>> let me welcome everyone for

coming out to this great kickoff event. mayor lee, supervisor chiu, distinguished guests from the community, city family, all of us coming together. last year we held a pilot project on stockton street to help the merchants and support the merchants in selling their merchandise. we were able -- we were very successful. we got a lot of great feedback from the pilot. so this year again, we are doing the second year of the pilot. all the agencies and the community and the merchants, we got together, and talked about how we can do better. and without further delay, i will ask the mayor to come and say a few words, who is a big supporter of this project. mayor lee.

>> thank you mohammed. [ applause ] >> i am very happy to be here. is this okay? all right. all right. [ laughter ] all right. first of all, happy new year to everyone. this is what i'm looking forward to every year and i know the merchants and residents and all the small businesses are excited. a year ago board of supervisors president david chiu and i and members of the community discussed how we can continue the economic vitality of the city and clearly we registered a big support for small businesses. i wanted to make sure that everybody neighborhood in the city has a chance of cultural celebrations. when it comes to chinese new year, there is a huge celebrate

in chinatown. we're a huge destination for visitors, a lot of people come to chinatown to celebrate chinese new year. as people come here, we wanted to help our small businesss with offering some additional space for them, but also make it even safer for our pedestrians. because if you have ever observed chinatown during the chinese new years, and david and i have been quite specific observers about this. you will see families and kids walk into the street in the middle of big buses and cars coming in. we didn't want that to happen. we didn't want anybody's safety to be compromised as we celebrate this new year's. because that would obviously be a serious hindrance. our public

health director barbara garcia and transportation director ed reiskin, public works agencis, our wastewater management, our police department, we have all gotten together to say how can we do this smarter with our small businesses, our chinese chamber, our stockton street merchant association and all work together to make this a safer experience for everybody? we came up with the idea that maybe we could simply expand the sidewalk by allowing everybody to use the sidewalk properly, but that the storefronts could have some additional space to offer their goods, when the chinese new years is happening, and when people are wanting to buy all the things that they want to do to celebrate the new year's and to come down here and be safe. so this pedestrian expansion of our sidewalks was the idea that came forward.

we piloted it last year as mohammed explain and thank you to dpw's great work, the pilot was successful. it was successful all around, particularly with our small businesses, particularly with our chinatown youth center and the people who are here to protect pedestrians. all the agencies got back in a very enthusiastic way to say we can do it better this year and get everybody's involvement. so it isn't just the pressure on the police department, that says we got to be safe. it is everybody working together on the front-end to produce an experience that is positive for everyone. so i want to thank supervisor chiu. i want it it thank him for his leadership and the leadership of our constant street leadership. they get a little economic bump. that was the year of the dragon that we wanted to do something bold. the year of the serpent is like

the mini dragon. it is there to also continue that great experience, but also make sure that we're safe for everyone. and so i want to register that we're going to do this again beginning this saturday. it will go for a couple of weeks before the actual start of chinese new year's, which is february 10th, but that leading up to it, all the merchants and in particular the small businesss along stockton street will get that economic bump as we work with chinatown youth center and all the wonderful non-profits that keep everybody safe on our sidewalks and have that positive experience. this is a great time for the city to celebrate. of course we'll be there from february 10th leading up to the great parade that we have that invites thousands of people here. i know the merchants association, the neighborhood associations, the chamber of commerce all see this as a positive way to celebrate our new year's and get everybody

involve in a positive way. i'm here with all the different agencies, our parking and traffic to mohammed and his wonderful staff working with our police department, working with sfmta, and the private sector as well. we're already looking at even better practices of picking up the garage earlier, getting the streets cleaner and making sure that we do everything to celebrate positively. everybody clean their house before chinese new year's. get rid of all the bad stuff that happened last year. [ laughter ] bring in the new spirit. this is the way to do it. as we celebrate and i am looking forward to not only a great new year's celebration, but something along the lines of some local football team that we want to celebrate as well [ applause ] thank you very much. [ applause ] >> thank you, mayor lee. and like the mayor said, when we work here in chinatown or in

district 3 there is someone that is always there with us, whether it's the broadway streetscape improvement, or the many projects that go on polk street or all around the neighborhood, please ask supervisor david chiu to say a few words >> good morning everyone, happy new year and happy new year of the mini dragon. i want to thank the chinese community coming together for today's announcement, as well as members of the honorary chinese community. this is a conversation that did start as i recall in one of the first meetings that i had with mayor lee when he was elected last year. we talked about how do we ensure that the oldest, historic and most amazing chinatown community in the country can continue to offer a new year's experience that is authentic and reflects the

community? and i want to thank the city departments for working together for the pilot program. we learned from that and hope to build from that. special thanks to our dpw crew and our police department and our department of public health to make sure that our pedestrians are safe and our private sector partners from ecology. all of us have come together and of course i have to thank the incredible diversity of our merchant community. bennie,pius, all of you who represent the community here. as our economy continues to recover, to make sure our merchants are thriving and this is the idea that will ensure that. i want to thank the folks that represent our residents who are here. we need to make sure we're creating not just a vibrant marketplace and a vibrant community, but we want to make sure that pedestrian safety first and foremost. we want to remind folks that our pedestrian accident rates are still much higher than they

need to be. so we'll make sure as we move forward with the program that everyone is safe, the merchants are displaying their wares that leave room for all the different transit vehicles to get through. thank you so much for being here. happy new year. >> thank you, supervisor chiu. you heard from the mayor and supervisor chiu, one of the major concerns is pedestrian safety and our partner agency, the san francisco police department has assured us again they will be here and working with everyone to make sure that everything is safe. let me ask captain tom come to the mic to say a few words. >> thank you, mohammed. i wanted to wish everybody a very safe, happy and prosperous new year. as the new year comes we look for ward to the stockton street market. we want all the ped steins stay

within the sidewalk. we'll have it barricaded off so no one gets into an accident. since this fair will bring in lots of people and business, we want people to be aware of their surroundings. be aware of pickpockets. put your wallet in your front pockets and just have a safe and very prosperous new year's. thank you. [ applause ] >> thank you. also as many of you know, stockton from corridor has got a lot of merchants and many of them sell food and merchandise. and enforcing compliance and making sure that business goes well. i'm going to ask dr. garcia to come up to say a few words. >> happy new year. the department of public health as you heard pedestrian safety about three or four times again and i will say pedestrian safety is one of our major goals in the health department,

along with food safety. we believe pedestrian safety is the utmost importance, but we also believe that the safety of the food, the people will be selling is also important to us and we'll be working closely with the merchants to ensure that they also follow the local and state law as round this issue. expanding the sidewalks and allowing for merchants to sell their important goods is such an important process to bring those two together. we're also looking at the bicyclists and pedestrians and walkers and those using transit to ensure safe passage through this new year's celebration. i want to thank the merchants specifically in terms of bringing this idea forward and working with the city departments to ensure that we have a wonderful new year's in chinatown. thank you so much. [ applause ] >> and stockton corridor, mayor bus corridor, mayor

major work to ensure that they run on time and a huge partner mta, ed reiskin is not here, but bond yee is here as they were last year. bond, would you come up and say a few years, please.&good morning everyone. on behalf of my colleague as the sfmta, we need the cooperation of everyone, pedestrians, merchants, the motorists and everyone else who uses the streets. so looking forward to another successful two weeks. happy new year. [ applause ] >> thank you, bond. as you heard, it's a huge partnership on stockton street, there are many, many merchants, but representing the merchant group and someone that we have

worked with in all details, making sure that the barricades are in the correct space, making sure that all the merchants understand what the rules are, making sure that everyone knows how things are going to work. if there are complaints, who to go to? our partner in the community, pius lee. >> thank you. mayor ed lee, supervisor david chiu, president of the board of supervisors. dpw mohammed, ladies and gentlemen on behalf of chinatown neighborhood association and merchants of stockton street, we want to thank you for your support and also especially our commissioner bennie. our chinatown chamber of commerce is here.

and chinatown merchants association for their understanding, cooperation and joint effort to help the chinese community continue a long standing cultural traditional program. the chinatown sidewalk merchants display program from january 26th through february 9. as you may know that it is the chinese tradition and custom throughout the world, merchants would close their businesses for the first seven days to celebrate the chinese new year. that is why mayor lee announced today the sidewalk merchant day program. it's for the those in the bay area to come to chinatown and prepare for the chinese new

year for their families' parties. under the leadership of our director mohammed, all the merchants have been well-instructed on how to comply with all the sidewalk rules. last year the pilot program, we had experienced some problems, but now we are confident that we will do a much better job this year and i can guarantee you, mr. mayor, supervisor, director, we will do a much better job. thank you for all of your help. thank you. >> thank you, pius. [ applause ] >> i'm going to ask henry low

from the chinese benevolent association. >> thank you. happy new year. i have been in chinatown for a long time, and this year, it seems to be different, you know? everything seems to be more prepared, and more orderly fashion. this year, the new year will be much more progress and hopefully. thank you very much. [ applause ] >> so all the details you have. this saturday, the crews will

be out, seting up for the chinese new year. it's a great time for the families to be out. happy new year!