The debate over the city’s cultural history has been ongoing for several years. Three years ago, the city school board initially supported the renaming of nearly four dozen schools. That controversial move was later rescinded shortly thereafter.Now, the city government is revisiting over what civic monuments should remain and how they should be viewed.
At a meeting last week, Angela Carrier, the senior project manager at the San Francisco Arts Commission, said at a meeting that some of the city’s monuments “no longer represent the values we say the city stands for.”
She added that the overall collection of the 98 city statues and monuments represent “a concentration of power, privilege, white supremacy, patriarchy, and colonialism.”Last year, the San Francisco Monuments and Memorials Advisory Committee issued a report recommending an audit.
The audit will be conducted by HR&A Advisors, an independent real estate and economic development firm. The city won’t have to fund the $3 million price tag. That’s being paid for by the Mellon Foundation.
The firm plans to hold three public meetings in October and is expected to make final recommendations by next January. What happens after that is anybody’s guess, since the Mayor and the Board of Supervisors will get to weigh in on whether or how to move forward with the recommendations.
