at the worst streets in the city. it will also make sure every supervisory district gets a fair share of those dollars so that you do not have people in carmen chu's district saying, how about my streets? it will be equally distributed. there is a geographical equity clause in the bond that says everybody gets a fair share. we just will pick the worst streets in their district to work on. the benefits of working on those streets, or threfor three years it is at a total capacity for what dpw can do. after three years, we do not want to come back with another big bond. what we would like to try to do is get the street repaving back

to the general fund. build up the general fund so that it can cover the streets. it may at the 100%, so we are looking at taking back the vehicle license fee that the state now has. they use it for everything but our streets. we need to take that local decision and get our vehicle license fee back to our streets. the combination of those two will colon -- continue to allow us to have a good pot of money to continue maintaining the streets at a high level. but these three years will only keep us at the current level. it will not get us into a better place because of all of the backlog of streets in disrepair. i want to make sure that we have done enough so that it does not increase fivefold, if we did not do anything. that is the danger.

i am spending my saturday -- weekends -- talking to neighborhood groups about pension reform, the street repaving bond. those are two important things we are doing. we will also be introducing a half cent sales tax to take the place of the state's inability to get theirs. as you know, july 1, the law changed. the sales tax would down from 9.5 to 8.5. we are asking for a half a percent increase to cover but the state is going to impose on us. it is a safety thing for us. i do not call it an increase. we called it a safety sales tax, something that restores half of what we gained. that will help us with money that i had to use to balance the

budget this year. i had to get into the reserves. i want to build up those reserves and be prepared for one or two more years of bad economic times for the city and county. i have to be smart about that. i hope the public understands, we're not increasing the sales tax, we are just trying to get half a percent back. to me, that is a lot of work between now and november, meeting with the different resident councils, neighborhood associations. if you see me, which you will, i will be active selling those three things as the mayor of san francisco. i wanted to give you a head start on the detail and answer any questions you had, make sure our asian community as well are versed in the details of it. at this time, i will open it up

to any questions you have. thank you for being here. >> [inaudible] have you seen his proposal? >> yes, it is not that different. i have to say, mr. adachi is offering a compromise because i think, he is the to realize we did the right thing. the only way that he can come in is to suggest that we compromise what we believe is a comprehensive proposal. i would welcome him to go to the board of supervisors to make his pitch to the board. i believe the majority, if not

all of the board of supervisors, will end up endorsing our proposal. we will have a public process for him to involve himself. i had offered his input. we took a lot of his ideas at the beginning in january, february, march, when we included everyone at the table, and he was still out that gathering signatures for something different, using outside money and outside help. we were all working with the city family, labor unions, city departments, trying to do our work. so his proposal has not really changed. i think he is just realizing the data is coming and he is a ploy to have to make a decision whether to go with hours or himself. i do not that there is much support for his proposal. he has not that it the right

way. we continue offering him eight opportunity to join us. he will attack our proposal with limited few points that are not correct. he is currently saying that we made some deal using the budget balancing proposal. that is so nonsensical. he knows for a fact that the police union had every right to a pay raise. it was done away before i became mayor. they had a contract with that right. we tried to get as much money back from police and fire, with their cooperation. they have every legal right not to, but police, fire, nurses, in consideration of our request that we needed to balance the budget -- and we could have had layoffs if we did not balance the budget -- they for going to

their membership and i believe they will vote in favor of giving back to the city. you have to thank them for that. they did not have to do it. instead of hitting them over the head, like mr. adachi does, you are not giving enough for you are taking something away, we need to thank them for cooperating. that is the difference in philosophy. i will invite him to appear at the board of supervisors, convince the board of supervisors, but i believe -- and they are checking in with the weekly -- they are telling me that our proposal is much more comprehensive. it has the help their contribution that they are going at. we have support of the unions.

they do not want another lawsuit from a union that will then place us in jeopardy. i think the board of supervisors make an intelligent choice. as you know, i have worked hard to make sure that our office communicate well with the board. i think mr. adachi has to appeal to the board of supervisors. i do not believe he will have the support. >> [inaudible] school construction bonds. do you worry about asian communities may not approve it -- thinking together -- two

things? >> i have not had a chance to review the school bond proposal. there are several government structures, so they can place things on the bonds without our authority. i will say, with a lot of bands, the asian community has always been concerned about the quality of schools. you talk to any asian family in general, they hope that schools improve because it is their kids getting into it -- education. if they believe the school board will increase the opportunity for their kids to have a better education, there is no doubt they will vote in favor of it. but if they believe the school bond will not do that, that they would be the first ones to say no. that is the way i think i. the school district will have that obligation to convince them

that this is good for them. we have challenges in our school district, as you know. everybody wants quality education. will the school bond help with that? that is a good question that will help people understand. >> [inaudible] >> if people think the only issue is their pocketbook, that might occur. but i think most people want to understand what are you proposing? is it good for quality of life in the city? for myself, many of the asian families, they enjoy quality of life. they want public safety, they want a safe city. they want a city that is not in debt. they want a successful city that keep on bringing in tourists. lots of tourists from china. you saw the ping pong group

yesterday. everyone enjoys that. i think asian community wants a successful city that is balanced. it but not always have to be the pocketbook, but they want a quality city. that is why they came here. it is about the richness of the city in general. do i want to keep living here? do i want to make my life here? that is on the minds of many asian families. i went to lunch with some sixth graders from alice fong. i said, do you want to be in the city? yes, i want to be in the city. they were asking me about twitter. they play some of the zynga games. they did not know that their

headquarters were here, but they need to know that, growing up. we want the chinese companies to also use san francisco as their headquarters and to continue to be the gateway. people love that about the city. asian families, the matter their income -- they could be a hotel workers, garment workers, for ceo's, they all want -- or ceo's, they all want a quality city. my job is to make sure they trust government, so that when we say something, we do it. what i do not like it, and past relationships with the government, they could not do what they said. that is where the mistrust comes out. that is why i am going around talking to every community possible. if i can take care of it, i will

tell them. if i cannot, i will tell them honestly. i think honesty in government is the most important thing right now, especially at three are trying to build quality for the city. that is how i will approach the bond, the pension, and sales tax. >> [inaudible] >> it will be by the actual roads. they have something called the pci index, the measurement of the road conditions. just because it district is larger in geography does not need -- it will have to be a combination of what is the quality of the road and what are the most traveled roads that

need of repair? which ones are in a state, where if we do not repair that within the next year, they will cost five times more? those combinations of things we will use for every district to determine which roads. the equity is about how much money we have per year to spend with road pavement, it is about $150 million of street pavement. the rest of the money will go to improvements for bicycle lanes, ada compliance. that is important for crosswalks. a lot of pedestrian safety projects. even sometimes in a district -- i always use carmen chu as an example -- because she has a flat district.

she says her streets are in pretty good condition but they have some pedestrian issues where they could use money to make sure that the long crosswalks are safe for seniors and kids to cross all the way. that is in there. almost $50 million is focused on pedestrian safety projects. so it is not just the roads. it is also a road-related work that is important for pedestrian safety. bicycle lanes are in there, signal lighting. but may look at geographical equity, it is spending the same amount of money in each district, not because of the size, but what is most important to that district? we have different categories for different things. some might want more money for pedestrian projects because

their roads are in ok shape. then there are others who just bought it for the roads. my streets are narrow, people get across, not all lot of history of pedestrian accidents. >> [inaudible] are you going to bring them back? >> yes, the budget does contemplate a police academy. the budget has passed, so there is a police academy included in there. we are glad to see that. i think the police department and public will be glad to see that. we are now getting more retirements from the police department and we would like to have a number police officers coming in -- younger police officers coming in. >> you talked about sciu as the union that you had to work with.

the pension is going to change their life. >> we did meet with retirees. they told us they're concerned is not their pension, it is health care. they have some plans that they believe are very good for them and their age already. our changes on the retirement services board have to do with economics. if there is a choice between the purchase of generic drugs versus brand name drugs, that decision has come before the health services board. in my opinion, there is no difference between generic and brand name, except cost.

so why don't we make a decision that saved us money without compromising quality? that is the kind of decision on what the health service's board to make. in by generic drugs -- invite generic drugs in. if we do not take quality away, we need to let you know, we are just lowering the cost. they are a little bit afraid of that, but i think they are more afraid of change which does not affect that quality of the health care they want. i think the additional person that we anticipate to be on the health care board will pay attention because it is somebody being selected and presented by the comptroller's office that will pay attention to the cost. we need to have some cost containment but it does not need

to compromise money. >> we just heard yesterday that there was a new comprehensive proposal, including resources that were already provided to the city in charity care. >> i have a team of people from the department of public health reviewing the proposal, also with the housing, also with the tenderloin community for the impact on their community, and of course, muni, mta, the human services group. they are reviewing it in detail. i will be scheduling a meeting with cpm see to go over that to see how -- cpmc to see how that translates over into the impact we want.

i do not have an immediate response except to say we are discussing this in detail. i am trying to help cpmc be successful at the board of supervisors and planning commission. as we get closer and closer to an agreement, i believe they need to listen to my advice. i work with the board every day. i know how they think. they want to have a successful vote at the board. i am guiding them there with the conditions -- it was not conditioned that i made up out of thin air. it was to deal with all of the impacts of a hospital decide they want -- they want a big hospital and want to have to take care of everything else. i am very careful to know how

each supervisor feels about the impact on the project. i would like cpmc to be successful because they do not have a lot of time. we would do the best we can and review every aspect of this so that they have the best chance of success. >> the issue of the state budgets have affected many local businesses. is there any way that the city could help more nonprofits? >> that is why i am proposing a set sales tax. the state did make some severe cuts. we do not know when those cuts will start that impacting the nonprofits. as you know, through our city budget, if you ask many of the nonprofits, they're pretty

happy. we restored a lot of the original cuts. their services reflect the values that i hold, board of supervisors hold. now the state is making cuts, some in the same places that we've restored. we cannot promise to back fill all of those cuts. we can promise to go through the same process and asked what are the critical services that we must save, and work on them as hard as we can. that is why i need an additional cushion with a half cent sales tax. that will give us the of the need to restore cuts that the city is making. it is unfortunate the state cannot resolve their problems and they push it off onto the counties. i know the governor is trying hard, but it gets frustrating that they cannot agree. i am happy to be working with a board that can agree locally. maybe we need to send a message

to get agreement that's fair. i need more resources to help with those state cut spirit that is by the have cent sales tax is important to me. and it is not increasing the sales tax, in my opinion. it is just saving half. the public gets the other half. that is what i considered the sales tax as a safety valve sales tax. >> i wanted to talk about redevelopment. what is the city going to do with that? when the state cuts, how much impact is that to the city? >> on the zoning issue, we have

calculated, in their process, they say if you want to restore your pre development agency, you have to pay a certain amount of money. we believe the amount of that money is about $20 million. we do not have that kind of money. we are trying to figure out ways in which we can finance that, but that they need to come through redevelopment. we do not have the money in the city at all. that is the challenge. the other challenge is, it is the opinion of the redevelopment agency that it is illegal for the state to do this. the redevelopment agency for san francisco will most likely join in a state-wide a lawsuit against the state from doing

this. as a city, we are reviewing our options, but because it is a separate agency, the redevelopment agency can make its own decisions. we have not included on our decision. we are working with the city attorney to get some aspects on the legality of this. we are fairly certain the redevelopment agency will be joining the state-wide lost it with all of the other major cities in the state. they believe -- and there are good grounds to believe that -- that this is not a maneuver taken by the governor's office. >> does that mean we are going to have a temporary injunction first? >> i think so.

the national league of cities, as well as the california redevelopment association, have indicated strongly their attorneys have strong opinions that that was not legal. >> [inaudible] you said many times that you would not be running again for mayor. have you changed? with all of these campaigns asking you to run, what is your position? >> i tried not to pay too much attention to the people who have been starting the campaign to ask me to run. to the extent that i read and see it, i do appreciate that

many people support what we are doing and how we are doing it. i enjoyed a lot of support, i think, not only internally from the government, but i think there are lot of people that agree with me. therefore, they believe that should automatically translate into my riding. there are two issues. -- running. i like that people are in joint what we are doing. it is much better than, you are a failure, get out of here. for me, the personal choice has debate with an understanding of why i came to do the job and under what circumstances. it is a personal choice that i had. i never wanted to be a politician had i been, i would

have signaled that many years ago. so i am still of the position that i will not be running for this job. i know there will be a strong effort the next few weeks to convince me otherwise. we will let that play out, but that is where i am at. i never look at myself as a politician. >> [inaudible] >> i think it is more appropriate for me to focus on the things that i asked the voters to pay attention to. i have not really paid attention to either of the candidates for what they are saying. right now, to me, that is it a distraction. -- or what they are saying. i will not be endorsing anyone for any office. i do need to focus on the pension reform, sales tax, and

on the road repaving, as my contribution to the voters. i think that is a lot already for people to understand. i think people will have to make up their mind about the other candidates they choose. but i hope they hold a session with you because you have some good questions. >> when you talk to supervisors, some say that you promised not to run. >> that was the circumstance. they did not want someone distracted. i understand that. that is why i came into this job. >> how do [inaudible] you may go back in many