San Francisco LGBT Seniors Say Health, Housing Needs Unmet
SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS)— San Francisco may have a gay friendly reputation, but seniors in the LGBT community have complained the goodwill doesn't apply to them, especially when it comes to affordable housing and health care.
A Board of Supervisors' committee hearing on Friday dealt with that very issue and how to better respond to the aging needs of the city's large LGBT community.
Seniors told the committee that it's especially tough for them and that they find health care providers sometimes culturally insensitive and housing beyond their financial reach.
KCBS' Barbara Taylor Reports:
The community has been trying to create LGBT senior housing at an old UC campus at Laguna and Market for years. Now some are getting old and wondering whether it will happen in their lifetime.
One argument heard by the older generation was that they created the Castro; it's mostly gay businesses, gay circuit parties and even gay press.
Social service providers agreed that the combination of being old and gay or transgender doesn't play well, even in San Francisco and results in discrimination at a time when people are aging and need help the most.
This was the first supervisors' committee hearing on the impacts of the aging community. Supervisor Scott Weiner said he sees it as the beginning of a longer conversation.
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