part of this grant will be to develop training and work force opportunities for people who are interested in digital media and digital media training. the 1766 will be to have time

positions which will be an opportunity to give folks interested in digital media and opportunity to provide work experience and learn under the tutelage of our sfgtv folks how to develop digital video. 1769 would be a half times supervisor that would supervise at staff. supervisor mirkarimi: back to the dt positions, can you be more descriptive of what they do? i understand the age our classification, but i did not hear what exactly they are doing. >> a large part of this grant will be to provide funding to nonprofit partners. in fact, dt will be providing money to two digital media nonprofit partners, 11 youth technology partners.

this will entail developing grant agreements with these groups, developing a work plan, statements of work, deliverable, and then collecting information from the partners on their performance, making sure they are doing what they are supposed to be doing, according to plan, and processing the invoices and request for payment on a regular basis. also, they will be working on the reporting function of reporting back to the government on our performance, and generally under the grant. >> the goal is inclusion. isn't the goal to try to strengthen the inclusion of san franciscans who are not necessarily accessible to this information? >> that is correct.

that is why the large majority of this funding is going to our community-based partners, to provide the training, access to computers, to develop interest and awareness of broadband, to help these individuals understand the importance of broadband and encourage them to participate to use broadband in their daily lives. things like -- things like how to find a job online, how to access city services online, how to communicate with family members. those types of things will be handled primarily by our community partners, but in the department of technology, we need administrative personnel to help us manage that and make sure they are doing what they are supposed to be doing under the grant. supervisor mirkarimi: that sounds great, but to me, it is

just a question of growing government more so and not really understanding what the total objective is. when we benefit from these federal grants, i am not seeing what the goals are, at least not in what is provided before us. i also want to take this gratuitous moment to remind the department of technology, that if part of the premise -- for me, and us -- is to build inclusion of san franciscans into having access to technology, being able to elevate their level of information, and transmitting and receiving, i do not understand, ofor $60,000, of doing streaming audio of the commissions and task force is not covered by sfgtv, by the

department of technology will not implement that. for three years in a row, i have been told you have not been budgeted at $60,000. when we have a grant of $7 million before us? we have been trying through an ordinance to make sure access has been made through the 69 or so commissions and task forces that dt has been legislated to ask, to install the system wherewithal, so that people have access. so i am unclear why those tasks and requirements in the queue have not been implemented. i agree, it is not apples to apples, but it would be nice if somebody came prepared to say, while we are trying to reach out and expand the radius of san franciscans getting this level

of technology, access to this technology, why not do that at the same time? i do not understand where the pickup is. -- hiccup is. >> in regards to the audio hosting issue, the department has a plan and i will provide it to your office later this week, where we will begin implementing -- starting with the 30 commissions and task forces that meet within city hall. we will begin training those staff and give their audio recordings on line by the end of march to begin the program. our hope is within six months, we would complete those within city hall. so that is now in process. i just received a revised version of the plan yesterday. so now i am setting aside the

funding this week and beginning working with the specific departments. supervisor mirkarimi: i am glad to hear that. that is a spot of good news. we were not informed of this. creating that access to the streaming audio for san franciscans, i am happy to hear that it may come into reality. but when a grant of $7 million is now within our grasp, here in the city, and great efforts have been made by president david chiu and others, yourself, into modernizing and sympathizing through the coit process, department of technology, these are the kinds of leftovers that i want to make sure do not get left out. that is why i am pushing this point here. so i am glad to hear is a

possibility. the other request is, what i was asking earlier, when we get grants of this kind, it iwould e nice to get a better measure as to what the money will be applied to. how it endeavors to help you all achieve the desired result of whatever that is. none of that information is in here. it does not speak to community interest, how many organizations we are necessarily try to reach out to, and we hope to get in return, other than the fact that we are just hiring more people. >> part of that may have been a function -- as i said, there were three grants that provided a comprehensive approach to how we would hope to handle this in san francisco. ultimately, because we were only awarded a portion of the overall program, we had to

squeeze things into that. all of the other mentors and objectives you talk about potentially were more involved than others. the thing to emphasize is that the math -- the vast majority of these funds go to the community specifically for the purposes of broadband training, education, accessibility issues. staffing is just what is essential for us to be able to run and monitor a program of this size using rf funds, which has requirements we have to meet on a regular basis, and that staffing will help us look for opportunities in other areas where we were not funded. supervisor mirkarimi: what is the life of the funds? >> three years. >supervisor mirkarimi: after that, do we reapply for them federally? do we assume the retention of these positions under the general fund? >> the positions are all limited

term grant positions. they were all hired as exempt positions, and so they would be eliminated when the grant and spirit that is stated in the ordinance. supervisor chu: thank you, supervisor mirkarimi. we have been joined by president david chiu. he has a few questions, but let me ask you to clarify. part of the line of questioning that supervisor mirkarimi put forward has a lot to do with making sure we are exploiting what this grant is about. you alluded to the fact that there were three separate pots of technology monday that we went after, and this is only one piece of the news we have received so far. out of the three different categories of grants that we have applied for to expand technology inclusion, we have only received one grant so far from rf funds. with the money that you did receive, it looks like it is

primarily aimed at trying to get to seniors as well as low income individuals that have traditionally been not as connected, correct? >> correct. youth and low income populations as well. supervisor chu: and that the department is planning to administer this grant, sounds like they are partners with nonprofit organizations in the community in order to reach out to the seniors, low-income youth, to broaden access, correct? >> correct. and scheck could you explain that more? -- supervisor chu: could you explain that more? while there is have added staff, the majority it is going to the training to provide that connection. >> i would ask ed frazier to address that since he is more familiar. >> thank you. there are four separate components of this grant.

there is the program for seniors, which will provide specific and customized training and services directly for senior citizens and older residents of san francisco, who sometimes have unique challenges with respect to going online and learning to use computers, that type of technology. the second is our youth technology program, which we are working 11 different community organizations that are already working with the department of children and youth, their families, to specialize in technology training and digital literacy for young people, and high school students. the focus of that training is to provide important skills, digital literacy skills for our young people. by using those skills and learning how to use computers, that type of thing, encourage

them to get out and try broadband, and hopefully, eventually adopt broadband. there is a digital media program which i alluded to earlier which intends to encourage broadband adoption through digital media, video, digital audio technologies, which are also very popular with you if -- youth. we believe that will help us develop a mechanism for more interesting broadband. we are also utilizing sfgtv, public access channel partners to help us roll out those trainings. the funding loss of support. finally, through the city college, we are developing a home-based skills training which will help people understand how to develop businesses if they can operate out of their homes, which will also incorporate the

use of broadband. supervisor chu: i just want to read into the record. part of the extensive package of information we received includes all the contractors we would be engaging to broaden our objectives. they include -- let me know if i am missing any. community living campaign. san francisco adult day services network. national council on aging. self-help for the elderly. northern california presbyterian homes and services. bay area video coalition. city college of san francisco. bay cats. street side stories. urban services ymca. bayview ymca. buchanan ymca. real options for city kids in visitation valley beaten center. mission center. richmond district neighborhood

center. community technology. so we have a number of organizations as detailed in the packet of information that shows how we are going to spend that money. is anybody missing? >> i believe you have got everyone. supervisor chu: thank you. supervisor chiu? >> thank you. during the federal stimulus allocation process, i heard from many folks in the community about the opportunity to receive federal stimulus money in this area. there were frustrations about the city's ability to apply for these funds. when i heard that we had been awarded this, i was excited and happy to be a legislative sponsor of that. that being said, i want to echo the concerns raised by supervisor mirkarimi and supervisor chu. it appears to all of us that

there is little irregularities in this application as to what the funds will be about. it does not sound as if you have the answers today on exactly how many folks will be served, would you expect broadband internet access numbers in different communities to increase by, more granular the about what these programs will intel. within a short period of time, if you could provide that to the board, a written analysis of what you expect to see. then i would like to get a regular report back, maybe every six, 12 months, to understand how this $8 million will be used. as supervisor mirkarimi said, this is a good chunk of money, wonderfully needed, but we want to make sure that it actually has the impact that we want to see. >> i believe we have, with a number of the programs, an idea on the number surged. i do not know if we have that on

a comprehensive basis. part of what we hope to develop in the early part of the program are some additional metrics of broadband adoption, but we think is realistic when we develop the agreements. it appears there may be people behind me with more information. finally, reporting back, we would welcome coming back as often as you decide. we view this as an ongoing program that we hope will grow in the ways that we can increase broadband access to these populations. that would be an opportunity for us to have an ongoing discussion in order to do that. >> other city staff that has answers? >> supervisors, brian robertson, the part of technology. there were some metrics as part of the grant that we will be reporting quarterly.

we can share those quarterly reports. they are the total number of home subscribers. this is about sustainable broadband adoption. the commerce department's goal is to get people to adopt broadband in their homes. so we have a target through this program of 5373 additional homes -- >> how many? >> 5373. 63 new institutional subscribers. 25,000 -- over 25,000 users in computer centers. a portion of that comes from the department of aging and adult services program, and also from the youth media and digital media programs. so we can detail all of that for you and provide you the quarterly reports, again, that

we will be providing to the ntia. >> if you could provide us written documentation of how you expect to get this money in the next coming weeks. i would like to get a report every six months in each of the different categories -- are these $8 million being put to best use across services for seniors, and digital accessibility, just understanding the impact of the dollars that go into this. this ought to be a technologically-impact full grant. we all know that it will have an impact beyond the fte's that it applies to the department. >> thank you. supervisor mirkarimi: could i add to that please? a similar question, and this does intersect a little bit.

around 1998, 2002, the city had been showered upon, like many urban centers. federal grants and state grants for the setup of technology centers. to help those in disadvantaged communities, and parched communities. and a different age ranges, seniors and below, so that people can come before -- can become more familiar with the operation of a computer and building computer literacy. all these centers had tried to reach out to communities within their orbit, to make that happen. the other plants that are here from the centers is quitting is obsolete. the instructions seem to be obsolete.