Store's closure another jolt to downtown SF

Downtown San Francisco — which has experienced a large drop in activity with the rise in remote working and a subsequent increase in crime — has taken another hit as the Whole Foods supermarket chain abruptly closed its flagship store over public safety concerns.

Whole Foods, which is owned by e-commerce giant Amazon, confirmed the closure of its Trinity Place store, which happened on Monday.

"We are closing our Trinity location only for the time being. … If we feel we can ensure the safety of our team members in the store, we will evaluate a reopening of our Trinity location."

The 64,737-square-foot store was opened in March 2022 at Eighth and Market streets in the Tenderloin neighborhood. It positioned itself as a "value-added" flagship and sold about 3,700 local products, including produce from local farms and wines from nearby vineyards. The upscale store looked to draw customers from nearby high-end businesses.

However, rampant shoplifting and frequent visits to store restrooms by drug users, who left syringes and pipes behind, were factors in the decision. The store initially reduced its hours, then deployed three security guards on a daily basis, one of whom was assigned to monitor customers who wanted to use the restroom.

A notice on the store's window said: "A receipt of proof of purchase is needed to access the restroom. Please show your receipt to the security guard, and you will be provided a QR code to gain access."

Athena Dai, a data scientist based in downtown San Francisco, said she once loved to go to Whole Foods to "grab a lunch and a cup of coffee", but stopped doing so because she witnessed a theft in February.

"A man quickly filled his huge, huge backpack by wiping groceries from the shelf. He then elbowed a security guard down and rushed out," Dai said. "I didn't even realize what was happening until I heard store staff screaming trying to stop the well-built thief. He was literally 30, 40 inches away from where I stood."

Several other retailers, such as drugstore chain Walgreens and the Safeway supermarket have cited crime as the reason for closing locations in San Francisco. In 2021, Walgreens announced it was shutting five stores in the city due to shoplifting. Safeway also had upgraded its security gate and changed checkout rules to discourage thefts.

"Downtown SF looks like a zombie apocalypse. People who've not been there have no idea," Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, SpaceX and Twitter wrote on the social media site.

The Bay Area has experienced a nearly fivefold increase in remote workers. Businesses throughout downtown San Francisco have closed, and the city's economic recovery ranks 24th out of 25 large US cities, according to Time.com.

In the first quarter of the year, office vacancies were the highest ever recorded, according to real estate broker CBRE, reported The San Francisco Standard website. The 29.5 percent vacancy rate last quarter was higher than during the dot-com bust of the early 2000s and the Great Recession of 2008. It has increased sevenfold from the beginning of 2020, the website reported.

The San Francisco Police Department recorded a 23 percent increase in property crimes between 2020 and 2022, with sharp jumps in burglary and theft. The homicide rate, however, has not risen substantially.

"It's really not complicated: When DAs refuse to prosecute shoplifting, shoplifting increases. When shoplifting increases, stores go out of business," wrote Jeff Jacoby, op-ed columnist at The Boston Globe.

"What's tragi-comic about the Whole Foods closing in SoMa (South of Market Street) is that the same activists who screech about ‘health equity' and the lack of grocery stores in ‘underserved communities' are the same folks who push social policies that make it impossible to operate a grocery store there," tweeted Adam Mayer, an architect in Silicon Valley.

Alok Gupta, who runs an electronics gadget shop on Market Street adjacent to the Whole Foods store, said street crimes are "everyday episodes".

"You smell pungent marijuana, encounter wandering homeless people, nimbly dodge syringes. Welcome, this is San Francisco," Gupta said, adding that as a small-business owner, he has had to install a security system.

"Can I ask San Francisco politicians, those who turn deaf ears to public safety concerns and push for police cuts, for reimbursement?" he said.

"Our neighborhood waited a long time for this supermarket, but we're also well aware of problems they've experienced with drug-related retail theft, adjacent drug markets, and the many safety issues related to them," Matt Dorsey, a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors whose district includes the neighborhood where Whole Foods is located, wrote on Twitter, adding that he was "incredibly disappointed but sadly unsurprised".

The city also was shaken recently by the fatal stabbing of Bob Lee, 43, a prominent tech executive who founded Cash App, in the Rincon Hill area on April 4. On April 5, a former fire commissioner suffered a fractured skull when he was attacked in the Marina District.

Dorsey believes that a lack of policing has contributed to the problem. The San Francisco Police Department has had 1,537 officers patrolling one of the most populous US metropolitan areas. He pledged to work on adding more police to meet the city's goal of 2,100 department members.

"This should be part of the solution," said Vivian Wei, a San Francisco Bay Area resident. "Safety is each of our citizens' priority. We need to take actions to hold politicians accountable for a safer San Francisco."

Contact the writers at junechang@chinadailyusa.com.