SAN FRANCISCO MAYOR PROPOSES TURNING EMPTY OFFICES INTO SCHOOLROOMS

San Francisco Mayor London Breed has a solution for the glut of empty offices in her city: turn them into classrooms.

The San Francisco Business Times reported the mayor has called on the University of California, the San Francisco Unified School District, and City College of San Francisco to consider moving into the vacant offices. The schools did not publicly comment on the mayor’s invitation.

She also called on City Administrator Carmen Chu – whose office provides services through the city’s real estate division – to consider relocating her department’s employees into these privately-owned properties. According to Breed, the city could use its municipal property for repositioning as housing – although she did not provide specifics on how that would be achieved or what it could cost.

“San Francisco has a need for more land for housing, and the city and these agencies have land all over San Francisco,” said Breed’s office in a statement.

This is the latest effort by Breed to fill gaping vacancies in her city’s commercial property environment. Last month, SFGate.com reported that she proposed tearing down the half-vacant 1.5-million-square-foot San Francisco Centre shopping mall and turning it into a soccer stadium.