Investors who took a chance on a unique Bay Area-real estate cooperative are now receiving their first dividend checks. They may be small, but they carry an important message.
If Mabry’s club was legendary, so was Mabry herself: 3rd-generation West Oaklander Noni Session remembers her for the annual scholarship she gave out to a C-grade student indicative of caring for those that the system left behind.
Esther’s Orbit Room closed in 2010, and not long after, Mabry herself passed away. The building has been vacant ever since.
But now Session is shepherding a new effort to revitalize the property as an anchor for the revitalization of the entire 7th Street commercial corridor. The plan is to re-open the space as an arts and culture hub, including a gallery space and a performance space, as well as space for incubating food businesses, with three apartment units above. In late March, as executive director of the East Bay Permanent Real Estate Cooperative, she reached an agreement to acquire the property for $1.45 million from the current private owners.