Christmas came just about a week early for tenants of 3235 16th St., a five-unit apartment building two blocks from Dolores Park: The San Francisco Community Land Trust officially acquired their building last week, retaining rent-controlled units and dissipating tenants\u2019 fears of displacement.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s really a relief, the stability and the security. Over the years we always thought \u2018What if somebody sells our building?\u2019\u201d said Alana Herron, a high school teacher in the Excelsior who has lived in the building for 24 years. \u201cThis really means a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n
About a dozen tenants live in the building, and many have for decades. Conversations between the San Francisco Community Land Trust<\/a>, which buys mid-sized buildings and has 17 in its portfolio<\/a>, and the prior owner, Deborah V. Vanpatten, started this summer. The discussions began after the owner notified the nonprofit that the building would be sold.\u00a0<\/p>\n Under the city\u2019s Community Opportunity to Purchase Act<\/a>, owners of buildings with three or more residential units, or land that can accommodate such numbers, are required to inform qualified nonprofits<\/a> of their intentions to sell. That guarantees the organizations the right of first refusal on the properties.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThis has been a lot of work, and it\u2019s been great to see it culminate in knowing that these long-term residents will be able to stay in their home,\u201d said Kyle Smeallie, the policy director for the land trust.\u00a0<\/p>\n The building, which dates to 1905, has five residential units and one ground-floor commercial space, the home of Barnets Salon<\/a>. Smeallie said the residential tenants worried a new owner could find ways to displace them.<\/p>\n \u201cFor them to have the feeling that they don\u2019t have to worry about that anymore \u2026 that\u2019s a sense of relief that is really palpable,\u201d said Smeallie.<\/p>\n The San Francisco Community Land Trust purchased the building for $1.55 million with loans from the city\u2019s Small Sites Program<\/a>, which helps nonprofits buy smaller buildings for affordable housing, and the Preservation and Seismic Safety Program<\/a>, which has money for the same.<\/p>\n The land trust has been growing and, two years ago, received<\/a> a $20 million gift from MacKenzie Scott, the billionaire ex-wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. It said at the time<\/a> it would use the gift to expand as part of a $60 million capital campaign.<\/p>\n \u201cEveryone feels like this was a really fortunate thing that happened,\u201d said another resident, who has lived in the building for over 30 years. The purchase, she said, gave a sense of relief, particularly for the artists and teachers who live alongside her.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen you talk about preserving teachers and artists we\u2019re kind of a living proof of that,\u201d she said. \u201cThat\u2019s who lives here.\u201d<\/p>\n While there has not been an official celebration yet, Herron said she and her husband took it upon themselves to toast the purchase by going out to dinner.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re really grateful,\u201d said Herron. \u201cIt is really a gift and we know that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Christmas came just about a week early for tenants of 3235 16th St., a five-unit apartment building two…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":108990,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[22459,581,1011,101,103,102,104,106,105],"class_list":{"0":"post-108989","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-francisco","8":"tag-16th-street","9":"tag-guerrero-street","10":"tag-housing","11":"tag-san-francisco","12":"tag-san-francisco-headlines","13":"tag-san-francisco-news","14":"tag-sf","15":"tag-sf-headlines","16":"tag-sf-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108989","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108989"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108989\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108990"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=108989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=108989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}