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A crew from the San Francisco Department of Public Works specializing in deep cleaning commercial streets visited Ingleside’s stretch of Ocean Avenue on Thursday.
The team started on Ocean Avenue and Victoria Street and worked its way to Frida Kahlo Way, scraping off stickers on road signs and poles, painting over graffiti and power washing sidewalks.
“It takes a city and all our agencies to work together to keep our city clean,” DPW Deputy Director DiJaida Durden said. She oversaw work crews.
The work was done under Clean Corridors SF, a DPW program started in 2021 to create more welcoming environments across the city’s commercial districts. They tackle an area in one of the city’s 11 supervisor districts every week.
“We would like to put it in the budget permanently because it encourages the business owners to do what they need to do in front of their businesses,” Durden said.
Clean Corridors SF has the support of District 7 Supervisor Myrna Melgar, Melgar’s legislative aide Emma Heiken said.
San Francisco Department of Public Works employees clean up Ocean Avenue as part of Clean Corridors SF. | Anne Marie Kristoff/Ingleside Light
Melgar allocated $505,000 in the 2022-23 add-back budget to DPW for cleaning along the district’s commercial corridors. She also sponsored a two-year pilot program launched last year that gives property owners the option to allow DPW to clean up graffiti for them at no cost.
The cleaning is in addition to that done by the nonprofit Ocean Avenue Association, a special-use district paid for by assessments on property owners. It contracts with Recology-owned Cleanscapes to perform many of these tasks throughout the week.
DPW employee Frederick Johnson has been painting over graffiti for the program for about one year.
“It’s kind of embarrassing when people come to visit our city and they get off the freeway and see all the graffiti and trash,” Johnson said. “It’s not welcoming so this helps.”
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Anne Marie Kristoff (she/her) is a recent graduate from San Francisco State University's journalism program. She enjoys writing about the arts, entertainment and nature.
