it helped the fillmore earner the reputation as harlem of the west. it attracted a lot of incredible folks in mucus to armstrong and a number of others. and when the redevelopment agency threatened to raise the fillmore the folks at that time, gathered to save this and several other historic buildings. the marcus building was raised off it's foundation and taken around the corner. since it's move the building has housed marcus bookstore the oldest black bookstore in the nation and it's center for black

intellectualism. it's hosted so many incredible fingers like rosa parks and others. it's iconic and appropriate that the historic preservation has been asked to keep this historic plays. only the occupants in that building a historic i think the buildings age and narrow escape disproves that. i would remind i thought national regulatory that the commission uses the criteria says a building may receive historic landmark status because it has a board pattern of our

history or are sobered with persons significant in our past. without question this building rises to that level. some have suggested that the commission delay considering this landmark status i commend we can't let that be deferred by it's present circumstances. nor can we see the time between the past and present. orwell's said he who controls the past controls the future. this is recognizing our history in japan town and so it may have a chance to survive in the future. history is not a static and landmarks don't survive on delay they survive because people protect them. we are asking you to protect

marcus books so people can know the history of this remarkable building. this building was resilient to survive two earthquakes and it was precious enough to move from the past bulldozer then surely it's historical enough to gain our vote today. please let this be a historic land n.y. mark in our great city. thank you >> excuse me. before moving on we're going to do 2 minutes by standing together you showed our support. we're going to have two bells one is the warning and respect the second bell. i'm going to call 3 names to

start with. greg or karen johnson and dr. i'm sorry o body and kenneth will be our first speakers >> well, first of all. >> could you - >> i'm mr. johnson i'm co- owner of the marcus bookstore. we're appreciative of the support we've gained throughout the world. having san francisco city and county support is the optimum to say the least. it gives us a feeling as the caretakers of a legacy business that there is respect there is recognition of the long and hard work that has been accomplished by the dr. julian and ray

richardson. again, we're nothing more than caretakers of this legacy business. the intent is to remain at the location since 1981 we want to recatch the building on behalf of the community. the reason i stood up was to say the building belongs to community. i'm 67-year-old i'm a producing product of san francisco city and county as a matter of fact, i spent 35 years working as an employee for the county of public health and rose to a administrative level. we appreciate everyone the commission members, supervisor breed and everyone else who has come to our support important

we're not here to beg or ask for salvation but redemption. again beside me is my lovely wife karen johnson. someone mentioned the present vs. the past we're the present. we now introduce you to a gentleman >> we're going to go into our speaker cards. to the san francisco historic preservation committee i'm with the san francisco state university where i teach. i'm the form leader of the san francisco civil rights movement when people could on the work in

their own communities. we willing busting u busted open opportunities for a blacks. the store was the historic site first for japanese-americans and they were incarcerated. and then from 6 to 45 thousand i know the history from julian who basically scald the scholarship in black studies. and before there was an installation called black studies this was an institution called marcus bookstore. dr. was the deepen of the college now chair a georgia state school was from therd of

the marcus. so that bookstore has been a repository of history and brought about change and astronomers so designating it as a historic landmark is crucial for a community and people of color and for san francisco at large. i brought a letter i know you require 10 or 15 but i hope you take s it and copy it on behalf of our department >> thank you, sir. >> and you'll have other statements. >> thank you. (calling names). >> commissioners thank you for your attention to this today.

i'm dr. kenneth i'm here to ask you designate this maushg us bookstore the architect maintenance the soviet and the commercial facade around it. still for me a sober and civic activists it should be designated as a landmark. the marcus has told stores and shaped there maushg us willing shaped the nation. since most of you are going to hear many stories an for example, it was a site of numerous poetry and other arts. maushg us what the save haven that shaped the phil more so

still going on things. the owners julian and ray richardson provided the state for sober justice they provided the is that a for the constitute stylists who resolution listed the black studies and the college that i currently lead. the students at that time, went on to be you're judges and your community activities and some of them are among you. it shaped the political legacy of the city when the doctor's and others architect of a movement in the city gave birth to willie brown and others including feinstein. and this speaks to us but the last store it was a about a

personal store that was told to me >> about a young man saved from his past. >> excuse me for members of the audience if i could refrain from clapping we to thely understand your support. >> i'm desiree i'm here on behalf of the - we're the city's largest conservatism organizations in the city. i'm here today to express our support of 1716 fillmore or marcus books. designating the property as an article 10 landmark will give a new level of recognition for the african-american owned and black

theemd bookstore in the country. in addition it will serve as a reminder of a once tlooifr african-american community in san francisco it continues today. additionally the property helps to tell the larger historical landmark including the history government intervenous. it documents the chair features of the property and makes a strong case for the buildings high-level of integrity we support this on fillmore street >> thank you kevin please. >> good afternoon. i'm a

member of the japan town organizing committee and i'm on a music committee it's a jazz performance and educational association or organization and we teach a jazz program at the rosa parks school and when we take the fourth and fifth graders we take them to marcus. we tell them this is the place where the real place and look at all the books look at the names and titles. this is a place of culture and history and heritage. this is your place and community. and i want to thank this commission and mary brown for doing such a wonderful job of

looking at this buildings history as a full history of the people and the organizations and the institutions that have lived there and are living there today. and i think that it's sad sometimes that we can't recognize the businesses there. but the businesses are part of that significance and the significance lives and it lives while they're there >> you know i want to point out this book to you the cool gray city of love dick you to chapter 41 when is the haunted house. he ends his essay the traffic roared underneath like a great river. today, i believe you're going to change that indifference with

our recognition of marcus books >> thank you (calling names). >> greetings commissioners i'm krifrt. i'm here 80 today to state my support for the jim boo report. i read it as was blown away. that i'm working on the african-american context statement and based on my research you know there's very little left that speaks to the fillmore we've knocked most of it down. this building has the postwar music entrances and performance culture with the intellectualism

with the 1960 and 70s. i want to point out that currently there's only four landmarks in san francisco it is associated with african-american history and culture. they've done away with the artifacts. we need to recognize the ones we have so i encourage you to support it. thank you >> thank you townsend. >> thank you members arnold telephone number send. >> today, i'm representing the naacp and the san francisco economic opportunity council. just a couple of things. i can tell you about marcus books. i've had a wonderful history i can tell you some things about

june i can't tell richardson. we have a wonderful relationship but i want to tell you about some history this buildings was slanted e slides to be torn down and some gentleman showed up and decided he was going to buy r buy the buildings and move forward them to fisherman's wharf. we started screaming why can't we have historic buildings in the fillmore. so the redevelopment agency was going to let him cut off the facade and slap them on the building and that would be victorian. we were able to stop the community created the victorian village. we came up with the african-american community there

were 10 buildings involved and everyone of the original owners was african-american. over time and difficulty this has changed. you heard the gentleman say that most of the icons of the african-american people are gone from fillmore now. it reminds me of slavery they bring you here to do their bidding and want to wipeout the evidence off our culture. this is on you. thank you >> thank you. >> jan. >> i'm sorry. >> my humanitarian. i'm jan. i live at 2331 busting street. my time in the neighborhood is about the same time as maushg us

books. i want to speak as a neighbor this is my community and my neighborhood. if you walk on jefferson marcus books is right in the middle where it belongs. it would be a shame if the prehistoric commission wouldn't facility the landmark culture institution. i'm a neighbor and a pat electronic we have to keep this. thank you >> thank you joseph. followed by (calling names) >> good morning honorable commissioners on behalf of some folks. my parents are out of town they

left a note. honorable commissioners we're asking that the property locked on if f fillmore street you've received many requests and those requests have come from parties that support the location without any regards to the property rights. we respectfully ask you postpone any decisions hon on this property because we the original property owners are out of the town to visit an aging mother in the middle east. there is no urgent need to hear this. and there's only severing to complicate matters. this will not that implicated

until we have full access to our property respectfully insinuated. i want to commit there seems to be some confusion on preserving the location of the bookstore. i will point out that my parents are long term san franciscans my dad move forward here 60 years ago and he employees over thirty san franciscans. they're not against altering the property >> thank you. (calling names) >> good afternoon

commissioners. i'm hawkins. i'm a lifelong resident of san francisco which happens to be in the southeast sector. we know mark us bookstores from coming across town to get books and when they started tearing down the vindicate to be sworn in the early 70s someone from new york came out and let them know those are valuable buildings but they were so busy to get the black folks out to our side of town. those 1980s those were all occupied by black people i know i used to party over there but now their occupied by people who come out and now during the

antiparth i do era the a mc people i'd escort around they wanted to see the harlem of the west and i took them by marcus bookstore. and i'm sorry for the people who own the place by it's a historical landmark place i understand you bought it but there's a 90 something old professor who lives there and if you replace those people god is watching you. god bless you >> thank you paul please. good afternoon, commissioners i'm paul. i can't say i will add much but

there's one thing that's not been said it's the importance the landmarks educating people like me to what we've done right and wrong and the store of that building and marcus books and it's history is incredibly important and needs to be howard >> i do so moot speaker card in the box then we'll move on to general public comment. >> got one more. >> oh. >> curtis. >> good afternoon, commissioners. i am a direct heir of the rejuly effects of what marcus books and

bob city is about. let me say this i'm the music director there. it's because of marcus books that and because of people like dr. goodrich and julian and ms. ray who were some of the people who spider me to extend myself in a way of understanding that i needed to better myself as a person and so they were responsible for making sure that i went to higher education. and because of that i received 3 bachelors degrees. let's talk about the importance of how they've been the pillar of the community when it comes to making sure that youth like

myself at that point understood the responsibility of community and education. i received a bachelor degree in radio and film and bachelor degree with emphasis on speak and music. a mafrts degree in orchestra extraction and raining a ph.d. from the originally development. now let's talk about the music aspect of it. because of my mat levitation i was able to play i'm a direct heir because i play with the duke elton orchestrate. this institution must be upheld

>> thanks. >> your time is up. >> it is john okay. >> yeah. ken johnson. i love maushg us bookstore it changed my life i probably would have long been in jail without marcus bookstore and the family. i've looked at what the landmark meant and it qualifies in all areas so, you know, i mean it seems odd to me with would even have to come and present this to you guys you, you know, it's a landmark i mean famous people have one of the crazy is if any of the famous people where in the property to preserve is it.

what is a landmark that is write down on here. in the william pedestrian and the legal pages on the internet. the choice is easy for you guys to make. here's a documentary about the marcus block store. people that are famous played there and their spirit is in the building. it is a landmark. you know, so, please do what you should do and declare is a landmark and leave it the way it is >> thank you very much any other member of the public

wishes to speak please come up to the microphone. >> good morning. my name is a dr. chiu and i'm here this morning in good company. i'm a licensed physician and business owner. i represented people at the white house and the biggest doors that opened were opened by decrease ray and julie i don't think richardson when they asked me to work behind the counter. another one was when the dr. called me into the office and he told me to go to medical school i went there. i used to baby-sit karen's

beautiful daughter and just a wonderful family karen and greg they're beautiful people r and are entrenched in this city. on the front pages of the phonebook is the designated landmark so if you're a tourist i just flip the yellow pages you'll find the historic places. and this generates revenue and a stream of customers if you're on a busy strip. so thank you >> thank you sir, you had gotten up. >> he had gotten up and was in line. ok