charged me for years. this stuff is [inaudible] it blew my mind when i realized what was being done to me and it's not just me. it's my neighborhoods and "john says the most homo homophobic things that could say ." i don't know if i could use the words but i will. he called me several names. one is true and one is not. to make a long story short he didn't do it one time or five times. he screams at me every time. this is the business plan and he raises the rent and rent it out again with the bed bugs and the lice and the mice. >> john, let me inform you if he

is illegally raising the rent you should see the rent board and final a petition for illegal increase and have a hearing. if he is calling you homophobic names check in with the human rights commission because they handle those situations and there are organizations that testified here today that do that. >> yes organizations are all fine. ultimately it depends who you talk to. i went to the rent board with this problem. there are a lot of rent increases i don't have because at one point charging $200 more than the market rate. when i got the apartment in 87 i was happy to find a home, and like i said i laifed in the hague for 40 years and loved it. i now tell people i live on corner of hague and resentment. it's not the summer of love. it's --

>> thank you for having me. i have the two wherein testimonies and i was going to read them into the record before they cut me off. do you have a question? >> this is very quick. i want to say one thing that is lacking is there is a lot of people being ellis act and there is no communication between those people. someone named jeremy started a website and people that were ellis act and i don't have the resources to do it myself but there is no communication between everybody being evicted. thank you. >> that's a good point. so if i could read these into the record and i guess we will adjourn. i will entertain a motion to adjourn. this is to whom it may concern "i am unable to make morning meetings. as a lgbt

senior i have many housing concerns that are basically no different from other seniors housing concerns. while i am fortunate to have a section eight housing voucher if you pay attention to the news lately you know dealing with the san francisco housing authority comes with its own problems. while i am currently housed there are thousandos the list and many lgbt seniors and less and less landlords in san francisco rent to section eight tenants. they are interested in going after the corporate dollar and the new legislation passed regarding this prohibits less than 30 day rentals as 30 days is not considered short term in san francisco. ridiculous if you ask me. hasn't stopped the conversion in my building and i am sure others. they have basically taken the units off the market for san franciscans and one worries that the

landlord will not comply with hud and with no one rent to section eight where will i go? they got rid of the rats here and over flowing bathtubs and et cetera and i am in a building that has rentals for over $2,000 in the tenderloin. how can a senior utilities afford to live here in this is not workts the price tag that the authority agreed to v it's over the payment standard. hud has raised the standard in reason 10 years but rent is going up. >> historical they're charging so much rent here. i have lived here 11 years and inundated with construction and much without

permits and a electrician that rewired the building with no license and broken elevators and because i have a section eight voucher i can't take them to the rent board but to the housing authority and with this housing authority it's easier to live with it and may may or may not deal with t i did appeal that the housing appeal let the landlord raise the rent above the payment standard because they didn't take the condition of my building into consideration but hud says they don't have to do that when calculating rent reasonableness for your unit and they can use other unit's rent frs that calculation as far as up to a mile away. in san francisco my tenderloin apartment can be more than a mile from knob hill. i

fought the authority to even get a hearing for this case. they said i had no right but then gave me a hearing and the person representing the housing authority said it was ridiculous we were there because hud rules say i don't get a hearing for this. the argue was august 31, 2012 and the officer made her decision and that the housing authority does have to take the condition of the building in consideration with this. i do have a roof over my head for now but a low income tenant with no resources is also fearful of losing their home. fortunately i won't be ellis act out because of the size of the building and one always feels

the push and they want the apartment soy they can make more money. these days there are so many trying for the apartment and the landlord could give a number of reasons and one reant know if they were discriminating. i would be happy to move into a mixed increase building one for lgbt seniors and one take my section eight voucher and i could really feel at home. terry frey. the second is from david allen. "for years in 2005 when i moved from new york i lived in a large room with light. i am a painter. it's for me to function. basically a sro. i don't feel feel poorer constrained. i am 76. my social security check covers my rent. i have no other income so i rely on life savings to provide health net and other

care and extra money for making life decent. however that money is running out. i have prostate cancer since 2005 and had a stroke and seizure in the last year. i am fine but have to resort to medi-cal and can no longer another insurance. i can manage but the space i am in is not available to subsidies. with recent real estate developments in town prices and rentals being inflated but not simply available with a year's long waiting list and condo stale living becoming the fashion. the asmo fear of radical change is the building could be sold et cetera creates a state of on

going anxiety and open housing for suitable change has me feel seriously on the edge. currently i am exhibiting paintings at visual aids gallery, a nonprofit for those with life threatening illness to encourage them to work. again the prospect of sales are remote because of the cost of promoting myself. frankly tight focused 1%ers. >> can i make a motion? coming out of the hearing today mr. chair and task force members we have enough information -- the motion i will be file signature motion to forward all of the information that we received today from the hearing over to the full task force for additional discussion if need be, but for additional items. something that we take right away and over to the board of supervisors and to the mayor's

office on the concerns that we heard from the community today and some of the presenters as well. >> do i hear a second to that motion? >> second. >> all in favor? >> aye. >> okay. we will forward the information onto the task force members. with this i will entertain a motion to adjourn? >> so moved. >> second. >> all in favor? thank you for coming to this hearing. your

>> all right, everyone, want to say thank you all for being here today at balboa park and want to say, first off, thanks to the trust for public land who played a key role in renovating balboa park and to put it to be where it is today. and i want to thank you all for your efforts. you know, one of the best parts about being an elected official is the ability to effect change in san francisco in a very positive way. and today i'm very proud to announce that after two years of incredibly hard work on behalf of a lot of people, we are announcing a new project in san francisco to bring free wi-fi to 31 different parks, plazas, and open spaces across our city.

from areas such as the marina green to washington square park to sunset playground, all a moe square, civic center, bernal heights to right here in balboa park, this project is going to touch parks and plazas across all of san francisco in every corner of our city. san francisco has been a leader in our technology community and our technology economy across our country and now we get to continue to play a role in being a leader bringing technology solutions to improve the lives of our residents here in our city. it's been a privilege to work on this project and to lead this effort the last two years and look forward to bringing the broader vision of free wi-fi across san francisco in the next few years with all the partners behind me today. this has been a strong collaboration on behalf of a lot of partners. in particular, google, sf city, our recreation and park

department as well as our department of technology, and i want to thank all of those involved. this project started a little over two years ago with a conversation i had with an old family friend from google. and i want to take a moment to thank the entire google team that worked on this project. it's been two years, so, it's touched a lot of desks and had a lot of approvals and in particular want to thank veronika bell who is here from google for stepping p. up. google is providing a financial gift of $600,000 to turn this into a reality. this is with the recreation and park department. i want to thank phil ginsberg, katy, so many people from the rec and park team that really brought this project forward. we selected locations throughout san francisco on a number of levels. first of all, we wanted to make sure that we continue to bridge our digital divide that exists not only throughout our country, but here in san

francisco, to place free wi-fi networks in under served communities and across different parts of san francisco. but also to make sure that we provide wi-fi access in some of the most heavily trafficked parks and plazas in our city so we can have the greatest impact throughout our great city. i want to thank sf city for their strong partnership in this project. we started working together a little over a year ago. they are not only the leading effect knowledge jai voice in san francisco, but they really stepped up to the plate to be the project manager here who are going to oversee the installation of this project. and i want to thank in particular alex turk for his leadership during this effort. i certainly want to thank our department of technology and its new leader mark tuitu for also stepping up to the plate. mark is such a visionary and i think we have years of great things to come out of our department of technology and this is just the first step. and lastly i want to thank my

staff and in particular wherever margo is, mar co-kelly. -- margo kelly. margo spent the last two years quarterbacking this project. she spent so many hours of her life dedicate today bringing this to the residents of san francisco and we shall all be incredibly thankful. the benefits of free wi-fi in san francisco are many. not only will it further open up our parks and our city to innovation, to education, and includetionthv i. for all san francisco residents, but it's also as i mentioned before a significant step towards bridging our digital divide in our city. it provides local groups and community residents access to the internet they might not have had before, as well for our rec and park department as phil knows all too well many rec centers still use dial up service. when we think about registering our children camps and play

grounds, what we need to do in our daily lives, but also our government on a daily basis to use technology, this will be an incredible boone to our rec and park department and something we should all be very excited about. in terms of the details of the gift, google is providing a $600,000 financial gift to our city with no strings attached. i think a lot of the prior debate around free wi-fi in san francisco that never moved forward was because of different questions about business models or so forth, to emphasize this is a free gift of financial benefit to the city of san francisco with no strings attached. the money will come through sf city which will manage the installation of the wi-fi network from beginning to end, and our department of technology will accept that gift on behalf of the city and county of san francisco. and ultimately rec and park will be the host of the wi-fi network on their properties. and at the end of the day, it's going to be all san francisco residents who benefit from this. after going through all the

necessary steps in city hall, the timing right now is that we believe installation will start in december of this year and should be completed by the spring of next year. so, this is going to be a project that will become reality very, very soon for the residents of san francisco. again, on a personal level, i'm incredibly proud to have led this project over the last two years. it's very gratifying that when you see an idea from the initial conversation to the project itself to now bring it to reality, to a city and park where i used to play ball in high school, to announce a project, this is something i've been incredibly proud to work on and something we started years ago and finally bringing to reality today. i again want to thank everybody who has been involved. this has been a complete team effort. and certainly want to thank mayor lee for his support during this process. mayor lee has been an incredible friend to our technology community as doing incredible things for our great city.

and, mayor lee, i want to thank you and introduce our great mayor, mayor ed lee. (applause) >> thank you, mark. welcome, everybody, to balboa park. and i know we have a couple of hosts and i want to meet and recognize of course our recreation and park department. phil is here. he'll speak in a minute. also recognizing john avalos, our supervisor for this district. but often a voice at the board in this city about issues of equity, and that is why i think it's important that we announced it at a place like balboa park. i live here just literally two minutes away, so, i often see this park completely crowded with so many families, especially with all the great improvements that rec and park has put in, in collaboration with the supervisor, because i know that some of his discretionary funding has often gone in to support efforts here and, of course, across the street with the challenges of

the -- both the bart and the muni station. but it is all about our neighborhoods. and i go back to what supervisor farrell said, and i want to again thank and appreciate supervisor farrell, his staff margo kelly, another great effort. this is what innovation does in the city. it gets everybody to actually work at even higher levels in government in a public-private partnership with companies like google and all the rest of the wonderful members of sf city to do what we can do and to do more than we think we can. in order to bring benefits, bring equity, bridge not only the digital divide, but perhaps bring the whole innovative spirit to every community in san francisco. this is what i think this wi-fi effort of our 31 parks is saying. and the nice thing about it is that when you study what we're going to do here and accomplish with the 31 parks, and that we

along with our technology partners, our communications partners, our department leaders, new ones as well as old ones, are saying this is just the beginning. this is literally the beginning of a continued effort to innovate, innovate, and innovate. and i like what mark said. not only are there no strings attached. really the benefits are targeted at our residents and our visitors, but that the only thing we're going to see is wireless connected to our fiber. we're learning that. we're learning that our fine and some of the backbones that we've always had to depend on can be improved on. i have to admit, the new director will also tell you we are behind. i call our self-the innovation capital of the world, but we're behind in many ways and we need

to catch up. we need to do more, but sometimes the funding wasn't there and it costs more than we think and we're trying to figure things out and trying to get as modern as fast as we can. and this is where i think that relationship with the private sector, particularly with our technology and innovative companies in san francisco is so important to us, that we gain a knowledge and a confidence that we can improve city government services, and also at the same time when we get wi-fi here, not only will the kids that play and visit here and utilize the services here will they have a better experience, but our seniors, people who don't have access at home will come here and visit. they'll take advantage of it as well. and this is why the list of 31 sites that you've been given

are really important because they represent a lot of communities where if we just concentrated on the things we know about, they would not get the service, i think, in a valuable time. this city has always been and i will continue with the board of supervisors in collaboration with them, with leadership of supervisor farrell and avalos to make sure that all of our communities get taken care of, that they all get connected up, they also experience the innovative spirit of the city. and that we do it in except ration that while technology companies are incredibly successful, challenged as well as successful in the san francisco and bay area, we take the opportunity every moment to say what else can we do to help our residents, help our citizens. and this is another great example of it, but i tell you, it's just the beginning. we have many more parks, many more plazas. we have corridors of our city yet to be connected up so that

when anybody comes in to the city, whether they're visiting from another state or whether they're from another country, they'll know that this city reflects the innovative spirit when they arrive at the airport, when they arrive at the port or they arrive on muni. they'll know we're all connected up. so, again, i want to say thank you to supervisor farrell and his staff for shepherding this, for all the departments that have worked collaboratively with google and our sf city, our citizens initiative for technology and innovation. they are an incredible group of people. and, by the way, i've been told now they sport 600 members and they're still growing. i wouldn't be surprised that they will now comprise the majority of the over 1800 technology firms that exist in san francisco. and they want to do more and they want to join all of our

neighborhoods to do more to improve life in our city for everybody. so, thank you to everyone on this wonderful effort. now, may i present to you the host for district 11 and someone who we were commenting earlier he will be signing the budget in the next few hours. he was the budget chair years ago and mark, of course, was the budget chair this year. i want to again thank supervisor avalos and supervisor farrell for their wonderful leadership continued here. now the supervisor of district 11, john avalos. (applause) >> thank you, mr. mayor. thank you for being here. thank you for your help on the budget as well. your office did the lion's share of the work putting the budget together. i want to thank supervisor farrell for his work on the budget. we'll be talking about that later today. but also really putting his relationships in order here to serve all of san francisco and

serve, of course, this park as part of that effort. this park is actually very exciting to me. i have a great deal of pride about how the neighbors came together to really advocate for this park to make great changes here. the playground that's behind me is a big part of that effort. it came in different phases. ball street park, skate park envisioned by the neighbors as well. wi-fi is icing on the cake. so, we know that our city dollars can't always stretch the way we want them to, and we look to our partners in business to be able to provide a helping hand at times. and this is a good, this is a good effort. it's a good project to be able to do that, especially that we have no strings attached, that this is a gift that's actually coming to residents in san francisco that has a benefit that maximizes the benefit to residents. i'm really glad that we have

that, private project moving across the city and this park. so, i just want to thank supervisor mark farrell for his great work. it's been a really good couple months for me working with him on the budget and seeing this project come into fruition, to know that he presents some really great leadership here in san francisco. and more to come i'm sure. thank you for being here. i'm actually going to be introducing our illustrious general manager of the rec and park department, mr. phil ginsberg. (applause) >> illustrious? thank you, john. illustrious? it's a great day for parks and for park users. so, we're thrilled. we get to be the beneficiaries of all this hard work and all this partnership. and it is appropriate that we're here at balboa park. mark, john, and the mayor all talked about the improvements that have happened in this really, really important piece of open space. it's a dense neighborhoodv.

it's in a transit corridor. and thanks to partnership and thanks to community support and thanks to the leadership of our elected officials we've made some incredible improvements here in the last few years. behind us, our new playground thanks to the support of the trust for public land. behind all of you is an incredible new skateboard park which is both a public -- another public-private partnership partially funded with bond funds. behind us even further is balboa pool which thanks to the 2012 parks bond will be renovated with a state-of-the-art swimming pool in a few years. the theme here is meeting evolving community needs. skateboarding has become more popular. the needs of our aquatics programs is changing. the needs of our playground is evolving and so, too, is technology. technology has a very important place in park and park systems and we're absolutely thrilled to welcome the park scape community. parks are democratic. parks create opportunity and accessibility for everyone. and to have wi-fi in parks and

to have the technological investment that will allow neighbors to come and do things that they wouldn't otherwise be able to do here, to learn, to read, to listen to music, we've taken a lot of steps in the last few years to become -- we're marching towards becoming the most economically robust parks program in america. we had a cell phone app, parka meanttionv, park hours, park programs. we can now register online and having wi-fi in our parks will make it easier for park users and frankly our staff to deliver the programs and services that the public expects in our open space. so, we're thrilled ~. government can't do it alone any more, so, this is really about partnership. we're so thankful to google and veronika, thank you for hanging with us. thank you to sf city. a big thanks to mark, supervisor farrell for stewarding this. and also a big thanks to the

mayor who has really given us room to be innovative, room to pursue public private partnerships and has really supported innovation in our parks. and, john, thank you for hosting us here. supervisor avalos has been an incredible advocate for our neighborhood parks and one of the things great about this gift, this is not just going to parks frequented by tourists or destination parks. this is a benefit that is going into our neighborhoods. so, we're really thrilled. the last folks i want to thank are my own staff, katy, [speaker not understood]. these are projects that actually take work and we're -- i'm very proud and appreciative of my own staff's help in delivering this. so, a great day for parks. and i now get to introduce one more very important partner, mark tuitu who is head of the department of technology has brought an infusion of energy into the notion of innovation and partnership. so, mark, come on up.

(applause) >> good morning. it's very exciting to be part of the reigniting of our sf connectivity effort. when i took the job three months ago, mayor lee challenged me to simplify, accelerate, and bring the private sector experience to, you know, bettering the architecture, infrastructure of the city. and, yes, mayor lee is right, we are behind in some ways, but the beauty is that we are ahead in many ways. and there are plenty of opportunities to leverage our infrastructure throughout the city to bring pre-wi-fi to our citizens. now, of course, when you're new in the -- any city company, one important thing is the budget.