supervisor mar: good afternoon, everyone. welcome to the monday, june 11, 2012 land-use meeting before the san francisco board of supervisors. we're joined by supervisor avalos as well. >> please make sure to silence also phones and electronic devices. completed a speaker cards should be submitted to the clerk. items act upon today will appear on the june 19 board of supervisors agenda unless otherwise stated. supervisor mar: thank you. we have quite a packed house today. there are five items on the agenda and we will do our best to get to as quickly as we can. could you please call item no. 1? >> resolution approving a free maintenance agreement for

highway 101 richardson ave at lyon st.. supervisor mar: we have a presentation from the department of public works. thank you for being here. >> good afternoon. i'm with department of public works infrastructure division here to answer any questions. supervisor mar: but are there any questions on this item? could you give us a brief overview? >> basically, the freeway maintenance agreement is to clarify the division of maintenance responsibilities as to city streets or portions of city streets and landscaped areas within the freeway limits on richardson ave at lyon st..

the improvements include bus shelter, shelter lighting, it, pavement markings at the bus stop, the bus zone, car painting at the bus stop, a city street lighting, landscaping, fencing, sidewalks, ramps and eight small portion of pavement and drainage. -- and the small portion of pavement and drainage. the small portion city is being asked to maintain is the result of the city trust improvements -- presidio trust improvements, and the state of caltrans up under a cooperative agreement. this is just to delineate maintenance responsibilities. supervisor mar: colleagues, if

there are no comments, let's open this up to public comment. is there anyone from the public would like to speak on this item? seeing none, public comment is closed. can we move this item up for with a positive recommendation without objection? thank you. could you please call item no. 2. >> ordinance amending the administrative code to allow the port to perform demolition repair and replacement on peers. supervisor avalos: thank you for scheduling this item so quickly. this is a measure i am sponsoring on behalf of the port. is going to help support the more efficient doing its pure made tents and repairs that is so critical at this stage. many of these peers are about

100 years old. this is in line with some of the work we have been doing as a board -- >> [inaudible] supervisor avalos: this is in line with some of the work i have been doing on the board for a number of years to increase the pipeline of workers into local projects. part of that effort, we had supported via budget allocation , the pile driver apprenticeship program to the port which will help enable that program to reach into real work doing our peer maintenance work along the waterfront. this ordinance is going to be changing some of the ways we typically do the projects,

typically over $400,000 we will contract out. with this ordinance, we would be approving contracting in and keeping the current work force within the port handling that pierre repair work, which is in line with some of our values, keeping a lot of our work in house. to percent from the port is brad benson and we will let him take it away. >> thank you, supervisor. brad benson from the port of san francisco representing the port director. good afternoon. we have a short presentation today in support of this item. i'm noticing the screens are not working, but apparently they klerk is trying to get those up and running.

the port has one of the last two sets of impact finger piers, historic figures representing the former type of shipping before cargo containers in the country. most of them are 100 years old. when the port received appears from the city in 1968, many were beyond their useful life. they are in bad need of repairs. they have maintained pile crews since 1924, that is our earliest record of having pile workers who would work on pier repair activities. it is needed work. it appears exist in a very harsh marine environment -- that appears exist in a very harsh marine environment and they do get damaged. some are so damaged they have to

be removed from the day. currently, the port is proud to have a 16 person pilot crew working up and down the waterfront was to pile ribs. -- with to pile rig is a. a lot of the damage is hidden. you have to do testing and open them up to see what the damages and it's hard to come up with accurate construction drawings to bit out of work. when we do bit out, there are a lot of change orders causing cost to increase significantly. we experienced some of lot with these types of projects. we see it is much more flexible to use support staff for this work -- if you find a bad condition, you can deploy court staff to another portion of the waterfront and order the materials to address more severe

conditions and not see a big cost increase as a result. the ad man code requires them to bid outwork above $400,000. there is a provision where they can bid for the work, but in talking to the city attorney's office, it is a situation ripe for conflict. it is hard to see how we can conduct that fairly and compete against private sector companies. the ordinance clarifies the rules and allows us to bid work out. it would also allow us to choose to use port staff and equipment to conduct this work. we think there are big potential cost savings for this arrangement. we have a few planned projects

on the horizon for this if the board does recommend the project that would clean out conditions in mission bay. they've also required a complete replacement and public access along the full length of pier 19 in the northeast waterfront. we think this will be an excellent opportunity for the crews to get out there and save money. we estimated the job and cost $3.5 million on a contract basis and we're looking at less than $1 million to conduct the work with port crews. in terms of material and supply costs. that concludes my presentation. port staff is available to answer any questions the committee may have. thank you for your consideration.

bad supervisor avalos: -- supervisor avalos: thank you for your presentation. supervisor mar: we're going to limit speakers to 2 minutes. is there anyone who like to speak on this item? seeing none, public comment is closed. supervisor avalos: i urge your support for this ordinance. it would clearly give flexibility for the port to carry out the work of repairing the appears and it has a great benefit for current workers as well as an apprenticeship program to learn the craft of pure repair. supervisor mar: can we move this forward without recommendation what they -- without objection and a positive recommendation?

supervisor mar: could you please call item three. >> ordinance amending the san francisco administrative code by establishing an urban agriculture program. supervisor mar: supervisor chiu is not here but i am wondering if we can proceed with the presentation. i don't have any notes of that is the department of the environment -- we have still barnes? >> thank you. i'm from the office of the city administrator. the ordinance before you would have the mayor and city administrator engage in a process to harmonize the various departments and agencies that oversee agriculture in san francisco. we have the department of public works and real-estate and other departments independent of us, including the public utilities commission, rec and park and any number of organizations

interested in this particular area. a report was issued that laid out the challenges and opportunities in streamlining these efforts. the goal is to make it easier for urban gardeners in san francisco to find plots, and extend this program, create consistency, clarity, and simplicity in the city. the legislation would have us put together a strategic plan by december 31 that would recommend a nonprofit organization or city department that would serve as a single point of contact. we have had a number of meetings with various departments and stakeholders to talk about these efforts. we look ford to convening this conversation to working with -- we look forward to convene this conversation and i know there are some stake holders from the urban agriculture alliance that will present in greater details about the specificity of what they're seeking to achieve.

i will turn it over to them. supervisor mar: thank you. we are expecting president david chiu in a few moments, but why don't we start with public comment? i would like to thank the san francisco are an agricultural alliance and the community-based farms and gardens for their efforts on this. the first speakers i have are -- [reading names] i will call the rest after they are able to present.

>> thank you. i'm the food systems and urban agriculture program manager for spur, a nonprofit think tank and advocacy organization in the city. we support this legislation, including the amendments put ford in the june 5 version. we support the -- put forward in the june 5 version. it will better support farmers and gardeners throughout san francisco and allow the city to better capture the benefits of urban agriculture. well people growing food in the city benefit themselves when they get the food, the city benefits from urban agriculture in a number of ways. that includes providing people with awareness and a connection to the broader food system, green space and recreation, savings to public agencies when volunteers manage public land, ecological benefits and the green infrastructure in terms of waste water and heat island effects. it is a place where many people find to build community in these spaces. our urban agriculture has

potential to it address sued access and public health and we are waiting to see but may have some economic development potential in terms of job training and in terms of employment. the urban agriculture program proposed in this legislation and the duties and goals set for the program will address a number of issues and opportunities identified in the report we published in april. first and foremost, we have an ad hoc approach in terms of how it -- [tone] supervisor mar: i would like to ask you to continue. >> it supports a lot of excellent projects, but the ad hoc approach is not the most effective way. from the city side, there are

many agencies involved but no clear goals across all the agencies or accountability for how the funding is used. without that, but the city -- there is some duplication when you have -- it has all been helpful but could be more so if a were coordinated. from the public side, it is not clear which agency to talk to if you want to start a project. it's not clear which permits are necessary or where to find funding, government funding or private funding. there is no clear point of entry or one-stop shop for urban agriculture. > there are at least 550 people waiting for a plot and we have seen 20 projects start in the past four years. we know there are a lot of people who want to start growing food in the city and we're looking for the city to provide

more support. the legislation will begin to address that by creating a program with specific goals and time lines. you will hear from many people today will provide personal examples of why that is important. right now, the city has an opportunity to capture that energy and better capture the energy of urban agriculture. i hope you vote in support of the ordinance. >> i am one of the coordinators of the san francisco urban agriculture of alliance. we are an all volunteer alliance and have a list serve with over 500 individuals. i would like to take a second to recognize everyone who came. if everyone could please stand. thank you.

there has been knows central garden program in san francisco for nearly a decade. city support has been spread across many different agencies, creating inefficiencies and a lack of coordination. this legislation which speaks to the third platform and our goal of increasing institutional support begins to do much to address these issues. the ambitious goals, as rebel targets, and creation of a focus corner position has the potential to give the gardening community to support it deserves and needs. we are strongly in favor of the timeline to ensure confidence of the goals. there are attainable with the effort of the city and community. we would like to emphasize that for this program to be a success and sustainable, he must speak out and include community input, especially in regards to the external evaluation of where the program will ultimately reside. nearly all of our urban

agriculture projects up and realized things to the callous hours, hard work, and skills of dedicated -- countless hours, hard work, and skills of dedicated volunteers. i ask you of this ford and thank you for your time and consideration. supervisor mar: can i just ask from the report, i think there is some demand asked of adequate funding and oversight body and you mentioned input from community groups and the urban agriculture alliance. i think there is an explicit asked mentioning job training and employment opportunities. could you elaborate on those? >> we feel it is a lot of potential and our members have made it clear that it has not really been a focus prior to this, how much potential there is for job training and private endeavors in urban agriculture.