better. and all of the philanthropic organizations that are part of this pathway initiative likewise believe that our democracy is better when everybody is included in it. the san francisco foundation is proud to be a leader and investor in this necessary work, bringing together the deep commitment of all of our immigrant communities, their partners, to assure economic mobility, education, health care access, and, of course, that they are civickly engaged. as the mayor and supervisor chiu said, we are a nation ~ and a city of immigrants. we are a testament to america's spirit of risk and its spirit of innovation. and the heart of every immigrant is a risk taker, a bold and courageous person who has risked everything to make a better life for themselves, but also to make a better life for all of their neighbors and communities in which they live ~.

like mayor lee and the supervisor, i'm a proud daughter of american immigrants. they came to this country with odds stacked against them to build a better future for my siblings and my cousins. my father served in the army, but more important to him was that he served at every polling station in every election from the time he was legally able to do so. and at breakfast before every election was a very, very, very engaged, vivid, enlightened conversation about how my mother should vote, even though she didn't always agree with him, and that really it was our responsibility to comment on the things that mayor lee referenced. what kind of health care should we have? what should be the caliber of our schools? what kind of open space should we have? how should we use land? these are all very critical parts of our democracy and our voice, and i'm very, very proud on behalf of the san francisco

foundation to partner with the city, adrian and her staff, our philanthropic partners, but most of all to partner with the nonprofit organizations who on the ground will be working to find ways to reach the hundred thousand folks living in this city today who have not yet found their pathway to citizenship. we believe it's a fundamental part of our city life to do so and the san francisco foundation is extremely proud to have partnered with this group, to bring it together. we look forward to three years of learning and to reaching as many of these folks as we can, to have them become citizens, and to come to health commission meetings and tell the director of health and all of our other commissioners what it is they would like to see their city be. thank you very much on behalf of the san francisco foundation. (applause) >> thank you, dr. hernandez. a final aspect of the san francisco pathway to

citizenship initiative is civic engagement. this component is not just another hurdle potential citizens must pass to complete naturalization exam, but an opportunity to instill lifelong active engagement among our new naturalized citizens and to encourage meaningful participation, to contribute to san francisco's overall success and prosperity. seven local community-based organizations with decades of expertise were selected for the pilot year of this initiative. but the outreach will extend to the many diverse immigrant communities that makeup the san francisco population and family. together these partners will inform, educate, provide language services, counseling, legal assistance, and many other services to residents who may be eligible for citizenship. our next speaker is a very special person. it's rare to find a leader as universally beloved and valued as annie chung, president and

ceo of self-help for the elderly. self-help is the lead agency for the citizenship initiative. annie is a model of compassion and highly effective leadership, efforts for the under served combined with savvy connections and her ability to bridge differences and create models of mutual respect are phenomenal. many of us are fortunate to call her our sister, our friend, and our inspiration. annie chung. (applause) >> good morning, everyone. i'm annie chung. the san francisco pathway to citizenship initiative is a dream becoming a reality for many of us in the community who have been working closely with both the city through adrian and the office of civic engagement and immigrant affairs, the five foundations and gsa.

they are providing the much needed funding for this initiative. there is a national effort called the new americans campaign which is working on naturalization in multiple cities in the country and the seven cbos who makeup the san francisco collaborative are truly grateful. now that san francisco is part of this americans campaign. melissa rogers from the immigrant illegal resource center who heads up that campaign is here today. i want to quickly introduce. and irlc is providing [speaker not understood] to our collaborative. besides self-help for the elderly, there are six other community based organizations and their representatives whom i'd like to introduce to you now. if i call your name, would you step up and stand beside me? because we're not doing this alone, we're doing everything together.

so, from the advancing justice asian caucus executive director hen june ro. from the asian pacific islander legal outreach, executive director dean ito taylor. program director from the catholic charities cyo christopher martinez. amy wang [speaker not understood]. cheryl madrid, jewish services. and [speaker not understood], executive director from la rasa community resource center. together all the partners have invited over 30 of our clients to join us to celebrate today and they're standing in the mayor's office right now, so happy that they're part of this celebration. i think together we represent the diversity of san francisco and many of the ethnic communities that so desperately

need naturalization services, from legal consultation to completion of the 10-page n. 400 forms, to the fee waiver forms to help them get a waiver for the 680 dollars application fee to become citizen. together our collaborative covers all of the major languages spoken by our clients, chinese, spanish, vietnamese, russian, other eastern european languages, burmese, tagalog and others. we urge you to attend upcoming naturalization workshop on august 10, 2013, to take advantage of the naturalization services which will be offered that day at number 1 south van ness. no appointments needed and free of charge. on behalf of all of our collaborative partners and our clientsv i want to thank mayor lee, president chiu, dr.

hernandez, and all of our philanthropic funders. thank you so much for your generous support and your continued support through the san francisco pathway to citizenship will be a great success. we will give you our 200% effort. thank you very much. (applause) >> there is nothing more exciting and challenging as going through the process of naturalization in the united states. we're now going to hear from three individuals who are sharing their first person stories and have been very courageous and open about sharing these stories with us. first we will hear from claudia rodriguez and then mrs. su fong gau and then mr. gregory takakun. please come up, ms. rodriguez.

>> good morning, everybody. i'm gloria rodriguez. [speaker not understood] catholic charities cyo and i am happy to say that now i -- my voice now counts. i can vote. now i can have my rights that were taken away. [speaker not understood]. i just want to thank public charities to help people like me to make it for the people [speaker not understood] for the community. so, thank you very much. (applause) [speaking in native language] >> good morning, supervisors.

hi, my name is su fong and i am 96 years old. i have been studying for citizenship more than two years. and because of the elderly and other agency provided legal service that i can start citizenship. i had attended june 29th workshop and they provide the free service for me and filled out the application form. now i feel [speaker not understood] to apply for citizenship family. [speaker not understood] and can benefit our community.

thank you. (applause) [speaking in native language] >> good afternoon, everyone. my name is gregory taku. i am 78 years old. i came from armenia. i became a citizen in april of this year. i am very proud of this. (applause)

>> to prepare for citizenship takes, of course, a lot of work. you really need to relax through that process because it is, of course, very stressful. and i'll say who helped me most through this process was jewish family and children services. for a few months before my citizenship interview, i took classes with jewish family and children services through the instructor, which is me. [laughter] >> i'm very grateful. thank you, everybody. (applause)

>> i'm very proud to be here and i'm happy to have left armenia so that i can take advantage of being an american citizen. (applause) >> something magical happens here in san francisco under mayor lee's leadership. before he begins the question and answer session, we have a few thank yous that we would like to make to our community and philanthropic partners for helping to make this initiative and this lunch possible. we'd also like to recognize

tessa rivero callejo. (applause) >> [speaker not understood] who is a wizard with the pen with the san francisco foundation. richard whipple, the office of immigration and civic engagement affairs. (applause) >> [speaker not understood] rodriguez sack burn of grant makers concerned with immigrants and refugees. (applause) >> and as always, the excellent team from sfgovtv and mayor lee's communications team. thank you very much. the mayor will now take a few questions. (applause) >> i don't have violet's energy. [laughter] >> >> any questions about our initiative here? >> [speaker not understood] about what this means to you? >> well, in many ways, certainly for my life, having been the son of immigrant parents, i knew that they were very focused on being citizens

because they wanted to get fear out of the way when they were adjusting. to me, i think that's been the story of so many of my clients when i was an attorney at the asian law caucus for a number of years that, as i serviced seniors and people living in low-income housing, oftentimes they wouldn't even want to use the legal process because of their fears. they didn't know what would be behind each door. and even speaking to an attorney sometimes was difficult for them, especially when i was trying to educate residents at [speaker not understood] about what is the warranty of habitability. something that we'll become more and more familiar with. but i think that's why i think going through a citizenship process, gaining the confidence that the individuals who have just spoken and feeling that you're as an american as

anybody else offers you the ability to say, hey, i've got an opinion, too. i want wetter schools. i want to do all these other things. i want to be a part of that decision making, not be a recipient or victim of someone else's decision. and that's the key, i think, to this initiative. we always felt that we didn't do enough just by doing the census count. and in this city, i think we want that full participation. we want it so badly that even david chiu and all of us are saying, let's give people a vote who are not necessarily citizens to the education system because we need that -- we need that input. we don't want parents disengaged in what's going on with their kids. education is so important to everybody and so much a part of the future, but there are a lot of things we want to do, but i think the path to citizenship and what we have outlined here particularly with the funding agencies have so much experience in dealing with refugee and immigrant families,

to have the nonprofits on the ground to do this work with us in collaboration i think is going to be -- you'll see in a very short time period, you're going to see a lot more levels of competence happen. and i suggest to you, it isn't just the individuals that will improve their confidence. when they live in their communities, they get to be part of their neighborhood associations. they get to be part of more nert. they get to be part of resident improvement associations. they get to tell us where our planning grants get to go to. what kind of flowers they want planted. they want a tree in front of their house? okay, put it on the side. and then all of this comes with, i think, full participation and get the fear out of the way, get full engagement in. that's what -- and that's why we created the office of civic engagement, to give everybody the power of being in the city that we welcome them in to participate. >> we don't have immigration reform. >> well, we don't have it today. that's not stopping us.

that's why we went ahead and made this announcement because we want to give people across the country, and hopefully some congressional representatives that are not maybe in the state of california, but other states, a vision for what people really want. they want to be participants. they don't want to live in the shadows. and there's many parts of the immigration reform that we have to pay attention to. i happen to believe very strongly, and i think everybody in this room does, we can't lose family unification as part of it. we have to have a path for people who have been here, maybe on paper not legally, but they're americans like everybody else. it's just on paper they weren't. we've got to get them fully participating, not subject to some immigration judge's decision that because their paperwork of their parents weren't right that they have to be ousted from this country. i think there are so many parts of immigration that must be had and that's why we're advocating.

and i am together with literally every elected leader in this city that san francisco is special. we know we're not the only voice in the country. so, we have to talk to other mayors in iowa, in indiana, in alabama and in florida, saying that there's a lot for immigrants to contribute to this country. we also have to have the talent come here as well. a lot of technology companies are reaching out to talent across the world and they need that talent to stay here to build the companies so that more jobs can get created. that's part of the immigration bill along with family, along with pathways to citizenship for those that are technically not legally here. how do you spend the $1.2 million on this program? >> thank you. that's over a three-year period and half of that money is coming from the foundations that are participating. that's why we wanted to officially thank them. the other half will come from

the city general fund through the office of civic engagement and immigrant affairs that adrian has. and she will be working with all the nonprofits to fund them appropriately for the activities that will get people the training, the orientation, the classes, but also the outreach, building their confidence that they should go through the citizenship process. thank you. thank you, everybody. (applause) ... thank you. good morning,

everyone. wow! [ applause ] wow. we just won the super bowl. good morning, everyone. thank you for coming this morning. a few weeks ago here we announced that my intention to appoint supervisor carmen chu and we made a commitment that we wanted to make her replace many appointment soon after we had time to talk with residents, businesses to get their in put the about a replacement. if i have learned anything i have learned that

the residents appreciate the leadership. it's been very strongly felt by many people, from park side to ocean beach. it's just in credible how that large group has appreciated the work. i have a strong push that continuity was important to the residents and the businesses in district 4. that they felt there was so much that the city had gone flew through and the district and certainly understood the team to help her legislatively, help her look at the district, implement and

communicate and all the supervisors i want to thank and all the officials that are here all of them for their constant work with carmen and to know that they have a member of the team that would present that very strong continuity for the district. i spent the last several weeks talking to the residents, having not only coffee but a number of different appointments. i talked to individuals who were interested in the position as well. i know we have one of the finest, legislative aids who knows the board and being a

presence in the public finances and helped supervisor chu work budgets, help create the plan to establish the two year budget with our office but also really talk through district and the rest of the board members in understanding deeply what our budget concerns are and then i think on the district side truly representing the interest of this district and all of it's diverse views about what it needed. so, i want to introduce my appointment today katie tang . [ applause ] . katie has lived in the

district since she was 1 year old. that might have been 13 years ago. [ laughter ] you will note and i'm sure it will be part of the stories we'll tell that it was the same age as carmen when she was appointed. her parents also live in the district as well and not only a resident but someone more interested in the district and representing all the issues, and graduate of lowel high school. both of my daughters are blowing kisses to me from new york as they also graduated from that fantastic school. she has a very distinction have gone to u c

davis. obviously some very strong intelligence, a double major, of course it is a proper time to thank mr. and mrs. tang for that great lineage of parentage that is demonstrated there. i have no doubt that katie will fulfill these incredible obligations responsibly for the district, representing everybody. she has been literally every corner and again the residents have continued to say can we have continuity. we want to have things done. we don't want name calling or disputes. really the collaborative experience that this board is demonstrating,

they wanted the same thing representing district 4 which is something they felt in supervisor's chu's representation for the last five years. i have no doubt that she'll be an effective representative of the district and also can be having things running and as you know we have an election coming. part of these conversations is how can we make sure we have someone that can balance all of these things and be true to commitment to getting all of these don's done that have been on the agenda for the last couple years, whether it's

painting or a park, all things that we want to see completed and carried to the future in a most responsive way. i know we are going to have a great colleague especially from the comments that i have heard from the rest of the board members. they feel very happy with this choice as well because they know katie, they know her work and they know how she's communicated with them and certainly katie's had that great collaboration already with our key agencies in the city. so with that, i would like to introduce our appointie who we will swear in tomorrow and have that done in haste so we can get on with the production of the city. may i introduce katie tang.

[ applause ] >> good morning, everyone. i guess the suspense is over now. i want to thank everyone for being here today. all the community members, members of the city family, members of the board standing behind me, my parents. my partner justin, but i especially want to thank mayor lee forgiving me the opportunity to represent the district 4. i also have to be completely honest here. this is a very bitter sweet moment for me, as someone who has lived in district 4 for over 20 years, i'm happy to represent the district that i grew up in, but on the other hand as a district

4 resident i'm sad to see supervisor chu leave as my supervisor. everyone says that work is work and you have to separate your personal life from your work life. for me especially in the past five years, work is very personal . when i first started working in district 4, people came to the office and wanted to rebuild the playground. i remember my own fond experiences at west sunset and thought people should be able to enjoy it as much as i did. with the pool open, i couldn't help to feel jealousy because that's where i learned to swim and then eventually teaching lessons. when i go to my parents house and look