Last weeks San Francisco Historic Preservation Commission meeting was in a different room so that the electronics could be fixed in Room 400 of City Hall. Four people spoke during Public Comment including a woman from Bernal Heights requesting a nomination for their branch library, currently being rehabilitated. This was followed by a somewhat distressing Staff Report by Tina Tam indicating that there was no budget to continue the Landmarks Work Program. Also reported was the fact that the Parkmerced Draft EIR was due to be published Spring 2010 and that a Planning 101 training would be offered to the members of the Commission.
President Charles Chase then skipped over items to hear a Certificate of Appropriateness for a property in the Bush Street Cottage Row Historic District that had been bumped from the last meeting's calendar. Conditions were added to the approval including waiting for an opinion from the easement holder, San Francisco Architectural Heritage. Interestingly enough, the City Attorney said that conditions could not reference a non-government agency. While that seems obvious, I don't doubt that conditions including SF Heritage have been included in past approvals.
The next item heard was a project in the South End Historic District that had been approved by the Landmarks Preservation Advisory Board last year. The original project had been controversial as the design was a very bold statement with a liberal approach to the Standards. With the advent of new economic conditions the developer went back to the drawing board to make some alterations and presented the revised project to the HPC. The project was approved with design tweak conditions.
Most of the public at the hearing was waiting for the next item which was the Landmark designation of the North Beach Branch Library and Multi-property listing of the Appleton and Wolfard libraries. President Chase was recused to avoid a conflict of interest. Sadly I had to leave half way through the public comment for this item and was not able to hear the outcome of the item nor was I able to share my own comments. Below is what I planned to have said:
I am a preservation architect and my qualifications meet the Secretary of the Interior Standards for historic architecture and architectural history. I am also listed on the State of California Historical Resources Consultants List. In my professional opinion based on the National Register criteria the Appleton & Wolfard libraries and specifically the North Beach branch are individually eligible for local landmark listing. I have to admit I have done some soul searching in regard to this issue and I am embarrassed to say that I remember thinking several years back that the projects including the modern libraries wouldn't matter as much as those with the Carnegies. And it is exactly that type of bias that is one of the many hurdles that the preservation of modern buildings will need to overcome. The preservation of modern is going to be different than that of our earlier building stock both philospohically and technically. The Appleton and Wolfard libraries are eligible for local landmark listing and can hopefully also be turned into a positive platform to start an open discussion of the preservation of modern buildings in San Francisco.
