CHN held its bi-annual in-person general membership meeting on May 15th. The topic was upzoning or “family zoning.” Dozens of neighbors attended the lively session.
Guest speakers were Josh Switzky and Rachael Tanner of the City Wide Planning Division, and Bridget Maley of Neighborhoods United San Francisco.
For
those who were unable to attend, key points from the presentations were:
Planning Presentation (Josh and Rachael):
San Francisco must have a plan for 94,300 housing units by January, 2026 to comply with the California state mandate; the current plan covers only 58,100, which requires rezoning for 36,200 units.
Risks of non-compliance include loss of funding, lawsuits, and loss of
permitting authority (leading to the "Builder’s Remedy").
The Planning Department noted that their plan prioritizes equitable housing in “high opportunity areas” with mid-rise housing (6–8 stories) on main streets.
The base zoning will be 40' in most areas and up to 65' on “key corridors” via the local program or state density bonus.
Josh noted that the benefits could include diverse housing, economic vitality, and
sustainability.
Next Steps:
Info hearings will take place this month (June), and the adoption process will happen this summer and fall.
NUSF is a coalition of 50+ groups advocating for community-centered housing, not just upzoning.
They believe SF has an affordability crisis, not a housing unit crisis. More housing will not lead to affordable housing.
Their concerns
include:
Excessive height increases (up to 65 stories), and lot accumulation for taller buildings.
Projects stalled while developers wait for upzoning (e.g., Geary/Masonic).
NUSF Recommendations:
Focus on existing pipeline projects (69,000 units).
Prioritize adaptive reuse and downtown revitalization.
Count existing 4–6 plex zoning in capacity.
Engage neighbors to educate and advocate.
Rezoning is permanent,
which makes precision in this process even more vital.
Planning and NUSF then engaged in a Q&A. Highlights:
NUSF is advocating for a more urban design approach to rezoning. What the state has dictated takes away subjective standards and imposes objective design standards. NUSF wants to make sure we’re not overlaying a one size fits all approach.
Planning clarified that the deadline is for rezoning approval, not construction.
Agreement
amongst NUSF and Planning that large scale projects (i.e. Stonestown) are great sites to build housing. Josh said that many of these projects are stalled due to complexities: in addition to the economics of adding this housing, these are essentially building all new neighborhoods and need utilities, roads, etc., requiring complex and expensive infrastructure.
Permitting has dropped post-COVID; high costs deter construction. Planning says we need to allow more housing
that is financially feasible. This isn’t going to turn around construction overnight, but they hope that this will create conditions for it to improve.
Rachael said that we have underbuilt in California for decades, resulting in this catastrophic housing shortage. While building doesn’t directly equal affordability, it is a necessary step towards solving the problem.
This month the photographs from the city assessor’s file will feature properties in Blocks 2651 (Douglass, Ord, Market, Corbett) and 2657 (Corbett, Hattie, Ord, Market). Most houses have not changed, but the automobiles surely have. Date yourself! Can you find the 1960-1 Ford Falcon Ranchero, 1956 MG
Midget, 1974 Alfa Romeo Giulietta roadster, 1970s Buick Skylark, 1962-3 Jensen, 1974-5 Dodge Dart, Nash Rambler 1962-3, 1958 Oldsmobile, 1960s Dodge pick-up truck, 1956 Chevrolet, 1974 Ford, 1972-3 VW Microbus, and 1963 VW Beetle? (Identification by John Koelsch)
114 Douglass
130 Douglass
118-120 Douglass
132 Douglass
135 Ord
140 Ord
130 Ord
136 Ord
137-9 Ord
152-4 Ord
160 Ord
2808 Market
123 Corbett
9 Hattie
17 Hattie
25-27 Hattie
31 Hattie (destroyed by fire October, 20, 2016)
35 Hattie (destroyed by fire October 20, 2016)
October 30, 2016
1-3-5
Corbett
San Francisco Parks Alliance
You may have read of the serious financial problems of the San Francisco Parks Alliance (SFPA), the long-standing 501(c)(3) entity to which you have made tax deductible contributions on behalf of Corbett Heights Neighbors. These financial issues have been reported by the San Francisco Chronicle as well as the San Francisco Standard. This is a brief
update on the current situation.
In the last few months CHN experienced delays in payments to its vendors, which is handled by SFPA on our behalf, such as those performing maintenance at our neighborhood parks. Recently we became aware that our experience was not unusual in that many of the other 80+ nonprofit partners that work with SFPA also experienced delays. We now know that this was because of SFPA financial mismanagement, particularly by the
prior officers and/or directors of SFPA.
Accordingly, in the last few weeks approximately thirty of the SFPA’s nonprofit partners banded together to petition SFPA for more information on the precise nature of the problem, how it will be fixed, and how long it will take to fix it. CHN is a member of this group (Community Partner Network-Advisory Committee (CPN-AC)) and was a signatory of a letter demanding answers to some of these questions, as well
as seeking a meeting with SFPA. In response, the new SFPA CEO welcomed the participation of this advisory group, proposed a general meeting in June with the participating nonprofit partners, and was optimistic that SFPA can be financially stabilized.
SFPA has been a valuable partner to CHN and scores of community groups in San Francisco because it provides tax advantages to members and Boards of those neighborhood organizations including holding funds in trust and,
importantly, the financial controls and “back office“ recordkeeping that is often difficult for small community groups to sustain. We will continue to participate in the work of CPN-AC and to press SFPA to right the financial ship. We will keep you informed of further developments.
Please email us if you have any questions or wish additional information.
A DAY AT THE BEACH by Gary D. Schmidt and Ron Koertge,
HarperCollins/Clarion, April 2025, 224p., ISBN: 978-0-06-338092-9
Richie Partington has recently moved to Corbett Avenue. He taught
children’s library services classes in the San Jose State MLIS
program. Richie has served on numerous American Library Association
award and selection committees, including the Caldecott Medal committee.
Richie generously and willingly agreed to let us print this latest
review.
“This summer I went swimming
This summer I might have drowned
But I held my breath and I kicked my feet
And I moved my arms around
I moved my arms around”
– Loudon Wainwright III “The Swimming Song” (1973)
“Tobias Jackson sprawled on the blanket.
He didn’t care if he got sand all over himself.
He didn’t care that the morning sun would soon start turning him pink.
He was in Triumph
Mode.
No. In Conquering Warrior Mode.
No. In some mode even cooler than that.
He lifted his T-shirt from the bottom, felt for just a second the old hesitation, then with a jerk, lifted it up and over his head.
The sun burned onto his chest. And you know what? It felt great. It felt triumphant. It felt like heroic warrioring.
No. It was even cooler than that.
This is what four horrible weeks at Fat Camp and four more horrible weeks under a supervised diet
stricter than a Navy SEAL’s regimen and a summer’s worth of gym visits with his dad had given him. From XXX Large to Large. Look at him! My God, look at him! He had the beginnings of a washboard!
And that wasn’t all.
In the back pocket of his trunks, turned to silent mode, he had the new iPhone Infinity Plus. No kidding. The iPhone Infinity Plus. No one had an iPhone Infinity Plus, because it wasn’t out yet. It was only through his father’s amazing connections that one had snuck out
of the factory–the reward his parents had promised him for dropping from XXX Large to Large. A prototype in his pocket while everybody else on the planet was just talking about the best phone ever in the entire history of phones and planning to get in line three months from now.
Not even the president of the freaking United States of America had one.”
Are you a beach person? I sure am. Growing up on Long Island (Long ISLAND), one is always within a half-dozen miles of
some shoreline or another. I fell in love with the beach at an early age, and have fond memories of long days in the water, of sprawling out on a towel, alongside family and friends. Or of sometimes sitting quietly, all by myself in the dark, bobbing around just offshore in an old wooden rowboat at night.
“Abram Tolland was the best Frisbee player that Booker T. Washington Middle School had ever seen. What he could do with a Frisbee was stuff Mr. F.R. Isbee himself could never
have imagined. Abram Tolland could sniff the air once, and his throws would settle on the back of the wind and go forever. Principal Bao–who was no slouch himself at throwing a Frisbee and who had won Booker T. Washington Middle School’s Frisbee Golf Tournament every spring until Abram Tolland showed up in his sixth grade class–could point to any spot on the athletic fields behind the school, and Abram Tolland could settle a Frisbee there from a hundred yards away. ‘On the dime,’ Mr. Bao would
say, laughing.”
A DAY AT THE BEACH takes place on the Jersey Shore, near Asbury Park (and Ocean Grove where, according to the old family stories, my great-grandmother maintained a summer place a hundred-and-something years ago).
“If Ruth had Snapchat or FB or TikTok or YouTube or Tumblr or Instagram or any other ‘Gram, she’d say the same thing every time: ‘ONE MORE DAY.’ What she’d mean is this: One more day before I get my phone back.
Ruth steps
off the blanket her mother laid out and tugs at it until the corners are perfect. The sand is hot, so Ruth is onto the sand, back onto the blanket, onto the sand, back onto the blanket. Perfect for a TikTok video.
If she had her phone, she’d dance that out in a heartbeat and then post it for Marco and Ben and Jasmin and Carla. Instead, she’s on day six of a seven-day social media fast, thanks to some very low grades in math.
She hasn’t lost a pound on that fast. In fact, she’s
probably gained a few, snacking just to keep her hands busy, hands that are usually wrapped lovingly around her phone, that lifeline to the world. Her world. No wonder that kid was asking everybody if they’d seen his phone. Ruth feels totally alone without hers. Abandoned. Forsaken. She kind of wants to lie down and stare out a window at a windswept moor.”
Tobias, Abram, and Ruth. They are just three of the dozens of preadolescents we meet at the Jersey Shore on this lovely
summer day. Over a fifteen hour stretch, jogging, swimming, kite flying, sandcastle fabricating, Frisbeeing, acquiring new friends (human and animal), contemplating a washed-up dead whale, and all sorts of other good clean (sandy) fun will be had.
And, yes, there are also a few kids at the beach who are going through some pretty tough stuff.
Given that the book features a great variety of tales starring these dozens of tween characters, A DAY AT
THE BEACH initially feels like a collection of short stories. And I’m typically not much of a short story fan. Too often, you just get into a story and then it’s over. You start another one and the same thing happens.
But here, with intertwining threads, with characters making cameo appearances, comically stepping into and out of each other’s chapters, those ends all tie together into a frequently moving and often laugh-aloud read. It makes for the best of both worlds: A
knockout tween read from which one can readily pluck, reread, and share individual chapters/stories that are strong and complete enough to stand on their own.
Up for a sunny summer day amidst the dunes? A DAY AT THE BEACH combines young characters and seaside situations into stories you won’t soon forget. But, hey! What else would you hope for when you pair up a couple of old favs, the award-winning, veteran authors of THE WEDNESDAY WARS and STONER &
SPAZ.
“And so castles made of sand
Fall in the sea eventually”
– Jimi Hendrix (1967)
So don’t forget to apply your sunscreen regularly. Make sure to stay hydrated. Watch those riptides. Go suck in that good salt air, and join the crowd for A DAY AT THE BEACH.
