Friends in several districts are raising awareness and asking for our help.
We citizens need to stick together against government overreach - those of you who have been members for a while know that we all need to step up for each other.
SF has recently mandated the retroactive installation of automatic fire sprinkler systems in 126 buildings built before 1974. The estimated cost to each apartment owner: $250,000, the cost per building: $20 million and the total cost to all affected buildings citywide: $2 billion. This is an outrageous requirement to just casually drop on citizens.
Request from our Neighbors: This fire sprinkler retrofit mandate must be modified to provide relief for homeowners from its crippling cost burden that would force many homeowners to have to sell their homes and move.
Two ways to be heard:
1) Attend Land Use Hearing on Monday Feb. 23, 1:30pm.
2) Send a note to SF Supervisors & Mayor (see below).
More Detailed Information from our Neighbors:
Ten years ago, standalone legislation to require retrofitting sprinklers in residential high-rises built before 1974 was proposed to the Board of Supervisors. In a report to the Board in 2016, this legislation was deemed practically and economically infeasible by the Board's Budget and Legislative Analyst.
At the time, the Board of Supervisors declined to advance this legislation, but in 2022, representatives from the fire department inserted the mandatory sprinkler retrofit language into the new fire code. This was done without notice to any of the 10,000+ affected homeowners or tenants. Unfortunately, in December 2022 the Board of Supervisors unanimously approved the new fire code, which included the retrofit language.
**This mandate is not a requirement under either the National or California Fire Code and no other fire jurisdiction in the United States has an equivalent mandate. Even insurance companies are not pushing it due to the increased risk of water damage and mold.
The San Francisco fire code now requires homeowners and buildings to have fully installed automatic fire sprinklers in every room of every apartment in each of these 126 buildings no later than January 1, 2035, with interim deadlines for progress completion before that date.
This is an incredibly burdensome requirement, particularly for individual homeowners in condo or co-op buildings, as they would have to cover the $250,000 renovation cost for their apartment and relocate for the duration of the renovation, which could take up to six months. Many residents in these buildings are older and live on fixed incomes and cannot afford the cost, which could double owners’ monthly costs for ten or more years. All of the affected buildings are built with concrete and steel and all of them contain asbestos, which will have to be abated and which could pose health risks to the entire neighborhood.
After being contacted by representatives of a coalition of 29 of the affected condominium and co-op buildings in mid-2025, Supervisors Sherrill and Sauter worked to reverse this mandate in the new fire code being considered for approval by the Board of Supervisors for the three-year period from 2026 to 2029, but were unable to do so.
This is not an affordable mandate. The City should be working to make it
easier to live in San Francisco, not chasing its middle-class residents out of
town. To eliminate the huge financial burden on homeowners, the city must modify this retrofit requirement by giving buildings the option of providing common-sense, alternative safety measures instead of sprinklers, or by allowing buildings to be able to defer the sprinkler installation until their buildings undergo major renovation, similar to the exemption approved by the Board of Supervisors in the gas to electric conversion legislation approved last year.
Please encourage your supervisors to support the changes to the new fire code that will extend the existing deadlines and create a working group to determine best practices for alternative fire safety systems.
Let’s keep San Franciscans in their homes!
(If you are curious, even more info can be found here: https://nosfsprinklermandate.com).
Send the email below to voice your support of a fire sprinkler compromise. It is important that Supervisors and Mayor understand that the entire city opposes this onerous burden cavalierly imposed on tens of thousands of residents.