Oakland to Have Its Own Queer District?

Posted on Fri, Mar. 26, 2004

Wan starts push for Eastlake gay district

By Mike Adamick

STAFF WRITER


San Francisco has its Castro District. New York has the West Village.

But Oakland, with the third highest per-capita population of same-sex couples and the nation's largest population of lesbian couples, does not have a specific neighborhood the gay community can call its own.

So City Councilman Danny Wan, who recently authored a resolution urging the county to allow same-sex marriages, is pushing for a gay-centered neighborhood east of Lake Merritt.

Wan, the representative for Grand Lake and Chinatown, wants to cultivate a gay community in the Eastlake area by using the business development and marketing powers of the nascent redevelopment area there to turn a tumble-down neighborhood into an economic and social hot spot.

"People are just incredibly hungry for ways to connect and having a geographical focus will help that," said West Oakland resident Tom Kelem, who has founded gay community groups in Berkeley and Oakland.

Wan, elected in 2000 as the council's first openly gay member, said residents have called once a month asking whether Oakland might one day create a gay district.

With more and more dual-income, same-sex couples moving to the city, Wan said marketing the Eastlake area, near Park Boulevard and East 18th Street, as a gay-focused neighborhood could unite a diffused community and ensure that entertainment and shopping dollars are spent in town -- as opposed to across the Bay.

"I get calls once a month, and they say Oakland is a great place to live, but every time we want to go out, or every time we want to go for a drink, we have to go to San Francisco," Wan said.

The neighborhood, which has seen a rapid rise in homeownership in the last three years, boasts community landmarks like the Parkway Theater, which holds gay and lesbian film festivals. It's also undergoing a spate of redevelopment, most recently a new Albertsons shopping center, said economic development manager Bill Lambert.

Oakland is not alone in trying to create gay-focused neighborhoods, though districts in other large cities tend to grow out of community will, as opposed to government proposals. But Oaklanders haven't yet pushed for a central gay district, because the level of social acceptance is higher than in other cities, according to demographers and gay business advocates.

The National Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce in Washington, D.C., founded in 2002, says there are already 51 different chambers throughout the country. And four more are on the way, according to co-founder Justin Nelson.

"It's really about creating safe places where individuals can flourish and feel welcomed," Nelson said.

According to the Urban Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank that tackles social issues, Oakland falls just behind San Francisco and Seattle in the per capita population of same-sex couples.

"In the Bay Area in general, there's a long history of acceptance," said Gary Gates, a demographer with the Urban Institute.

Wan and other gay advocates see a gay district eventually boasting a panoply of coffee shops, bookstores, bars and movie houses -- service-oriented businesses that foster social interaction.

Oakland has a smattering of what are considered gay bars, but no thriving social scene in one area, according to Kelem. He thinks a designated gay district would be embraced, and the Eastlake neighborhood could benefit from business development.

"In a lot of ways, it's an underdeveloped little shopping area, sort of sleepy, things that have been there for a long time -- so there's room to grow," Kelem said.

Just how much growth, and what kind, might spur community debate.

When Eastlake resident Carrie Anderson heard about the idea from this reporter Thursday, she thought a gay district would be a great idea. She warned, though, that general redevelopment in the area could lead to a spike in housing prices and force people out of an affordable neighborhood.

From a social standpoint, the neighborhood is ethnically diverse, and the prospect of a gay-focused business district could raise ire among more conservative or religious segments of the area, Anderson said.

The city's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Roundtable has created a subcommittee to study the issue further, said roundtable member Al Lujan.


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Reach Mike Adamick at 510-339-4061 or at madamick [at] cctimes.com.