epa concluded that dph were utilizing best practices. there was no risk to the community on the site. opponents have been using false claims about the scientific realities of the site to intimidate decision-makers in the community in an effort to stop the economic revitalization of bayview-hunters point. the regulation is never perfect, but we must have multiple, independent regulatory agencies. supervisor campos: thank you, sir. let me read a few more names. [reading names] good afternoon. >> it is clear in every area that we have people that are battling ethical issues. supervisor campos: speaking to

the -- >> somebody was a bustedtweetib -- busted tweeting, emailing. she needed judgments based on evidence. she was dismissed. she told us plainly that she did not have to prove with scientific facts or presidents -- precedents. she said she did not have to give any sign to the facts or evidence. she has also made everything that she stated on the record. what we want is everything she said, everything she had oversight, everything she had her hands on, we wanted to revisited, reviewed, and investigated. it is clear she violated the

department of health's own principles. that is what we are asking for. supervisor campos: i ask that you refer your comments -- >> i apologize. how to do your job. how to make sure they can do this so we can pass this project forward. that is a violation. we wanted revisited, reviewed, and investigated, not by them, but by an independent party with your oversight. that is all we are requesting. let the chips fall where they fall. we want it reviewed, revisited, and investigate it. we know we have a conspiracy and collusion. thank you. supervisor campos: thank you. i ask that you refer your comments to the committee, please. >> star miles, resident of bayview-hunters point.

we need accountability. remove amy. the issue we are here to talk about accountability. we have no objection to additional training, but it does not get to the issue that we are here to address today. everything that the dph representatives involved in this cover up or commenting on the need to be reopened and investigated. there is testimony before you wall and it has impacted the decisions that this city made. everything her hands have touched needs to be examined. now we know that their opinions were biased in an effort to conceal the true -- truth. it caused the community to be divided amongst each other. we're calling for the removal of the environmental engineer, amy

brownell, and anyone else involved in the cover-up in the navy pier shipyard project. in december of 2009, the restoration advisory board held a vote of no-confidence in her. rather than taking these concerns seriously, the navy entirely. there has been a consistent practice of environmental racism. black, latino, samoan, and lower-income children have been impacted by the health effects. thank you. supervisor campos: thank you very much. >> i want to thank you all for having this hearing today.

we released a report as part of a coalition. 30 organizations nationally signed on. we did a freedom of information act request that went back to 2006. we reviewed hundreds of females that were going back and forth between the department of public health related to environmental review of the shipyard. i brought videotapes. hundreds of people were coming down here. we were door-knocking. people were getting rashes, nosebleeds. it was literally plumes of dust coming over the community. it has been documented that throughout that time, lenar was not monitoring the dust. they did not have data. they said they forgot to put batteries in air monitors that

were supposed to record how much asbestos was being released into the community. we have heavy metals that caused serious issues for everyone who breeds that in, especially children. we said, we need something to be done. the department of public health at that time, david was saying in general, i see we are trying to put together an argument that exposure was low, right? we need to put together an argument that exposure was low. it seems to me that the available facts are on our side. we should stay away from trying to create additional data. more data may not help us. we can talk about this more directly. that is a serious violation of ethics. why are you trying to put together an argument that exposure is low? why do you not want more data? [tone] we also want to talk about amy. supervisor campos: thanks.

thank you. next speaker, please. >> good afternoon, supervisors. i have been a resident for approximately 30 years. there is a question we must consider. is the health of the people of america for sale? is it something a corporation can buy? in the third world, that is all too often the case. we know about the people affected by the rain forest. their health is being destroyed for corporations. we know about the people in the niger delta in nigeria. we have heard about jobs being moved to china. a few of the reports mentioned

china is becoming one of the most toxic countries for its citizens. now it is america's turn. will the u.s. government sell the health of the people to corporations? we must answer now. we should have taken a stand sooner. we must take a stand now. no regulatory body of the government nor any of its employees can be permitted to collude with the corporations they are to regulate. where such collusion is found, employees must be removed from office. thank you. supervisor campos: thank you, sir. next speaker? >> good afternoon, supervisors. daniel landry, for the record. i sat on that restoration

advisory board in 2009 the past unanimous resolution to remove mrs. brownell. we felt at the time, after numerous times of dealing wh the issue of the dust, and going to the department of health, there was no response. i stand before you today and say we need to revisit, reexamine, and investigate this issue. generally speaking, we are talking about accountability. the doctor did not really explain the fact that when the commission, and even supervisors, make decisions as critical as the eir, our city is put in a compromise position. plenty of things have happened since 2006, dealing with this development and many projects in

this city. now we have to book -- look very closely at every project because it is clear what is in the e- mails. it is clear what the epa, what happens with the epa. this is a story that goes on and on. generally speaking, we are not saying that the department of public health may not be doing something in this city that any other director would not do what they believe is right. to pass a project as an expert is not acceptable. i sat on that advisory board and i voted. we were disbanded by the navy, which was irresponsible. we brought that before the supervisors. it went back and forth. here we are again. [tone] supervisor campos: thank you,

sir. next speaker. sorry for mispronouncing your name. >> not a problem. i am with green action for health and environmental justice. on my way from another project that i have to take care of, it occurred to me that everything should or should have already been fixed. let me simply say that while your job as supervisors is not just to protect the district that you're directly elected for, ok, your job is to protect all of us. some of you have shown me that you took that very seriously. i trust that you will do that in this case. it is not coincidental that we are here before you again. i personally went through these e-mails. in a few minutes, no. something has got to happen here. if they don't see it now, they will never see it.

there are nice terms and beautiful -- i commend the doctor for his presentation. i think he was wonderful. all of those things that he put before us in the rare -- in the very beginning were valid. let me mention just one thing, and then i will let you do your own meeting. i think what you see with your own eyes and what you here with your own ears should tell the story. from an e-mail, from amy brownell, sent to the staff at lennar, she states, "i am sure you will also want to change my wording." i am a little upset about this. i will not use any foul words. i promise you. "go ahead and change it anyway

you want to. i may change some of that back, but i am willing to -- >> -- supervisor campos: let me ask you to finish reading the mail. >> i won't do that. i know we gave you the facts. my job is not to do your job for you. i would be betraying your trusted by did that. let me say for me and for grain action, and as a resident who lives in bayview-hunters point, i have been raising my children and grandchildren, and my great- grandson, i find it appalling that our health department has attempted to save they cannot be trusted with the public's health. supervisor campos: thank you.

>> i am with power. one of our members had to leave. she wrote this letter. "i have been a resident of bayview-hunters point since 1989. i will comment on the role of the representatives amybrownell. -- representative amy brownell. the department of public health was supposed to particularly protect the public's health near the to the limit. nearby residents began complaining of high levels of dust and resulting health problems. there are numerous hearings due to the residents' concerns, yet the department of public health always diminished complaints and reassured the residents that their concerns were overblown. as a resident, i was concerned about the monitoring process and the apparent dismissal of the request for tests for toxins,

particularly the most vulnerable young children. the presence of airborne asbestos is particularly prevalent. eventually, the plan was approved by the san francisco board of supervisors. now we have evidence that the very agency, the department of public health, that is supposed to be protecting, was collaborating with the the developer, lennar. this was -- all responsible parties must be held accountable immediately. the city must recognize its role in affecting the public health and safety. the many small children in bayview-hunters point are having held a protest. we must be able to trust all employees of the department of public health, especially those working to protect that health of the residents in bayview- hunters point. do your part. protect all the families in the neighborhood. all the department of public health account." supervisor campos: thank you

very much. next speaker, please. >> good afternoon. my name is vivian donohue. i am with, or and i am a resident of hunters point. i live a block from hunters. -- hunters point. ewe are the people who have suffered. i know i am one. my family -- i have grandchildren. there are people up from where i live. they have nosebleeds. i know you have heard this before. i have been here before, many times. i have a 9-year-old. he still has nosebleeds. when they go to school, they

won't stop. they send paramedics for him. he still has nosebleeds today. my grand kids, when they overdid the dust, they had nosebleeds, like many other children, and the main thing we are here for is to ask amy brownell to step down. i have been in meetings with her. she says this community is not sick. if they truly believed that, why wouldn't they test the children and the elderly? why wouldn't they do that? i know of some more elderly people that i don't even see any more. i think they have passed on. what i am concerned about is my grand kids, 20 years from today.

that is out. it does not take but one particle. [tone] supervisor campos: thank you for coming to speak. next speaker, please. >> good afternoon, supervisors. my name is douglas. i have lived in san francisco for 69 years. i have worked at the park -- department of public health and hospitals for 20 years. i would like to think this committee for its aggressive stance, especially holding this hearing. i think everybody in this room agrees the department of public health has been under- scrutinized for long time. face the facts. gavin newsom is not in san francisco. the only conclusion i get is that it is now time to clean up the department of public health. [applause] i hate to say this, but it is kind of suspicious, in my

opinion, the department of public health puts forth all of these platitudes about ethical conduct, compliance, concerns, rules, etc., get in actual practice, they go after their own valuable employees, like myself, just for whistle- blowing. these are actual fact. i am still requesting the board of supervisors to hold a hearing on the department of public health and if they are as clean as some people say. let's put it in writing and all of us will then shut up. but the department of public health needs to be cleaned up, it is your duty to do it. i think this committee is a starting point and deserves credit for at least holding hearings on the department of public health. in my own opinion, senior persons inside city hall have made a conscious effort to stop

my consistent efforts just to question what is going on at the department of public health, and in my opinion, it is a sad state of affairs of the department of public health -- [tone] supervisor campos: thank you, sir. next speaker. >> mr. chairman, honorable committee, members, i am dr. aurelius walker from bayview- hunters point. the african-american revitalization organization -- i am appalled. i looked at an article and it said -- it was a press release. m "ayr lee -- "merayor lee

applauds." lieutenant governor gavin newsom, state controllers, recognition of the hunters point shipyard, a model for redevelopment. i want to applaud the health department of the city. we have an outstanding health department. amy brownell was outstanding. in the face of public insult, public attacks, she still did her job. on one occasion, they went out to do some research on nosebleeds. it was intimidating. they had to stop their research because of the attacks and all of that. one of the things i'm concerned

about, supervisors, is last summer, the shipyard's project was approved. the board of supervisors, six other city boards, and the two community advisory groups with jurisdiction over the site, and the citizen committee, the same old, and become a dead rhetoric is what we have been hearing all this time. [tone] supervisor campos: if there is any other member of the public would like to speak, please come forward. good afternoon. >> mr. campos, supervisors, real briefly, the health department may have employee issues. i don't know. i am not in the health department. but certainly, we should absolutely not allow that to be a backdoor way of undoing what

the citizens of this city overwhelmingly supported in the shipyards and the board of supervisors support it, also. someone has said, let the chips fall where they may. the chips have fallen. this project was overwhelmingly support it. it needs to go forward. the thing that disturbs me the most, on this issue and a lot of other things, i have -- i am representing the san francisco naacp and our church -- the thing that kind of really gets me is that we love to talk about the environment, but somehow, those who seem so concerned by the environment never allow children who are hurting and living in poverty, people who are unemployed, somehow, those people never disturb their

environmental landscape. that messes with my environment. having clean air does not do me any good if it is being preached by unemployed, hurting, and hungry people. we need this economic revitalization and we need to move this forward. thank you so much. supervisor campos: thank you. next speaker? next speaker. i would ask that we respect each other. everyone has an opinion. >> thank you. my name is sheila. i am not with none of these people. i want to say one thing. this is an inhaler, right here. this is an inhaler that a lot of us have to use because of the toxins in the air and the exposure that we have no control of. having said that, i just think that everyone has said what needs to be said.

this honorable committee will make educated decisions on this issue. i would like to leave you with, we need action now that holds regulators accountable and demonstrates the environmental racism and unethical behavior that will not be tolerated in san francisco. i say that as a native san franciscan. we do appreciate clean air. i really appreciate clean air. thank you very much. supervisor campos: thank you. is there any other member of the public who would like to speak to has not spoken? if so, please come forward. public comment is closed. colleagues, i want to make a couple of points. one thing i want to say, i would ask the doctor if he could come forward. as i indicated, legally, we

cannot delve into any specific item or case. there are a number of issues that may be implicated. the one thing that i would say, having read some of the e-mails that are being referenced, the implication that somehow anyone in the department of public health, i am not saying it is true or not, but the way the e- mails read, it does create issues about the arm a's length relationship that we talked about. i think it is important that you mention the importance of providing additional training so that people understand very clearly what their obligations are and what their obligations in terms of neutrality are. i think it is very important that that be in place. from the perspective of the board of supervisors, on a given

project, i can definitely see how the planning department perhaps as one perspective, one preferred outcome, or that maybe some other department has that preferred outcome, but you don't want anyone in the health department to be playing the role, putting together an argument that was the message -- the language that was used in one of the e-mails. we want you and your staff to be there to give us facts and scientific evidence, and not to put argument together. i think that training is really important. i don't know if you have any thoughts on sort of how that would move forward. >> i appreciate that. i appreciate what you just said. i think that from our perspective, we don't want to be putting together any argument that is supportive in one direction of a policy or decision. we want to produce -- present the health facts. they speak for themselves.

we value health in the society. i give you the facts, people know what to do with them. i think given everything i have heard, every time there is a challenge, an incident of concern, we should use -- we use that as a case study as an opportunity to learn. what happened here? what could we have done better? the shipyard, the work in every project, gives us that opportunity to learn. i will go back, and i will be much more attentive to the way i staff communicates. they mainly communicate with environmental professionals. i think that we have to have -- we should have an internal conversation. we don't want even the perception of favorability to be there. it is something we will look at very closely. we will discuss it together and go for. supervisor campos: just

connected to that, you talked about the process that to follow. i know that with respect to specifics, there is a in investigation -- there is an investigation. how long does that take? how does that work? >> with regard -- i cannot speak to the personnel investigation. supervisor campos: obviously. >> i don't have an answer for that. in terms of the review of the work, regarding article 31 and our shipyard, it has been for multiple reviews by multiple public agencies. i don't think another review of the regulatory work as planned. supervisor campos: ok. call it? supervisor cohen, 84 sitting in with us. supervisor cohen: you talk about certain triggers. if certain