good evening, everybody. if i can have everybody's attention for a few minutes. we would like to welcome you to the reopening of our visitor information center here in san francisco. it's a real great occasion for us. we enjoy seeing it today than the way it was before. many visitors especially international visitors get off the bus at the airport and come here as their very first stop looking for information from san francisco. we get over 400,000 people to come here to learn about what to do in san francisco. i think the changes which i'm going to

talk about in san francisco. it's brought the feeling of the city in san francisco and the region into the building and it's a positive experience for us and the visitors and the volunteers who spend so much time here. so i would like to crews right now the mayor who has been a great partner with the hospital industry. in fact this whole project without the city of san francisco could not have done with without the help to make the plaza better and the visitor center a better experience and will work to make it more welcoming. i would like to introduce mayor lee, a tremendous ambassador to what we are all about. let's give

him a round of applause for that leadership. thank you for not only what you do for the residents, but the visitors as well. >> thank you, you and the board have been just fabulous. you know san francisco i get to talk about everywhere i go whether it's ireland, paris or washington, d.c. and pretty soon i have to go to baltimore. what a downer. and eat their crab. [ laughter ] anyway, it's all in great gist that i say to you that again this is a 16 million person visit every year to san francisco. just millions and millions of dollars are spent

by our visitors in this city. so we have to keep it beautiful, we have to keep it updated and informative. we have great partners that have known over many decades that this is the heart of our business, tourism, the hotels, some of the greatest hotels in the world are here in san francisco and they will be welcoming all the people that come from 55 days of sailing. event after event find it's way to san francisco, the bay area because they know we know how to host this. i want to welcome bob from our chamber of commerce because he's learning very quickly how wonderful this place is. [ applause ] and how we do things and how we do things successfully is to identify or challenge and get really bright creative minds like joe, and you start working

with union square and you discover and help everybody be successful and you find john, who gets this going. you get all of these discoveries like people in the city like john, who has been there year after year operateing the whole convention visitor center and you start to putting things together and more each year things get better and better. when you see success, there is so many examples of our success in working together and cooperating together that you get a whole hotel group of owners together and they are paying for an expansion of the convention center. that's going to make us world class competitors with places because of the size. so they know how

to get things done and know that our city is much acknowledging that this is the most important employment center, the tourism center for the city, it continues to be, we have natural beauty but we also have beauty because we all work together to get that great experience going and for this center to be refurbished, technology wise, space wise and adding things like made in san francisco. i have to say that because for me i got to talk about san francisco in ireland, in paris, i'm going to talk about it beginning tomorrow night the day after when i arrive in beijing that we are really on our way to kind of manufacturing beautiful wonderful things that people can take with them that they are looking for all the time. i got those inquiries. what are

you making in san francisco, the middle class in china, they have money to spend, they are investing all over the world. i want them to invest here along with the other 400,000 visitors that come through here and take the advantage of the exposure and what everybody associated with the movement here. we can have more of the products, more of the accessories, more of the things that they want to have as memories, but also make on going connections with us. i want to thank all the volunteers that are working here because, you know, you do it for the love of the city. if the visitors who speak multiple different languages walk in and they don't get a smile from a volunteer, earning a lot of money, they are not going to

spend money and not feel appreciated. we all know in this industry, it's not just the smile we care about, this is why we need to invest in looking at this future of the holiday plaza, working with webcor, we are working to try to redesign even better i improvements here and you see the space in the highest level of appreciation for the city. i want to emphasize it would not happen without everybody reaching out to each other, with n the city, stake holders, in our small businesses, the hotels and successful areas of our city and say let's work together for an even more improved vision of what we can do for our visitors. that is

going to enhance everything, that is what turns one visit into 5 visits with the same person. it turns someone who comes by themselves and then they bring their families or they meet up with friends here in san francisco. and this is what it's all about. this is what i care about and i know that i will continue to try to do the things that the mayor's office that support this effort, talking about it, quoting the statistics to the supervisors and they know that visitors is at the heart and all the way to market street. pretty soon, i'm not supposed to announce these things, but i would like to announce things that are not finalized yet because they get people excited about what else people want to do. market street is going to get free wifi by the end of

this year. i assure you of that. because the companies of at&t are saying gosh, look at what we are doing on market street. let's get free wifi going on the plazas and all the way so that we honor people's investment and honor all of the work they are doing to recreate and reestablish market street greatest street in san francisco and then we'll work on many of the other corridors that also want our attention and as joe has done with travel to reignite for all the people to visit and experience and do different things. this year is going to be incredible year. the exploratorium opens next month, the america's cup, the giants are back for another great season and then you have

in addition to all of that you have the latest, the bay lights. the incredible innovative [spelling?] spirit that it causes. how can you do that, to put led lights and you get incredible mastery of technology to go with art. these are the things we do to celebrate. i love this city more and more even though we are working our toe nails down to make it better, you turn and see it's really worth it because everyone loves this city and you know we all appreciate it. thank you for working together, thank you for going beyond the boundaries and thank you for reaching out to each other and asking for help and solutions. so that we don't

take the person on the sidewalk and say we have a problem and we have a problem. we do something about it. we are working with everybody to make things better. we have partners, they are showing up on market street. 3300 residential units being constructed, and we have venture capitalist. we need more. this is a big way of saying thanks to everybody for working together. another great center here and we are going to make sure this center flowers with all the other plans that we have. thank you for working together. >> thank you. for your leadership today. today i was

with the representative for the football league and they are looking at the site for football. they said i haven't seen this many cranes in american city for such a long time. it's very exciting. and mayor, i wasn't able to join you in court, but i will join you to our most important city and that is our sister in italy. thanks again for your leadership and in taking this city to a new direction and preserving it's past and celebrating it's presence and making sure it's future is as strong. let's give mayor another round of applause. [ applause ] so now i would like to clues to -- introduce you to my other boss, the board share of the traveling association and the board share of the improvement district and the square, david

maeld man. >> thank you joe, thank you mayor lee for all of your support, and your leadership. it's such a great time to be in san francisco. tourism is just coming and that's due to your efforts and your administration's efforts. thank you very much. san francisco travel. as joe mentioned, i kind of wear three hats but i'm standing in the middle of my world. union square improvement districts and tremendous work that they are doing down here, joe dell sandero with travel and of course due to mayor lee's efforts it's a time for

tourism and general manager in this city. thank you. visitors information center. it was a freudian slip because it improved tremendously and it couldn't be in greater location. so all the visitors that come to san francisco from the airport stop right there and come here for information on things to do in the city. it's tremendous for me to be the general manager because i have concierge but the volunteers and the people here are an extension of concierge and giving information for all the visitors that come in and make this a world class city and really visit all the areas, the restaurants, the attractions and everything else this city has to offer. i want

to thank again san francisco travel because they are the ones who market tourism, no. 1 industry in san francisco and again i want to thank you. i want to thank the volunteers. as mayor lee has said, you are the ones that truly breathe live into this city. and you give out information with just such authentic and hospitality to all the visitors around the world. they go back and tell their friends and tell them to come to one of the best cities in the world, san francisco. thank you. [ applause ] >> in conclusion, a couple things. we have a little game we are playing here that we encourage you to do it. we talk about our staff and volunteer that wear a yellow ribbon that say staff on them. go ahead and meet them. write their names on

the piece of paper. put it in the silver bucket and you have the opportunity to win -- some prices. these volunteers speak italian, hindu, french, mandarin, portuguese, spanish, tagalog and vietnamese. they are the ones that really help. a couple things i want to point out, the main changes here. when you walked in here you bumped into a bunch of brochures. the real experts are not the brochures but the staff and volunteers who share their information and passion. we put the brochures against the wall and brought the volunteers and staff to the middle. when the people came and they needed to understand what was the heart and soul of the city to meet the geniuses, they found in

front and middle. that was an important change. we don't always have a dj out here. many times we have volunteers and staff. another feature we are proud of is technology. we have touch screens. we have sf made products, we'll have more in the future as we continue. we have these the wonderful maps back here. the one of san francisco and it's neighborhood and the one of california. it amazing how many volunteers want to get in front of this map and discuss what they remember about san francisco. we encourage you to spread the word and thank you for your partnership. thanks for coming tonight. enjoy the rest of the reception. thank you. [ applause ] [ applause ]

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