Now that a private prison company is running a halfway house at the site of the famed transgender protest known as the Compton's Cafeteria Riot, trans activists are hoping to redesignate the site with another set of historical protections.
While the detail had been somewhat lost in time in previous decades, it has become well-documented in recent years that the address 111 Taylor Street was the one-time site of the former Gene Compton’s Cafeteria, and home to the 1966 Compton’s Cafeteria Riot that served as the sort of Stonewall moment for the trans rights movement. It has also become something of an abomination to the trans community that that 111 Taylor Street site (technically 101-121 Taylor Street in today' s nomenclature) is now a for-profit reentry facility run by private prison contractor GEO Group, and one that allowed a resident to die on their watch this past July.
The trans community has attempted to get the prison contractor booted out, though they’ve been unsuccessful with that campaign thus far. The Bay Area Reporter reminds us this week that activists with the Compton’s x Coalition are in the process of trying to bolster the historic landmarking of the building, which may not itself get the GEO Group removed from operating on the site, but does at least provide additional protections for the building.
The site does not lack for historic landmark status. It received both federal and state landmark designations in early 2025. And the site has also received a landmark historic designation from the SF Board of Supervisors in 2022, though that designation only applies to the “Intersection of Turk and Taylor Streets" and the exterior walls of the building at 101 Taylor Street.
In other words, the bulk of the building that housed Gene Compton’s Cafeteria is not landmarked, and activists believe this leaves it vulnerable to potential demolition — with a future developer getting away with preserving just the facade, perhaps. A city-designated historical landmarking would likely protect the building from such demolition, even though it does not give supporters the power to evict a prison-industry contractor from operating at the space.
The San Francisco Historic Preservation Commission is scheduled to hear this historic landmark designation request (among several others) at their Wednesday, January 21 meeting scheduled for 12:30 pm.
Related: SF Trans Community Rallies to Reclaim Historic Compton's Cafeteria Site In the Tenderloin [SFist]
Image: Pax Ahimsa Gethen via Wikimedia Commons
