Grand Jury: City Needs to Buck Up Nonprofits and Get Out of Its Own Way to Better Help Vulnerable San Franciscans

2024–2025 San Francisco Civil Grand Jury Report calls out obstacles to effective social services grantmaking.  

SAN FRANCISCO, June 4, 2025 /PRNewswire/ — San Francisco spends more than a billion dollars per year on grants to social services nonprofits. The provision of critical services with this money, such as housing, mental health treatment, childcare, and senior services, is hamstrung by weak organizational capacity and an overly complex procurement process, the San Francisco Civil Grand Jury reported today.

The Jury found that nonprofit grantees often lack the skills to manage city funds effectively and that the city’s lengthy, over-complicated and under-resourced procurement process further impedes service provision. Moreover, the city’s monitoring programs do not lead to timely correction of mismanagement problems, aggravating inefficiency and undermining public trust.

Investigation Committee Chair Nicholas Weininger said, “Social services nonprofits struggle to do their best for vulnerable San Franciscans. The city fails these nonprofits, and their own employees, by entangling them in layers of over-complicated, time-consuming bureaucracy. As a result, city residents are denied timely, effective delivery on specific promises to make the city a better, healthier place. This erodes both quality of life and trust in government.”   

The Jury’s report details the management problems commonly experienced by social services nonprofits and the inefficiencies in the city’s process for awarding grants to these nonprofits. The report’s recommendations include:

• Starting up a dedicated team to proactively help nonprofits manage themselves better.
• Simplifying and speeding up the granting process through comprehensive reform that eliminates unnecessary review steps and sets clear deadline goals.
• Investing in training and tools to help city employees make grants efficiently.
• Monitoring nonprofits for mismanagement risks and addressing those risks before they turn into expensive problems.

Weininger added: “The Jury presents in its report clear analysis of how we got here and prudent, budget-sensitive recommendations for improvement. As it stands, inadequate risk management and byzantine processes are setting money on fire. In a time of budget austerity, the city must step up and reform, for the sake of every taxpayer and every vulnerable San Franciscan.”

To read the full report, Capacity to Serve–Setting Social Services Nonprofits Up for Success, please visit: https://www.sf.gov/resource–2025–civil-grand-jury-reports-2024-2025

About the San Francisco Civil Grand Jury

The Superior Court selects 19 San Franciscans to serve year-long terms as Civil Grand Jurors. The Jury has the authority to investigate City and County government by reviewing documents and interviewing public officials and private individuals. At the end of its inquiries, the Jury issues reports of its findings and recommendations. Agencies identified in the report must respond to these findings and recommendations within either 60 or 90 days, and the Board of Supervisors conducts a public hearing on each Civil Grand Jury report after those responses are submitted. For more information, visit the San Francisco Civil Grand Jury website: https://civilgrandjury.sfgov.org.

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SOURCE San Francisco Civil Grand Jury