Committee endorses reappointments to Historic Preservation Commission, urges attention to representation

The Rules Committee on March 1 recommended reappointment of Chris Foley and Diana Matsuda and forwarded a new nomination to the Historic Preservation Commission to the full Board of Supervisors.

Supervisors praised the nominees’ qualifications and community perspectives. Chris Foley described his focus on people, culture and legacy business preservation and suggested using QR codes to share site histories. Diana Matsuda highlighted inclusive preservation work, oral histories and the racial and social equity initiative that allows broader consideration of underrepresented areas and cultural assets. Richard Nagaswaran, the nominee for an architect seat, summarized roughly 25 years of experience and said he meets the Secretary of the Interior's professional qualifications for historic architecture.

Vice Chair Rafael Mandelmann noted the mayor had not reappointed Commissioner Aaron Hyland and said that reduced LGBT representation on the commission; he urged the mayor and supervisors to consider filling remaining seats to preserve queer history leadership. Committee members agreed to amend the three files to remove the word "rejecting" and change the action to "approve," then voted to forward the items as committee reports to the full Board.

The committee cited Charter Amendment Proposition J (2008) as governing seat qualifications for the Historic Preservation Commission. The full Board will consider the nominations at its upcoming meeting.