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Our Committees!
Join a committee! Contribute to the future of the District!
All our meetings are free and open to all.
Committee meetings are currently held on Zoom.
For meeting information, visit our:
Home page’s “Timely Reminders” post or,
Our Events List / Calendar, or
Our Facebook Events page.
Choose Committee Email Subscriptions
Our current committees:
Arts and Culture Committee
Communications Committee
Diversity Committee
Membership Committee
Fundraising Committee
Land Use Committee
Safety Committee
Other Groups
(Artist Opportunities, Volunteers, Save SOMA Network, GDA Info)
General Information about Committee Meetings and Membership
Arts and Culture Committee – third Thursdays, 6-7pm
The next meeting of the Arts and Culture Committee will be Thursday, November 20. This committee advocates for creative activity in the Cultural District, organizes events, performances, public art, and gallery shows, and explores opportunities to attract and support leather and LGBTQ artists in the Cultural District. Please contact the Arts and Culture Committee chair for more info!
Communications Committee – second Thursdays of the month from 6-7pm
The meeting of the Communications Committee has been re-scheduled to Wednesday, November 12, at 6 pm. The Zoom link for the meeting is Communications Committee Meeting. This committee handles the Cultural District’s social media and digital presence, public relations, branding, event promotion, and outreach to clubs, organizations, and individuals. Contact the Communications Committee chair for more info!
Membership Committee
The Membership Committee will pause our monthly meetings for the remainder of the year while we focus on planning for the year ahead and preparing for our upcoming Board Retreat. Regular meetings will resume in January 2026.
We appreciate your continued engagement and enthusiasm, and we look forward to reconnecting in the new year with fresh ideas and renewed energy.
Diversity Committee – first Thursdays, 6-7pm
Due to travel and illness, the next meeting has been rescheduled to Monday, November 17. This committee works to ensure diversity of membership, programs and participants, and to promote diversity, inclusion and equity in our organization and our community. Contact the Diversity Committee chair for more info!
Fundraising Committee – select Tuesdays, 5-6pm
This committee plans the District’s fundraising events, LeatherWalk and the Golden Dildeaux Awards. Its work also includes planning other fundraising events and campaigns, exploring grant opportunities, and creating materials to generate donations to support the work of the organization. Please contact the Fundraising Committee chair for more info.
Land Use Committee
The October meeting of the Land Use Committee has been cancelled. A combined November/December meeting will be Monday, December 8, at 4 pm.
This committee tracks construction projects and developments in the District and working with developers and city agencies to mitigate the effects of gentrification.
The Land Use Committee also works to preserve culturally and historically significant buildings, businesses, organizations, traditions, arts, events, and aesthetics, to protect tenants from displacement, and to promote affordable housing in the District. Contact the Land Use Committee chair for more info.
Safety Committee – first Mondays, 6-7pm – CANCELED
We are cancelling this month’s Safety Committee Meeting. We will see you again on January 5.
The Safety Committee works with local residents—including kinksters, sex workers, and others across the spectrum of our diverse community—to promote safety, share resources, and foster strong district-wide connections. The committee organizes safety and tech-related resources into an accessible online hub, keeps neighbors informed about upcoming events, and invites broad participation in conversations on public safety. Through inclusive outreach and relationship-building, the committee supports a safer, more informed, and more connected district for all. Join the Safety Committee. Contact the Safety Committee chair for more info!
Other mail lists
Artists
Information about opportunities and programs: murals, commissions, grant possibilities, etc. Join our Artists mailing list.
Volunteers
Our volunteer opportunities include greeting the public at event info booths, helping distribute posters and flyers, and helping with special projects throughout the year. Join our Volunteers mailiing list.
Advocacy
Join the “Save SOMA Action Network” for opportunities to advocate for our District, our businesses, and community institutions through letter writing and speaking at City hearings. Join our “Save SOMA Action Network”.
Golden Dildeaux Awards Info
Sign up to receive timely emails about Golden Dildeaux Awards categories, nominees, and voting. Sign up when you cast your vote!
Our meetings are free and open to all. Unless otherwise noted, all in-person meeting locations are ADA compliant and wheelchair accessible.
ASL interpreters will be provided if requested at least ten days in advance. Please send requests to manager@sflcd.org.
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Participate, help out, and be a part of our historic Cultural District!
Blow Buddies Closes Permanently
As reported on their Web site, on Hoodline, and in the Bay Area Reporter, Blow Buddies will not be reopening after the pandemic. The club, which opened on August 8, 1988 and saw its last guests on March 15, 2020, will be much missed by many in our community. As the Web page says, “The club was created in response to one virus and done in by another.”
It joins Watergarden, the San Jose bathhouse which recently closed after 43 years of operation, a victim of both the cost of being closed, and the uncertainty about when they might return to normal. A Bay Area Reporter article on that closing can be found here.
The good news, however, is that San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors is taking steps to make it easier for a bathhouse to operate in the city. In legislation passed by the Board of Supervisors in July 2020, and adopted by the Department of Public Health in January 2021, they have removed the mandate for inspections and the ban on locking doors, making traditional gay bathhouses possible.
They have also implemented zoning changes which allow “Adult Sex Venues” (ncluding bathhouses) to operate in broad areas of the city, including key locations in the Castro, Tenderloin and SOMA, where such venues would be most welcome and successful. You can learn more about the zoning changes here.
The first impact of these changes was the opening of the new Eros SF Sex Club, an SF Legacy Business formerly located on Market Street. The new facility at 132 Turk Street opened in June, in time for SF Pride. Read about the move here, and visit the Club’s website here.
Of course, the Steamworks bathhouse remains open in Berkeley, for those willing to travel across the bay.
With the new zoning, other adult sex venues are likely to open in San Francisco. If you would like to create one in SOMA, the LEATHER & LGBTQ Cultural District would love to help you. Write to business@sflcd.org for information.
Update: As of the summer of 2024, we understand that the Blow Buddies building is now a tea warehouse.
Murals of the LEATHER & LGBTQ Cultural District
Garrett Sohnly, a local artist and member of the LCD’s Arts and Culture Committee, has been compiling a slideshow of the murals and street art of our neighborhood.
We are also developing a “Map ‘o Murals” using Google Map technology. The map includes photographs of the murals, addresses, the artist’s name (where we know it), and where to learn more. You can use the small embedded version below, but for best results:
Open the LEATHER & LGBTQ Cultural District Mural Map in Web Browser or Google Maps
You can help us maintain, improve, and expand this map:
If you have better information that the map offers (the mural title, artist’s name, etc.), please share it with us.
If you spot a mural in our District – or other example of Leather Culture in the general vicinity of South of Market – send us a picture, telling us where it is, and anything you know about the artwork or the artist(s) who created it.
The Arts and Culture Committee of the LEATHER & LGBTQ Cultural District is very invested in the murals and public art visible throughout our special, South of Market neighborhood.