>> good evening. sue hester. 35 years ago, i was -- i sat on west bay health system's agency board. on the long-term planning committee. we were struggling with some of the same issues, though they are much worse today. in terms of access to care, distribution of health care services, we had a lot more hospitals and they were much better distributed than we do now. the is that you mr. brooks brought up is a real one. in an earthquake, access to care, it is not so much building collapse that is the immediate problem. it is people getting access geographically over a mountain to hospitals and we are now concentrating them exclusive ply in a small area of the city. and cpmc is a large part of that decision because they have concentrated their facilities. i want to talk about something no one is talking about.

the mayor's office took it off the table. this is a project that is being built intentionally. it is moving intentionally to one of the most congested transit issue areas of the city, an area the city knows needs massive transit, geary rail and van ness rail and that has been taken off the table and this project should be required to -- they are tunneling under van ness. it is a state highway. it is a very critical place and yet they are intentionally banning other sites that are not as bad transit-wise putting people into one very intense -- area that will put over capacity already congested intersections at van mess in and market. van ness and geary and van ness

and post. it is an intentional act in vie ligse of ceqa. you have to pay a-- violation of ceqa. you have to pay attention to it. fument >> good evening. i'm bernadette smith. i am also a registered nurse. in the interest of time, i'll hold my remarks and be here to answer any questions that you might have. >> thank you very much. >> [speaking spanish]

>> good evening, honorable commissioners. my name is ramon. i'm an employee of cpmc. for over 12 years. thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak about this because we need to construct a hospital and rebuild st. luke's. >> [speaking spanish] >> i also work and am committed to my job. >> [speaking spanish] >> my job as a housekeeper is to guarantee that the patients have a comfortable and clean place to get well and that their families

can focus on them and not on the distractions that sometimes happen in old hospitals. >> [speaking spanish] >> my job as a pharmaceutical technician is to ensure that the medicines that patients need are delivered correctly and timely. >> [speaking spanish] >> i think that the best way to serve the patients in the recovery is to keep a clean and comfortable environment. >> [speaking spanish] >> i also believe that the best way to serve the patients in

their recovery is to have the equipment and builds that are more modern to give the care to the patients that need it. >> [speaking spanish] >> it will give the patients of san francisco a place to recover in comfort. >> [speaking spanish] >> cathedral hill will give the patients of san francisco a modern hospital that will give the best care. >> [speaking spanish] >> for the sake of the patients that i have seen and the ones that i will see in the future, i implore the commissioners to recommend cathedral hill. thank you. >> thank you very much. >> and the next speakers will be

olivia fay, nick, camellia and -- >> good evening, commissioners. i really thank you for being here tonight. i know it is a late night. my name is rebecca rolf. i'm here to speak on behalf of cpmc. it has been a long night. we've heard a lot of testimony. a lot of compelling stories. and i need to tell you i'm not a medical expert, nor am i a planning expert. but have i been struck by two things. one of them is cpmc's willingness to invest in san francisco and continue to build a state of the art medical facilities to serve our citizens and the second is cpmc's investment in the communities that make up san francisco. i will say that cpmc has made a deep investment in the center and in the center's ability to serve the community. i want to give you just a couple of examples of that. one of our board members is paula, who is cpmc's manager of

community relations. she is one of our hardest working board members. she works practically full time at the center as a second job, third job, i guess she is a single parent as well. financial contributions. i know they have significantly -- many other medical organizations and medical services for the community including organizations that, you know, provide critical safety net services to low-income folks and they are partnering with us currently to provide a series of workshops and lectures and outreach efforts to reach seniors, folks often isolated without information on medical services and finally we're interested in partnering with them to bring programs to the low-income folksed a they open their new center. i think they have made a deep commitment to the community. i encourage us to allow them to continue to make that investment. and i encourage your support.

>> good evening, commissioners. thank you for being here tonight to listen to this very important item. my name is olivia. i am the executive director to have latina breast cancer agent. we're a small nonprofit agency that works to assist the latina community who are low income and uninshirrd to acquire breast cancer screening ssts with no cost with dignity and without barriers. we have long standing partnerships with cpmc and st. luke's and other hospitals and local clinics here in san francisco county. cpmc has recognized the value of our partnership and supported our organization through the community benefits program for the past few years. their support has enabled our organization to help our community access quality care at no cost to women in need of

screening, diagnostic and treatment services. as a leader within my community, i have served as a member of the st. luke's community advisory community and i participated on the outreach task force and we strongly support the recommendation to blue ribbon panel. we believe that st. luke's can thrive as part over the full integrated system of care. the duplication of services at various sites is costly and inefficient. i'm here today to express our support for the commitment to rebuild st. luke's. and keep the hospital open so this hospital can continue to provide services for most vulnerable communities living in the southern part of the city. thank you. >> thank you. my name is alysa.

i'm a diabetes educator. i've been doing it for about 20 years and have been at st. luke's for about three years now. i work as a diabetes educator for health first, which is a center for prevention and education and through them as an exercise group leader for people with diabetes and a consult and mentor. you have heard a lot about how cpmc has supports a lot of different kinds of organizations and this is one -- i wanted to talk a little bit about how i work a little bit differently. the reason that i'm here is just to talk about one way they share the resources. hunters point area. i say one way because there are so many different ways they support different community programs. and in this case, the case of i want to talk about the resource that is shared is my expertise and experience as a diabetes educator and as a senior exercise leader and exercise

nurse, in short sharing my time out in the community. i work with the department of public health, the city department of parks and recs and wmca. instead of only keeping me at st. luke's as a diabetes eaktr and using my experience there -- educator, using my experience there, i'm allowed, my expertise is sent out into the community instead of just keeping it at st. luke's. diabetes is a horrible disease. of course it is worse in areas, as we all know, in areas where there is less financial resources and we also foe what works to control die -- know what works to control die sbeets lacking in those communities -- buy beets is -- diabetes is lacking in those communities. i'm so pleased to ask you to

support. >> thank you. >> thank you presidents tierney and olague. members of the health commission. thank you for your attention tonight. it is a late evening. i'm a physician at st. luke's. i started working at an ob/gyn at the hospital. you might ask why would somebody join the staff of a hospital that is battle weary and has many failing equipments and being in a recession, serving poor people and i really can't say anything other than how could you not work there. it is one of the best and exciting interesting places to work in the city. my history at st. luke's goes back as a medical student when i recruited patients at the hospital. we are at the intersection of diverse neighborhoods in the city and in any one day, i really -- it is difficult to see

people from any background in the city. medical education activities were suspended during the uncertain future of our -- and i'm happy to say they have resumed. we continue to stimulate the minds of the next generation of practitioners and i encourage you, expeditiously approve plans because we're really excite and cannot wait and there would be no shortage of committed people to work in this hospital in our area of the city. thank you. >> our final five speakers. desiree, caroline, linda. >> good evening, commissioners. it is good to see you again. my name is emily. i am a nurse. oncology certificate-ified nurse. i was here in november 2009 in strong support of rebuilding of

cpmc. first and foremost, i believe that san francisco residents deserve the state of the art facility like cpmc. the consolidation of the services in one building is very important. we've had many patients that we have to move back and forth between campuses. i work in oncology. most of the rooms are double roms. patients are going through chemotherapy. it is a very difficult time in their lives and they need privacy and infection control and the most difficult part is when a patient is newly diagnosed and -- they are at the end of their fight with cancer. it is disstressing to both patient and family. and at the most -- severe of -- disstress on the patient is when they are sharing a room and one person has passed away and we had to move a patient out of the room to take care of the

deceased patient and leave them in the hallway in meantime since we don't have a private room to move them in. i think we can avoid all of that by having these private rooms in the new hospital. thank you for your time. >> good evening commissioners. and distinguished -- barbara garcia. my name is linda richardson. i'm a long time resident of san francisco. a former planning commissioner. the time allotted is not enough to defend a legacy of a great organization like cpmc. i'm sure you have listened to many speakers tonight. i'm here, though, primarily as a patient for the last 25 years. i have actually used these services of cpmc and i can tell you that my daughter was from there as one of the finest medical -- in the country.

a lot of people have spoken about hunters point and i really take it seriously when people come into a public forum to disseminate lies and misinformation. we're talking about the bayview health center. cpmc responded to the disparity in the health and established the bayview health center which has become a model for the country. i cannot just sit by when you talk about the community by not invoking the african-american community, the breast health center and the work of one of -- cpmc staff, dr. dyson. the community has benefited tremendously and i wanted to -- as a bridge builder to con -- the immigrant community to the -- that working with cpmc will bring value to their community. the other parts of san francisco is exactly what that community

has to benefit from. i want to remind my fellow commissioners also that building a state of the art facility in san francisco, you heard about reports and reports about the ratio of medical facilities and services. we are the leaders in the nation and then to elongate this process? i know it is getting late. please do not delay this process. >> thank you. if there are any more cards, we really you to bring them up so we can get a sense of how much longer we're going to be listening to public testimony. >> good evening. my name is carol. i support the rebuilding of cpmc. i'm a critical care nurse at the campus and when the big earthquake hits, will the building still be standing? will it be functional? as a nurse in the i.c.u., i shouldn't have to worry about

whether or not our life-saving equipment will function or that we may have to evacuate our patients because of the structural integrity of the building is in question. i work in the pacific campus and the building -- the rooms there were originally made for one patient. there are now two patients in this room. imagine that you are a patient recovering from a surgery or illness in this room. this room is divided by a curtain. you can hear all of your roommate's conversations. there may be sounds or smells coming from the other side of the curtain. this is not a therapeutic environment for healing. for the caregivers it is very difficult to care for patience in such small spaces. there have been countless times where i have literally had to crawl turned bed to reach an outlet. to transfer a patient, we have to move everything from one side of the room to the other just to

transfer a patient. did i mention our rooms are too small? we need a hospital -- with private rooms where we can take care of patients and their privacy and that we can have spaces that work efficiently. please consider rebuilding cpmc. we need a hospital that can support today's technology so that we can continue to give the care that we can to our patients. thank you. >> thank you. >> good evening. members of the health commission. my name is desiree, a director of care at st. luke's health care center. i have worked there for the last 15 years. it is a true comment hospital. we need a new state of the art facility. health care center patients are

sections of our diverse community. they come from all walks of life. we have 54% of our adults spanish speaking and 75% of our pediatric patients being spanish speaking. a large percentage of our patients are covered by government insurance. over 80% of medical or uninsured. 72% of our patients are either seniors on medicare, adults on medical or uninsured patients. the demand has increased for primary care in our area. in the past two years, we have seen a significant rise in demand for our services. in 2010, the clinicic increased 3% in total volume. we saw an incredible 14% from 2007. so there clearly is a demand and need in community. at the prime acare clinics we have struggled. i have professionals in my

office who are nurses and social workers who share waiting room with my patients who are struggling to feed their families. i have one patient who is a lawyer. she has received all of our care at st. luke's. she prefers staying at st. luke's. i also care from an immigrant from mexico who arrived to us with uncontrolled diabetes. much of his vision gone and after multiple interventions, he has almost total return of his vision and control of his diabetes. he deserves a state of the art faspiment our hospital is old and lacks many futures. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> hi. good evening. i know i'm going to make this as short and sweet as i can. i'm carol williams. i'm a respiratory therapist. the bulk of that time was at

stanford university where i actually helped build that hospital as well. i was part of opening the doors so currently i'm a respiratory supervisor at st. luke's. my children were born at the cal campus and lived three blocks awhy from the cal campus but now time at st. luke's. that was actually my very first clinic cal experience was at st. luke's. we took care of a juvenile diabetic mother who was 17 and was 27 weeks pregnant and she was coding off and on. so anyway my daughter now is a nurse at the cal campus in the pediatric so we're all pretty much want to support this hospital and make sure that it becomes -- that it is rebuilt so that we have a state of the art hospital. we also have a success story

with the ventilators and the first hnhn case was at lukes and the mom and baby were able to go home. thank you very much. >> they said please read this. this is from the dad. i'm very tired. my wife is exhausted. our child was health departmenty. it was an intense 36 hours of childbirth. there are so many ways it could have gone. it was heartbreaking for me to watch my wife who with inhuman

strength and endurance push on and on, night and day, night and day. our saving grace was the magnitude of support and competence of the staff. mid wives, nurses, task force. with killed commitment and demags came into our lives and helped pull us through. it might be difficult to thank a few remarkable people but i'm almost dumbfounded by the individual who is make up the staff. it was -- we understand st. luke's is the stepchild of the hospitals. with slightly disstressed buildings and underfunded facilities. i have been thoroughly educated and can't imagine why all hospitals don't rely on midwife, nurse and doctor staffs.

you have literally changed our lives and i just don't know how to thank you. i am moved. sincerely, todd, father of my 12-hour son. for me, please build us a building that rises to the care that we give and honors the patients that we care for. >> thank you. >> good evening, commissioners. thank you for being here so late. my na i have been in san francisco for 38 years. i was a commissioner for 10 years for as the president of the relocation appeals court. i'm this month celebrating my 30-year anniversary with the harvey milk club. the joy and the vein of american public policy is that you can take the same set of facts and

analyze it from many different places. and perspectives. i'm taken tonight by the fact that i've been involved in the coalition for public health to try and save st. luke's hospital. cpmc was planning to close st. luke's hospital. close it down. over the past fife years, it has done away with either ob/gyn, many, many different programs. to dumb down that hospital. now three, four years later, they are active in the community giving money to many nonprofits who apparently showed up today to say how wonderful cpmc is. how wonderful they have been in the community. they have not been -- they wanted to close st. luke's. they wanted to dumb it down and make sure that it was functionally and operationly

inactive. so you need to consider the sources of the folks who appear before you, maybe myself included. they are not good members of our they have not been. and i think you need to slow down, take care on what we do. and consider all the alternatives before you. thank you very much. >> thank you. >> good evening, commissioners. i've been working at cpmc for over po years as a hospital aid. i ask your support and i strongly support the cpmc project. this new building has met the

california earthquake code regulations. they can have a feeling of safety and security. these new buildings will provide more accessibility to health care and increase the level of patient care. i believe patients heal faster when they are in a clean environment and i have been working to provide them that environment for 30 years. everybody who works -- my job is to ensure -- they are covering the best environment possible. commissioners. the opportunity for more -- thank you very much. >> thank you. >> it is all on you, maria. [laughter] >> saving the last -- best for the last. good evening, commissioners. my name is maria cordova.

i'm a respiratory therapist at st. luke's hospital. i'm also a member of -- as you can see. a union member and i've worked for st. luke's for the past 10 years. i have lived in the mission district for 17 years and i'm here to speak in support of the new hospital for my neighbors that i have treated and gotten to know for over the years. first of all, i'm a proud -- i'm proud to work at st. luke's. we're known for providing charity care for the community. in fact, my own brother came here to st. luke's and got help when his wife was laid off through their low-income program. actually a lot of our patients are low-income. uninsured and underinsured and st. luke's provides essential services but the state to have building is shameful.