LOS ANGELES — Since 1987, the AIDS Health Care Foundation (AHF) has been providing HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment and advocacy services, operating clinics, pharmacies, thrift stores and the Healthy Housing Foundation, which offers affordable housing.

What You Need To Know

  • AHF’S Susie Shannon is heading up a “No On 34” campaign
  • If passed, Prop 34 would require certain providers such as AHF, to use at least 98% of their drug sales revenue on direct patient care

  • AHF has been directing some of their revenue from their participation in the 340B pharmaceutical program to affordable housing campaigns, which is what Prop 34 wants to stop
  • Shannon explains that if passed, Prop 34 could threaten AHF’s licenses to operate clinics, potentially affecting some 16,000 patients, and that the proposition is tailored to specifically target AHF

AHF’S Susie Shannon is heading up a “No On 34” campaign. If passed, Prop 34 would require certain providers such as AHF, to use at least 98% of their drug sales revenue on direct patient care. AHF has been directing some of their revenue from their participation in the 340B pharmaceutical program to affordable housing campaigns, which is what Prop 34 wants to stop.

“AIDS Healthcare Foundation has been funding two previous rent control initiatives,” explains Susie Shannon. “And now, this current rent control initiative, which is Proposition 33, and so now what they’re trying to do is silence the leading advocacy group, which is AIDS Healthcare Foundation on rent control and on these rent control initiatives.”

Shannon explains that if passed, Prop 34 could threaten AHF’s licenses to operate clinics, potentially affecting some 16,000 patients, and that the proposition is tailored to specifically target AHF.

Meanwhile, the Apartment Association of Greater LA’s Daniel Yukelson claims while Prop 34 might seem like it’s directed only at AHF, it’s more broadly about patient care.

“It targets nonprofit organizations like the AIDS Health Care Foundation that are generating profits, even though they’re a nonprofit organization,” says Yukelson. “But they’re using those profits for political endeavors, and so they have no place to be proponents of a Proposition 33. We need to take them out of the equation and make sure that they focus on patient care. That’s what the AIDS health care Foundation was set up for.”

While Daniel recognizes California’s affordable housing crisis, he and the California Apartment Association, the group sponsoring Prop 34, do not think the rent control expansions proposed by Prop 33 are the answer.

“What we see as the solution is encouraging more construction. We have a major housing shortage here in California,” Yukelson says. 

But Susie Shannon calls Proposition 34 a “revenge initiative” aimed solely at AHF for their supporting of rent control initiatives, and that a ”Yes" on 34 could threaten many of their patients services, adding that affordable housing is a part of patient care.

“It would impact 16,000 patients up and down California. So, it’s actually very, very serious,” Shannon says. 

With only a few weeks left until Election Day, it will be up to the voters to decide whether or not Prop 34 becomes law.