TODCO Advocacy

TODCO Advocacy: Community Planning, Civic Action, and a Just Future for SoMa

Why TODCO Combines Housing Development with Civic Action

Yerba Buena Redevelopment Area

TODCO’s advocacy grows from a simple conviction: a neighborhood should remain truly diverse and renewal should benefit residents rather than displacing them.

Working together with South of Market’s many communities, our vision is to realize: a just and inclusive neighborhood of opportunity. Achieving that in San Francisco requires more than housing development—it requires community voice, coalition-building, planning engagement, and civic action that shapes how the city grows.

TODCO’s founders were community activists of their era, not only housing developers. From the beginning, TODCO has incorporated civic action as a central and vital part of our mission.

Build Affordable Faster California (BAFCA)

Build Affordable Faster California (BAFCA) is a local, regional, and state Civic Advocacy & Action Project of TODCO. As a nonprofit community-based community development corporation for San Francisco’s South of Market Neighborhood since 1971, TODCO has built, owns, and operates approximately 950 units of affordable senior and SRO housing for lower-income San Franciscans in eight SoMa residences.

BAFCA’s mission is to fight for and with those living below the poverty line, the disadvantaged, and the working people of California—elders, people of color, the unhoused, immigrants and families—to win affordable housing and build a strong safety net that supports the health, safety, and well-being of all Californians.

BAFCA engages organizers, advocates, and policymakers around legislation and ballot measures that address:

  • production and protection of affordable housing

  • untenable wealth inequality

  • health and economic well-being across the state

Community Information and Engagement

Throughout its history, TODCO has emphasized working together with Central City community organizations of all backgrounds on the complex realities shaping SoMa’s future.

Examples include:

  • Yerba Buena Neighborhood Consortium (YBNC)
    Convening residents and stakeholders regularly since 1980 to learn about and address complex issues impacting the neighborhood—including those affecting the 2,000 senior housing residents of the Yerba Buena neighborhood, such as pedestrian safety.

  • Community Advisory Committees
    Including committees for the Sixth Street Redevelopment Area, the Eastern Neighborhoods CAC (for all SoMa), and the SOMA Stabilization Fund Citizens Advisory Committee.

  • Boards of Directors (current and past)
    Including the Yerba Buena Community Benefit District, Yerba Buena Gardens Conservancy, and the Treasure Island Development Authority (past board).

  • SoMa community coalitions
    Including groups such as the South of Market Problem Solving Council, Senior Power, Advocates for the South of Market, Coalition for Jobs, Arts, and Housing, and today, We Are SOMA.

Community Planning: Decades of Neighborhood-Shaping Work

Since 1980, TODCO has been a leading community voice in major urban planning undertakings, including:

  • Yerba Buena Redevelopment Area (including the seminal 1980 Yerba Buena Neighborhood Plan)

  • South Beach / Rincon Hill redevelopment: advocating for affordable housing within repurposed industrial waterfront districts

  • SoMa rezoning efforts: pushing for stabilization and a mixed-use future

  • SoMa Redevelopment Area post-Loma Prieta: neighborhood building focused on the distressed Sixth Street community

  • Treasure Island Base Reuse Project: co-founding the Treasure Island Homeless Development Initiative and advocating for neighborhood building within a major master-planned project

  • Central SoMa Plan (completed Sept. 2018): supporting community-based objectives integrated with downtown/tech expansion through TODCO’s Central Corridor Community Plan

  • Mission Bay Community Survey (2021): documenting race & equity dynamics in a new master-planned neighborhood

  • DignityMoves (2021): significant funder for temporary unhoused housing operator start-up and the 33 Gough prototype “village” project

  • Westbay Pilipino Multiservice Agency (2021): significant funder supporting acquisition and renovation for a permanent home

  • SF citywide EIFD (2021–22): proposing and advocating for tax-increment bond funding over 10 years for affordable housing and community-building investments

  • Hub Area Plan (2018–20): reducing scope and securing modifications and collateral agreements for community benefits

  • Yerba Buena Gardens Conservancy (2019–20): significant funder and organizer of a nonprofit now operating Gardens facilities and programs

Civic Advocacy: Citywide Policies and Coalitions

TODCO has joined coalition efforts across decades on pivotal civic issues, including:

  • Downtown Plan (1985) and subsequent outcomes like Proposition M (Annual Limit on Office Development) and the Unreinforced Masonry Building Seismic Retrofit Program

  • Hotel tax and redevelopment financing for affordable housing over decades, as a founding member with CCHO

  • Inclusionary Affordable Housing Program: helping establish and expand inclusionary housing requirements

  • Yerba Buena Gardens: supporting the vision of a community amenity for all San Franciscans and helping shape its future community-based management

City Ballot Measures: Support for Community-Focused Housing Policy

TODCO’s Yerba Buena Neighborhood Consortium helped develop and provided significant financial support to a series of San Francisco ballot measures, including:

  • 2014 Prop K: 50% goal for future City housing to be affordable

  • 2015 Prop K: mandated affordable housing on surplus City properties

  • 2016 Prop C: increased affordable inclusionary housing requirement (with scheduled increases)

  • 2016 Prop X: replacement of certain commercial spaces demolished for new development

  • 2018 Prop C: business tax increase to fund unhoused facilities and services

  • 2020 Prop E: sponsor/funder of a housing/office development balance mandate

  • 2020 Prop I: transfer tax increase to fund affordable housing

  • 2020 Prop J: supporter of an SFPD City Charter update

  • 2020 Prop G: lead supporter of a youth vote measure (unsuccessful)

Legal Action

The Yerba Buena Neighborhood Consortium has undertaken appeals and litigation on major developments, including:

  • UCSF Parnassus expansion (2021–22): EIR suit regarding jobs/housing balance

  • ABAG Plan Bay Area 2050: EIR suit regarding protections for sensitive communities and funding plans

  • 706 Mission tower (2016): EIR lawsuit settled with commitments for pedestrian safety improvements

  • Central SoMa Plan (2018): EIR appeal regarding balanced priority for neighborhood building

At the state level:

  • AB464 (2021): sponsored new EIFD mechanism; passed and signed

  • SB6 (2021–22): lead community supporter; pending (at time of writing)

  • CA wealth tax movement (2020–present): supporting coalition work advancing legislation

Community Empowerment: Funding and Organizing Capacity

TODCO has supported community empowerment efforts including:

  • United to Save the Mission (2020–present)

  • Oakland Progressive Alliance (2021–present)

  • Latino Task Force (2020–21) pandemic response coalition

  • SoMa Community Stabilization Fund and CAC initiatives (2019)

  • Inner Sunset Coalition (2020–22)

  • 469 Stevenson Project (2021): EIR appellant with a SoMa community coalition to stop a market-rate housing project that threatened Sixth Street community stability

Past Advocacy Example: 469 Stevenson

TODCO issued a statement on 469 Stevenson on December 6, 2021 and has engaged in related public discussion as part of its broader commitment to community stabilization.

The Bottom Line

TODCO advocates because a future for all communities requires it. Development and renewal should not erase the people who live here. Our work aims to protect opportunity, stability, and dignity for SoMa residents—especially those most at risk of displacement.

Last updated: 2025