look forward to getting messages from us and i hope you can join us. thank you. next on the agenda, i believe, is rob, recent e.o.c. activations? >> certainly. i'm going to touch on the last three or so that we've had because they're in relatively recent memory and work backwards a little bit. first starting with, we did activate a small team for the rock slide earlier and we did that to basically make sure everything gets pulled together in one spot and make sure that everybody's working together. it seems like maybe it doesn't raise up to the level of e.o.c. but this is a key message we've been trying to push, it doesn't have to be a big event in order to have the benefits of the cross departmental, cross-agency coordination. in this case, this is specifically one of those events that really benefits from getting people in the room

because oftentimes what happens is if something -- if there's an event, it gets put in the dispatch system, we get pages and updates and what the fire and police part is done, they go back to their stations and go back in service and it drops off everybody's radar so one of my charges to my team has been to keep tracking these events beyond the end of the first respond because it is first respond. it doesn't mean the event is done. we've really seen that in dealing with displaced people and a lot of these fires in the past year and it also folds over into this where we're able to maintain tracking it for several days after it until we get a sense that we've got to the recovery phase and it's down to one or two departments working together to solve the problem. that's what we did here. it also gives us visibility and i think this is really important. it gives us visibility for identifying those events that might be eligible for some form of reimbursement down the line because if we get together early and capture the data early and

get the damage assessments early, we're able to make that determination and work with cal ema to determine whether or not it's going to hit their thrish hold so we don't miss these opportunities and i think it's going to be critical as we move forward and the economy can continue to do what it does and government budgets can do what they do. i think it's important and sometimes it's the small events, all it takes is working together. the one before that we did was the n.f.c. championship game which, again, people say, well, nothing really happened. that's because we didn't win. let's be honest. i'm very sorry for that. >> chief, sir, is still crying. >> he's all broke up. but the reality is, in today's environment, we see, you know, all over the country, where you have big professional sport event games, when people win and

you have what i've been calling celebratory chaos so the point was getting everybody in the e.o.c. ahead of time working together to solve problems before they're big problems and we learn from every one of these things so we went home disappointed that night but we were there in case it went the way it did. prior to that, it also means -- this is one thing i have to say, a note of progress. because prior to the game, we had a request from park and rec. and d.p.w. to pull together a team and do coordination about -- because, honestly, i didn't really think about it, i forgot because i hadn't been down there in too many years, the marina effect at candlestick when the parking lot floods so we got a team together and was able to keep track of what was happening. everybody knew what the other participants were up to. it was quite helpful. then going into the game, we all knew who was doing what and what the efforts were throughout the

game. it was quite helpful. it went really well, all things considered. there's always stuff to learn from. we'll do a hot wash on it next week, is when it's scheduled, and when the after-action report is put together, we'll can read that. and finally, i'm going to close on new year's eve, which was a resounding success this year. on just about every metric i could come up with to measure the city's ability to manage an event that is incredibly unpredictable from year to year. we know it's going to be busy but exactly what happens, you know, this year we were lucky not to have a fire on new year's eve so we didn't have that added complication but based on the lessons of previous years, we ramped up in significant ways both on the law side, the e.m.s. side and then did some out-of-the-box things, some nontraditional approaches. last st. patrick's day, we piloted the idea of doing an alternate sobering center so we

increased the capacity for those who drink too much to where they would have a place to go that's not jail and not a hospital and therefore not tying up those two critical resources. that particular facility, the extra one, saw 46 people that night. it was a good investment on the part of the city to get that done and i have to -- absolutely have to thank the bearer of most of the cost on that was the health department because the clinical staff involved. that was a huge contribution to the overall event and the success of it. we also upstaffed the ambulances. i have to throw out a thanks for bearing the majority of the cost on that was the fire department. they up-staffed significantly and our private e.m.s. partners up-staffed significantly and threw a lot of resources into the game with no guarantee of being able to run calls and seek reimbursement from medical payers so it was all kind of just a -- we think it could have been business but it could have been a big loss all the way

around and we were able to have the resources in place. for about two hours, it was dicey. we had called coming in and resources going out at about the same pace but we held and it was a good model and i think we're going to use similar planning for next year. as far as the rest of the activities that night go, everything went without a hitch. we had the usual celebratory chaos that is new year's but we didn't have any real significant events and we're working on the after-action report on that, as well. with that, questions from the members? >> going back to the n.f.c. championship game, contrary to a report in one of the papers today, there was not one moment of radio silence between public safety and/or back and forth with the 49ers on sunday. in fact, we took over 400 calls. i want to assure supervisor

cohen, where candlestick is her district. it went as well as it could go. we've gotten a lot of compliments from the nolve how it went -- nfl on how it went. our main mode of communication, police and fire, is via radio, not by cell phone. i never spoke to the reporter that wrote the article. what was taken was out of context from a budget and finance committee meeting earlier in the week when we were speaking to the bay web project and the advantage of having exclusive public safety spectrum in a disaster when asked why wouldn't we just go with a commercial carrier and we said, because in big events like loma preetta, 9/11 or n.f.c. championship game, sometimes cell phone service can be unreliable and text messages at time. that does not include radios. we were on top of it the whole game. we had a great plan, as rob said, it went off without a hitch and we appreciate that and

apologize for anybody thinking it was otherwise. >> thank you, chief. yes, mr. ginsburg? >> the department of emergency management, not just the n.f.c. championship game or preparations for flooding but we had power issues going back to the monday night game in pittsburgh so there was a ton of interagency coordination with sfpd, fire, d.p.w., rec. and park and d.e.m. often throughout that three or four-week process, served as the quarterback and coordinator facilitating conference calls and making sure we were working as well together as we could so my thanks to all of the other city agencies involved in helping us manage the variety of issues that came up at candlestick, special thanks to d.e.m. sometimes even little events, we can use this model and it works and it worked well. thank you. >> we're getting much better at it. we're figuring that out as we move along. thank you, phil. i'm going to move on, then, unless there's other comments,

here, to recent fires and we have three presenters today but we're going to start with chief hayes-white. if you could give us a little update, please. >> certainly. good afternoon, mayor lee, elected officials, colleagues and members of the public. it was the comment is that you were really busy during december and january and when we analyzed it, we were, but for the fire department, no busier than in previous years. typically, the winter months, we do have an uptick in the number of fires we respond to. i think what singled out this year is a slight increase but more than that, people that were displaced so i think to have the three presenters, the fire department as well as ben from h.s.a. and harold brook from american red cross, it's really about partnerships and everybody knows it's tough to get displaced but particularly during the holidays, that's an added burden so we had a lot of people displaced. the mission of the fire department is to protect lives and property. we go in and suppress the fire

and we always wish well for those displaced but really my hat is off to the h.s.a. and american red cross because where we leave off they take over and that sometimes can be just as challenging just in another frame of mind so thank you very much for that. i decided i'd put a few slides together, overview of fires for the year. we had a total of 242 working fires and i can get into it a little bit about what constitutes a working fire. that was an increase over the previous two years. 2009, we had 225 fires and 2010, 217 fires. so it's basically resources. the more resources you need, the greater the alarm. the fifth alarm mayor lee referenced on golden gate, we hadn't seen a fifth alarm since july 8, 2005. it's very rare. we pride ourselves on going in and making an aggressive attack, minimizing property damage and saving lives. that fire, it was a windy

afternoon. fortunately, the fire was in the afternoon and we didn't have a lot of occupancy and rescue problems that afternoon. however, we had great support while we were fighting the fire not only from mayor lee coming, then supervisor mirkarimi, our fire commissioners. i'd also like to acknowledge the d.e.m. because they're the unsung heros in my book. that's where everything starts. when the 911 call is made it goes to the division of emergency communications, highly trained professionals that get the right resources and equipment to the scene. can't say enough about our police department, working shoulder to shoulder. at one point when things started to go south, i thought i might need to place some your police officers. police department was great with traffic control, m.t.a. got involved in re-routing lines, the water department and like i said, the unified school district because one of the

exposure buildings was a school property so they got involved. d.p.w. was involved to a certain extent and h.s.a. and red cross took over. very challenging. i believe there were 41 people displaced. and like i said, that's just a sign of people that didn't have other places to go, as herald and ben might comment on. a lot of times, people have neighbors or friends that will take them in. so you were dealing with many more than 41 just displaced. people trying to get their paperwork processed and so forth so i would imagine there were a lot more residents in the four buildings involved. so to break it down a little more. in december, we had 23 fires, four of them were greater alarms. we're proud we had minimal injuries and the injuries that were sustained were moderate to slight. i believe all of the civilians and firefighters were treated and released with the exception of one fire where we had two civilians that needed some

in-patient stay in the hospital. january, the figures are up just until the 23rd of this month. it's been busy with 21 fires, three greater alarms and to mayor lee's point and supervisor mirkarimi at the time, they were concerned because we had the fire, fourth alarm on haight street a few months back and then the fire on golden gate and the third alarm this month on masonic and all of those have been investigated and none of those turned out to be any arson-related fire. so after theafter the fire was , hsh takes over. we have a combined fire and arson unit. one thing that works well as having those relationships ahead of time. we all saw down in l.a. there was a series of arson fires. my observation was there was some delays in terms of the processing between the fire and police department. not so here.

we have had a joint arson team that helps determine cause of origin. you have your fire department going into look at cause of origin and your police department interviewing witnesses. it works really well. for any fire that is a second alarm or greater, we have the arson team come out and respond directly. even on smaller fires, they come out if there is a suspicious origin. this highlights were the greater a long story and the level of alarm. -- where the alarms were and the level of alarm. on december 22, we were very stretched. you can imagine that we have -- we had 46 apparatus and 150 personnel just at that street corner. our daily personnel is about 300. we had half of our uniformed members on the scene for.

we always worry about making sure that we have the rest of the city covered rehearsed there was a lot of interaction and discussion that goes on at the d m. -- at the d.e.m. will take fire station personnel and we move them to another area of the city to rebalance the city. our goal is to press the fire in but we want to make sure we can get units had back in service as quickly as possible. in the event that there would be more of a stretch of our resources, we do have adequate and sophisticated recall procedures. we did not need to do with it -- that afternoon, but it was very challenging. the other thing i just wanted to say is that it does not

necessarily mean we have a large greater alarm. in that instance, we had 43 people displaced. sometimes it is the smaller fires -- the fires are not that much of a challenge, but a lot of times there is water damage and other things i will displays residents. in december, there were a two pretty small general working virus. 34 and 23 and people were displaced, respectively. there are challenges to that as well. even though we were able to suppress the fire, there was a lot of work that needs to be done on the back end. i think is appropriate to turn it over to ben. >> thank you, chief, mr. mayor,

members of the board. i'm going to let the red cross start off on the first couple of slides of our presentation during -- on the first couple of slides of our presentation. >> i got to the western addition fire after you have left. as i was coming up, there was the chief coming out of the building with his laptop and other precious things that belong to the family. the joy in their eyes and their hearts when they saw those things melted my heart. she does this very well but what he does wonderfully is lead her troops right into the middle of this stuff. we are so lucky -- we are so lucky to have a wonderful fire chief here. [applause]

i'm not produce than the half hour it will take to do justice, because our share of disaster services welcome to me. -- our chair of disaster services welcomed me. >> always an honor to follow in the footsteps of the planning department. -- of the fire department. the december month was very taxing all of us. thanks to our partnerships, we did manage to cope with it. we can do the immediate things an emerging -- and emergency housing. this shows a number of

volunteers that were deployed and the services, following up on those fires. >> other way. there we go. >> this is our mission statement. we -- is to respond to disaster and help others in. the first chair is the emergency. then there is the follow-up case where we will go on as necessary so that every displaced person has access. while we do have our basic programs in red cross, we provide those, we have to depend on a great many of our partners. the losses are usually devastating to most of the people. we go much beyond our red cross boundaries with our partnerships carry especially the partnership with h.s.a, ben amyes is on our

side. >> thank you. so, in the month of december, we had 166 people displaced. what is important about this slide is we're going to carve out the way the services were delivered. 65 people use hotel stays from the a.r.c. or extensions from h.s.a. and ancillary services from the red cross. 192 hotel nights he given. h.s.a. took on 105 of those as extensions. 73 people used ancillary services from the red cross. in the middle of the night, people are saying, i have a place to go, but i need a

blanket or shoes or something. those are the ancillary services that the red cross is providing. 28 people said no thank you, i am fine. a lot of those are probably property owners. we have a mix of renters and property owners. those are people with insurance that have the need to take care of themselves and generally will do so. of the folks the we were seeing, we saw nine children displaced from housing and 23 people over the age of 62. none of these folks were discharged from our services with the red cross or wicked h.s.a. to the streets for the homeless shelter in which, i think, is something we should be very proud of. one of the things i want to talk about our people with functional

access needs. that is one of the key components for us when we go out into the field to respond to a fire. we are looking for people with disabilities, people that are, when i say vulnerable population, those are people who are vulnerable to hitting the streets with no place to go. that is one of the most important things we are doing with the red cross. making sure that all of those folks end up -- essentially, i want everyone to be warm, safe, and dried. after that, everything else is gravy. that's pretty much sums it up. mayor lee: does anybody have any questions? i really want to credit the board of supervisors who, in particular supervisor wiener,

who helped lead the board to establish -- they immediately signed off on the good samaritan ordinance. we just did not believe that as a good piece of legislation, we have started implementing it. to the credit of the board, it is an honor to harold and -- to what harold and then have been doing for so many years. the best way to honor your work is to get you more partners. we went on a road show already and we started. supervisor wiener h and i can hear.s.a. representatives and we made our first and pitched to the san francisco parks association to gain more membership into the good samaritan ordinance to create a longer list and help them come in and with more resources in case we have more displaced persons. this is where we are going to go with pitches for persons with disabilities, getting more harm is listed up and the access

for all the property owners in the city, we have treasure island also as a landlord. we have merced park has been a great resource. his their managers have been on the ball. we wanted to make a pitch on the good samaritan ordinance, taking what we have been doing on a responsive note and building longevity and an ongoing response with a larger host of people. that is how we honor the great irresponsibility is we have. get more partners in there. i want to credit the board with good legislation. it is going to create that larger body of people that are part of our whole community of response and sustaining our residents in with the kind of help they wish to have in the great city of san francisco. >> are there questions or other comments? any members of the board which to comment? president chiu? president chiu: my district,

from the tenderloin, oftentimes buildings -- have you seen that as a pattern? is that something that i have been observing? >> we can do further analysis on it. your district has different challenges that some of the other parts of the city do not. they are all attached buildings so if you get a fire, you are likely to have it extend into other dwellings. wood frame construction has a lot to do with it. a lot of the buildings are older, wood frame buildings that have not had the benefit of more modern fire code -- that have

been grandfathered in with a protection system. if you look at the last group of greater alarms, we do get a number of fires out in the bayview. recently, there was one out in the richmond. the last bit of time has showed us that everyone is vulnerable. more to the mayor's point in addition to fires that they can be prepared ahead of time. our program is great and the website is great to be able to prepare yourself not just for a big, citywide event, but also for a personal emergency current we have begun to look at that analysis. the city in general, there are challenges. when the conditions, the roadways, 1-way streets, and, like i said, the wood frame construction. also, the density of our city. president chiu: there appears to be a pattern in certain

neighborhoods. as much as i love to see them working with them, if there are ways that we can focus on certain neighborhoods -- >> one of the things i've noticed over the years is that when we do have a fire, it can be a one alarm fire. because of the damage that is not necessarily related to the fire, especially water damage, we see a large displacement of people that have the tendency to be low income and do not have an easy way to find affordable housing within the neighborhood and it would like to stay in. those are challenges for us. those are challenges that we always somehow rise to meet, but it is a population that is adversely affected. >> i would echo that. i have worked from south central los angeles to new jersey to

washington d.c. and georgia. that statement can be made in those vulnerable communities in each and every one of those metropolitan areas. it is one of the things that we know. we have a program that is focusing on the 50 most vulnerable neighborhoods in the bay area. a lot of time and attention into that. it does not prepare the entire metropolitan area, but it does focus in on those communities. president chiu: i probably attempts to separate my district. i think every single one except for one was in a chinatown. if there is something we can do more, that might help to cut down.

>> thank you. are there other comments or questions? that you all for your presentation. that was excellent. moving on, our next agenda item is a recap of humanitarian mission that we took to van, turkey, right before christmas. rob dudgeon is going to kick this off. >> thank you. there is a bit of a back story. for some, it might seem a little random, eastern turkey as a destination. it did not get a lot of play in the news here. there are some questions i have heard about how and why. the back story is that members of the san francisco community that are from eastern turkey brought this to our attention and asked, it was interesting because they asked how would