mayor because as supervisor weaner noted, when the $7 million of funding was cut, even though we were lucky that for so many years leader pelosi protected that, the mayor did not blink. the mayor wasn't even a question. and that's the beauty of san francisco. that when it comes to these issues, making sure that we take care of our own, that those questions are no-brainers for us. that is the san francisco way. so, i am very excited. i look forward to seeing the beautiful building, the gay man in me wants to see the design what it looks like inside. [laughter] >> so, let's get this going. thank you very much. (applause) >> thank you. i want to say that this has been a collaborative effort on so many levels. and it's been a collaborative effort in the city as well. i want to next introduce mohammed nuru director of public works who was instrumental in helping us launch this project. (applause) >> thank you. i'll keep it brief.

i just want to say thank you to the department of public health for being a great partner with dpw. we've had a good opportunity to be able to renovate many of our health centers. we are building the new hospital and today this very, very great project. the project from dpw, we provided architectural design. we provided engineering and construction management. and i'd like to thank the team that worked on the project real quick, the project's architect, lamont and banito, please give them a hand. (applause) >> from the engineering james ing and ray louie, give them a hand. (applause) >> and for construction administration jose gordato. (applause) >> and, of course, from the public health side, mark primo

from dpw, [speaker not understood] who both led these projects. a little quick note about the project itself, the building is over 100 years old. and while all this work was going on, nobody in the building and all the people who work here, they were not disrutctionved. they were able to continue working. * disrupted and as you heard we are 70% complete and very, very happy to be here for this grand opening. and as we heard from all the speeches today, it will be a world renowned center and public works is happy to be part of that. thank you very much. (applause) >> so, none of this could have happened without the support of the public health department. we are fortunate to be working under dr. thomas argon who heads up the population public health unit. we are led by barbara garcia

who is also the principal investigator of this project and i'm going to turn it to her. clap lap >> okay. as supervisor campos said, he can't wait to get inside. one of the things about this grant, the face of staff is usually a grant with research. it is either study participants or services. but this is a little different one. we were the only health department in the country to receive this. most of this went to universities. one, we didn't have as big overhead as universities do. two, we have a lot of experience in doing building. and, so, we really had to work at making sure nobody got disrupted. i do believe i have a big thank you to real estate because i think we did give them i understand general election a couple times out there. -- indigestion i want to thank them. i see win of the employees who resigned as a retiree, he was

instrumentsal. (applause) >> this took space planning and trying to figure out space and it's all you know in san francisco, space can be a conflicting process. i think this worked really well. mark primo consulting with us on all our capital projects and departments. martin who provided a lot of leadership in this area. [cheering and applauding] >> and now that everybody is clapping, let's do the ribbon cutting and get inside. [laughter] >> okay. we're going to now do our ribbon cutting and then we're going to invite everybody in to tour the facility to get some hot coffee or tea, warm up, and some snacks. and if we could have the mayor and barbara come up and all of our other esteemed guests.

>> 4, 3, 2, 1. [cheering and applauding] >> good morning, good morning, i am charlette shults and behalf of mayor lee, we welcome you to this occasion that we have been waiting for for six years because the mayor of paris, this occasion, we're excited that mayor delaware is here from paris, he was here six years ago and we have been

meeting every air france flight since then waiting for you. so, the occasion has now come and we are looking forward to the mayor looking around san francisco and seeing the changes that have been made. i don't know whether -- is willie brown here? he was the one who started this some 16 years ago, i think he would have turned in this beret in order to change jobs with the mayor of paris, having gone there so many times, we also have with us tom horn who is our chairman of our sister city committee which has many exchanges which we're going hear about more of them today, mayor lee, you have been mayor for almost two years, and as you know, the mayor of paris has been mayor for 11 years, and look how young he is, so

there's hope for you. we have just had a meeting inside and the mate -- mayor has made a promise which tom and i and matthew, we're going to make sure he keeps that promise and he says, next year, we're going to paris, so tom horn and i are going to be the advanced team, we're leaving with the mayor on a sunday when he goes back. so, may i introduce our mayor, a newer mayor than the mayor of paris but one we are proud of and we will be hoping that he is planning the trip very soon, so may i present mayor lee. [applause]. >> thank you, charlotte. >> well, thank you, everybody, for coming here today. as you can see, there was excitement in the air when the

mayor of paris comes to san francisco and i want to welcome him, i want to welcome the council general office as well, this is an exciting moment for me, waiting 6 years since his last visit is too long, not to renew a friendship to this city which has been historic friendship and one of the most dynamic sister city relationships that we have, i noticed in our room we have other numbers of our other sister cities, manila and gosh, there's so many, cork, and other regions that also -- and our other council generals that are here today, thank you so much for coming and frn council blats for enjoying this moment, there is a lot to be gained by our sister city and especially with paris, i was informing the

mayor of my first trip to paris, it's been my only trip which is why i have to go officially, but that was 1969 was my very first trip to pear ris as a high school student, as a high school choir of high school in seattle, we raised money all yearlong for us to go, i got to visit the jazz club along the river and then i got to hear for the very first time stevie wonder saying my shari amor in paris, look it up, that's why of course mayor dell way has invited me to be making my first official visit some time next year and certainly charlotte and tom and others have jumped on the occasion, matt and everybody

else, but it is one of those relationships that i have understood as being one of the most porn -- important in the city, one is an international status, one we hold dearly because there's a lot to learn, each of our cities as great as they are become greater as our goals of becoming environmentally responsible, creating our opportunity for our economies to fwroe and our dialog in our country is the urban cities that have to create the new jobs for the new economy. i know paris must do so as well, and if we work tokt, we can create those and instigate and innovate our new ideas for the new economy and our mutual obligations on the environment, and then there is something that paris and san francisco hold very dearly and that's an ongoing conversation about our human rights as world leaders,

so it's human rights, it's the environment, it's the economy and these are the reasons why we hold our relationship with paris and with all the other great cities of the world in a sister city relationship so dearly, we learn from each other, we send delegations to each other, we welcome each other to the city but in each and every instance, we are always thinking about ideas about how we can help each other and help regions improve, so i am excited to have met with the mayor just a few minutes ago to reaffirm our relationship and we'll sign that in a few moments to document that and to promise each other that we will continue this very great relationship and we could not have done it without the involvement of our private citizens, tom horn has led a

fantastic group of volunteers on our sister city committee for paris and san francisco, and he's doing a marvelous job and this again reflects how our citizenry helps our city become a better city with these sister city relationships and again i want to thank you and the audience too who are volunteers in our -- i really, really thank you from the bottom of my heart for creating such a great part of our soul of our cities, and giving us the reasons why we can be an international city, so with that, welcome, mayor, and i look forward to not only signing the semlu, and our visits of our various government officials as well as private citizens to continue instigating wonderful ideas and implementing ideas, and with that, i would like to present to you on behalf of our city

and to the mayor -- >> as everybody knows, we did have our 77th anniversary of the golden gate bridge, not quite as old as some of the things in paris, and so this is a set of prints, there's many of them. >> oh, i love the golden gate. >> so beautiful. >> celebrating our 77th anniversary. >> so, we give you this, in order the take it home, you have to walk across the bridge. [laughter]. >> i can do it. [laughter]. >> thank you.

>> thank you. >> of course, our pleasure. >> yes, dear friends, i'm very happy to be back in san francisco because charlotte waits for me. [laughter]. >> i [inaudible] charlotte and i don't go in san francisco six years ago, so my english is very bad, and i am going to speak french. (speaking french). >> i'm very happy to be here again. first of all, because san francisco and paris are both very great cities, american and french cities and i cannot think with great emotion that

between the american people and the french people, history has given us the best of the friendships and our time tokt together, it called freedom, democracy, to the dignity of all human people, and certainly san francisco and paris are an emblem of the link that exists between the french and the american people. there's something very magical about san francisco, the golden gate that i know now well, but there's a style of life, there's an art of life, there's a way of living together but being different and respecting the freedom of

each other. the other privilege for paris is we've always played a role to create a very rich and strong relationship between the two cities, but also a very useful one. [inaudible] in the past with [inaudible], the foundations of this agreement [inaudible] and i will see later on my good friends who a couple of years ago told me that he was going to celebrate his birthday in paris and he would want toez personal happy moments that he would spend a moment in city hall where i would open the doors in this symbol of this

human tie of this individual adventure that exists so much between paris and san francisco. i have -- charlotte was a sweet person, she reminded me i was old and i was in paris now for 11 years, i had the opportunity to work with my great friend, thanks to tom horn, that's in the [inaudible] that this working relationship and eternal relationship with tom, so with the team amongst mr. lee, i could understand that the relationship between san francisco and paris is not just a friendship, it could be a very efficient relationship and i will have the pleasure tomorrow to visit various places

where there's a common dynamic between paris and san francisco have made innovations, technology and the spirit of enterprise and all those elements together enable a concrete relationship between paris and san francisco and even remember it last time, with had a virtual highway between san francisco and paris, we started this virtual highway, it had a lot of babies and a lot of [inaudible] in paris and in san francisco was created, were developed from this common belief that we had in innovation, in research and with the need of building economic development on new technology, on new ways of living and creating wealth and

progress of the 21st century. and it's in this spirit that with [inaudible] that i'm happy to salute with all my friendship, we are going to start a new period of our links, our ties, mayor lee is a very popular man, a very popular mayor and i want to know first the reputation of the people of san francisco through him and through his progress. we have another common link, we believe that innovation can be noble if it starts many the people, so from the intervention of people in the democracy, a dynamic democracy, of course with new cooperation, new act of cooperation, first of all, there's always

innovation [inaudible] of working in a smart and efficient way. we work together on the program as smart cities where we want san francisco -- other cities to be modern cities but also civilized cities which means that consider that everything we wish for as far as economic development is concerned must consider the environment also, and the quality of the planet on which we live. with mr. lee, we talked about all these questions and of course we are going encourage all of these new companies and everything that enables us to improve our cities and make them a better place to live and

less polluted place to live, as may it in transportation, management of energy, in san francisco and in paris, there are innovations that are certainly ahead of many other cities in the world and i want to learn from san francisco and of course paris is there for the san francisco team, may it be a development of electric transportation or automobiles or [inaudible] or the reuse of energy of heat to heat private buildings or public building by using waste water, i explained to mayor lee that a couple of years now, i worked with bill clinton on the isolation of

public buildings and specifically schools so that every year, we could renovate 100 schools in paris and the children are in heated rooms but where we don't waste energy. these are subjects on which we have a lot of common ambition and where we'd like to exchange our dynamic efforts between san francisco and paris. but what would be a cooperation between san francisco and paris without culture? in san francisco, there's so much talent, so much genius, so much creation of cultural events that i want to open my doors of paris to them, [inaudible] that's an emblem that i created for the creative

arts that come from new technology, i know there are fwraet creators in music and classic art, they are home in paris, that is where i will welcome them. you have beautiful dancers and the director of the [inaudible] is here with us today, there are dancers from san francisco that i would love to welcome at the [inaudible] vil in paris, but we too, we have talent, we have some talent, we have a lot of passion for artistic creation so it may be in music and theatre and painting, we are ready to share a lot here in san francisco and i'm happy to have my trip be with the first visit of a french company

in the united states, the great artist had its head in [inaudible] that was in los angeles a couple of days ago, will be in berkeley tomorrow and then after that in new york of course, so there you are, that is how we are civilized together, how we are human beings that try to push ahead san francisco, paris, two cities that are destined to understand everything and do the maximum understanding because san francisco and paris believe in progress, know that it's difficult that progress of a factor of human development, we don't want to forget anybody, we want to shoulder each other, help each other so

that the two cities, san francisco and paris be the most attractive cities in the world but also the most smiling cities in the world, the most -- the cities that are worth your affection and that express to the rest of the world their taste of friendship, fraternity, friendship and for that we have to be together, we have to wan -- want to draoe yait toing and we want to make sure that this memorandum of understanding, this understanding between paris and san francisco be a final way of saying to each other it's happiness to live in both san francisco and paris together. thank you very much.

[applause]. >> my presence to san francisco is maybe not as symbolic as the golden gate. i done have with me works of art that express when the banks of the san river won't have anymore cars that i started recently, but parisian artists know how to do things that we like a lot, so this is an object that is very symbolic of paris for you. [applause].

>> so, there's little christo and bakarage. >> what's wrong? what's wrong? >> [inaudible]. >> he's not happy? what's going on? >> how beautiful. i'm going to put your picture in it. beautiful. >> thank you, mayor. isn't the french language absolutely so exciting, but maybe because it's coming out of the mouth of this wonderful

mayor. and i always thought we were great but didn't he make us sound great? even better? and i do see that we have the fire chief here in case, you know, we have had an earthquake and fire, so we brought the chief, chief haze in, and also a former first lady, gina miskony, gina, she's right behind the photographer, her husband was mayor and his portrait is right up here. so, we're coming to the signing, more important, of the signing, but tom horn is the one as been said has been leading us, in fact, we had to put a leash on him and we have him guarded at the airport with security guards because he would be on that air france airplane almost every