This May we announced the latest round of ShineOn SF Action Awards – a mini grant program providing ten $5,000 grants plus technical assistance open to SF residents, SF-based businesses, and community groups interested in bringing free, recurring community events to public spaces in San Francisco.

After reading through dozens of applications from skateboarding events to beach cleanups, we finally settled on the following ten grantees. We can’t wait to help bring these free events to public spaces across the city. Keep an eye out for more details on these events and the next round of Action Awards by signing up for our newsletter below or following us on social media (@sfparksalliance).

Fierce Fat Femme

The Fierce Fat Flea Market is a clothing and goods market dedicated to the plus size shopper and open to everyone! The market brings together a curated clothing swap along with small business makers from the SF Bay Area to provide a unique shopping experience to the fat community and more! The Fierce Fat Flea is created by fat people, for fat people and it is the only plus size market in the Bay Area. The Fierce Fat Flea is a fat liberation space working to showcase a safe space for the fat community to be created and cared for.

ASL Love

ASL Love is bridging linguistic and cultural gaps between sign language users and the public through a series of arts and culture events. Their Deaf-led team is working with local organizations, schools, and Deaf-led grassroots groups to address language deprivation among Deaf, DeafBlind, DeafDisabled and hard of hearing youths by creating accessible and language-rich spaces in the community.

(Left) Fierce Fat Femme

(Right) ASL Love

CREATE

Create Skateboards will organize an outdoor professional skateboard demonstration event, called CREATE Fest. This event will not only entertain and inspire but also integrate economic opportunities, stewardship of public spaces, community connections, pandemic recovery, and involvement of nearby communities to bring about positive change and rejuvenation.

Marty’s Place Affordable Housing Cooperative

Balmy Alley Movies (BAM) is a monthly gathering at The Richard Purcell Community Center at Marty’s Place Affordable Housing where attendees clean up litter in Balmy Alley and watch movies and live entertainment. This event brings together the LGBTQ+ community and allies from the Mission District’s Balmy Alley & 24th street and surrounding San Francisco neighborhoods.

Tradición Peruana Cultural Center

Tradicion Peruana Cultural Center will provide four consecutive weeks of “Toca, Cajon y Baila,” a music and dance workshop at Excelsior Park. “Toca, Cajon, y Baila” is a workshop for all skill levels. It will be taught by TPCC co-founders Lydia Soto and Juan de Dios Soto and will provide a unique and enriching cultural experience for participants.

Reclaiming SF!

People unfamiliar with SF tend to ask, “Are there Black people in San Francisco?”– a question that erases the city’s diverse Black communities. This public space activation turns that question on its head to create a space elevating all that is beautiful and vibrant about Black San Francisco– past, present, and future. Reclaiming SF is part museum, part kickback that ultimately invites people to gather, create and reflect about spatial justice, and how our relationship to space influences urban life.

MusicTechSF

“Music in the Garden” will be a chance to gather the community of Southeast San Francisco to create, listen, and share music together in the beautiful community garden at June Jordan School for Equity in the Excelsior District. We will host 3 monthly beatmaking/songwriting & gardening workshops for the greater community, while exploring the community garden at June Jordan and sharing our love for plants, culture, community, music, and social justice.

Other Avenues Grocery Cooperative

Other Avenues Grocery Cooperative wants to go beyond their place as a community resource for natural food and goods, and create fun, healthy ways to bring people together to celebrate the Outer Sunset neighborhood. Over the next few months, they will host community events that meet at the co-op on 44th and Judah for shared food and drinks, then venture around the neighborhood on two community bike rides, two beach clean ups, and a cooking workshop.

The YouVerse Project

Discovery Day Aboard The YouVerse Bus/Shipyard Community Cleanup is a free 6 part, twice a month event focused on self discovery, personal development, emotional wellness and community building cultivated through a series of craft projects, meditation, fundamental activities, social play, interactive gaming, and volunteering.

Youth Art Exchange (YAX)

Youth Art Exchange will present a series of three outdoor free visual arts family workshops in the courtyard at YAX Studios at La Fénix (1950 Mission). This outdoor space is a paseo or passage that connects Mission Street to Wiese Street. This event series will launch the space as a new indoor/outdoor community arts hub and activate the gallery storefront space on Mission to increase pedestrian and community activity on the block.