SF New Developments

S.F. State, city see blockbuster film center at Hunters Point

San Francisco Business Times - May 19, 2006 by J.K. Dineen

San Francisco State University is in negotiations to build a digital arts campus in the Hunters Point Naval Shipyard, a project Mayor Gavin Newsom is hoping will become the heart of a sprawling film and new media business cluster in one of the city’s poorest neighborhoods.

While the concept is in the early planning stages, SFSU is looking at acquiring Building 813, a cavernous four-story 320,000-square-foot concrete structure that is one of the few existing buildings at the shipyard not slated to be demolished.

Under the scenario being discussed, the city would give the building to SFSU, which would then convert it into a state-of-the-art center for new media and digital cinema.

Newsom told the San Francisco Business Times he is “thrilled San Francisco State University is interested in partnering on a digital arts campus in Hunters Point,” which he said could generate educational opportunities and jobs for Bayview and Hunters Point residents.

Newsom said that he hoped SFSU would be to digital media at Hunter’s Point what UCSF has been to life sciences at Mission Bay: both an incubator for new companies and magnet for existing ones.

“It could provide us with a cluster similar to Mission Bay — that is the ideal and the idea,” Newsom said.

Lee Blitch, vice president for university advancement at SFSU, cautioned that the school officials still need to do a thorough engineering analysis of Building 813 before committing to…[continue to article]