tax the midmarket -- as we passed the midmarket legislation, if companies come to the board of supervisors threaten to leave the city, we do not pass piecemeal legislation to keep and retain companies. i took that commitment seriously as i thought seriously about this legislation, because to me, this is a definite step in applying tax exclusions for other companies in san francisco. there are other things missing from this legislation. one is a focus on neighborhoods. a focus on neighborhoods where there are high levels of vacancy. the second is the community benefits agreement for companies that contributed a high amount of payroll to san francisco. after some thought, a kind of came to the conclusion to support this legislation for the

following reason. one, in terms of the community benefit agreement, very few companies would be eligible for this tax exclusion on stock options. as was indicated by ted egan's report, a very few companies are ipo and stay under $150,000. there are very few companies that will hit that level of payroll tax option. by the way, i appreciate my colleagues'support for my neighborhood and my district. it has been refreshing to me to talk to zynga and hear their commitment to the city of san francisco into our neighborhood. and i know they are in talks right now with several community advocates and nonprofits are

around how to support local hire and individual jobs for individuals who have less than a four-year college degree. it was also nice to hear about the community work they have already been doing thus far, and the further commitment to deepening that level of support in our neighborhoods by partnering with nonprofits and potentially working on open space and other park issues. so, after careful thought, realizing that this legislation is terribly narrow and would impact a small number of companies, i am thinking we're moving in the right legislation. i will be supporting the legislation today. i do hope this does not continue a piecemeal legislative approach around tax reform, and as we're able to make companies whole, they will continue the negotiation process next year, and they will still stand with us.

thank you. supervisor chiu: supervisor of los -- avalos. supervisor avalos: colleagues, i oppose the payroll tax exemption because i thought it was overly broad and put in place many measures attempting to revitalize the central market area. i also heard as we were discussing this legislation in our offices and in here in this chamber, that the real value of the exemption was four twitter, which was going to go public and would not be able to save a lot of money and stay here in san francisco. so the real issue was about the initial public offering that twitter was going through in the next few years. when i voted against the central market payroll tax exemption, i

said i am willing to look at the issue of companies going public and seeing how the impact of our payroll tax covering stock options are around ipo time. that is what is before us today. it is legislation that is specific to that issue for a lot of companies. also, my concern about the central market payroll tax exemption was it was going to be eliminating the payroll tax for new hires, prospective new hires in the central market area and i did not like the idea of adding our payroll tax, which is the payroll tax. it is a much broader examination of what the value of our payroll tax is. we have people talking about why

do we have to have a payroll tax at all? why do we even have to have a business tax? those are some of the whispers i heard out in the community of san francisco. i got alarmed hearing that kind of talk because we do need to have a business tax. i do know in the next few years we will be looking at making our business tax structure. i get really concerned when i hear people say "the payroll tax is a job killer." maybe in some industries the payroll tax might be a disincentive on business going forward, but i would not be surprised if we came out of the discussion about remaking our tax for next year that involves a combination of a payroll tax, a commercial occupancy tax, and a gross receipts tax.

all of that can be remade in a form of our business tax structure. i look forward to robust discussion, because i think we can tease out a lot and have a new ones approach -- nuanced approach. i look forward to that discussion. this to me seems like a very narrow way that is much more palatable for me to accept in terms of how we get to keep small startup businesses here in san francisco and i will be supporting it. thank you, colleagues. supervisor chiu: supervisor mirkarimi? supervisor mirkarimi: i concur with supervisor at a los -- av alos' comments. it is probable there will be great movement between now and

2012, some attempts at significant reform. i know that is being well probed by a number of our colleagues here and by the mayor's office and by others. and that is a good thing. but right now san francisco has a problem. the problem is we have of growing industry of pre-ipo companies. what the midmarket debate was able to shed light on was it was not about one company, company,a -- but a discrete population. the questions were prompted about companies who, in our minds, the also legitimized in wanting to keep their business. ed but this is without the adverse boomerang effect. the best approach, the only approach, is to look at what is

unique in san francisco and that is we're the only ones with a payroll/stock option tax. by peeling off the stock option tax on the payroll, being able to help those specific companies right now -- and there are not many. there are maybe 10. but those may be right now will allow us to really be able to corral, i think, an industry that is burgeoning, but one we may have lost before because we did not tackle the problem. let me tell you. at least from this political side of the bench, it has been a long time that people in this government have confronted business tax reform. people have been talking about it for a long time. the prevailing theory and conventional wisdom is gross receipts over payroll or some hybrid thereof, but there has been no delivery on this. i think that is something that

comes to unnatural ahead. before that comes to that head politically, before it is reconciled by the voters of san francisco, being able to justify our case so that it is a more foolproof case is one that i think is furthered by what we passed here today. in light of that, i have a quick technical amendment. i am told this is not substantive. page three, line 16 -- the amount of the stock exemption is that amount of stock-based compensation pre-payroll expense or the company's 2010 stock- related tax-based compensation. with that amendment it will read as follows of " a person who tax

in 2010 paid more than 70 $50,000 in payroll tax attributable to stop-based compensation made their payroll tax in excess of that aid in tax in 2010. number two is a person who did not pay more than $750,000 in stock-based compensation may exclude compensation in excess of $750,000. those are technical, not substantive, right? good. >> second? supervisor chiu: can we take that amendment without objection? supervisor mirkarimi: just ending, i have mentioned several times important action of

supervisor farrell and supervisor to -- supervisor david chew -- chiu. i do not know what his name was not on this, but that was missing in this particular version. supervisor chiu: supervisor farrell? supervisor farrell: thank you, mr. president. thank you, supervisor mirkarimi. obviously, we took the question of stock options from something of a different approach. i thought both of these pieces of legislation were mutually exclusive, and i think i still believe that. but i have to say, i have been speaking over the last week with a number of companies and individuals that were not affected by supervisor mirkarimi's legislation who are -- that considering separately, to me, is a mistake. i hope that this is a point where i can ultimately support supervisor mirkarimi's and mind together, but i do not believe

we should be considering the separately. i think supervisor mirkarimi is right. we have a problem. and that is we're the only city in california that has a tax for stock options, the only city that does this, and it does not only aspect these 10 companies. it aspects -- affects a large cadre of companies. that is why i suggest my item the other week in committee was continued. i want to wait until the report comes out about that. i have no problems with that at all. i think that is the right approach. at the same time, i do not think we should take up one portion of this without considering this together. we need to have a comprehensive look at this issue. it is not limited to pre-public companies.

it is a holistic thing that applies to all companies in san francisco. if we do not deal with this comprehensively, that is an affirmative statement on our part, on city hall's part, that we do not think we need to deal with as comprehensively and i think that is a mistake. maybe at the end of the day, one of our approaches is better, and i do not have opinion on that right now, but i think we should be continuing this together and be considered together. i am happy -- as i understand president chiu wants to speak -- but i am going to make a motion to continue this for four weeks and consider these items together. supervisor chiu: colleagues, first of all, i want to think supervisor farrell and supervisor mirkarimi for their leadership in this area.

to take a step back, the issue we are confronting is we have a payroll tax that is singular in its existence here in california, and a payroll tax that makes us the only exception in the entire country. this is why we need to move forward with supervisor kim's legislation and this is why i do think we need to move forward with supervisor mirkarimi's legislation today, which we know deals with the situation confronting pre-ipo companies. that being said, i am open to working in the coming weeks and months to find out if there is a way for us to tackle the dilemma confronting other companies that otherwise might be making decisions to send employees outside san francisco. i happen to think the rights decision would be one that does not impact the general fund, that creates jobs, and is limited in time like supervisor kim's and supervisor mirkarimi's

legislation so we can see how this impacts our tax policy and how it affects things in the future. that being said, i think we need to move forward with this right now. in part because not only do we have all lot of work in the budget committee on this item in front of us, but we have a solution that we know is going to work. it may take some time to figure out a solution for a larger, more public companies. if it turns out we're able to find an elegant solution that could encompass the issues that are dealt with in the legislation we are considering today and will take care of those companies as well, i am open to revisiting that. at this moment, we have the bird in the hand and we should move forward. any further discussion, colleagues? supervisor farrell?

supervisor farrell: i have a motion to continue this item for four weeks. supervisor chiu: is there a second? seconded by the supervisor of burned -- supervisor elsbernd . colleagues -- any discussion? >> this is one of those -- when i hear the bird in the hand argument, there is no practical impact of delaying for four weeks to the negative here. all we are doing is allowing policy to be discussed in an open manner and allowing basic collegial respect to a colleague who has been working on this issue for months. you are not going to harm anything by delaying this for four weeks. we're going to be in the middle of a budget. we will deal with a variety of things in june and july anyway. i think we are more than capable of dealing with another

10 or 20 issues in june or july as we have been elected to do. i think we and the public would benefit from a comprehensive discussion. that is why i am seconding the motion. i think it is as simple continuance that we so often give to our colleagues who are working on issues, and i think we should respect that typical norm that happens here. supervisor chiu: supervisor mirkarimi. supervisor mirkarimi: the due diligence has been done on this legislation. it has been well vetted in a number of committee hearings and the small business commission. you have heard a number of arguments that they are mutually exclusive or not. they are night or day. this piece of law would focus on a dozen companies, at most. not even that many. the other law, that i think is

being asked to be linked together -- we are talking about well over 200 companies. there is a significant difference in the impact of what that number looks like and the impact would be -- it is not well felled by the general fund. at least not well understood. we know what the impact of this legislation would be right now. we should use that information to move forward with the kind of confidence that has been furnished by our controller, our key economic analyst. the mayor's office feels comfortable with that. to roll the dice on a larger piece of law right now which ex facto would have the law in it, i think it is a very large role of the dice. let's not be clumsy and let's then embraced the future legislation that will come before us at the same level of diligence that we have done with

this. i ask that he reject the continuance. supervisor chiu: any further discussion, colleagues? on the motion to continue, roll call vote. [roll call vote] there are four ayes and six nos. supervisor chiu: motion to continue fails. roll call item on item 25. >> [roll call vote]

there are 7 ayes and 3 nos. supervisor chiu: this ordinance is passed and the first reading as amended. madam clerk -- we need to rescind items 20 through 324 on advice of the mayor's office -- through at 24 on advice of the mayor's office. can you explain what we need to do that? >> if we could request that items 20, 21, 23, and 24 could be continued well we wait for a delegation from federal applied. supervisor chiu: a motion to rescind the vote, motioned -- motion to rescind the vote,

seconded by supervisor kim. without objection, we will rescind the vote. we will continue this item until what date? june 14. motion by supervisor carmen chu -- it is in the middle of budget season. i assume these will be relatively simple items to resolve, right? >> yes, sir. supervisor chiu: motion by supervisor carmen chu, seconded by supervisor mercury me -- supervisor mirkarimi. if we could now call the treasure island items 26 through 36. >> items 26 through 36 are the ordinance is that pertain to the treasure island/yerba buena project regarding ceqa guidelines and chapter 31, the

adoption of a mitigation, monitoring, and recording program. items 27, or is amending the general plan with figures and various elements by adopting and adding the treasure island area plan. item 28, hornets amending the planning code to include the treasure island used district, amending section 1 of 5 relating to height and bulk limits. item 29 -- ordinance and in the zoning map to show the zoning designations of treasure island. item 30 is an ordinance amending the subdivision code, i -- adding division four, pertaining to the subdivision process pertaining to a process for reviewing a filing vesting transfer maps. item 31 -- resolution approving the transportation implementation plan. item 32 is an ordinance

approving the treasure island community development for certain real property located within treasure island, accenting certain parts of administrative code chapter 6 and adopting findings. item 33 is concerning the disposition and development agreement and interagency cooperation agreement and various findings. item 34, resolution approving the am -- economic development conveyance memorandum for the former naval station treasure island from the united states government to the treasure island development authority. item 35, resolution approving the amended and restated base closure almost assistance agreement and adopting various findings. and item 36 -- resolution approving the public trust exchange agreement between the treasure island development authority and the california state laws. supervisor chiu: supervisor kim?

supervisor kim: my apologies. i would like to continue in 26 through 36 so we can hear it as the same time as the appeal of the ceqa. however, i would like clarification on item 33 from the city attorney. i believe we may need to defer that to the land use committee. >> supervisor ken, that is correct. we recommend item 32 b referred back to the land-use commission. supervisor kim: thank you. i would like to amend my motion and re-refer item 32 to the land use committee. supervisor chiu: colleagues, supervisor kim wants to re-refer

item 32 back to land use. is there a second? seconded by supervisor mirkarimi. any discussion? those items shall be handed -- handled as discussed. item 37? >> item 37, ordinance amending the planning code to require any business selling prescription drugs to the public to post display materials explaining how to safely and lawfully dispose of unused prescription drugs. supervisor chiu: colleagues, this is item 37. any discussion? supervisor mirkarimi. supervisor mirkarimi: thank you, mr. president. first of all, i would like to think the department of the environment and the mayor's office for their help with this particular legislation. if you will recall, we were trying to advance legislation that had never been advanced before in san francisco, and that is to create a repository for people to take back their discarded medications, other

unwanted pharmaceuticals. we gleaned from other legislatures who asked that pharmaceutical companies help shoulder the burden of the cost, so their citizens would be able to use these repositories so hazardous waste would be properly disposed of. the law was never implemented. nowhere in the united states are there laws at the state level. so, county by county, these laws are beginning to crop up at the county's expense. san mateo county actually practices the infrastructure that allows their citizens to be able to dispose of their unwanted medications and pharmaceuticals at san mateo county's expense. we want the pharmaceutical industry to shoulder the cost of the burden here.

we have dealt with the two pharmaceutical consortiums for a program that will begin in the next several months, 2011. in order to direct people to know where they can discard their pharmaceuticals, this ordinance, which got the support of the small business commission as well, has directed people in pharmacies like walgreen's, safeway, others, where they can go. that is the criteria from other legislation like the mercury warnings. i would appreciate your support. hopefully, state law will catch up with local law and we will be able to do something about what i think has become an increasing threat to our waste water system because of contaminants leaching into that, about people getting access to medications, pharmaceuticals that should not, especially our young people,

because cdc had shown where fatalities and harm has been well caused by unregulated access during your support is appreciated. supervisor chiu: any additional discussion? roll call vote, please. >> [roll call vote] there are ten ayes. supervisor chiu: item 38. >> item 38, and ending the governmental conduct code to allow a former appointed mayor to obtain full time city employment within one year after leaving office.

supervisor chiu: without objection, this ordinance is passed on first reading. item 39. >> in 39 is on motion confirming the appointment of joel ramos. supervisor chiu: supervisor wiener. supervisor weiner: i am speaking in favor of the nomination. i want to commend mayor lee for making this nomination to the mta board. in g-8 make such a difference to the lives of citizens to take muni, and mr. ramosmr. ramos hal the experience to run the transportation agency, and he knows of people rely on these systems. being able to think outside the box and