Planning Association for the Richmond, SF

Beach Chalet Soccer Fields ALERT

 

TO ALL SUPPORTERS OF GOLDEN GATE PARK:

 

1.     SF Ocean Edge volunteers meeting – June 5^th,  5:00 – 7:00 p.m. 

2.      Outreach opportunities – Sunday Streets and more – come have fun with your fellow Ocean Edgers!

3.      Leafleting opportunity – get exercise and get to know the neighborhoods!

4.      Report on Commonwealth Club panel - a great success!

5.      The new buttons are very effective!  Get one and wear it with pride!

 

1.      Volunteers meeting: 

Come and learn what’s going on!  Enjoy great snacks!  (Bring great snacks!)

Sunday, June 5th, 5:00 – 7:00 p.m.

1243 42^nd Avenue between Lincoln and Irving

 

2.      Outreach opportunities

Volunteers needed for the following events.  Bring a friend!    Let us know so we can plan coverage ---

 

Oak Woodland Trails improvement meeting:  Wednesday, May 25^th -  Leafleting:  5:30 to 6:30.  Meeting starts:  6:00 (ends at 7:30 p.m.)  GGP Senior Center (Fulton near 37^th Avenue).  Come a little early and hand out leaflets at the door.  Oak Woodlands folks are interested in habitat and should be informed about the damage to the habitat that the soccer fields will cause.  Feel free to stay for the meeting.   (Other dates:  June 15;  July 13)

Sunday Streets:  Sunday, June 12^th, 11:00 – 4:00 p.m. ·          Bayview, 3^rd Street from Bayview Opera House to Dogpatch, Lower Potrero Hill.  Join our volunteers if only for an hour or two, and then go off and enjoy the day.  This is a fun way to talk to people and enlist their support and a great way to get to know other parts of the City.  

(Next date:  July 10^th: Great Highway and Golden Gate Park)

 

Ocean Beach Vision Plan public workshop:  Saturday, June 4^th.  Anytime between 10:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. (Final time and location TBD   - somewhere in western Sunset or Richmond.)  Hand out leaflets as folks arrive to view the most recent plans for Ocean Beach - from the Cliff House to the Zoo.  While you are there, give input on any plans near Golden Gate Park and ask to keep the Park a place for nature – not development!  Leafleting will be continuous – come at any time.

 

3.      Can’t come to a scheduled event?  Want some exercise and to get to know the neighborhood?  Come join us in distributing leaflets !

Many, many people in the Outer Sunset and Richmond Districts still do not know about the soccer fields project (or the water treatment factory!).   Join your fellow Ocean Edgers in walking the local area and leaving leaflets.  Let us know you are interested, and we’ll have a leafleting party. 

Other ideas are to leaflet at places like Other Avenues and ask people to sign-up for our group. 

 

4.      Commonwealth Club Panel

Thanks to the many people who attended this enlightening discussion.  Attendance was over 90 people!  Many had never heard of the soccer project and talked with us afterwards.  The panel will be broadcast by the Commonwealth Club in a few weeks – we’ll let you know the date and time.

(Left to right)  Moderator: Jim Chappell.  Panel:  Mark Buell, Anthea Hartig, Katherine Howard, Mike Lynes, George Wooding

 

5.      Get your button now and wear it with pride!

Our new buttons are a great success.  Members took a bunch to the San Francisco Tomorrow dinner, along with our flyers – the buttons were snapped up by attendees.

Get a button (only $1.00 donation) and wear it.  People will ask you:  “What is happening with Golden Gate Park?”  You can give them a short talk and then the flyers, which are FREE – yes FREE – with the button!  (Well, OK, they are free anyway….) 

 

 

La Playa Safeway – new website launched

A new Safeway La Playa website has been established for information about plans to rebuild the store at Ocean Beach. According to Safeway representatives, the next neighborhood meeting will be held sometime in mid-November 2010.  For ongoing information, contact Ms. Natalie C. Mattei, Real Estate Manager, Safeway, Inc. Northern California Division, 5918 Stoneridge Mall Road, Pleasanton, CA 94588-3229 or by phone at 925.467.3063.

Make Sure Your Input is Included! Only Public Opportunity to Weigh in on Environmental Issues Affecting the Outer Richmond -- October 26 at 6pm

The next Neighborhood Meeting will be Tuesday, October 26 from 6-7 p.m.  Please note, there will be NO meeting on October 19 as previously reported.

 

This will be a scoping meeting to provide an opportunity for the public and interested parties to comment on the scope of the environmental review that will be undertaken when preparing the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS] for the Institutional Master Plan (IMP).

 

Copies of the IMP will be made available for review on or about October 12, 2010.  I will provide more information on how to review or obtain a copy at that time.

 

Thank you.

 

 

Judi A. Cheary

Director of Public Affairs

San Francisco VAMC

4150 Clement St.

San Francisco, CA 94121

Phone: 415/750-2250

Fax: 415/379-5663

Cell: 415/760-8449

www.sanfrancisco.va.gov

 

Planning Commission Hearing on 2009 Housing Element to Prepare for 2010 Draft

On October 14th the Planning Commission will hold a hearing on the draft 2009 Housing Element. The intent of this hearing is to host a public discussion on the June 2010 draft Housing Element. The Planning Commission hearing starts at 1:30 PM - please check the Planning Commission agenda one week before the hearing to determine when the Housing Element item may be heard.

 

The Department continues to receive public comments on the draft of the 2009 Housing Element update. Please attend the hearing or send your written comments to me. Many comments have been made in references to changes between the first and second draft. Both versions are available on the website, along with a summary of the changes. 

 

Housing Element website: http://housingelement2009.sfplanning.org/

 

If you've received this message you are on our 2009 Housing Element Update e-mail list. Please let me know if you would like to be removed from that list. 

 

Thanks for your continued interest in the Housing Element, 

Kearstin

--
Kearstin Dischinger
Policy Planner, Citywide
San Francisco Planning Department
1650 Mission Street
San Francisco, CA 94103

415.558.6284

Public Meeting on Proposed Hotel at the Presidio, Wednesday, Sept 22 at 6:30pm

NEWS RELEASE, proposed 14-building hotel on Presidio's Main Post

Sept. 17, 2010

For more information, contact

Gary Widman, 415/435-0360, gwidman@mindspring.com

Whit Hall, 707/778-6975, whithall@comcast.net

www.presidioassociation.org

 History Association Seeks Public Response to Presidio Hotel Proposal

 San Francisco…The watchdog nonprofit Presidio Historical Association (PHA) is asking the public to speak out against plans to build a new 88,000 sq. ft. luxury hotel in the most historic area of the Presidio of San Francisco National Park at next week's Presidio Trust Board's public meeting.

 The meeting is scheduled to begin at 6:30 pm on Wednesday, Sept. 22, at the Golden Gate Club, 135 Fisher Loop in the Presidio of San Francisco. The agenda includes an update on the massive 14-building hotel proposal and time for public comment on the complex.

The Trust, a federal agency charged with managing the Presidio's real estate, has proposed a hotel including 12 new buildings encompassing 70,000 sq. ft., and the conversion of two historic structures measuring 18,000 sq. ft.  The hotel complex would total nearly 90,000 sq. ft. located in the heart of the Presidio's historic Main Post, which dates back to 1776."The Presidio National Park needs a Visitors Center and History Museum, neither of which has been built by the Presidio Trust during its 10 years of overseeing the park," said PHA President Gary Widman. "This hotel is an improper and totally unnecessary use of this most important historic national park site."

The Presidio is already financially self-sufficient thanks to the rental income from its homes, offices and land.  To date, the Trust has not released any financial analyses that show the proposed hotel would be profitable, and its Executive Director recently admitted that hotel profits would be "marginal."

Federal funds may be used to build some or all of the hotel, which will compete with nearby hotels and inns on Lombard Street and in the Marina, Cow Hollow/Union Street, Pacific Heights, Laurel Village and Fisherman's Wharf.

In addition to attending the Wednesday night meeting, Widman urges concerned citizens to call Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and US Senators Boxer and Feinstein to protest the commercialization of the federal park, and to contact relevant local officials.

"Does a city with 33,000 hotel rooms really need another hotel in the midst of the most historic and open part of its new national park?" Widman asked. 

The Presidio Trust spent more than two years and more than $1 million in public funds fighting the public outcry against a controversial art museum proposed by the Donald Fisher family to be built on the Presidio's Main Post.  Fisher, who died in September 2009, withdrew his proposal and turned his art collection over to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art one week before his death.  

"Many of those who protested the museum also opposed the Main Post hotel, which was first proposed by the Presidio Trust in 2007.  But the Trust has chosen to ignore that outcry and is now trying to authorize this large hotel and a multiplex movie theater – creating a new commercial district in the historic heart of the park," said Widman. "The Trust is trying to change the rules that now prohibit such construction by amending the Presidio Trust Management Plan (PTMP) to allow it."

For more information, contact the Presidio Historical Association at (415) 921-8193 or visit www.presidioassociation.org.

###

Founded in the 1950s, the nonprofit Presidio Historical Association (PHA) has worked in cooperation with the National Park Service and Presidio Trust since 1994 to advocate for preserving the integrity of the Presidio's National Historic Landmark District, located in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area (GGNRA).  PHA created a museum for the Army when it was based at the Presidio.  Earlier, PHA helped restore historic Fort Point at the base of the Golden Gate Bridge.

Presidio Historical Association 
P.O. Box 29163 
San Francisco, CA 94129
(415)921-8193
www.presidioassociation.org