The San Francisco Examiner from San Francisco, California • 144

1 E-12 Sunday, May 10. 1998 SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER of the Sin Fnncuco Sunday Eiaminn ml Chronicle A taction -rr; i't '-v erated by a local housing authori PROJECTS, from E-7 Housing projects get whole new look entire communities will be a major subject of discussion when the American Institute of Architects holds its national convention in San Francisco this week. Changes already are under way in the Bay Area, from San Francisco to Oakland to San Jose thanks to a program the federal government initiated six years ago called the Hope VI program. The purpose was to create a new world not to mention image of public housing, recalled architect Tom Jones, author of "Good Neighbors and Affordable Housing." Among the general concepts it embraced, Jones said, was that of creating low-rise, secure homes for public housing tenants. "The idea," added Pettus, "was to improve life both in these environments and in surrounding neighborhoods." Both neighbors and residents like the look and feel of the newly opened Hayes Valley North project in San Francisco.

"I've not heard any gunfire in the middle of the night," said nearby resident Doug Thompson, noting that such sounds were heard almost nightly in the old project a notorious, multistory complex that was a den of drug dealing. "Nowadays, the streets are much safer," agreed businessman Tim Carrico, who manages nearby apartments. Residents who live in the new townhome complex the first stage of a $42 million make-over agree. "There's not the violence there used to be. And this is cleaner, neater," said Howard Jones, a former longshoreman.

Patsy Brown remembered the old Hayes Valley projects being frequented by "people who didn't live on the premises. They would hang out, selling drugs." The new complex, Brown added, "is beautiful, peaceful, quiet and more closed in so drug dealers are no longer around." Pettus, one of the AIA panelists who will explore the rehabilitation issue at the May 14-17 convention, said major strategies for change include mixing low-income residents with more prosperous families, tearing down buildings deemed unusable, reducing the number of units, and making security improvements by installing fencing and surveillance cameras. In the process, Pettus added, architects can create "defensible space," such as designing windows that face courtyards and play areas so parents can easily supervise their children. Consider the architectural design of Hayes Valley North, four blocks west of San Francisco's French Renaissance-styled City Hall, where rows of newly constructed townhouses gradually are being occupied. Their pastel-hued, gabled EXAMINER PHOTOS BY BOB MCLEOD Oakland's Acorn project is undergoing a renaissance.

The vacant lot in photo at top will soon give way to a courtyard with locked gates. Housing units go topless in photo at left. Soon they'll sport gable roofs similar to the one in the background. The top will be lopped off of the multistory unit above. That way, it will conform to other building sizes in the neighborhood.

lawns, playground equipment, fenced patios and improved night lighting. Half rehabilitated, half new, the 129-unit complex has been designed, Herman said, "to look like market rate housing." man, its architect, "Crime has been drastically reduced. "There's no graffiti and no more cruising," said Herman. "And the creeps that used to own the strip are gone." The approximately $20 million projects which recently won an American Planning Association award has erased what was a monotonous, cookie-cutter appearance typical of old public housing. In its stead, Poco Way has new entrances, new patio overhangs, porches, planted walkways, front -i 1 1 Patsy Brown is thrilled with her new IS I I 1 1 -I 'JJ- i I styles, designed by Backen Arrigo-ni Ross, are in context with their older Victorian era neighbors.

They look like middle-income housing rather than public projects for the very poor. "They're much more domestic and personal," said said San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Executive Director Jim Chappell. "They feel like houses instead of warehouses." The townhouses that have replaced the old cell block-like structures have front lawns and gardens. A new east-west street cuts through the block providing car-free play space for kids, all within sight of the houses' kitchen windows. Trees have been planted.

At the tops of rear stairways are decks big enough to hold barbecues and a couple of chairs. There are garages instead of the dreaded parking lots where vehicles shielded drug dealing. The only open parking lot is a small gated area for staff cars. The indoors are worlds removed from the dingy studio and one-room apartments that predominated in the old project. The three- and four-bedroom dwellings, which rent for up to $900 a month in a city where $900 barely pays for a studio apartment in many neighborhoods, range up Natalie Magallames, with infant Yessenia, at their home in San Francisco's Excelsior District.

The May 3 real estate section contained incorrect figures for a graphic on residential buildingval-ues. The building values represented cumulative totals for the first three months of 1997 and 1998 respectively. A quarter-mile west of Oakland's twin-towered Federal Building, a two-block complex known as the Acorn Housing Redevelopment Project is no longer a typical public housing institution owned and op- i i EXAMINERCHRIS HARDY kitchen in the Hayes Valley project. 1) CT I ty. It has been taken over by the award-winning firm BRIDGE, a private nonprofit developer based in San Francisco.

Work has just started on the contemporary, flat-roofed, sand-hued townhouses that sit amid empty lots. As conceived by Michael Willis Associates, Acorn's appearance will be replaced with a whole new look as early as next spring. Like many other projects, Acorn was known as a dangerous place for residents and nearby neighbors. The new Acorn will have a number of safety features. Density will be reduced by half from the 700 units that made up the old project and Willis' firm plans a series of courtyards with locked gates to limit access.

Among the more conspicuous changes will be roofline alterations to make Acorn dwellings conform to the look of typical neighboring houses in West Oakland. The new homes will have sloping or gabled roofs. And facades, still all the same sandy beige color, are slated to take on a variety of pastel shades. Acorn also is slated to be the site of a computer learning center, a swimming pool, two basketball courts, a 100-yard running track and an expanded recreation building. The computer center is being developed jointly with IBM Corp.

In addition, "we're bringing fiberoptic cable into every unit so tenants won't have to rely on Internet phones lines," said Michael Johnson, a co-developer with BRIDGE. To escape the stigma of an exclusively poor folks' ghetto, only 145 of some 300 families will receive rent subsidies from federal Section 8 vouchers for their $50 to $500-a-month rents. Other units will be available at market rates with rents ranging from $350 for studio apartments to $675 a month for a four-bedroom town-house. "The days of public housing where 100 percent of the tenants are on Section 8 assistance are going away," said Johnson. And this time around, public housing may just work.

1 ilverado, the crown jewel I of the Napa Valley announces the final residential community to be built there. It is called The Highlands. The setting is nothing less than spectacular. Sweeping the two eolf courses, Atlas Peak, quaint vineyards and the picturesque valley beyond. The Estates are awe architecturally stunning, enhanced by an array of the finest state-of-the art-amenities.

Prices start in the mid Membership is included in the famed Silverado Country Club and Resort. Be sure to secure your place at The Estates this coming weekend and be pan of the magic that is uniquely Silverado. For information please call (707)259-5151. Open Uam to 6pm Friday through Monday, Hillcrest and Watgate Drives, Napa. dales AT SILVERADO (2 to 1,400 square feet.

They include as standard equipment automatic washers and" dryers, dishwashers, wall-to-wall carpeting features unknown to the old Hayes Valley projects. There are spacious, walk-in closets and sliding door closets that glide as if on Rollerblades. There are no bars on windows, a hallmark of crime-beset neighborhoods. At the same time, each unit is equipped with an electronic burglar alarm system as well as a direct communication line to the police department. In a recognition of the communication age, every rental has jacks for cable TV, telephones and computers.

Some apartments even have three bathrooms. But the San Francisco Housing Authority intends to reduce that number to two when it outfits Hayes Valley South, the other half of the project that awaits construction. Fifty miles south of San Francisco is Poco Way, a three-block area long regarded as one of San Jose's most dangerous neighborhoods for its drug dealing, prostitution and other criminal activities. Seven years ago, the Santa Clara County Housing Authority undertook a metamorphosis so effective that, according to Bob Her UK Prices, ti rms, availability and sprdjkations ia are suoifcl 10 cnungf wummi nw. The Examiner corrects errors.

Please notify the editor: P.O. Box 7260, San Francisco 94120. A photo caption in the Real Estate section May 3 misidentified two families who purchased Bay Area homes for under $200,000. Portrayed in the photographs were Dick and Mary Kirk and their daughter, Emmalee, in front of their Pinole home, and Luis and ft 30 year fixed of $227,150 and below. 30 year fixed of $227,151 to $650,000, Rate Points A.P.R.

Rate Points A.P.R. 6.625 2.0 7.010 6.875 2.0 7.236 6.875 1.0 7.163 7.125 1.0 7.388 7.125 0.0 7.313 7.375 0.0 7.539 7.625 7.629 7.625 7.662 APR assumes 20 down APR assumes 20 down $150,000 loan amount $300,000 loan amount.