the meeting starts at 904 a.m. secretary fuller, please call the roll. >> good morning. please respond with, here, or present. lauren post is absent today. gerald turner, present. commissioner turner is present. paul woolford, present. commissioner woolford is present. fady zoubi, present. vice chair zoubi is present and residing. with three members present we have quorum for the public works commission. public comment is taken for all informational and action items on today's agenda. to comment in person, please line up against the wall near the screen, the audience left when public comment is called and members of the public wishing to comment on an item

from outside the hearing room, you may do so by joining webinar through the link on page 2 of today 's agenda. to be recognized select the raise your hand icon in the webinar. you may also comment from outside the chamber dialing 1-415-655-0001 using the meeting access code 26609792016 pound, pound and to raise your hand to speak, please press star 3. the telephone log in information is available on pages 1 and 2 of today's agenda. commenters may speak for up to three minutes per item and you receive a 30 second notice when your speaking time is about to expire. in the event we have many commenters on an item, the chair may bedeuce the public comment time to less then 3 minutes per person. unless you are speaking under

general public comment, please note you must limit your comments to the topic of the agenda item discussed and if commenters do not stay on topic, the chair may interrupt and ask to limit comments to the item at hand. we ask public comment be made in a civil respectful manner and refrain from the use of profanity. abusive or hate speech will not betolerated. address your remarks to commission as a whole, not individual commissioners or staff. the public is always well come to submit comment in writing of publicworks.commission@sfdpw dot org or by mail. on behalf the commission extend thanks to sfgovtv building man jsment

and media service for helping make the meeting possible. mr. chair. >> thank you secretary fuller. i have made a request to remove item 4e from the consent agenda and move it to next meeting consent for last minute changes or corrections. are there any request from the commission to change the order of the agenda today? no further agenda changes, mr. secretary, please call the first item. >> item 1, the announcement by the chair commissioners and secretary and this is informational item. >> thank you. i have three short announcements. i want to congratulate everyone

who is celebrating pride month this month. the city is-has a lot of people and lot of things going on and just looking forward for the parade. my second announcement is, i also want to acknowledge this month we will have celebration of juneteenth. this is our american history and that great day that happened in 1864 and wish everyone happy juneteenth. last but not least, i want to encourage public to utilize our 311 system. it is a great item. i talked to a lot of people and using the app, using the phone call, the calling and getting things resolved in our neighborhoods is very important, but communication is also very important and the system

actually works. those are my announcements only. any announcements from commissioners? commissioner turner. >> i wanted to also thank the staff. many folks i think many people have been participating in the multitude of night markets and events going on. there is now been two in my neighborhood and i happen to work up the street and it is amazing to see the street cleaners, the crew, the orchestration that happens behind the scenes we quitely do, so so many people both guests and residence can revel in this amazing city. i know as many of these are becoming more and more prevalent, it will put more and more staff and i want to thank you because it is so important for the city to have these opportunities to bring energy back into the city but i recognize what it takes to get

that done. as we see more and more of the night markets and other things coming into the sit a e, i are want to one, thank, the staff and direct r short, i wonder how we are planning for impact as we see more and more of these coming seemingly every week. >> thank you commissioner turner. good morning, carla short. yeah, i think we try to work closely with the various sponsors of these events, including many of are sponsored by the supervisors office or some of the cbd's, so we have many events that we have sort of extra level of attention for ongoing, and so this is adding another to that mix, but we will always do our best to try to reallocate resources to be available and

ready to help support the events because as you know, they are very important to revitalizing our city and it is really fun to see when so many people get-join this type of event and see the activation happening. i think our crews feel that energy and excitement too. >> i want to thank you again and looking forward to the hr report, because i do think the city is back and as we have more and more of these activities, they are not going to see utbus feel us as our team is in the streets making sure everyone can revel and have a great time. thanks all around. >> thank you commissioner turner. any other announcements? there being none, secretary fuller, your announcements, please. >> thank you. as part of the regular report to this commission about the sanitation and streets commission, they held their last meeting may 20 and

discussed the street environmental services performance measure report as well as a special report on public trash cans which was initially a conversation that came up in this commission and the sanitation and streets body took lat over. that over. the next meeting is next monday, june 17. it will include proposed adoption of standards of cleanliness and they will also have their performance evaluation with the commission secretary. next announcement is this commission will evaluate your secretary in closed session june 24. that is how it is scheduled. and our schedule to hold their director's performance evaluation to

provide commissioners evaluation forms ahead of time for respective evaluations held in closed session. finally, my last announcement is, the you may notice the restricted communication report is updated and now includes additional information for project based contracts, a direct link to the scope of work inside the project advertisement for many of those projects, if it is much larger project, a link to the larger web page for that, and that is included for the benefit of commissioners and the public. that concludes my announcements. >> thank you secretary fuller. please open public comment. >> members of the public who wish to comment on item 1, announcements by which chair, commissioners and secretary may line up against

the wall furthest from the door and if calling on the phone press raise your hand feature or star 3 on your phone in order to be recognized. okay. no one approached to speak on this item and there are no callers, so that concludes public comment. >> is there further discussion by the commission? there being none, secretary fuller, please call the next item. >> item 2 is the director's report and communications. public works director carla short is here to present and this is an informational item. >> thank you. good morning, carla short. director of public works. hope you all had a good weekend. i would also like to get started by saying happy pride. our department kicked off pride multh celebration with pellagraising ceremony at operation yard tuesday. we had a nice turn out across

the department. we have events throughout the month. tomorrow we have a staff lead lunch time webinar titled, my queer work besty where colleagues chat about being out of the closet and supported by straight allies at work. the big is pride parade. we'll have a large force of crews cleaning up after the parade. this is san francisco's biggest civic celebration of the year and we are proud to be part of it. the pride parade falls othen last sunday on the month. i give a big thanks to our public works pride committee for their work. as department we are committed to making all employees feel valued and safe and the work around pride and all our heritage month celebrations help us elevate that principle. next up i want to give a brief update on our budget. mayor breed submitted her $15.9 billion budget plan to the board of supervisors may 31. as expected, her spending

priorities are public safety, economic revitalization, shelter for the unhoused, drug treatment and street cleanliness. for the most part, the public works budget and mayor plan holds the line. as we expect in planning for, there is a slight reduction in funding for the pit stop public toilet program. we are not looking to close any of the 31 sites, but taking a surgical approach to reducing hours at some locations guided by our usage data to minimize unwanted impacts. as reminder, the pit stops are staffed public toilets. we don't want to see any funding cuts to the program, we understand the mayor had hard choices to make, closing a $789 million two year deficit to balance the budget. all in all, we faired pretty well. we are not contemplating staff lay offs and that is a scraer very good news. the other area keeping close eye on is paving budget. we did not get all the funding to keep the paving budget whole, but

the mayor proposed a bond measure for november ballot that if approved would provide additional money for our street resurfacing program. i want to emphasize we are really at the very beginning of the budget deliberation. the mayor budget is in the hand of board of supervisor for consideration and wednesday of this week, we'll be at the board of supervisors budget committee for the first public hearing on public works budget. i will toy to update the commission on our budget status. next up some exciting news on the permitting front. last year as part of ongoing effort to advance the city commitment to streamline the housing development process, we implemented significant changes allowing earlier releases of holds on building permits. now we are reforming the way we review applications to insure they are complete at the time they are submitted. our team at the bureau street use and mapping developed and published a new check list and resource guide thet

provides clear standards, detailing what applicants must submit to department before the application can be reviewed and deemed complete. complete permit application package includes the filled out preapplication check list, the application, the project plans and the permit fee payment. once the application is deemed complete, public works will circulate the package to all relevant city agencies. this change is intended to make the city review of proposed developments impacting the public right of way, particularly housing faster and more efficient allowing projects to reach construction phase more quickly. it remains our responsibility at public works to safeguard the public right of way, which means success of this new approach relies heavily on applicants understanding and insuring their role to submit projects complete and compliant with standards. we are getting the word out on our website.

permit center posters, meeting with permitting agencies, targeted eimation to construction and developer communities and public forums like this one. together we can and will improve the permitting process to move san francisco forward. a huge thank you to avenue wn who worked on this. i know this will go a long way streamlining and improving the process. if you want to learn more visit sfpublicworks.org/service/permit s/what's new. i want to let you know about a change to the sidewalk vending program in the mission district. mayor breed and supervisor ronan announced the implementation of a moratorium to target the sale of illegal goods along this vital commercial stretch. to mitigate impacts with permitted vendors, the city worked to

support permitted street vendors setting up temporary market space, launching a marketing campaign to promote those venue jz offering wrap around support services, including emergency relief fund forveneder for low income households. in february the moratorium was extended for additional 6 months through august 22. the decision was driven by data with decrease in assault and robberies and 311 services requests for street cleaning. to support the vendors with permits, the good actors so to speak, we are working on phased pilot project to allow limited number of street vendors to runch to the streech of mission street while the city continue to assess how the area can remain safe and clean. the chaichck will come through public works director order, which is being finalized. meanwhile, scott wiener introduced a bill last week that allow san francisco to regulate the sale of items

that are commonly stolen and hold those who continue to engage in this practice accountable with criminal penalities. the police who can not enforce vending rules under state law would be able to take action under limited circumstances. currently, enforcement falls to our street inspectors. senator wiener bill takes direct aim at harmful sale of fenced items and assist the efforts to support vendors who have permitted and contribute to the vibrancy of the neighborhood. the legislation which has support of the mayor, supervisor ronan, the mission street vendors association and other community leaders establishes that those in violation receive an infraction for the first 2 offenses and infraction or misdemeanor up to 6 months in county jail are for third offense. okay, the final topic i wanted to touch on is outreach around our new love our

neighborhood permit. we are finalizing the regulations needed before we can issue the permits. the love our neighborhoods cover amenities as tiled or r our appellanted staircases, little libraries, sidewalk benches murals and community service instillation aims to make it easier for people to get the city permission to stall these in the public right of way. chair post asked i report on the community outreach around the permit so far. allow me to give a brief run-down. in addition to the public hearings at the board of supervisors we presented before your commission. we also held multiple meetings with community stakeholders and partners in government, including our community benefit districts, the san francisco parks alliance, the council of district merchants, green benefit district, the arts commission, livable city, the small business commission, community challenge grants and arts commission among others. in addition we have a robust roll out plan ready to go once the

regulations are finalized with easy to navigate online portal posters and handouts. with that, i will wrap up today's director's report. thank you. >> thank you director short. i have a question about the love our neighborhoods. so, how would the process be for community members that do the project? how would that go? >> the idea is that our on pp line portal is designed to be very very user frndly and basically they can go there and start--it will kind of direct them for how they apply based on what they want to do. they'll fill out their information and it will ask them what's your project and based what they say, it gives them innext steps for the application and once we receive the application, public works will really take the responsibility of routing to other city agencies if necessary like the

arts commission if it a mural for example, and the applicant will get updates but dont have to chase down the approvals. we will hand-hold that process. >> sounds great. thank you. does commission have any questions from the director's report? commissioner turner. >> good morning director short. three thingz. under the budget, i want to thank staff for a very differ cult negotiation. we know it from the state down to local level, this is tough year. there was another win, which i don't know if it is going to come through, but $300 million in bond proceeds for new capital projects, general hospital, laguna honda so i think that is positive, is that correct? >> definitely, we would deliver many of those projects through the bond programs.

>> pernect. fect. my next question is the permitting process. we are seeing a lot of municipalities streamlining and huge benefit. just to be clear, this is continuation of working group around streamline, this isn't a new initiative, is that fair? >> yes, it isn't a new initiative so have been working how to streamline. one thing we heard from folks is, there is a lot of back and forth that we think could be avoided if from the get go we did a completeness check. it isn't a new initiative, but it is a refurbish-we had a check list years ago and this is now taking into account all the new requirements and all of the information we need and making it very clear we hope to applicants, because if we get a complete application we can quickly route it and hopefully

avoid a of the iterative process. >> got it. lastly, love our neighborhood permitting process, excited. ask it going to cover the planter issue that is--will this streamlining process pulling all the agencies together, it will cover also those-not just little liberies but those type of opportunities for street engagement, yet they need in legal places, is that fair? >> yes, that is right. we are rolling the planter guidelines into the love our neighborhood permit. again, i want to emphasize planters are designed for beautification purposes and need to be maintained and are planted with plants, but it is part of the love our neighborhood permit process. >> thank you director short. thank you. >> any further questions? there being no further questions, mr. fuller please open public comment on this item. >> members of the public who wish to

make three minutes of comment on in person the director's report, may line up against the wall. if commenting outside the chamber, please press the raise your hand button in the webinar or star 3 on your phone to be recognized. okay. no one has come forward to speak on person and we do not have callers so that concludes public comment. >> is there further discussion from the commission? hearing no further discussion, secretary fuller please call the next item. >> item 3 is general public comment, which is for topics under the commission mandate but not related to a specific item. members who wish to make three minutes of general public comment may line up furthest from the door and commenting

outside the chamber press raise your hand in the webinar or star 3 on your phone. you are the first, so you can come right on up. you have three minutes to speak and you'll hear a chime when there is 30 seconds left of your time. if you don't mind introducing yourself and then the organization you represent. >> hello commissioners. my name is ray horn, r & i glass works a glazing company in city county of san francisco, a lbe. we are here today-i'm here to plead for dealings on behalf of my company and family. i entered into subcontract with buller construction in january 2020 for department of public works for the 109

window replacement. i'm here to ask for help as i feel i have exhausted all my avenues for relief and i am suffering from a lack of advocacy for what i thought was available to the lbe contracting community. i submitted a claim to dpw the city attorney which was denied, because denied due to statute of limitations. the claim was submitted within a year of the project closing date, but dpw and the city opted to choose the close it-deny on a unidentifiable date and so i'm in the process of appealing against the statute of limitations, but i have no expectation of fairness as i have been treated unfairly to this day. as one of the few remaining black subcontractors in san francisco, this is attempt obtaining fairness

and equity on a contract, so, i don't have my glasses so i can't read too good. i have this letter along with some ups drives i have for each of your commissioners if you would be so kind totake it up at the end. so, i try to summarize it. i entered into a contract back in 2020 and with buller construction, and the contract started off hostile from the very beginning. so has tile we got the contract monitoring division involved and the the general contractor received this project for a bid of $860 thousand, when the contract was 1.7 $1.7 million so way less then half and chose to make this up with us because our bid was low and he tried to make it up through our bond, so he was disparaging the

company from the beginning saying we were not qualified, even though i'm a union glazer in city and county of san francisco for 20 years. local 718. and they try today put a $2 million claim on our bonds and negotiating down to $300 thousand and the bond company is trying to meet on that. they [indiscernible] exceeding their specification insured the windows failed. the dpw team was--in our opinion was hostile and didn't try to help us. that's why we are here and like i say, i have all the information and only ups and envelopes if you allow me to give them to me. >> thank you for your comment s and i can take those document and distribute them. >> thank you, sir. >> we do not have further

commenters who called in either, so that concludes general public comment. >> secretary fuller, please call the next item. >> item 4 is the consent calendar of routine matters and includes the draft minutes from the may 13, 2024 meeting of this commission as well as three contract modifications and 12 contract awards. also want to note, before item 1, the commission discussed holding item 4e and i suggest as part of the motion to adopt the consent calendar that

also excluding item 4e so it can be heard at the next meeting. i'm happy to take any questions on the minutes or any corrections as well. >> does the commission have any corrections or questions? do i have a second? >> second. >> given the motion, we will now hear public comment. secretary fuller, please open public comment. >> thank you. members of the public who wish to make three minutes of comment in person on the motion to approve item 4, the consent calendar and all resolutions excluding item 4e contained within it, may line up against the wall furthest from the dpoor door and

commenting outside the chamber, press the raise your hand button in the webinar or star 3 on your phone. no one approached and we do not have callers on this item as well. >> i have been moved and seconded that the consent item be approved, excluding e. all in favor say aye? >> aye. >> opposed, nay. the ayes have it. secretary fuller, please call the next item. >> yes. and just to clarify, item 4e will be continued to the next meeting. item 5, is beginning of regular

calendar, the public works human resources update and karen hill is here to present and it is informational item. >> good morning everyone. karen hill, human resources director for public works. so, this morning i will be presenting out on the human resources update. i'll go over the overview of the human resources bureau and our action plan of filled position as well as position overview. the first thing i wanted to share is our hr current structure as it is today, so i have four functional areas that reports directly to me, which is the employment services and talent acquisition team, the training

and development employi and labor relations and health and safety and there is sub-groups that report directly up to those areas. on upcoming slides i'll share some of those responsibilities covered in those areas. our first area is employment services and talent acquisition unit. employment services is responsible for managing the hiring processes on-boarding and off-boarding. our talent acquisition unit is responsible for job postings, recruitment and administering civil service exams for public works specific classifications. our next area is employee and labor relations unit and under labor

relations, they are responsible providing advice and guidance for insure compliance with various memorandum of understandings as well as department and city policies and procedures. on the employee relations side, we have our absence management unit which tracks and manage absence and administer employee request for paid and unpaid leave. then we have pay roll unit that insure all employees are paid timely and accurately. and then we have our newly established compliance team. this team manages claims of harassment-excuse me, manage claims of harassment, discrimination and retaliation. workplace violence and prosrequest for employees and reasonable accommodations. our next area is training and

development. training and development unit works with-is responsible for providing resources to all employees and support specific training and needs of various bureaus and divisions as well as our signature initiative, which is our public university that has our signature initiative to invest in our staff by providing professional development, training and supporting career advancement within public works. and then we have our environment and health safety unit. this team educates and provides guidance on health and safety issues, including work practices

involving hazardous material and track and investigate workplace injuries and accidents. and now to the fun stuff. hiring. hiring plan updates. our hiring plan update for fiscal year 2024 our goal was to fill 350 positions by june 30, 2024. our plan to reach that goal was to continue hiring provisionally to speed up hiring . we participated and attended job fairs and had recruiting events as well as partner with our union and had hiring fairs at the union hall. we streamlined and standardized

processes and improved tracking and transparency on hiring activities. our hiring metrics. hiring updates. so, as of may 2024, we hired 434 positions. we filled 434 positions and hired temporary and budgeted positions. as of may 2024, 301 budgeted positions were filled of 350 targeted goal, which is 86 percent of the target and we are looking to exceed that target by the end of the fiscal year, with 143 selections in queue.

the positions listed to the right are some of the key positions that we filled this year. 231 positions were filled on the operation side, which were general labor and public service aids, which is more then we ever hired in 7514 and 9916. 87 street inspectors-some of the idc, 87idc and street inspector engineering and construction managementf. 56 positions filled in bdc and some positions were architects as well as 63 in general and that was key positions accounting series.

hr accomplishments, we improved employment servicess by streamlining the work-flows. we had a new location that we had our staff moved into, it is 25 van ness, which is our labor team, our pay roll and our compliance team and labor relations team, and our employees files were moved over to that location, which was a move from the previous hr department over at 1155 market, which minimized the disruption of regular work from employees having to go to that location to retrieve files. we launched our new hr hub as of may 31. we hired 57 general labors through the job fair recruitment back in september

and october. our exam team will be conducting a first civil service exam which is looking to transition all the 7514 general labors we hired in the past 6 months to transition from provisional to pcs. and we attended several job fairs between october and february and we restarted the 7501 general labor apprentice program. with those accomplishments, we do still face challenges and barriers. so, a few challenges we have is staffing within hr, and this is unplanned leave of absence, which has been anywhere from 1 to 6 month leave of absence of staff. we have an additional approval path for the approval of our positions,

which went into effect november 2023, which is slowed our ability to get positions approved quicker, which is causing hiring delays. and then lastly, these city testing site close as of may 31, which will cause some challenges finding locations to conduct civil service exams. we have our total filled positions by appointment type, so we have total of 1549 positions filled as of may 2024. provisional hiring increased by 4 percent which was 5 percent to 9 percent, 78 to 139 positions as of the last report in october.

pcs positions permanent civil service decreased by 4 percent from 71 percent to 67 percent and exempt positions remained the same at 24 percent, but changed from 354 positions being filled to 368 compared to the october 2023 data. the public works vacancy rate is at 15.7 percent. now, this vacancy rate is-the vacancy rate in october 2023 was 13.1 percent, which we use a different calculation back in october then we are using today. so, the new vacancy rate calculation excludes project funded proposed vacancy and counts the request

hires as filled. the old vacancy rate considered only vacancies hr had been asked to work on. the new vacancy rate consider vacancy hr has been asked to work on and vacancies they have not been asked to work on, so this new calculation reflects the department vacancies. that concludes my presentation and i'm open to questions. >> thank you. great presentation. looks like you have been busy. >> yes. >> great job on the new positions. i had a couple questions and i'll give my colleagues a chance to ask also. about the training part. if we go back to--on page 10, you have

the [indiscernible] >> page 10? >> page 10. >> yes. >> yeah. just for the abbreviations. so, what is the difference in training for all these positions length timewise? we talk about the training department, so for these positions, are they-i'm sure they have different training curriculum and programs, so how long does it take for these positions once they are hired to actually get on the job and start working? >> so, i think it is different from the training. you are saying once a position is filled to them starting? >> uh-huh. >> so, we have not tracked the time to hire data yet. once the employee hch once we do recruitment and on-boarding if that is your question--our goal for

the next fiscal year is track time to hire so we can praid provide a more accurate time to hire the time request to fill a position put in to the time a person walks into the door. >> my question is after they walk in the door, they go to public works university. how long is that training for these type of positions? >> actually, they go through new employee orientation, so the public works university is not a mandated training, but it is a training that provides training to advance careers, so for-it provides tools for them to advance their career development within public works once they become a employee. so, for example, i will give a example and carla you can add to it. if a general labor is hired as

7214 and want to become a supervisor, they can sign up for courses and career advancement training with the public works university to provide them tools to prepare for those promotions. >> got it. once that general laborer is hired, we give keys to the truck and everything, how long is that training? how long does that take? >> that is a day one. when they start as a general laborer they go through orientation, new employee orientation which is requirement for all public works employee s and then from the training-new employee orientation they have on the job training which is provided by their supervisors or their whatever their bureau training is required before they start their job.

>> it varies depending on their assignment. for example, our-if you are a steamer who addresses cleaning the sidewalks, sometimes dealing with bio hazards, they do on the job training, but they would work with either a colleague or supervisor to teach them all of the protocols around that, so they have to wear their-they have to be fit tested for a res pirator and taught how to address the issues, verses say what we call litter patrol, which is general laborer who picks up litter along the routes. everybody has a little bit of basic training they all go through in terms of closing out our service requests in the system because they have tablets in their vehicles so that is something they learn on the job as well, but after they they may have specialized assignments and in those cases they get

additional trainic. as director hill noted, it is on the job training after the new employerorian taig where they work with a supervisor or colleague who teaches them how to address their specific assignment so varies dependent on the assignment. >> i assume it varies on the supervisor how they like to teach or-- >> yeah. >> [indiscernible] every position needs? >> yeah. so, that's something the operation team in particular have been working on. i think each bureau is responsible for putting together their own plans. we have basic on-boarding plans and each bureau adds level of detail, so i know for example operations they have been really working on position by position what are the trainings you need, what are the protocols and having it in a binder they can

refer to. just to emphasize the university does once that employee is working with us, it really the idea is to provide opportunities for growth within the department. so, many employees have said, i like help with learning how to do a interview better and so we had interview skills classes that the university hosts. we have supervisor academy where we teach aspiring supervisors how to--what being a supervisor entails and newly appointed supervisors, what it takes to be a supervisor. the university is a little unique because it is designed to support employees with their professional development within the organization based on what they like to see and learn. >> thank you. one last question. about city--you mentioned city

testing shut down or what happened on may 31? >> the testing site, so the cesar chavez testing site was the location where majority of civil services exams were held, so all the inperson exams whether they are computerized or manual testing that site has closed may 31. so, now the city which is hr are looking for other options where to have these civil service exams conducted, but until them we have to work independently on our own to find locations which may cause delay because that means the entire city, all the city departments are actually scrambling to find locations to hold these exams. >> thank you. any questions from colleagues? commissioner turner. >> thank you for a great report and great progress. i was trying to understand

director short, how to take this report in context of future reality. there is budgeting process we are still going through. we know vacant positions will be holding for just different reasons. when i was reading this report, it seemed that when i was look at the vacancy rate for instance, it is impacted by that and so, how do we i guess navigate reality that we got a management-the city don't know it is call adhiring freeze, but it is going to impact our ability ploorly particularly going forward with the budget. the second thing also tied to that is, how are we as the world evolves, are we expecting the mayor to lift this moratorium on new hires as programs need to be back-filled? >> thank you for that question commissioner turner. so, we will never have a zero

percent vacancy rate, even as budget times were fantastic, because we always maintain some project funded positions we keep vacant until the project is ready for them and also because we have attrition and so, in times like this, our vacancy rate is going to be higher because we are holding certain position s vacant as part of our budget plan, but we anticipate when we submitted our budget we anticipated what those positions are, so the rate will be higher, but frankly it is lower then many many years, but we know which positions we are not intending to fill in order to meet our budget and so the other positions, there isn't a actual hiring freeze. budgeted positions that were not held vacant intentionally we can continue to fill and we will. does that answer your question?

okay. great. >> thank you so much for clarifying. deputy director robertson, you have something to add? >> good morning commissioners. bruce robertson, deputy director of finance and admin. there is no hiring freeze, but the one thing mrs. hill pointed out on her presentation that is new is a result of these more constrained time is the mayor's office is reviewing every single position as part of the approval path recollect so the impact that is the extra layer of due diligence that doesn't always hap in in more healthy probust financial times so that is one item. the other thing other thing i add, mrs. hill gave a 15.7 percent vacancy rate and as part that, there is two numbers that we track. we track the operating funded positions, and those are mainly our street cleaning positions and some of our support staff positions and we also

track that budgeted-the vacancy rate for project funded positions because it fluctuates depending what the project looks like so if we do work for public health and hospital we folks to have hospital experience and understand all these acronyms i'm not sure what they mean, but about the hospital delivery and we have the street bond back in 2011. we needed more civil engineers to implement those programs so those positions always have a higher vacancy rate. >> thank you. any further questions? there being none, thank you mrs. hill for your presentation. secretary fuller, please call the next item. >> we will need to do public comment before we head to the next thing. >> [indiscernible] sorry.

>> members of the public who wish to comment in person on item 5, the public works human resources update may line up against the wall furthest from the door and if commenting from outside the chamber, please press the raise your hand button in the webinar or star 3 on your phone to be recognized. and no one approached to speak on this item, and sfgovtv is letting me know there are no callers so that concludes public comment. >> hit the gavel again. secretary fuller please call the next item. [gavel] >> item 6 is capital project update for the mission branch library renovation and project manager andrew sohn will present the item and as reminder to the commission and public, this contract for the renovation was approved in december 2022 and is

informational item. >> good morning commissioners and director short. my name is sandy sohn, a architect in the bureau of architecture and today i'm going to present a update for mission branch library under construction. i'm joined by my colleagues senior architect lourdes garcia and construction manager, dennis oats. the first thing you see on this cover sheet are images from the project that is under construction and future design images. the project was awarded by this commission on december 2, 2022 at the amount of 23 million and 20thousand

dollars with calendar date duration of 730 days. the contractor that received the award was [indiscernible] construction. we are approximately 25 percent construction complete. the project is complete renovation and expansion of the mission branch library. [indiscernible] has been good partners oen the project. the job trailer is positive and we enjoy quarterly facilitating partnering sessions with the contractor. mission branch library is located on 24th street between mission and valencia in the mission district which is district 9. the scope of work is complete renovation and expansion of the

library. it includes new program areas such as community rooms, team spaces and restrooms. it includes the complete renovation of mechanical and are electrical lighting systems, new elevators and new elevator and it also includes replacement of historic architectural features that were demolished in 1990 renovation. interesting aspect of the project are, one of seven carnegie libraries in san francisco. it is extraordinarily congested construction site, very small with lot of complex structural work going on. in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as part of the building electrification program in the city and gas service is disconnected from the project. the project did receive grant

funding from the state with the building forward infrastructure grants from the state librarian office, and the san francisco arts commission has-is provided art by [indiscernible] it will be a beautiful stain glass window in the project. the contract schedule we issued notice to proceed last august. the current duration is 770 calendar days, which puts final completion november 2025. there is a possibility of a time extension of 85 days, which is represented here in gray. we are welcome to active construction with demolition, micro piles, foundation, shoring and

excollation under way or complete. the next slides are images of construction progress. we had a ground-breaking ceremony last august and attendance were district 9 supervisor hillary ronan, director short, city librarian michael lambert, library commissioners and the artists alicia. a feature of a highlight of the ground-breaking was aztec dancers who performed and engaged the audience in dance. the next photos are construction progress. this is historic reading room awaiting restoration. the upper floor of the library. and this is the future

community room and you can see beyond the shoring and foundation work going on it will be a big open space. this was not a space present in the library previously. we opened this up. this is at orange alley, which is on the side of the library that will receive the building addition. this is the demolition of the courtyard and you can see a large pg&e transformer vault which is being demolished. this area will be excavated for a new basement. this is interior view showing wall construction on the left and foundation in the middle. this is inside the future community room. this picture shows new foundations and building underpinning that gives a sense of extent work and see you see

columns dangling mid-air awaiting a new foundation to be built underneath them. and this is the instillation of shoring, you see a drill rig on the right and the soldier beam craned in, it is a very small area this work is happening in, so very interesting to observe. and this is what we hope will be the final outcome for the project. the upper left is image of the build addition. the upper right is future community room. on the lower images are main reading room and the exterior view with the courtyard. that concludes my presentation. happy to answer any questions you have. >> thank you mr. sohn for this prezen taishz. z presentation. we are looking forward for a

update. remind me, we saw multiple library projects at the commission, is this the one where the beams were in the way of the facade of inside? there was some work done in 20 years ago and they added those retrofit beams? >> yes. this one has columns built into the-you are thinking of chinatown library. that one is the one with the big beams on the inside. this is the one where they demolished the stair in the middle of the building and moved the entry. >> putting back [indiscernible] >> we are putting back the architectural features from the past. >> that's great. great job on being right on time. ahead of schedule on this, 25 percent, all most-matches the contract. what went into the calculation

that potential extension? >> the potential extension represents potential delays related to gaining access to the neighboring property to do work and getting permission from these neighbors. that was one item. another item was, there was a stop work notice issued by our team that was related to vibration monitoring plan not implemented demolition started and third item is pg&e deelectrification and disconnect. >> thank you. commissioner woolford. >> thanks andrew. great presentation. it isn't a question, i just wanted to follow up and say, i have been working with public works and

department of architecture since my tenure on the arts commission. it is fantastic to see this project not only getting funded, but well into construction. it will be a phenomenal addition to the neighborhood and to our cultural assets in san francisco, so thanks to public works. >> thank you. >> any further questions from the commission? hearing none, no further questions, secretary fuller, please open public comment. >> thank you. >> members of the public who wish to make three minutes of comment in person on the capital project update to the mission branch library renovation, may line up against the wall further from the door and commenting outside the chamber, press raise your hand button the webinar or star 3 on your phone to be recognized. and we do not have anyone who has come

forward on this item and also do not have callers, so that concludes public comment on item 6. >> thank you secretary fuller. please call the next item. >> item 7 is the new business initiated by commissioners and this is an opportunity for commissioners to suggest business for a future agenda and it is informational item. >> commissioner turner. >> director short, over the course of the last couple weeks, there has been monumental projects years down the road, but do i want to know how we engage supporting them. one is portal project that is the expansion of the rail to [indiscernible] i know we will have a huge role in that so i want ust to be mindful. if there is a opportunity to learn more about what that is now that there is $3 billion signed to it. the second i wasn't aware of until the past weekend, i guess there

will be a raising of the embarcadero for sea level change and things. again, another thing i know from the fire station, we have been a part of designing so wondering those two are big consequential federally conscious projects. how can we engage now they are moving? >> commissioner, would you like us to give a presentation about the two projethsnz i know we are involved in both projects. we will actually be kind of the lead from the city side on the what they call the dtx portal, the downtown extension. pulling together all the city agencies and helping work with transbay joint power authority to develop that. it is early day. s. we completed agreement to allow public works to be that lead, but

beyond that i'm not sure we have much a update. similarly, there is a major future planned project at the port that will include raising the ferry building and there's some other potential designs to try to address sea level rise. we are still very much in the design phase and participating actively in that and we could present something, all though we could also potentially invite the port who is the lead agency on that to give you a overview. what would you-my long-winded question, how would you like us to respond? >> i think the first important thing which is acknowledging our very embedded role. we often read these things, i know we will be involved, but really to be leading these things in meaningful way. the second ing the, i assume the port

is leading this. i am not sure if we want to ask them when it is time or if this is a come up on the project list of review, but given they are important i want to make sure we are cognisant of them, but also thank you for clarifying our important role in reading and supporting those projects. >> thank you commissioner turner. i have a request for--you have--i have request for the director's announcement report next meeting. tell as more about our involvement with pride. the parade. >> great. >> i know every time i-when i ask, people think that public works cleans the parade afterwards, but i'm sure we are involved more then that, so i like to ask next time. any commissioners have anymore new business?

no further business, mr. fuller, please open public comment. >> yes. i also did want to note that there is a scheduled update on the transbay joint power authority in the near future as well, so i know that the project lead on that is working on coming up with that as well. okay. members of the public who wish to make three minutes of comment on item 7, new business initiated by commissioners, may line up against the wall furthest from the door and if commenting from outside the chamber, please press the raise your hand button in the webinar, or star 3 on your phone to be recognized. and no one approached and we do not have any callers on this item so that concludes public comment. >> mr. secretary, is there any further business?

>> since we did not use up all the time during item 3 for general public comment, item 8 is not necessary and there is no further business on the agenda. >> well, hearing no business, i adjourn the meeting and this commission will meet again on june 24, 2024. [gavel] [meeting adjourned]

>> you are watching san francisco rising with chris manner. today's special guest is carla short. >> hi, i'm chris manner and you are watching san francisco rising the show about restarting rebuilding and reimagining the city. our guest is carla short the intric director of public works and here to talk about the storms we had and much more. welcome to the show. >> thank you for having me. >> great to have you. let's start by talking about the storms that started beginning of the year. there fsh a lot of clean up recovery and remediation. can you talk about what your team did? >> sure. the 17 inches of rain we got starting on new year's eve through the first 2 and a half weeks of january

made it one of the wettest periods in recorded history for san francisco, so as you imagine we had a lot of work to do. we gave out more then 31 thousand sand bags, we were operating all most non stop from new year's eve to san francisco residents and businesses out of our operation yard and frequently working thin rain so it was a beautiful dance to watch. we had a corio graphed where people drive in the stop and load with san dags and get on it way so thats was the most visible thij weez had to do. responded to all most a thousand calls for localized flooding for the corner of the street with catch basin. our team trying to address that. we clear and pick up anything to block and it hopefully get the flooding to go down. if we are able to respond we call in the san francisco pub

utility system and are responsible for the sewer system under so they bring ing vack trucks that vacuum out debris inside the catch basin. we also dealt with lots and lots of calls about trees and tree limbs down. i think we actually faired better then some other places in terms of loss of full trees. we did have whole tree failures and that is not that uncumin with super satch waited soil conditions. we had over 950 calls about trees or tree limbs down. a lot of calls were about loss of a limb and we could save the tree. we are still assessing the data to figure how many were full tree failures versus limb failure. >> also had land movement too. the great highway comes to mind. what is your approach to managing rock mud and land slides? >> that is a great question. we had 28 different slides over the course of that period. it is kind of a

interesting process, so the first step is we have our geotechnical or structural engineers take a look to see is the hillside safe, do we need to stabilize it in some way or just need to do some cleanup? once they made their assessment they will recommend the next steps. often times to protect public safety we will place k rails the giant concrete rails at the base omthe slide area to make sure that any debris doesn't get on the edroway and bring ing the heavy equipment to scoop up on the ground and move off the roadway and try to open the roadway. some cases, we will actually inject some rocks or other stabilizing forces either into the slide area or sometimes below the roadway. right now there is nothing that's unstable out there but be are keeping a close eye on the areas including the gray highway area. >> right, right. well, so talking about the storms in the

city response, brings us to southeast community scepter when there is rain remediation projects going on. can you talk about the inconstruction project kblrks that is a favorite project. a beautiful new community facility. we were involved in pretty much every aspect of developing that project for the public utility commission. they were a client. we design project management and construction management and the landscape design for that project. and one thing that we included was storm water management throughout the entire project site. so, that project encapturealize the rain water that lands on the roof and flows into the landscape where we have rain gardens so intent is slow the water down to and give areas to collect to percolate into the

ground rather then the sewer system. when we have sewers that are overloaded, because our rain water mixes with the sewer treatment storm sewer system, we actually can end up dist charging into the bay which we dont want to do. anything we can do to just prevent those combined sewers from overpm loaded is a good thing and in this case allows the water to collect onsite and percolate to the ground which is the best way to manage the storm water and it is beautiful and provides habitat. i encourage everybody to see it. it is special place. >> that's great. there was recently news about how city (indiscernible) powered by steam, which is super unusual i think. i understand public works ablgtually does the maintenance on the system. can you just talk about that a bit? >> sure. that is a unusual situation. that steam loop was actually built when the city was recovering from

the 1906 earthquake. it only provides to steam about 4 buildings in civic center but that is how we keep buildings like city hall warm. the steam goes into the radiators and provides the heat. it is a old system and if you see steam billowing out of the man holes or other spaces, that is indication of a leak actually. we spend a lot of time trying to fix the leaks because it's a old system. it is managed by the real estate department and at one point they were looking trying to replace the whole thing but think that is a massive undertaking so now they focus on making as needed repair said. we did a big repair on growth street where we spent a month and a half working on the known leaks s in the area. it is a very tight spot and have

to use blow torches to seal up the leak so a intense operation and seeing more leaks on polk street so we will be out there once it warms up to fix the leaks. >> excellent. let's discuss what is the reunifiquation of public works. there fsh a proposal or plan to split off the division, called the street and sanitation. now that has been shelved and public works is going to just retain being a single entity. can you talk through the process? >> sure. yeah. the original proposal was a ballot measure voted on to split the department into 2. it basically create the department of sanitation and streets that was really going to incompass all our operation divisions so it was a street cleaning department but encompass everything we refer to as operations. when we worked preparing for that split with the city administrator

office, we found there were actually 91 what we call touch points between the operations work and our engineering and architecture side, so we really felt like it could be very difficult to split into two departments. we have so many areas of overlap. there was a new ballot measure last november to reunit the department. technically we split october one and did split in some ways. we did put on hold some of the behind the scenes things like rebranding all the vehicle jz giving everyone a new e-mail address in the sanitation and streets department, but on january 1 of 2023 we came back together so we are reunited i want sing the peaches and purb song and think it is a good thing for the 91 areas of overlap. we making #2c3w50d use of the

research. preparing for the split. looking at all the touch points and trying to strengthen the department so we are more streamlined and efficient. one of the most important component from the original ballot measure is commission oversight. we retained two commissions, the public works commission which oversee the over-all department and approve the budget and contracts. and sanitation and street commission and their mandate focus on policy and deliverable for street cleaning and basically the operation division. reporting to them regularly how we are doing, we think will help make sure we are as efficient and effective as we can be as a department. >> that sounds great. thank you so much for coming and talking to me today and appreciate the time you have given. >> thank you so much for having me. it was a pleasure. >> that is it for this episode. you are watching san

francisco rising. >> i am supervisor melgar. i am the supervisor for district 7. [music] i am a immigrant to san francisco. my family came when i was 12 from el salvador during the civil war. this place gave us security, safety and an opportunity to thrive, so i love the city deeply, and as a mother of three kids who have grown up as city kids, i'm grateful for everything the city has to offer for people like me and families. i have been politically involved my whole life, either in government or a non profit worker and i care about the

community. i care about people around me, and i want to make sure that as the world changes around us, other people have the opportunity that my family did. >> we are back in san francisco post pandemic. so important to be out supporting our businesses, supporting our neighbors. >> i'm the first woman to represent the district, believe it or not. i'm the first latina elected to the board of supervisors without an appointment first ever, so i do think that (indiscernible) i want immigrants to be represented, women, moms, people that have different experiences because that brings richment to our decision making and i think it makes for betting decisions so that inspired me to run. district 7 is one of the most diverse districts in san francisco both in economics and

ethnicity. it spans north from golden gate park. it includes all the institutions in the park, the wheel. the music concourse, mew seem to the south to the daly city boarder and west to the organization. includes the zoo (indiscernible) all those fun things and to 280 oen the east. includes city college, san francisco state. i had ucsf parnassus so very large geographically. it is mostly single family homes, so it is the place where for generations family (indiscernible) nice parks, lake merced, mount davidson. >> this is like a village within the city, so we are very close nit community. we tend to band together and try to support one another and it is a friendly place and families and people to have a cup of coffee and check out the

park. >> ocean avenue, which is the southern end of our district is vibrant commercial corridor that mostly cater tuesday the local neighborhoods and the students. as you go further west you have the mall which has some of the best pan asian food offerings in the city. if you haven't been there, it is really fun. as you go up a little bit further, there is west portal avenue, which is a very old school commercial district where you can still find antique shops and cobbler shops and as well as like more modern restaurants. it is definitely hopping and full of families on any weekday. >> i'm matt roger, the coowner or (indiscernible) >> carl, other coowner in west portal. >> we are a neighborhood hardware store. been a community institution since it was founded in 1936.

we had a little bit of everything. (indiscernible) to gardening or gift buying. >> my entire experience in san francisco is this community. it is a very small town feel for a big city. the community is caring and connected. >> what makes me excited doing business in district 7 is i know it sell well. i grew up here. i knew a lot of customers, parents of friends. it is very comfortable place and feels like home. >> if you go up north, you have the innerpz sunset commercial corridor which has a awesome farmers market on weekdays and plethora of restaurants. there is everything you need. >> friendly and safe and (indiscernible) i love they bring their kids with them. they teach

them how to use their money, and it is something you dont see in too many markets in other communities. i love to see the kids come and talking to you. it is something different then i see from (indiscernible) >> the ev access to transit in inner sunset and ability to do a lot of shopping on foot, and now the improved biking with jfk closed to cars, because we have a 4 and a half year old who rides her bike. we now have a safe place to go and ride bike jz don't have to to worry about traffic. >> graffiti continues to be one of these things that during the pandemic just got out of control everywhere in the city and i do think that it is hampering our recovery of commercial corridors, so some of the volunteers on west portal avenue, some of the merchants got together with interns at our office to do

some hands on abatement and we have been doing it regularly. we are doing it once a week and we have a wonderful neighbor, carrie organizing and storing the paint and supplies in her office on west portal, but this needs more then just a volunteer efforts. >> i'm grateful for the collaboration. we passed legislation at the board and put $4 million in the budget over the next 24 months to help the department of public works hire laborers and labor apprentices to abate the graffiti on private property on commercial corridors. i think that for a couple years this recovery strategy so we can get back up as normal after this awful pandemic. participatory budgeting is a pot of money that is available every year for district 7 neighbors to propose projects that

improve the neighborhood and the district. anyone, any organization in the district can propose a project and then it's a vote. it is popular vote. we have 14 projects just approved and they span from you know, a vegetable garden at aptos middle school to pedestrian safety projects on (indiscernible) it runs the gamut, but it is wonderful because it allows people to be engaged in a real way, and then to see the outcome of their energy and work, because the things get improved in front of them. >> i like it is really close to the parecollect parks and bunch of businesses as well as a calm feel. it is a very peaceful feel even though it is close to a lot of things.

(indiscernible) also not boring. there is stuff to do too. >> so, there is lots to see and experience in district 7. [music]