WITH LUXURY DEVELOPMENT ON ALL SIDES, OAKLAND ARTISTS BUY THE RIGHT TO STAY PUT

KQED - Aug 8, 2018 - By Sam Lefebvre

“Shadetree is now an important model for other communities of artists trying to find the wherewithal to buy their building in Oakland,” said Kelley Kahn, the city’s policy director for art spaces, who supported the tenants through the acquisition. “Ownership is the most powerful tool artists have to protect themselves in a changing and highly competitive private real estate market—and unfortunately the hardest to achieve.”

David Keenan of Safer DIY Spaces, a consulting organization helping Shadetree resolve permitting and zoning issues, called the purchase “unprecedented,” adding that the live-work complex is arguably the oldest of its kind in Oakland. “The odds were long and the timeframe was compressed,” he said. “It defies not just my expectations—all of the lawyers and professionals who helped were dumbfounded that they made this happen.”

In Oakland Artists' Enclave, Residents Ponder Life With New Neighbors

KQED - Apr 22, 2013 - By Kyung Jin Lee, Deborah Svoboda and Dan Brekke

'Residents wonder how much longer their good fortune—the affordable digs, the bohemian atmosphere, their intimate view of the estuary's weirdly juxtaposed natural splendor and bruised industrial waterscape—can last.

Zack Parkes is a musician who recently rented a cottage in the neighborhood. He loves it. "It’s as pure down here as it get," he said. "This place really hasn’t been changed and altered. I think it still embodies a lot of the tradition of what makes Oakland Oakland."'

Pleading the fifth / Artists revel in enclave's eccentricity, fear waterfront development

SFGATE - Friday, May 4, 2001 - Janine DeFao, Chronicle Staff Writer

“Around 100 people live and work on Fifth Avenue, and most are on a first- name basis with each other. They are neighborly and love to party -- their annual Halloween bash is legendary -- but not so cozy that they interfere in each other's business, they say. 

It is a place where neighbors are just as likely to borrow a forklift as they are a cup of sugar. 

"There's a very communal sense here. Everybody shares raw materials and helps each other out on projects," says Carol Russell of Phoenix Iron Works,...”

Night Crawler

SF WEEKLY - Wednesday, Jul 29 1998 - Silke Tudor 

“On Dec. 12, 1979, he put down $77,378 on a piece of derelict property with three crumbling buildings on Fifth Avenue.”

“Schultz discovered the 22,000-square-foot compound during his career as a designer for the city of Oakland.”

“"I've been working on this sculpture for more than 18 years," says Schultz with the selling wink of a confidence man. "I call it my Museum of Unnatural Wonders."

Bob Schultz believes “you can be as crazy as you want to be, as long as you don't hurt anyboDY"

SFGATE - Friday, October 10, 1997 - Maitland Zane, Chronicle Staff Writer

“...a tight little community who see themselves as Davids fighting the Goliaths of the Port of Oakland.”

“Fifth Avenue Point is an enclave much like the Sausalito waterfront or the houseboat dwellers of Mission Creek in San Francisco, a hive of some 50 small businessmen, architects, woodworkers, photographers, ironworkers and artists…”

“Heller responded diplomatically when told of Fifth Avenue residents' fears that they might be booted out. "Our current plan would not displace them," he said. "Rather, we would want to incorporate Fifth Avenue into the Expo. We see the neighborhood as a 'craft zone,' which could be quite fun."