■" >> without firth r ado, we will begin with the anthe countries, the united states of america, the s the of american samoa. thank you. thnk you mayor london breed. appreciate having us and hosting us in

our great city. we'll begin with the everyone please rise. [playing united states t-

>> for the anthem of american samoa. thank you. [playing anthem of american

samoa] o■

>> please remain standing for t of samoa. [singing anthem of the independent of samoa] bzib

>> respectfully ask to please be seat ed. like to call on pastor ray, for opening prayer. >> bow your heads father, we are grateful today. we acknowledg ur

your mercy for this brand new want to acknowledge many of that have labored to make this day possible. we also want to thank the honorable mayor lo breed and all of the san francisco officials that also labored to make this day po■zss. we are people of faith.people t of our heritage and our traditions. but we also acknowledge lord, that without you, none of this would be possible. begin today, we begin with y, but also end with you. giving you all the glory and

all the aiyou alone deserve. bless this day now that is done and we pray all this jesus name, amen. >> want to thank pastor ray for thgod to begin our ceremony.remarks and introductions.■m the national samoan chief council was foundedin 1972 here in san francisco by high chief-- we have some of endants to my left. would you please stand? [applause]

thank you. organize the chiefs of samoa residing here in san francisco and the bay area. they also formed the samoan flag day, which is what we are lebrating this weekend. from what i recall, the last ■? time the independent state of samoa flag american samoa flag flags were raised in city hall mayor willie brown. fast forward 20, 30 years later, the honorable dobreed has allowed us to do the same, to raise our flags here an we thank you honorable mayor. applause] i know your time is brief, so i will do my best to consolidate our program today. i want to start with some

introductio s of faith leaders. to my left we have reverend--please stand. [applause] also, advocate for the samoan community for many years. we also want ■■to recognize pastor ray. [applause] pastor lemu of the first ai and pastor--of the faith of san francisco. [applaus■ to my right, we havee--i will introduce san francisco when she comes up, but before that,

have just mayor of daly city, justin and we a special guest from our cousins in the kingdom of toma. the only existing kingdom in pacific of the polynesian islands. we have conslet, please stand. thank yo. we also have y right, --sorry-- maybe she ou [laughter]

the non-samo par sheriff miyamoto. [applause] mandy, can you help me here, please? i apologize. okay. okay. thank you. introducing our communit@' francisco and the bay area, tointroduce the samoan community development center, probably the profit serving our community and also employi thmost pacific islanders in the country. we like to introduce dr. patsy samoan community development center.

we also to introduce another leader of our community that has been in many things. she has organized an organization in tribiant to one our brothers and communities, jt, formed the--which means, all my brothers and all my and gentlemen, please welcome■w■h, ■9■r christine, executive director of all my brothers and all my sisters. that has been servisan mateo county for many years. she's organized and serving thousands and thousands of our community through the food bank harvest. she's organized one of the large est festivals in our community ir g

gentlemen, please welcome for together, executive director rayna. [applause] also, we have the only one of the largest platformin the pacific islander community and they do a great job in reporting and updating our unity■and many events. ladies and gentlemen, from the pacific by design, please ■owelcome, my sister [indiscernible] please rise. [applause] and we alsohae our sister that has been leading on the grounds here iqin san francisco-- [applause] to recognize rever

[applause] i apologize if your name, but please know that we have yoand is very limited, so we also want to recognize our famiconslets that have supported us, ver the south pacific and in the sa francisco bay area. please rise, our counslet, please. thank you. we would like to at ■-/9this without further ado and with all the respect from the samoan community, we like to introduce the horable mayor london breed for her remarks. [applause] want to

introduce our mrs. samoan golden gate, >> thank you everyone, and good afternoon and city hall. i am so honored and blessed to have each and every you joining us here today. you can take as long want to celebrate this moment, especially because it has been a long time coming. and is so interesting, because it is full circle and i want to acknowledge all the work she does and alher very talented son o american

idal. idle. i'm sure we all know that and we are all very proud of hhe just lifted our spirits today with his beautiful voice that he inherited from his mom. i'm so grateful. bo and i worked together for ti and he was instrumental bringing the lebration to city hall then and instrumental bringing it to us today so it is great here in community to celebrate this historic milestone ■i with each and every one of you. but, i also want to just loss o part of the samoan community, a police officer who comes from a family of police officers, luciano. somhave heard, he served on the force for 9 years and

unexpectedly passed away yesterday. many of you might have known jackie, also currently as lieutenant in the department and i would like to the this moment to just recognize him and emendous work and reall lift up his family in prayer and with a moment [moment hiof silence] thank you. and i appreciate the connection to spiritually the connection to family and the

has always been about in san francisco and throughout the bay area. so, it is of course fitting to take this moment to ory and culture samoan community as it relats ■3■to sa francisco, and how it has been a critical part ofat san francisco a special and more vibrant i appreciate the work of so many of the organizations and the religious institutions that held ite the recognition and the lack of support that this community deserves. it is why i appreciate my relationship so much in terms of being able investments that will help make difference for community. in fact, visiting the samoan community center and having a chance to tour and to see work first-hand with young people and with students and with others, it is inspiring, and it

is something that we ne■jed yrmore throughout san francisco. i appreciate mrs. patsy for all the amazing work b?well as christine and all you increde munity together and how you come together today to significance of the samoan heritage here to als appreciate that we in san francisco are an international city, and when we talk the relationships between so many countries and plac they are often times very impactful has everything to do francisco and the people who helped us really coordinate this event and bring these kinds of activations to our city, ■y involve no other then chief of protocol, marion and the council cower joining from tango, australia,

israel, singapore, italy, pursue d you all so much for being here today and sharing this and recognizing the important work of the national #]■asamoan chief counc and appreciate the opportunity to do something very special to recognize this milestone, because even though it has been a long time since the last celebration has happened, celebration has to happen every single year and we want to make sure are the vehicle through our chief of protocol to insure its success and an opportunity to bring community together in a place that belongs to you too. [applause] soto county of san francisco, we be lighting city hall in red and blue in honor of the flag of samoa, and we will officially it samoan

heritage week, not day, week in the city [applause] so, since the high chief is not with us today, i'm looking at you fo.$d fo is trying to run away from it. who ever and want to present this ■>proclamation in honor-- you are the high chief today.mu here and celebrating with us. we are honored it samoan heritage week in san francisco so that history and culture in your community as weas throughout the city and county of san francisco. we appreciate ng this milestone here with each and every one of you and thank you so much for almake san francisco a better place. [applause] ■m

>> breed, this is surprising that i was given opportunity and privilege for me to accept on behalf of all leaders, community leaders, all the people of w:saa who accept this-thank you so much. i dont know whto deserve this, but other then the 32 years #bi served as probation officer for city of san francisco, i just officially received my last week, so please come up and join in sharing this. [applause] ■

>> thank you for your service to the city. >> london ■■wbreed, i have--we were al flag raising in daly city and my testimony was the samoan history at bib luical proportions. i liken to history of israelite, when we enter promise and and shua sent came back and say, we have a lady in the city, for us and then joshua say, take this red flag. when we come to destroy the city, raise the reg flas a memorial for us.

we have in r lifein ■the midst of enemies. you are allies today. 46 years ago, mayor feinstein was our ally. 4yes ago the mayor was our ally. i was doing the ceremony with the mayor. when you heard you promise million dollars to samoan lopment center last year, we are waiting for that $1 million and will continue and you will continue to be our ally. thank you very much. god bless. >> how about another round of applause for honorable, ? [applause] and those beautiful rem before i introduce th

item, i apologize, but i like to introduce a few more of our chiefs residing here. please help welcome, high chief--of viala samoa. please stand. [applause] we also have san francisco zz former president neal fdofuetopia. a lot ofuetopias city mimics san francisco as flag day.have founded and started in san francisco. we also nta high talking chief ■íframerican samoa, please welcome-- [applause] like to introduce

poet reading by theresa-- am i have been waiting a long time to do that. my name is dr. birch and it is definitely full circle tostand in fronts of you to introduce my sister.■z&f 52 years ago when my grandfather started this francisco, it is o fitting that i serve the city and un francisco, his granddaughter, he told

us tont to thank mayor for her service and honoring this because a lot of you see my work as a person in community and not as a a lot of work being seen, so thank you for seeing s islanders. to introduce my sister in this work. we used clean crocker amazon.] for samoan flag day. we were the kids picking up trash, but globally recognize my sister-- [applause] >> good afternoon and happy samoan heritage week family.

you please give your love to my ster, my cousin dr. birch more time? [applause] first foremost and like to say to the national samoan chief colping revitalize samoan heritage week leading up to flag day festival. to the mayor office allowing us gather in-not just inviting--we can give her love. [applause] not just initing me and my cousin to share some words today to kick off this grand father but always thinking legacy of our grand ather, the high chief--a man that devo

his life to the prosperity of the y in san francisco he established numerous programs ana legacy all samoans in the bay ea is or whether they know him or not. our grandpa loved him deeply and i know would you byhiside to implement this weeks programming, so thank you. [applause] as a poet and writer, the last two times i shared a poemat city hall was women march mayor breed lead in d [indiscernible] fitting the committee ask i share a poem to commemorate a time of than people especially. a man who

documents and journals from the bedroom office bayview hunter points, t beef project to the fillmore last breath in 2018. you heard poetry at a open mic or event. [applause] you know you dont have to clap in it doesn't have to be a quite endeavor, we are not ■t■k anyway. you hear anything you resonate with, you cfingers and pretend you are taking a bite. you can repeat after me, you can say, okay,po et. go in poet. that's right poet. if you like what you hear. if you don't like what you hear, we can talk about it after. this is to us, this is always for us. here we go.samoans believe when

our ■'d islands [nam■rg and beyond, he made 9 heavens, but the truth if you learn our story deeper there the 10th is where [indiscernible] if you samoans belong to 11 heavens and the 11th one is san francisco. but hey, dont take my word for it, just read any of the 7 books our $ father wrote about genealogy our our people and legacy. i'm not a child born one february evmñen in 1988 he

stationed as upon imat and meeting my mother over the phone after mistakenly calling her house number in north ojects instead of his cousin. the love story of my pares stretched across the phone wire and that is the 11th heaven too. my mother is not a samoan god either, just a galileo school graduate raised in bayview hunter point before moving to north beach projict. 11 heaven was the chinatown tr,@,q steam buns. it was the fred■ldy es and pizza bred in wax per.ái■z to purchase his daily sf ndp chronicle our grandpas camcorder and

tripod. it was the type writer, the desk top and lap top he document every bit of after the camcorder crocker amazon park every august where the san frano place since the year our grand father founded it in97. it was the trash bag my cousin and i carried around e park as clean up crew and the secret bbq mare nade fam lay makes for the food plates they sold as vendors the stage our grandpa us sing on and clean up once the festival was done. apartment 225 my cousins and attended saturday school in our grandpa's office hawse he wanted to his sacrifice come with onor two ph.d. the man promised if we from college, he would buy us

family, no rolex have been purchased. ndrnible] went to get her doctor degree and rolex is. he was just the samoan man who loved us so much he had no other choice devote his entire life to the preservation of our ur history and our truth, the 11th heaven was the 30 grandpa spend holding the chairman position for 25 different committees, councils and task forces dedicated to our ■■samoa community between 1963 and 1993. it was

the 11th heaven was the on for bureau that ined term, asian pacific islander in 1978. struggled to affirm their lives in this country made it possible for our samoan people to immigrate here with dignity.y- fact it is 2024 and how even though we stil have our work cut out for us, we can still celebrate all that has been ■ga all that continues to be. the 11th heaven has alwa been the sunnydale projeths. the community development center generation long legacy of service. the service og to samoan grandmas headed good times at the bbq at yeoman park. the prek dual language program.

enrollment number of dual lang program ;x in san francisco public schools. the 11th heaven has always been pacific islander community partnership in all the youth empowering programs from camp unity to polynesian heritage ard from ms. samoa gol gate to cultural arts, the 11th heaven is everywhere and everything my ■o people are. from heritage week to protests, from culture being rich and entertaini of our resistance. the core of our manna. from poemmy samoan pride how my favorite thing being u■@ everything, to what my demands of me once the po welcome to the 11th heaven family. thank you to our ancestors for making it so. for long us so fiercely.

being extra they made 10 heavens before this one so we never tio how [indiscernible] oce■ deep belong to each other and after we leave this world for the next, wen bet our intime samoan life we will return to ever@y samoan heaven that made us and praise all of our samoan for th [plse >> how about another of applause for -family. thank you so much.

i also want to on behalf of the president of the national samoan chief council, high chief-- and our vice president, high ch-togies for not being able to attend th we do have our faith leaders, we do have and o chiefs and we do have beautiful community leaders and their staff and also our mayor, london breed.■xl1 mayor justin malao, conslet and puic officials, i apologize--i hope

we dont cross paths ona different level and you remember i didn't remember the conslet of the countries that are supporting our samoan community, thank you very much.

before i also failed to mention, we do have a commissioner delafsi, please stand. i apologize. i'm not only short with our public officials, about with our own community, i apologize. 9b going to have a closing prayer. thank you. >> let us pray. my most dear gracious heavenly father, we come before you at this time

with humble hearts and humility. we all that thou has done our samoan community throughout these years. we are grateful and are ■7 thankful for thy continuous mercy.■z we thank you who have come together to stand side by side so ■we are able to have this day our samoan community. we are grateful and kful for leaders in the public gures the community, as well faith leaders, to unit d stand together to continue to stand

for our community and to allow our community to be recognized.■■ father, this cannot be possible without thy.ur blessing continue to be upon us as we continue to move uth of today so they may be future leaders to continue the legacy of our samoan community here in san francisco. father, we ask this prayer sacred name of our beloved son, jesus is the christ, amen. >> thank you pastor for the closing prayer. again, i want to ask moa golden gate to please come to my side. how about a round o[applause] f

young lady courageous young ladies. ms. samoa golden gaologize, i j mayor's aff j>if a opportunity for the mayor to have a %aphoto op with us, because i think it is fitting to have a with her, so if that's not ableto happen, i apologize are. it was probably due to my long introduction. we have refreshments provided by the mayor's office. hoabout a round of applause for the mar'll keep me informed if it is a go the photo

p the mor. we have others from the community and feel free to mingle and network. y god bless on your way home.

>> he is a real leader that listens and knows how to people together. brought this department together like never before. i am so excited to be swearing in the next chief of francisco fire department, ladies and gentlemen, let's welcome, jeanine nicholson. (applause). >> i grew u t4íotckal tomboy, athlete. i loved a good crisis, a good i grew up across the street from the fire station. my dad vote. i never saw any female firefighters because there weren't any in the 1970s. i didn't know i could bre

fighter. when i moved to san francisco in 1990, some things opened up. i things they growing up. doing when i was one thing was firefighting. a woman recruited me at the gay-de parade in 1991. it was a perfect fit. brain, body, working as a team,uring things out, troubleshooting and coming up with differe ways to solve a problem. in terms of coming in female cht think anybody says that about men. yo are coming in after another man, chief?ú>(, what is t i understand why it is asked. it is unusual to have a woman in this position. i think san francisco is a trailblazer in that way in terms of showing the world what

happen and what other people who may not look l■úike■ç what you k the fire chief should look like how they can be successful. be asked me about being the lbgs because there are little queer kids that see me. worked my way up. i built relationships over the years, and i spent 24s■'the fie. workingent is a family. we live together, eat together, sleep in the same dorm together, go to crazyer, dangerous calls and we have to look out for one ano■(ther. when i was burned in a fire years ago and i felt responsible, i felt awful. i didn't want to talk to any of

my civilian friends. they couldn't understan the firefighters they understood. they had been there. it is a different relationship. we have toy0■ely on one another. in terms of me being the chief of the department, i am to mainn relationship with all of our members in the field so s deputf us to go around to stations to e hit all within thest three or four months to start a conversation. that hasn't been there for a while part of the reason that i am getting along well with the el now is because i was there. i worked there.ople know me andi know what we need. i know what they successful. >> i■ñ have known jeanine

nicholson sincee worked together at station 15. i have always held her in the highest regard. since she is theief s has infused the department with■ó optimism. she is easy to approach and is s and paramedics. i appreciate that she is issues releva to theeepartment today. >> there is a retired captain who cancer prevention foundation 10 years ago because he had cancer and he noticed■ fellow firefighters wee getting cancer. he started looking i in 2012 i was diagnosed with breast cr of my fellow firefighters noticed there are a lot of women in the san francisco fire department,

premenopausal in their 40s was e we were working with workers comp to make it flow m■.oreur mt have to worry paper work when they go through chemo. the turnout gear was covered with suit. it was a bge over your coat and helmet. the dirtier you were the hard you worked. that is a cancer causeser. it -- casser. it is not -- there islassic everywhere. !3we had to reduce our exposure. we washed our gear more often, we eating or sleeping.

we sta decontaminating ourselves at the fire scene after the fire was out. go the fire station and then taking a shower. taughe decontamination py sure that gets through. it is not if or when. it is who is the next person. it is like a cancer sniper out there. who is going to get it next. of the things i love about the fire department. it is team effort. you are my family. i love the city and department and i love service. i -- to work hard to carry out the vision of the san francisco fire department and to move us forward in a positive way. if i wer to give a little

advice to women andueer kids, find people to support you. keep putting one foot in front of the other and keep trying. you nr know what door is going to open next. you really don't. [cheers and >> ■ (music). >> (multiple voices.) >> lanngt leidesdorff is as the new public school in

downtown san francisco for people to come together for 0 lunch and weekends a new place to enjoy the architect and our culture. >> landing at leidesdorff onex of several initiatives to the road map for thenitiatives all about using your public spa fors to 0 invite people >> it shows there is any time excitement and energy and people wore looking forward to enjoying the space that peoplex■ may wan to end up in downtown. >> we've operating in the financial district since 2016 with t treasury and coming up we had a small surge in business in the leidesdorff and in about thee financial district and a good time to grow here.

>> as a small business the le■áes■)dorff is making us bein part of it as being part of in project. f me makes we want to be part of san >> so landing at leidesdorff for me represents hope for san francisco the sense that this is become such a safe welcoming■> we local artistsxes and li music but culture. >> the downtown partnerships has a studio in san francisco. they identified 6 locations throughout the downtown■ñ aa we come together with new activity >> is between us a place to tell our own story and history. >> it was named after a captain one san francisco before that was

called he was the first treasurer of the city commercial street a cross street the hifblg san francisco was just a few et where we're 12357b8z around opportunity to bring people■f have an opportunity to tell stories for local businesses. >> ■e■r ■jú/book. thank you.

(music). >> my name is orlando i'm the owner and operator of sf pizza. >> pizza ismy expansion growing up i loved pizza and loved tok and been in corporate banking jobs myhat whole life wanted to own a pizza or and moved to san francisco 45 years ago and coun't f pizza i like so one day of savinndfigure out what i would like to do to fu■2lf my dream and to literally must be that i went out on interesting things skills i again have slight changes to find theight something i enjoy and contin it. so the positive important thing in years and years and

years of trying to get it like e a unique sauce to bring out the flavors have to mats and capital improvement plan any and using use a high quality of cheese th quality of pizza and made with i try to keep it to be a comfortable foods or fo6■£od and that's what i try t over and offers so having a really bus illegal in the community and rile appeal to me and that's what i was trying to accomplish i have thought when i thing if i can, make a great cheese pizza

he can do anything like growing up that's what i brought to to