For the past several years, many of us have spent an extraordinary amount of time trying to participate in the future of Hayes Valley in good faith. We attended hearings. We submitted records requests. We documented conditions. We spoke with neighbors, merchants, agencies, and elected officials. We tried to ask difficult but reasonable questions about a one-block street closure that has steadily evolved into something much larger: a long-term political project reshaping an active commercial corridor. Somewhere along the way, many of us stopped feeling like constituents — and started feeling like we simply didn’t matter. That realization did not happen overnight. It emerged slowly through repeated interactions with city agencies, public processes, and ultimately the Office of Supervisor Bilal Mahmood.
When Supervisor Mahmood first ran for office, he spoke often about listening. Many residents and small business owners wanted to believe there would be a reset from the divisive dynamics that had already taken hold around Hayes Street. We believed there would be broader engagement, balanced outreach, and a willingness to hear from people living and working directly in the impacts of these decisions. Instead, many of the same patterns intensified. Projects continued to advance through a narrow set of aligned individuals. Broader corridor outreach often appeared secondary — if it occurred at all. Significant operational changes affecting businesses, residents, transit, access, and neighborhood character increasingly felt predetermined before meaningful public dialogue ever occurred. At times, interactions with agencies became particularly revealing. Repeatedly, discussions surrounding enforcement, permit conditions, or operational concerns would eventually circle back to some version of the same question: “What does the Supervisor say?” Over time, that dynamic began to change the atmosphere surrounding the entire corridor. The issue stopped feeling administrative and began feeling political in a much deeper sense. Agencies appeared hesitant to act independently. Permit regulations have not be enforced. New initiatives continued layering onto the corridor despite unresolved complaints and growing division within the community.
The cumulative effect has been profound. Many small business owners now feel exhausted, dismissed, or politically invisible. Residents who raised concerns found themselves increasingly characterized not as stakeholders, but as impediments to a preferred vision for the neighborhood. Even basic participation began carrying social and emotional consequences that few people outside the situation fully understand. In at least one instance, participation escalated into legal action initiated by individuals associated with the closure effort. Litigation that ultimately was not sustained, but nonetheless contributed to a chilling effect around civic participation which sent shockwaves across the neighborhood. As a community we’re still processing what transpired since November of last year when the legal threat by the HVNA commenced.
And perhaps most troubling of all: many of the people making assumptions about us never truly sat down with us in the first place. That is the part that stays with you. You begin realizing that people who have never meaningfully heard your experiences already seem to know who you are supposed to be. The narrative has already been constructed elsewhere. You are no longer a resident, a merchant, or a constituent with legitimate concerns. You are a voice that is consistently dismissed and minimized as one that does not matter. But the reality is far more human than that. Behind every records request, hearing appearance, or public comment are people trying to protect their businesses, their homes, their quality of life, and the character of a neighborhood they care deeply about. People who watched a temporary, pandemic-era intervention evolve into an increasingly permanent political structure without ever feeling there was broad consensus for that transformation.
This is no longer simply a debate about a street closure. It is a broader question about representation, accountability, and the concentration of influence over neighborhood decision-making. How much authority should one elected office — alongside a narrow set of aligned actors — have over the long-term future of an active commercial corridor? At what point does political momentum begin outweighing balanced administrative oversight and meaningful stakeholder participation? And what happens to public trust when residents and small businesses no longer believe they are being heard equally?
Hayes Valley deserves better than managed consensus and selective engagement. It deserves leadership willing to engage with the full complexity of the neighborhood — including the many who believe the closure needs to end. Because the future of a community cannot be built sustainably through exclusion, assumption, or political sorting. Especially not in a neighborhood where the impacts are being lived every day.
Bilal, in our view, has failed Hayes Valley.