HOMEY is returning to the Mission!
After spending years tucked away in the upstairs space of a building in SoMa, the originally Mission-based nonprofit Homies Organizing the Mission to Empower Youth is set to move into a Mission Street storefront.
“Were coming back home,” said Executive Director Roberto Elegio Alfaro.
He said the group, known as HOMEY, was told it would need to leave its current space by March 2018, and has been looking for a new space for about a year. HOMEY leaders have been in conversations with the Mission Economic Development Agency about getting a more permanent space at 16th and Folsom streets, where MEDA is developing a below-market-rate housing building.
But MEDA recently acquired 2221 Mission Street, near 18th Street, through the city’s Small Sites Program. The commercial space was most recently home to furniture store The Touch, which closed in December. That gave HOMEY the chance to make an earlier move. The group will now be on Mission Street for about three years, and anticipates moving in by November or December.
The move also marks HOMEY’s first time operating in a storefront. The organization will take full advantage of that — it’s planning to sell clothing items from the space while also running its nonprofit programs, Alfaro said. –LW
Brava’s new commercial front
On Sunday, Brava officials opened their doors for a sneak preview of its newly renovated storefront spaces. They look spectacular and offer room for an art cabaret, offices for Brava and other neighborhood nonprofits, and new dressing rooms. –LC
Building tries to shake off its gambling-den past
Details are sparse so far, but someone has applied to change 2949 Mission St., formerly the Fizzary — and, later, a gambling and prostitution den that proved surprisingly difficult to root out — into a restaurant.
The application has been accepted by the planning department but not processed or decided on. Because it’s a change of use, especially one from retail to restaurant — a typically sensitive kind of conversion — it could face a tricky hearing. —LW
Korean restaurant “Foxsister” has opened on 24th Street
We wrote about this new tenant at the recently closed Montella Pizza, which will be serving Korean drinking snacks and a variety of cocktails and Asian beers. The new menu will reportedly include spicy fried chicken, noodles, pancakes and hotpots. –LW
Mayor to honor local institutions
The Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts, Precita Eyes Mural Arts Center, Casa Bonampak and La Santaneca will be among a group recognized by city leaders at a Latino Heritage Month event next week.
An awards ceremony will take place Monday, Sept. 25 from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. in the North Light Court and Rotunda at City Hall. –LW
Activist bus posters
You may have seen a series of posters with a strong anti-eviction message at your bus stops: The San Francisco Anti-Displacement Coalition has produced the series of advertisements as part of National Renters’ Week of Action.
The posters feature some very local figures and talking points: people like artist Rene Yañez, and issues like reforming owner-move-in evictions and the Ellis Act.
They’ve been rolled out in English, Spanish, Chinese, Tagalog, Russian and Vietnamese. The Anti-Displacement Coalition and the Mayor’s Office of Housing and Community Development commissioned five local artists for the images: Kayan Cheung Miaw, Patrick Piazza, Fernando Martí, Sydney Cain and fourth and fifth grade students at Guadalupe Elementary school in the Excelsior.
For more on the campaign, visit sfadc.org. Images courtesy SFADC –LW
