Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Cultural Heritage topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
San Francisco Heritage urges city actions and a legacy-business registry to protect cultural assets
Summary
San Francisco Heritage presented a report urging incentive-based programs to preserve cultural-heritage businesses and proposed a legacy business registry (Supervisor Campos' legislation) that would lower age thresholds and offer modest financial incentives and transfer-tax rebates.
San Francisco Heritage presented 'Sustaining San Francisco’s Living History,' a report that catalogs threatened cultural-heritage businesses and recommends incentive-based tools for preserving restaurants, bars, bookstores and other long-standing establishments.
Mike Bueller, executive director of San Francisco Heritage, described case studies from London, Buenos Aires, Paris and local initiatives such as the Community Arts Stabilization Trust. The report recommends a legacy-business registry (draft legislation advanced by Supervisor Campos) that would recognize a broader class of cultural businesses, reduce the age threshold to 30 years for registry eligibility and attach modest incentives, including a potential transfer‑tax rebate to encourage property owners and buyers to keep legacy uses in place.
Desiree Smith, Preservation Project Manager, outlined ongoing local proposals — a Japantown sustainability strategy, proposed social-heritage districts in SoMa for Filipino and LGBTQ resources, and the legacy bars and restaurants program. Bueller said the register would be voluntary and that the registry’s incentives are intended to be layered onto existing city programs (Mills Act, Invest in Neighborhoods, SF Community Investment Fund). He urged the Commission to support incorporation of cultural-heritage policies into the forthcoming preservation element of the General Plan.
Commissioners praised the report’s cases and noted multiple recent local losses (Marcus Books, Estinoche, Lexington Club) while urging staff and supervisors to integrate heritage protections into area plans such as Central SoMa. Bueller said staff and supervisors would receive follow-up work from the Office of Small Business in June to recommend further assistance strategies.
