they have spoken more articulately than i can to the issue, but what i would like to speak to you today about is the fact that i think we have been disrespect for a long time. supervisor chu has been active on this issue for a number of years. we have these meetings and hear the promises, and the problems continue to get worse. i'm appreciative of the problems the mta has come a particular with money. it is no secret that the former governor and former mayor alluded the agency of hundreds of millions of dollars. let's try to fix the so we do not have the consuming problem of dwindling resources being poorly distributed around our city. we should not be punishing the west side, saying that it is just a small percentage. it is a big deal because if you expect us to use it, we will use it. if you do not provide the service, we cannot. thank you very much for your hard work. supervisor chu: thank you.

next speaker please. >> good morning. i live on 34th ave. i was just hearing the beginning of your meeting. to get a liquor license, you have to serve the convenience of the people of san francisco, and i would hope that same level of convenience is expected from muni. the last time i got shorts which was the train turned at church, so we all got off, like we were requested may be about five minutes before that, and we waited for the next train, and when it came, it was so packed that i had to stand on the stairs that go up and down, so when we got further out, i had

to change in -- to inch in. i understand that we have the most ridership of the trains, and i think listening to -- i really could not understand muni's presentation, and it looked like you were having a hard time following it as well. it sounded like it is because it is flexible when you get out with the avenues, and that is why the train turned around. it should not be based on flexibility of where the trains are. somebody has got to be running this, and we want to ride it, but we feel like we enter into a contract. when the front of the chain says ocean beach, we expect it is going to go to ocean beach. we should be able to expect to get on a train that has a

destination and goes to that destination. thank you very much. supervisor chu: thank you. next speaker place. >> good afternoon. congratulations on your reelection. i live in the inner sunset. i'm not quite as impacted by the turnaround's, the short term ends. i understand that they are a necessary evil sometimes, but nonetheless, they are still evil, and i think there are ways to make them less evil. one radical change would be basically to try to pull up the rails where they can make the short turns, and if they are short turning, just to get to the part of public works. i know that is pretty radical,

the i heard from the other speakers that there is maybe only two-minute difference between sunset boulevard and ocean beach. again, that is pretty radical. one of the other things we could do is to mitigate the city short trends are have a bus bridge. i do not know if it can get a bus behind the trades that are affected, adjusted at least -- if it does require a two-c travel, at least you are getting to your destination. there is some inconvenience, but if you just want to get home, as long as you can get there, you are pretty much happy. at least knowing that there is a bus behind you or that they will have some buses set up, inform passengers that there will be the boss, would go a long way to help mitigate some of the evil in this -- evilness that is

occurring. those are just my opinions. thank you. supervisor chu: thank you. next speaker please. >> afternoon, supervisors. the problem is when people are on the streets, they are standing on the sidewalks. some sidewalks are very narrow. suppose they get into an accident? a kid runs into them on a surfboard or something else like an automobile. i think the city is responsible. if any body of the passengers get hurt because he or she was put out on the sidewalk. this is unacceptable.

i remember the vehicles we have now, and we talk about the street cries. senator feinstein was there, and she learned to drive this thing, and this is about at least 20 years old, and the vehicle which is 20 years old demands a lot of maintenance, and the maintenance is pretty for on vehicles, including buses. the car stopped a long time because the whole system was not designed right, and market street is continuously trouble. when the in a car goes through,

electric wire gets stolen. why? copper is very expensive. they make big business out of it. first of all, the area where it goes through the haight-ashbury is the most delayed place there is. supervisor chu: thank you very much. next speaker please. >> charles moody, 34th ave. i'm concerned about the turnarounds. i'm just amazed about the credibility problem that muni has with its riders. most of us understand that the

trains will have to be turned around occasionally, and when you are put off a train, another one is there or coming soon. it is maybe a minor annoyance or inconvenience, but when you are put off a train in the middle of the night and there is no train, it is a real problem. as the previous gentleman said, for those of you would not -- who do not get out often, 19th avenue is not where you want to be hanging around waiting for a train that may or may not come. i think that some of the problems could be somewhat mitigated by having some better policies in place. the idea of science or indicators down in the subway is fine, but just have it on the train. if the train is going to not go all the way, have it on the front of the train. they simply do not say that. oftentimes, even when it is

going to go all the way to ocean beach, the signs on the trains say the craziest things. there are some other web sites that have photographs of some of the crazy signs. so nobody reads them, and guess what? no one reads them. they have no liability. i would like to suggest that muni in force some protocols for announcements. the announcements -- enforce some protocols for announcements. the announcements should begin with "this is an important announcement." and we find out at 19th avenue when we are put off the train that that probably was the announcement. also, please fix the speaker systems so they worked -- so they work and have reasonable

fidelity. you can do that. it does not require a lot of money. just have some protocols and enforce them. thank you. supervisor chu: thank you. are there any other members of the public who wish to speak on this item? please come on up. >> good afternoon, supervisors. i am 59 years old. i can remember that these problems used to happen when i was less than 10 years old. i grow up in chinatown and later moved to third and late in the richmond and later to kirkland street and the sunset. even though i was less than 10 years old, the problem still persisted, even in my day. i was forced to learn to read the destination signs and pester the drivers continually to make sure i knew i -- where i was going. they used to happen so often --

be used to happen so often -- it used to happen so often. those little turnouts used to make me laugh because i used to have fun talking to all the older passengers and telling them that this was nothing new and that they should make sure they asked the driver continually where the bus goes. even when i was in high school, when i used to come home from games playing basketball at sacred heart, the team bus used to drop us off 1:00 or 2:00 in the morning by the time we got back to school, and five or six of us were forced to take the bus home on our own, and we always reminded each other to make sure you know where your bus is going. do not end up stranded, especially in certain parts of town.

that was back when we were teenagers when it was still safe to be out at 3:00 in the morning. can you imagine how people would feel when they get some house stranded on these buses without the proper notification? when i ride tehe muni, i notice they have these pre-recorded messages. they should have a pre-recorded message that says, "this bus is only going to sell and sell -- to so-and-so." supervisor chu: thank you. are there any other members of the public who wish to comment on this item? public comment is closed. supervisor avalos: i want to thank you for holding this hearing, and i want to thank the members of the public for coming here today. my district as well has a

similar problem. the 14 bus gets turned around quite frequently, and it is very frustrating. my agitation is based on that, and it is your experience as well. there is a lot of work to do. i do not want to be a constant thorn in the side of the mta, but i think it is important that we raise this as an issue that needs to be tended to on an ongoing basis, and i look forward to working with supervisor chu on it. supervisor chu: thank you. i also want to thank the members of the public who came to speak on this today and also the many folks who contacted our offices. this is a problem. the mta like a way to get the system back on track, and i understand the way to do that, but julie having the experience is heard today about people who get left certain places across

the city without clearly the next train really ready to pick them up and move them forward is a problem in terms of reliability and in terms of the public's trust about our transportation system. the other thing that i do want to underscore is in the outer reaches of our city, there are simply not a lot of options. you cannot suddenly get off a train that was short turn or stock in trends of service -- or stopped in terms of service and ketch another one very easily. in terms of the impact on the riders, you may feel like the number of passengers is low, but at the same time, folks in the district simply do not have the richness of options the other folks may have in other places. i think that this topic is a good one to continue.

what i would like to do is continue the item to the call of the chair. this is something that i think we have a lot of work that still needs to happen. specifically for me, some other action items, and things i would like to continue to seep from the mta -- i would like to see a breakdown of the causes for the delays in the system, very specific to what our -- are muni responsibilities and how many were related to things beyond their control. i would like to understand how much is presentable a rigid preventable -- how much is preventable. i would like to actually see what the policy is for the turnaround. we talked about muni mta's policy, but i have not seen what that policy looks like. we have heard that the policy is

if there is a train that is five minutes behind -- are there other things that are part of that policy that we need to better understand? perhaps as some of the public comments have made, the needs to be better public policy so we might consider not having these occur in the nighttime. perhaps we might want to consider making sure there is not consecutive turnarounds that occur, and certainly, we want to make sure there is a way to say when we say five minutes behind, there really is a train that will be moving people long five minutes later. we often have a lot of hearings, and sometimes, they result in some kind of change, and sometimes, they do not necessarily result in anything you can measure. i would like to see something we can measure. i would like to see the mta work with us to figure out those metrics. do we want to see a certain number of turnarounds not really occur and that five or 10 months

from now, we can see a different measurable number? is there something we can put together that helps us understand whether we are making any progress in trying to reduce this problem for many of our neighborhoods? that is something i would like to see. two final points -- in terms of the options, what we have heard today is not a whole lot of options that are really viable. we heard the idea of a stand by train, but we heard also that it is expensive. we have heard of the option of a potential express line, but what is the likelihood of that being implemented, given where we are with our budget constraints? i'm looking for things that will be implemented all, things that really could work -- things that will be employmentable -- things that will be implementable,

things that really could work. supervisor avalos: just to reiterate that, mentioning an option does not make the problem go away. it is nice to say that is an option, but if you have no intention of actually implementing that option, please do not mention it. that is something that i think is important to note. supervisor chu: with regards to communication, i do appreciate the changes that the m.t.a. has made in terms of improving communications to riders. better communications is not a solution to the problem. it is something we should have been doing to begin with. letting people know where the end stock was really should have already been done -- letting people know where the end stop was. again, just with regards to the

options, communications is not a solution. it is not something that is going to really help with the problem. with that, i do want to thank you for your presentation. i know it is not easy to come before the board, especially on issues that are difficult to tackle, but i hope we can make some progress on that. i would like to continue this to the call of the chair if that is agreeable. ok, continued to the call of the chair. without objection. are there any other items before us? >> no, madam chair. supervisor chu: thank you. we are adjourned.

>> ok, let's get started. good morning, everyone. i am happy to see so many city leaders here as well as students from local schools. welcome to the asian art museum. my name is jay shee, the director of the asian art museum. on behalf of the staff and board, we welcome you in the backdrop of the upcoming exhibitions, ritual performances. it will be open to the public february 25. this is the first time in history of the united states that the indonesian culture, particularly the island of bali, will be presented to our public. this is a wonderful example of

the value and service that a museum provides to our community. we are a platform for cultural exchange, as well as cultural diplomacy. this museum has served for many years this say and we continue to be more robust in our service to the public. as you know, our museum is governed by a couple of foundations. the foundation is a private fund-raising arm for the museum. that museum took out a loan in 2000. we have had some difficulty and this is the news lately. under the leadership of our city and our commission and

foundation board, today we are pleased to present to the public a proposal to solve a bond issue that is conflicting the foundation. let me introduce to you the leaders from our city, mayor gavin newsom. [applause] city attorney dennis r. veherre. former mayor willie brown. and the president of the asian art museum foundation. as well as the vice chair for the asian arts commission. carmen chu, our city supervisor. then rosenfield, the city comptroller. and nadia, our city finance public director. welcome all. without further ado, let me give

you our mayor, gavin newsom. >> thank you all for taking the time to be here. this is an important moment. we have been working diligently behind the scenes for the last number of months to try to solve a bump in the road in terms of the future of this extraordinary museum, the finest collection of asian art artifacts anywhere in north america. we are very proud of this museum, its place in history, our city, and the contributions from americans that have built this extraordinary place. in fact, last year i gave my state of the city here because of all of the accomplishments and contributions that were made. it goes without saying, when we first made aware of some of the challenges that were taking place and taking shape here, the

city family came together very quickly to try to help work through those challenges. we are blessed to have not only outstanding current leadership but outstanding leadership that was formally here and continue to be represented in the private-sector, particularly mayor willie brown, one of the first call we made. dennis brown and his team were magnificent and immediately asserted themselves in the negotiations to advance our efforts to get us to this moment. of course, we are blessed -- as was the case when i made when he was originally appointed -- that there are few people better than rosenfield in his ability to think about a tough issue. he partnered, in particular with nadia, and was able to organize a framework working with j.p.

morgan, mbia, working with willie brown and working collaborative lee with carmen chu and others on the board of supervisors so that we can get to a place where we can say the future of this museum is now significantly secure. [applause] you are all supposed i did not y applause time, a lesson for you students here. what we're doing here is important. we are also announcing a new team of people, and that is notably why mayer brown is here. he is committed to lead a civic effort to help significantly

enhance the foundation's already good work, to raise additional money for this museum. mayer brown and dennis herrera, are leading that effort. as the future ex-mayor, perhaps i can be committed to that effort, to go out there and to seek to reach, not only within the san francisco community but throughout the bay area and state, nation, and for that matter, around the world, to raise the millions of dollars that need to be raised by the foundation to put it on more permit financial footing. so the purpose of the day was to celebrate the work that has been done and the case that there is a lot of work that needs to continue to be done and we have the right people to do it. i will close by thanking those who are about to come up and

speak, for their remarkable leadership and commitment. thank you, dennis herrera, ben rosenfield, steve cava, carmen chu, and notably, willie brown. >> thank you, mr. mayor. our next speaker will be the city attorney, deninis herrera. >> thank you, jay. i thought it was notable to thank the mayor. he will be going to the lieutenant governor's office. i think it is notable that mayor newsom said he would continue to be involved. i think that is testimony to the leadership he has shown throughout what has been a difficult time over the last couple of months.

there was a tremendous amount of work that had gone on ensuring the security of this museum, going forward. mayor gavin newsom and his chief of staff deserve a tremendous amount of the credit for showing the leadership that we are focused on getting a common solution that insures the viability of this institution. i want to thank them for their leadership, then rosenfield, who does a tremendous amount of the heavy lifting, i staff who did a lot of the negotiating with financial institutions to make sure everyone had some skin in the game. the fact is, mayor newsom alluded to, there are a lot of people that have to do work to make sure that long-term we have the security that we have focused on here. it is going to take leadership from the city family. i applaud what