San Francisco Chronicle - September 2, 2005
Wyatt Buchanan, wbuchanan@sfchronicle.com.

"I was in San Francisco for three weeks meeting with people to find an apartment but nobody was returning my calls," said Dallman, 36, from his home in Chicago. "I've e-mailed 20 different properties and two or three e-mailed back that they were taken and the rest didn't respond at all."

When Dallman, who is gay, does finally arrive, he will face other challenges: The average gay man leaves San Francisco after only four years, according to a San Francisco Department of Public Health survey; sex here involves a bigger risk of contracting HIV than most places; and many gay men say the community, if it is more than a population mass, is unwelcoming. That isolation can lead to depression, which itself can lead to substance use and abuse and risky sexual behavior.

Dallman would be one of scores of gay men new to the city. A health department phone survey from 2001, the most current data, estimated that 13.5 percent of gay men had lived here less than a year.

In response to this influx, several organizations are beginning to address their needs. The Web site Magnet (www.magnetsf.org), a health and community center in the Castro, has links to information for the "new boy in town."

The San Francisco Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Community Center is starting a program this month with a $150,000 city grant that will help newcomers to the city find housing and work and foster a social network.

But the major focus of the San Francisco Newcomers' Assistance Program, or SNAP, will be HIV prevention. That aim is particularly important for new residents, said Jason Riggs, spokesman for the Stop AIDS Project, which used to have an HIV prevention program for newcomers. The organization is not part of the LGBT center's program.

"Risk assessments and studies indicate that living in San Francisco less than one year is a predictor of high risk (for HIV)," Riggs said.

A young man from a state like Kansas may feel safe having unprotected sex with people of the same age and reserving condoms for encounters with older men, because it seemed safe to do that elsewhere.

"That's a harm reduction strategy, but there's a higher risk in San Francisco than in Kansas," he said. Nearly a quarter of all gay men in San Francisco are HIV positive, according to city and federal statistics.

Anthony Philip, director of health and wellness for the LGBT Center, expects 75 people to sign up this year. Only men can sign up now, but if it is successful the program will expand to include women, he said. Health department statistics show that men who have sex with men receive 77 percent of new HIV infections in the city each year. "(San Francisco) is a playground. We want people to know when to play and when not to play and, if you fall down, what to do," Philip said.

Robbie Martin moved to the city about four months ago to escape an addiction to crystal methamphetamine begun when he was a New Orleans DJ spinning on Bourbon Street. He has been clean and sober since moving here and believes newcomers can be easily consumed by San Francisco's nightlife.

"If people come here and they don't realize that there are things to do other than going to gay bars, they're going to get engulfed in the gay bar culture," said Martin, 30. Like many new residents, he struggled to find a job and companionship.

Martin, who has a college degree found it hard to get a well-paying job. He remembers that he didn't even hear back when he filed an application at a supermarket -- "That was humiliating and humbling," he said. With the help of friends, he eventually found a job managing an office.

Martin spent much of his free time at the LGBT center and thus was asked to join the steering committee for the newcomers' program.

Marek Neumeyer, 50, is one of about 20 newcomers who have contacted the center in the few weeks it's been advertised. He moved from Costa Mesa in July after visiting and falling in love with San Francisco. He lives in a residence hotel in the Tenderloin and plans to get an apartment.

Neumeyer says he offsets San Francisco's high housing costs somewhat by living what he calls a "cheap" lifestyle.

"But I'd rather live somewhere (I like) and pay extra money than live somewhere I don't like," he said. "I figure the benefits outweigh the cost."

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For more information:

To contact the San Francisco Newcomer's Assistance Program, call (415) 865-5612 or go to the San Francisco Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Center at 1800 Market St.

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