Yesterday there was a massive fire in San Francisco at a construction site next to some occupied homes. The city’s Fire Chief said her first impression on seeing the fire was that it had the potential to take out an entire city block. Thanks solely to the hard work of about 140 SFFD firefighters that didn’t happen.

Cameras were rolling when part of the structure collapsed in on itself.

A massive 4-alarm fire engulfed a building under construction in San Francisco's Hayes Valley at Octavia Blvd and Oak St. Video shows scaffolding collapsing under the flames. https://t.co/XOVPrIdREz pic.twitter.com/3Lvwb42sKn

— ABC7 News (@abc7newsbayarea) August 1, 2023

Another angle showing how close this was to other homes:

#SanFrancisco
4-alarm fire at Octavia & Oak. pic.twitter.com/XEmDhjcR1R

— Shane B. Murphy (@shanermurph) August 1, 2023

No one was hurt but eight people were displaced from their homes because of damage caused by the fire. Like probably half the people in they city, I immediately had my own suspicious about how this got started but didn’t write about it yesterday because I didn’t want to speculate.

Today, we still don’t know for certain how this got started but we have learned their residents in the area had previously written a letter to elected officials sharing their concerns about homeless camps nearby, in particular about fires at those camps.

Months before a massive fire ravaged a Hayes Valley building with flames hot enough to crack windows on nearby structures, a San Francisco neighborhood group implored city leaders to act after a string of smaller blazes cropped up near the site of Tuesday’s vicious conflagration.

“Hayes Valley has suffered a series of dangerous fires along Octavia Boulevard that started around tent encampments,” wrote Jennifer Laska, president of the Hayes Valley Neighborhood Association, in a May 30 letter to Mayor London Breed, Supervisor Dean Preston, Police Chief Bill Scott and other city officials.

Laska went on to describe a troubling pattern, citing fires that sparked up on March 31, April 24 and April 25 near a construction site at Octavia Boulevard and Hickory Street, where people had pitched tents, she said. During the April 25 incident, an encampment burst into flames along the median of the roadway, she said. Cyclists passing by rescued a person from a tent as the fire erupted, she added.

The same letter also complained about people taking the covers off power poles and splicing into the wiring which is a fire hazard. But perhaps the most damning thing was a photo taken by a local resident showing a homeless person sitting next to a fire build beneath the scaffolding of the construction site that just burned down.

KRON 4 published the photo along with a bit of the exasperated letter sent to elected officials:

“Our neighborhood and our city is literally being trashed and set on fire and you all are doing nothing about it. We are asking you to take these issues seriously and remove encampments that pose a danger to our community when we report them instead of throwing your hands up in the air.”

To be clear, that photo was apparently taken in January so it’s not related to the fire yesterday but it gives you an idea what is happening in the neighborhood. Mayor London Breed published a lengthy thread on Twitter today asking people to be patient and not jump to conclusions.

First, again, right now we can't jump to conclusions and connect this nearby encampment and the fire. I understand it's hard, especially now when we have access to social media and shared content 24/7. But we must be patient.

— London Breed (@LondonBreed) August 2, 2023

They successfully connected 12 people into shelter, but others did not accept. We can't force people to accept or stay in shelter and we're unable to prevent people from setting up an encampment in area that was just cleaned. This is the situation we are in.

— London Breed (@LondonBreed) August 2, 2023

As long as there are encampments, there’s a risk that conditions like this will persist. We will do everything we can, within the law, to address that.

— London Breed (@LondonBreed) August 2, 2023

Every day our outreach teams go out to help people. But what they can do is limited, and the pressure they are under is immense. They cannot monitor these sites 24/7 for illegal behavior.

— London Breed (@LondonBreed) August 2, 2023

Finally, it’s important to reiterate that yesterday’s fire is under investigation and too early to speculate the cause for how it happened. While the investigators conduct a thorough investigation, we'll continue with our outreach efforts with the limited abilities we have.

— London Breed (@LondonBreed) August 2, 2023

Several points about all of this. First, this is probably the right thing for the Mayor of the city to say at this moment. Officials have to say the right thing even if they have a hard time believing it themselves. That said, it’s really not too early to speculate. In fact, given the letter, the recent homeless fires in the area and the photos, it’s pretty reasonable to conclude that the homeless are a likely culprit in this fire. In this case that’s not just a knee-jerk reaction.

Second point, I hope the investigators are able to figure out what happened here but given the extent of the blaze you have to wonder if that will even be possible. Arson investigation isn’t magic. It’s at least possible this can’t be conclusively solved. We’ll have to wait and see.

Third, Mayor Breed may sound like she’s whining a bit but honestly the city’s hands really are tied by judges at the 9th circuit and elsewhere. She writes, “We can’t force people to accept or stay in shelter and we’re unable to prevent people from setting up an encampment in area that was just cleaned. This is the situation we are in.” I think that’s probably accurate. So long as tent camps can be set up anywhere and can’t be removed just as quickly, the city is fighting a losing battle. Whether or not this fire was caused by the homeless, we know that hundreds of calls to the fire department every year involve the homeless. In Portland, it’s about half of all calls to the fire department.

Of course it’s possible investigators will solve this and maybe it won’t be connected to the homeless in this instance, but the really depressing part of this story is that it probably doesn’t matter. Put another way, what will actually change if this blaze is definitively connected to a homeless camp nearby? The legal situation won’t change. The residents of the city won’t change their opinions much.

So I guess we can all be well behaved citizens and refuse to speculate knowing that the outcome won’t matter anyway. Homeless people have been setting dangerous fires in the city for years and they’ll still be doing it next month and the month after that no matter what investigators working on this case conclude.