>> good morning, commissioners. catherine howard, golden gate park alliance. i'm here with the annual report. this report is also available through our web site, golden gate park preservation dot org. we have a summary on the first page, but it's always more fun to go through and look at the pictures. on -- the second first of all, we did a preliminary walk through. we went through the parts of the park. >> could we please have everybody move away from the door? we need you to take your seats. >> on page two, there is a light standard. the weight was distributed

unequally, which could damage the lawn. for some reason, the vip's seem to be the only group that does not understand you cannot park on tree roots. the chain of lakes were closed to parking. it looks great. perhaps it's time to start thinking about across-the-park tunnels, as was proposed a few years ago. >> here, here. >> i want to know that the general manager said here, here to the tunnel proposal. some pathways were locked for days even after the concert was done. the complaints that i heard about the sound thing -- some of

the gates could have been opened and they were not. it was difficult to get near the polo field at all. we did manage to go around 1 centfence. there was a lot of equipment that was too close. there's so much fencing for this event. we could arrange that so the security areas are fenced first and the rest last, that would be great. bikes were still chained to trees and this was right next to the bike parking area. maybe we could get a person in charge of that.

the cyprus at the speedway metal has become the dumping ground. that tree can only take so much. we appreciate the measures. commissioner buell: thank you. >> jean? >> good morning and thank you very much for letting me speak this morning. i am a resident of the richmond district. i live on 27th avenue and balboa. i'm talking about some of the abuses we've had as a result of this concert. i was the victim of a home invasion last week. that's the way it felt. it was an invasion. it was not an invasion from these people. it was an invasion from another planet. from friday evening until sunday night, i was insulted by rally concertgoers, litter, and worst

of all, the enlist noise of a thumping bass and other instruments. simply put, i was trapped and it was awful. one woman measured the sound level at her house at 23rd and california, which is almost a mile from the epicenter of the concert. 106 decimals in her house. this is twice the allowable sound level during and the noise in the city of san francisco. most importantly, there was not any community outreach. rec and park had a party in our neighborhood and everybody showed a callous disregard for our hospitality. i'm here to make what i hope is a productive request. i'm here to ask that the outside lands producers and rec and

park sit down with us, listen to us, and work with us in the future to mitigate these problems and other concerns caused by the outside lands and other park concert. please let's not go through this again. i also have a letter i am submitting. i will try to read it. summarizes some of my earlier comments. attached are complaints of other residents in the richmond district about the outside lands concert in golden gate park. my experience is similar to those in the attachment. most of the times, it was very unpleasant. i was forced to leave my home in order to get a little peace and quiet. the excessive noise was only part of the problem. the neighborhood was covered

with litter. there were illegal cameras in the park and there were complaints of other anti-social behavior. additionally, there's a great deal of resentment that this concert was planned with little regard to the residents of the neighborhood and joining golden gate park. i hope there will be fewer problems and other events in the future. your attention to these concerns is greatly appreciated. thank you. i would like to submit this for the record. commissioner buell: thank you. >> thank you. tom? >> hello and thank you very much for giving me the opportunity to speak to you. my name is tom and i live in richmond. i got overwhelmed with the amount i would like to say, but i thought i would just address a couple of things.

one is the issue of outside lands and the park. i feel that the issue with the park is to fwofold. the goal of the park is to provide recreation for the citizens and to encourage nature -- it's a natural setting. the falcons that might nest in a tree and then be chased off by a concert. there are many places where -- what is that? the other issue with the noise. i am a little overwhelmed, but the neighborhood was affected greatly, yet they say it was not that loud at the concert.

i believe it is an engineering issue. it should be engineered so that it is contained. that might mean elevating the speakers. that might mean creating a sail that you could secure that would bounce the sound in the direction that you want. in some areas, it was louder farther away than it was nearer the park. i have had a recent issue with sound. with the extreme sports encouragement that near my house i had the skateboard function. and i had a couple of complaints about that function. one is that the staff wasn't wearing helmets. i have numerous photographs of staff members without helmets on. i think we need to teach

children not to be little outlaws. and two, with having a p.a. system to crank rock 'n' roll from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. for five days a week. very loud. and when i spoke to larry about it, he said, well, noise complaints are a matter of opinion. i'm concerned if we can have a concert a block away from the park, how long will it be until we are having concerts next door to our house in the playgrounds throughout our city? and another thing is that if we teach our children that they have a right to be exposed to music when they do their skateboarding, which skating is illegal in the park, it's posted, but they skate anyway- maybe we should encourage the roller skaters back to the park. i guess it's legal. i'm afraid they are going to start bringing all their boom boxes to the park and feel that they have a right to be exposed to sound. thank you, sir.

commissioner buell: thank you. >> is there anyone else who would like to make a public comment under the general manager's report? please come forward. this is the general manager's report item number 3. is there anyone else who would like to make public comment under the general manager's report? being none, public comment is closed. commissioner buell: item three? commissioner lee. commissioner lee: given the comments i was thinking i would be happy to convene a meeting or meet with some of the residents on this issue perhaps denny might have some time and perhaps the organizers of another planet, we can have a meeting out in the richmond and hear some of the noise concerns and so forth and maybe take that

back and attach it to our overall evaluation of the program for next year. and perhaps some ideas for abating some of these issues can be developed in time for next year's festival. that's agreeable to you. commissioner buell: i might get the staff to weigh in on this. >> sure. we will certainly, i know other planet will sit down and analyze all the complaints. i think it's worth noting that we actually do a lot of this already. we do a lot of outreach prior to the event and we will do outreach post event in responding to some of the complaints and analyzing the complaints. during public comment -- there is a significant amount of outreach particularly in the sunset and richmond neighborhoods and how to balance what is a very joyous event and economically important event for a lot of people with some of the neighborhood concerns. we will continue to strive to do that.

commissioner buell: so just recommend, then, let commissioners know if there is any appropriate time they could participate or be of assistance and we'll try and facilitate. >> we are now on item number 4 which is general public comment. it is up to 15 minutes. at this time members of the public may address the commission on items of interest to the public that are within the subject matter jurisdiction of of the commission and do not appear on the agenda. with respect to agenda items your opportunity to address the commission will be afforded when that item is reached in the meeting. i have tony, richard, and neal. please come forward. >> good morning, commissioners. tony is a retired senior animal keeper, speaking today on behalf of the dolores parlor of the native sons of the golden west

parlor number one. i saw other members are committed to preserving california history and our western heritage. an important institution in golden state park is the bison which has a history dating back to the turn of the last century when president teddy roosevelt launched an initiative to save the bison from extinction. during the summer myself and other members have been concerned about during our visits to the paddock that this seems to be a considerable disappointment by other park visitors in that the bison are not particularly visible. this is due to the fact that the herd has been reduced from 20 animals to only three rather gare yacht trick -- geriatric animals and they generally repose in the back of the exhibit back in the trees. i brought these concerns to the

joint zoo committee last month and was happy to receive assurance from the zoo managers that planning is being done to add animals to the exhibit and to improve the handling of the animals in that exhibit. i took that -- those comments back to my meeting last week and we resolved that we commend the zoo's efforts that we really believe that the bison herd deserves better attention and support from the wreck and park department which has ownership of the exhibit. we recommend the addition of sufficient animals, provide quality visitor experience, not to satisfy the byson's social needs as animals with herd instincts. also if possible we urge new animals should be purebred bison and not hybrids that have been inner bread with cattle for meat production.

the native sons advocate that the restoration of golden state park bison herd and the continued fulfillment of president roosevelt's dream. thank you. commissioner buell: thank you. >> richard? >> good morning, commissioners. i just wanted to give you an update with the water project, recycling water. i just talked with suzanne on the recycle water project and still m.b.a. major environmental analysis. i just wanted to bring up something additional to that. when i was looking at some of the layout they have, they have available, they have a reverse osmosis, they have a membrane, they give you a little diagram, it goes through the membrane and so forth how they treat the water. one of the parts that i see in

the diagram has chlorinated after the water has been recycled and put through reverse osmosis. that's the part i wanted to look at is where you have such a membrane, we can always treat that as a semipermanential membrane, that is in chemistry, so when you have a closer loop in there it as anode, diode you can get out the chlorine, get it out before we put it into our parks. that way it would decrease all the sailenation of topsoil. we are going to use this kind of water, golf course, i understand from commissioner buell, that golfers are not interested in saving the native water. the biggest culprit is chlorination . this particular process i'm

going to be forwarding to the engineering division where you treat the water, treated water, out of storage before it's actually used regarding the put to the process. the key to it is that being that it's of the -- as i previously talked about, the chemistry, we can gauge the amount of electric current put through the close circuit loop based on the amount of water that might be in storage tanks. i just want to keep you update that we are going to -- they haven't finished it yet, but one other point, i was more interested in trying to get across where they had a selection of site. i myself i think i like it a little higher up than at the betch level. that would be the armory, the national guard armory. that's it. thank you. commissioner buell: thank you. >> neal? >> good morning, commissioners.

my name is neal, community planner with the san francisco coalition. i just wanted to give you a brief summary of the j.f.k. drive project. i definitely commend staff of the recreeks and parks department as well as the n.t.a. for coming together to come up with a really exciting project that i think is going to be transformative for the park and how people get around the park. so far there have been two community workshops for planning for the j.f.k. workshops. j.f.k. drive separated, one in june and one just earlier this week. we have seen overwhelming support for the concept as it's come through the multiple option stages to one particular option that's going forward with design details. through surveys, emails, neighborhood group meetings that we have been a part of, people overwhelmingly support it but fully separated. i wanted to make sure that you understood, we are excited about

this one particular project, but we have a coalition, we have a vision called connecting the city where there are 100 miles of separated cross-town bike way that is get you everywhere you need to go on the bicycle. and j.f.k. drive is one part of that route. the city is also looking at projects on oak streets, the three blocks between the pan handle and scott street this year. market street is a continuele evolution project. once all these projects gets elevated, i think it's going to help the thousands of residents, thousands ever visitors to want to come to our parks. i know that's something that's been resonating really well. i have talked to people at the academy of sciences, staff members, as well as some of the upper management, and they see a huge number of their staff members biking and wanting to bike more, but also see a vision like this where people can get a cross -- across-town safely, where you don't need special skills to do so.

it will be a really big boon to their institutions and getting more people out to the park. we are really excited to be in the final stages right now. i believe that you will be hearing -- getting a lot more information later on this in october. i just wanted to let you know it's going really well so far and we are excited to be working with a lot of people here on this project. thank you. commissioner buell: thank you. >> is there anyone else who would like to make general public comment? come forward. >> commissioners. my name is andrew solo, i have been very interested in youth soccer for almost 20 years now. i actually thought i should say a few words about the upcoming renovation of the dolores park soccer field. i put them in writing because i think it would take quite a bit more than two minutes to go over all the them.

the primary issue with the renovation of the dolores park soccer field is now -- how it will be maintained after the renovation is complete. normally the department and the commission don't consider ongoing maintenance in capital improvements in a coincident way because it's very difficult to predict how much money you are going to have for regular operations on a year-to-year basis. but in this particular case, not actually making some kind of a plan in conjunction with the approval of the capital improvement, some kind of a plan for ongoing maintenance, will ultimately result in the creation of a $1 million mud hole. so i wanted to stop by and drop this off. there's actually three different requests for calendarring of items for hearings before committees of the recreation and park commission, and then this single item which is my concern

here. i don't want another $1 million mud hole. i pay 27 grand in taxes last year and i don't like it being wasted. i think we really need to consider how we are going to maintain a natural grass athletic field in the middle of a park that is very heavily used where there is no fence. that is a disaster waiting to happen in order to prevent it from happening, you got to plan for the maintenance in advance. so i have actually submitted some sort of an informal or skellly tal proposal for did shall -- skeletal proposal for maintenance to staff and they have told me there is no money to do it but they would bump it upstairs to anna alvarez, and i spoke to her about that and she said she does not normally make plans for ongoing maintenance and renovation of capital improvements until after the capital improvements are actually approved.

and under way. i think in this particular case, because we know it's going to be a problem because the area is so heavily used and there will be no fence, to control usage with, we should more carefully consider how we are going to do the maintenance before we actually approve the capital improvement. my comments are in writing. hopefully everybody got copies. and that's it. thanks very much. commissioner buell: thank you. >> is there anyone else who would like to make general public comment? being none, general public comment is closed. we are on item number five, which is the consent calendar. is there anyone who would like to make public comment on the consent calendar? being none, public comment is closed. commissioners? commissioner buell: motion? >> second. commissioner buell: opposed? hearing none, it is unanimous. >> we are in item number six

which is a san francisco zoo. >> director of the san francisco zoo. i'm pleased to report that the zoo is having a good summer. this has been in large part to a terrific response to the zoo's temporary tarantula exhibit, sea lion exhibit, and arrival of the siberian tiger. specifically in july we had over 109,000 visitors when we had budgeted only 103,000 visitors. and as of august 14 the zoo had 51,000 visitors versus a budget of 50,000. since the start of fiscal year on july 1, our year to date attemptance is over 161,000 visitors versus budget of 153,000. because of its success i'm pleased to report the zoo is extending its exhibit until halloween this. way the creepy crawlers will take part in our annual boo at the zoo festivities. this summer the zoo's youth

programs also did well. and internships like the nature trail and young zooologists were completely full. and in fact this week the san francisco bay guardian listed the zoo's internships as one of the best. we were able to get anything positive in the area, so just have to raise this. and said that's what a young zooologist, nothing gets better than being an intern at the san francisco zoo. i'm also pleased to report that the zoo is reinvigorating its 40-year tradition of providing story boxes throughout the zoo. these talking boxes have long fascinated our young visitors and this ball we'll be adding 10 solar powered boxes. in addition we are introducing our new lion key, here's the first one hot off the press. and in light of commissioner arata's birthday, i leave this for you. happy birthday. that means you have to come to the zoo and use it. lastly, save the dates have been mailed for the zoo's annual kids

feft at the zoo -- fest at the zoo. here's the postcard. this highly anticipated family friendly event is organized by the zoo's auxiliary and feature exclusive wildlife presentations, animal feedings, and live music by the country frog band and river rats. guests also will be able to enjoy rides on the friend care sell and everyone's favorite, the little puffer train. with that i finish my report. commissioner buell: thank you very much. >> is there any public comment on this item? being none, public comment is closed. this was discussion only. so we are on item number 7, the glen canyon park improvement plan.

>> good morning, commissioners. my name is karen mauney d.c. brodek with the planning capital division. i'm here to bring back to you an item that the capital committee heard on august 3 about the glen canyon park improvement plan. for you the item is to recommend to the board of supervisors to accept a gift valued over $483,000 from the trust of public land for the development of a park improvement plan and the related outreach process. approve the agreement with the trust public land for use of the gift. and direct the general manager to commence, tell me, to commence further design development and outreach to implement portions of the project to be funded with the neighborhood parks fund, clean and safe neighborhood parks bond. let's get started. i wanted to review again the goals that we set out to work with the community, to come up with a long-term plan for this

very complex and beautiful asset in our system, which is glen canyon park. it was important to work with the community to sign a long-range vision and also figure out what we could build with the funding we have at this time. which is $5.8 million. and determine what the best way is to proceed. the park is really special. it has both a natural beauty of glen canyon and the creek located in the heart of the city, array of amenities including hiking trails, children's play area, tennis courts, athletic fields, and a wreck center, which attracts a variety of users. we are trying to balance both preserving and maximizing those things with the constraints of having limited funding at this time. we wanted to make sure whatever we spend money on now we don't rip out. we want to do something better in the future. and also trying to balance both the natural area's needs and recreational amenities needs.

i have a slide here, can i show you, the canyon itself is special in a sense because it is in fact a canyon and it has limited flat area. flataire is areas usually used for ball fields and athletic fields and other facilities that serve active recreation, and most of the canyon is quite steep and offers natural environmental resource that is we want to make sure we don't harm. i want to talk about the outreach. again we had a series of community meetings. six public community meetings. in addition we had three trail planning workshops. a trail walk, several focus groups, an online park youth survey where we got hundreds of responses, in addition we had over 100 email comments and written comments that provided feedback as we went through the process. and we had internal reviews with