. it is a wonderful thing to bring the community into this now. people have seen art being put into the community. this has not been touched by any graffiti. it just faded over time. it is so open here. there is nobody watching this. i think that is a plus to the community. i hope the graffiti people do not go out there now that i am opening of my mouth. >> i want to thank you for the 50 years you have already given to the city as an arts leader. >> i started in to briberon, i's only been 45. >> you have championed his work over these years.

>> it has been exciting working with him. it is one of the highlights of my life. >> thank you for being part of "culture wire" today. >> to learn more about the program and the list of public arts in need of maintenance, visit the website. thank you for >> good afternoon. thank you so much for being here. it is really an honor to work with the department of environment on the san francisco home improvement program. we hope it becomes they hit this

program in the city. we really are here to talk about the financial, as well as the environmental benefits of going green. in san francisco, as well as across the country, what we forget is often our home and the real estate that we own is normally the most valuable piece of wealth that we have in our family. but we also for get that real- estate and buildings also have some of the largest carbon footprint in san francisco, as well as across the country single-family homes are almost 22% of the carbon footprint. in my understanding, we have actually been miscounting the carbon footprint, and we actually undervalued the carbon footprint of real estate in those homes. we're here today to talk about how you can go green with doing some very simple things. some improvement items did you

can get a rebate of up to $7,000 just by putting in new water heaters, and doing ventilation, and we have margaret here, who is a homeowner and a contractor, just to tell you really how easy it is. it is so important when we're looking at our home. our home is one of the most valuable things we have to continue to invest in. many of these minor investments will make huge returns on investment and a huge savings down the road. on average -- most of you know that i am a huge solar advocate and i have solar panels on my home. the return on solar is even more than the return on energy efficiency. energy efficiency often times will return your investment in three years. it is so fast and so easy. we're really here to encourage energy improvement. we want you to be part of this. we did in the assessor's office,

we have an annual noticed of the best evaluation that went out to every single property owner in the city and the county. over two hundred thousand letters, and each of them got a brochure. there is a copy of the brochure that we mailed out with this wonderful family here, talking about how you can get $7,000 in rebates just by participating in this, just by going ahead and working with solar city and being a part of this. is it is so important that we take the first step that we can take to become greener in our own lives, because we forget how big an impact just our small little, as on the environment when you add it up with all the people in san francisco. i am honored to be joined by the director of the department. she is going to walk you through the program and talk about the great things they are doing. >> before i talk about the program, i really wanted to thank phil for is leadership on

these issues. he has been a champion for solar in san francisco as well as for energy efficiency. we are excited to have partnered with the assessor's office to get this information to homeowners in san francisco. my name is melanie, the director of the san francisco department of the environment. in an effort to help our city's homeowners afford energy efficiency in their homes, my department has partnered with energy of great california to develop the san francisco home improvement and performance program. this is a program that does offer financial incentives of up to $7,000 for san francisco homeowners, which is an exce looking to do energy efficiency in their homes. as you all know, making home energy improvements will all to save money on electricity bills, as well as gas bills. doing energy efficiency of grades in a home also makes

comes more comfortable as well as more healthy. ultimately, as he said, if you do energy efficiency upgrades in your home, it does increase the value of your home. the first up in terms of participating in the sf hip program is to call one of our specially trained contractors who can come out to do an energy assessment, to basically look at what some of the measures are that you could do in your home to see these types of energy savings. this is an apparent factor in the program, because the more energy that you say, the more money that you can receive, up to $7,000. it is here with the percentage of energy that you can save, connected to the rebate that you can get. some of the projects that contribute to energy efficiency that could be part of your home energy upgrade includes adding insulation, air sealing around windows, walls and crawlspaces,

upgrading or installing high efficiency heating and cooling systems, as well as a grading a water heater or a boiler. i did want to urge homeowners to take a vintage of these savings now. we're offering up to $7,000 in rebates for energy efficiency. after august 21, it will go down by about $1,000, so there really is reasons to participate in the next five weeks. ultimately, by helping homeowners make these upgrades, we're working together with the assessor reporters office to ensure that we can meet our carbon reduction goals here in san francisco. we are working to reduce their carbon emissions in the city by 20% below 1990 levels by the end of next year. that is one of the reasons to put together this program, to aggressively how to do energy efficiency in homes throughout san francisco. ultimately, this program, sf hip is a great example of our commitment to visionary and burn the to programs that help to promote social equity, to

protect human health, and to leave their way towards a sustainable future. we're working very hard -- we have more direct -- very hard to get where we are, but to set our goals, we need to keep pushing the envelopes thef hip -- we need to continue pushing the envelope. sf hip will help us to do that. thank you. >> thank you. my name is margaret wilson. i have been a resident of san francisco for eight years. my husband and i bought a house. we did it with my daughter and her husband, and we share an old victorian with my husband, daughter, son-in-law, and their three children. since we bought the house, we have had a lot of maintenance just to repair damage and stuff. but we have been also very conscientiously trying to do

environmental upgrades. and we had been a solar city customer. we put solar on our house two years ago and were able to do so with almost no out-of-pocket expense. and we have seen, you know, basically not a reduction in our energy bill, but flat on our energy bill, and we know that is from solar. so when i received a flier from solar city that announced the energy audits, i talked to my daughter and we decided that we would go and do that right away. so we replied and a requested the energy audit. we had a team of solar city people come into our house and go through the whole house, through the heating, you know, the windows, the drafting, how

we used heating and stuff like that. and as a result of that audit, they designed a program for us that included ceiling cracks and weather stripping, reducing its draft from a fireplace by putting something in to block the draft. replacing in 1950's vintage heater that i had been told in the past was about 50% effective. they replaced it with a new height efficiency furnace, and in doing that, it also had the asbestos removed from the house. i was delighted to get rid of the asbestos, too. that heating system also allows us to better modulate the temperature in the house because it is a multi-story house. it is very hard to keep both

floors comfortable. but the system that puts in allows us to better modulate the temperature and keep the house comfortable. also, as part of the energy audit, they identified a very hazardous situation we had with an old stove that is leading carbon monoxide. we planned on replacing dead in the future, but we have now budgeted to do an immediate replacement of that stove, so they identified a very hazardous situation, and we now have the opportunity to correct that. so i have been very thrilled with the work that solar city did. they also completed the work in a timely manner. the people were very pleasant but there was absolutely no mess left. i am delighted in the looking forward to our energy savings. so thank you. >> i will just say a few words about how solar city.

it is one of the leading full- service solar energy efficiency and now electrical vehicle charging providers in the united states, and we're delighted to be working with s the environment and energy agreed california, providing homeowners with incentives to make it easier for them to make energy efficiency and upgrades to their home. we have about 2000 energy efficiency customers in the u.s. and 15,000 solar projects completed are underway -- or under way. i think margaret wilson as a prime example of a homeowner who has seen comfort and health benefits, in addition to environmental and monetary savings. d want to tell us about some of the rebates from the program? >> absolutely. in addition to the san francisco home improvement program, there's a program called the energy agreed california program, and it is designed to help all want -- homeowners make energy efficiency improvements to the home and offset the cost. up to four thousand dollars for

pg&e utility customers available for doing things that you might want to do already, adding insulation or reducing traps in your home, replacing the water europe -- water healeheater. not only do you save energy and money and reduce your current footprint, but you'll be much more comfortable in your home. >> grade, thank you. again, in san francisco, we're actually a prime target for this program, because the folks who should consider this program the most are folks who are owning older homes. margaret's home was built in the 1880's. we have a lot of homes built in the 1920's and in 1930's. those homes are prime targets for this program in terms of having a leaky windows and older furnaces and water heaters, all the upgrades we would normally do. in addition to this program, we're also going to be working on a green grade.

we are encouraging residents to homeowners to do a certification process through our office, where they can actually get a certification to show that their house has gone green. obviously, when people sell those homes or or refinancing those homes, we anticipate that green homes will obviously be more valuable, just like energy- efficient homes of the more valuable immediately once those improvements are made. let me stop there and see if you have any questions for any of us. >> when do you begin recording this information? >> i think we're looking at the next few months to do that. >> so they will have to come to the city and that you guys know about the improvements -- collect just like through commercial properties and their certification. we're looking to do something similar for san francisco. >> are other municipalities

already doing this or is this considered the best practice? >> i am not aware of that. >> and not just going to be a best practice. no other questions? ok, thank you very much. i'm the president of friends of

mclaren park. it is one of the oldest neighborhood community park groups in san francisco. i give a lot of tours through the park. during those tours, a lot of the folks in the group will think of the park as very scary. it has a lot of hills, there's a lot of dense groves. once you get towards the center of the park you really lose your orientation. you are very much in a remote area. there are a lot of trees that shield your view from the urban setting. you would simply see different groves that gives you a sense of freedom, of being outdoors, not being burdened by the worries of city life. john mclaren had said that golden gate park was too far away. he proposed that we have a park in the south end of the city. the campaign slogan was, people need this open space. one of the things that had to open is there were a lot of people who did a homestead

here, about 25 different families. their property had to be bought up. so it took from 1928 to 1957 to buy up all the parcels of land that ended up in this 317 acres. the park, as a general rule, is heavily used in the mornings and the evenings. one of the favorite places is up by the upper reservoir because dogs get to go swim. it's extremely popular. many fights in the city, as you know, about dogs in parks. we have 317 acres and god knows there's plenty of room for both of us. man and his best friend. early in the morning people before they go to work will walk their dogs or go on a jog themselves with their dogs. joggers love the park, there's 7 miles of hiking trails and there's off trail paths that

hikers can take. all the recreational areas are heavily used on weekends. we have the group picnic area which should accommodate 200 people, tennis courts are full. it also has 3 playground areas. the ampitheater was built in 1972. it was the home of the first blues festival. given the fact that jerry garcia used to play in this park, he was from this neighborhood, everybody knows his reputation. we thought what a great thing it would be to have an ampitheater named after jerry garcia. that is a name that has panache. it brings people from all over the bay area to the ampitheater. the calls that come in, we'd like to do a concert at the jerry garcia ampitheater and we do everything we can to accommodate them and help them because it gets people into the

park. people like a lot of color and that's what they call a park. other people don't. you have to try to reconcile all those different points of view. what should a park look like and what should it have? should it be manicured, should it be nice little cobblestones around all of the paths and like that. the biggest objective of course is getting people into the park to appreciate open space. whatever that's going to take to make them happy, to get them there, that's the main goal. if it takes a planter with flowers and stuff like that, fine. you know, so what? people need to get away from that urban rush and noise and this is a perfect place to do it. feedback is always amazement. they don't believe that it's in san francisco. we have visitors who will say, i never knew this was here and i'm a native san franciscoan. they wonder how long it's been

here. when i tell them next year we'll get to celebrate the 80th anniversary of the park, >> being a pedestrian in san francisco is not easy for anybody. >> [inaudible] people push tables and chairs outside the sidewalk. >> i have to be careful not to walk the sidewalk. it is very hard.

>> sometimes people get half way across the intersection. >> you have to be alert because there is always something coming up that you need to know about. >> i learned to listen to the traffic patterns. sometimes i notice the other pedestrians, they are crossing, on occasion, i have decided i'm going to cross, too. i get to the middle of the intersection, and i find out that the light has changed. >> we need to be able to work and go from one place to the other and have public transportation. the world needs to be open. >> people on disability has the task of addressing all the disability.

when we are talk about the sidewalks, ramps, we have very specific issues. for people blind and low vision, we have the issue of knowing where they are and when the cross. it can be hit or miss. >> at hulk and grove, that sound the the automatic -- it helps people cross the street safely. >> now we have a successful pedestrian signal. >> i push the button, i get an audible message letting me know that i need to wait. when it is safe to cross, not only am i going to get an

audible indicator, this button is going to vibrate. so it tells me it is safe. there is the driller sound and this trigger is vibrating. i am not relying on anything but the actual light change, the light cycle built into it. >> it brings san francisco from one of the major cities in the u.s. to what is going to be the lead city in the country. >> city working on all sorts of

things. we are trying to be new and innovative and go beyond the ada says and make life more successful for people. >> disability rights movement, the city has the overall legal obligation to manage and maintain the accessibility and right of way. with regards to the curb ramps, bounded by a groove border, 12-inch wide border. for people with low vision to get the same information. the shape of the domes, flush transition between the bolt

bottom of the ramp and gutter. >> we have a beveled transition on the change in level, tape on the surfaces, temporary asphalt to fill in level changes, flush transition to temporary wood platform and ramp down into the street under the scaffoldinging. detectable ramps. they are all detectable. nothing down below or protruding that people are going to get snagged up on. smooth clean that nobody is going get caught up on. >> our no. 1 issue is what we see here, the uplifting and

shreufting to concrete due too street tree roots. here is another problem we have with street trees. if i have i was a person blind, this would be an uncomfortable way to find out. >> we don't want to create hazards. >> sometimes vendors put sidewalk cafes where people push the chairs too far out. >> sometimes it can be impassable. so much foot traffic that there is no room for a wheelchair or walker to go by. >> san francisco is a lively

street life, it can be an issue with people with visual disabilities as well. they have these diverting barriers on other side of this tables and chairs area. if people can find thraeur way around it without getting tangled up, it is still fully accessible. >> we don't want anything special. we want people to basically adhere to the regulations and laws as they are on the books now. people can also, just be cognizant if they have stuff on the street, they thaoed to have 48 inches so we can pass, think outside your own spectrum of

yourself that there are other people you need to share the sidewalk with. we will all get along better. >> although san francisco is a hilly place for a whraoel chair user, we seem to be better at most. that doesn't mean we can't continue to improve upon ourselves. >> the public has a clear are -- of travel. we can't be every to make sure that is the place. we have to rely on the place. call 311. give them your name. that goes into a data base. >> it is difficult, still, um to make the case that the disabled community isn't being represented. in some ways we are not. we have a long way to go. >> the city of san francisco is

using the most innovative technology available. these devices allow people to remain out in their communities, doing things like shopping. it is great to be able to walk as a pedestrian in this city and cross streets safely.