Sausalito divided over development or preservation for its Marinship district

By Itay Hod

A lot has changed at Heath Ceramics over the last eight decades. The machines have evolved. The company has grown. But much of the work is still done the old-fashioned way.

“We’re actually one of the last dinnerware manufacturers left in the United States,” said Robin Petravic, co-owner of Heath Ceramics.

For Petravic, that means a process that remains stubbornly hands-on, with each piece shaped, glazed and carefully finished by a small army of artisans in Sausalito — a cozy town, just north of the Golden Gate Bridge, that looks straight out of a postcard.

For generations, Heath has been part of that picture. Its distinctive dishes have found their way onto tables far beyond the Bay Area, earning a place in American design and in museum collections around the world.

“These become family heirlooms. Very often we’ll have three generations of Heath families shopping together,” Petravic said.

But just outside the factory doors, time hasn’t been quite as kind. Heath sits in the Marinship, a waterfront district where decades-old land-use rules tightly restrict development. Those rules were designed in part to protect the area from more intensive development. Petravic says they have also made it harder for existing businesses to adapt.

When Heath wanted to replace a sloped roof with a flat one so forklifts could operate inside, Petravic says the zoning change needed to make it happen would have required a citywide vote.

Heath expanded in San Francisco instead. Now, Petravic and his fine dinnerware may finally have reached their breaking point. 

“We’ve been looking at locations for a while,” he said. “We don’t want to leave Sausalito. But at some point, we’ve been pushed to the limit too much,” he said.

But the argument over how much Sausalito should change is headed to the ballot.

Measure X, which voters will decide Nov. 3, would rewrite development standards in the Marinship’s industrial and waterfront zones. It would increase limits on floor area, building coverage and, in some cases, added height, while allowing a wider range of uses. It would also revise a decades-old ordinance, so the City Council could make future zoning modifications outside the Downtown Historic District without the need for a citywide vote. 

Supporters argue those changes could attract investment and generate economic activity that could help the Marinship adapt. Opponents say that allowing larger buildings and potentially higher-value uses could put added pressure on artists, makers and maritime businesses that give the area its character. Those are competing against arguments about what Measure X might ultimately bring, not guarantees of what would happen if it passes. 

For nearly four decades, painter Leslie Allen has worked at the ICB, the Industrial Center Building, home to dozens of artists.

“Sausalito is sort of an arts capital in our state, and it bills itself that way,” she said.

Where Petravic sees obstacles, Allen sees guardrails. She fears more development could bring gentrification, eventually pricing out the artists and maritime workers who give the Marinship its character.

“I’m not just worried about it. I’ve been told point blank, ‘That’s what we’re after, that’s what it’s gonna be, and brace yourself,'” she said.

And therein lies Sausalito’s predicament: How do you give businesses room to grow without putting at risk the people and places you’re trying to preserve?

Zach Weinstein is living somewhere in the middle. His family has been making clothes in the Marinship for decades. Now, he’s continuing that tradition with his own label, LLEA Blue, designed, cut and sewn right in Sausalito.

But there’s a catch. He can make the clothes here. But under the current zoning, he says, he can’t sell them here the way he would like. Measure X would change the rules governing accessory retail and other commercial uses in the Marinship. 

Still, Weinstein doesn’t want growth at any cost.

“I don’t want Sausalito to turn into Emeryville, as an example, where it’s like, you know, a mall and you lose the kind of small-town feel,” he said.

So, when it comes to Measure X, Weinstein finds himself caught between two competing instincts: giving the Marinship room to evolve and protecting what made it worth preserving in the first place.

Whether people on opposite sides of Measure X might eventually find common ground is yet to be seen.

“It’d be nice,” he said.