You know the acronyms: HANC, HAIA, HAMA. You might even know what they stand for. But, do you know what they do, or how they’re different from each other? Click through to find out.

HAIA: Haight Ashbury Improvement Association

• Established: “Rejuvenated” in 2006
• President: Ted Loewenberg
• Positions: Lobbied for Alcohol-free Haight/Ashbury Street Fair, supported Head Shop restriction, “spearheaded” Sit/Lie, campaigned for removal of HANC Recycling Center, supported Whole Foods, opposed the bike lane on Oak Street.
• What Else You Need to Know: If you ask around, they’re known for being on the conservative side, and they tend to have more dollars to back them when they want to get things done. HAIA President Ted Loewenberg is outspoken, and a quick google search of his name will show you that he’s vocal in the press.
• Can You Join Them: $25 per year for residents, $50 per year for merchants.
• Next Meeting: Member meetings happen on the third Wednesday of February, May, and September at Urban School from 6:30-8:30 PM.
• Contact: haia_sf@yahoo.com

HANC: Haight Ashbury Neighborhood Council

• Established: 1960
• President: Kevin Bayuk
• Positions: In 1959, they stopped the panhandle from becoming a 6-lane highway. More currently, they lobbied to keep the Recycling Center open, they’re involved in future Haight-Ashbury Public Realm Plan with HAMA, they proposed a homeless bill of rights, and they did not (and do not) support sit/lie.
• What Else You Need to Know: In terms of the street population in the neighborhood, HANC tends to lean toward harm-reduction rather than criminalization. They’re the oldest neighborhood organization, and have remained steadily left-leaning since their inception.
• Can You Join Them: $15 regularly, $3 for elderly/student/disabled/low-income folks.
• Next Meeting: Meetings are held on the second Thursday of each month at 7pm in the downstairs room of the Park Branch Library
• Contact: There’s a form on their website.

HAMA: Haight Ashbury Merchants Association

• Established: 2011
• President: They’re about to run elections, but they do have a board. Christin Evans (of Booksmith) is officially the treasurer, and mostly runs the show (with lots of help).
• Positions: They try to remain mostly apolitical. Their focus is narrower, in that they only deal with issues that effect businesses. They led the initial push to secure funding for the Public Realm Plan, though they want the community and other Haight organizations to be involved going forward. (By the way, there will be a meeting on the Public Realm Plan in July that all community members are invited to attend. Stay tuned.) They are responsible for the Holiday lights that go up in the neighborhood every season.
• What Else You Need to Know: HAMA is made up of business owners – but not necessarily property owners, as most business owners in the neighborhood don’t own their buildings. About half of their board members live in the neighborhood in addition to owning businesses here.
• Can You Join Them?: You can request to come to a meeting but only business owners can join. For the record, members pay $250
• Next Meeting: HAMA’s meetings aren’t at set dates or times (or places). Most likely the next one will be the one in July we mentioned earlier, and we’ll keep you posted on that.
• Contact: hama94117@gmail.com

Not pictured: HYA (Homeless Youth Alliance), & CVIA (Cole Valley Improvement Association).

Regardless of which one seems most appealing to you, these organizations are a great way to stay politically connected to the ‘hood, and have a voice in solving problems. Email them, show up to meetings, be heard. They thrive on participation.

This Saturday from 9 to 12 noon, help clean up our park at Alvord Lake.

Part of having a lovely park is making sure it’s safe to use for everyone.

Another part is making sure the park itself is a place people want to spend their time. This Saturday, May 25, you’re invited by Susan Strollis of the Friends of Alvord Lake to join in a volunteer work party to help clean the planted walkway (shown above, 2 years ago before being re-planted). The pond has been skimmed and weeded at the last work party; this time it’s just trimming up the flowers and grasses on the walkway.

We’ll also keep you posted on the upcoming effort to save the oaks at Alvord Lake, which is being launched by the Friends of Alvord Lake and which is designed to stem the erosion of soil around the roots of the oaks at Alvord Lake from heavy foot traffic. According to the Friends of Alvord Lake the oaks are in danger of deteriorating, and need a little help to stay where they are.

We’ll keep you posted on how you can help.

Jack & Co. spruced up the facade on Second Act, so you’d have something pretty to look at while you wait for the new space to be completed.

The new mural was done by Trinity at Cold Steel and Darren Villegas. The idea was to cut down on some of the tagging, and to brighten up the construction site.

We asked Jack how things are progressing, and he said they’re still mostly doing demolition, so there’s not much to report.

He also told us that he’s still getting lots of questions about what the space will become, so for anyone who missed our previous coverage, here’s an update.

The Lobby goes to Alembic. The theater space gets turned into a marketplace with 5 local food-based startups. They’ll also have a 49-person event space for classes, private parties, film screenings, and other goings-on.

Jack promises to give us an exclusive on the space when it’s ready to be photographed, so stay tuned for updates.

In the latest installment of the long, convoluted Bacon Bacon saga: coverage on SNL, a compromise, and a vocal opponent unveiled.

The city-mandated Bacon Bacon closure scheduled for last Friday, which got some coverage this weekend via Amy Poehler on Saturday Night Live’s Weekend Update, has been postponed thanks to an agreement arrived at between owner Jim Angelus and the unhappy neighbor/s. The agreement is based on Angelus’s commitment to install an air-filtration system.

In return, the neighbor has agreed to stop holding up the city’s re-permitting process for Bacon Bacon. As a reminder: Bacon Bacon was initially permitted by the city, but when the permitting limits posed by the city changed, some of the restaurant’s neighbors (two of them, according to Jim Angelus) held up the re-permitting process.

In another twist, we received a letter last week from local resident Ted Loewenberg, to offer the counter-argument for supporting Bacon Bacon (some of you were wondering). We reprint the letter below in its entirety.

An important note: in the letter, Mr. Loewenberg expresses his opposition of Bacon Bacon “on behalf of HAIA,” (the Haight Ashbury Improvement Association, of which he is president) although we were unable to verify the opposition to Bacon Bacon as an official HAIA position. On the contrary, one dues-paying HAIA member we spoke with said that HAIA was never asked to take a vote or express its position on Bacon Bacon, and that Mr. Loewenberg’s opinion was strictly his own. Mr. Loewenberg declined to provide the names of other HAIA members who opposed Bacon Bacon’s remaining open.

As follows:

“Your blog posting about what’s happening at Bacon Bacon ignores the reality of what Jim Angelus is doing on Frederick St.

On behalf of the Haight Ashbury Improvement Association (HAIA), I write to express our members’ serious concerns regarding about the dispute over Bacon Bacon’s operation. This is neither a complaint by NIMBY neighbors, nor only about the smell of bacon permeating the air. Mr. Angelus’s permit expediter has tried to define it as a feud of one cranky resident versus “a firestorm of support” for their food. This flagrant attempt to demonize and trivialize a respectable person voicing one of several valid objections is disgraceful. It is not a popularity contest.

At its heart, the objections of several neighbors are based on the fact that the restaurant was constructed without permits, operating for 18 months without permits [sic] and is in violation of the Planning Code and the Health Code of San Francisco. Other entrepreneurs have taken the legal path to opening their doors, costing them tens of thousands of dollars, long delays and expensive city fees. Bacon Bacon makes them look like chumps. In addition, the Planning Department knew all this, and is trying to legalize this mess through a simple building permit, with only a discretionary review offered. The neighbors called for the still unscheduled review, as they also have deep, legitimate concerns about the impact on their lives on this quiet, residential street. The Haight Ashbury Improvement Association supports the objections to this building permit. The question is not “do we like bacon?” but “what happened to the rule of law?”

The Health Department found a significant number of violations that pose a threat to the health of both patrons and neighbors, not the least of which is that no application for operating a restaurant was ever filed with the department. There is also the issue of an illegal subdivision of the property at 205 Frederick, as well as a demonstrated lack of concern about his neighbors.

HAIA supports entrepreneurs who seek to establish a neighborhood serving business in the Haight Ashbury. The businesses have created hundreds of jobs and helped to promote community. Bacon Bacon, on the other hand, has completely circumvented not only the required city reviews and approvals, but also the neighborhood. There is no good reason why they should remain open. After all, food-borne illnesses can be deadly. No one wants that.”

Now, though, it looks like Bacon Bacon will be able to keep its doors open. We’re glad everyone was able to make friends.

Well, ladies and gents, it’s finally here again: Bay to Breakers.

This Sunday, May 19 is Bay to Breakers. Watch out!

May we recommend putting on your sunscreen and your happy face, and spending the day either in the park or out at the beach (Baker Beach, naturally), as the mood suits.

For the unfamiliar, the street closures are posted here.

We expect to see the SFPD out in force much like last year, especially in light of the ruckus we all had on 420. So keep it friendly, and try not to be too much of a mess.

After a response from Supervisor Breed’s office, we have an update on the city’s RV parking ban.

It turns out that the parking ban implemented by the city last month is only a pilot program rolled out over a few select streets in a couple of districts. The SFMTA will evaluate the success of the program in the pilot areas and its effects on other areas of the city.

A spokesperson from Supervisor Breed’s office said that the MTA will present its findings to the Board of Supervisors at the end of the summer and then, pending a successful outcome, identify additional areas of the city to roll out the program.

And in the meantime, Supervisor Breed is encouraging all District 5 residents to be in touch (london.breed@sfgov.org) about concerns with the program and any interest in seeing it established in and around the Haight.

Yesterday evening a car drove into the Haight Street Market parklet.

One of the less frequently considered facts about parklets is, apparently, their susceptibility to being driven into. Which is exactly what happened yesterday evening when a young man drove his car into the corner of the Haight Street Market’s parklet.

Nobody was seriously injured (except the corner planter of the parklet) and the damage sustained to the structure seems relatively minimal, despite its being hit hard enough for the car’s airbags to deploy.

According to an employee at the market who saw the incident, the car was a brand new Dodge Dart.

As far as we know, this is the first instance of a car damaging a parklet. What do you think: does this change the parklet charm?

Last summer we reported on the possibility of a semi-permanent bike rental unit to be installed at the Alvord Lake entrance to Golden Gate Park.

Now, it looks like that possibility is becoming a reality.

Last week, the Board of Supervisors Budget & Finance subcommittee held a hearing to discuss the plans for a part-time bike rental stand to be installed, as in the illustration above. The proposal was to amend the Rec and Parks agreement with ParkWide bicycle rentals to allow an Alvord Lake rental service on the park five days a week. After hearing public comment, the resolution to add the Alvord Lake bike stand was passed.

According to a HAMA representative present at the meeting, there was only one voiced objection to the new bike stand, and it came from a merchant that isn’t located in the neighborhood.

What do you think? Good thing, bad thing, neither, both?

We sat down with Mary Howe, the director of the Homeless Youth Alliance, to find out what she thinks about the state of the street kids.

Mary is a formerly homeless youth, and she’s been at the helm of HYA since 2006. Her office is in the back corner of the HYA building at the corner of Haight & Cole (on the north side). On a normal day, she sees 30-40 homeless youth come and go. On a busy day, more like 120.

What do the kids do there? They sit, get warm, watch TV, shower, brush their teeth. In addition to basic hygiene needs, HYA has counselors who can help kids get documents they might be missing (birth certificates, Social Security cards, etc.). HYA provides medical and mental health care, a needle exchange program, referrals, and up-to-date information on how to transition into housing, if that’s what someone wants to do. They’re right here in the Haight, because “that’s where the kids are.”

Unlike a lot of other programs for the homeless and homeless youth, HYA has no preconditions for those who want to take advantage of the services they offer. A kid can drop in once to brush her teeth, or, come every day and get sober and transition into housing. Whatever is needed, HYA will provide.

They can do this because they’re privately funded, so, as Mary puts it, “there’s no one looking over our shoulders to tell us how to help people.” They just help them.

We asked her if she thinks that there have been more kids lately, and if so, if they’re getting more violent or destructive. She told us that there has been no increase in the amount of kids they help. “The kids have always been here, and they’re always going to be here.”

The only demographic shift recently, she says, is that she’s seeing more and more mentally ill kids.

Our conversation about destructiveness led to, of course, shit on the sidewalks. She says that HYA has rallied to get public bathrooms in the neighborhood, to no avail. “Nobody looks at a sidewalk and says, ‘yeah, that’s a great place to shit, right here where anyone could see me.’ Nobody wants to live like that.”

“There’s this myth that they’re all trust fund kids, trust fund brats. ‘Okay, so Daddy is molesting me, but he has money, so I guess I should stick around and see how this turns out.’ No. You run away, they run away. Money has nothing to do with it.”

On average, Mary says about 10% of the kids who come through are from San Francisco. The others come from all over. “It’s a destination. The kids have always been coming here. You can thank the 60s for that.”

We asked her about the recent uptick in citations and police presence on the street. Does she think it’s scaring them straight?

“Absolutely not. They sit on the street because there’s nowhere else to sit. They want them out of the parks, but then they want them off the street. So it becomes this constant back-and-forth shuffle. Passing Sit/Lie, or putting a bike rental place [at Alvord Lake] doesn’t mean that all the kids magically get houses to go to.”

She went on to explain the ticketing process for Sit/Lie: they get a warning, then a citation, then a fine, then prosecuted. She said she’s seen a few people get prosecuted. “Now they have a criminal record, which will obviously help them get a job.” Further criminalization, in HYA’s view, doesn’t make them go away, or not be homeless anymore. Human services, drug treatment, and referrals, however, might.

As for the future, she says she’s trying to work with HAMA and the merchants on the street to start a program where merchants can donate to HYA, and HYA can give the kids jobs to do, like scrubbing graffiti, or breaking down boxes, or other odd jobs that might need to be done cleaning up the ‘hood. She’s positive that if something like this can be arranged, the kids would jump at it.

If you’re interested in getting involved with HYA, there’s information on their website about how to volunteer, donate, or get their newsletter.

The storefront will be forced to close its doors effective May 17th until the issue with the planning department is resolved.

Back in February, we reported that Bacon Bacon was having some trouble with a neighbor who didn’t want commerce on Frederick Street. As a result, the business was in the process of renegotiating their permits with the planning department to try to stay open at the current location.

There will be a hearing, but it won’t happen until sometime in July (there’s no date set yet, we’ll keep you posted). In the meantime, you can sign a petition to keep them in the Haight at their website. It’s already got 1,250 signatures and counting.

According to their facebook page, they have faith that the hearing will go in their favor and they’ll be back. Considering that the “vocal minority” we reported on seems to be two people who have filed complaints in the past about businesses operating on Frederick, so this might not be over for awhile.

UPDATE: If you want to send a letter of support, here’s the info you need. They can be send to either Jim at Bacon Bacon (jim@baconbaconsf.com), or Sharon Young at the planning dept:

sharon.m.young@sfgov.org
Sharon M. Young
Planner, NW Quadrant, Current Planning
San Francisco Planning Department
1650 Mission Street, Suite 400
San Francisco, CA 94103
415.558.6346 (voice)
sharon.m.young@sfgov.org
www.sfplanning.org/ (website)