(applause). . (applause). . . >> thank you guys so much for that beautiful performance can we give them another round of applause? (applause). all the this time if i can ask mr. joaquin torrez to join us again on stage, joaquin will be introducing the mayor and if i can ask my fellow

committee members to also join us on stage. joaquin. >> thank you very much i have to say as director the mayor's oches of neighborhood services it's refreshing to have a mayor so dedicated to couldn't and it makes my job easier when our people in the community want to feel our elected efficients make our needs and it's in physical presence and i have had the great pleasure of serving under our mayor lee who i would like to make a invite to make a few remarks in honor or of arab heritage month here in san francisco. >> thank you, thank you joaquin, thank you, welcome to our orange city hall. i want to welcome everybody here this

fourthth animal america arab month of separation and it's my pleasure to join us here and many of us know that we are such a lucky city, and we are lucky because people around their world make their way to fraction, find hopey until the city they know that we celebrate our diversity and find strength in the different cultures that pretend together and now, i ask you also to bring me talent from the arab america communities to make me and help me lune run the city. yes, it's incredible. union, i think i can talk about how wonderful diversity is, but we have to get the talent from our communities to represent all of the different thing that we do in the city. and you know, tonight, even though there is something called a baseball game out there, but these wonderful events that we have in the city whether it's america's cup whether it's fleet week, whether it's

the 49ers playing or the giants playing, even eventually when we land the superbowl it all board of trustees all of us, i know that what i'm doing as a mayor and making sure that i support smallbitions in the city is helpful to the america arab community because all of us whether we are chinese americas hal teen know arabs is a starts for us to make our life a little more pleasant and own our business and is make sure that our kids get the best education possible and this is a story about immigrants in our great city. and so why not you have the first chinese mayor inviting immigrant community to really identify the talent in our community and allow me to give them appointments in the various moo commission and the city and i want to announce my newest point to the aging commission because per not

getting younger i want you to know doctor sham meret tan knee has been selected to be on our commission on aging and yes, he is going to help us because there is a lot of you that want to be in our city and you want to make sure that healthy nutritional unusuallile programs and housing are constructing wisely and so i have asked him to step forward and i have asked john paul s ema h a who has been on our treasure island and watch what he is going to do because that is a new part of our city and it's one where if he conducts all of the work that he is going to do as a commissioner on treasure island, he is go to get a lot more treasure island to serve the that you saws of small residents that are a part of it and so we are seeking more fault and please step forward and

represent our communities proudly and i'm very willing to work with all of you and on behalf of our city and on behalf of this wonderful celebration that we have, i call upon on our coaches for the arab heritage celebration, jeff who's here as well as l u b n a to please come on up and receive and just again, thank you very much for your work in the film festival and l u b n a for the wonderful leader ship that you have and devise that you are giving to he to run a vibrant culture center and i hopey that you are able to get a larger cultural center is because the population is going and i hopey that we are able to get you a larger cultural center and get you the resources that you need to run the cultural and art programs and so on behalf of the city l u b n a and jeff this is our arab heritage month

celebration proclimation. (applause). and go giants: enjoy everybody.. >> thank you mr. mayor. (applause). . >> yeah, mayorly thank you very much for the letting us use your house here tonight and letting -- we really appreciate it we know that you ran from the game to get here and so we really appreciate your commitment to our community and we are happy that you are here to celebrate this momentous day with us. we have an awesome community here, we are here to celebrate the

awesomeness of our community the dedication of our community and, you know we are hebe here to serve all of you so really this award should go to everybody here in our community. thank you very much. (applause). and i just want to echo jeff's words and say thank you for having us here today and thank you all for joining us and we look forward to many more arab heritage month celebrations and as well as our bigger community center and you know, through all of the different work that we do in different arab organization, different community organizationings it's about strengthening our community and contributing to the amazing cultural land scam of our city and we are very thankful to here today. >> and thank you shad deand the committee for putting on such a great show and where joaquin. thank you very much also for all of your dedication and

work. okay thanks a lot:. >> so please everyone, join us for the reception, for the following if he is activities we have a fashion show, as well as some food and accommodations and so please follow us into the hall. thank you. ♪ ♪ >> all right, good evening, everybody, who wants to see a tree lit? >> happy holidays, welcome to fabulous mcclarin lodge here in golden gate park.

my name is phil ginsberg and i am the general manager of your san francisco recreation and park department and i want to welcome you all to the 83rd annual tree lighting. happy holidays for you all. the trust for public land as mr. mayor knows recently named your park the number one park system in the entire united states of america. [ applause ] >> we were also just named as a finalist to host this cool international parks conference in 2015 in which we are going to be welcoming cities from all over the country to learn how we do it here in san francisco. and then, just last month, and a big thank you to all of you, san francisco voters approved proposition b. the cleanest safe neighborhood parks fund which allows us to

renovate and juvinate your parks. 83 years ago, uncle john mcclarin and if you go in the gm office you can see a picture of him. started the tradition of lighting this mile-long stretch of trees started and ending here in front of the lodge where he lived for a number of years. so this, this is san francisco official holiday tree right behind us, uncle john's tree. it is a cyrus that is more than 100 years old closer to 130 years old and tonight it sports over 550 christmas holiday lights. >> so i really want to give a

big shout out to the rec and parks staff that has continued the tradition and i want to thank all of them and single out a few, bob pelosio who organized tonight's event. and i also want to single out loranie bamford whose team put this on and our entire recreation staff. and i want to thank our tree topers who get all the way to the top of this big tree to hang all of its lights. i want to thank our electricians who make sure that the lights go on and i want to thank all of the crews and there are so many people that have a hand in planning the for tonight and give a big shout out for the hardest working team your rec and parks department staff. [ applause ] >> so we got a lot of special

people here tonight, and i really want to single out a few who may or may not be here, i want to thank the rec and park commission, commission vice president tom harrison is here. [ applause ] commissioner page erata is here, glora buna is here and commissioner levatin is here and commissioner allan lowe is here and martin is here and give a shout out to mark who could not be here. and i saw supervisor mark ferrell and his entire family in the house and give him a shout out for him. i want to give... let's give a big special thanks to scott weiner for all. he was out campaigning for the bond every night. thank you scott. [ applause ] >> i saw tom ewy the director of the department of building inspection who is here and i

want to thank him and i want to thank the san francisco parks alliance who is here and the trust for public lands and most of all, i want to thank all of you, all of you for helping make this happen. [ applause ] >> oh, yeah. it is his last official tree lighting as a supervisor. where is he? come on up. yeah, we have already forgotten up here, you have got to come up. a big... our loudest, loudest round of applause for supervisor sean elsbern and his son michael who is here. look at this guy who just showed up in the left-hand part of the stage, our former mayor willie brown who is here. [ applause ] all right. now, would you... thank you.

so now, i want to introduce the city's park champion and chief and of course he shares our vision for making our parks, better cleaner, safer and more fun. he also loves to be in our parks and loves sports and he loves to play and pretty darn good at a game of ping-pong among other activities let's give a big san francisco welcome to our mayor, mayor ed lee. >> thank you, phil. how about another round of applause for phil. >> i am so happy to join you with the supervisors and sean thank you again for all of those wonderful years that you have served the city thank you very much for being here. to all of the other supervisors, scott weiner and mark ferrel, thank you for your leadership on infrastructure and open space and parks and on

supporting families in this city and to the hardest, most effective commission rec and park commission, thank you very much. all of your leadership there. but there is many other people to thank, we have got a lot of things to be thankful for this year. i mean it is not just prop b, we have so many other things that compliment proposition b and our open space, we have a renewed commitment to build infrastructure and see that supports a lot more things because the most thankful things that we have, i think, are the very people that are standing to my sides and in front of me. these are the folks that we are most thankful for because they give us purpose, and focus for this city and where we need to take it. that is why we build more parks and we invest in our open space. it is for all of these children and the families. i also want to thank all of the

sponsors i know three of them are big sports sponsors in the city. and the reflected by the toy train that you see on the side. you will see the caboose, led by golden state warriors. followed by the 49ers. [ applause ] and then two-time world series champions, san francisco giants. [ applause ] >> they give us all of this inspiration and i know that we are looking at some of future players on these teams right here in front of us. so thank you everybody. if i may, during these happy times, when we are thankful for the things that we have and giving thanks for it, please remember the victims that continue to suffer on the east coast. and they are having a hard time it is very cold over there do anything that you can to help them. there are fellow citizens, they all wish that they could be

here tonight. i am absolutely sure of that because everything is working pretty well in san francisco thanks to people like phil and all of the people that work hard especially the parents and the parks alliance and all of you neighbors out here, you help us make the city run really well. so i am thankful for all of you and all of the people that think together for the benefit of the city, so congratulations and have a wonderful holiday. and thank you mayor brown for being here tonight and to join all of us. kids, happy holidays. all right. >> thank you, mr. mayor. so, a couple of other shout outs, our music concourse commissioner is here. [ applause ] and katie from the arts commission here and supervisor cohen just showed up in santa's sleigh and so speaking of there

is a read jeep cherokee on conservatory drive, so if you have a red jeep cherokee you want to move your car. >> also want to thank whole foods for sponsoring tonight's event and so now mr. mayor and i am going to welcome you your predecessor mayor brown and i would like you both to lead us in the count down, are are we ready to turn the lights on? >> the lights only are electricians are literally at the north pole and they can't flip the switch unless there was a joke about the candle stick. they can only flip the switch from the north pole as we really, really hear them.

so before i turn it over to mayor lee and mayor brown to do the count down, i need to hear as loud as you could possibly scream, are you ready to turn the lights on? they said that they heard a dull roar but they could not hear it up at the north pole. one more time. are you ready to turn the lights on? [ cheers ] >> they heard that. all right, mr. mayors all you. >> okay. 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. [ cheers ] >> it worked.

♪ ♪

♪ >> the san francisco playground's history dates back to 1927 when the area where the present playground and center is today was purchased by the city for $27,000. in the 1950s, the center was expanded by then mayor robinson and the old gym was built. thanks to the passage of the 2008 clean and safe neighborhood parks bond, the sunset playground has undergone extensive renovation to its four acres of fields, courts, play grounds, community rooms, and historic gymnasium. >> here we are. 60 years and $14 million later, and we have got this beautiful, brand-new rec center completely accessible to the entire neighborhood. >> the new rec center houses multi-purpose rooms for all kinds of activities, including basketball, line dancing, playing ping-pong, and arts and

crafts. >> use it for whatever you want to do, you can do it here. >> on friday, november 16th, the dedication and ribbon cutting took place at the sunset playground and recreation center celebrating its renovation. it was raining, but the rain clearly did not dampen the spirits of the dignitaries, community members, and children in attendance. [cheering and applauding] ♪ ♪ >> we came to seven straight about 10 years ago. -- 7th street about 10 years

ago. the environment is huge. it is stronger than willpower. surrounding yourself with artists, being in a culture where artists are driving, and where a huge amount of them is a healthy environment. >> you are making it safer. push, push. that is better. when i start thinking, i see it actually -- sometimes, i do not see it, but when i do, it is usually from the inside out. it is like watching something being spawned. you go in, and you begin to work, excavate, play with the dancers, and then things began to emerge.

you may have a plan that this is what i want to create. here are the ideas i want to play with, but then, you go into the room, and there maybe some fertile ideas that are becoming manifest that are more interesting than the idea you had initially set out to plan. so there has to be this openness for spontaneity. also, a sense that regardless of the deadline, that you have tons of time so the you can keep your creativity alive and not cut it off and just go into old habits. it is a lot like listening. really listening to watch what is going to emerge. i like this thing where you put your foot on his back. let's keep it. were your mind is is how you build your life. if you put it in steel or in failure, it works. that works.

it is a commitment. for most artists, it is a vacation and a life that they have committed themselves to. there is this notion that artists continue to do their work because of some kind of the external financial support. if that was taken away, artists would still do their art. it is not like there is a prerequisite for these things to happen or i will not do it. how could that be? it is the relationship that you have committed to. it is the vocation. no matter how difficult it gets, you are going to need to produce your art. whether it is a large scale or very small scale. the need to create is going to happen, and you are going to have to fulfill it because that is your life.