San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Santa Rosa’s party problem leads to limit of some rentals
On a given day, the basketball courts outside Oakland Chinatown’s Lincoln Recreation Center are full of people of all ages improving their jump shots. Next to them might be a group of mostly Chinese American elders slowly moving their arms as part of tai chi practice.
The building itself, however, has been closed to most community events since the start of the pandemic — leaving seniors, in particular, unable to enjoy activities like ballroom dancing and table tennis at what many say had been the busiest rec center in all of Oakland.
In the coming years, however, it may get new life. Plans are afoot to tear down and rebuild the aging center, which sits in the heart of Chinatown — and not just to accommodate more people but also to make it a safe haven for seniors and other users as climate change threatens even the urban way of life.
“We really wanted it to be a
Volunteer Larry Hoktchu (right) helps a child at a fishing game during Lincoln Summer Nights at Lincoln Square Park in Oakland in July.
Tiffany Eng, co-founder of Friends of Lincoln Square Park
One by one, Bay Area cities and counties have been moving to limit the number of shortterm rentals that have stirred complaints about everything from noisy parties to housing shortages.
The latest to do so was Santa Rosa, whose City Council voted 5-2 Tuesday to allow no more than 198 non-hosted vacation rentals, meaning rentals without a local host living at the property. The new limit is meant to curb the most troublesome short-term rentals — properties with no one neighbors can turn to for help with problematic visitors.
People who live near the rentals “feel like they’re in a living hell,” said Council Member Victoria Fleming, who supported the cap and wanted the city to consider an all-out ban on short-term rentals outside commercial districts. “Nobody should have to live next door to a perpetual party zone.”
“During the pandemic and the smoke, it became very clear that what we had was really not adequate.”
state-of-the-art Swiss army knife for the community,” said Tiffany Eng, co-founder of Friends of Lincoln Square Park. “Especially during the pandemic and the smoke, it became very clear that what we had was really not adequate.”
Plans for upgrading the center, which was built in 1978, have been under discussion in the community for well over a decade. The roof leaks, and the building is too small for the many groups that want to use it; an estimated 2,000 people used the park and rec center daily before the pandemic. Now, while the outdoor park area remains heavily used, the building is only open to children’s programs due to pandemic restrictions — though it’s possible indoor senior activities will resume this fall, according to the center’s director, Gilbert Gong.
A complete tear-down and rebuild of the Lincoln Recreation Center would cost around $32 million. The hope is that the new building would be an all-around expanded, two-story structure complete with environmentally friendly credentials — solar panels and battery storage with plenty of capacity for refrigerated food as well as other community needs.
The goal is not only to save energy and water — it’s to serve as a hub for the community during climate disasters such as power outages, wildfires and heavy smoke days.
“We have more smoke days where people need clear air, we have ongoing power outages … where people need reliable access to electricity, whether for really critical needs like homebased medical equipment or just daily needs like charging your cell phone,” said the City of Oakland’s Sustainability and Resilience Director, Daniel Hamilton.
The idea of such hubs, known as resiliency hubs, is gaining traction. Both the City of Richmond and Berkeley also have plans in the works to create hubs, and Oakland is planning hubs at the 81st Avenue Library and the Rainbow Recreation Center in East Oakland. The hope is that rather than mass evacuation sites run by the state, investing in neighborhood infrastructure would be more effective and equitable.
At the new Lincoln Center, people could gather with others in the community in an emergency to charge devices and exchange information.
The idea, said Shina Robinson — policy coordinator at Asian Pacific Environmental Network in Chinatown, one of the organizations planning the new hub — is “investing in community centers that are trusted, so people don’t have to
Dancers perform during the monthly Lincoln Summer Nights at Lincoln Square Park in Oakland’s Chinatown.
leave the place where they know they feel safe.”
Her group has surveyed the community regarding their needs. Other needs include refrigeration for medicine and breast milk, hot water, better bathrooms, and air filtration after wildfires.
Oakland resident Lisa Peng remembers being scared during the wildfires a few years ago. She was living in Chinatown with many other immigrants and said in Cantonese that it felt like “there was no way to escape” the smoke. Peng, a member and leader of APEN, typically went to the rec center four to five times a week prior to the pandemic for activities like table tennis and ballroom dancing. She sees a critical need for better facilities
during crises.
A power shutoff, she said through Cantonese interpreter Kenneth Tang of APEN, is “horrible.”
“First of all, food storage, then needing to charge batteries like a phone to communicate with friends and family. There’s just a lot of inconveniences to daily life usage. I wish Lincoln can provide these things to support the needs of the community.”
Residents, particularly those who are mostly Cantonese-speaking, may feel safer there during emergencies when they might be hesitant to call 9-1-1, said Diana Chan, a retiree and community leader in her 70s who has been coming to the Lincoln Recreation Center for decades. “A lot of people in Chinatown don’t
speak English,” Chan said in Cantonese. “With a lot of seniors living here, the new center could potentially save peoples’ lives.”
Fundraising for the new center is under way. Oakland is providing $4 million through Measure KK funds, a city’s infrastructure bond. That seed funding helped to hire an architect to draw up plans for the new center.
“Being able to upgrade the conditions at that center, particularly to house more programming for different groups to gather at the same time would really be a gift to the community,” said Tiffany Kang, policy analyst and community partnerships manager for Oakland City Council President Nikki Fortunato Bas’ office, which has been
working with the community groups to secure more funding for the upgrade.
In December, Oakland was awarded state funding for two recreation centers; Lincoln will receive $8.5 million as part of the state’s Proposition 68, a climate initiative. At the federal level, Sen. Alex Padilla has federally earmarked $2 million for Lincoln Recreation Center. Friends of Lincoln Square Park also plans to raise additional funds through a campaign.
“It’s one of the most used rec centers in the park system,” Eng said. “This community has been promised this for so many years.”