ongoing issue with the agency. we are also not using energy efficiently. we need to have enough money to run the system and we need to use our energy efficiently. i bring up energy because, in the city, all of the energy we use in san francisco, including our energy to heat our houses and cut our food and drive our cars is vastly more than what we used to run our municipal transportation system. we only use 2% of the energy we use on muni. so you know we are not efficient. we can improve that. and we need to because the cost of energy is only going to go up. we need to figure out how we are going to do this. the best way is to make muni

efficient, make it appealing, affordable, and help everybody get onto our municipal transportation system. we need to improve pedestrian safety, bicycle safety, we need to improve bicycle parking and implement bike sharing. and in the richmond district -- and i think this could also be for district 5 -- we need to make it easier to do city car share, and even to rent cars. more specifically, about two years ago, we did begin to cut service, muni service, because of a budget shortfall. at this point it is time to assess those cuts to service in the richmond district. we eliminated the ocean beach and we rerouted the 18. it is time to assess those.

the ocean beach line serves primarily elderly people who live out without any avenues. the 18 east to be a direct route from land's end to the safeway, and that is gone. it is also time to assess intersections for pedestrian safety. last night i was at the intersection of 24th avenue and clement street, and i saw three incidents. they were both right across the street from each other happening at the same time. one involved a bicyclist, won a pedestrian, a few minutes later, another incident with a pedestrian. there was almost an incident with a bicyclist. they did not happen but we need to start assessing every single intersection in the city for pedestrian safety. i do not know what the metrics are for that, but we need to

think about this. adding more meters, parking meters throughout the city. these are tools for parking management. as we do this, we need to be able to tell people where we are adding the meters, that we will improve transit in specific ways to make it better for them, or we are to put more bicycle parking in or something. we need specific things that we will say to people. yes, we are where to put parking meters and, yes, you are going to pay for parking, but we are going to start with low costs and raise them incrementally and then we will improve transit and all these other thing we want to make better. for example, geary brt, we need to find out what the holdup is.

i think it has the potential to be an engine for economic growth in the richmond district. i would like to see that implemented. thank you. [applause] >> we have a lot of seniors in the richmond district. i am one of them. so we have the executive director of the golden gate senior services who will talk to us about senior needs. >> mayor lee, supervisor olague, chiu, mar, i am the director of golden gate senior services and also a senior myself. one of the programs we operate is the richmond senior center, which is out on geary boulevard

between 26 and 27th ave. i appreciate the opportunity to speak with you tonight. golden gate senior services is a non-profit agency and was established 37 years ago to provide services to seniors at about half the cost to the city if they were to provide similar services. we can do this because our salary scale is about half of what the city would pay for similar positions. we have a scaled-back health plan for our staff, and i'm ashamed to say we have no retirement for our staff. there are over 15,000 seniors in district 1, and the richmond senior center is full every day providing a full range of activities and lunch. each year we are asked to take budget cuts. in the past, supervisors have helped to restore some of these cuts. last year, mayor lee added money back to the department of aging.

i appreciate and am grateful for this. for this upcoming budget, the human services agency and the department of a bold an aging services have submitted a budget to mayor lee with no cuts to service providers. i urge you to accept their budget. at the same time, the cost of doing business for nonprofit contractors, like golden gate senior services, has gone up year after year. over the last five years, our health care costs have risen on an average of 7.5% a year. that is about 30% over the last five years. it is now costing us on an average of $858 a month for each employee. this is just one example of the rising cost that we have just to keep our doors open. this responsibility for our staff and seniors sometimes seems like a heavy weight on my shoulders. if at all possible, i would urge

you all to give city contractors the cost of doing business increase. it would send an important message to all of us, that the city, indeed, values our work. thank you so much. [applause] >> now we will hear from somebody from district 5, gordon phillips from the diamond youth shelter, talking about homelessness and also someone from the haight street referral center. you are here? i knew that. >> good evening, supervisors, mayor lee, department heads, we appreciate their opportunity to be transparent in this process. i am representing larkin street youth services. we have been around for 25 + years.

over 25 programs serving the city's most vulnerable. we have two particular sites at district 5. our haight street referral center and we also have our diamond youth shelter which serves the cities most vulnerable you, an emergency shelter for temporary stays. i want to speak recognizing that there is lots of priority that are being made around the budget process, recognizing also that our city has as a fundamental belief and value that we will maintain services for families, seniors, and i would like to advocate and urge that you also maintained its services. currently we have the eight st. referral center that operates on limited powers due to funding restrictions, staffing capacity levels. additionally, we have our diamond youth shelter that the

upper during the day simply due to some of the neighborhood relations issues around having that site there within the panhandle districts. we want to see some of that change. reebok to see the funding maintained. as we look at making these are decisions, our needs are also being met. i'm also going to turn the mike over to steve, a case manager. so she can speak more to the specific needs of the homeless youth population in the haight district. >> good evening. thank you for listening to us. i have been working as a case manager for about two years at the referral center. i usually work with approximately 10 youth. last year we had at approximately 1700 to come through the referral center. i just want to urge you that there is an outreach staff.

we have four at the referral center. i am the only case manager there. i want to make sure you understand, recognize that youth is really important for our community, even if there from other places. a lot of those folks and coming here to make this place their home. a lot of these folks are very smart and have a lot to give to our communities. i also wanted to mention, when it comes down to how the community is interacting with the youth population, i would encourage that the police presence in the community would be more engaging and welcoming, trying to build relationships, rather than a hardened hand when speaking, like around the lake situation that has been going on there. i appreciate everyone coming out. i just want to recognize that

some of you that i worked with have been severely mentally ill and i have been able to support them and facilitate them getting into long-term housing. that is something, if we have more funding, we would be able to do. if we had more funding, we would not have a place for people to go during the day so that they can spend time off the streets, instead of on the streets creating a problem for the neighbors. i hate to say like that, but that is how it is put. some of the utah have talked about have spoken about community gardens and things like that. they're interested in giving back. i want folks to know that that is a big part of who we are serving in the haight. everyone has a story and we should give them the opportunity to share with one another. thanks. >> thank you very much.

now, speaking about families and children, from district 1, from the richmond district neighborhood center, we have patricia. >> thank you. she and her husband were instrumental in the beginning of the richmond district neighborhood center. that was 36 years ago. totally a grass-roots effort to save the school district law from being turned into condominiums, and turning it into social services for the richmond district, which there are very few social services. we now have served over 3000 people per week in all of the schools and other sites around the richmond district. we do that on a $3 million budget. our main focus at the neighborhood center is that we are trying to keep families in san francisco. all of you have read over and over again how we lose our

families. you see corridors of the city where there are many strollers about, and then you say, happens to all of them? they move out when they want to buy a home or go to a good school. we have to get the word out that we have good schools. we are proud of our schools in the richmond district. my children went to alamos school. i personally would not run a program that i would not send my own child to. i challenge all of you to have that same mantra for yourselves, that you would not put a child somewhere where you would not put your own child. that is what we need to do in san francisco, understand that all families of all ages, all the grandparents that what their kids to school, they are critical for their safety, for their mental health and living experience. i feel strongly about that. i have seen that in the 42 years i have lived in the richmond

district. i have seen it change. we have gone larger and larger. we have gone more diverse, which is a lovely thing for us. we have got to stand up as richmond district residents to say what our needs are in the richmond district. there are great pockets of need. at the neighborhood center, we have many food banks across the richmond district. our food bank on thursday, we have to close down at 200 people. they are predominantly. and families. since 2010 and those numbers have gone from seniors to more and more families coming. so we have younger people coming to the food banks. we have got to hold onto those people and support them and give them jobs. one of the things we do through the beacon program is jobs for youth. we train people to feel good about themselves, that they have the talents and tools they need

to be the best possible worker, whatever it is we're doing. i encourage all of you -- thinking so much for coming, thank you for having these town halls, and remember the richmond district and all of these people sitting here very quietly. wonderful, safe neighborhoods with lots of pockets of need. do not forget us when you go to do the budgeting process. thank you. [applause] >> and it could have been just a few condominiums. it is a wonderful place. my triplet grandchildren will grow up and do a lot of things in the richmond district center, i hope. our last speaker is going to be from district 5, that the washington, a community member and district 5 resident, who will talk about you if, and he is young. >> how are you doing?

my name is matthew washington. i grew up in san francisco in the western addition, fell more area, district 5 to you all, like we are aliens from the district 5 movie or something. my concern about how you guys are going to allocate your budget is for the youths. i grew up in housing -- you know -- you work with the housing? you? horrible job. horrible job. when i move into the housing, i was 5 years old with my family. in the backyard there was grass. it is gravel now. we used to play football out there. if you play football on their, you will get hurt. recently, we had a murder up the street from where my mother lives. you all have cameras on the corner and everything.

i do not know if they function or not, but this is a concern to me because it affects our youth generally from little babies to 17, they have nothing to do during the summer, nothing to do after school. i think it would be wise to allocate funding to the families, predominantly the families in public housing, or the family that you all are talking about that are dwindling in san francisco. a lot of them are forced to move out of san francisco because of certain been the that affect the community and the cost of living is going up in san francisco as well. these people are important to your community because what is your next generation of san francisco? visit a cat that moved here and has the next internet boom? or is it the children of san francisco that have pride for

san francisco, have family in san francisco. these kids are just as intelligent as someone coming from another state to go to these colleges to be part of the silicon valley, which is our neighbor, to be a part of companies within san francisco, like twitter. we have billion dollar companies out here, and these children know about these companies, they use their devices, facebook, twitter, myspace. my advice would be to allocate some funding to the children so that they can learn how to become a part of these companies, become a part of these new things, because they are just as smart as the kids moving into san francisco to start these businesses. the only difference is, they had the privilege an opportunity to learn early, to write code on computers. put a computer in the middle of turk, i guarantee you will have

the next markzuckerberg come out of the project in san francisco. how would you like to know that? when i see that number of $6.8 billion, that is a lot of money. that is how we feel you all need to allocate funding, for those families. those families in the projects. [applause] >> you have heard from some very powerful speakers. they have said some things that is the truth about government. what is government for, and what is that money for? government is to help the youngest, the oldest, and those who cannot help themselves. we are talking about families.

we are talking about you if. we are talking about transportation that brings people in and takes people out. we are talking about all of these things that people need. you are going to hear more because we have some speakers who will want to come up here. two minutes each. they will come up and ask their questions or give their opinion. first -- i hope i read this right -- linda from district 1. >> mayor lee, supervisors, thank you for inviting members of the richmond area to speak today. i want to say something about seniors in the district. i manage the senior center on a daily basis.

we have our programs, music, billiards, we have a drum circle month -- once a month. hippie hill in golden gate park inspired our drum circle. i want to tell a story about two of our seniors. we have one gentleman who was born in korea. he came to the united states as a young man. he was born with cerebral palsy. he is wheelchair-bound. he has limited use of his two hands. he comes to the center twice a week and does part with us. he draws pictures of his church. his church has stained-glass doors and palm trees. we have several hundred pictures of this church because he draws it again and again, he loves it so much. his state is so great. his friend is roberts yip, a san

francisco transplant, a merchant seamen. he had lived in the richmond district for 30 years, owns a house about two blocks away from the senior center. he takes care ofinsun. insun takes medication. robert helps them. he always make sure that he has a chair and makes sure that he has a napkin and silverware. this is how the two men take care of each other. it is a lovely french ship, and it happened in the senior center. that is what your money does. thank you. [applause] >> we have a person from huckleberry house, patrick. i want to tell you, huckleberry house save my family, so i really want you to speak.

>> my name is patrick. i am a case manager at huckleberry house, in the fifth district. i am a resident of the first district, so this works out nicely. i want to talk about the cost of living adjustments that we were hearing about. i do not think either one of you were in that committee. to talk about why there are important, i first need to talk about huckleberry house itself. we are an emergency shelter for a 11to 17-year olds in the city. we are open 24 hours a day. we are open 365 days a year. we work with children and families in crisis. if there is violence in the home, if there is a kid running away -- we get kids from all of the country and the world running away from different situations. we work with kids who are having drug abuse issues, alcohol abuse issues, we work with kids who

are suicidal, any kind of crisis that the youth might be going through in the city. because of the work that we do, a lot of the city agencies and a lot of the not-for-profit in the city are dependent on us or them to be able to their job, child crisis, the police department -- i have a list. schools, a juvenile probation, therapists, community-based organizations. i understand you have a lot of difficult decisions to make when it comes to this budget, but you need to understand what kind of decisions -- what your decisions are. you can either give us the money when it comes to these increases, so we can continue to do the job we need to do, or you will still have kids in crisis. so you will end up spending more money in the long run. otherwise, you spend money putting kids into foster care with course outcomes. he will spend more money having kids on the street.

you are going to spend more money -- god forbid having kids in hospitals from abuse or because of suicides. i'm out of time, but i appreciate it. i would love to meet with you afterwards. [applause] >> now we have sarah, who will be talking about seniors and a dull day programs. when i work with seniors, i know how important that is. . >> thank you, good evening. my name is sarah chan, the director for the self-help for the elderly adults services. i am here to talk about seniors and their families. really, representing the frail seniors to attend our adult day services center in district 1.

because we are so grateful to mayor lee, supervisor mar, supervisor chu, olague, for your continuous support for the adult day services in the adult community. as you know, providing services to the seniors, providing an opportunity for them to continue to stay with their family, spending quality time, instead of going to a nursing home or other institutions. as you know, in the last year, we have been in this big battle with the state. we almost lost our program. thanks to mayor lee for helping to save our program so that seniors can continue to come to the center. it has been a tremendous impact for their family and their life. as we know, in 2010, the census,

in district 1, about 10,000 seniors and 65 and older. 1500 over 75. in our center in district 1, we have about three centers. we are taking care of about 400 seniors. that is only about 4%. preserving these services is important. mayor lee is asking about innovative solutions. we are saving money and we are much cheaper than going to a nursing home. so we continue to thank mayor lee and your team, to remember us when you do your budget, continue to be sensitive to the seniors needs. thank you so much. >> it should be noted, when the state said they were going to cut adult day services, ours was the only city that said, we will

help. it is the only city that i have seen in this state that stepped in. caroline goodman. she is here to speak. ok. the next speaker will be ann chung. >> good evening, everybody. my concern -- i am in district 5. i am going to say this. we need to ensure we provide young people with jobs and internships, opportunities, but we also have to make sure that we prepare them with life skills that allow them to be successful in their position. another thing. we want to make sure that the youth has behavior and technical training when they enter the

workforce. many of you in district 5 are disconnected from job opportunities, even unpaid internships that allow them to gain valuable experience. so i am speaking for the youth in district 5. we need help for our youth. [applause] >> ann chung from district 1. >> thank you. good evening, mayor, supervisors. i am from self-help for the elderly. i want to share with you this associated press article that came out on april 19. the title just says "census