>> unfortunately, you are missing the audio soundtrack. if you have any questions, i would be happy to answer. >> thank you for the presentation. it is quite an ambitious project. i have been involved in excuse projects, restoration of buildings. it is a long journey. we look forward to hearing, after the quiet phase, how the funding goes. keep us posted. public comment. >> stephen career -- currier.

>> good morning, commissioners. we started back in 1998 when muni wanted to tear it down. this is one of two historic buildings in district 11, the other one is balboa high school. i have so many points to cover. this is 12 years in the making. commissioner lee, i appreciate all of your questions, but we have worked so hard in ascertaining funding, not only locally, through the state, but also federal aid. back in 2001, i put together a package for the national historic places, and they do a program every year, the 11 most endangered spaces. we were number 12 and angel island got in.

this is a community, as commissioner bonilla knows, that is really neglected, forgotten. the highest number of children and youth in san francisco, and all of these programs taking place at the moment are directed toward children, youth, and young adults. i am also a board member of the geneva office building. this goes back a long time. we are in the initial phases of fundraising. we are looking at our local community, but district 11, as you know, is a working-class neighborhood. trying to raise funds out of the district is quite difficult because nobody knows -- few people know about the geneva office building. some people that drive by -- why don't you just tear the damn thing down? this will be a ground rule in

our very small tiara. i look forward to any help that we can get from the rec and parks commission, city and county of san francisco, calif. we know we are in a fiscal crisis and this is not one of the important pieces to fund, but in my heart of hearts, i know this is going to get done. the other portion of this is, at the same time that we were saving the geneva office building, we were also looking at the balboa park bart station. it is the most dilapidated station in the system, but the most heavily used, other than downtown. bart and muni came together, along with other agencies to look at a transit village. we were looking at the fruit vale project.

the money ran out. now we are looking at other areas, like near city college. but that is what we were looking at for the geneva office building. so i want to put that package together for you. we look forward to great things on that building. >> thank you very much. is there any other public comment on this item? >> hello, commissioners. this sounds like a great project. catherine howard. you got one page, as of 9:00 yesterday morning, there were no documents for any agenda items on the website. i know this is not the commission secretary possible, because she is the epitome of efficiency. i hope that they will find that missing link, so we can all find out ahead of time. everything should be available before the meetings so people can know about it. thank you. >> is there any other public comment on this item? being none, public comment is

closed. this was discussion only. >> let's go back to item eight. >> item 8. department of children youth and their families. >> almost good afternoon, commissioners. thank you for having us. i apologize for not being here when the item was called. >> no problem. we have a confused agenda today. >> an interesting agenda, definitely true. as my staff is loading up the power point, -- i just want to start the presentation by saying, thank you for having us. secondly, i want to acknowledge -- jenny is here. we have worked with general manager ginsburg. i keep on calling him director, but i realize he is a general

manager. really enjoyed working with him. we have a number of projects that we work on together, whether it is direct transfer of funding from our department to yours, getting people together so that we can have a think tank conversation, so that we can leverage human capital. it has been a joy to work with members in your department as well as direct staff. i just wanted to the knowledge that. we are here today to present to you our preliminary findings from our community needs assessment. many of you know we have been in front of you several times. the last time i was here, regarding any of our policy work was when i presented a year and a half ago our children services allocation plan. last year, we took that plan that was approved by many of -- all the commission that we presented in front of -- as well as the board of supervisors. we took that plan and created a

request for proposal to essentially actualize that plan. we completed that process, and now, according to the charter, we have to go back and redo the planning process. now we are back in year one of the planning process, which is the community needs assessment. within the charter, -- i am not following my power point. within the charter, we are mandated to gather information and feedback from all of the 20 neighborhoods within the city. we took a step further this time and went out and gather feedback, which later my staff will explain to you, from community members, and also did specific focus groups and conversation with parents, key stakeholders, key providers. we interviewed members of your senior staff and rec and park.

we wanted to understand, what were the needs and goals at the community level, resident level, as well as from the city? just a small point regarding the geneva car burn. i live literally up the street from the geneva car barn. i see it every day. it is really exciting to see that there are some possibilities. our department funds the youth program that the geneva car barn runs, and it is also exciting to see that we are bringing some of the arts programs into that area. it is true, it is not run out of that facility right now, but we hope in the future that it will be, and it can turn into a vibrant neighborhood. i want to hand it over to my staff now to explain the data collection process as well as key findings. >> good afternoon, my name is sandra, a policy analyst at

dcyf. where we are currently in the process is beginning the first year of a three-plan planning process. this created the community needs assessment. we are presenting our initial findings from that. those findings will then inform the next year's process, which is coming up with the allocation plan, which is the so what with the data that we have gathered. the third year will be the request for proposals. the point of today is to present to you what we have heard so far in terms of the needs. as maria suggested, our methodology is a mixed design approach, looking at data from different city agencies and demographic indicators. we also had a series of meetings to gather community perspective on what people are seeing as the needs for children

and families. the next slide shows how we gather those perspectives. neighborhood meetings, citywide youth groups, service provider groups. some of the groups that provide advice on a certain service, demographic, population. we had focus groups as well as some survey data that we used to assess what folks not the need for in san francisco. part of our report will include some demographic data. unfortunately, the timing outlined in our legislation does not line and strategically with the release of the 2010 census data, so you might be aware that there was a release a few weeks ago showing the overall population in san francisco has increased by 3.7%. but it looks like the youth population has declined by about 5000, under the ages of 17, since 2000, which is a different

direction than the midcourse estimates were pointing to. there was expected to be a growth in europe as well, but the census data does not show that. unfortunately, the only data available for the census is time-limited. we do plan to submit something later, when more of the data is available from the census. this shows that the youth population is declining, unfortunately. you can see estimates from 2002 through 2009 that show the fluctuation by age group, but we will not have any definitive data until the release of the census data. our next slide shows a trend that we have been seeing over the last decade, the population of you is more diverse than the adult population, which is, again, at a trend of no surprise. on the next slide, we are

looking at the change in the number of low-income children by race and ethnicity. again, we are anxious for that census data because we know some of the estimates are over estimating the population. this shows a decrease in the number of asian american and african american low income youth. the next slide looks at some neighborhood data. this is from the 2000 census. it shows how the six neighborhoods in san francisco with the highest number of youths, aged breakout. as mentioned in the previous presentation, the excelsior has the largest in each of the categories. the five other top categories are listed. the next slide shows the huge proportion. the darkest eras are where there is the highest proportion. you will see some differences in the presidio, which has a small

population in general, so it seemed like a higher proportion of youth. the next segment looks of families living in poverty. again, this the data taken from 2000. we are anxious to see what has happened in the past decade. our last slide is a snapshot of how public school students kindergarten through 12th grade, how they are doing on academic achievement. the darkest eras are where the scores are the lowest. again, the southeast sector, lots of similarities with poverty statistics as well. i am going to move quickly through these next few slides and highlight thing that might be of interest to you so that we can have time for your feedback and questions at the end. generally, we are organizing our needs assessment looking a different age groups. the first one looks at ages 0

through 5. what we heard from community input in this group is that finding quality, affordable, accessible child care continues to be an issue for many families in san francisco. there is also concern around mental health issues, early screening of those issues with children and youth of these populations. we also heard concerns around parents concerned about their children being ready for school. what can parents do to increase their child's readiness? how can i find qualified preschools? we know that enrollment is increasing, things to this city and district working together, but it is still an issue. only 57% of students entering kindergarten in the public schools are considered to have school readiness skills. moving on to the next age population, ages 6 through 13, kindergarten through eighth grade, a lot of what we heard an

hour sessions was focus on out of school time. after-school and summer programs continue to be a priority for this age group. some of the data we gathered city-wide show about 94% of students who would want access to an after-school program, there should be a slot available for them. it does not mean that the family would be satisfied with the allocation, but we feel there is a substantial amount of after school programs. however, community input and input that we are gathering paints a bleak picture. only 52% of students of this age group would have access to a publicly funded program. we are working on the many programs that do not receive public funding to understand the need there more. more need for summer programs, especially those that meet the needs of the day working family.

there were types of activities, strong emphasis on academic support as well as a peer relationship building, physical activity, science, math, and reading. we also heard this age group wanted more safe, open spaces for physical opportunities and other sports. skipping over to the next group, the older youths, ages 14 through 24. in this age group, our department focuses mostly on the 14 through 18 population, high school. in terms of the older, our focus is on those who are disconnected. those who are facing a challenge that may pose a threat to their successful transition into adulthood. in this population, one of the biggest concern we heard was around the employment opportunities, job readiness opportunities. we have some data that shows how many are supported through

office funds. we know 70% of families surveyed with high school students said that they are facing some sort of barrier to accessing these programs. whether it is location or cost. we also heard a loud and clear that these people now live out of school program, whether it is athletics at their school, club, other activities. 70% of high-school youth are participating in some kind of extracurricular activity currently. this population also voiced concerns around mental health services, and related to that, concerns around violence. there were quite a few parents, school and administrators, community members, who talked about the stresses on this population as they transition into adulthood, as well as the factors of living in an urban environment that really drew out the need for mental health services as well as activities

and intervention that would help to prevent violence. our last session focused on families with children, looking at families as a unit. one of the take away from the data continues to show families of almost every income level continues to struggle, due to the high cost of living here. it looks like from recent data, and the idea of family fight or flight is leveling off, but if it is continuing, it is affecting those families most with children of the youngest ages. we're hoping that the census will help us understand those trends clearly. we did hear from parents and community members that they were in more -- in search of more support for parents and skills as well as healthy lifestyles. we heard from parents that they sought out services such as support groups, parenting classes, workshops that help them manage their children's behavior, helping their children

prepare for school, and that they were seeking more access to information that was not dependent on computers, and that was in multilingual formats, to know what their resources are and what is available to them. in terms of supporting a healthy lifestyle, many different things on mental health, access to healthy food. also, families were desiring more open spaces for recreational opportunities as a family unit. lastly, we heard concerns around violence. one of -- community violence. one of the themes that came up in these sessions was parents wanting access to open spaces that were safe for families to concrete and the safe from any community violence issues. that is a brief overview. i know i sped through it quickly. we want to leave some time for

your questions so that we can drill down on anything that is of particular interest to you. commissioner lee: i found your number is very interesting, particularly with the african- american population being so small. according to your chart, african-american youth in poverty has dropped more than 60%, which is an astounding number if you consider the popular perception that people half -- that people have. in fact, the largest population, white children. it shows after 2000, number is climbing back up to the 1990's, if i am meeting to chart correctly. and latinos are your largest group of youth population in the city along with asians.

also, what is striking is when you look at your map of need in this city, and i would suspect if you overlay that with the service providers and where service providers are based, there is a disconnect there because i do not think you are finding a lot of service providers based in the hunters point area or in the areas where their clients are, but if you look at, say, south of market for even chinatown for the tenderloin area, you have a high concentration of service providers there. this has, i think, real implications for how you are awarding funds, wh kind of populations you are targeting. and, it also says that the city -- the popular perception of

where need is may not be a reality. i do not know what you are doing about that. you look at the population of youth in the sunset and park side. that population is large. you have a large population there, how they are being served by your program. are you finding service providers in the communities that need them? >> we are eagerly awaiting the senses to get a better understanding of where those indicators are, but -- and that will inform our funding that will take place two years from now in terms of our three-year cycle. in our last cycle, the request proposals that took place last year, one of the factors we used in terms of determining which providers to award was looking at indications of need. so we have a deposit called the

index of need, which we have on our website, but it looks at things like poverty, high school dropouts, crime statistics, california works usage, and it comes up with a deposit measure to show, based on all of those measures, which are the neighborhoods in need. in our proposal, we ask for writers to project how many from each neighborhood they would be serving. that was factored into grant reward decisions, the number of youths living in these guys need neighborhoods that would be served, so that was something we plan to continue to refine and use in the future. >> i think that is important, that service providers are serving the communities that have the greatest need, and perhaps even based there. you just wonder, given the high concentrations in the northeast part of the city, and you look at your maps and numbers, and the need is not where your providers are.

they tend to be further south, if you look at your blocks. the other is the language access, which, i think, is apparent in this. you have a very large asian youth population, according to your numbers, and as far as your adult population, much older population, among asians, so i would think that the language access would be very important in all your funding and programming priorities. >> definitely something we could consider in terms of cultural competency, language. then the commissioner, you mentioned -- anyways, i cannot find a slide now. the declining rate of african- american children in party. i think once again, waiting for the 2010 census data -- it will actually show us why. it could be a lot of the

african-american families have left san francisco, and that could explain the reasons why we are now seeing a smaller number of african-american families in need. >> that is dramatic, to go from 76, 72, and 90, down to just 3000 people, in 2005. i mean, that is incredible. and then, the white population. it is quite dramatic. more than tripled from 2000. again, to this idea of popular perception, you would think that would be the reverse, when in fact, your numbers indicate the the opposite is true, and i wonder how many people and policy makers in this building know that. >> we are sharing our findings with five different commissions throughout the city. we are also presenting at the

board of supervisors, so, hopefully, we will get this into the hands of many policy makers here once again, making sure that we all acknowledge that these are not 2010 census data. so it is just a slight caveat, that there might be some shifts in the numbers. >> commissioner, -- commissioner bonilla: i have several questions. one of them has to do with after-school related programming activity. at the state level, there were some propositions -- propositions out providing more funding for school activities. perhaps with the downturn in the

economy, the -- or the economic downturn, the level of funding available and the level of advocacy for this type of a program has kind of petered out. i do not know. is there still -- do you still see that there is an interest at the state level to provide support for after-school activities in the county's? or can you give me an update, basically, on what is happening at that level? because we have not really heard much about that in a while. >> it is a great question. 2007 is when proposition 49, which was arnold schwarzenegger 's proposition about after

school funding -- that is when it was triggered. funding did flow. it is now at $550 million across the state of california for that school-based after-school program. in terms of the impact in san francisco -- the funding, because it was created through a ballot initiative at the state level, is actually more protected than the core funding for k-12 schools. for the legislature or anyone in sacramento to make changes to that money or to the amount of money, it would have to go back to the voters, so it is quite expected. there have been proposals in the last few years from the legislature to put it back to the voters. are all schwarzenegger was an advocate for not letting that happen. it remains to be seen how our new governor will respond to those proposals. at this point in time, there is no concrete proposal to put it back on the ballot just yet, but i would imagine it will come up in the next couple of years.

in terms of the impact the funding had on san francisco, the funding -- the first dibs on the funding are for school districts, and san francisco unified has been doing a great job of pulling down both federal and state resources for after- school programs. when the new funding at the state program was released, we saw a bit of an increase in funding that came to our school districts, but not the same you have seen in other counties because our school district was already pulling down so much of the funding. for the school district, there is about $11 million of state after school funding, and they have about $6 million of federal funding. but there was definitely something that is at this point in time very secure. but there are threats kind of looming, just given the state's fiscal crisis. >> we did see some funding coming in, and there is still a likelihood that there will be more advocacy down the road for te