Warfield Commons Meets the Neighborhood

This interview is part 4 of a 4-part Breaking Ground (opens in new tab) blog series exploring the people, places, and ideas shaping San Francisco’s Mid-Market and Tenderloin communities. As Warfield Commons (opens in new tab) opens its doors, we’re taking time to listen, learn, and get to know the communities that have long been rooted here and to explore how new neighbors can show up for each other.

Yesterday, Warfield Commons (opens in new tab) opened its doors. Now comes the part that matters just as much: becoming a neighbor.

Throughout Breaking Ground, we’ve been asking what it means to enter a neighborhood thoughtfully, and what we can learn by listening to the people who have been here long before us. Conversations with Carolina Osoria (opens in new tab), Del Seymour (opens in new tab), and Lila LaHood (opens in new tab) helped us look beyond the walls of Warfield Commons and better understand the histories, relationships, challenges, and possibilities that surround it.

In honor of SF Good Neighbor Week (opens in new tab) and National Good Neighbor Day (opens in new tab), this final chapter brings those conversations together and reflects on what it means for CAST, KALW, and the many organizations now calling Warfield Commons home to show up in Mid-Market and the Tenderloin. Breaking Ground was developed exactly for this reason: to uncover the stories that emerge from shared spaces and explore the connections that take shape when communities intersect.

Opening the doors is one milestone. The conversations that follow are where the next chapter begins. We’ll leave the final word to Hanisha Harjani, who conducted these interviews and spent the past few months listening, asking questions, and getting to know some of the people who make these neighborhoods what they are.

When I first met with CAST to discuss this project, I was really looking forward to the opportunity to talk to our neighbors in this new neighborhood where we would be putting down roots. There is no doubt about it — this is an incredibly exciting time to be at KALW. This move and the communities we are creating space for in Warfield Commons, brings in a new era to one of the oldest public media organizations in San Francisco. 

It also brings a lot of responsibility. Warfield Commons is situated at the intersection of the Tenderloin, Mid-Market, and SOMA neighborhoods. These spaces have rich histories that have defined the city’s reputation as a cultural hub and center for resistance and progress. They are also spaces that have been weaponized against the city and media narratives have painted particularly the Tenderloin and the people who live there in negative lights. 

Throughout this project, I have been grappling with questions around gentrification and revitalization. How do we move into a new space while being cognizant of the histories that have shaped it — way before we ever got here? How do we show up as good neighbors to the people who live there? There is no doubt that our existence in this space will shape the future of these neighborhoods and the city itself — so how do we wield that influence and power in a way that serves the communities already here?

Through my conversations with Del and Carolina and Lila, I was able to start mapping out the answers to some of these questions. But this is just the beginning. 

My hope is: as we move in and interact with our new neighbors on the daily, we can continue to have these conversations and deepen our practice of neighborliness and continue building on this foundation. 

KALW just welcomed a new Audio Academy cohort — this group of 8 early career reporters will learn how to create impactful journalism from Warfield Commons. I’m excited to see how our new location will shape the connections they make and the stories they tell. They have nine months ahead of them to explore this space, ask questions, and learn about our new neighbors.

This is just the starting point. The rest is yet to come.

About Hanisha Harjani

Hanisha Harjani is a journalist, educator, and multimedia artist living on unceded Ohlone land.  They’re an award-winning reporter, producing work for outlets like NPR, The Guardian, the Markup, and the San Francisco Chronicle, where they’ve helped tell stories about mommy blogging, conversion therapy, psychedelics, dating apps, and satanism — among other things. They currently work as the Community Journalism Director at San Francisco NPR member station KALW (opens in new tab), where they facilitate training programs for new and early-career radio reporters taking non-traditional pathways into journalism. They also produce experimental radio show — transmissions from [the psychic deli] (opens in new tab) — on online community radio stations.

Read the series