Planning Commission backs stricter limits on tobacco paraphernalia in North of Market SUD

The San Francisco Planning Commission on Feb. 8 endorsed a planning‑code amendment to curb new tobacco paraphernalia establishments in the North Of Market Special Use District (NOMA SUD), voting unanimously 6–0 to approve staff recommendations and additional community requests.

Planning staff told the commission the measure tightens the code’s definition of “tobacco paraphernalia establishment” — so that any retail presence of paraphernalia would qualify the use — requires conditional use authorization where applicable, and shortens the abandonment/grandfathering period for legal nonconforming TPEs from three years to 18 months. Staff also recommended extending existing Polk Street controls into the Lower Polk neighborhood and adding a quarter‑mile buffer to close a gap where high concentrations of drug‑related incidents were reported.

Supervisor Dean Preston’s office, represented at the hearing by Chief of Staff Kyle Smealey, described the proposal as a response to community complaints about a proliferation of variety stores that, while selling less than the current 10% threshold, still offer targeted drug‑use paraphernalia. The sponsor’s office said the measure is intended to reduce overconcentration of those uses so neighborhood‑serving businesses can locate and to blunt associated public‑safety harms.

Residents and neighborhood groups — including the Central City SRO Collaborative and the Tenderloin and Lower Polk Community Benefit Districts — urged the commission to go further, calling for an outright ban on new tobacco‑paraphernalia retail in parts of the Tenderloin and Lower Polk. Speakers described sidewalks “overrun” by open‑air drug markets and urged limits on stores that market items used for ingestion or inhalation of controlled substances.

Commission members pressed staff on enforceability and counting existing stores. Staff said many of the establishments now operate as general retail or corner stores that deliberately keep paraphernalia below the 10% display threshold and therefore do not appear in land‑use inventories, an enforcement challenge the ordinance seeks to address by making the stricter definition apply in the NOMA SUD.

Commissioners also asked whether the city could limit hours of operation for problem storefronts and whether a shorter than 18‑month abandonment period might be possible; staff and the city attorney said 18 months is common practice and shortening it further could raise legal and policy questions. The commission voted to approve the ordinance with staff’s modifications — including making TPEs not permitted in the NOMA SUD if the sponsor accepts that change — to add the quarter‑mile Lower Polk buffer, to adopt an 18‑month abandonment rule, and to formally recommend that the supervisor and staff study hours limits and enforcement strategies.

The action is a recommendation from the Planning Commission and would go forward to the Board of Supervisors where jurisdictional adoption steps occur. The commission’s vote requires follow‑up from the supervisor’s office and planning staff on the mechanics of enforcement and any proposed hours restrictions.

What happens next: the supervisor and planning staff will work through code language and enforcement options, and any ordinance amendments will proceed through the Board of Supervisors for consideration and final action.