detained for either using or selling drugs on the streets.
Members of the Department of Public Health will then asses them on site. And if they are refused, they could be sent out of the city.
Lurie said the fentanyl triage center should be up and running within the next couple of days and is a 30-day pilot project.
The triage center is in Supervisor Matt Dorsey's district, who said he has been briefed by the mayor's office about the pilot project and wants to see exactly how it will work. Dorsey supports the mayor's larger and aggressive effort to clean up Sixth Street and open fentanyl use citywide.
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"Public drug use is illegal in California," Dorsey said. "And the people I represent expect California laws to be enforced here in San Francisco. And they're tired of seeing, what we're tolerating and enabling in terms of public drug use."
A spokesperson for the San Francisco Public Defender's Office said they are still studying how the program will work. The same goes for Jennifer Friedenbach, the director of the city's Coalition on Homelessness.
Friedenbach does have an immediate issue with the San Francisco Police Department running the triage center.
"We are concerned that the police department is leading an effort that is a healthcare concern because that doesn't tend to be very effective," she said.
Friedenbach also said the city does not currently have enough medical treatment for opioid addiction, so she is skeptical about the services people will be offered.
