S.F. supes pressure Breed to build library at a specific site
San Francisco legislators are trying to pressure Mayor London Breed’s administration to move forward with plans to build a library at a specific location on the southwest side of the city, a project that Supervisor Ahsha Safaí has accused Breed of blocking because he’s challenging her reelection bid.
The Board of Supervisors on Tuesday passed an ordinance that directs the city to “prioritize” city-owned open space at Brotherhood Way and Orizaba Avenue for the development of a library serving the Oceanview, Merced Heights, Ingleside and Lakeview neighborhoods.
City officials started considering that site years ago as a possible spot to construct a replacement for an existing library on Randolph Street that Safaí said is far too small to properly serve the community.
But Safaí, whose district includes the proposed library site, said last month that he was dismayed to learn that Breed’s administration had begun to consider other locations for the project.
He told the Chronicle at the time that he suspected Breed might be “trying to punish the community” because she was angered by his “challenge to her position as mayor.”
Breed’s office has denied that claim. At a Dec. 12 public question-and-answer session with supervisors, Breed said there wasn’t enough community agreement on the proposed new location and that she also had concerns about the cost of building on the originally planned site, especially in light of the city’s budget challenges. Safaí said supervisors had already put some funding for the library project on reserve. At Tuesday’s board meeting, Safaí told his colleagues that the project has “undoubtedly grown in cost and size” in recent years, “but it’s a solvable problem.”
“There is no alternative site,” he said.
The current neighborhood library branch on Randolph Street is so small that schoolchildren who use it sometimes had to do so in shifts, community members have said. A new facility could more than double the size of the current building.
Safaí’s ordinance passed on an 8-3 vote after he watered down language that would have required the city to build any new library in the area at the open space along Brotherhood
Way and Orizaba Avenue. The amended version of the ordinance requires only that the city make that location a priority.
Supervisors Myrna Melgar, Rafael Mandelman and Matt Dorsey voted no.
“Contrary to the assertions of some, there’s no consensus that this proposed location is the best location,” Melgar said. Her district borders the site.
In a statement after the vote, Jeff Cretan, a spokesperson for Breed, did not commit to pursuing the project at the location sought by Safaí’s legislation.
“The Mayor is going to continue to work with the community to identify a site that works best for a future library,” he said.