Sign Of The Times: How A Roller Rink In San Francisco Encapsulates The City’s Current Problems

In October, a pop-up skating rink, Sam FranDisco, opened up in the Civic Center in San Francisco. Situated across from City Hall, the opening day brought out a lot of notable people, including Mayor London Breed. Open from Wednesday to Sunday, from noon to eight, the covered rink was soon a very popular place to go to. Was it for everybody? No, only so many people like to skate after all. But for those who liked it, they showed up. And it was also hailed as a positive for the city, something good to put out there during a time when people are leaving the city in droves, where tech layoffs occur with alarming frequency, and where crime and drug use are still very prevalent.

“The pop-up rink is all about having a good time and encouraged residents to focus on the positive elements of the city,” said the Mayor in October. “Everything can’t be about all the negative stuff.”

@sfstandard

Look out for SF’s new temporary outdoor roller rink. Located on Fulton Plaza in Civic Center, “San FranDISCO” offers the fun of roller skating to anyone willing to strap on some skates. #SanFrancisco #SF #RollerSkating #FultonPlaza #SanFranDISCO

♬ original sound – The San Francisco Standard

Less than a half year later, skating days, even on warmer dry nights that had brought a ton of people in during the fall, looked a little different:

So what happened?  The area where the skating rink is located, nearby the Asian Art Museum and Fulton Plaza, was a high traffic drug area for a long time. And with Mayor Breed instituting drug crackdowns since last year in higher traffic areas, the dealers had to go somewhere. The problem was that the rink only had a few security guards. The dealers didn’t go, and neither did the users. As a result, skating rink patrons stayed away, and soon, what once was a new bright spot in the city simply became another area showing the sign of the times.

“People don’t want to bring their kids here and see that,” said a security guard at the rink, pointing to a drug den in between the Asian Art Museum and the roller skating rink. “It’s crazy.”

Sebastian Luke, a local Bay Area resident, told the Globe earlier this week that dealers would even accost those walking by and the few patrons left with drugs to enhance the skating experience.

“As I was browsing through the drugs bazaar, a drug sommelier approached and offered me ‘Hot Stuff,'” Luke told the Globe. “‘Wanna grab something before you skate and let the good times roll?’ he asked with a wink.”

Even worse was the skating rink parking lot, which was filled with drug users shooting up and getting high, all within sight of the City Hall.

“As I was taking this photo from the parking lot right behind the skating rink, I witnessed several people shooting up in their cars parked in the parking lot,” added Luke. “They were just too ‘occupied’ to notice that I was standing next to their car windows.”

Drug use in San Francisco

Despite the area quickly becoming rundown, the City extended the rink being up until the end of March, with no mention made of the high levels of both drug sales and use in and around the rink. That’s not to say that the SFPD has been doing nothing. They do routinely make large fentanyl busts, and major crackdowns in high-traffic areas still happen frequently. Others, such as DA Brooke Jenkins, have also been reversing policies formerly favorable for dealers and other criminals, leading to many more to be arrested under watch than the previous DA, the recall-ousted Chesa Boudin.

However, a combination of judges and some city leaders have not followed through on punishments, with many dealers/users being let back out on the street. Proposals to change the sanctuary city policies in the city to help curb the fentanyl and opioid dealers have been met with fierce resistance. Overdose prevention sites and areas where the city looks the other way on drug use, have been heavily favored over other policies. As a result, the problem continues to grow even worse.

And all of that goes back to the skating rink right by City Hall. Many wonder what exactly happened there. But the perfect storm of shifted priorities, drug dealers returning to the streets, police being spread thinly, and other factors led to the skating rink changing from a place supposed to bring joy, to yet another place where drug use could easily be seen.

“Only San Francisco could let this happen,” noted Mike Nguyen, a business owner nearby who used to have many skater customers come in. “It seemed like such a good thing had come, but it suddenly went away. Drugs. Of course it was drugs. San Francisco cares more about those people selling them and using them than they do about people following the law and trying to get by.”