On April 1, 1977, five grassroots organizations came together to create the Chinatown Resource Center (CRC), a nonprofit community development organization. These five founding organizations were the Committee for Better Parks and Recreation in Chinatown, formed in 1971 to advocate for Chinatown's open space and recreation needs; the Chinatown Coalition for Better Housing, formed in 1972 to advocate and organize for affordable housing; the Ping Yuen Residents Improvement Association, established in 1968 and one of the most active public housing tenants association in San Francisco; the Chinatown Transportation Research and Improvement Project, founded in 1974 to advocate and plan for Chinatown's transportation needs; and the Chinatown Coalition for Neighborhood Facilities, formed in the 1970s to advocate for funding for a neighborhood facility in Chinatown resulting in the development of the Geen Mun Center in 1979.

In 1978, the Chinese Community Housing Corporation (CCHC) was established as a subsidiary of CRC to provide safe, decent and affordable housing. CRC and CCHC have worked closely to integrate housing development activities into an overall neighborhood improvement strategy. Those efforts have resulted in over 2,200 units of new or rehabilitated affordable housing, primarily in the Chinatown, North Beach, and the Tenderloin communities of San Francisco. CCHC's development portfolio in these three neighborhoods is one of the most diverse in the State of California, both in terms of housing type and tenant demographics.

On January 1, 1998, the Chinatown Resource Center and the Chinese Community Housing Corporation was consolidated to become the Chinatown Community Development Center. This restructuring occurred so as to streamline governance and operations to better serve our constituencies as a community development corporation. We now have a single Board of Directors with 27 members, and as one entity, Chinatown CDC is perhaps the closest representation of a traditional community development corporation in the San Francisco Bay Area, doing advocacy and organizing, planning, housing development and construction, property management and tenant services work.

history | awards | funders | staff | board

[home] [contact] [about] [workareas] [connect] [join] [support] [sitemap]