Skip to main content

To: San Francisco City and Community Leaders

Support the SF Good Neighbor Policy

Adopt the SF Good Neighbor Policy; a code of conduct that guides interactions and engagement with the Black, Latinx, and native SF community. Help us preserve our city's culture.

Why is this important?

SF Black Wallstreet was formed in June 2020 by seven Black SF natives amid the COVD-19 pandemic and the global Black Lives Matter movement against police brutality. We are committed to securing business, cultural space, and homeownership for Black San Franciscans.

This summer, SFBW and members of our community rallied around Cafe Envy -- one of the few Black-owned restaurants in the Bayview corridor to remain open during COVID-19 restrictions-- in response to excessive nuisance and compliance complaints being filed by a neighbor. Cafe Envy, located at 1701 Yosemite Avenue within the African American Arts and Culture District -- has been a site for Black locals to gather and socialize for more than 40 years. Thanks to city and community partnerships, Cafe Envy continues to be a welcoming space for Black people to legally and safely eat, drink, and celebrate our culture during the pandemic.

Despite the value Cafe Envy brings to our community as a whole, one neighbor continues to terrorize our community by weaponizing his privilege, filing complaints against Cafe Envy, bullying, and intimidating the restaurant staff, patrons, and other neighbors. This week, those complaints materialized into a written petition and an organized effort to shut Cafe Envy down permanently. Fortunately, Cafe Envy remains open for business with all legal permits and staffing in place, but it is now under heightened surveillance and subjected to over-policing.

White transplant residents using anti-black bullying tactics to intimidate long-term Black, Latinx, and marginalized residents by weaponizing complaints and code violations is a National issue. The underlying motive of these complaints is to shut down our businesses, over-police our spaces, and erase our culture in an attempt to make us feel unwelcome in our own neighborhoods. We can no longer allow the discomfort, fears, and expectations of privileged SF transplants to disrespect our community, regulate our community activities, or strip away our cultural identity.

SF Black Wallstreet and community stakeholders are calling on city and community leaders to adopt an SF Good Neighbor Policy, a code of conduct that guides respectful engagement with the Black, Latinx, and native SF community. The Good Neighbor Policy would also penalize 311 callers for using the line to file unsubstantiated and malicious reports. The “Good Neighbor Policy” will be crafted by a coalition of Black, Latinx, and SF natives who organize and advocate on behalf of their respective communities.

Black San Franciscans, like all other communities in San Francisco, are entitled to spaces where we are welcomed, celebrated, and appreciated.

Sign our petition to support Cafe Envy and encourage city officials to close the loophole on 311 complaints and enact a Good Neighbor Policy to guide respectful engagement with our Black, Latinx, and native SF community!

Links

Updates

2020-11-27 21:32:07 -0500

500 signatures reached

2020-11-17 00:30:38 -0500

100 signatures reached

2020-11-16 21:50:21 -0500

50 signatures reached

2020-11-16 20:50:51 -0500

25 signatures reached

2020-11-16 18:19:28 -0500

10 signatures reached