still am opposed to this plan. it can be done we doing it in grass. what else? >> thank you very much. [reading names] are you ready? >> i would like to say how disconcerting is to see the proposed modifications. it is a huge change to the park. and to the interaction between

the two windmills. excuse me. ok. i have trouble with my hearing dance. -- aids. the new lights will impact the neighborhood close to the western edge of the park. all the way across the park. these new lights will be three times as close. our old neighborhoods character will be -- our whole neighborhoods character will be a fact. -- affected. many professional sports fields have switched from artificial turf to a natural grass field. these fields would provide many

more planning hours that are now available. we can employ the same approach and enjoy the same benefits to accommodate our many soccer players. i totally support the good, natural grass fields that are used in the daytime. thank you. president fong: next speaker, please? >> good afternoon, commissioners. my name is rossa moss and after this huge parade, wonderful, of children i kept listening if there was any child since they obviously were well informed about the matter, who would have a different point of view and nobody spoke up except maybe two children with their parents for grass fields. so i would just like to relay a message from my grandson who is a soccer and little league player.

he's 7 years old and playing soccer today on a grassy field and he wanted to come and say that he doesn't want artificial turf because you hurt yourself when you slide on it and he really wants to play on grass. then other points have been made about the value of grass. i would just like to mention that there are many children here and they love sporkts but they also need something else, which is connection with nature. and that is getting more and more scarce. the two rare qualities that are really missing, especially in cities, is natural quiet and a night sky. one place where you get those is right there on the ocean and in the meadows around the fields. this is so precious as to be really valued and not to be lost, and that is what was provided by those who planned for golden gate park there. the one thing that's not mentioned and that's easy to forget with the many beautiful

children is that they won't be the only ones playing there and who will play late at night? and will these fields be actually a big income generator or is it really just for children? thank you. president fong: thank you. >> thank you, president fong and buell and other members of the planning and recreation and parks commission. i'm susan hirsch, with the city foundation. we started almost six years ago and our sole mission is to make sure there are enough safe, accessible sports fields right here in san francisco. as stated in the e.i.r. as you have heard tonight also, the city has very few fields for kids. there's a shortage. there simply are not enough fields for those kids who want to play. with rec -- rec and park we have worked hard to complete

renovations in seven other parks all across san francisco. each of these parks have been enormously popular with players and moat of the parks' neighbors. the proposed beach chalet is the first to undergo an e.i.r. and with rec and park we willingly requested additional review leading to an e.i.r. which confirmed that this project is safe for people, the environment, the park and for kids and that's exactly what the e.i.r. found. this project will have practically no environmental impacts. the e.i.r. thoroughly examined many of the issues you will hear abouted tooze -- today. it's very comprehensive and very data-driven. this renovation has been studied extensively the past two years and we've had an abundance of participation. this is a good project for our kids and for our city. you've heard a lot today about families with kids leaving the city. i raised two here and it's not always as you -- easily -- easy

but the city haze lot to offer. let's give them one more reason to stay, the safe, high quality fields. thank you very much. >> good evening, commissioners. i'm linda, a 43-year resident of san francisco, a mother and a grandmother of children who play soccer. i live in district 11 which is home to the crocker amazon play fields which you heard a lot, quite a bit about today and hopefully soon the levy ward fields. these are going to be synthetic fields. the community wanted those fields and that was their desire. however, after seeing the reviews about the beach chalet i'm more and more convinced that this is the wrong location for synthetic field turf. it goes against everything with golden gate's master plan and the feeling in the communities around the park that golden gate park is special and does not need to have synthetic fields. we don't know enough about

these fields yet. we've got 10 years, less than 10 years under our belt learning about how these fields are good going to be react and whether we're going to need more funds to keep them in shape. whereas with grass, by renovating the beach field with grass we have the opportunity to do all those wonderful amenities, the bathrooms, all the parking, the issues that other people brought up that could make this a classy field for everyone to use if down the road soccer is not the main sport, if we want to turn it into something else. if you want to use this for multipurpose uses you've got that opportunity. once you turn it into synthetic fields, that's it and you have a limited use. thank you. president fong: calling more cards. patrick henin, ellen koss. andrea nelson. dick cross. maureen tarot.

mary pat dord. sheila ramirez. if you're ready -- well, they're working their way. if you're ready. >> my name is dr. ellie koss and i want to thank you for giving me the opportunity to take tonight. -- talk tonight. i've worked with at-risk youths throughout my life both on the field, coaching lacrosse, building new lacrosse programs both here and in northern california and in massachusetts. it's the fastest-growing sport, not only in the country but also in northern california. i've also worked with at-risk youths off the field, tutoring and with leadership development. i've also recently started a lacrosse program for both boys and for girls with the boys and girls club of san francisco.

keeping our youth off the streets, occupied and healthy, is key to a vital and healthy san francisco. both in the short term and the long run. currently many of the natural fields as you have heard in san francisco are home to a very large gopher population, make our fields dangerous and often wonderful, it's-up keep -- upkeep is sfens -- expensive and consumes enormous natural resources. the current general erakse of turf fields are safe, sustainable, and they reuse materials that normally would be slated for landfill or insineration. increasing the available field space will enable more youth in our city to have safe places to play, to build their character and contribute as productive citizens to a healthier and more vital san francisco. so in my view the only choice you have to -- is to approve

this project. thank you. >> hi, i'm jill lands berry with the san francisco nighthawks. i'm speaking in behalf of dick cross. i have his notes. we have both coached the same team for many years. i've bain resident for 25 years and coached that entire time. i know everybody has been saying oshe, the children, the children, and making lighted of that, saying we're trying to use the children to get these fields. but you know what? adults need the fields too. i have a women's semipro team and if you watch them play the style stoove -- of play has increasinged tenfold since i was a kid. they play with such athleticism and muscle that to play on these fields with any sort of

holes is possibly ending a career or a scholarship. we're talking about a kid who is maybe a foster kid, from a low income family that's getting a chance to go to college so they can play. if they hurt themselves it's on me. it's my fault that they are now not able to go to college. i was at crocker amazon last night with our practice and it was overwhelming to look around and see all the teenagers and adults playing anding how necessary it is. when they first put it in, i was standing there talking to a gentleman what said i'm so grateful for this, i work owl day and i have children and i come home and i'm angry and i come around and run around the field for two hours and all of a sudden i'm a better father because i can go home and i'm not angry any more. it's important to look at the fact that adults need things too, and that's why the lights are important. because athleticism doesn't

just stop at 6:00 p.m. people need some place to go after work. we need to have these fields ab proved. thank you. president fong:next speaker? >> hi, my name is courtney johnson and i'm the director of cyo athletics. what the fields mean for our organization is we're able to provide access for kids all throughout san francisco particularly in the southeast part and it enables us to provide access. it allows us to do things in terms of teamwork and commitment and all the things kids need in order to survive later in life. so for us, particularly the girls' sports, because we want to provide access for them, it means having more space -- space and more fields. that field space is critical for our kids to go -- get that teamwork and self-esteem and

commitment they need to be better citizens. thank you. president fong: thank you. >> my name is cristine sali and i as -- also work at c.y.o., the catholic youth organization in athletics. i work with courtney and as courtney said, our third and -- children need fields. not only do we serve thousands of children in san francisco, but we're an extension for them to get out of the house to get off the blacktop play groufpbletds i know this is redundant and you've been hearing it all day. i'm also speaking as a native san franciscan and mother of four, trying desperately to stay in the city and raise my children in a healthy, safe environment. the safety issues brought up about artificial turf avoiding ankle injuries, well, renovating beach chalet will also be a safest -- safety -- have any of you ever been there

after the sun goes down? it is pretty sketch as my kids would say. it's bad. there is criminal activity as the police chief said. there's all kinds of really bad things going on at night in the western end of town. berenovating beach chalet that will go away, so please, please on behalf of the children, on behalf of the families, mip parents live out near beach chalet, please, please consider the renovation not just from an athletic safety standpoint but from a public safety standpoint. thank you. president fong: at this time our court reporter needs to take a break. we're going to take ed >> the joint neetlg for the planning commission and rec and park commission is back in session. we in -- were in public comment. >> if there are speakers iche called already, apoach the

podium and i will call batches of names every now and then and if you can line up on that side of the room it will make it go smoother. >> i'm sam and i play for the san francisco little league. the vikings soccer. and the lacrosse san francisco riptide and all my friends at marin country day school say why don't you live in mari in? there's so good fields and everything is so perfect but in san francisco all of the fields or most of them are like beaten up and rough or have gopher holes and stuff. >> i was going to apologize for not bringing more children to the hearing, but at this point i think that's not really an issue. my name is pam and i'm the

president of the san francisco lacrosse club, the riptide, the club that sam plays for. we have 300 kids from every single part of the city. over 50 schools. our kids range if age from 7 to high school at this point. the part of the fields issues that concern me light -- right now, i wants to have as many boys like sam out there playing but the other thing nobody has really brought up in terms of lacrosse is the girls' lacrosse on the west coast. we have gone from one team to five teams in two years of all different age groups and the from having eight teams next year or the year after is field space. we just don't have the field space for either home games or for practices and beach chalet would help us unbelievably much. we do already practice at beach chalet and i know all the

comments that have been made about the gopher holes and safety. but the main thing i'm concerned about is getting more kids out there to play lacrosse and we can't do that without for fields. we have a lot of kids who want to play, but i'm going to be sending thm to marin unless we get more fields. president fong:ok. jeff, kim fernandez, rick fern, jim shapiro, pam ruppright, sue grissom, rebecca evans, lynn benedict a.m. -- bexam, mary lynn shimik, paul kiske, andrea o'leary, terry roller. if i've called your name, you

can come on up. >> well, i was the last one called, but no one else seems to be taking the space so i will go right head. my name is terry and i'm a resident ever the district. although i care for children and recognize their need to for a place to recreate, i'm opposed to this project. stadium lighting and artificial turf have no place in golden gate park. some day they will grow up and have children of their own and we have to ask ourselves, if we approve this project what kind of a park are we going to leave them? i truly believe that this project is going to permanently and dramatically change the western end of golden gate park. this is not the type of park i would want to leave my children and certainly not the park we have today, but there is an

alternative that gives kids a place to play today but preserves the park for them and their children in the future. fix the beach chalet fields but keep the natural grass. maintain habitat for wildlife. why insist on artificial turf for golden gate park and then choose natural grass for the west sunset playground? given that the two fields are essentially the same size, why not simply witch -- switch them around? this would accomplish the same goal but eliminate the controversy. why is the department of rec and park refusing to even consider this sensible compromise. field goal -- forget about the stadium lighting. in the evening kids should be home concentrating on school work, not playing soccer until 10:00 p.m. finally take the money saved by not putting in the lights and artificial turf and use it to fix other felleds -- fields. this is a compromise that would

do right -- what is right for kids today but not forget to do what is right for kids tomorrow. can i enter this into the record? mr. -- president fong: next speaker, please, that i have called? >> andrea o'leary. i almost want to say ditto to all that because basically that's what it comes down to. all these children you heard speaking earlier i don't think they really care what they have to play on, just as long as it's nice, clean, maintained and they get access to it. that's really what they want. we can maintain these fields if we want to. that's the real issue here. we want to maintain golf courses. we have dedicated gardeners out there to keep that grass at that exact height and density and everything and they don't talk about gopher holes all that much. so why can't we do that for our play fields? there's no reason for this.

but my big issue here is there are a lot of places where the small groups can come and play but they're underiletused. my neighborhood -- underutilized. do we get anybody there? not a one. we're still open for it. i'm really concerned about the dark skies. i come from a part of the country where other than africa the skies are the darkest there and this is just such an important issue. cities really have ordinances about keeping skies as dark as they can. why? well, next month we're going to have a lunar eclipse. how many people are going to be able to see that if we keep flooding our skies with this brightness? how many blocks are you going to be doing this to try to maybe see venus in the sky? i think this is a really critical issue. i don't think this process has been very well vetted. i don't think it's been thought through.

i think we're trying to rush through something here. i think this is about money i don't think it's about kids. i don't think you should certify this and i don't think you sha prove the design. thank you. -- should approve the design. thank you. >> hi, my name is sue grissom and i'm 62 years old. i'm asking you to decide this issue on logic, not emotion and on science, not finances. based on this e.i.r. if it says this sturve safe, then this e.i.r. is defective and should be disproved. no less an authority than dr. dean edell did his medical minute on this this past monday. you can go back and hear it in the archives and he's known for getting the latest research. the professional sports teams are going back to grass for a reason. this recent study said you're one and a half times more likely to injure your knees on synthetic turf an grass. and the reason i gave my age

earlier is because it's important. i suffered the past 25 years with a knee injury. over the past 60 years i've sprained my ankles a dozen times. i don't feel any pain. sprained ankles heal. broken bones heal. they're forgotten. knee injuries are forever. also based on science the effect of bright lighting on the migration of birds is well documented, and it's not good. based on logic, you can remove the bright lighting, you can remove the synthetic turf and still have a good plan, or even better, consider the alternative such as west side playground. all i'm asking is that you keep the west side wild and disapprove this plan. it's defective. thank you. >> additional speakers called?

commissioners and ladies and gentlemen, we're trying to both, commissions to try to nake process as fair as possible and i know there are a number of speakers yet. in fact there say card stack still here. because of 9 hour i've asked the organizers who have brought kids here to batch them up in very large groups and conga line them through so they have an opportunity to at least be seen. this isafter -- san francisco and i feel like and hope my fellow commissioners feel the same, that someone who is 8 years old or 80 years old should have an opportunity to be seen at least if not heard. so i'm going to ask to quickly bring them through. if you want to assign one speaker, mr. hanon, to this large group that would be great. >> we have two teams, two speakers, starting with this guy.

>> ok. hello, my name is max and i play for the vikings club and my lacrosse team is riptide. the reason why i think we should have turf fields for beach chalet is because there's a lot more injuries without turf because of all the potholes on the field and also all the practices happen, they're all cancelled because they're rained out. and -- yeah. president fong: great. thank you. ok. this team here in the blue? or the red dragons? >> hi. i'm jett and i play on the t.r.x. fire journey. and i'd like the beach chalet fields to be turf because i

play lacrosse and soccer and i play in the spring and the fall so i'd like it to be turf because it the been rained out a lot and i just haven't -- we've had a lot of times when we couldn't -- when we couldn't practice and many other teams like sacramento or even just out there, they all have their turf fields and it's just that one field. and we can't compete. president fong: right. thanks, guys. next group? you've been waiting quite a while. >> hi. i'm barbara mcdowell and i am a soccer parent but i am in favor of real grass at the beach chalet fields. there are other fields in the outside lands that could be renovated with you i -- but i

know we have a -- the technology to use the drip irrigation and gopher proofing and all the other things. i discovered that -- this when i was pouring all the -- the rest of the coffee on the grass and it gets recycled. if you put the grounds in a gopher hole they move. so there are even biofriendly things that we can do to re cycle the grounds that we have. i just say be careful what you wish for because you just might get it. during an el nino year when it pours every weekend and you have your unverted umbrella, your kids playing on the tirble tissue might think wow, those lucky kids that got rained out there are playing on the real grass. you know, you never really know. we are hearing oh, we got rained out. well, that is rained out. you can embrace that. go to a matinee with your kids

and do those things you didn't get to do and you can embrace the fact that if they're literally bouncing off the walls take them to the house of air. you can book time in there. i live equi distant to the ocean at the beach chalet field and i wouldn't put fake grass out in the yard so my kids could play out in the fog and rain at night. [timing bell] also the sweat and spilled food and animal droppings and all the other things that go on the astroturf is biohazard and it sits on top and then you have to put the chemicals on because it's a high traffic area so we're going to be killing everything. i don't find that the utopia of having the artificial turf, the art tirble grass, it's more of a biohazard because it's designed for heavy traffic. president fong: thank you very much.

next group, please? >> hello. my name is liam and i play on the s.f. united soccer team. soccer players are not a special interest group. we represent every zip d.o.d. -- code in the city. we are the future of the city ard -- and we are the city. artificial turf can be maintained in played on in all kinds of weather. 9% of be be players polled prefer artificial turf. the players who use beach chalet support the project. those who oppose it do not use the fields and use other areas of the park. also on turf you can't get rained out and even if it's raining i really do love soccer and would like to play soccer. please move forward with this project. thank you. [applause] >> are you with a youth group, sir? >> yeah. good evening,