By Calvin Welch, HANC Housing and Land Use Chair
HANC's October meeting, Thursday, October 10, beginning at 7:00 pm in the Community Room, downstairs at the Park Branch Library, 1833 Page Street, will feature a discussion with Art Agnos and Tim Redmond about Propositions B and C on the November ballot.
The proposed 8 Washington development on the waterfront would build some 134 luxury condo’s (costing an average of $5m each) in a 136 foot high building on a 3.2 acre site on the northern waterfront. The project would require a 62% increase in the current 84 foot height limit. A portion of the project would be built on port land. The development would pay some $11 m in affordable housing exactions, $4.8 m in transit “improvements” and pay the Port $3m for the land. In addition the project would receive additional public funds through a tax increment bond payment, the amount of which is unclear but is in the range of several millions of dollars. No estimate has been made as to the additional costs the project will require of various City departments but a major potential cost impact is the development's 20 million gallon a day sewer line, should it be effected by earthquake or bay level rise over time noted by a recent engineering report.
Proposition C is a “referendum” overturning the approval of the projects by the City and placed on the ballot by some 19,405 valid signatures gathered in less than 30 days, the first such referendum placed on the ballot in nearly 30 years in San Francisco. Proposition B is an initiative ordinance placed on the ballot by some 9,700 signatures gathered by the developer and if it gets a majority of the “yes” vote would prevail over Proposition C even if C was defeated. Thus for the developer to “win” he needs only to have B pass. For the project to be stopped both B and C need to be defeated.
These are the bare “facts” of the project and its potential costs and benefits. But there is far more to the story than these dry numbers. 8 Washington has come to symbolize the current “great divide” in San Francisco: a seemingly endless stream of luxury condos occurring at the same time as a steep increase in rental evictions regenerating the “gentrification” war last seen during the 1995-2000 dot-com boom.
To help us understand the particulars of this issue and its broader significance we have invited Art Agnos, former Mayor of San Francisco and Tim Redmond, former editor of the San Francisco Bay Guardian and current CEO of the newly formed San Francisco Progressive Media Center to our October meeting.
These are the most important issues on the November, 2013 ballot and you have a chance to learn more about it in detail only available “live and direct ” at our meeting. Bring a friend Thursday, October 10, 7 PM at the Community Room of Park Branch Library, 1833 Page Street.