San Francisco's Bayview-Hunters Point, long known as the city's historic Black enclave, is changing, alongside neighboring Portola. Decades of housing economics and political fights over representation have helped reshape a corner of the city once defined by its World War II shipyard workforce.
Bayview and Portola have changed over time, with shifts in local commerce and housing shaping southeast San Francisco.
A Food Desert Becomes a Price Haven
Bayview housing prices have risen, yet they remain below the city median: hearthmap puts the neighborhood's typical home value about 34% below San Francisco's median, according to hearthmap.
Portola's San Bruno Avenue corridor shifted from Maltese-owned shops to an Asian commercial hub, according to SFGATE, in an area once nicknamed San Francisco's Garden District.
From Shipyard Boomtown to Contested Ground
The Navy acquired Hunters Point Naval Shipyard in 1940, and workers flowed into the district, according to SF Heritage. The shipyard was deactivated in 1974, and the neighborhood has wrestled with disinvestment and displacement ever since.
Phong Duc Yen, an ethnically Chinese refugee from Vietnam, opened a Chinese grocery store and herb shop on San Bruno Avenue, and later opened the area's first Chinese restaurant with his wife, Lien, the Chronicle reported.
Redistricting Reopens Old Wounds
San Francisco's 2022 redistricting process included debate over moving Portola from District 9 to District 10. The city's Redistricting Task Force approved its final map in a contentious 5-4 vote after 230 hours of public meetings, according to Mission Local.
Black and Asian communities have experienced tensions amid shifts in their population shares, New Breath Foundation reports. The Community Ambassadors Program began in 2010 and does safety work. It was expected to continue through the next fiscal year, though it faced possible funding loss amid an $800 million city deficit.
A Dim Sum Restaurant
Imperial Garden is a dim sum restaurant.
A Farm Bureau Takes Shape
Community leaders and neighbors have promoted cross-racial solidarity through joint celebrations and a communal farm. Local nonprofits have hosted a joint Lunar New Year and Black History Month celebration since 2010, an event New Breath Foundation traces to a partnership between the Bayview YMCA and the Community Youth Center of San Francisco launched to counter rising cross-racial violence.
In July 2024, Teddy Fang became the first president of the San Francisco Farm Bureau, California's first new county farm bureau in nearly 50 years, according to KALW.
A School Built to Close the Gap
Education has become another bridge-building front. Danny Kim started Rise University Preparatory with other teachers in 2017, a private Christian school intended to address education inequities, the Chronicle reported. Hoodline covered the school in 2016, when it was at 1224 Fairfax Avenue and had a 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. schedule.
The school reserves 80% of its seats for low-income students, first-generation college students, or Bayview residents, according to the Chronicle. The school covers about 90% of tuition costs through fundraising, and all of its recent graduates were admitted to four-year colleges — a record that, alongside the farm and the joint cultural celebrations, represents the neighborhood's ongoing effort to hold its communities together even as its population keeps changing.
