The Noe Valley Voice • July / August 2015 27
Vicki Rosen, A Champion of Upper Noe “And though she be but little, she is fierce.” —Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night’s Dream
By Heather World
V
icki Rosen, longtime president of the group Upper Noe Neighbors, died June 11, surrounded by her husband of 32 years Randy Zielinski, her daughter Erin, and Rabbi Gedalia Potash and Leah Potash. She was 68. “She will be sorely missed,” said Rabbi Potash of Chabad of Noe Valley. “She had such a deep spiritual compass and sense of purpose.” Rosen’s relationship with Upper Noe the neighborhood began in 1978, when she moved to a Victorian on Valley Street to live with Zielinski. “There were a lot of homes where families had lived through several generations,” Rosen recalled in an interview published in the December 2012 Voice. In fact, her block was called the “widows block,” she said, because of its many older residents. However, the neighborhood was changing fast, filling with a new generation of young families. Hoping to meet the neighbors as well as have a say in outer Church Street’s growth, she and Zielinski joined Upper Noe Neighbors at the group’s inception, in 1988. After Rosen took the helm in 2000, she held regular meetings to rally the neighborhood around quality-of-life issues, ranging from squeaky streetcars to pedes-
From UPPER NOE NEIGHBORS:
Vicki Rosen led our community for over two decades, inspired a sense of civic duty, and left a legacy of public service. The community is discussing a memorial plaque in her honor to be installed at Upper Noe Recreation Center. Later in the year, there will be a dedication and celebration of her life. If you would like to help plan or donate to the dedication, please let us know. Donations can be sent to Upper Noe Neighbors at 205 30th St., San Francisco, CA 94131. Upper Noe Neighbors will carry on the tradition of hosting presentations and public discussions of current events, and welcome all neighbors to participate. Join us on July 8 at 7:30 p.m. at Upper Noe Rec Center at 295 Day St. We will be discussing the changes to the San Jose Avenue off-ramp of 280 Northbound. —Marianne Hampton and Olga Milan-Howells (with grateful help from Tom, Eileen, and Chris) To contact Upper Noe Neighbors, email Marianne.Hampton@comcast.net.
Vicki Rosen sat down for a portrait and interview in 2008. At the time, she and the Upper Noe Neighbors were fighting to keep services at St. Luke’s Hospital. Photo by Pamela Gerard
trian safety to the need to keep an eye on large, multistory construction projects. An outreach coordinator for the Environmental Protection Agency Superfund sites, Rosen was excellent at disseminating valuable information, keeping neighbors engaged, and keeping meetings free of rancor, said UNN board member Marianne Hampton. “She was really in touch with people in the neighborhood,” she said. “She was approachable.” Not only did Rosen bring wine and sign-up sheets to Neighbors meetings, she sat through plodding meetings of the city’s boards, commissions, and agencies, to plead Upper Noe’s case. Her familiarity with the system earned her respect with city officials and gave her a sense of whom to call when. “She would find the right people in government agencies, and she had enough clout to have them listen to her,” Hampton said. State Senator Mark Leno, who worked with Rosen in the 2000s when he was a city supervisor, called her a born leader. Former supervisor Bevan Dufty credits Rosen with putting Upper Noe on the map by marshaling city departments to address neighborhood problems. The result was a neighborhood renaissance, he said. Her long history of neighborhood activism made Rosen a tremendous neighborhood leader, said Supervisor Scott Wiener. “She really brought institutional memory and broad perspective,” he said. Her strongly held opinions did not overshadow her professionalism, and she could disagree with you one day and work with you the next, Wiener said. Rosen was also deeply dedicated to Chabad of Noe Valley, the neighborhood’s orthodox Jewish congregation. The child of a conservative Jewish home in St. Louis, Mo., she didn’t connect to Judaism until she encountered Chabad of
Noe Valley in 2001. Attracted to the simplicity of the services, the welcoming rabbi, and the congregation’s mix of views from atheist to orthodox, Rosen soon became a community strength. “She was a pillar of this community,” Rabbi Potash said. Rosen attended services every Saturday morning, never missed holiday celebrations, and took a deep interest in other members of the community. When the congregation looked to buy the house next door to its Cesar Chavez
Street location, to expand and build a center for Jewish learning, Rosen helped secure the loan. “Without her, it wouldn’t have been possible,” Potash said. Rosen’s passionate pursuit of her goals was evident from a young age. Zielinski remembers one of Rosen’s favorite stories, about the time she and a friend, both in their teens, mailed in 5,000 postcards to a Chicago disk jockey to win tickets to a Beatles concert there. They won and attended the concert as guests of the DJ. He later invited the two girls to hobnob poolside with the Rolling Stones at the Chase Hotel in 1966. A picture from that day is among the many rock-and-roll mementos that line Rosen and Zielinski’s hallway, including a sketch made by Don Van Vliet, better known as Captain Beefheart, and a note handed to her by the drummer of the Yardbirds, asking her to meet him after a show. Rosen’s music savvy and a degree in English from the University of Missouri led to a 17-year career in publishing, including stints at Rolling Stone and New West magazines. Her music reviews earned her and Zielinski backstage passes to concerts by bands like Blondie, U2, and the Talking Heads. Rosen’s passions stayed with her until the end. When Wiener visited her in early June, he said she was frail physically but hale mentally and had plenty to say about Upper Noe issues like development. “To the end, she cared like hell about the neighborhood and about the city, and that was our Vicki,” said Wiener, who adjourned the June 16 Board of Supervisors meeting in her memory.