29 Years of Leadership in San Francisco
“Pelosi has used her power for public benefit, nationally and locally. Her many San Francisco accomplishments include her role in securing AIDS/HIV funding and the transition of the Presidio into a national park. Her leadership helped deliver the Affordable Care Act. The list goes on and on.” – San Francisco Chronicle Editorial, Oct. 2012
From Bayview to Bernal Heights, Chinatown to the Castro, the Mission to the Marina, and North Beach to Noe Valley, Congresswoman Pelosi has transformed San Francisco in her 28 years of service: preserving public lands and parks, expanding transit, protecting the Bay and the environment, and fighting to create quality, affordable housing.
After the Army closed the Presidio of San Francisco – a military post from 1776 to 1994 – Congresswoman Pelosi led the fight to preserve the Presidio for the people of San Francisco against those planning to sell off this treasured asset to the highest bidder. After years of work, in 1996, Congresswoman Pelosi passed a bill creating the Presidio Trust, an innovative public-private partnership model of governance with the twin goals of preserving the essence of a magnificent national park and achieving economic self-sufficiency for the American taxpayers – a charge accomplished on schedule in 2013.
Pelosi’s work in the Presidio can be seen from the trails and overlooks to the Main Parade Ground, with the Walt Disney Family Museum, Futures Without Violence, the Letterman Digital Arts Center and the Japanese American Historical Society’s Military Intelligence Service Historic Learning Center. Thanks to Pelosi’s advocacy in securing millions in federal funds, the barren, broken asphalt of Crissy Field Air Field became Presidio’s spectacular front window to the Bay – with public walkways, restored dunes and wetlands, the Crissy Field Center and spectacular spaces for recreation.
After the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, Congresswoman Pelosi worked to ensure her constituents received timely assistance, joining her California colleagues to secure a $3.45 billion earthquake relief package. In the aftermath, Pelosi worked to raise the SBA loan cap, and led efforts to restore City Hall and the Geary Theater, home of the American Conservatory Theater.
Pelosi has fought to improve bus and rail transit, walking, biking, and transit-oriented development while creating vibrant livable communities. Over the past 28 years, she has been instrumental in extending BART to the SFO Airport; creating the Third Street Light Rail and the Central Subway; securing $400 million in Recovery Act funds for the Transbay Transit Center to break ground; and re-envisioning the structurally and seismically-deficient Doyle Drive into the new Presidio Parkway through a public-private partnership. Pelosi also helped enable the seismic upgrade of the Golden Gate Bridge and secured a change in the law to allow federal funds for the installation of a suicide prevention barrier.
Since its closure by the U.S. Navy in 1974, the Hunters Point Shipyard has been a neglected and contaminated neighbor to the Bayview / Hunters Point Community. Pelosi has helped secure nearly $900 million in federal funding to clean up contamination and transform the former shipyard into a source of jobs and economic development, parks and affordable housing for the community.
At Treasure Island – a man-made island in the Bay between San Francisco and Oakland – the Navy’s plans to sell the island to San Francisco languished for over a dozen years after the Navy base had closed. Pelosi was crucial in finding a path forward to redeveloping Treasure Island, helping to secure an agreement that is allowing the City to quickly move forward with substantial redevelopment plans that include sustainable transit-oriented development with essential affordable housing and over 300 acres of parks and open space.
As an advocate for affordable housing, Congresswoman Pelosi has been essential in securing federal funds to rehabilitate severely distressed public housing units at Hunters View, Sunnydale, and Alice Griffith; the veterans housing project Veterans Commons at 150 Otis Street; and the renovation of Nihonmachi Terrace in Japantown. Pelosi secured $54 million – more than half the funding – for the Kelly Cullen Community and clinic for the chronically homeless at 220 Golden Gate. Pelosi was also instrumental in the creation of Housing Opportunities for people with AIDS (HOPWA), and has long championed the Low Income Housing Tax Credit, which has created over 10,000 homes in our Congressional District since it was enacted.
Pelosi’s support for a new federal building in San Francisco dates back to her first days in Congress, and with her assistance securing federal funding and authorization, the San Francisco Federal Building at Mission and 7th opened in 2007 – one of the greenest federal buildings in the country. Thanks to the Recovery Act passed under then-Speaker Pelosi, $121 million in federal funding was made available to renovate and modernize the historic federal office building at 50 United Nations Plaza, which reopened in 2013.