playa park. we have been working closely with stakeholders to address a range of issues in our neighborhood. among these are traffic and pedestrian safety concerns throughout our neighborhood and in the sunset area in general. particularly at the loop. we are very supportive of various beautification projects that have been taking place. we are experiencing something of a renaissance in the hour sunset. other issues we have been addressing include oversize vehicles. some are stored there by residents elsewhere in the city. some are inhabited and we have had ongoing issues of sewage disposal, waste disposal, drug use and so forth.

homeless this is another issue. many people might consider a quiet backwater, our neighborhood, but we do have a homeless population of maybe a dozen or more in our neighborhood. they are sleeping in parks and so forth. needless to say, a lot of these folks struggle with drug and out called addiction. we could use support in that regard. there is also the issue of illegal activity taking place around the murphy when the bill in golden gate park. it is kind of a dangerous and sketchy place and many neighbors do not feel comfortable going into the park on that side. what do we need? more police officers certainly -- we've worked with a succession of captains and they have been phenomenally supportive of our efforts to address these various concerns,

but their resources are stretched thin. homeless outreach in our neighborhood is much appreciated. we could use that. resources for beautification projects. a solution to the legal activity taking place in the western end of the park. that has been a problem that has been ongoing for decades and we could use some help. this is a quick list of some of our concerns and we appreciate the opportunity to talk to you. [applause] supervisor chu: so we have had a number of speakers just to talk about neighborhood issues. they are representative of some of the things we hear on a daily basis, whether it's pedestrian safety, the challenge of small- business, making sure our corridors are vibrant and clean. there are a ton of different issues that we hope you will

hear further from. but in my haste to get straight to the committee voice, i skipped over the budget presentation. at this point, i think it would be important to hear about the budget a little bit. i would like to invite the mayor's budget office to a quick presentation for us. >> good morning, everyone thank you for coming out. i'm going to do a quick overview of where we are in the budget. our of last year's adopted budget was $6.8 billion. half of that is what we talked about as being the general fund. half of that is what we call enterprise funds like the airport, the mta and some other smaller departments. those departments have their around dedicated revenue streams and are responsible for

balancing themselves within their own budget and revenue streams. the other half is what we call the general funds. that is what we are talking about when we talk about the deficits the city has. we are really talking about the general fund deficit. that is about half of our budget. what do we spend the general fund money on? we spend it on a lot of services and priorities for the public. we spend it on the social services. we spent our public safety department. we spend it on streets and infrastructure and making sure we are meeting the priorities and values of our citizens and making sure our streets are safe and comfortable for all are residents. where do we get our general fund money?

we get from our tax revenues, from property taxes, business taxes, payroll tax, hotel tax. we get a significant amount of money from the state and federal government, but predicting that amount is always a difficult challenge. the state and federal governments are dealing with deficits and a lot of times they try to push that on to us. predicting the amount of federal and state revenue is a big challenge for our office. we also get revenue from all of you through a variety of fees and payments you make for services you get from the city. what are we talking about in terms of our problem? the last few weeks, we updated what we are calling our budget deficit for the year.

we are projecting we have a $170 million deficit in the first year and a $312 million deficit in the first year. this year for the first time in the city's history, we are legally required to balance the two-year budget. in the past, we would have we been dealing with the $170 million problem but this year we have to deal with both. over two years, we have $480,000,000,000.21 call for. why has that happening? we are seeing some amount of recovery and are economics this year which is exciting. it's a very different story that we have dealt with in the last few years. we are actually seeing revenues improved, but our expenses are increasing faster than our revenue stream. it is as if we were to get a small boost and our paycheck and

then go home to get letters from the landlord showing our rent had increased and letters from health insurance telling us are in premiums are going up, going to the gas station and knowing the price of gas is raising and it is eating up that little boost in your paycheck. i think a lot of you can relate to that. we are dealing with the same pressures many in the public deal with. our expenses are increasing at a faster pace than our revenues. even though we see some amount of economic recovery, we have a problem we need to deal with. over the next six weeks, my office along with the mayor and supervisors will be working on balancing the budget and coming up with ways to solve that problem. our goal is to have a two-year balanced budget and bicol this

year is to make some decisions that will result in a long-term structural balance and solutions for the city. as we balance the budget and continue looking ahead into the future, we are not going to have these major fluctuations we have dealt with in the past. we are looking to find structural solutions to make sure our expenses stay in line with our revenues. as we balance, we are looking to balance that two-year budget. we want to make sure we are funding what we hear from the community is the priorities and goals for t city. we want to make sure we are investing in infrastructure and make sure we have found sound

investments for the future. to do that, we really want to listen to you which is why we are here today. thank you and look forward to hearing from you. [applause] supervisor chu: thank you. this is a very simple view of the budget and a great summary, but it does speak to of the challenges we face. each of the department's year player role in making sure the budget becomes balanced, so they are all here today to answer questions. we want to hear from you directly so we have people who will be asking their questions. each person will get two minutes. if you would like to have a question answered, your questions should come within the one minute timeframe so we will have time for the department's answer. if you would like to make a statement, me have your full two minutes.

>> first question is from susan. come on up. >> when we were asked to pass an additional amount of money for street improvements, one of the things listed as a problem was the lack of curved cuts around the city. if memory serves, there almost 6000 intersections that did not have curved cuts. why are we spending money all over this neighborhood whipping up perfectly sound sidewalks with existing curbs cuts to replace them with different curved cuts when there are places all over the city that do not have them at all? that is flushing money down the toilet. i do not understand it. >> thank you for having me. we did it pass proposition be bond which allows us to improve the conditions our streets.

their federal standards and so as part of rebuilding our streets, we will be building all of the streets and repaving and rebuilding all of the cuts to standard on the street. we do need to comply with the federal mandate for standards so when you see a curb cut being repaired, it is because we are trying to bring them up to standards. >> i understand that. but wouldn't it be better to put them in places we don't have them now? >> we work closely with the mayor's office of disability and they advise us on the critical areas. just because we have one in a certain location, use is a big concerns we have to prioritize. >> one of the areas we have seen

is in the past, we might have had a rap that was compliant based on previous laws and as the rule change, we had to fix or repair them to come up to the new standards. >> i am with the mayor's office on disability. the city has a transition plan for the public right of way that addresses the curb ramps specifically at we have a rating system where we evaluate all of the different curb ramps. our priority is always on public safety. so what we rate the existing ramps, if they meet a certain threshold, we leave them as they are and put them on the list for a later upgrade. but this failed to pass the safety test, having a lift at the bottom up my cause a wheelchair user to tip over -- we do prioritize of four replacement. we tried to do that in conjunction with other infrastructure upgrades taking

place in that neighborhoods like street repaving programs. >> i am going to read out a few more names and asked if you could line up to be more efficient with our time. [reading names] [applause] >> good morning mayor and supervisors. i am here to represent these seniors for self-help for the community. we are in non-profit based organization and we serve about 25,000 seniors in the bay area. over 90% are low any comment from minority communities. senior services has always been

a very important that the senior population. different social, educational and educational things to decrease but isolation and promote mental health. our senior centers provide 1200 meals to the elderly every day. it has been the most busiest center in san francisco. in district 4, we have over 9000 seniors 65 years or more. we only have one the city-funded new site which we can always serve around 500 seniors each day which means thousands of seniors may not benefit from the senior services. i would like to take this opportunity to thank the officer at park and recreation for providing as a great place for

the past 10 years. however, with limited space and resources, many activities are restrained. the seniors want to find a place to have meals and meet friends and mingle with old friends. but because of the space, they are limited. on behalf of seniors, thank you. with your future support, we are always ready to expand services to make sure all seniors will not be isolated, hungary and lost. these seniors all need you. [applause] >> my name is steve ward and i represent the playa park

neighborhood. we are nearly completed with the park and hope to have some sort of opening eventually. what i really wanted to ask was there is an area i call the sun set, not because it goes the whole length of the sunset from lincoln all the way to sloat. it is about 50 feet wide and it is a huge area. as john over here has said, because of the way it is cut, the bush's hide in cabins and a lot of illegal activity. is an unsafe situation and i want to know if there is some provision in the budget being made so that we can continue to make that area transparent and i think it would help to beautify

the area for walking and for the enjoyment of our favorite. >> i can just answer briefly that we are well aware of the public safety challenges in that area. you are correct that having it well maintained to make sure that area is as safe as we can. the best way to keep not just that area with the west and of a golden gate park safe is through activation projects like bringing more kids. we want more kids and play in that area. >> thank you. i look forward to working with you and muhammed and of the mta because we have issues in regards to that. we are just getting our coalition organized and a look

forward to working with the city in the future. [applause] >> do you want to ask a question? you can do it for right there. >> i have no question. i just came because i'm on the board for west with highland and i love all the different neighborhood associations. that is why many of us choose to live here. i just put that i signed something -- i don't have a question but i would like to have the chance to say thank you to all of you, because this is why we live in san francisco. i really like the idea that our voices can be heard and i wish i had something to say. [applause]

>> , on in. a few others -- if you want to line up. >> i would like to thank you for holding these budget town hall meetings. i formerly represented district 7 on the pedestrian safety advisory committee. i have concerns about the configuration of jfk drive. i am concerned it is not safe for people because i know it is supposed to provide traffic called in. we have a two-way traffic and the traffic going in opposite directions is very close to one another. there is the pathway and the park and a bicycle lane and a small buffer zone and a place for people to park. i feel everything is so small

that when a driver has to park, it is going to stop traffic actually going both ways and it's going to be difficult for the driver to exit the car without endangering himself or herself and when the passenger'' exit, they're supposed to go through the buffer zone which is too small if you have small children who could guard out in to the bicycle lane causing injury to a child or the bicyclist. i have concerns about the current configuration. thank you. >> thank you for that comment. anyone who has been to golden gate park has noticed pretty significant changes. our department has worked closely with both mta and try to model the best practice happening all run the world. it is a separated by claim.

while it is confusing right now and will take some time to understand it and for everyone to figure out the new practice, the idea is to create a safe path for bikers in both directions and to provide pedestrians more access along the trails because right now you have bikers and pedestrians, not dissimilar from the path around lake merced. the idea is to create a dedicated space for bikers. it is a heavily used route through golden gate park. the project is not done yet so what you are seeing is a little confused and hectic. i was talking to the director yesterday about the importance of outreach and education. the safety of our park users comes first and it's something we'll have to continue to work through as we adapt to what will hopefully be a good, safe path

of trouble for us all. >> i just wish you had public safety in to the mayor's disability council as well as the bicycle coalition and others. one of the ideas i had when i was on the committee was something called the bicycle ambassador program. it would actually be you've run by the bicycle coalition itself. they would train bicyclist to be on the street and check on bicyclist currently riding on the street and remind them to follow the rules of the road, not to run red lights, stop it saw signs and yield to pedestrians. -- stop at stop signs. [applause]

>> rim also concerned about public safety. it's a very important issue for people to understand and it needs to be addressed. decrease in the amount of accidents that can happen. thank you. [applause] >> thank you for the opportunity. i have been told in your inauguration address that you spoke about the importance of

jobs and you continue to do so. to "directly, it says to make progress is connected to giving every family the dignity of a paycheck. i would like to speak briefly in support of the community jobs program. it provides a critical funding source for a population of folks trying to transition from welfare to work. we really do need to step up and look to ways to expand this is possible. i understand there is some legislation and development to do that. i look forward to the possibility of working with you to be able to move them forward. i don't know if you want to respond to that >> you can finish, but i like your hat.

>> if you start be on jobs, i'm going to be here all day long. i do support community jobs. that is at the heart of why i think i exist in room 200. every chance i get, that is what motivates me to go to work every day. if i can get somebody a job in any industry -- we are focused on troubled used for summer jobs as well. but creating jobs, especially where the best jobs are ones that really require a college education -- we are trying to create education training centers. i'm not going to just say they hire the best engineers. they also want to hire folks to help design and market. they are going to create job skill centers that hire people to train them, local people.

this is my priority to make sure all of us who live here in this very expensive city get a good shot at the best jobs and we can train people into those skill sets and motivate them as well. that is where we are going. >> i want to express a concern regarding the efforts to be able to bridge this deficit. i keep hearing again and again how our parks are being used as a way to generate more money. the continuing privatization -- i hear this over and over and over again. it really concerns me because all of us do pay taxes and our publics are public -- our parks are public facilities and we should be able to use them a end its stock closed because somebody has rent it for the weekend. i have the managing, coaching,

playing softball in san francisco for more than 30 years. one of my teammates now is telling me and we have over the years, we are paying more. it has leveled off. we have another change this year because some complaints were made about the lights on certain fields going off before the end of the last of softball game. -- softball game. now they have changed the rules. one of the guys sarcastically responded, i remember when there used to be four balls and three strikes. you know? that is not the case in city softball and market i am outreach. i am considering not registering again for next fall's season, because that is just an outrage. thank you. [applause] >> i guess i have been asked to respond. parks and rec, like this it,

today. there are still four balls and three strikes in softball, as far as i can tell. i am happy to understand what your concerns dark regarding the field permit process. in many respects, our parks have not actually been in better shape, despite serious financial challenges. spurre did a study saying to adequately manage our parks system, we would need to add about $30 billion to our operating budget. my staff has been asked to do much more with less. like other departments, we have experienced a general fund cuts over the years. but i am proud of our efforts to actually increase access and programming. we have more recreational programming going on at our rec centers than we have ever had. our scholarship fund, which kutcher years ago we gave away subsidized $80,000 worth of free

programs for our kids. now, thanks to partnerships with dcyf and the school membership and the housing authority, we have given away more than that. we have fewer burgers than we have ever had, and they are being paid as high as they have ever been. we're lucky to be open up playgrounds and facilities like delors park. but the truth is our park system needs funding. we need to decide whether we are going to invest more public money in that, and there are trade-offs. i have heard a lot of need here with the streets and public safety. or whether we're going to pitch in to the best practices and things that other -- that every other urban park system in the country is doing to stay open. the revenues are an important part of our budget. that it is for keeping the programs and facilities open. there is a lot of joy out there, and it is pl