the cable car, can anyone imagine how many people is not counting the cable car that live in the area? a lot of people do not know anything about san francisco. that is all they do, they come and vote. they do not know the condition of the people live in different neighborhoods. i have lived all around san francisco. i want to be a part of that cac to keep you guys on the right track. [applause] >> [reading names] chairman brinkman: are those people here? >> we are with the families united collaborative.

we are speaking as a group. we are a citywide collaborative of families who live in single room occupancies. i am a staff and one of the organizations. they will be speaking cantonese and i will translate. >> [speaking cantonese] >> my name is nancy and i am a. organizer at the collaborative. -- i am a peer organizer at the collaborative. my daughter goes to school. she is a junior and every day, she took four muni trains at the minimum. she is turning 18 very soon.

after she turns 18, she will have to buy a $62 passes every month. that would be $744 per year. that makes us in eligible for a lot of the tax credits. that is a lot of burden for my low income family. >> [speaking cantonese]

>> my husband and i work really hard so my kids have could convert -- education. a free bus passed lets them know that society treasures them. it is an affirmation and an encouragement for education and for them to participate in the community. >> [speaking cantonese] >> all of our kids need a free pass. i am here to ask the board to give the future of our country and our city a fair chance. thank you. chairman brinkman: thank you. >> hello. >> hi, everyone. i have two kids.

>> [speaking cantonese] >> if my kids have a free muni pass, they can participate in community activities and go to the library whenever they want. they do not have to stay at home because we want to save money for bus passes. >> [speaking cantonese] >> because of budget cuts, the kids are not going to school as much as they used to. i do not want my kids to stay at home and play video games all day. >> [speaking cantonese]

>> the bus passes are $21 per month. with the two children, i have to pay $42. dad is a big line item in my budget for -- that is a big line item in my budget for my family. >> [speaking cantonese] >> the city of san francisco is a progressive city. we hope that all young people had a free mini past to go to wherever they want. -- have a free muni past to go wherever they want. chairman brinkman: i feel like we need to give the board of directors a break. if we could take 10 minutes. we will take a 10 minute break and we will pay back here at --

we will be back here at 4:46. we will make >> to the extent that there are any people remaining in room 408, i believe because of the number of shares -- chair, could we please get started? we can call the next speakers. ok. if there are any remaining people in room 408 or 416 who wish to participate. we have space in the main hearing room, we will ask them to come into this room so that you can proceed. [reading names]

>> good afternoon. i am with the market community action network. i am here to support to provide free muni for youth. we know that san francisco, there are a lot of families living san francisco, especially middle-income families because they do not feel the city loves them. they do not feel the love in the city anymore. it is a huge problem in san francisco. we have the lowest number of children than any other major city in the u.s.. by providing free transit, we can take a necessary step to support youth who are struggling to get by in this challenging time. that is why we are asking you to consider the free muni for youth. we want to see the city invest

in our young people, invest in our families. we want them to feel valued and important. we ask you to provide free muni for all. thank you. chairman brinkman: thank you. >> hello, commissioners. thank you so much for the opportunity to come and address you. i am a commissioner with the san francisco board of education. last year, the san francisco board of education unanimously passed a resolution in favor of free muni for all youth. the governor is proposing not to reimburse us for any transportation whatsoever. free muni ensure that every student would have the means to get to school. add san francisco unified, we like to say the city is our

classroom. in recent years, we have less of our children going on field trips to our museums, parks, historical sites because of the cost of muni to take all of the kids. i would be remiss to not bring to your attention that we have hundreds of students in our system who have turned 18 before they have graduated from high school. they depend on muni every day to get to school. they are full-time students. the majority of them do not work any job at all. we are getting them to graduate. san francisco unified is the top district in the state of california press school districts concerning test scores. i would ask for you to consider our 18-year-olds who are still in high school, full-time students, when you are considering free muni for youth.

i am a san francisco fourth generation -- i rode muni all over this city. it would not just be access to the schools, it would be access to the whole of san francisco. i urge you to pass free muni for all youth. thank you very much. [applause] >> hello. >> good afternoon. i currently attends school of the arts high school. i am also this didn't delegate to the board of education and we represent the student -- to the student delegate to the board of education. we passed a resolution with the board of education with the support of implementing free a fast passes for all youth and

san francisco. 56% of the school district school buses have been cut. the cuts will continue to increase over the next two years. in our society, we have the responsibility to make sure that youth have access to a free and public education. that should not exclude accessible transportation to and from school. we are urging you to vote for free muni for youth in san francisco. thank you so much. chairman brinkman: thank you. [applause] >> [reading names] >> hello, everyone. i am chair of the san francisco youth commission. i have spoken in front of you before. there are three things.

we do not want to stigmatize muni as being only for low income. i am appreciative that the proposal includes -- it has proven that they do their free lunch status data, but it does not reach everyone. people do not consider themselves low end, and they do not want to apply. that is one of the things i fear happening. administration of the program, i read the proposal that you have here. on page 5, it is sam's that administering would cost less than administering it for all low-income -- let's backtrack. administering the past for low- income students would cost less than administering it for all students. i find that the really interesting.

i want to make sure the board took notice of that. another point is family flight. not only are low income families leaving the city, all families are leaving san francisco. i really want to make sure we get them to stay. this gives families a reason to stay. it addresses the administration challenges. a couple of other things i want to include, we have been working with the supervisor's office in coming up with the finding. we have identified those funds and they are available to us. free muni for all allows us to leverage climate funds, going to drivers of all income levels to get out of their cars. we do not -- it helps the city

reached being a transit to first city. [applause] >> [reading names] >> good afternoon. i am here today -- i am an appointee on the youth commission. i come here today to support a free pass for all youth. the budget is tough, but we have to think about what it could mean for investment in our future. congesting, drunk driving, these are problems in our city. they are not because of cars. they are because people are not comprehending how great public transportation can be. or adult generation has been exposed to a life style in which cars are the only option. this is going to continue until

we make a change right now. transportation is cool. i think transportation is cool. i have some type of fun. [laughter] this enlightenment of public transportation needs to be for everyone. i want everyone in the audience to have a clipper card like mine that has the plastic torn off because that means everyone is respecting muni and everyone is really into just the idea of public transportation. so, yeah, this will help the environment and improve, eliminate car-related danger and also it will just make our public transportation system something that we'll all share in the future and be extremely proud of. and san francisco's goal is to be a modern city so we need not only a modern mode of transportation system but think in a modern way and enjoys taking the future into account,

not just the present. so for the future, let's not trade a stigma but come together to build a new sustainable city. this will only happen if all youth are involved and that would mean making muni free-for-all youth. thank you. [applause] >> selena lane, maria tapia, francisco dacosta. >> is selena here? maria? tapia. stanitruculo. francisco decosta. jessica enron. any of those people here?

>> hi, my name is jessica, and i'm speaking on behalf of ymac members and coleman advocates. i support free muni for all youth. i believe all youth deserve a chance for free muni not only for school but for work and extracurricular activities. all youth deserve a chance to explore a place they call home and that's san francisco, obviously. so, yeah, thank for you listening to all of us. [applause] >> thank you. >> madam chair, the speakers i've called haven't respond. is there anyone else who has not had a chance to speak who would like to address the board on this matter? all right. no more speakers, in that case we -- oh, one more. >> two more.

>> good afternoon, board members, i'm earnest stokes, a long time resident of san francisco and have been a resident of san francisco for approximate 30 years. and i'm here to support free muni for youth. free muni for all youth, not just a free muni pass for low income youth because that doesn't stop you from raising the fare, not just a free pass for local youth because it doesn't stop you from raising the fare in the future if you set a fare for low income youth. that's number one. and really my statement is more about values than it is about muni and stuff like that. if i can read what i've got here. it's on money and the cost of war. we as a nation are willing to spend any amount of funds on

needless wars, and by needless wars, i mean wars against nations that have not attacked us. i'm talking about iraq. libya, afghanistan, and even now we're considering going to a shooting war against iran. we as a nation do not need any more wars against nations that have not attacked us. we have better use for that money. we can start by spending it on infrastructure and yes, that includes free muni for youth. >> thank you. yes, sir. good afternoon. >> how are you all doing? >> spread the word! free muni! >> spread the word. >> for the youth. >> free muni. >> for all the youth. >> yeah. >> good afternoon, board, my name is anthony navarro representing s.o.p. solidarity

organizing at the high school. working with power two, wimac, excelsior district, all our neighborhoods. can we give it up one time for all of the grassroots organizers, youth, students, families who have been coming for a year now out of their own time, not getting paid, out of the love and accountability to their community. can we give some love for all of you all. [cheers and applause] >> once again, as all of you know, i'm not going to repeat -- i'm going to repeat a lot of what the community says but we want to be accountable to our want to be accountable to the community and to serve the people, to provide the best service you can as public transportation. and it's my understanding that you need to listen to the -- you all can hear me? you all good? that we have fought and

organized a lot of these folks who secured the funding for two years. these folks aren't getting paid to do this. they have done out of their own blood have been supporting this campaign. we want to hold you accountable to your words saying you want to serve the people of this city. and look at the long-term pro muni folks, young generation. think of the impact you can make for this country, not just the city and changing the game. we have secured this funding and can see where we're going after this. this is pro muni. we have been pro muni. we ride the muni every day. you don't want to serve us into anti-muni. we'll hold you accountable and we love you all because you all are supporting this but we are asking to meet the needs of the people and we're saying free muni for all of youth. in solidarity, can you say this with us? spread the word. free muni.

>> for our youth. >> right on, mr. ramos. right on. >> all right. thank you and i think that was our last speaker for public comment. one more. one more. good afternoon. [cheers and applause] >> hello. good afternoon, board and members of the public and community. any name is renee antivaros, youth minister for district 9 and is my daughter, and we're here to represent the thousands of youth that were not able to attend and we're also here to represent the thousands of youth of our future. as you know, the 2000 census compared to 2010, the age from 0-18 has declined by 5%. we need to secure the future of our youth in this city to not only stay here but thrive here, teach ethics in our schools so we can bring forth innovation together. when my daughter is older, i would not want her to be

segregated because she may qualify for free muni for youth as of now but i know when i get my degree she will not qualify for free muni for all. but for low income, however, i would like her to be able to unify and interact with her peers on the bus, not profile each other and say hey, you're the kid that got the muni for free, i'm the kid that got it and had to pay for it. story telling and dialogue changes life and changes the course of history. we need to unify our youth again and we need to be that leadership city which we are and promote transit, be the first transit city of san francisco. i know we have a great, efficient city and need to continue to promote that leadership within our peers. thank you. and i appreciate all your willness to hear us today. and appreciate your willingness to work for this and let's just remember secure and invest in our future youth as sometimes

financial burdens may not outweigh the outcomes if our peers interact with each other. thank you. >> thank you. do we have any more public speakers? are i think that was our last one in which case we declare public comment on this item closed. thank you very much. you're very patient to wait all this time. we appreciate it very much and appreciate hearing from you. yes? >> i want to thank everybody who spoke and who came and left and wasn't able to speak, and all those who wanted to be here. a lot of good comment. i just want to try to offer some clarifying comments to some of the comments that were made or some of the themes that were brought up, and then just had one other -- couple other pieces of information. i do want to clarify that i didn't really speak to it much in the budget. the budget is built on the

assumption of the staff recommendation which means that under a different scenario, we would have to rebalance the budget, so just wanted to -- i don't think i said that. i wanted to clarify that. there was a lot of public comment about the revenues that are available for this, and i want to make two points that i think we heard some kind of conflicting things on. in terms of the source of funds and the different bucket of funds from the region, there is up to $5 million available from the m.t.c. that arguably without this movement would not have been coming to muni or to san francisco, and i think the folks here and supervisor campos all deserve great credit for those even being in play. that still is the subject to m.t.c. approval, a vote of the commission, but the fact that those are even in play, that

wouldn't otherwise be coming our way, our testament to this effort are only available because of this effort. the balance of the funds from the region are lifeline funds that will be coming to san francisco and for the most part to the m.t.a. regardless so that i think there were some speakers that suggested that all of the funding from the region were coming only for this purpose. the balance of those funds are for the overall -- they're lifeline funds and is a combination of capital and operating fund. we endeavored to explain that in our staff report. and the lifeline funds are for -- are meant for low-income populations so there was some commentary that -- making muni free-for-all youth is exactly in line with the lifeline program. i'm not sure that's entirely correct. so two clarifications on the revenues there, the lifeline revenues would be coming to san francisco and to the m.t.a. and

they can be and would otherwise be used for other purposes. that's not the case in that first, up to five million which is really there because of the efforts of this group. there were some discussion about whether the $4 million revenue loss was a low estimate. we acknowledge, and i think i tried to indicate that we don't know what the ridership impact of this would be. it's possible that is low. it was among the risks that are in the budget, to the extent it's greater, that's kind of more of a hole we will have to fill at the end of the two years if we were to go with that option. we heard from a number of seniors, as i said. i just want to reiterate, i think in the long term we maybe want to look at our whole fare structure so we don't have a

situation where high income kids are paying more -- paying less for muni than low-income adults. and i think seniors who are on fixed incomes have perhaps a higher call on any additional expansion of the program than high-income youth. there have been in this meeting and in others discussions about fare enforcement and about targeting youth. i just want to state, i think again, that less than 2% of the citations that we issue for fare revision goes to youth and while we don't have great ridership numbers of youth versus adult we know the youth constitutes more than 2% of our youth and are underrepresented on who is receiving citations on the system. whether that was true in the past or not, i can't speak to but that's where we're running often at 1%, 1.5% last month.

so just a factual clarification. and there was some discussion about the clipper card and the difficulty of getting a clipper card and requirements to getting a clipper card and we're certainly willing, and i think we put in the staff report, big to work with m.t.c. to see if there's a way to change the requirements. the use of a clipper card for this program in whatever option the board chooses was always meant, and i believe by all of the advocates as well, to be a clipper based program. if you're paying cash, you're still going to pay the regular fare. this is a clipper-based program, so whether it's free-for-all or cheap-for all or free for low-income youth, the clipper issues are there and we're committed in whatever format it takes to try to get clipper cards in the hand of the youth. that's what the regional climate forms would be supporting some of those are dedicated only