U.S. Senator Joni Ernst sent a letter on Tuesday to Robin Carnahan, the administrator of the General Services Administration (GSA) questioning its plans for the Nancy Pelosi Federal Building in San Francisco — and whether it ought to be shut down for good — after federal workers were told to abandon the facility and work from home due to crime, drugs, and violence around its exterior.
As Leah reported for Townhall in August, Biden's HHS Assistant Secretary for Administration Cheryl R. Campbell issued a memo lamenting the "conditions" at the Nancy Pelosi Federal Building and recommending that all employees "maximize the use of telework for the foreseeable future" due to concerns about crime, drug dealing and use, and violent crime adjacent to the federal offices.
The first half of 2023 saw some 150 suspected overdoses and 30 deaths outside the Pelosi building, and a chain-link security fence was installed as a result of deteriorating conditions. Ironically, while Pelosi has long insisted that the United States not have a wall along its southwest border to protect Americans, she apparently had no issue with a wall of fencing being erected to protect the federal office building bearing her name. Meanwhile, employees who are supposed to be working in the federal office space have been chased with hammers and threatened with knives.
Senator Ernst's letter to the GSA administrator explains more about the house of horrors the Pelosi Building and its immediate surroundings has become:
The same day President Biden’s White House Chief of Staff called on agencies to return federal employees to their offices, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) advised hundreds of employees working at the Speaker Nancy Pelosi Federal Building in San Francisco to stop coming to the office “for the foreseeable future” due to safety concerns with crime and violence outside.
The General Services Administration (GSA), which manages the property, spent $3 million redesigning the building’s public plaza “in order to maximize its use by the community and employees.” When the new plaza opened less than two years ago, GSA stated it would “create a new safe space for public gatherings and education.”
The exact opposite is occurring. The plaza is a dangerous, open-air drug market, with addicts shooting up, snorting, and smoking drugs in plain view. Drug users pass out on the public benches and used needles litter the ground. Overdosing is “a commonplace horror,” with nearly 150 suspected overdoses— including more than 30 deaths—on the block surrounding the Federal Building reported in the first half of this year. Dozens of dealers show up daily, one of which opened fire with a gun near the building recently. While fencing has been put up, addicts and dealers still hang out around the plaza.
According to its designer, the building was set up to represent “the way government should be and how the workplace should be.”
Clearly, the Nancy Pelosi Federal Building has become the opposite — a demonstration of the way government should not be running a city by creating an environment where workers are unable to safely do their jobs and the public is unable to safely interact with the federal agencies their taxes fund.
"It’s extremely concerning that the city’s inability to control crime is endangering civil servants, children, and visitors," Senator Ernst notes in her letter. "With at least five other federal facilities within the San Francisco area and GSA reportedly utilizing only about ten percent of its available office space, perhaps the Speaker Pelosi Federal Building should be shuttered for the foreseeable future with its workers relocated where taxpayers can interact with government agencies face-to-face without fearing for their lives," she emphasized.
"Working at a Department of Health and Human Services building shouldn’t be a risk to your health or life, but it is now due to former Speaker Pelosi and the other liberal politicians that have allowed criminal chaos to overtake the streets of San Francisco," Senator Ernst said in a statement provided to Townhall. "Ironically, the Nancy Pelosi Federal Building is a symbol of the way government doesn’t work, with offices and workplaces largely empty due to misguided policies of the federal, state, and city governments," the Iowa Republican reminded.
"If it’s not safe for federal employees to work here, it certainly can’t be safe for businesses to operate and families to live here," Senator Ernst added. "I’m calling to shut down the Speaker Nancy Pelosi Federal Building — after all, they’ve already been forced to abandon it, so why should taxpayers keep the lights on in Nancy Pelosi’s haunted house?”
Senator Ernst's letter also sought information about the Pelosi Building, with a deadline of December 20, including:
- The number of federal employees whose primary workstation is the Speaker Nancy Pelosi Federal Building;
- The number of employees who report to the building for work on a weekly or more frequent basis;
- A detailed description of the number and manner of any threats or crimes reported against employees, visitors, or the facility itself documented on the premises of the building over the past two years;
- The current utilization rate of the space within all of the federal buildings in the San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland, California locality pay area;
- A description of all additional measures, including the escorts, fencing, and increased presence of FPS officers, being taken to secure the building and protect workers and visitors, along with the estimated cost for each measure on a monthly basis;
- A summary of the risk assessment conducted, if any, for the inclusion of a public plaza as part of the San Francisco Federal Building and any safety considerations, such as the crime rate of an area, GSA considered when determining the location and layout of a facility;
- A list of all federal buildings or properties, if any, where employees have been directed to work remotely due to crime or other risks to health or safety over the past two years; and
- An explanation as to whether or not the recommendation to work remotely “for the foreseeable future” is extended to all employees in Region IX due to the unsafe conditions of a single building, and, if so,—
- The rationale for such a determination; and
- All documentation forming the basis for the issuance of the HHS memo.
As Senator Ernst noted in her letter, even former Speaker Nancy Pelosi has "raised concerns about the building's tenant safety" with authorities in California, but relief has not come for the office building nor its tenants which include Pelosi and HHS offices as well as space for the Departments of Labor, Agriculture, Transportation, and the Social Security Administration — in addition to a daycare which Ernst notes is, understandably, "having trouble hiring due to the location."
Ernst has previously sought answers from the Biden administration when it comes to the federal government's telework policies, whether those policies are being abused by taxpayer-funded employees, and how many tax dollars are being wasted to keep federal office buildings operational while they sit largely empty.