Potrero View 2021: October

Efforts to Rename Jackson Park Underway

BY JESSICA ZIMMER

In August, Jude Deckenbach, Friends of Jackson Park (FoJP) executive director, introduced the idea of renaming Jackson Playground at an online meeting of the Potrero Boosters, a neighborhood group consisting of Potrero Hill, Dogpatch, and Showplace Square residents.

“We are in touch with Jude and have shared our park renaming policy,” said Tamara Aparton, San Francisco Rec and Park spokesperson. “They must conduct a community outreach process to arrive at a name or possible list of names to be considered.”

Deckenbach said FoJP wants to rename the park because its present designation commemorates U.S. president Andrew Jackson.

“Jackson’s anti-abolitionism and forcible removal of Native Americans from their ancestral homelands, in addition to other contemptible traits and actions on his part, make him an undeserving and undesirable namesake of our beloved park,” said Deckenbach.

Jackson Playground has been named for the former president since 1912, when the park was first dedicated for use by San Francisco children.

Jackson, who “owned” human beings, caused the removal of roughly 100,000 Native Americans and enslaved people from Southeastern states to territory west of the Mississippi River. Between 1830 and 1850 the Cherokee, Creek, Seminole, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Ponca, and Ho-Chunk/Winnebago tribes were expelled from the South. At the time the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, and Seminole peoples had laws limiting Black freedom, reestablishing slavery when they arrived in their new home. The “Trail of Tears” resulted in the death of upwards of 15,000 people. Thousands of Native Americans and Blacks suffered illnesses, financial damages, and the loss of family members on the journey west.

Jackson’s actions were facilitated by federal legislation, including the Indian Removal Act, which Jackson signed into law in 1830. The relocation was enforced through acts of aggres-

10-Townsend to Return in 2022

BY JUDY GODDESS

Samuel Thomas is angry. During the public health crisis, the 10-Townsend – a bus line he and other Potrero Annex-Terrace residents relied on to go shopping, travel to medical appointments and get to work – stopped running.

“I’m old and sick, I use a walker,” Thomas said. “A lot of us are sick, old. We can’t get off this hill without a bus.”

Thomas secured paratransit van tickets with help from the Community Living Campaign, but “paratransit can’t pick up everyone on the hill. We need the Number 10 back up here.”

According to Stephen Chun, San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency deputy spokesperson,

the agency is grappling with limited resources and reduced transit demand, with fewer people traveling Downtown.

“Also, several lines overlapped the 10 Townsend’s route, but despite the temporary suspension, 98 percent of San Franciscans still can access Muni service within two to three blocks of their home or work,” Chun said.

Thomas appears to be among the two percent without such easy access.

When your home is atop a steep hill, the bus stop at the bottom, “the distance will kill you,” Thomas said. “It’s like climbing a mountain. We know there are overlapping routes, but we can’t climb the mountain to reach them.”

SFMTA plans to restart all or part of the 10-Townsend line this February.

As part of its “post-COVID” resurrection, the agency is considering three different configurations for the Muni system, all of which include the 10’s return. Under the “familiar” option the entire 10 route would be reinstated. The other options would bring back a shortened version that ends at the Financial District.

Under all the alternatives riders will likely have to wait longer for a bus. A March 2021 SFMTA notice stated that Muni service will ultimately be restored “to 85 percent of the preCovid level.”

SFMTA wants input on its three route options. Learn about them at www.sfmta.com/2022network or call 415.646.2005

New Bayview Station Police Captain Grapples with Staff Shortages

BY JOHN FERRANNINI

David Maron was named captain of the Bayview Station last February, after more than 25 years with the San Francisco Police Department. His appointment was made in the wake of a year of civic unrest demanding changes to policing and public safety nationwide.

Maron was previously a lieutenant at Park Station on the Westside for three years after being a patrol sergeant and station investigator at the Ingleside Station for five years and serving 10 years in the tactical unit. He

got his start at Southern, Northern and Mission stations.

When asked if morale has been affected by anti-police sentiments, Maron said “I think it would depend on where you’re at. Here in Bayview, morale is pretty good. A lot of people – including myself – love to come to work, enjoy this job. Now that may change if you’re talking to someone else, but I love connecting to work, and interacting with the officers and the community.”

Maron’s approach to patrolling remains consistent. “In general, we’re doing what we’ve always done,” he said.

“We try to be fair.”

As the View reported last month, crime has declined in District 10 – which includes Potrero Hill, Dogpatch, Bayview-Hunters Point and Visitacion Valley – over the last four years, including from 2020 to 2021. Maron confirmed that trend, in spite of perceptions and a shortage of officers.

“We move officers around to fill the needs of the community, but we’re short,” Maron said. “Numbers wise, Bayview has 111 police assigned.”

Maron said he’s “not sure” how

Heroes: DeHaro Property Owners Pg. 3

Peter McCandless: Dogpatch Cinematographer Pg. 5

Supplies Relocates Pg. 5

Dakota Street was previously served by the 10-Townsend.

PHOTO: Cathy DeLuca

PUBLISHER’S VIEW

ARGUING OUR WAY TO AUSCHWITZ

BY STEVEN J. MOSS

The Nazis discovered the family hiding in France and put them on a train to Auschwitz; mom, dad and two sisters.

“We argued the entire way,” said the sole sibling survivor. “About whose fault it was we were captured.”

The rest of her family were gassed to death immediately after they arrived at the death camp.

We too are on a journey, to an unknown place that seems vaguely scary. It’s probably not a spa. We travel together, some of us packed into standing room only cattle cars, others in opulent sleeping carriages, many in between. Outside the windows vistas pass by: an ash-orange sky, towering flames in the distance licking towards

the stars; masked people, waiting in line for free bags of groceries, six feet apart; heat shimmering off baked asphalt, hot enough to fry an egg laid by a tightly caged chicken; fog, crowding in like cows hungry for their morning hay; diners eating at picnic tables placed in spaces still slick with the oil of previously parked cars; babies chewing their fingers as they’re strollered by disheveled loners screaming from drug-induced sleep deprivation; trees, blowing in the wind.

Where are we going, we humans, traveling on a planet that we’ve made too hot to handle? Not to the stars, at least not for a long while, other than

PUBLISHER’S VIEW continues on page 11

Recall

Last month, Recall San Francisco School Board turned in what appears to be a sufficient number of signatures to trigger an election to unseat San Francisco School Board President Gabriela López, Board Vice President Fauuga Moliga , and Commissioner Alison Collins. The campaign needed 51,325 autographs, 10 percent of registered voters, per candidate; it submitted 81,300 for López, 81,200 for Collins, and 77,700 for Moliga. Autumn Looijen and Siva Raj, Recall San Francisco School Board founders, led the signature collection effort, with support from the Chinese American Democratic Club “We had nearly 1,000 volunteers across the City and they’re the real power behind this movement,” said Raj. “They collected 40 percent of the signatures and asked us to bring in paid signature gatherers to finish the job. We ran the whole campaign for under $600,000.” “We sent signature gatherers to street fairs, farmers markets, bus stops, and supermarkets. It was tricky to collect signatures during a pandemic. Our volunteers asked people to bring petitions to their friends, family, and neighbors,” said Looijen. Recall San Francisco School Board is now identifying candidates to replace the three members targeted to be recalled. “We’re going to run an open process where we ask candidates how they would handle the most difficult problems facing our school district… post their answers on the internet and

have the community vote,” said Raj. “This campaign is personal for us and for thousands of families in the school district. Our children deserve amazing schools. We’re looking for leaders who can help make that happen.” The San Francisco Department of Elections has until the first week of October to verify the signatures.

Farley’s

Farley’s free annual Halloween pet parade and costume contest returns at 1 p.m. on Saturday, October 30, starting at 18th and Arkansas streets. Roughly 100 entrants are expected. Participants will process to Texas Street to be judged. “Afterwards, we’ll have live music on the parklet until 3 p.m. The partial closure of 18th Street through the City’s Shared Spaces program makes it easier for more people to socially distance,” said Chris Hillyard, Farley’s co-owner. Any animal can participate; past entrants included dogs, cats, rabbits, mice, iguanas, and goldfish. Throughout October Farley’s will vend its seasonal apple cider and pet-themed merchandise, such as dog collars, bandanas, and treats. Rose Shattuck, founder of The Foggy Dog, a Mission-based business, has partnered with the cafe to sell two Halloween bandanas and several other fall flannel bandana styles. “We love working with local small businesses like Farley’s to drive recognition. It’s amazing to see

SHORT CUTS continues on page 12

De H aro Property Owners Among Unsung Heroes of the Pandemic

BY EBONY RENEE PARKER

“Essential workers” have been deservedly lauded over the past almost two-year pandemic. Medical professionals, among other “frontline workers,” have had to grapple with potential exposure to the COVID-19 virus, as well as the effect of compounded, concentrated stress and anxiety. There have been other “heroes,” though, some right in our backyard.

Allow me to introduce you to Tricia and Jerry, my landlords. They became my lessors because they offered a “frontline worker stay” through a temporary housing site last year. I was a nurse working a time-limited contract testing people for COVID-19. Tricia and Jerry enabled me to live in their beautiful flat near the top of Potrero Hill. What was originally a three-month commitment extended to more than a year.

During this difficult period Tricia and Jerry offered a sanctuary, perfectly equipped with all things necessary for staying-at-home. A deck overlooks the Bay to the east and north, providing a highlight at the beginnings and ends of trying days in uncomfortable conditions.

In ordinary times I wouldn’t have been able to afford the rent. Yet in this extraordinary period I found myself waking hours before the sun, quietly sitting outside soaking in the sights and sounds of early morning life cross-

ing the Bay Bridge. Daybreak’s stillness became a most-sacred preparation for eight- and 10-hour days shielded by gowns, gloves and respirators, days working to mitigate the fears of hundreds of people presenting for testing, days that ended in nursing sore shoulders and wrists from the repetitive motion of collecting specimens, as well as physical exhaustion unlike anything I’d experienced.

Most people who knew what kind of work I was doing were reluctant to ask about it. That resulted in either less frequent contact with friends or conversations driven in any direction than my work life. The resulting isolation was as unexpected as experiencing a global public health crisis.

However, neither Tricia nor Jerry considered me anything less than a neighbor and community member, often checking in on me – safelydistanced and masked, of course, in the shared outdoor space – to make sure I was well and had everything I needed to stay that way. I often found a bag of fresh citrus fruit waiting for me along with wishes for my continued health. At no point did I feel as though I posed a threat to their sensibilities of safety after hundreds of personal, yet protected, exposures a day, even as I was concerned for them.

Not only did Tricia and Jerry offer their peaceful home to a stranger, but they consistently demonstrated the need to remain balanced through

each day’s unpredictable happenings. There were lots of smiles and laughs, shared prepared dishes and sweet treats, lots of “right on” and “get down” for encouragement, and no intangible sense that they were afraid. They carried on living in the safest world they could create around themselves, absent the weightiness of panic readily available beyond the door’s threshold.

This was inspirational for me. I knew I struck gold when I could come home from the thick of pandemic madness and just relax. I suspect this wasn’t the norm for many people. My landlords didn’t know ow much work THEY did on the frontlines. At least not until now.

As life has begun to return to normal, Potrero Hill buyers have been exceptionally active. Many singlefamily homes and condominiums are selling at strong prices with multiple offers as buyer take advantage of low interest rates. If you have been thinking of selling your home, now may be an excellent time to take advantage of strong demand from buyers.

tim@timjohnsonSF.com www.timjohnsonSF.com

DRE

ARCH Art Supplies Relocates to College Campus

BY AKASH GHOSAL

After about five years of doing business from a red warehouse building at 10 Carolina Street, ARCH Art Supplies is moving to a new ground floor space below Blattner Hall, on the California College of the Arts (CCA) campus. The 17th Street building, across from Jackson Playground, was constructed in 2018.

“ARCH Art Supplies has been the go-to location for California College of the Arts students and faculty since the store moved to Potrero Hill 20 years ago,” said Taryn Lott, a CCA staff member. “The new Blattner Hall location is just the latest iteration in ARCH’s long history and continuous evolution.”

ARCH originally opened in Jackson Square. In 2001, the store moved to 17th Street and has been in various sites in the neighborhood ever since.

“Because CCA’s students are doing such ground-breaking things with 3D printing, CNC machines, laser cutting, and computer-generated design, we’ve upped our game to provide the tools and supplies they need,” said ARCH’s owner Susie Coliver. “We’re probably the only art supply store in the country which also stocks plywood and rotary sandpaper, cast acrylics

and REN foam blocks, Killer Red tapes, and the like.”

“When [we] first started out, it was not an art supply store,” Coliver continued. “We began forty-three years ago in 1978, and we were exclusively selling drafting supplies, which used to be the very bread and butter of our business. Throughout the ‘70s, ‘80s, and ‘90s, manual drafting was still the only way to create architectural, landscape architectural, and engineering drawings…so we had a store that had nothing but supplies and equipment for design professional, who today need almost nothing.”

“Over the years, we’ve morphed into art supplies; at this point, it feels like we are morphing again; not away from art materials but more into the prototyping as well. We’ve had to be nimble and roll with the punches throughout the years, but it’s opened up all sorts of new avenues for us. It’s been very exciting. In recent years, we’ve put in a lot of materials for prototyping, product design, and industrial design, because there’s so much of that being done in the Bay Area and at [CCA].”

According to Coliver, “a majority of practicing artists in San Francisco live in the southeast quadrant, and ARCH Art Supplies is one of the only stores like it to serve the City’s artist community.”

Coliver said that a visit to a local art supply store offers far more value than purchasing from an online retailer.

“Everyone who works here has an arts background and most are practicing artists,” Coliver said. “They know a lot, and they give out free information all day long. You can play with materials, experiment, and be exposed to what’s possible! When you buy online, you only get exposed to just what you search for. Just as a vibrant community needs libraries and bookstores, we need to feed our creative impulses.”

Peter McCandless, Dogpatch Cinematographer, Has Seen the Light

BY JESSICA ZIMMER

Minnesota Street resident, Peter McCandless, 67, believes he’s contributed to the world’s body of knowledge by serving as a cinematographer for more than 13 significant documentaries, including Of Civil Wrongs and Rights: The Fred Korematsu Story (2000); The Bridge (2006), and The Great 14th: Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama in His Own Words (2019).

“Documentaries have a long, slow life. They have their impact over time and reach a lot of people. They have a message that endures,” said Mc -

Candless. “I’ve learned there’s no real mystery to people who live across the globe. We all have similar practices and mindsets. You will be welcome if you approach people from any culture or background in a good way.”

McCandless was born in Framingham, Massachusetts. He grew up in Princeton, the son of Mary Margaret “Bunny” McCandless and Joey Leigh “Jake” McCandless, a football and basketball coach at Princeton University. He became interested in art after taking a mechanical drawing class in high school.

“The follow-up course was architecture. I drew the floor plans and elevations and built a balsa wood model of a house at the end. I remember thinking architecture was amazing. The photography and sculpture courses at Cornell University were even better,” said McCandless.

McCandless attended Cornell for two years, during a period in which the University’s art program focused on drawing, painting, sculpture and printmaking, “although they did have a conceptual art class that was great, taught by Norman Daly.”

Daly, who was fascinated by Native American and Hispanic cultures, is known for his large, complex project

Cinematographer Peter McCandless. PHOTO: Peter McCandless

that used faux artifacts, documents, photographs, audiotapes, and explanatory texts to imagine an entire culture, “The Civilization of Llhuros.”

McCandless finished his undergraduate degree at the San Francisco Art Institute (SFAI), which offered the same disciplines as Cornell – filmmaking, performance art, and ceramics – as well as a strong photography department and visiting artist lecture series.

“Also, my girlfriend at the time was in labor relations and wanted to work with Cesar Chavez. We moved to San Francisco in 1975,” said McCandless.

McCandless initially lived in Project Artaud, an art cooperative space in Mishpot. He graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in sculpture from SFAI in 1977 and moved into a studio in the American Can Company building on Third Street.

“It was all artists’ lofts down there. It was important that when you wanted to rent a place, you didn’t tell the landlord you were actually going to live there,” said McCandless.

McCandless left Dogpatch in 1979 when the property owner, Angelo Markoulis, forced the artists from the lofts.

“I rented an apartment in SoMa for a while. Later, I bought a house on Minnesota Street. I’ve been here ever since,” said McCandless.

McCandless started experimenting with filmmaking after graduating from SFAI.

“My first projects involved projecting slides onto hyperbolic sails [four-sided sails to create a threedimensional canopy] at dance clubs. Before there were video cameras,

I’d create montages of slides for live concerts. I soon started experimenting with a Super 8 camera and 16 millimeter film,” said McCandless.

The gigs didn’t pay. McCandless supported himself by plastering and painting private homes.

“Art was never paid. You did it because you were it,” said McCandless.

His first photo and film projects focused on the punk rock scene.

The first documentary film I worked on was Of Civil Wrongs and Rights Documentarian Eric Paul Fournier, a North Beach resident and former punk rock record producer, knew McCandless through the local music scene.

“I was aware of Peter’s films for bands in music clubs. Our girlfriends at the time were friends. Both of them were fashion designers. Before starting the Korematsu film, I worked with Pe -

“I did a series on Suzi Skates, a female skater in the City who used to travel around in a tutu and roller skates. I took pictures of Flipper, a rock band, and lots of other bands that crashed and burned,” said McCandless.

“After 12 years of doing unpaid work in film, I finally started to get photography and film gigs that paid. I did cinematography for Levi’s, UCSF, UC Berkeley, Specialized, and others. My film career began with word of mouth.

ter on a number of projects, including Celebration: Reverend Cecil Williams and Glide Church, a film about the congregation at Glide Church,” said Fournier.

Fournier was chosen to direct the Korematsu film by Ken Korematsu, Fred Korematsu’s son.

“I knew Ken well from his work in advertising. At first, Ken wanted to make a film about his father himself. Later, Ken asked me to co-produce and

direct the movie. I then asked Peter to shoot the film,” said Fournier. “No one lights a room better. Peter’s steady and solid, unflappable. You know you’re going to get quality footage. He won’t get flustered. I’ve hired him for approximately 80 percent of the pieces I’ve directed since Celebration.”

Of Civil Wrongs and Rights follows Fred Korematsu’s 40-year legal fight about the constitutionality of the Japanese American internment during World War II.

“I worked on several narrative films before this documentary. This one made a big impact on me. I think it’ll be around forever. People are still watching it,” said McCandless.

Of Civil Wrongs and Rights centers on the overturning of Korematsu’s conviction under Executive Order 9066, issued by President Franklin Roosevelt on February 19, 1942, which authorized the evacuation of all persons deemed a national security threat from the West Coast to inland relocation centers. The film reveals how the U.S. government intentionally suppressed or destroyed evidence that Japanese Americans didn’t pose a military threat.

The Bridge, a film about suicides on the Golden Gate Bridge, was filmed daily for a year from two locations at opposite ends of the span. McCandless shot interviews of family members and friends of people that’d jumped.

“I also went out on boats and filmed scenes from the water, like the people who were kiteboarding. A friend of mine helped me become part of this film. She ran into director Eric Steel and said, “Why don’t you have Peter to

McCANDLESS continues on page 14

Cinematographer Peter McCandless (left) films director Eric Paul Fournier (center) interviewing a bartender for Bartender, a documentary. PHOTO: Fornier Films

The Big Picture

BY MAX BLUE

Pier 24, located on the Embarcadero, is offering visitors the opportunity to see more of its collection than ever before. Exhibitions at the prominent photography museum typically revolve around one or two artists or a strong curatorial theme. Looking Back: Ten Years of Pier 24 Photography , through December 31, tosses these limitations in favor of a retrospective that plumbs photography’s rich history while celebrating the museum’s first decade of exhibitions and acquisitions.

The museum’s 28,000-square-foot exhibition space has been subdivided into seventeen small galleries. Six revolve around broad themes and aesthetic trends in photography; 11 focus on just one or two artists. Looking Back serves as a history of Pier 24, founded in 2010 by philanthropists Andrew and Mary Pilara, and an accounting of photography, spanning centuries and styles. The 400-plus works on view – roughly ten percent of the institution’s collection – are a combination of fan-favorites and pieces debuting at

the museum for the first time.

The largest gallery, About Face , focuses on portrait photography, from celebrities to the unhoused, including one of the best pieces debuting at the museum: Richard Avedon’s 1957 portrait of a wistful Marilyn Monroe. The adjoining gallery contains hundreds of 20th Century criminal mugshots from around the world. While itself a neat exploration of one historical application of photography, the juxtaposition with the formal portraits illustrates that having a camera pointed at you, for any reason, makes you special, a standout among the masses.

The exhibition – like history –reflects a dialogue between the macro and micro; the individual and the global. Edward Burtynsky’s Manufacturing

#10ab, Cankun Factory, Xiamen City, China, 2015, featuring prominently in the Industry and Labor gallery, best encompasses this theme. The picture shows hundreds of factory workers on an assembly line. Their identical yellow uniforms belie the personality discernable in their faces: quantity doesn’t reduce the innate value of the individual experience.

The gallery titled The City that Never Sleeps, features photos of New York by Diane Arbus, Lee Friedlander, and Garry Winogrand. Most are titled simply New York, a stylistic convention that emphasizes the monotonous and impersonal experience of city life and photography itself, even when made up of close looks and stolen glances at the deeply personal. Winogrand’s New York, 1962, is an image of a couple riding with a monkey in their convertible; Arbus’s Child with a toy hand grenade in Central Park, 1962, shows precisely

what the title states, the young boy’s face warped in a maniacal grimace.

“There are things nobody would see unless I photographed them,” Arbus once said.

That’s not unique to Arbus. Photos wouldn’t exist without the photographer’s discernment. But the experience of seeing so many photographs in one place also brings to mind how many more moments go unseen Looking Back prompts us to apply to our daily lives – increasingly image-saturated, thanks to the smartphone – the same deliberation with which we view art.

Because photography shows us how things are – or were, at one moment in time – Looking Back is as much a history of humanity as it is a history of an artistic medium. The volume of images in the exhibit matches the multiplicity of human experience. We all move within

Hiroshi Sugimoto, The Last Supper: Acts of God, 1999/2012 (installation view). PHOTO: Courtesy Pier 24 Photography

PIER 24 continues on page 14

COMMUNITY | OCTOBER

10/2 Saturday

Art: Don Soker Contemporary Art 50th Anniversary Reception

Don Soker Contemporary Art was founded in 1971 by Don and Carol Kaseman Soker as the Upstairs Gallery in a Victorian flat in North Beach.

Working with the Kyoto-based art venue Gallery Coco and later directly with artists, early shows focused on contemporary Japanese conceptual art, little known in the United States at the time. Survey Exhibition Opening Reception: 2 to 5 p.m. Carriage House Annex, 1217B Fell Street. Japanese Art 1970-1980s + Beyond: Sundays 12 to 4 p.m. and by appointment. 2180 Bryant Street, Suite 205. For more information: donsoker@yahoo. com or 415.291.0966.

10/8 Friday and 10/9 Saturday

Art: Recology Artist in Residence Exhibition Minoosh Zomorodinia uses sculpture, video, and the performances of daily life to explore how the dynamics of power play out in urban spaces and nature. Sculptural assemblages and stop motion videos explore discarded elements from everyday surroundings, asking us to consider the weight of our collective consumer excesses and the possibilities for new life in overlooked things. Friday 4:30 to 7:30 p.m. Saturday 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Reservations required (work will be viewable in 30-minute time slots). Free. The John A. Legnitto Environmental Center, 401 Tunnel Avenue. For more information: https://bit.ly/3CXlULn

10/10 Sunday

Music: Jennifer Bryce Singer of jazz, soul, and beyond (and health coach), Jennifer Bryce performs at an outdoor gathering. 4 p.m. Donation $20+ 711 Carolina Street. For more information: https:// bit.ly/3F0N31x

10/11 Monday and 10/12 Tuesday

Film: Born in Chicago at the Mill Valley Film Festival White blues prodigies in the 1960s learn from their Black heroes and bring the music’s spirit to the next generation of fans. Featuring explosive live performance footage and a who’s-who of blues legends, the film is a loving tribute to a distinctly American art form. Writer/producer of Born in Chicago, Joel Selvin, is a Potrero Hill resident. $8 to $16.50. Monday, 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, 4 p.m. For more information: https://bit. ly/3kKPXPS

10/15 Friday

Film: Dear Homeland

Dear Homeland tells the story of Bay Area-based singer-songwriter Diana Gameros as she finds her voice as an artist and fights to define home for herself as an undocumented immigrant. Told in part through Diana’s hauntingly beautiful music, the film follows her nearly 20-year journey from Ciudad Juárez, Mexico to San Francisco, California, where she asserts herself as a musician, an immigrant seeking citizenship and an advocate for immigrant rights. 7 p.m. In-person ($15.00) or livestream (free). KQED Headquarters, 2601 Mariposa Street. For more information and to purchase tickets: https://bit.ly/3F0Akfy

10/16 Saturday

10/18 Monday

Theater: Monday Night Playground

Monday Night Playground invites emerging professional playwrights to submit original ten-page plays on the topic of Rebirth. Select plays, presented as socially-distant online staged readings, feature Bay Area directors and actors. Admission is free; donations gratefully accepted. Advanced reservation required. 7 p.m. Live at Freight & Salvage, 2020 Addison Street, Berkeley, and simulcast. For more information: https://bit.ly/3ANQHtg

10/23 Saturday and 10/24 Sunday

Art: Shipyard Open Studios

Explore the historic bayside home of the country’s largest artist community. Connect with more than one hundred art makers in their studios. Ample free parking with easy access to six Shipyard buildings. Food vendors and musical entertainment. Free. 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. 451 Galvez Street. 19 or 15 bus. For more information: https://bit.ly/3ug98o3

Community: Potrero Hill Festival Stretching over four blocks with live music, food, and fun, the Potrero Hill Festival benefits the Potrero Hill Neighborhood House. 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Free. 20th Street between Wisconsin and Missouri streets. For more information: https://bit.ly/3zNg9h5

10/30 Saturday

Halloween: Minneslowta Spooky Stroll

Start Halloween early, hang out with neighbors, show off your costumes and stroll the slow street. 4 p.m. to dusk. Minnesota Street, between 19th and 22nd streets.

10/31 Sunday

Halloween: Halloween on the Hill

Celebrate a family friendly Halloween on the Hill. Enjoy music, street performers, and the Insect Discovery Lab. Amazon will distribute gift bags loaded with candy and gift certificates to use at local businesses. Free. 5:30 to 9 p.m. 18th Street between Connecticut and Texas.

Lion, Dragon, Domo, and Snake. Oil on canvas. See Carolyn Crampton at the Shipyard Open Studios this month. PHOTO: Courtesy of Carolyn Crampton

Two Giant Sequoias, Merced Grove, Yosemite 2018. See Monica Denevan (photographer) at the Shipyard Open Studios this month. PHOTO: Courtesy of Monica Denevan

The steps to success are:

1)

care and be safe.

2) Rely on my experience on the Hill, and my connections with agents and buyers. 3) Put my team to work cleaning out and sprucing up your property. 4) Price carefully and correctly.

5)

Own a Piece of Dune History

BY REBEKAH MOAN

Fans of Frank Herbert’s Dune have a chance to own a piece of the novel’s history: the stucco house where most of the seminal science fiction novel was written. After 35 years, owners Gayle Keck and R. Paul Herman are selling 412 Mississippi Street.

Herman is in the sustainable investment space and an author of business books. Keck is a food and tourism writer; she won a 2008 Lowell Thomas Award for her travel story, “Pirates of the Mediterranean.” They plan on moving to Illinois to pursue business opportunities.

“One of the things we hope is that someone will buy the house with an appreciation for its history, and for Dune ,” Keck said. “For sci-fi fans, there’s a lot of history here.”

In the Frank Herbert biography, Dreamer of Dune, Brian Herbert noted that his father wrote most of the novel at a rolltop desk in 412 Mississippi Street’s dining room in the early 1960s.

“There’s a big skylight in the dining room and I can totally picture Frank writing there because it’s really light-filled,” Keck said. “It’s an inspiring space. There’s a good creative feeling here; that may be the house or it may be who’s lived in it. We hope we’ve added a layer of creative vibe to it ourselves.”

Sci-fi legends like Robert Heinlein, author of numerous books, including Stranger in a Strange Land, visited the house when the Herberts lived there, according to Dreamer of Dune

“We hope the house will go to someone who really appreciates that,” Keck said.

“Most people are at least appreciators of art,” Herman added. “Some people are creators of art; they’re not professionals but they’re still creators. Maybe they produce for their own benefit but someone who is creative, that would be my feeling about who would enjoy living here. That’s certainly been my experience.”

The two-bedroom, one-bath residence is listed at $1.6 million.

“I hope people will come and look at the house even if they have no interest in buying it because it’s a chance to walk through it and get a feel and appreciation of where Frank Herbert wrote the book,” Keck said. “He wove so many elements of philosophy and his broad knowledge into the book itself. The fact people are discussing it decades later and finding new things to interpret says a lot about the book. I’m looking forward to the new movie and I hope it’s not a stinker like the last one was.”

Dune: Part 1 is slated to be released on October 22. Directed by Denis Villeneuve, its cast includes Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya, and Jason Momoa.

“We’ll miss everything,” Keck said, about Potrero Hill. “The sunny weather, the convenience to the airport, the friendly people, the neighborhood shops and restaurants where we know the names of the staff. It’s a nice,

DUNE continues on next page

DUNE from previous page

friendly neighborhood.”

Herman added, “We have gone to almost every Potrero Hill appreciation night and always learn something about the community. A lot of people are making the world better through their creativity or expertise. That’s the feeling for most of us in San Francisco. We can envision a world we want to live in and what we can do about it.”

sion against Native Americans and Blacks perpetrated by the U.S. Army and state militias.

Deckenbach said FoJP will consult with Native Tribes as part of the retitling process. “We will await their suggestions on the name change,” said Deckenbach.

FoJP envisions creating a survey to solicit reactions to renaming proposals.

“I feel that this process should 100 percent be conducted by and for the people that live in the Jackson Park community,” District 10 Supervisor Shamann Walton said. “I will be here to support the process every step of the way, but this is a community decision.”

“Regardless of what is ultimately considered, we have an opportunity to give the park a name with a connection to the site,” said J.R. Eppler, Potrero Boosters president.

Early conversations about possible designations have centered on local Native Tribes, including place names for villages that once occupied the area. Dr. Jonathan Cordero, founder and executive director of the Association of Ramaytush Ohlone, a group that represents indigenous people of the San Francisco peninsula, said that local Native peoples should be consulted about possible tribal names.

“We would have to discuss this more internally, but I gather we would rather not use our ancestral village names for a park,” said Cordero.

Sharaya Souza, American Indian Cultural District executive director, said the Native community would like to develop a relationship with FoJP and collaborate with it before taking a position on a name change.

“We are honored FoJP is pursuing a name change. We would like to make sure that American Indian initiatives are done with American Indian people and not for American Indian people,” said Souza.

In 2017, Rec and Park opened In Chan Kaajal Park, located at 3100 17th Street, the name for which is a nod to Mayan heritage and culture. In Chan Kaajal means “little village.” The designation is meant to recognize the growing Mayan community that came from the Yucatan peninsula and settled in the Mission. The commons had been called “17th & Folsom Street Park.” The San Francisco Rec and Park Commission renamed it in 2016 after going through the agency’s name change procedure.

The process for renaming City recreation and park facilities is outlined in a 1981 San Francisco Rec and Park Commission resolution.

According to Aparton, Rec and Park’s role is to ensure there’s extensive public outreach before a name change proposal reaches the Rec and Park Commission, and to guarantee “that the process is fair, equitable, and takes

the practical requirements into consideration, things like existing plaques, historical references.”

Under the Commission’s renaming policy an individual or organization making a renaming proposal must fully justify it to Rec and Park, submitting information about dates of community meetings and evidence they were held, such as agendas, meeting minutes, or videos.

“It includes letters of support, neighborhood surveys, and petitions with a minimum of 100 signatures. Both quantity and quality matter. We want to see that the community has been both informed of a name change proposal and had a chance to weigh in on the matter,” said Aparton.

Aparton said anyone from the “impacted community” can propose a new name. “We typically guide them through the outreach process, work with them to address any questions that come up and can amplify their efforts. Rec and Park approves the list of proposed names, and the Commission has final approval on the name change of the facility,” said Aparton.

Aparton said it’s up to the renaming advocate to conduct outreach to stakeholders, “whether they be residents, local businesses, or Native American communities with ties to the land.”

There can be competing renaming proposals, though Aparton couldn’t recall rival name change proposals by separate groups that were successful. She said renaming the Presidio Wall Playground, originally Julius Kahn, in 2019, involved three choices, “Presidio Wall,” “West Pacific,” and the “Rhonda Goldman Playground.”

Aparton said parties advocating a name change must submit a letter to the Commission which contains a detailed summary of the service or support the honoree contributed to the City or community. The precis usually includes factual data and a petition with enough signatures to indicate substantial support for the proposal. It must also contain endorsements from a cross-section of stakeholders, including recognized community leaders.

a handful of billionaires with their necessary entourages. Not to any place untouched by garbage or the exhaust of a million cars or without water saturated with tiny plastic pellets, or that’s free of disease or biting insects.

Perhaps we can just stay where we are. For many, even the non-wealthy, and setting aside this season of sickness, things are just fine. A visit to any supermarket ice cream aisle reveals a king’s ransom of flavorful choices, with snack corridors stuffed with salty treats. Water still flows out of taps at the right temperature on demand; toilets whisk away our wastes. Abundance, sanitation, and better health care have collaborated to raise global life expectancy by six years from 2000 to 2019. Children are at the lowest risk of dying young ever, with worldwide mortality for those less than five dropping from 93 deaths per 1,000 births in 1990 to 38 in 2019.

Polish and German Jews were similarly thriving during the first third of the 20th Century. Until they weren’t. World gross domestic product per capita fell by more than four percent between 2019 and 2020, after steadily

increasing the previous five years. In the United States, life expectancy peaked at just under 79-years in 2014 and has declined since. Heat spikes, fires, pandemics, persistent racism, extreme inequality. Bumps in the road, or a forever reality?

As we journey, we could just shut the window shades, and stare at screens showing imaginary places more pleasing than our own. Those swaying in the standing room only car hanging on tight, whispering “excuse me” to neighbors as the rocky road causes them to elbow one another. The privileged, reclining on designer pillows in the first-class cabin, binge-watching dramas featuring mass violence in the standing room only car.

If eyes are portals to the soul perhaps our souls have been damaged by too much streaming.

Along the way we argue. About whose news source is superior, which celebrity is best suited to lead us, what deserves to be cancelled, elevated, modified, mummified. We shout at one other in languages that share the same alphabet but nothing else. Or, most viscously, we’re stone silent, staring past our neighbor’s shoulder as if they do not exist.

We didn’t choose our destination, but we did create it. We changed the world. Not like we changed a channel or changed clothes. There was little

overt purpose or intent. A million baby hands reached for the good life. We drove our gas guzzling Chevy to the levy, which had been pumped dry decades ago to grow pistachios. It’s no one’s fault, except all of us, or mine, or yours. Definitely yours.

Wait, what? We changed the world! We can change the world. We built the train and the tracks it’s on. We decide if it’s fueled by steam, coal, electricity; whether we travel by car, bicycle, scooter, or legs. When a novel disease emerged, we devised vaccinations and delivered them into the arms of more than five billion people worldwide in less than two years, even while some balked at the jab. We can get off the train, stay on, change the route, retire the engine and repurpose its parts. Not everyone has to come along.

It’s hard not to doggedly debate who is responsible for where we are, for the good and the bad, the enslaved and those without homes. We need to find a way to do that, though, to forgive, if just temporarily, one another for sins committed and omitted. The things that happened earlier, or even right now, we can’t change. We can’t offer anyone a better past. We can alter the future, though. That’s within our power.

Time to pull the shades up, and decide where we’re going.

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Green Benefit District

Work Party October 9. The GBD board has approved neighbor requests for a volunteer work party at the Progress Park Dog Run, Iowa St near 25th St, on Saturday, October 9, from 10:00 to noon. We will be spreading new bark chips and doing light gardening. We ask that volunteers show proof of vaccination. To sign up, email us at info@Greenbenefit.org

Starr King Open Space

Please join our monthly volunteer days on the second Saturday of the month from 9:30 a.m. - 12:30 p.m. This month it is October 9th.

Also, feel free to join our monthly meetings which are open to the public, done via zoom for now, the third Monday of the month at 7 p.m. This month it is Monday, October 18th. Check the website for the zoom link.

If you can, please donate to help keep Starr King Open Space open, accessible and well maintained for our neighbors. www.starrkingopenspace.org

Potrero Boosters Neighborhood Association

Be in the know. Meet your neighbors. Make the Potrero a better place. We’re meeting virtually on the last Tuesday of each month at 7pm. Go to www. potreroboosters.org for details.

JACKSON PARK from front page

PUBLISHER’S VIEW from page 2

our stuff on San Francisco dog owners, partly because the City is such a great place for dogs,” said Shattuck. “For years, I used to participate with Mookie, my Rhodesian Ridgeback. This type of event is very much needed. It allows people to come together in a safe way and be less isolated,” said J.P. Morgan , a Missouri Street resident. Maggie Pinzuti’s companion, Blue, a Kelpie miniature pinscher, winner of the 2020 contest, said she’ll return this year. “Last year, he was the Pope. This year, he has a throne to defend,” said Pinzuti, who advises new entrants to get used to wearing a costume earlier than event day. She recommended practicing walking in the middle of the street and choosing sizes a bit small. “Farley’s has been a bright spot when things were pretty dark. Just seeing Amy and Chris’s friendly faces has meant a lot during the pandemic,” said Pinzuti.

Art

San Francisco is joining a handful of other cities that host an Institute of Contemporary Art, ICAs, known for being experimental and without permanent collections. Ali Gass, formerly head of ICA San Jose and the Smart Museum of Art at the University of Chicago, has raised $2.5 million to start the Institute of Contemporary Art San Francisco, located at 901 Minnesota Street, already home to a cluster of studios and galleries. ICA SF will showcase emerging Bay Area artists “who are ready for national and international attention,” Gass said, as

well as exhibit more established artists.

“Starting an institution from scratch allows us to think deeply about contemporary art as a navigation tool for local and global issues,” she said, citing the extreme wealth disparity in San Francisco as one example of an issue that artists could explore. The art collectors Andy and Deborah Rappaport, who founded the  Minnesota Street Project gallery complex in Dogpatch, are ICA SF’s lead funders. In addition to making a million-dollar donation, through the Minnesota Street Project Foundation they’re underwriting a 15year lease for the museum’s building, an 11,000-square-foot space that used to host kids’ birthday parties as My Gym. Other donors include Instagram co-founder Mike Krieger and his wife, Kaitlyn Trigger; Reach Capital partner Wayee Chu and her husband, Ethan Beard; and the Kindred Ventures partner Kanyi Maqubela and his wife, Martha Muña. The museum will be open free to the public by fall of 2022, with a preview of the space in January during the FOG Design+Art Fair.

Union

In September, roughly five months after the election, contested ballots cast by Dandelion Chocolate workers voting whether to unionize under International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 6 were counted by the National Labor Relation Board. The outcome: 20 votes in favor of unionizing, 19 against. The final tally came following claims that several ballots were filled out by ineligible individuals, such as managers.

Lingering hazard in the public right of way on 22nd and Kansas streets.

PHOTO: Jerry Bonafair

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many officers Bayview station should have, “but we are down compared to where we were several years ago.”

According to Maron, when a station loses officers, foot and bike patrols go first – even though those activities are popular with the public – because vehicle patrols are most responsive to an emergency situation.

“When we start losing officers, we have to be sure we have adequate numbers in the sector cars, so we have to pull from the bike beats,” Maron said, noting that SFPD is recruiting, sometimes finding officers “as far out as Chicago and New York.”

Matt Dorsey, SFPD’s director of strategic communications, said that staffing shortages may worsen as officers like Maron – who joined the force during a hiring spree that created the so-called ‘Clinton cohort’ in the mid1990s – retire.

According to a 2020 Matrix Consulting Group report on police staffing, “another 134 officer positions are needed to staff patrol at a level that is able to consistently be able to handle incoming workloads” and reach proactivity goals. At the time the report was issued there were 691 sector patrol officers.

The Reverend Raynard H. Hillis, of the San Francisco African American Faith Based Coalition, takes an expansive view of what it means to foster public safety that goes beyond issues the police can address.

“Like many other cities, some neighborhoods are rougher than others,” said Hillis, Coalition co-chair and pastor at the Double Rock Baptist Church in Bayview. Bayview residents “…don’t consider themselves in a safe environment, and that’s what I consider when it comes to safety. The job market has not improved and whenever there’s an issue of no jobs, no housing, education not meeting the needs of people, you’re going to have an unsafe environment.”

According to Hillis, under his definition public safety in District 10 is worse than it was a year ago, with too little economic investment in the Black community.

Hillis said that law enforcement is necessary but “there’s no community policing. When people started to cry ‘defund the police,’ I think we needed a clearer picture. African American leaders thought reform would be a better slogan than defund because most of us understand we need competent policing. The problem is there’s no community policing. So you ask people, men and women, to serve our

community but they don’t know about us, about our culture.”

Hillis said that police officers should reach out to everyone from pastors to business owners to ask about their blocks and communities. For example, he said, community leaders can tell constables if someone who lives in the neighborhood has a mental issue that may cause them to behave erratically or dangerously.

“Learn about the hot spots,” Hillis said. “Community people can offer to be of help and support before it becomes an issue. I don’t think police will ever be policing our community until they learn our community. Police officers have to make life and death decisions in the blink of an eye. They can’t be getting ideology from TV and other forms of media.”

According to Maron, who is the son of Canadian and Filipina immigrants, “we do community engagement every single day. We’re walking foot beats; we’re really engaging with the community,” adding that officers distribute flyers about such issues as proper behavior in traffic and stopping burglaries. Maron holds a public video meeting the first Tuesday of each month.

Hillis believes that police should not be asked to deal with “mental health issues” that aren’t in their competence.

According to Maron, the Street Crisis Response Team, an initiative launched last year, is responsible for responding to a nonviolent person having a mental health crisis on the street. Street crisis response teams are dispatched in response to 911 calls that don’t require a police presence.

In spite of the officer shortage, Mayor London Breed and District 10 Supervisor Shamann Walton have made good on their promise to divert police funding to the Black community. Earlier this year, Breed announced a plan to redirect $120 million over the next two years. The largest portion of that this year — $15 million — was spent on community health and wellness initiatives.

“I agree completely,” Hillis said. “I still have a problem with certain equipment the police are spending so much money on. It’s not like we’re in the Vietnam War. Do I have hope it’s gotten better? No. Do I hope it will? I do.”

film it?”” said McCandless.

Other projects came from another lucky break. In 2003, a friend told him

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that a group of Tibetan nuns would be visiting the Bay Area.

“She asked if I would come help videotape the nuns chanting at a recording studio. I said “yes.” I went there and met director Rosemary Rawcliffe for the first time. She had been called to interview the nuns,” said McCandless.

Rawcliffe, founder of Berkeley nonprofit production company, Frame of Mind Films, has made several documentaries about Tibetan women. McCandless has served as her cinematographer for the past 18 years, working on Women of Tibet: A Quiet Revolution (2006), Women of Tibet: Gyalyum Chemo - The Great Mother (2006), and Women of Tibet: The Buddha’s Wife (in post-production).

“Rosemary is familiar with Tibetan Buddhism and extremely tenacious. We work together well. She’s taught me a great deal about playing it by ear. We’ve shot films together in the Bay Area and northern India,” said McCandless.

McCandless said working with light in remote locations, such as the Dalai Lama’s private residence in Dharamsala, India was exciting.

“You have to collaborate with the light until it’s right. On one side of the residence, the prayer wheels are illuminated at sunset. On the other side, they’re lit up in the early morning. I scouted out the location to watch how the light changes over the course of the day. This makes it apparent what side is best to film on at different points during the day,” said McCandless.

McCandless said unpredictable conditions, like passing clouds blocking light during interviews, have taught him to control illumination whenever possible.

“Another thing I learned while filming with Rosemary is to admire the people we film. People in the Tibetan Buddhist community are amazingly compassionate and cooperative. They’ve taught me you can endure and press on,” said McCandless.

The COVID-19 pandemic stopped many productions in which McCandless was involved.

“I haven’t worked on any cinematography since the pandemic started. This summer, I took a cross-country trip from San Francisco to Maine. I shot landscapes along backroads that paralleled I-80 and I-90,” said McCandless.

McCandless plans to film an epi-

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logue for On Civil Wrongs and Rights with Fournier.

“This additional footage will put the Korematsu case in context. It also addresses the case’s ongoing relevancy to constitutional concerns today, including the holding of undocumented immigrants. In addition, we’re remastering the original film On Civil Wrongs and Rights for a 4K UHD release. We’re editing footage from a multi-part documentary film about race in America, from Obama to Trump. It started with Peter and I following Barack Obama on the campaign trail in 1997 and 1998. Peter will film the final interviews for this movie,” said Fournier.

McCandless encouraged beginning filmmakers to work with creative colleagues like Fournier, who have “a like mind. You want people who are enthusiastic. Don’t worry about how the film will start, just begin. It will evolve.”

McCandless added that filmmakers today are fortunate that modern cameras and gear are relatively inexpensive.

“When I was younger, you couldn’t make a film on your own. You had to rent gear, take film to a lab to get it developed, and take the finished footage to an editorial house, where you worked with an editor,” said McCandless.

McCandless advised filmmakers to appreciate mystery.

“We attended a session His Holiness the Dalai Lama had with three Tibetan oracles. In the session, they went into a trance. It’s said that they were a conduit for spiritual energy. After the session, he came out and said goodbye to the crew. Then he said, “A little bit mysterious, don’t you think?” That was profound. All of life is a little bit mysterious, don’t you think?” said McCandless.

PIER 24 from page 7

the flow of history, but often lose sight of the present. Looking Back inspires us to engage with the abundantly diverse world around us as we would with a photograph. Each picture was, after all, someone else’s present.

Pier 24 is open free by-appointment Monday through Friday. A companion exhibit, Looking Forward , slated for early 2022, will focus on recent works and newer acquisitions.

McCANDLESS from page 6

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