come in from taxes and so on. the reality is, there is a perception that i certainly share, which is that we, as a city, feel comfortable giving money to wealth, and are really cheap when it comes to things like parks and the poor, as several speakers here have already said, to the people who are residents of the city who are in great need. i would urge that you look at that value system and reevaluate it. the money needs to go where the residents of san francisco need it to go, not just to those -- like twitter and larry ellison -- who are really not in need of our money. [applause] >> we are going to do two more

speakers. then i'm going to have to rush you, mayor lee, because i have another meeting at 7:30. what can i say? it is the teacher in me. i cannot help it. pam lee from district 1. the next person is carry patterson. all the rest of these are going to be given to the proper people so that we have everything you wanted to say. >> i have a couple of things i want to say, so i will do it quickly. i am a teacher at city college. the students are in serious crisis. my students are coming up to me, telling me they can no longer stay in school. because there are not enough

classes, and also because the price per unit is so high and the books are too expensive. what i am seeing is, my students are leaving school and going into low-wage jobs. we have to find a way to save city college. we're one of the wealthiest -- my son has helped to build three condominiums, places for the will to live, so i know they are here in this city. we need to find a way to take care of our children. the second thing is, i drive through golden gate park every day. there are all these bike lanes. i would like the public health department or some entity to be able to do a public health-kind of education on how to share the road. i do not think cars know how to make a right-hand turn when there is a bike lane on the right. i see by sneaking left-hand turns like they are cars.

there are all kinds of other violations that are going on. i would like to see some kind of public education around this comment in the newspaper, on tv or something. we have to learn how to share the road. thank you for your attention. [applause] >> terry patterson? if a elizabeth jones could get right behind me, i will give you half a minute peters you will be talking about something that is important to me. >> i am terry patterson, a resident of district 5, a member of the sap system mental health board. as the last speaker, i am glad to be able to express my concerns on behalf of cuts to the mental health budget. as you all know, mental health affects every area of city life. and as many of the eloquent

previous speakers spoke to senior centers, used shelters, community centers, public transportation, the people who are not getting our corporate mental health care are often hidden in homes where families have to deplete their budgets and take care of them. i am talking about the people with bipolar and other serious disorders, who, if their immediate situation does not rise to the level of going to cite an emergency, as many of you know, or become hospitalized, they do not get services. so, i want to urge the city not to be penny wise and pound foolish when it comes to preventive services and sustained services for people who need them in the city, not

only to protect public safety, but to bring our families together to function adequately. thank you very much. [applause] >> this is the reason i wanted this laid to speak about summer programs. -- lady to speak about summer programs. >> good evening, mayor lee, city officials. my name is elizabeth jones, president of the west sacramento tennis association. i am standing here hoping to receive funding for the summer arts camp. i started the program last year in the summer of 2011, and it turned out to be a huge success. i founded the program, which was an out-of-pocket expense from a part-time job. i have made numerous attempts in try to obtain funding for the west side courts summer camp. it is just unfair that west side courts children are once again

being left behind. there is enough funding that can be divided equally where west side courts can receive a portion of the proceeds. why can the children of west side courts receive equal treatment as the other developments? i understand some of the kids wanted to speak, but they are shy. thank you for listening. [applause] >> the residents of district 5 and district 1, this does that make your job any easier. they were eloquent, talked about the problems they see, where we think the minute should go. now it is time for you to answer back, right? you do not have much time, but that is okay, too. >> thank you very much. >> thank you.

first of all, thanks for your input. you know, tonight, we emphasize from the start of our time would be focused on listening to all of you. so, we have done that. obviously, some of you deserve answers right away, but we cannot do that because we, the supervisors and the mayor, and all of these departments, have to get together to decide, after hearing from all of you, what are those things that we must pay attention to? so we have kept our minds open. there has been no decision on the budget as of yet because we wanted to make sure we heard from everybody about what you think priorities are. having said that, we can at least give some of you a feeling of what direction we are headed in. some of you tonight spoke very

eloquently, and i wanted you to know there are some answers on the way. for example, that washington, did you know we got 5000 jobs this summer for kids -- matt washington. to thousand 500 of those jobs are with city agencies, and another 2500 jobs are from private companies, and all join together with united way to create jobs for our summer youth, age 16 to 24, aimed specifically at disconnect the use and use in poverty. in other words, youth from our public housing. these are paid internships jobs the would begin in very short weeks. everybody is participating. so that is part of the answer. i just wanted to let you know that because we knew that having positive outcomes for our youth

was going to be very important because we pay in the short and long term if we do not do that, so that is on the way. we are focused on -- in fact, we've got some proposals already. you heard hsa has already submitted a proposal to not cut some very valuable funding that we had for seniors. we are listening to our director tonight to make sure we pay attention to that. he is watching us like a hawk, make sure we do not say anything different, but at the same time, we will try to figure out other things that we need as a city. we need to invest in public safety. all of us have been around. i'm not getting any younger. neither is our police force. captain goldberg, thank you very much for being here today. his cohorts are younger. they will be here, but we need to move on, so we've got to make

room for classes for our training. we also are paying attention to families. we are working very hard to create family-friendly policy that will lead to good investments in our city. by the way, i know you said may be giving away to some rich folks. i turned to my supervisor -- did we give some money to larry ellison i did not know about or to twitter? ok, but we are raising that money in the private sector. to cover our costs for america's cup. that is why we have recreation and park here. they know that. we have to raise $32 million in the private-sector to cover the cost in that, so they are going the public/private partnership in that way. we will go into more details about it because i know there

are perceptions out there that we are giving money away to twitter. we did not give money to them. we just tried to save 2500 jobs to make sure they did not go to south san francisco because they were moving. we gave them a tax break. but something that we can cover because we are going to get it back with their investments in mid market. these kids, when they are living and staying and working there, they spend money. that is why we got revenue increases coming on in the city. maybe, but they would not be spending money at the levels they are spending now. that is why we got the recovery going on. i will not say the word trust, because there's different perceptions out there. we have to prove to -- >> we are not here to argue. and saying that to the gentleman over there. we are here now to listen to this gentleman. >> i'm trying to provide some answers.

i will not have the complete answers. we will have some answers to it, and we will work on providing complete answers, hopefully more in our budget and more in ongoing discussions that people want to have when it comes to families, to schools, transportation -- i think a gentleman here was saying we should work with the adults -- there's a lot of other investments that we could be making as we go into our sessions about how we collaborate with each other to make sure we find the best and most important things we are hearing throughout the community. i just wanted to let you know, at least when i regurgitate some of the things, you know that i heard some of it, that i'm awake, not on my cell phone listening to the latest twists or something like that. i just wanted to let you know these are some of the things i have heard. i have taken my notes. we will read through the others that have submitted. thank you again for submitting written comments and questions.

we will get those back out. we have a lot of other groups we are meeting with between now and when we present our budget to the board of supervisors, but again, a big thanks to all of you for coming up tonight and for being participants on this and having enough trust and faith in your kids can come out and give us a good feeling about what we do. liz, you got my attention. >> thank you all for coming. [applause]

>> thank you. good morning, everyone. thank you very much. as many of you know, i'm a person that doesn't like a whole lot of drama.

but i do want to make sure that we take this opportunity to enjoy. this budget is one that's important to all of us, it certainly is one to me and one that reflects a lot of great work. first of all, let me thank everybody for coming this morning. certainly board president david chiu for helping me co-host this and carmen chu and her work with us already started and will help guide us, along with board president david chiu on all of the hearings that the rest of the board will have. i want to thank each and every member of the board of supervisors as well. you've been weighing in and we've been creating a different dialogue on the front end to make sure that all of our constituents know what we're doing, more transparent, and ultimately where our values are. i also want a big shout-out and

thanks to everybody in this room. there's a lot of department heads and commissions and labor representatives and representatives from our non-profits and community members as well. thank you for engaging us in this really dedicated six-month process. i want to go back to the very first neighborhood budget hearing that we held about almost six months ago. it was one where i was asked at the very beginning, what does the budget mean to you? and i wasn't the only one. there were several supervisors that were there, and we all said pretty much the same thing. it really is a reflection of our values as a city and it's one that we want to work hard at, but ultimately it is who we are and it's a combined effort here, a collaborative effort. so it still is that way, and you'll see from the highlights that we'll be announcing today, as reflected in this budget, it

still is a reflection of all of our values. so good morning, everybody. thank you for joining me here today. again, thank you for board president chiu and budget chair carmen chu and all the others that i've identified here today. i also want to say at the outset this budget reflects countless hours of work. a lot of work behind the scenes. in addition to all the neighborhood budget meetings that we had, there were numerous, numerous staff meetings. kate howard's done a wonderful job with her staff. they've met with all of the different departments -- [applause] this is her first full year budget working with us and she's done a great job and her

staff has done a great job. it isn't just putting numbers together, it's listening to each of the finance personnel from each department, it is engaging in the numerous meetings that we have with community, it's engaging with staff of the various supervisors, the non-profits. we had special meetings help, it was health and human services and housing and homeless advocates and others. she was there and her staff was there at every turn making sure that we listened and it reflected in both number-crunching and challenging what the priorities are and so forth. also want to give a shout-out to steve cava. steve, wonderful with all your work. [applause] it's not easy. you and micki callahan, it's really not easy at all to face a year when there's 27

contracts open, trying to face everybody in the room, trying to make sure that we can make promises we can keep. having been a former employees relations director, i know that keeping promises with our labor representative is critical to building trust and to make sure that we carry out and we honor all that they do every single day in carrying out services for us. to all the department heads and your wonderful staffs, thank you. i also want to make sure i acknowledge all of our labor unions, all of our representatives. for years you've worked with us and sacrificed and bemoaned the bad budget years, but you've stepped up in every occasion. for the department heads and non-department heads who we've shared challenges with, thank you for sacrificing so many years. and now we get to, i think, a budget that has some relatively

good news and a good foundation. this year we begin the hard work of presenting the city's first two-year budget. and we began that year with a $263 million deficit for our general fund. and then the coming year, the second year of $375 million shortfall. that's what we faced at the very beginning. but because of the fiscal discipline that we put in process, a discipline that's reflected in the great work of ben rose enfield and his staff and the controller's office that keeps reminding me of the credit ratings of our city and that we must make sure that we do things in a very solid financial way, we made investments in job creation and we made commitments to reform with that guidance. now san francisco's economy is recovering and reserves are going. in fact, during the last nine months the controller has reported that our revenues were

$172 million more than projected. this is good news. this is good news, but it did not come without commitments, without sacrifice by everybody and all the groups represented in this room. i would like to again thank owe employee unions for working with us to find a common goal, saving more than $28 million in your contract negotiations with us. i'm happy to report that i'm presenting a responsible and balanced two-year budget. while we spare the city the deep cuts we've experienced over the last several years and one that i present to you in a san francisco economy that's recovering, in this budget you will see investments. investments that ensure that people who live, work and visit our city feel safe, investments that protect our social safety net that supports seniors and youth, low-income and

working-class families, investments that support our neighborhoods, our infrastructure and our commercial corridors. this budget reflects a lot of collaboration and partnership with our san francisco community. one thing we agreed on early was that in a time of state and federal cuts, protecting our social safety net is more important than ever, and in this budget i've rejected all service reductions in our health department and human service agencies. [applause] s i've included full restoration of federal cuts to programs and services that serve people with h.i.v. and aids. the loss of redevelopment has been a severe blow to our city,

especially for this first street corridor. so we will invest in economic initiatives in the heart of bayview to stabilize businesses and attract new ones. [applause] we will also continue our investment in central market and especially sixth street, where the elimination of redevelopment has left a gap in services. with our community partners and including the very spirited arts community that's been so wonderful in helping us lead that effort, we'll support businesses in that sector, attract new ones, and keep the area clean and safe. we will also invest in the youth of sfsk and in their education. i will propose releasing the $6 million in rainy day funds to support our public schools, to offset the state's deep cuts to education. [applause]

most importantly in this budget we are putting san franciscans back to work. you've heard me say on many occasions recently our unemployment rate dropped from 9.6% in early 2011 to 7.4% today, our lowest since 2008. [applause] we, as a city, along with our business partners and every neighborhood, we created 22,500 net new jobs in san francisco in just the last year. [applause] that's good. that is really good, but we need to do more. with this budget we are continuing to invest in strategies and incentivized job creation, training, and place our residents for their jobs for the 21st sent re. we are creating a climate that gives entrepreneurs and investors confidence in our city, allowing them to work

with us to innovate, grow and create jobs, whether they are in neighborhoods, small businesses or tech start-up or a thriving global headquarters. in neighborhoods, we are more than doubling grants available to small businesses, and we are including $4 million for neighborhood commercial districts through our new invest in neighborhood strategy. that includes job squad and the recapitalize the small business revolving loan fund. we are bringing staal to the neighborhoods -- city hall to the neighborhoods where it belongs, to support small businesses. my proposed budget includes $4 million in smart capital investments and $441 million in smart capital investments in our city's 10-year capital plan to improve and invest in the city's infrastructure. [applause]

over the next two years we'll invest in and improve or water system and continue investing in our waterfront. we will also continue to invest in our parks. and i've joined the members of the board of supervisors to introduce $195 million bond measure to keep our parks clean and safe. [applause] all told, over the next two years enterprise departments will spend more than -- will actually support more than 8,700 jobs in san francisco by infusing $1.3 billion into our local economy. as our economy grows and as we add jobs, we must redouble our efforts to expand housing opportunities and build more housing for people at every income level. i get it. i know there's anxiety out there, because rents are start

together creep up again in every neighborhood as our economy recovers. but the answer to scarce housing and rising rents is not to stop growing our economy or creating jobs. that's why we proposed the housing trust fund measure for this november, to create a permanent source of housing and revenue to fund the production of housing at every level of our economic spectrum. i am pleased to share with you, too, that my budget also includes a six-year police and fire hiring plan. [applause] this hiring plan for police and fire will train the next generation of san francisco public safety personnel. we are planning for anticipated retirement, reducing overtime and making sure our public safety departments are appropriately stand. mow, of course, this submission of the bubt is not the end of

the process. i've looked forward to working with the full board to ensure that our residents receive quality services while we balance the budget and continue in our economic recovery. i again want to recognize supervisor carmen chu and the board of supervisors for their steadfast leadership and commitment to building a collaborative process, backed up with our board president, david chiu. thank you steve cava, chief of staff, thank you budget office, director kate howard, and to best rosenfeld, thank you to you and your wonderful staff and i will advance, thank you harvey rose, for his work he'll be doing. this is very less dramatic presentation, i know that. but all the work that's been done in a very comprehensive way, and i want you to know that the values of the city are intact, we are moving forward, and we are investing in all of our neighbors in san francisco.

thank you very much. [applause] [applause] ok, back to work. [music]