September 2025 eNews
Happy September from SDA!
Thank you to everyone who joined us for our CommUNITY Celebration last month! Your energy and presence made the event so meaningful, and we’re grateful to be part of this movement together.
As we look ahead to the fall, our organizing work continues. This month’s newsletter highlights the campaigns we’re building together — from our Muni Now, Muni Forever campaign, to housing organizing around the harmful impacts of upzoning, to our ongoing Medicaid defense work in coalition with other senior and disability organizations. Despite the passing of the horrific federal budget bill (HR 1) in July, we keep organizing in this new political landscape and fight for a better world as seniors and disabled people.
Don’t miss our September General Meeting next Thursday, September 11, 10am to 12pm on Zoom. This meeting will include a presentation on COVID safety and resources, and you’ll learn about opportunities to plug into our current campaigns. Register for the General Meeting here.
Read on for more information about upcoming events this month and how to get involved.
SDA News & Highlights
Recapping our Muni Forever Summit — and how to get involved in the campaign to protect Muni funding
We had a great turnout at our Muni Forever Summit on August 20! Thanks to everyone who participated, virtually and in person, in these important discussions on our vision for a fully funded Muni that works for all of us. A huge percentage of our members, and seniors and disabled people in general, depend on public transportation to go about our daily lives. We need to work together to protect it!
If you missed this event, don’t worry! We plan to hold more summits like this one in the coming months, and we need your help to organize them. Are you part of a group of people who are interested in transit and might want to host a discussion? We can help you plan a mini Muni Forever Summit or Town Hall in your neighborhood, perhaps at a senior center or place of worship. If you are part of a political club, PTA, book club, or other local group, please invite us to give a short 5-15 minute presentation about Muni Now, Muni Forever. Email mia@sdaction.org for more information.
You can also plug into our work online at muniforever.org. There, you can make sure you’re signed up for the Muni Now, Muni Forever campaign mailing list, sign our petition, and share with other people you know. We believe everyone deserves a seat on the bus that takes them home safely.
Muni Forever Summit – August 20, 5 to 7pm
SDA Canon Kip and Housing Collaborative members Demi, Cristina, David, and M and their family (not pictured) joined our comrades from around the state at the California Renters Power Assembly at the end of July. We gathered to learn from each other and build our relationships and power statewide to expand and strengthen rent control and renters protections and rights. It was important that our senior and disabled voices were at the Assembly, as our stories and our presence are a reminder that accessibility must be a part of every step toward collective liberation and building our statewide renter power!
We will be hosting a meeting on Friday, September 12 at 11am online to review and discuss some of the exercises from the conference with our Housing Collaborative members. Email ocean@sdaction.org for more information and a link to join!
More ways to get involved in our housing organizing this month:
Join a community meeting on the city's upzoning plan we are co-sponsoring with SOMCAN and Soma Pilipinas this Thursday, September 4, 5:30 to 7pm at 180 11th Street (the Arc SF). The location is wheelchair accessible and masks are required (and provided).
Show up to the Planning Commission meeting on Upzoning on September 11, 1pm at City Hall! We know we need more housing, but housing for whom? We don't want to see seniors and disabled people further priced out of the city in the name of profits for developers. Upzoning must include tenant protections against displacement and lead to real accessible and deeply affordable housing for seniors and disabled people.
We're gearing up to fight back against the city's RV ban this month. Read this article on the impacts of legislation to ban RVs from city streets, which disproportionately harms Latinx families and seniors. You can also sign our petition to urge the SFMTA to amend the RV ban and protect RV residents.
We are hosting a SRO Residents Listening Session at our next SDA SRO Workgroup on September 25 at 11am. We will be joined by guests from the Planning Department and the Mayors Office of Housing, and hopefully others, to listen to senior and disabled residents' concerns and priorities.
If you're interested in being part of any of these events, or have feedback or questions, please connect with Ocean at ocean@sdaction.org for more information.
Everyone needs health care, and just about everyone has been affected or knows someone who has been affected by the health care system. For many of us, accessing health care and paying for it can be difficult. Why? Every other industrialized country treats health care as a human right, but in this country, health care is under the control of for-profit health corporations who put profit over patients. If you'd like to learn more about the crisis in our health care system, how we got here, and how you can be a part of the movement to achieve a health care system we deserve (after all, we are all paying for it!), join us Thursday, September 25 at 7pm for a virtual teach-in.
The goals of this session are: to educate our community about the crisis in our health care system, and to mobilize us to achieve a program comparable to the crisis at hand.
Register here for It's Not Normal: the U.S. profit-driven "health care" system teach-in.
Senior and Disability Survival Schools continue!
On September 3, SDA is partnering with the Eviction Defense Collaborative for a free workshop on tenant rights, eviction defense, and short term rental payment assistance. On September 9, we’ll learn about local free food programs, and on September 16, we will cover SDA’s ongoing transit justice organizing to save Muni lines and restore funding to public transit. The series will close with a presentation about getting on In-Home Supportive Services (IHSS) and appealing your hours.
These classes are free and open to all. Drop in or attend all of them.
Interested in hosting a Survival School at your building, neighborhood center, library, or other space? Contact Education and Partnerships Manager Liza Mamedov at liza@sdaction.org.
This month, SDA concluded another Survival School series at the Bob Ross LGBTQ Senior Center. Join us in celebrating our new cohort of graduates!
Join us for our September Survival School at Telegraph Hill Neighborhood Center (TELHI). on September 3, 9, 16, and 17 from 10 to 11am. Address: 660 Lombard St, San Francisco, CA 94133
Help shape programs and services for seniors and disabled people in SF!
The Dignity Fund Community Needs Assessment is currently in progress. This is a critical opportunity for seniors and disabled people to provide feedback to the Department of Disability and Aging Services (DAS) about what services are most necessary. Take the 10-minute needs assessment survey here or sign up for an upcoming virtual or in-person forum to provide feedback.
The fight for Medicaid continues!
As a part of the Long-Term Services and Supports for All (LTSS4All) Grassroots Coalition, we are organizing this fall to make sure our CA Representatives understand our communities' priorities and needs as we face budget cuts that will impact the services we rely on, such as LTSS and IHSS. These cuts are a result of the budgets passed at the state-level by Governor Gavin Newsom and at the federal level with the passage of HR 1 (also known as One Big Beautiful Bill).
SDA will take part in conversations with Senator Scott Weiner and Assemblymember Matt Haney. If you are in either of their districts, and especially if you are a recipient or know someone who is a recipient of Medicaid and/or Medicare, or other state and/or city funded services, please connect with Itzel at itzel@sdaction.org.
Community Resource Corner
The Community Resource program is led by Damara Lopez and staffed by our team of Peer Advocates. The Peer Advocates field calls and concerns on a variety of issues and work to help people find the right support or redress for their problem.
If you need help...
Getting your benefits, such as SSI, SSDI, CalFresh
Finding home care
Understanding a confusing letter or document you received
Getting services in the language you prefer
With your housing situation
Our Peer Advocates can help answer your questions and direct you to the appropriate resources. Call 415-546-1333 and leave a message or come by during our drop-in hours. To find our up-to-date hours of operation, or to send us an email, visit the Community Resource page on our website.
Resource Highlight: Disability Rights California
Disability Rights California (DRC) works in litigation, advocacy services, and public policy to protect and advocate for the rights of Californians with disabilities.
As part of their services, DRC operates a legal helpline that provides information, advice, and referrals for disabled Californians and their families. By contacting their helpline, they may be able to give you general information, referrals or self-advocacy materials related to your rights.
Call today to get started: 1-800-776-5746
Reading Recommendation: Crip Kinship: The Disability Justice & Art Activism of Sins Invalid
By Shayda Kafai
Crip Kinship explores the art activism of Sins Invalid, a Bay Area-based performance project, and its radical imaginings of what disabled, queer, trans, and gender-nonconforming bodyminds of color can do: how they can rewrite oppression, and how they can gift us with transformational lessons for our collective survival.
Available to borrow at the San Francisco Public Library!
Community News & Events
Aging Your Way Community Event
October 1, 10am to 2pm at Booker T. Washington Community Center
Check out the Institute on Aging’s 8th annual Aging Your Way free resource fair with performances from local senior groups.
Learn from local experts and resource providers
Connect with peers and caregivers
Explore tools, services, and activities to help you thrive
Enjoy food, drinks, and live performances
Still Here: Images of Resilience and Memory
October 9, 6 to 8:30pm, 344 Fell St
Proud Stutter, affiliate of Independent Arts & Media presents: a night of art, film, and community, featuring the premiere of photographs by Bay Area artist Jon Harrison. These images serve as a visual prologue to a forthcoming film about Issac Bailey, a journalist, professor, and Black man who stutters, as he returns home to confront the silences that shaped his voice and reckon with a family legacy marked by resilience, poverty, incarceration, and unspoken trauma.
Sensory-friendly mini film activations designed to create an inclusive and immersive experience. Event details & tickets here to Still Here.
Justice in Aging Webinar: HR 1 and State Budget Impacts – Updates for Aging and Disability Advocates
September 16, 11am online
Justice in Aging is hosting a webinar to discuss HR 1 implementation in California (HR 1 is the federal budget bill narrowly passed and signed into law by Trump in early July). At the webinar, Justice in Aging will be providing updates on what HR 1’s changes to Medicaid and Medicare will mean for older adults in California, as well as potential state budget impacts. Register here for the webinar: HR 1 and State Budget Impacts – Updates for Aging and Disability Advocates.
Register now for CARA's annual convention!
October 15, 10am to 4pm online
California Alliance for Retired Americans' (CARA) free virtual Convention is coming up in October, with guest speakers like Jon Bowser from Social Security Works and California Secretary of State Shirley N. Weber, Ph.D. Featuring a candidate forum of the California gubernatorial candidates, including Former California Controller Betty Yee, Former U.S. Representative Katie Porter, and Former President Pro Tempore of the California State Senate Toni Atkins. Register here for CARA's convention.
"When Driving Is Not An Option" Book Talk with author Anna Zivarts
September 17, 6 to 7pm online
September is Transit Month, and the Transbay Book Club is hosting a virtual book talk with Anna Zivarts about her book, When Driving Is Not An Option: Steering Away From Car Dependency. The event is open to all and will feature a moderated discussion about this book, followed by an open Q&A. Find more info on the book talk and register here.
Let's build this movement together.
Please become a member or donate today!
Senior and Disability Action
P.O. Box 423388
San Francisco, CA 94103
www.sdaction.org
(415) 546-1333
Please let us know if you have any issue with the webpage format or if there are accessibility changes you think we should make. Thank you for reading!