work through people liked doris ward, people like espanola jackson, but it is very clear to me that if people like me are only able to sit in and do the kinds of things we're able to do because of people like mrs. westbrook, i would like to thank her family for sharing her with us and allowing her to do the kind of worked that should be done. let me close by saying there are a couple of staff members at the redevelopment agency who have worked very hard. in addition to the money that has been put on the table, staff have worked tirelessly with partners to find funds to turn over every rock that was needed in order to make sure that the money was available to turn this out the way it was. this has been a project that has been near and dear to his heart. and as a dangerous, bill o'brien, sally forth, chris

harris, mike rizzo, angela , heidi, kimberly, al, ricky -- these people represent about every aspect of the agency's work from finance to real-estate to housing and everything. they along with the commission, along with the pac, along with mercy and the south of market health center, always it -- deserve a resounding round of applause. >> the san francisco cons tri of flowers in golden gate park

is now showing a new exhibit that changes the way we see the plants around us. amy stewart's best-selling book, "wicked plants" is the inspiration behind the new exhibit that takes us to the dark side of the plant world. >> i am amy stewart. i am the arthur of "wicked plants," the weeds that killed lincoln's mother and other botanical atrocities. with the screens fly trap, that is kind of where everybody went initially, you mean like that? i kind of thought, well, all it does is eat up bugs. that is not very wicked. so what? by wicked, what i mean is that they are poisonous, dangerous, deadly or immoral or maybe illegal or offensive or awful in some way. i am in the profession of going around and interviewing botanists, horticulturalists

and plant scientists. they all seem to have some little plant tucked away in the corner of a greenhouse that maybe they weren't supposed to have. i got interested in this idea that maybe there was a dark side to plants. >> the white snake root. people who consumed milk or meat from a cow that fed on white snake root faced severe pain. milk sickness, as it was culled, resulted in vomiting, tremors, delirium and death. one of the most famous victims of milk sickness was nancy hangs lincoln. she died at the age of 34, leaving behind 9-year-old abraham lincoln. he helped build his mother's casket by carving the woodallen petition douche the wooden

petition himself. >> we transformed the gallery to and eerie victorian garden. my name is lowe hodges, and i am the director of operations and exhibitions at the conls tore of -- cons tore of flowers. we decided it needed context. so we needed a house or a building. the story behind the couple in the window, you can see his wife has just served him a glass of wine, and he is slumped over the table as the poison takes affect. a neat little factold dominion about that house is actually built out of three panels from old james bond movie. we wanted people to feel like i am not supposed to be in this room. this is the one that is

supposed to be barred off and locked up. >> the ole andersonner -- oleander. this popular shrub is popular in warm climates. it has been implicated in a surprising number of murders and accidental deaths. children are at risk because it takes only a few leaves to kill them. a southern california woman tried to collect on her husband's life insurance by putting the leaves in his food. she is now one of 15 women on california's death rowan the only one who attempted to murder with a plant. >> people who may haven't been to their cons tore or been to -- do serve tore or their botanical garden, it gives them a reason to come back. you think let's go and look at

the pretty flowers. these are pretty flowers, but they are flowers with weird and fascinating stories behind them. that is really fun and really not what people normally think of when they come to a horticultural institution. >> "wicked plants" is now showing at the san francisco conserve tore of flowers. unless next time, get out and play.

>> we came to seven straight about 10 years ago. -- 7th street about 10 years ago. the environment is huge. it is stronger than willpower. surrounding yourself with artists, being in a culture where artists are driving, and where a huge amount of them is a healthy environment. >> you are making it safer. push, push. that is better. when i start thinking, i see it actually -- sometimes, i do not see it, but when i do, it is usually from the inside out.

it is like watching something being spawned. you go in, and you begin to work, excavate, play with the dancers, and then things began to emerge. you may have a plan that this is what i want to create. here are the ideas i want to play with, but then, you go into the room, and there maybe some fertile ideas that are becoming manifest that are more interesting than the idea you had initially set out to plan. so there has to be this openness for spontaneity. also, a sense that regardless of the deadline, that you have tons of time so the you can keep your creativity alive and not cut it off and just go into old habits. it is a lot like listening. really listening to watch what is going to emerge. i like this thing where you put your foot on his back. let's keep it.

were your mind is is how you build your life. if you put it in steel or in failure, it works. that works. it is a commitment. for most artists, it is a vacation and a life that they have committed themselves to. there is this notion that artists continue to do their work because of some kind of the external financial support. if that was taken away, artists would still do their art. it is not like there is a prerequisite for these things to happen or i will not do it. how could that be? it is the relationship that you have committed to. it is the vocation. no matter how difficult it gets, you are going to need to produce your art. whether it is a large scale or very small scale.

the need to create is going to happen, and you are going to have to fulfill it because that is your life.

>> i just want to make a public statement to acknowledge that appointments to the police commission and any commission which is a policy-making body is very important. i want to encourage about keep

in front of our minds the importance of not only to elect women, but to work to get more women appointed to these bodies that help make legislative decisions for our city and county of san francisco. >> i am from san francisco. i grew up in the local neighborhood. i did my under deprad wait work at fisk university, where i studied political science with a concentration in public administration and worked eight years largely in the public sector. then i earned a master's degree from carnegie melon in pittsburg, pennsylvania. i spent some time as assistant executive director for a non-profit. we did work if a lot of kids in the neighborhood. i have done fundraising for candidates and issues. i have experience with the federal reserve bank of san francisco. when i look around my neighborhood and see the changes that are happening, i

so there is no neighborhood grocery store. i see that small businesses in particular are coming and going, and they haven't been able to really sustain themselves. from my work experience in working for the city in the mayor's office as well as in the non-profit, i had a good sense as to what some of the challenges were. when i look in the future, i could see more challenges coming. i thought i had a set of experiences and more importantly a passion and desire to serve. >> i understand that no one wants to have their programs cut. of course not. i also want everyone here to understand that no one up here wants to cut programs because they don't care about the population being served. there are no value ains here. we are all on the same team. it is a tough situation, as we are here so that we can begin the work together. >> i am actually more forward thinking. for me it is less about being left or right, or in this town, moderate or progressive. it is really about the issues and about creating policies

that will have a sustainable and lasting positive impact on the families that live here. it is very costly and difficult to do business in sfrinls, to raise your children in san francisco, and i would like to have a voice at that table to really create policies that will minimize that san francisco is not a big business-friendly city. i think we started to go in the wrong direction. the reason why we started walking down that path largely was because of political ideology. when you deal with me, you are dealing with facts, less than politics. i really want to have a positive impact on the city overall. >> good afternoon, everyone. how are you? >> good. >> it's a nice day today. thank you for coming out to our community event. please give a round of [applause] to them. we have a lot of development going on. you see how lovely leland street looks. do you like it? >> yes. >> beautiful, isn't it? we are going to continue. we have a library that is going to be opening up in june.

that's right. so i will see you all there at the library. there is a lot of activity going on. it is important we remain connected and engaged. >> would you mind if we were to pull the seniors together and translate for me in a mini meeting? >> yes, sir. >> what we are going ready to do is we are going to have a quick little mini meeting to -- because we didn't translate my short message before. >> i just want to say i want to welcome everyone to the event. >> we have folks in visitation valley only talking with visitation valley. we have folks in bayview again only talking in a very small corridor of 3rd straight and the merchant corridor. we don't have people talking to the hill merchant association, doing patch. all these fragrmented

conversations are happening, largely talking about the same thing, crime, keeping the streets clean, supporting sbaubs. that is something i made a concerted effort on the campaign to build bridges. >> along third street, dog patch, and everyone along the cord door has the same complaint. >> i have the same complaint. >> we have the third street merchant corridor and an opportunity to revite lies what i consider to be the main artery of the business district. it is a pretty long street. there is a lot of opportunity there. let's not squander that. when we recruit businesses, we want it to be a healthy mix that reflects the cultural history of the southeast part of the city. we are all human, and how to connect with that human spirit, whether you are in public housing, own your own property, or if your asian, african-american, male or female, we are really a

community. when we start to realize and move in the direction of being humans and having this human experience and connecting together, really if you will, being each other's keeper, then san francisco really begins to continue to thrive.

>> thank you very much for coming this morning and welcome to the rededication of the reservoir. we are happy to be here today. this represents one of the milestones in our project. we are happy to share this with you. this reservoir has been empty the last two years and today, you will hear the sound of water rushing to fill it again. it makes the city safer, provides water for customers, for firefighters, for after an earthquake. we will be updating our systems. this was originally built in 1885. 125 years old. it takes care of a good part of san francisco, places lower than this.

it is an incredibly important part of our system in san francisco. it was a $39 million project and it came in under budget. we are doing it effectively and efficiently. we do appreciate the folks who worked on it. it is part of the $4.6 billion water system improvement program. this is about a half with point in that program. it is the last major project in san francisco that has been completed. there are a few more projects to be done. this is the last major one. san francisco is more safe than before these projects were done. there are a lot of projects that happened in district 11. the first was a tank replacement project that started a number of years ago. it is fitting we are in district 11 because we're finishing the major work on our

program in district 11. we're happy to be joined by supervisor john avalos. he has been supportive of all of our programs and was a leader on having local jobs for people who need them. the work is happening to provide those jobs. in fact, at the end of this week, we will have six kids out worth $18 million that will help the new local hire ordinance legislation. we are certain the pilots for how to expand local hire. supervisor avalos? [applause] >> thank you. i want to congratulate you and the public utility commission, san francisco water, power, so were for your great work on this project and throughout the head ceci -- throughout the improvement program. we have projects being done across northern california and

it speaks volumes about the puc staff, being able to bring these projects to fruition. these are paid for by our tax dollars. we owe it to the ratepayers to make sure that our public investments are made efficiently and a sound way for the budget. congratulations. i am excited about the track record of the puc on hiring locally in san francisco. for this project alone, we have 60.5% of the residents who are around the area working on this project. we have 6.5% -- it is 27.5%, sorry, much better. 27.5% of the workers are local residents. that is above what our current mandate is for the local hire ordinance that we passed last year at the board of

supervisors. i wanted to congratulate you on that effort. 54.5% are from the bay area. 60.5% of the workers are apprenticeships workers, new workers, who are getting new jobs into this industry. the project helps to make that happen. congratulations on that. we are hiring carpenters, cement workers, and landscape professionals. we know we are providing employment opportunities for this project. i look at this as providing so many benefits to san francisco. we're providing reliable water. we are making our water system safe. we are also improving the process for many san francisco workers and businesses. those workers will go and spend money for their basic needs in san francisco. congratulations to the puc. i look forward to more of the

work being done on our local monuments. thank you very much. [applause] >> thank you, supervisor. don't we love this almost summer weather? it is a wonderful place to be, isn't it? this is part of a larger improvement program and it is good when you have these ceremonies to have somebody who knows what is happening in back of us as opposed to those who come for the celebrations. julie is the head of the program and she will be talking about what we're doing here. thank you. julie? >> thank you. i am thrilled to be here this morning to commemorate the completion of this key retrofit project as well as to celebrate the construction completion of 29 other projects here in the city of san francisco. the university mount reservoir is the fifth to be retrofitted as part of the water system

improvement program since 2003. i think it is important to remember that every time we complete a project like this, we are a step closer to making our system completely seismically reliable and to ensure our 2.5 million customers have drinking water, and that we have an adequate supply to fight fires following a major seismic event. how did we seismically retrofit this 125-year-old structure? we installed a number of super frames to support the roof structure. we added multiple sheer walls and stained -- and frames. we also drilled 500 miles through the bottom of the reservoir to anchor it to the bedrock to prevent it from sliding. we completely sealed and waterproofed the roof.

with all of these upgrades completed, this reservoir will be possible of heating be -- feeding the entire city following a major earthquake. be completed some improvements to the inlet-outlet piping of the reservoir that will allow us to backseat our transmission system so that customers in the upper peninsula do receive water following an emergency. i am really proud of the hard work of our project team. there to be commended for successfully delivering the project and also for their dedication to the program. i also wanted to highlight the pretty impressive track record of the regional project manager, howard fung. job well done, howard. [applause] thank you. >> thank you.

just to make sure we understand, this is a partnership of a lot of folks. the general manager of the puc, the general manager for infrastructure, the assistant manager for external affairs, and a lot of you who have worked hard for the puc, we appreciate it. we also have the leadership of the puc, the commissioners to make the decisions. we have the president and the vice president of the commission. francesca is here to make another announcement today. [applause] >> i am so happy to be here to celebrate this project. i think it is appropriate, the weather we are having, as we dedicate the reservoir. it is a little strange to be getting this rain, but we appreciate every drop of it and we are happy to have a big reservoir. i am excited to announce that we have plans to install three small hydroelectric generators here on site. that is a clean, renewable

energy source, something that we are committed to. it will replicate on a smaller scale of our large scale hydro project up that hetch hetchy dam . we are thrilled that will be on line. that will be done by 2013. 200 kilowatts per day will be generated by those three facilities, those three generators, enough to power approximately 200 homes. we are excited about that as part of our efforts to move away from dirty, empowered -- imported power sources in san francisco, and an example to our commitment to a clean, renewable energy future. we are excited about that. i want to congratulate the power enterprise staff for this project. they are doing everything they can on the efficiency front to make us a clean, green city. i want to acknowledge them as

well. it is a team effort. not only the water enterprise, but the power enterprises making this a success. thank you to them and to everybody at the puc for making this happen. [applause] >> now we have a few gifts for the people who are speakers. then we will walk down and turn the valve. when it is totally open, it will bring in 2.5 million gallons a day into this reservoir. it holds 80 million gallons. it will take a month to fill up completely. you are welcome to come down. watch your step. we will make the last turn of the vowels. you will start to hear the rush of water going into the reservoir. [water rushing]