August 11, 2021
Dear La Cocina Community,
In 2005, Folsom Street had six lanes of traffic, significantly fewer multi-million dollar single-family homes and a vibrant informal food economy at Cesar Chavez, at 24th and throughout the homes of the neighborhood. The first cohort of La Cocina entrepreneurs had already been built through the hard work and grassroots advocacy of organizations and people like the Women’s Initiative for Self-Employment, MEDA and Valeria Perez-Ferreiro and Laurie Mackenzie. Veronica Salazar was selling huaraches and caldos out of her Tenderloin apartment, Maria del Carmen was frying plantain chips in her Folsom Street apartment and Fernay McPherson was driving the 14 and dreaming about never having to drive that route again.
When we opened the doors to La Cocina, we didn’t know what the viable paths for our businesses or for this organization were going to be. I was — when I wasn’t working in restaurants — sitting in coffee shops with a busted Lenovo laptop, applying for just about any job I could find on Craigslist. More to the point (which has never been my strength, though I bear no shame for that truth), La Cocina existed before me, and as I consider my transition out of this organization at the end of this year, I know with confidence that it will similarly thrive without me here.
I first began working on a succession plan at La Cocina in late 2016, alongside our board and staff, particularly with the tremendous Leticia Landa and Geetika Agrawal. It’s an industry best-practice to consider succession, and also an exercise in the essential capacity to think about a future that does not involve one’s self. Since that day in 2016, we have grown tremendously, hired additional leadership (Michelle Magat, Aniela Valtierra, Cynthia Solis and Laura Ambroseno) with a transition in mind, opened a marketplace, lived in the midst of an on-going pandemic and extended my tenure here by one year. That extension will be coming to a close as we relaunch our search for La Cocina’s next Executive Director with Koya Partners this week. You can find the job posting on their website here.
Over the last 16 years, La Cocina has demonstrated again and again what might be reality if we were to honestly address the inequities baked into our economies, cities and spaces. La Cocina has seen great success; we have launched businesses, festivals, a book, markets and more. We have won awards, captured hearts and redefined the Bay Area landscape for both food and economic opportunity. If you’re reading this, I have to assume that you know about many of these successes already (or, if not, will just follow the links that our tremendous team has built into this very same website to learn more).
You should also know that what has always driven that success is the talent, diligence and focus of the entrepreneurs who choose to launch their businesses out of La Cocina, the staff and volunteers that have dedicated their time and talent to those launches, and the generous donors who see the need for meaningful investment in models like ours. I don’t say that lightly, I say it because I’m leaving La Cocina in the very hands that built it in the first place.
I can’t imagine my life without La Cocina, and I feel lucky that I won’t have to. Veronica’s home-cooked food is now available at multiple locations, Fernay’s fried chicken for sale nearly every day, and Maria del Carmen’s business - now run by her daughter Estrella - is an anchor at our Municipal Marketplace. And this work that I have been so very lucky to get to do is not limited to La Cocina.
We are all responsible for advocating for, participating in and building the economy that we need, and I can’t imagine not working towards that end either. What a gift, then, to know that I will be so well fed doing it.
Thank you to everyone who has been a part of this place alongside me. You’ve built something that means the world to me.
Warmly,
Caleb
Press release (Aug. 2021): La Cocina Executive Director Caleb Zigas Bids Farewell to Organization After 16 Years