XPost: talk.politics.guns, alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, alt.society.liberalism   
   XPost: alt.california, alt.politics.democrats, sac.politics   
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   San Francisco’s once-trendy downtown area has descended into a   
   drug-addled hellscape — where addicts regularly overdose in city-   
   funded “dens of death.”   
      
   Historic hotels in the Tenderloin neighborhood — which used to be   
   the City by the Bay’s premier entertainment district — are now the   
   face of the progressive California city’s deterioration.   
      
   Around 20,000 rooms in about 500 hotels have been converted from   
   coveted tourist destinations into roach- and vermin-infested   
   “Single-Room Occupancy” (SRO) housing for vagrants.   
      
   Many of the century-old buildings are now overrun with drug-addled   
   “zombies” high on fentanyl and the flesh-eating animal tranquilizer   
   dubbed “tranq,” residents told The Post during a tour on Tuesday.   
      
   “It’s like living in a prison, but worse,” Robert Blackburn said of   
   his squalid room in one of Tenderloin’s SROs.   
      
   The neighborhood, located just 2 miles south of tourist hotspot   
   Fisherman’s Wharf, was “once one of San Francisco’s fashionable   
   neighborhoods, home to Bonanza Kings, politicians and millionaire   
   merchants,” according to the San Francisco Chronicle.   
      
   Now, Blackburn says he sees overdoses “all the time” as drug dealers   
   run the corners just steps from the squalid hotels.   
      
   “I’ve had human feces come up and out of my shower,” Blackburn told   
   The Post. “I try my best to keep my room clean, but there’s been   
   mice [and] lots of roaches in other rooms.”   
      
   Longtime Tenderloin resident JJ Smith, who lives near four of the   
   city-funded buildings, said that “once they put these people in   
   these SROs, it’s like they are stuck.”   
      
   “The biggest issue is there are too many deaths in and out of there.   
   On a daily basis, I see five overdoses, at least one or two of them   
   end up dead,” he said.   
      
   “The only way they leave there is in a coroner’s bag.”   
      
   Smith estimates that he’s personally helped revive at least 50 SRO   
   residents in the past year, sharing graphic video of one such   
   harrowing scene from June.   
      
   The shocking video shows the woman unconscious on the ground of the   
   filthy room as Smith passes Narcan to the boyfriend to try to revive   
   her.   
      
   He squirts the Narcan — a drug used to reverse overdoses — into the   
   woman’s nostrils, but she doesn’t move.   
      
   “Wake up, girl,” the boyfriend says. “Come on, baby girl! Don’t die   
   on us!”   
      
   Smith repeatedly calls out her name, while her boyfriend shakes her   
   repeatedly in a desperate effort to wake her up.   
      
   “She survived that time, but she died about a month later inside the   
   SRO,” Smith told The Post.   
      
   “I saw her body be wheeled out by the coroner. She overdosed and   
   died because no one was there to help her that time.”   
      
   The city runs nearly 20,000 rooms in about 500 SRO hotels, according   
   to San Francisco’s Department of Building Inspections 2021-22 stats.   
   The rooms are typically 8 by 10 feet and the residents share a   
   common bathroom on each floor.   
      
   Many of the residents in the city’s hundreds of SROs are vagrants   
   who first lived in encampments or one of the homeless shelters   
   before securing a room. Some are recovering addicts, but many “fall   
   off the wagon” and start using drugs again while living in the SRO,   
   which is against the rules each resident must follow.   
      
   Blackburn, a recovering heroin addict who is now taking methadone,   
   said the SRO desk managers who man the doors and check on residents   
   “don’t do much” to push them into seeking treatment and counseling.   
      
   “They don’t push it because they can’t control us, and really, it’s   
   not their job,” Blackburn said.   
      
   The SROs were not meant to be used as permanent housing, but many of   
   the recovering and still-struggling addicts stay in the roach- and   
   mice-infested rooms for years.   
      
   “We need help,” Blackburn said. “We keep asking, but our voices   
   aren’t being heard.”   
      
   Block after block in the Tenderloin district, drug dealers can be   
   seen handing balled-up foil to addicts on the street.   
      
   Business owners said they are frustrated with the amount of   
   homelessness and drug overdoses happening right in front of their   
   doors.   
      
   Residents and business leaders alike said the blight surrounding   
   Tenderloin and other areas in downtown have contributed to the   
   city’s “doom loop” and flagship businesses like Nordstroms and Whole   
   Foods to leave the area.   
      
   “A lot of people just don’t want to come down to this neighborhood   
   anymore,” said Tommy, who owns a Vietnamese and Chinese restaurant   
   on Larkin Street.   
      
   “We had the grand opening 10 days right before the [COVID-19]   
   pandemic, but business is so slow. People see the street conditions,   
      
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