Diamond Heights Blvd. Median Project Volunteer Workday Saturday, November 13th, 9-12 noon Please join us for even an hour or two!
The plants on the median island are happy with the recent rains. The rains have also encouraged weeds to again thrive. Your help is needed to get a handle on the weeds before they get out of hand. Our approach is to keep the block in front of the shopping center and the median in front of St. Aidan’s church weeded. We plan to continue to weed whack/trim the grass on down to Diamond Street. Date: Saturday, Nov. 13th Time: 9:00 a.m. to 12 noon – helping us even one hour would be terrific! Location: Meet at St. Aidan’s Episcopal Church on DH Blvd. at Gold Mine Dr. Work: Pull weeds, pick up trash on the median islands and spread one pile of wood chips Recommended for 12 years and older No gardening experience required Supplies: Kneeling pads, gloves, safety vests, weeding tools and bottled water will be provided. You may wish to wear masks to reduce the risk to new COVID variants and to avoid breathing in dust. You may also want to bring your own gloves and weeding tools. Bathrooms will be available in the upper level of the church.
Please let me know if you plan to attend. Please reply if you have questions about the Diamond Heights Blvd. Median Project.
Thank you to all the volunteers who have worked hard to improve the appearance of our median islands along Diamond Heights Blvd.!
Date: Saturday, October 9 Time: 9:00 a.m. to 12 noon – helping us even one hour would be terrific! Location: Meet at St. Aidan’s Episcopal Church on DH Blvd. at Gold Mine Dr. Work: Pull weeds, pick up trash on the median islands and spread one pile of wood chips Recommended for 12 years and older No gardening experience required Supplies: Kneeling pads, gloves, safety vests, weeding tools and bottled water will be provided. You may wish to wear masks to reduce the risk to new COVID variants and to avoid breathing in dust. You may also want to bring your own gloves and weeding tools. Bathrooms will be available in the upper level of the church.
Please let me know if you plan to attend. Please reply if you have questions about the Diamond Heights Blvd. Median Project.
Thank you to all the volunteers who have worked hard to improve the appearance of our median islands along Diamond Heights Blvd.!
Diamond Heights Blvd. Median Project Volunteer Workday Saturday, September 11, 9-12 noon Please join us for even an hour or two!
We will start off with a moment of silence to remember all those who died in the September 11, 2001 Attack.
For those not fond of weeding and gardening, we will have supplies to pick up trash. Please see the flyer provided by Vince Yuen. Vince is volunteering to organize trash pick up projects all around San Francisco. Thank you, Vince!
Volunteer Workday Details Date: Saturday, September 11 Time: 9:00 a.m. to 12 noon – helping us even one hour would be terrific! Location: Meet at St. Aidan’s Episcopal Church on DH Blvd. at Gold Mine Dr. Work: Pull weeds and pick up trash on the median islands and spread one pile of wood chips Recommended for 12 years and older No gardening experience required: Kneeling pads, gloves and safety vests will be provided. You may wish to wear masks to reduce the risk to new COVID variants and to avoid breathing in dust. You may also want to bring your own gloves and weeding tools. Bathrooms will be available in the upper level of the church. Water will be provided.
Please let me know if you plan to attend.
Please reply if you have questions about the Diamond Heights Blvd. Median Project.
SF Planning Commission Hearing on 5367 Diamond Heights Blvd. (1900 Diamond) Previously Scheduled on August 26 at 1 pm has been Postponed Until October 14, 2021
The SF Planning Commission has postponed the Conditional Use Authorization Hearing for 5367 Diamond Heights Blvd. (1900 Diamond) previously scheduled for Thursday, August 26 at 1 pm. The hearing is now scheduled for October 14, 1 pm. The City Attorney’s Office is investigating potential legal issues with the sale of the land.
For more information, please contact Planning Department staff: Planner: Gabriela Pantoja Telephone: 628-652-7380 Email: Gabriela.Pantoja@sfgov.org
You may also reply to this message for more information. The Diamond Heights Community Association continues to take no position on the proposed development since there are residents who are both pro and con for the development in our neighborhood.
Since people still ask – where is the location of the proposed development? – the site location is pictured below. The photo shows the corner of Diamond Heights Blvd. and Diamond Street. The proposed development will remove this entire hillside. The property is owned by the Cesar Chavez Foundation which owns the Vista Del Monte Affordable Housing uphill to the hillside.
Refuse Refuse is a citywide campaign dedicated to litter abatement and is partnering with the Diamond Heights Blvd. Median Project to help keep the neighborhood clean! If you are tired of seeing and walking on food wrappers, cigarette butts, coffee cups, etc. this is your opportunity to do something about it. Come join us for the Diamond Heights Cleanup & Audits on Tuesdays August 17th and 24th from 10-11:30 am meeting at Walter Haas Dog Park (Diamond Heights Blvd and Addison St). This is how it works – we pick up and count litter to form a benchmark for the amount of waste in the neighborhood. The data is used to identify hot spots, measure progress and motivate people and commercial establishments to do their part. So mark your calendars, put on your old clothes, gloves, face masks and join your neighbors. Everything else you need is provided.
Please join me in helping to develop an organized program to pick up trash along Diamond Heights Blvd. The Diamond Heights Blvd. Median Project has been picking up trash on the medians for 5 years. We need more help.
The sign up information is listed on the above flyer. You may also reply to me to sign up.
Stay safe and well,
Betsy Diamond Heights Blvd. Median Project Acting Coordinator
SF Planning Commission Hearing on 5367 Diamond Heights Blvd. – 1900 Diamond August 26 at 1 pm
Hi All on the DHCA Email List,
The SF Planning Commission has scheduled a Conditional Use Authorization Hearing for 5367 Diamond Heights Blvd. – 1900 Diamond for Thursday, August 26 at 1 pm. The attached Notice of Public Hearing provides much information. Here are some highlights:
A Planning Commission approval at the public hearing would constitute the Approval Action for the project for the purposes of CEQA, pursuant to San Francisco Administrative Code Section 31.04(h)
For more information, please contact Planning Department staff: Planner: Gabriela Pantoja Telephone: 628-652-7380 Email: Gabriela.Pantoja@sfgov.org
Members of the public are strongly encouraged to submit their comments in written form via email to commissions.secretary@sfgov.org by 5:00 pm the day before the hearing. These comments will be made a part of the official public record and will be brought to the attention of the person or persons conducting the public hearing.
Added note – For written comments to appear in the docket of information for the SF Planning Commissioners, submit statements by Aug. 17 to commissions.secretary@sfgov.org
The virtual hearing will be live streamed. Check the website https://sfplanning.org, select hearing agendas for the link closer to Aug. 26. The link is not yet determined.
The On August 5, orange flyers were posted along Diamond Heights Blvd. and Diamond Street.
The Diamond Heights Community Association continues to take no position on the proposed development. Our role is to provide information to our community.
Saturday, August 14, 9-12 noon – Please join us for even an hour or two!
Volunteer Workday Details Date: Saturday, August 14 Time: 9:00 a.m. to 12 noon – helping us even one hour would be terrific! Location: Meet at St. Aidan’s Episcopal Church on DH Blvd. at Gold Mine Dr. Work: Pull weeds on the median islands and spread one pile of wood chips Recommended for 12 years and older No gardening experience required: Kneeling pads, gloves and safety vests will be provided. You may wish to wear masks to reduce the risk to new COVID variants and to avoid breathing in dust. You may also want to bring your own gloves and weeding tools.
In the future, we may be able to offer lunch for volunteers when St. Aidan’s will be open to groups. On August 14, bathrooms will be available for volunteers in the upper level of the church. Water will be provided.
Please let me know if you plan to attend.
Please reply if you have questions about the Diamond Heights Blvd. Median Project.
Why is the median on Diamond Heights Blvd. so lovely these days? These volunteers are the reason. And you can help.
Reminder – Diamond Heights Blvd. Median Project Volunteer Workday Saturday, July 10, 9-12 noon – Please join us for even an hour or two!
Glen Park News Blog on Median Project Please read Why is the median on Diamond Heights Blvd. so lovely these days? These volunteers are the reason. And you can help. July 7, by Murray Schneider. In the story included below after Volunteer Workday Details, Murray tells about the history of the Median Project and gives updates on our current work. A huge thank you to Murray!
Volunteer Workday Details Date: Saturday, July 10 Time: 9:00 a.m. to 12 noon – helping us even one hour would be terrific! Location: Meet in front of St. Aidan’s Episcopal Church on DH Blvd. at Gold Mine Dr. Work: Pull weeds on the median islands Recommended for 12 years and older No gardening experience required: Kneeling pads, gloves and safety vests will be provided. You may wish to wear masks to avoid breathing in dust and bring your own gloves and weeding tools.
In the future, we may be able to offer lunch for volunteers when St. Aidan’s will be open to groups. On July 10, bathrooms will be available for volunteers in the upper level of the church. Water will be provided.
Please let me know if you plan to attend.
Please reply if you have questions about the Diamond Heights Blvd. Median Project.
Diamond Heights Boulevard Median Project — June 5, 2021 work party Standing, left to right — MIke Davis, Linda Kern, Gilbert Chavez, Joan Chaplick, Todd Siemer, Betsy Eddy Kneeling, left to right — Betty Carmack, Margaret Dyer-Chamberlain Volunteers who left before photo taken — Jaime Cid, Elaine Carlino, Margo Lark, Nicole Miller
Betsy Eddy is a middle of the road kind of person.
Literally. In the middle of Diamond Heights Boulevard tending to a the plantings.
On June 5 she put in a three-hour stint keeping San Francisco beautiful, one block at a time. This time it was between Gold Mine Drive near St. Aidan’s Church and north to Duncan Street at Saint Nicholas Church.
Eddy, who has lived on Farnum Street for 35 years, supervised 12 neighborhood volunteers in the service of filling 36 refuse bags with grass and foxtails along three median islands.
Significantly, this was the first project work party since the onset of COVID-19 sequestration.
“We left the thistle, though,” Eddy told the Glen Park News, “because gold finches like its nectar.”
She took up the mantle from Paul Matalucci, the former Diamond Heights Boulevard Median Project Coordinator. He moved to Hood River, Oregon in June 2020 to fulfill a dream of planting an orchard of rare apple trees.
Paul Matalucci, who project coordinator for the Diamond Heights Boulevard Median Project before moving to Hood River, Oregon to plant an apple orchard.
Never one to allow the grass to grow under her feet, she now finds herself overseeing what she hopes will become monthly work parties to continue an effort that Matalucci began in 2014, but remained dormant during the coronavirus pandemic.
Her mission? To inspire neighbors to replant and maintain islands along Diamond Heights Boulevard between Duncan Street and Berkeley Way.
“The resumed median project will schedule a volunteer workday each month,” with the next work party scheduled for July 10, she said.
Standing near a teepee of trash bags on June 5, Eddy, who is also a columnist for the Glen Park News, watched automobiles pass while volunteers tugged weeds buried in soil hardened by lack of rain.
“When Paul started the project,” she added, “the medians from Berkeley Way to the corner of Duncan were a jumble of dead trees, tall growing shrubbery and brush that obscured sight lines for pedestrians and motorists.”
Up in Oregon, Matalucci and his husband, Tom Osborne now run the Apple Core Farm, where they are establishing an apple orchard with heritage trees developed by early pioneers. This spring, with the help of a Yakima, Washington apple grafter, Matalucci grafted 120 trees representing 11 unique varieties. One of them was the Hewes Crab, considered the best cider apple by Thomas Jefferson who grew it in Virginia.
The botanical scene is a little different along Diamond Heights Boulevard. There, Eddy and the crew looked out at 14 Canary Island pines, purchased by Friends of the Urban Forest and planted by DHBMP volunteers in September 2016.
In the past year, only four of the graceful trees have succumbed to the elements.
The team worked to daylight the hearty survivors, along with drought tolerant plants such as red buck wheat, thanks to the efforts of the Matalucci-Eddy corps of volunteers
Gilbert Chavez is one.
Volunteers clear the median at Diamond Heights Boulevard.
Chavez has lived in the Tenderloin for 15 years, and has been involved in the median project for five years. A congregant of St. Aidan’s for 35 years, Chavez didn’t take long to throw in his lot with Eddy when he learned she’d revived pre-pandemic efforts.
“The good work of the people of Diamond Heights often goes unappreciated, and I wanted to do my part to make the neighborhood safe and beautiful,” he said.
Eddy has long labored to make Diamond Heights a better place. She‘s been the Diamond Heights Community Association president for 12 years, a term that’s included advocating for park renovations at George Christopher and Walter Hass Playgrounds, championing traffic improvements such as crosswalks and cement sidewalks, lobbying for the repair and or replacement of City water pipes along streets such as Diamond Heights Boulevard, Topaz Way and Jade Court, and jawboning with the MTA about retaining the 35 Eureka bus loop down Farnum Street and back up to Addison Street and extending the 35 bus to BART.
The pandemic was not good for the medians. Waist-sized grasses threatened half-a- decade of earlier planting of gold leaf, pink kaboom and a host of succulents along the thoroughfare.
The median project leadership had mapped out a six-year timeline that included installation of plants and gopher baskets, coordination with both PUC and DPW to confirm status of median irrigation and landscape design and finally neighborhood review of the design.
The beautification effort began in the spring of 2014 when Matalucci got a District 8 Greening Grant from Supervisor Scott Wiener that helped him launch Phase 1 of our project. That included replanting of the ‘thin’ median islands between Diamond Street and Berkeley Way.
The DHBMP then received two Community Challenge Grants, the first awarded in 2015 to the tune of $46,000; the second, in 2017, for $40,948.
“The first CCG included funds to hire a landscape architect who created a water use and attractive assortment of California native plants,” Matalucci wrote in an email to the News. “We also worked hard to develop relationships with San Francisco Public Works and were grateful for its partnership.”
The money was earmarked for shrub removal, soil remediation, landscape design, gopher abatement and the purchase of plants. And along the way the project received an anonymous donation from generous residents that allowed the median project to retain the services of a professional garden service to remove weeds from Gold Mine Drive near the shopping center up to Saint Nicholas Church.
Surveying the morning work on June 5, Eddy envisions setting reasonable goals as the median project springs back into action.
“We have no plans for new plants in the immediate future,” she said, eyeing Diamond Heights Boulevard, rife with swaying knee-high grasses propelled by ever-present neighborhood winds. “We need to get a handle on clearing weeds and getting the irrigation system back in operation. We are also waiting for Public Works to repair a city water pipe break at the south entrance to the shopping center.”
And Eddy, after nearly four decades as a community advocate, is stepping back. She relinquished her DHCA presidency one year ago and now shares the office as co-president with Mike Kramer.
Succession planning has taken center stage.
“I am hoping someone with more gardening experience takes on the role of project coordinator,” she revealed.
Fresh from the COVID-19 lockdown that thwarted their efforts, Eddy’s volunteers bagged the last of the encroaching grasses by 11:30. Removing their safety vests, they began eclaiming parked cars and preparing to walk to nearby residences.
Prior to the pandemic volunteers were treated to lunch at St. Aidan’s, but the church is still in lockdown mode, not yet ready to open its doors for social gatherings.
It’s this ongoing effort that keeps the medians looking lovely for everyone.
“The real work is ongoing maintenance and I’m grateful to Betsy for taking up the cause and reenlisting many of our core volunteers to weed and clean the median islands now that it’s safe for people to gather outside again,” Matalucci said.
Diamond Heights Blvd. Median Project Volunteer Workday Saturday, July 10, 9-12 noon Please join us to improve the appearance of our median islands along Diamond Heights Blvd. Helping maintain our medians is important because Public Works has indicated they do not have the staff to maintain the area. Public Works is watering the plants and trees until it fixes a broken City water pipe that provides water to the drip irrigation system installed by the Median Project.
The medians are in good shape from Addison St. to Duncan St. for several reasons:
12 volunteers including the ones pictured above filled 36 leaf bags with weeds on one median on June 5. One of the volunteers weed whacked much of the tall grass.
Anonymous neighborhood residents donated funds to weed the median islands in front of the Shopping Center from Gold Mine Dr. to Duncan St. The Median Project is very thankful for this generous donation. The weeded medians made a huge difference in the appearance of our neighborhood.
A volunteer weeds the median from Addison St. to Diamond St. and cares for all the geraniums and jade plants on the hillside. Another volunteer turns on the drip irrigation system not affected by the broken City water pipe for this median once per week.
Volunteer Workday Details Date: Saturday, July 10 Time: 9:00 a.m. to 12 noon – helping us even one hour would be terrific! Location: Meet in front of St. Aidan’s Episcopal Church on Diamond Heights Blvd. at Gold Mine Dr. Work: Pull weeds on the median islands Recommended for 12 years and older No gardening experience required: Kneeling pads, gloves and safety vests will be provided. You may wish to wear masks to avoid breathing in dust and bring your own gloves and weeding tools.
In the future, we may be able to offer lunch for volunteers when St. Aidan’s will be open to groups. On July 10, bathrooms will be available for volunteers in the upper level of the church. Water will be provided.
Please let me know if you plan to attend.
Please reply if you have questions about the Diamond Heights Blvd. Median Project.
Have a Safe July Fourth Last July 4th, 108 fires caused by fireworks were reported in San Francisco in a 12-hour period. Fireworks caused a fire in a backyard in Diamond Heights early on June 27 of this week. Fortunately flames did not reach homes. It seems many people do not realized that all types of fireworks even sparklers are illegal to possess and use in San Francisco. Every year fireworks scare and injure people. People with dementia, people with PTSD including many of our Veterans and pets are impacted adversely by fireworks.
Safety Tips for People and Pets The attached flyers provide information on alternatives to setting off fireworks, dangers of fireworks including sparklers and tips for keeping your pets safe.
Reporting Fireworks: A Message from Capt. Nicole Jones, Ingleside Station Captain “Please report illegal fireworks only if you see the person lighting them, can describe them, and can give an exact location or address. If the circumstances observed meet this threshold, please call 311 and provide the aforementioned information.
In regards to reporting noise from fireworks, please know that SFPD is aware of the noise generated by fireworks and how that impacts many in our communities. SFPD will be out in the field mitigating these complaints. If you feel it is necessary to call, complaints about noise should also be directed to 311.
During the holidays when fireworks are prevalent, namely the Fourth of July, SFPD receives a high volume of fireworks-related calls requiring our Dispatch to triage based on the severity of the call. Therefore, SFPD may not be able to respond to every firework-related call unless fires or injuries are involved. In these latter instances of fire and/or injury, please immediately call 911.
As always, please keep 911 available for people with police, fire, or medical emergencies.”
Have a safe and fun July Fourth! Resilient Diamond Heights
Diamond Heights Community Association 