Letter from Raquel R. Redondiez, SOMA Pilipinas Director

Dear Community:

Our first SOMA Pilipinas Cultural Heritage Housing and Economic Sustainability Strategy (CHHESS) report outlines our community struggles and strategies to preserve our home and cultural heritage in the highly gentrified South of Market neighborhood of San Francisco - the technology and finance capital of the world. These strategies were crafted during the unprecedented COVID-19 pandemic, which compounded the precarious conditions for families, seniors, artists, small businesses, and cultural institutions in SOMA Pilipinas.

The year 2020 was one of many trials and great losses not just for Filipinos but for many people, especially immigrant working class and BIPOC communities. It is a year we will never forget, with heightened political struggles and uprisings amidst the fight for survival against the pandemic, economic crisis, and violence of white supremacy and institutionalized racism.

As we emerge from all the challenges of  2020, we are ever so grateful for the spirit of bayanihan and kapwa that has guided us in developing strategies through the praxis of resistance and resilience. We want to thank all the community members who contributed their lived experiences, analysis, insight, and foresight to develop these strategies.

San Francisco served as the launching pad for the Philippine-American War and was the City of broken dreams for thousands of first-wave Filipino Manongs who were pushed out of Manilatown. SOMA was the neighborhood where hundreds of Filipino WWII Veterans and generations of Filipino migrants landed, who faced the shattered promises of America. Our CHHESS report aims to address 120 years of forced migration, national oppression, dispossession, displacement, and racial discrimination targeted towards Filipinos. We offer it in honor of those who came before us and for generations ahead of us. We offer it in solidarity with all other people whose land, labor, and lives have been stolen, who have been historically denied equitable resources, and social and economic justice, racial equity, and reparations. 

We stand on the shoulders of our ancestors and generations of community activists and unsung s/heroes who laid the foundation for our cultural district. We are excited to be part of the recovery of our City, a recovery that must be based on racial equity and economic opportunity, and sustainability for all, especially marginalized communities. As we re-emerge from the pandemic, we are also determined to re-create our public realm with new monuments and cultural markers that honor our ancestors, history, contributions, and collective legacy.  

In community and solidarity, 

Raquel R. Redondiez
Director, SOMA Pilipinas

 

SOMA Pilipinas Mission

Cultural Celebration: To increase the visibility and celebrate the contributions of the Filipino community in SOMA, San Francisco,  California and the Diaspora, and to sustain our cultural institutions and events,  and develop and expand our cultural arts, assets, and place-making.

Community Development: To prevent the displacement of Filipino residents,  protect our historic and cultural assets, help develop and sustain our legacy institutions and  anchor community organizations,  and to improve the living conditions of the community.

Economic and Racial Justice: To develop economic, housing, and workforce opportunities for the Filipino community to thrive and to support our people’s struggle for dignity, equity, and rightful recognition.

 

History & Cultural Legacy

SOMA Pilipinas, San Francisco's Filipino Cultural Heritage District, is home to a network of community-serving organizations, cultural institutions and landmarks, multi-generational residents, workers, artists, and activists that represent the rich cultural history and perseverance of the Filipino community. SOMA Pilipinas’ formal recognition is a result of decades of organizing and community advocacy and the resilience and collective power of the Filipino community in the face of urban change, political struggle, dispossession, and disinvestment.

The establishment of cultural districts is a critical epoch in San Francisco’s history and was formed to sustain and protect San Francisco’s cultural strongholds in direct response to intensified displacement and gentrification. The importance of cultural districts such as SOMA Pilipinas representing immigrant communities should also be seen in the current struggle to challenge the old national narrative of the United States that is based on white supremacy and institutionalized racism. These challenging and critical times of polarization and heightened political struggle call for a new national narrative that brings to the fore the true history of the peoples of the U.S., one that weaves a communal identity that consciously and sincerely incorporates an understanding of our national origins, local histories, and cultural traditions and heritage. Hence, SOMA Pilipinas can contribute to and be an integral part of a new American narrative.

SOMA Pilipinas continues to evolve as a concept of a community based on a shared history, cultural identity, and neighborhood that has served as a gateway and cultural heritage home for Filipinos in the Bay Area. SOMA Pilipinas provides a deeper understanding of our roots and heritage by connecting our current generation of Filipinos to our people’s historical and collective experience in America and the Philippines, including the colonial past of the Philippines as a former colony and neo-colony of the United States.

Though SOMA Pilipinas was only formally recognized in 2016, the Filipino community’s presence in San Francisco spans over 120 years and is inextricably tied to the larger historical legacy of San Francisco as well as the complex colonial and imperialist legacy between the Philippines and the United States (U.S.), which continues to this day. In 1888, Jose Rizal, the revered Philippine nationalist and leader of the movement against Spanish colonialism in the Philippines, sailed towards the U.S. and first set foot in San Francisco. He stayed at the luxurious Palace Hotel, which is positioned at the intersection of New Montgomery and Market Streets and currently lies within the present-day district boundaries of SOMA Pilipinas. Though San Francisco was just one stop on his travels around the world, Rizal observed the city’s conditions and was struck by the pervasive anti-Asian racism. Today, a small plaque on the exterior of the Palace Hotel commemorates Rizal’s stay at the hotel in May 1888, serving as both a reminder of the revolutionary history of the Filipino people and an inspiration to the community that is now carrying the torch.

However, all other historical and Philippine-related monuments in San Francisco are war trophies of the American invasion and occupation of the Philippines. In 1898, shortly after Rizal’s visit and following the defeat of Spain in the Spanish-American War, the U.S. waged a brutal war against the Filipino people in the Philippine-American War in 1899-1902, with hundreds of thousands of Filipinos (up to 1 million), including women and children above the age of 10, targeted and killed during the war. In 1902, U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt claimed victory. He declared an end to the war, and in the same year, a 95-foot tall statue was erected in San Francisco’s Union Square to honor Admiral George Dewey’s victory over Spain at Manila Bay in 1898, serving as a symbol of conquest and the beginning of the United State’s rise as an imperial power, including its domination over the Philippines, its first colony.

Today, the Dewey Monument is still the preeminent stature towering over visitors in Union Square, the tourist center in the City, and serves to represent the bloody exploitative colonial history between the U.S. and Philippines that continues to this day. Statues representing racist and colonial pasts are being removed all around the world in response to the growing Black Lives Matter movement. The removal of monuments that glorify colonial and imperialist legacies is an important step towards correcting false historical narratives— and withdrawing the Dewey Monument from the public realm is long overdue. With nine cultural districts established representing historically marginalized communities, San Francisco can lead the way in erecting historically accurate and community empowering representations of those who have contributed to the rich history and culture of this city, including the Filipino community.  

The South of Market (SOMA) has historically been an industrial and blue-collar neighborhood, layered with the history of different waves of working-class immigrants and laborers. The establishment of the Filipino community was part of a larger movement of immigration that took place in the 1900s and continued in successive waves throughout the twentieth century. In 1920, California was home to roughly 2,700 Filipino residents. By 1930, more than 30,000 Filipinos were in the United States, and 74% resided in California. It was during this large-scale wave of immigration that the Filipino community started to set down deeper roots in San Francisco. San Francisco’s first Filipino enclave, Manilatown, began to form along Kearny Street, bordering the edge of Chinatown. At one point during this decade, the number of Filipino immigrants in San Francisco totaled to 10,000 individuals. During this time, multiple Filipino social organizations were founded, including the Gran Oriente Filipino Masonic fraternity— the first mutual aid association formed by Filipino immigrants in the United States in 1920. The Gran Oriente fraternity further contributed to Filipino community development in San Francisco by pooling their resources to purchase a building in South Park in 1921 to serve as a community space and housing for Filipino seasonal laborers in the Bay Area. Today, this building remains one of the Filipino community’s important historic assets.

From the 1920s through the 1960s, Filipinos in the Bay Area and across the country experienced institutional and systemic racism, including anti-Filipino sentiment, violence, and  anti-Filipino legislation. Filipinos also faced severe labor exploitation at a time of major change in the global and national political landscapes that prompted immigration policy changes, wartime demand, and the economic expansion of the Bay Area. In response, Filipinos found ways to engage and confront these challenges. They created their own social support organizations to survive and cultivate bayanihan, described as the spirit of “unselfish cooperation” and “providing mutual aid,” in a hostile and foreign land through providing spaces of community and belonging. They participated in labor struggles, organizing with other farmworkers to demand better working conditions, and led strikes which set the stage for the historic labor movements of the 1960s. With the population of Filipino immigrants steadily increasing after World War II, they created direct service organizations to meet the needs of veterans and newcomers, including employment support, legal services, education services, youth and senior-focused programs, nutrition and food services, and housing, such as Westbay Pilipino Multi-service Center. 

As a result of the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act, the SOMA quickly became one of the main gateways for Filipino immigrants moving to the United States. With family reunification, and the influx of families and children, and an increasing Filipino population, educational services also began to expand during this time period. While many Filipino youths attended Bessie Carmichael, founded in 1954, there was an identified need to provide educational support to non-English speaking children. As a result, the Filipino Education Center (FEC) opened in 1972 in the SOMA, with the assistance of the San Francisco Unified School District and the State of California. 

For Filipinos who remained in or moved to the original enclaves of Manilatown, the Fillmore, and the SOMA, changes in national and local policy posed direct challenges to their stability. Policies including urban redevelopment and the expansion of San Francisco’s Downtown and Financial District after WWII which focused on profit-centered urban growth, occuring during the rapid rise and expansion of global capitalism, began to displace Filipino residents and erase long-standing Filipino enclaves, most notably the eradication of Manilatown, once home to a bustling Filipino community. Though the fall of the International Hotel in 1977 marked the end of Manilatown, it sparked the beginning of San Francisco’s contemporary housing movement, serving as a formative and activating experience for many Filipinos and the multi-racial coalition of activists who would then become engaged in future struggles against market forces and the use and purpose of urban space.

The SOMA soon became the center of gravity for Filipinos, and the community began to express their presence in the built environment and urban spaces in which they inhabited. In the SOMA, organizations in the community partnered together to build housing for low-income seniors including the Dimasalang House, renamed streets after important figures in the fight for Philippine liberation and sovereignty against foreign powers such as Rizal, Lapu-Lapu, Bonifacio, and Tandang Sora, installed a seven-story public mural titled “Lipi Ni Lapu Lapu” along these same streets, and began hosting cultural events and festivals. The Filipino community continued to help push for neighborhood improvements towards building a community where children, youth, families, and seniors could live.

In the 1990s, the dot-com boom brought novel challenges for the Filipino community in the SOMA. The rise of evictions through the Ellis Act, illegal conversions of industrial property to office use, the explosion of live-work lofts, loss of good-paying jobs for working-class residents, threat of displacement of both residents and businesses to make way for market-rate development, all made it imperative for the community to organize. Given the erasure of Manilatown just decades prior, the community understood the urgency to claim space. During the dot-com era, the community organized to protect important cultural assets and further develop the community. They fought to rebuild Bessie Carmichael and preserved the Filipino Education Center - the first elementary school in the nation to offer Filipino bilingual education. They created Victoria Manalo Draves Park, a two-acre park named after a Filipino-American Olympian and SOMA resident. And they protected anchor businesses and institutions like Arkipelago Bookstore and Bindlestiff Studio— the first Filipino bookstore and the only Filipino-American arts theater in the United States, respectively. 

During this time, the South of Market also became home to hundreds of Filipino World War II veterans. The Veterans Equity Center Task Force formed, providing services and advocating for the rights and benefits of Filipino veterans. Veterans Equity Center opened its doors to the public in 1999, providing housing application assistance, counseling, legal referral services, and case management. San Francisco became the headquarters for the fight for full Equity for Filipino WWII Veterans who were not recognized for their services during WWII due to the Rescission Act. This political struggle for the right to recognition from the U.S. government brought together the whole community and many student activists in a powerful campaign for racial equity and recognition. The South of Market also became home to newly arrived family members petitioned by the Filipino WWII Veterans.

 ³ Allan W. Austin and Huping Ling. Asian American History and Culture: An Encyclopedia (2010). Page 262.

 

Impetus for Establishing a District

Despite many victories due to community organizing and political activism, current crises continue to put the Filipino community in the South of Market in a precarious position, once again facing the threat of erasure. The struggle for official recognition and the formal establishment of SOMA Pilipinas is part of our fight against displacement and for economic and racial justice, community development, visibility, recognition, and cultural preservation.

The current gentrification and displacement crisis is historically linked to the pattern of market-driven growth that has shaped planning and development in San Francisco. The first and second technology booms have brought in enormous amounts of capital and created countless new millionaires. This process of wealth generation, like that of the past, has been to the direct detriment of low-income, immigrant, working-class communities and communities of color in San Francisco. The first tech (or “dot com”) boom, 1995-2000 and crashing soon after, saw mass evictions, especially in the Mission, and the rapid transformation of the South of Market where the boom in San Francisco was centered.

The second tech boom has been much longer-lasting than the first. Beginning in 2010, technology companies began to settle again and grow in San Francisco and the Bay Area. San Francisco City government played a critical role in ushering in and supporting the tech boom, passing plans and policies that attract technology corporations, often at the direct expense of low-income residents, working-class neighborhoods, and existing communities. The infamous Twitter Tax Break is one example of this, as is the more recently passed Central SOMA Plan, which explicitly sought to continue the expansion of high rise office uses in the South of Market, specifically for tech. The persistent drum of never-ending market-rate housing development has also been a core feature of the tech economy, with the constant unfulfilled promise that the wealth will eventually trickle down.

The second tech boom has been accompanied by another wave of evictions, displacement, and gentrification that persist to this day. Mirroring the overt plans of the past to create a richer and whiter San Francisco during Urban Renewal, the city has steadily lost low-income and working-class residents and had a net out-migration of black and Latino residents from 2006-2015 as wealthier residents came into the city., 

SOMA Pilipinas is a community in action and a cultural movement that resists the profit-driven transformation of the South of Market. We are advancing a model of self-determination and community development that puts the needs, experiences, and realities of low-income Filipino seniors, families, and workers at the center.

These realities have been immensely compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic that is disproportionately impacting communities already suffering from the violence of gentrification and displacement. The South of Market shoulders a higher burden of COVID-19 cases (along with other Eastern neighborhoods) compared to the rest of the city. COVID-19, however, simply emphasizes existing inequities and brings them more clearly to the surface for those to see who are less aware. The existing economic and social issues of housing instability, landlord harassment, low wages, food insecurity, health insecurity, lack of childcare, and many more that plague our community are intensified.

⁴ San Francisco Planning and Urban Renewal Association (SPUR). Prologue to Action (1966).
⁵ San Francisco Planning Department. San Francisco Housing Needs and Trends Report (2018). Pages 29-32; 50.
⁶ DataSF. Maps of COVID-19 Cumulative Cases Map. https://data.sfgov.org/stories/s/Map-of-Cumulative-Cases/adm5-wq8i#cumulative-cases-map. Accessed June 30, 2021.

 

CHHESS Community Engagement Process and Methodologies

During the year-long CHHESS outreach, feedback, and input process, we held 12 focus groups relating to areas covered in the report, conducted over 20 interviews, collected over 40 surveys specifically aimed at seniors and unhoused Filipino residents, and held a community presentation on CHHESS strategies.

SOMA Pilipinas Conducted:
12 focus groups across various issue areas
20 expert interviews
20 surveys of unhoused Filipinos (in language)
20 surveys of seniors on SOMA cultural life (in language)
Including over 100 individual participants

The focus groups covered: 

  • Filipino Heritage and Historic Preservation 

  • Tenant Protections and Affordability 

  • Land Use and Community Stabilization 

  • Small businesses 

  • Visibility, Public Art and Urban Design 

  • Language Access and Cultural Competency 

  • Arts Sustainability: Artists and Arts Organizations

Through this process, we were able to gain a range of input and feedback from residents, workers, community members, stakeholders, and a wide range of community-based organizations and small businesses. This work built upon the existing 2016 SOMA Pilipinas Progress Report, which outlined core goals and strategies for various policy areas for the cultural district, and included the creation of an updated 2020 Status Report that followed up on and expanded on the work of the Progress Report and worked to help inform the CHHESS process.

 

SOMA Pilipinas CHHESS STRATEGIES

Cultural Preservation: Preserving Filipino Arts, History, Heritage and Culture

Goals Statement: As the City’s Filipino Cultural Heritage District, we must continue to uplift and pass down Filipino history, heritage, and arts and culture, and create channels for learning and documenting the community’s history and contributions locally, regionally, and nationally. Our history is especially pertinent to impart to youth and future generations, as they carry forward the community’s history and legacy into the future. The City must invest in one of the primary missions of the cultural district — to preserve, celebrate, and cultivate the Filipino community’s unique history, cultural heritage, and identity.

Strategy 1

Develop and Support SOMA Pilipinas Filipino Cultural Heritage District Archive and Living Legacy

Support the development and staffing of an archive (both digital and physical) that is accessible to the public that collects and contains research, data, images, documents, arts, and cultural contributions, and other materials relevant to the rich history of Filipinos in SOMA, the City, and the region (Filipino WWII Veterans, housing struggles, and flagship cultural activities).

Along with archiving efforts, the City to help promote and support active production and creation of new cultural contributions of the current community, including publications, exhibits, ethno-tours, films, and oral histories of Filipino experiences in San Francisco, particularly through multi-generational projects that meaningfully engage youth and older adults to allow the community to create their own collective history and contribute to the living legacy of SOMA Pilipinas, as well as promote the cultural district as a destination that not only holds a rich history as an established enclave but is also actively shaping modern culture and history.

Strategy 2

Expand Access to Filipino Arts Education & Programs Teaching Filipino Languages, History, and Culture

Promote and support the expansion of linguistic and cultural programming and creative exploration in partnership with community-based organizations, artists, seniors and community historians, and educators/educational institutions (i.e., CCSF, SFSU, SFUSD) that would be open and accessible to all people and generations interested in learning, teaching, promoting, and sustaining Filipino arts, history, culture, and Filipino languages. 

Arts Education includes performing, visual, media, literary arts with a specific focus on Filipino cultural elements and integrating various arts disciplines into academic core subjects (history, math, science, social studies, and language arts).

Strategy 3

Expand and Strengthen Programs that Empower, Serve, and Address the Health of Filipino Children and Youth

Increase funding and support for programs that support and empower Filipino children and youth to learn their history, language, and culture and to be active in their community and City and address barriers like mental health, language access, and economic disparities.

Tenant Protections: Anti-Displacement, Tenant Stabilization, and Housing Readiness

Goals Statement: Anti-displacement is one of the core missions of the cultural district, as the first and second technology booms have caused massive displacement in the Filipino community. We must focus on strategies that preserve existing housing, stabilize residents in place, and increase access to affordable housing. We must identify buildings with a high proportion of Filipino residents at risk of displacement and protect them. We must build capacity and provide funding for a community and SOMA-based organization to do residential acquisition and management. There is also a need to increase housing readiness and access of Filipino residents to new affordable housing. Filipino families and seniors continue to live in overcrowded and substandard housing conditions and continue to pay a large proportion of their income on rent. At the same time, there continue to be barriers for this population in accessing and successfully getting into affordable housing opportunities, and the COVID-19 pandemic has increased the number of unhoused Filipinos.

Protect and Stabilize Buildings that Contain a High Proportion of Filipino Tenants and Stabilize Existing Filipino Residents

As an anti-displacement and eviction prevention strategy— identify and stabilize buildings with a high proportion of Filipino residents. Evaluate each building to determine what strategy for stabilization would be most effective. As the value of land and buildings increases, we must prevent further displacement and stop the rapid decline of the Filipino population in the neighborhood and city-wide. Strategies should include evaluating the use of historic land-marking for buildings with a long history and cultural significance for the Filipino community and directing funds (including affordable housing fees from Central SOMA) towards residential site acquisition. 

Pursue strategies that have worked in this area as well as new strategies such as an Anti-Displacement Fund and/or the use of the Accelerator Fund to support the stabilization of Filipino residents and buildings. Effective strategies include site acquisition and rent subsidies for those at risk of eviction or displacement, experiencing exorbitant rents, experiencing increases and jumps in rent due to the existing Small Sites acquisition program, etc.

Strategy 4

Build Capacity and Filipino Cultural Competence to Support Residential Acquisition and Rehabilitation in SOMA

Build capacity, including identifying funding, for a South of Market based organization to acquire and manage existing residential properties in the South of Market, mainly focusing on the population of Filipino renters that are at-risk of displacement.

Strategy 5

Increase Language and Culturally Competent Housing Readiness Support for Filipinos to get into Affordable, Below Market Rate (BMR), and Supportive Housing

There must be increased support provided, including identifying funding sources and a better understanding of what institutional and cultural barriers exist and how to address access issues (including data and analysis) for affordable, BMR, and supportive housing. 

Strengthen outreach to homeless individuals and families that are “doubled up” living with family or friends and families living in SROs, increase outreach to unhoused encampments with Filipino social workers, and build more multi-generational housing and affordable senior housing. Ensure neighborhood preference for South of Market residents and those displaced.

COVID-19 has increased housing instability and has caused a visible increase in the number of Filipino unhoused residents. There must be increased outreach to the unhoused Filipino population and direct connection and placement into supportive housing.

Strategy 6

Arts and Culture: Arts Sustainability, Public Art, and Urban Design

Goals Statement: As a major cultural hub for the Filipino American community in the region, the SOMA Pilipinas Filipino Cultural Heritage District is home to many cultural institutions and assets, arts and cultural organizations, artists, and long term culturally-relevant public art pieces. There must be greater promotion and investments to support the sustainability of artists, arts and cultural organizations, and arts-related businesses integral to the City’s cultural fabric and economy. As the South of Market continues to go through immense changes with the recent passage of the Central SOMA Plan, the City must eliminate institutional and systemic barriers to community-led public art projects. It should instead proactively incorporate the Filipino community’s unique, culturally relevant, and community-vetted design concepts and public art elements in new developments, public art, and the built environment to delineate SOMA Pilipinas’ boundaries, expressing the community’s cultural heritage. As a state-designated cultural district with the largest Filipino population in the nation, investment in Filipino cultural and visual arts in SOMA Pilipinas will contribute to the unique cultural diversity and offerings that help make San Francisco the most visited city in the world.

Strengthen and Stabilize the Capacity of Filipino Arts and Cultural Organizations and Individual Artists

Given that most funding to the arts is project-based, there is a great need to increase funding, resources, and City support to artists and arts and cultural organizations in the areas of general operating, programming, evaluation, and technology needs, working with key partners in creating new art, offering arts programming, and helping to preserve and promote Filipino arts and culture for a thriving cultural district. City to help promote public awareness of cultural district activities.

Strategy 7

Develop a SOMA Pilipinas Arts Master Plan

Work in partnership with the SF Arts Commission (SFAC) in developing a SOMA Pilipinas Arts Master Plan which would articulate a district-wide vision for art in the City’s SOMA neighborhood with a specific focus on the Filipino community’s long history in the SOMA and San Francisco, and identifying and prioritizing locations for art opportunities, and developing outlines for the selection process of art projects (e.g., murals, plaques, monuments, etc.). Also, encourage private developments to direct all or a portion of the required 1% art fee (for applicable projects) to the SF Arts Commission Public Art Trust towards administration, creation, and maintenance of public realm, wayfinding, art, and related public art projects within the Filipino Cultural Heritage District.

Strategy 8

Create SOMA Pilipinas Special Area Design Guidelines and Create a SOMA Pilipinas Public Realm Design Toolkit

Work with the City’s Planning Department in developing and approving, through a community-based process, SOMA Pilipinas Special Area Design Guidelines that would work in concert with the City’s Urban Design Guidelines to ensure that the site design, architecture, and public realm components of private development projects contribute to and reflect the unique culture of the Filipino community.

Create a SOMA Pilipinas Public Realm Design Toolkit that would provide city departments such as DPW, SFMTA, and the Planning Department with community-vetted design and public realm elements and concepts for incorporation into public projects in the cultural district. As they would be designed to comply with the SOMA Pilipinas Special Areas Design Guidelines and vetted with the Planning Department, they should also be provided to applicants for inclusion in private development projects and incorporated into the review of projects by the Planning Commission.

Strategy 9

City support for Cultural District Public Realm Improvement, Maintenance, and Neighborhood Cleaning and Beautification

Dedicate funding for street signs, monuments such as gateways and other cultural markers, way-finding, institutional signage, and other public realm improvements to delineate SOMA Pilipinas boundaries and express cultural heritage, as well as direct visitors and residents to cultural assets. Align placemaking initiatives to City plans for renovations and identify businesses and cultural assets to be highlighted. Increase investment in street cleanliness, beautification, and public safety, including traffic calming techniques to improve the district’s livability. Align with CBDs in SOMA and other neighborhood-based groups to advocate for equity in City services, especially for street cleaning and sanitation, and develop community-based strategies to ensure public safety.

Strategy 10

Development of Cultural Conservator

Dedicate funding for maintaining and preserving historic buildings, murals, plaques, and landmarks in SOMA Pilipinas through a cultural conservator or public art trust to lead these efforts. Work with SFAC and City Departments to replace monuments representing colonial and racist histories with more historically accurate and community-empowering representations and/or develop alternative signage to correct misrepresentations. City to work with the community to inventory War Memorial Philippine War artifacts.

Strategy 11

Economic and Workforce Development: Small Businesses and Family-Sustaining Jobs

Goals Statement: San Francisco’s position as a global city and economic center has produced specific challenges for the Filipino community and other working-class communities city-wide but particularly in the South of Market neighborhood, which is in immediate proximity to the City’s Financial District. While San Francisco is host to many public and private sector jobs, the Filipino community, especially immigrants, faces barriers in moving from entry-level and low-wage positions into living wage and family-sustaining jobs. The City must partner with the community to create better opportunities for living-wage employment opportunities, including for non-profit and community-based workers, and create pathways to enter into family-sustaining jobs in the public and private sectors through internships, on-the-job training, and targeted outreach and pathways.  

Small businesses in SOMA Pilipinas also face major barriers to sustaining their businesses due to high rent costs, limited or inaccessible financing, and loan opportunities, and lack of general and technical assistance and infrastructure support. COVID-19 has only compounded these issues. Small businesses in the cultural district are in a precarious state, with many businesses having no choice but to shut down operations during the pandemic. Moving forward, the City must prioritize the needs of small and neighborhood-serving businesses to stabilize the district’s economy, sustain small businesses’ longevity as economic and cultural anchors, and set businesses up to thrive. The City must invest in developing a commercial corridor in SOMA Pilipinas, similar to other cultural districts, which would help anchor small businesses, produce sustained economic activity, and attract residents and visitors to the cultural district.

Strengthen Non-Profits Ability to Sustain Community Workers

Community-based organizations provide essential services critical to the well-being of community members and the City. There must be equity in these organizations’ wages compared to City employees and contracts regarding COLA for non-profits providing essential services. Without adequate funding to ensure competitive compensation, living wages, healthcare, and benefits, it becomes harder to maintain and sustain community workers.

Strategy 12

Further Development of Mission Street as a Commercial Corridor for the Cultural District

Defined commercial corridors can help support the cultural, social, and economic life of communities, create synergy between small businesses and the community, and serve as visible anchors for the cultural district. A commercial corridor of businesses along Mission Street in SOMA Pilipinas is essential to attract visitors to sustain small businesses and help maintain the cultural district as an economic and cultural hub regionally. This requires support to identify City-owned properties that can be utilized as pop-up or long-term tenancies, technical support to businesses, investment in signage and way-finding to increase visibility, and City grants and fee waivers to neighborhood-serving businesses. Several City-owned properties, including 967 Mission Street (Kapwa Gardens), 863 Mission Street (Republika), and The San Francisco Mint and Mint Plaza in SOMA Pilipinas, are underutilized and could be activated as cultural anchors along the corridor.

Strategy 13

Support the development of a Mutual-Aid and Mentorship-Based Merchant Association to Support the Stabilization and Attraction of Filipino Businesses

The development of a merchant association that can provide culturally competent mentorship, education, coaching, technical and financing assistance, and referrals to a spectrum of professional services can contribute significantly to the stability and longevity of businesses and provide a base of support for new, existing, and legacy businesses in the community. This support can include a City liaison to work with the merchant association and Filipino businesses to navigate city resources and permitting issues and use of the City’s Legacy Business program to recognize long-term businesses.

Strategy 14

Strategic Planning to Create Filipino Access to Family-Sustaining Jobs in Public and Private Sectors: Addressing income inequality is the key to keeping the cultural district viable and keeping residents in a position to remain in the cultural district. The City and cultural district must partner to identify the current representation of Filipinos in City departments, where they are concentrated, and at what level; identify barriers and design programs to support access to key sectors including healthcare, public sector opportunities, tech, trades, and union jobs; create pathways and pipelines to careers that can sustain families and are in demand by community-serving nonprofits, local businesses, City government, and other key sectors; and fund specific workforce and technical training.

Strategy 15

Land Use: Community Development and Stabilization

Goals Statement: Land use in the South of Market has traditionally benefited developers, corporations, and real estate interests. This has led to the gentrification and displacement of long-standing working-class communities. Instead, land use must be used as a tool to protect and enhance the health and environment of the communities that have contributed significantly to the history and culture of the neighborhood. The community must lead this process, with support from the Planning Department, especially in light of Planning Commission Resolution No. 20738 (Centering Planning on Racial and Social Equity) and the emerging emphasis on Racial and Social Equity efforts from the Planning Department, the Historic Preservation Committee, and other entities, to acknowledge systemic harm, racial segregation, poverty, and environmental injustice imposed upon San Francisco’s marginalized communities and communities of color for decades through inequitable planning policies. 

At the same time, we must actively work to stabilize community-based organizations that have to compete with a profit-driven model of land use and development that has put non-profit organizations that serve the community at a huge disadvantage.

Establish a Working Group to Examine, Strengthen, and Expand the Youth and Family Special Use District

Establish a working group composed primarily of South of Market community members, including residents, workers, youth, community planners, Planning Department Staff, and the District 6 legislative office. The working group will provide recommendations to the City for changes to the Youth and Family Special Use District so that it can more effectively protect and enhance the health and environment of children, youth, families, and seniors by addressing needs such as affordable housing, jobs, small businesses, open space, pedestrian safety, and livability.

Strategy 16

Increase Community-Based Ownership, Use, Stewardship, and Control of Buildings and Space, Including Utilization of Publicly Owned Buildings and Space, and Increase Community Serving Uses of Land

Non-profit services and cultural organizations in the South of Market need stability and security to continue to serve the community without the constant threat of displacement. This includes small businesses and arts organizations, including the need for a performing arts space that would allow cultural groups and artists to scale up production. 

The scarce amount of developable land in the South of Market must be prioritized for community-serving uses such as affordable housing and affordable commercial space. 

This can be achieved through the acquisition of existing space, acquisition of land, land banking, dedication of land, new development, incorporation in new developments’ projects, use, stewardship, and control of underutilized public buildings/space, and incorporation in new publicly-funded developments and projects.

Strategy 17

Ensure That the Historic and Ongoing Displacement of the Filipino Community Are Part of the Discourse in Developing Planning’s Racial and Social Equity Plan Initiative Including in the Phase II Action Plan: To develop a more comprehensive race and social equity action plan, we must ensure that community-centered planning and development, addressing the historical racism, discrimination, and displacement faced by the Filipino community, and preventing the further displacement of the immigrant and working-class Filipino population be included as part of the development of the Planning Department’s Race and Social Equity Initiative and Action Plan and incorporated directly into Phase II of the process.

Strategy 18

Cultural Competency: Language Access and Culturally Competent Services

Goals Statement: Community-based organizations, service providers, artists, and arts and cultural organizations have contributed to the City’s rich cultural fabric and have served the Filipino community for decades. However, the Filipino community still faces many barriers to accessing resources, and many organizations and cultural assets need support to sustain their ability and capacity to serve and address the specific needs of the community in the face of ongoing challenges. Major challenges, including the displacement of Filipino residents in the South of Market, continues to be an ongoing problem that deserves immediate and concrete solutions. As the community continues to struggle to stay, it is imperative that SOMA Pilipinas, in partnership with the City, invests in the existing Filipino community in the neighborhood and city-wide and set up infrastructure to support Filipino immigrants and newcomers. The City must take steps to invest in the sustainability of community-serving organizations and cultural assets, and cultivate cultural competency to preserve and uplift cultural identity, strengthen language services to ensure equitable access to City materials, and address the unique needs and cultural values of the Filipino community.

“Barangay Center”

Support from the City to identify possible ADA compliant locations along key corridors in the South of Market for a co-location services hub that acts as a one-stop-shop for multi-generational Filipino residents, immigrants, and newcomers that offers a range of services within the cultural district and provides linguistic capacity for its clients, as well as enlist the participation of seniors as integral to the center’s operations. This co-location model fosters increased access to and participation in services and leverages established relationships between nonprofits and residents, allowing nonprofits to make direct referrals to other community resources. As part of this process, explore the need for a separate senior center/dedicated space for seniors with wrap-around services to foster healthy aging in place and a separate wellness center for low-barrier access to clinical and culturally competent mental health services.

Strategy 19

Strengthen and Expand Language Access for Filipino residents

Enforce and strengthen the Language Access Ordinance to ensure accurate and equitable delivery of information to Filipino residents by (1) Creating a pipeline and database of credentialed Filipino translators that can provide accurate and consistent translation support and standardization of the language at the municipal level, including creating a structure to certify translators and interpreters; (2) Implementing recommendations in the Language Access Report by Dr. Valerie Francisco-Menchavez; (3) Supporting the establishment of K-12 access to Filipino language to immerse students in the Filipino language and provide relevant historical and cultural education; and (4) Pursuing formal partnerships (including internships) with students and professionals with language abilities in social service and related fields and institutions (i.e. social work, mental health, public health, urban planning, etc.) to place in community-based organizations or City departments to enhance access to services and information.

Strategy 20

Invest in the Sustainability of Filipino Community-Based Organizations

Support the operations, capacity-building, programming, and sustainability of Filipino-serving community organizations to increase capacity to serve residents and to strengthen and expand the district’s cultural life and activities. Ensure racial equity in funding and provide added resources to sustain staff with language capacities, particularly funding support for the service providers that provide language translation services (as added work) for clients without compensation, as well as for Trauma-Informed Systems and other training. City to work with community groups on data collection, disaggregating data, and timely analysis to inform policy and programmatic decisions around community stabilization and development.

Strategy 21

Develop a Community Health Report on Filipinos in San Francisco

Assess and generate health data and statistics in a comprehensive report for Filipinos in SOMA and San Francisco (in partnership with community-based organizations/other entities, i.e., SFUSD with existing data and reports), including data and statistics regarding mental health, physical health, homelessness, suicidal ideation for youth, impacts of gentrification and displacement, environmental harm, COVID-19 (impact on Filipino frontline workers and essential workers), funding that addresses community health, disaggregation of data regarding Filipinos from the general Asian population, and to develop recommendations to address report findings.

Strategy 22

 

CHHESS Consultants

Jeantelle Laberinto, CHHESS Lead Consultant | Writer | Researcher
David Woo, CHHESS Land Use Analyst 
Ron Muriera, Arts Consultant

 

Community members and organizations who participated

SOMA Pilipinas would like to thank all of the many community members and stakeholders that were involved and gave input during the CHHESS process of interviews, focus groups, surveys, and community presentations - including the following organizations and small businesses:

Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center (APICC)
Assembly Hall
Bayanihan Equity Center (BEC)
Bill Sorro Housing Program (BiSHoP)
Bindlestiff Studio
Canon Kip Senior Center
Eskabo Daan Filipino Martial Arts
Filipino American Arts Exposition (FAAE)
Filipino Arts and Cinema, International (FACINE)
Filipino-American Development Foundation (FADF)
Filipino Community Center (FCC)
Filipino Education Center Galing Bata
Filipina Women’s Network (FWN)
Hinabi Project
JT Restaurant
Kalayaan SF
Kearny Street Workshop (KSW)
Kulintang Arts (Kularts)
Kultivate Labs
Mabuhay Health Center
Make it Mariko
Malaya Botanicals
Manilatown Heritage Foundation/I-Hotel
Mestiza
Mirage Medicinal
Parangal Dance Company
[people. power. media]
Pilipino Senior Resource Center (PSRC)
Pin@y Educational Partnerships (PEP)
Pinoy Heritage
San Francisco Filipino Cultural Center (SFFCC)
SF Urban Film Fest (SFUFF)
SOMA Community Collaborative (SCC)
South of Market Community Action Network (SOMCAN)
The Living Room
The Sarap Shop
Undiscovered SF
United Architects of the Philippines California Chapter #116 
United Playaz (UP)
West Bay Pilipino Multi-Service Center
Yoü by Hü

 

Contact Information

Raquel Redondiez, Director | raquel@somapilipinas.org

David Woo, Land Use Analyst | david@somapilipinas.org

General Information | info@somapilipinas.org