Letter to Editor: Update from SAVE MSB: What are the next steps?

South San Francisco, Ca  May 2, 2023 by Cynthia Marcopulos, Community Leader

The Municipal Service Building Must Be Preserved for Senior and Community

By the Fall session, Park & Rec classes will be moved to the Campus on ECR/Chestnut.  What is the fate of the MSB?

We witnessed the City Council vote for the Housing Element in January that included the MSB which meant it can be developed for future housing.

We hear our city council & staff say, “Don’t worry about it, it may never happen, maybe 3 years down the road.”

SAVE THE MSB! This MUST be preserved for seniors and our community!

With the recent vote to approve the Fire Station on Camaritas, by the time it is built, it will be 3 years.  There is a shortfall of funding that one can only believe Measure W Oversight Commissioner Brosnan stating (you’ve seen the video) that the MSB was to be sold to fund the new fire station.

We have said over and over what a stable, sturdy, sound building the MSB is, citing documentary proof.  It is ridiculous to believe all the services that are being promised will be housed in the Campus (let alone if you can find parking with the 20 underground parking spaces, 100 surface parking, and street parking competing with the 408 apartment units within a block of the campus, and our SSF PD parking in Safeway’s parking lot –  BART is a 22-minute walk from the campus – but I digress).

Roberta Cerri Teglia Center

Once the City’s Elementary School, and then a Recreation Center, the Magnolia Center is currently home to the Senior Center and Adult Daycare Program. {Photo: SSF.net}

The Roberta Cerri Teglia Center aka the “Former” Magnolia senior center is a dilapidated old elementary school and is primarily for Adult Daycare, and when the elevator breaks, it is not ADA complaint (a State law) and has only 34 parking spaces.

So, we are a population of almost 64,000 residents, and as our city council panders to the biotech and corporations on the east side, now allowing “life science” corporations to be in our neighborhoods, we think that the $21 million earmarked for bike and walking paths on the east side should be used to preserve the MSB as a senior/multi-use community building. (Why is the $21 million for bike/walking paths mandated by the State for that use because it’s labeled “East of 101 impact fees”, but our city can find funding for any pet project they have at their whim?  Who is more “impacted” than the residents??)

This is what we are losing in our fair city, community.  We need to be a community again, and preserving the MSB as a community center for all ages is paramount to finally recognizing that this city belongs to the residents, not to the biotech, not to the pie-in-the-sky ideas that have destroyed our city thus far.

Please contact the council and ask them to rezone the MSB back to its original state, mixed use, and preserve it as a senior/multi-use community center.  Here are the councils’ emails:

Mayor Flor Nicolas:  Flor.Nicolas@ssf.net

Vice Mayor Mark Nagales: mark.nagales@ssf.net

Councilman Mark Addiego: mark.addiego@ssf.net

Councilman James Coleman: james.coleman@ssf.net

Councilman Eddie Flores: eddie.flores@ssf.net

And, if you haven’t signed the online petition to Save the MSB!, here is the link:

https://forms.gle/QZ5CC7gqZZedRwNH6

Let’s Take Back Our City!

Cindy