San Francisco's historic Verdi building faces uncertain future: demolition or preservation
SAN FRANCISCO — For more than 100 years, the Verdi building has stood on the corner of Columbus and Union in the North Beach area of San Francisco. But today, it is a ruin, crumbling away.
The building caught fire in 2013 and then again in 2018. The flames spared nothing inside, but the shell and the façade remain.
Nobody wants to see it stay the way it is, but what to do with it remains the million-dollar question.
Katherine Petrin is helping champion a possible Historic District Designation for North Beach.
"It's at the symbolic heart of North Beach, right across from Washington Square Park. It's a busy corner," she said. "There is every reason to save the building. It still has the potential to be a thing of beauty and to recall the Italian palazzo that was the inspiration for the architects who designed it."
Her ideal proposal is to bring the building back to life with new housing while preserving the historic façade.
"For over a century, it has been one of the most distinctive architectural buildings in North Beach," she said. "It would be great if what is coming is the right scale, instead of like, a tower."
"There's every reason to think that this building could be rebuilt using the existing walls," she said.
A plan for that was in the works, but now, the Verdi building's part-owner, Jeff Jurow, has changed course.
He'd like to demolish it and start from scratch.
His proposal is a mixed-use site with retail, housing, a hotel, and a rooftop restaurant.
He declined CBS News Bay Area's request for an on-camera interview, but did answer questions via email.
"We respectfully disagree with those who believe demolishing the walls would destroy this corner of North Beach. North Beach is much more than four burned-out walls. The walls themselves are not particularly significant or unique," he said. "Preserving them would also cost millions of dollars that the family simply cannot afford. Our proposed project is far superior in every way to a burned-out building that has remained in its current condition for far too long."
Jurow believes he's fighting against time to get the project underway, as the state considers the Historic District Designation, saying, "We see no path forward if the historic district is put in place."
"We've wanted to start building since day one. The proposed historic district doesn't change that, but we should see it for what it is: nothing more than an anti-housing measure masquerading as an effort to preserve North Beach," Jurow said. "North Beach is in no danger of being redeveloped, as there are already very strict laws protecting rent-controlled housing from demolition. If a historic district is established, it's very unlikely there will be a path for us—or anyone else—to build new housing in North Beach."
"We intend to utilize pro-housing state laws to help expedite our project," Jurow added.
Those laws could include SB 423, which streamlines multi-family housing approval if there are enough below-market-rate (BMR) units in the proposal, and, SB 330, which locks in a site's development rules to the date an application is filed.
"I don't know what the proposed project looks like for this site, but I do know that a 24-story tower would be allowed, and I just don't think that's the right solution for this site," Petrin said. "This is not an anti-housing stance. It's just a very symbolic building and symbolic corner, and that would not be the right project at this site."
Petrin believes a project needs to push forward, but says the site's future shouldn't push its past aside.
"Buildings like this will never be built again," she said. "I think we should do everything we can to save it, restore it, and return it to its former glory."
