made the entrance accessible and you have trouble accessible. restaurants only have to be accessible if they are available to your customers and clients. and actually does not cover employee access to the restrooms. we have other priorities that come into play. [inaudible] you want that inspected to come out before you get a that letter. it is not only your obligation, but it is the right thing to do. you want to be disability accessible. you want more customers. the best way to do that is to start planning. when you are choosing, ideally,

your inspector would have a background in inspection, design, and construction. that means we have some excellent general contractors out there that could be excellent task inspectors or building inspectors as well. in order to get the legal benefits, the protections that are important, you want your inspection to be under that theory that is how you can get that 90-day [inaudible] as you start to interview your inspectors, i would ask them to a lot of questions. do not rely on just the resume. what you're really need to do is ask a series of probing questions. you want to know what their area

of expertise is, how many times -- you want to ask them if they have any references, and if you follow through on those references, you should call the people and have a heart to heart conversation. [inaudible] you also want to ask to see a copy of the tass report. some recommendations that i think are pretty basic. you want to make sure that the inspector is pulling a full building permits. it is being felt as how accessible it should have been in the past. it is the context. you also want to make sure

[inaudible] because we all are very visual people. you are going to be working on problems. you want to be able to see it. they should also be following the party's in the ada -- the priorities in the ada. your task report should also be giving you some constructive solutions. they should be tailoring it to your very specific circumstances. [inaudible]

also, you want to make sure that your task inspector has a relationship with an attorney. it could be beneficial to have that legal expertise readily at hand. the task inspector may have learned some useful information. it is also helpful if your task inspector knows the contractor because the contractor can provide you with a construction bid for what is going to take. so i want to leave you with some closing thoughts. one of them, as mentioned at the beginning -- be proactive. do not wait for the letter. get the inspection now. the second is keep really good records. [inaudible] they had actually been doing work over the years. they have been removing barriers. but because they were not keeping good files documenting

the reasons why they widened a door or replace the hardware or remodel the bathroom, tracking exactly how much money they spend, they do not get a whole lot of credit for the work they have done so far. but you also want to keep good records tissue products you will be taking on in the future. maybe you cannot remove that step this year or next year. maybe it will take you five years to get there. but you are providing yourself protection. >> good evening.

we have a loan fund for small business owners facing ada compliance issues. opportunity fund is a non-profit organization sponsored by [inaudible] to help small businesses that could not obtain a loan from their banks. we created a loan program for small businesses who are trying to become compliant. under this loan program, we can provide financing for small businesses up to $100,000. those are the small businesses who have been sued, and there are small businesses trying to preempt of a protect themselves against these issues. i will talk about the second rocket first. for the small businesses out

there that have been hearing about compliance issues and what to protect themselves and make the improvement and have inspections done, we are willing to work with you and willing to look at the plans that you have any inspections you have to enable you to have tenant improvement to become compliant. for those folks, we would recommend that you go and get a task report done and see whether the contractor can lay out the plan and complete the requirement and then come to us and show us your plan. [inaudible] and have had complaints against them because of compliance, we are also able to work with your

peer the fundamental requirement for those is that we need you to finish the lawsuit or settle the lawsuit before we can work with you in terms of providing financing. the reason for that is the conversations and these issues can go on for a long time, and we want to make sure that you fundamentally understand what you need to comply with and what are your obligations as part of the settlement of the lawsuit. obviously, it can cost a lot of money. we have provided financing before. it is a lot of money. so come and talk to the office of small business and make sure you have professionals and task inspectors and contractors lined

up so that we can be part of that conversation in terms of helping you maintain your business and helping to stay in business despite the fact that a lot of businesses are being regulated by now. if you have questions, my information is in the packet. we are more than happy to field any questions, but again, because there are different parts of this whole saga, we are all in different parts in terms of financing, but the loan program will be available. it will be available until the ada compliance issues are no longer there. >> thank you. any questions?

[inaudible] we do have legal expertise and individuals with our mayor's office of disability. if you do have any questions at all about things that you might have heard about or issues you are facing, it might be the opportunity to ask questions. any questions? >> thanks, supervisor. sorry for being late. i heard the gentleman say that the help for small business

maximum is $100,000. someone else mentioned a repayment plan. a sort of interest rate and so on and so on. business people show up here. a lot of restaurants and small businesses, and i am certain those members are very interested in this program. i myself have been faithful so long. that is why i am interested. hopefully i will be able to learn something and pass on to the people who need my assistance. if there's any way the supervisor would be able to generate a little more activity, maybe the location might not be perfect for the small orders to

attend, and hopefully, we have another similar occasion to notify all those people to attend. but thanks so much for being here. thank you. >> yes, so, the typical loan for small businesses, these compliance issues, the term depends on the loan amounts. the most we can do -- in terms of other qualifications, again, this is a loan program, loan fund. these are not grants. they are credits. we will look at the capacity to avoid loan payments and also the totality of the situation, taking into consideration whether there are legal fees or remediation fees that need to be

paid. but i will say that we want to be an alternative for folks that cannot obtain financing from a bank. this may be a combination of that. maybe they need to go to a bank and get something and we can fill the rest or if they get decline by a bank, we can come in and assist with financing. >> [inaudible] you can only do so much to get people here. that is why we are asking for help from not only our media partners, but those of you in the room. people do not often come to ask for assistance until they are hit with a lawsuit. until they receive a complaint letter or a threat of being sued, they do not take the issue very seriously. by that time, a lot of your investments are gone.

you will be exposed to lawyer's fees, exposed to having to make copier repairs immediately. these are all things that are very hard for small businesses to weather. what we are trying to promote today is the fact that you can protect yourself as a small business if you are private about it. it is a hard mentality to get people to think about, but that is what we're hoping people will accomplish. we know if you get inspections and that you really put together a plan, that over time, we might not be able to do it today, we might not be able to do it in one year, but if we can make changes over five years or 10 years, that really helps to improve accessibility issues. that is something that is really helpful going forward pierre the other issue that was mentioned is the fact that if you are a business that has received [inaudible] from a certified individual, you received a 90-day stint.

the things that would not be counted for peer you can help to remedy the problem and get help, so that your liability at the end of the day is a very small one, hopefully. we know we will be heard from from our experts on a legal side. a lot of them can really add up here this gentleman again had heard about a situation where someone had already racked up $40,000 with of legal fees. became an issue. we are not talking about what it costs to fix up which in itself would be excess of, but also the legal component. your word of mouth and the people you know will really help. and, of course, to our media folks, people will read your articles and understand that they can really do a lot to protect their businesses early on. >> i just want to add one comment about getting our

association involved. we put together a really great training. we have a panel available to you. it is only going to cost you $35 for a 30-minute conversation, and that might be the best $35 you have already spent to avoid something that will be happening in the future. that is just part of the collaborative process with supervisor chu's office, and i am very grateful to her. there is a panel of lawyers that have all attended training and know-how to represent businesses and give you some expert advice. >> when we were first looking at the issue and working with different systems, we realize that there was an issue with how you get loans to be able to make those improvements, how you get expertise to help walk you

through what you're supposed to respond to. one of the components we saw that was missing was that legal component. how do we find lawyers -- where can i find quick information -- it is not very typical that someone already automatically knows a lawyer who can help them, so they might not know who to reach out to. they really put together a huge effort to train their lawyers that they become experts in this topic. that is something that i think is really important. as julie manchin, there is a $35 consultation that is available -- as julie mentioned. >> any other questions? there are multiple languages available. vietnamese, tagalog, chinese.

just to let you can receive assistance from some very qualified individuals. >> any other questions? if not, thank you very much for coming. [applause] >> good morning, everyone, so great to have everyone here on this beautiful morning, my name is os and i am the council

member of the city of san jose and the board chair of the bay area air quality management district and vice chair of the valley transportation agency and it is my pleasure to be here with you this morning. and as the chair person, the lead agency for this project, i would like to officially welcome you to the inauguration of the bay area bike share. this is the first public bike share program in california. and the first regional multicity bike share program of its kind in the nation. this exciting new transportation system offers an alternative to the bay area commuters that eliminates high, polluting vehicles. and in the bay area, transportation is the largest source of air pollution and a major contributor to greenhouse

gas, emissions. and this system will help the bay area improve the air quality and reduce the greenhouse gases on behave of the air district, dca and the city of san jose i am extremely proud to be introducing this morning, some of our speakers, representing san francisco, mayor ed lee. [ applause ] representing mtc board chair, amy winhern. and representing redwood city, vice mayor jed geee and also the vice chair, of san transand also honored to be joined this morning by cyclists region nine, jared bloomenfeld. [ applause ] >> additionally i would like to recognize and thank the following elected representatives for their support of this program.

supervisor john avalos. and san francisco, supervisor and commissionerer scott weiner. [ applause ] san francisco supervisor jane kim. [ applause ] sfmta board of directors tom nolan and cheyrlbrick man. >> and the mayor and director transportation policy, jilian gelet,. >> and mayor district, executive director jack broadbent. department of environment, melanie nutter. sfmta, bon ye. san francisco bike coalition, kit hodge.

[ applause ] sfcta deputy director for policy and programming ana lafort. sfcta interim director maria lumabardo. and san francisco police chief greg sure. [ applause ] >> so how do we get here? as early as 2009, tda ban working towards a bike sharing program in santa clara county intended to address the bike issues on cal tran and provide the connections to the light rail and bus services at the same time, there was a growing interest from other bay area agencies to pursue and expand bike sharing on a regional level, as a recall, with the support from the partners represented here today from the bay area, air quality

management districts, board of directors, the district submitted an application to the commission for an innovative climate protection grant to conduct a regional pilot system. and just so all of you know right now, in many of the cities, there are also law of events occurring including in my city of san jose. to date, the pilot project has been awarded more than 11 million dollars in public funds, including a 7.1 million dollar award from mtc, matched by 2.8 million in the bay area district and 1.3 in the partner agencies. and as a result of these grants, today, we are celebrating the availability of more than 600 bicycles and 64 stations. that within the next few months, it will be expanded to 700 and by early, 2014, will be expanded to a total of 1,000 bicycles and the main goal in

the regional pilot program would be to evaluate the potential to reduce the traffic and improve the local air quality, as a result of these grants, actually this program, could not have been achieved, without the strong commitment and partnership from the transportation commission, the bay area air district, the transit district, the county of san mateo, and the city and county of san francisco transportation authority and municipal transportation agency. the valley trans, transportation and cal trans. and now it is my pleasure to welcome ed lee the mayor of san francisco to the podium and before mayor lee takes the podium, i would like to introduce him, properly. and mayor lee was elected in november of 2011, following an

appointment as interim mayor earlier that year. as mayor, he has aided in securing more than 21 million in grants from the united states department of transportation for muni including the new bio diesel, electric buses to optimize the services and he has also helped to implement the move to cleaner vehicles and the vehicles and green city government and i know, him to be a great advocate regional for transit infrastructure and for clean air, mayor lee? [ applause ] >> thank you, for that, introduction, and welcome everybody to this launch. i am so glad to be joining our supervisors and scott, and jane, our very strong advocates for our bike program. and supervisor avalos as well. and as well as the rest of the supervisors and i want to thank all of the agencies working so hard to get to this and i know that i get to ride with chief

sir today and loftus as well. and you know, but i want to thank everyone because jared and i are sitting there and we are asking ourselves why did it take so long? this is about our air, our air quality and we need to do a better and we need to do it faster shs but we are glad that we are here at this time, to launch a bay area, effort, to reduce our emissions, and by signaling to our regial partner and whether they are san transor our own mta or mtc and or whether it is redwood city, or santa clara all of our partners want to act together to make sure that we do the right thing and by starting a regional bay area bike share program, it is exciting because we are already thinking not just within the boundaries of san francisco, but we get to

share this opportunity to share the bikes, and to drop them off at different locations with ease and to make sure that people get used to it and then our jobs within the city is to make the cities safe and make them efficient and to make a dedicated bike lanes so that the people can get around the city safely and efficiency and we will continue to work on that but this is exciting with the first phase of over 7 million dollars of grants, and thank again to mtc and the air district for being great partners and i am excited to do this and we are going to have more safer lanes throughout the city, the city of san francisco is already completed over 217 miles, bicycle lanes, where we are putting hundreds of bike racks up and we are getting facilities, situated where the people need them and it should not be a big surprise that south of the market area, where jane kim represents, that that

is the hottest area of bicycle use in all of san francisco. and it is concentrated in that area because that is where a lot of our technology workers and new small business workers are working and they need the state routes between the home and cal train and downtown and all of the areas and so we are working hard on that so this is a great exciting news and finally a bike sharing program that our mta is proud of. and the pass mayor, continued to call me up saying where are you getting my bike share program started? and so, of course, the governor we get to say that we got it started, now we are into expansions already. and i can't wait to get on this bike and see how the stations work. and see how the service gets done. and then to see so many people join this effort and so thank you again for all of the agency and all of your cooperation for getting this done, congratulations. >> thank you, mayor lee for your leadership and offering to

host this great event in your city. and thank you, supervisor kim for also hosting us we appreciate it. >> now, i would like to introduce amy wine worth the city of the mayor and mtc chair. and amy has served on the city council since 1998 with the terms of mayor in 2000, 2005 and this year, 2013. she was first appointed to the metropolitan transportation commission governing board in 2007 and served for the past two years as the commission's vice chair before becoming chair this year. push [ applause ] >> thank you, thank you, and mayor lee, it is such an honor to join all of you today in celebrating this great day in the launch of the bay area bike share. you know on behalf of the metropolitan transportation commission and along with the air quality management district, and all of the other partners i am thrilled to be part of this celebration and this launch today. and i took bart over from the

east bay and the cars were full of bicycles and it just illustrated the tremendous potential that this program has for the entire bay area and i also wanted to give special recognition to my colleague on mtc, scott weiner who has been a tremendous advocate for this program, and that has been launched today and he is a great bike share advocate and helped us in this last year of moving those funds to enable this to all happen. and i also want to thank all of the hard working staff for making this day happen. and a special thanks to the air district, staff and our partners at sfmta, dta, and you know the beauty about launching this program in san jose and san francisco we are going to learn a lot. we are going to learn about how bike share works in the hills and on the flats and so we will be able to take that knowledge as we expand across the bay area