1095 Market Street
San Francisco, California 94103
www.shapingsf.org/grant_bldg
grantbldg@yahoo.com
|
|
|
<<=Go to Shaping San Francisco
After six long months of organized resistance to eviction and dogged pursuit of negotiations, the Grant Building Tenants Association has achieved its goals: no evictions, affordable rents, and multiyear leases. New leases were signed Friday, March 16.
See GBTA attorney Randy Shaw's analysis of the struggle and its problematic coverage in the local and national media. See also the GBTA's open letter to nonprofit organizations interested in renting space in the Grant Building. The GBTA is now working closely with the South of Market Anti-Displacement coalition (SOMAD) and the Redevelopment Agency to gain affordable housing, offices for community nonprofit organizations, and arts space in the Mid-Market area.
The GBTA was aided by the City-wide antidisplacement movement, housing activists, independent members of the Board of Supervisors, the Mayor, and people prominent in San Francisco culture. In particular, the GBTA formed alliances with tenants of the Mint Mall and the Redstone Building as well as with SOMAD and the Mission Antidisplacement Coalition (MAC). Supervisor Chris Daly's support was crucial to the GBTA's success in negotiations.
Over the months, the association developed a savvy strategy that blended grassroots organizing, City Hall lobbying, and media contacts, while relying on expert legal advice from Randy Shaw, of the Tenderloin Housing Project. We owe much to all who helped us. We will be there when they need us.
The building owner, Seligman Western Enterprises, eventually recognized that the tenants were, in fact, valued by the City in ways that the out-of-state developer had trouble understanding. In the end, Seligman apparently came to realize that the GBTA was an asset that refused to go away.
The artists, writers, nonprofit organizations, and small businesses who work in the Grant Building have reclaimed a small part of San Francisco. We stood up for our right to the City, and we stood together in our claim that urban space is a public resource, no matter who owns it. But we know that one building is not enough. The City still must find solutions to gentrification and displacement.
The GBTA wishes to extend thanks to all who helped over the months, especially Randy Shaw and his colleagues at the Tenderloin Housing Clinic, Supervisor Chris Daly (Dist. 6), the South of Market Antidisplacement Coalition, the Mission Antidisplacement Coalition, the Mint Mall tenants, the Redstone Building tenants, friends in Art & Revolution and Story Road, the Samsara Singers, the Political Ecology Group, supporters at City Lights Books and School of the Arts, and our favorite librarians at the San Francisco Public Library. We look forward to working with all of them and more on finding ways to reclaim San Francisco. Special thanks to all the supervisors who worked for us.
On March 8, Grant Building tenants staged an enthusiastic, festive rally to protest their landlord's attempt to evict them. See the call to the demonstration and the photos.
In a brisk breeze, a colorful group of more than two hundred protestors chanted, sang, and listened to speeches by GBTA members, representatives from the Mint Mall and the Redstone Building, students from School of the Arts, and Supervisor Matt Gonzalez. Flags, banners, and signs aloft, demonstrators marched down Market St. to show their strength of purpose in developing Mid-Market for the people of San Francisco.
The first poet laureate of San Francisco, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, released a statement to support the Grant Building tenants and to urge the people to reclaim their City from the real estate speculators.
Resisting Eviction and Gentrification
The Grant Building Tenants Association formed in September 2000 to resist Seligman Western Enterprise's attempts to force the current tenants out by imposing exorbitant rent increases--and to resist the owner's threats of eviction. Our location on the corner of Market St. and Seventh St. has enabled a unique culture to flourish in the building--our resistance to an outside developer is only one manifestation of the spirit that has made the Grant Building so important to the Mid-Market area and the whole City.
In the words of Mayor Willie Brown (Nov, 1, 2000), "The Grant Building has, for several decades, housed a wide variety of community-serving nonprofit organizations as well as small businesses. [They] are the backbone of San Francisco." Supervisor Chris Daly declared (Feb. 21, 2001) that "We cannot stand by while the cultural fabric of San Francisco is torn apart by unjust evictions.... For too long, the voices the everyday people have been silenced by the sounds of excessive profit, and today that changes."
What Does the GBTA Want? || Who
Works in the Grant Building? || Who Owns the
Grant Building?
Hollow Out Market? || The Shark Who Ate the Grant Building
History of the Grant Building || Mike Mosher's Grant Building Murals
GBTA Welcomes Nonprofits to the Grant Bldg. (May 24, 2001)
GBTA Thanks Supervisors (Mar. 27, 2001)
Photos of the GBTA Rally Against Eviction
"Lawrence Ferlinghetti Decries Latest Wave of Gentrification" (Mar. 8, 2001)
GBTA Press Release (Mar. 8, 2001) - "Grant Bldg. Tenants Rally Against Evictions"
GBTA Fights Eviction (Mar. 8, 2001)
Sup. Chris Daly Supports Grant Bldg. Tenants (Feb. 21, 2001)
Seligman Threatens Eviction III (Feb. 20, 2001)
Seligman Threatens Eviction II (Dec. 28, 2000)
GBTA Letter to Seligman (Nov. 28, 2000)
Seligman Threatens Eviction I (Nov. 15, 2000)
Mayor Willie Brown Supports Grant Bldg. Tenants (Nov. 1, 2000)
GBTA Letter to Mayor Brown (Oct. 18, 2000)
GBTA Letter to Seligman (Oct. 18, 2000)
GBTA Letter to Seligman (Sept. 22, 2000)
GBTA Internal Newsletters (Sept.-Jan.)
MEDIAFile (May/June 2001): Tenant Activists Win Market Street Building, Media Yawns
San Francisco Chronicle (Mar. 17, 2001): Historic Grant Building Keeping Its Nonprofits
San Francisco Bay Guardian (Feb, 28, 2001): Grant Building Tenants Rally Against Eviction
San Jose Mercury (Feb. 22, 2001): More Eviction Threats Prompt a Call to Arms
San Francisco Examiner (Feb. 22, 2001): Evictions Hit Artists, Nonprofits
San Francisco Chronicle (Nov. 26, 2000): Grant Building Renovations Force Eviction of Nonprofits
San Francisco Chronicle (Nov. 23, 2000): Letter to the Editor
San Francisco Chronicle (Oct. 27, 2000): Move to Shield S.F. Nonprofit Organizations
San Francisco Chronicle (Oct. 26, 2000): Rent Increases Threaten to Kill S.F. Nonprofits 2 Ballot Measures Tackle Problem
Updated June 8, 2001