francisco. ♪ ♪ ♪ >> we're here at one of the many food centric districts of san francisco, the 18th street corridor which locals have affectionately dubbed the castro. a cross between castro and gastronomic. the bakery, pizza, and dolores park cafe, there is no end in sight for the mouth watering food options here. adding to the culinary delights is the family of business he which includes skylight creamery, skylight and the 18 raisin. >> skylight market has been here since 1940. it's been in the family since 1964.

his father and uncle bought the market and ran it through sam taking it over in 1998. at that point sam revamped the market. he installed a kitchen in the center of the market and really made it a place where chefs look forward to come. he created community through food. so, we designed our community as having three parts we like to draw as a triangle where it's comprised of our producers that make the food, our staff, those who sell it, and our guests who come and buy and eat the food.

>> the small business commission the time is now 5:34 p.m. and the meeting is being called to order. at this time we would like to

thank sfgovtv dawn city hall media services for their continued support of our meeting. we would like to ask members of public to turn their cell phones and pagers to "silent "or turned off. first item is roll call. commissioner adam? >> here. >> >> vice president white? >> here. >> commissioner dooley. >> here. >> commissioner dwight. >> absent. >> commissioner ortiz-cartagena here >> commissioner yee riley. >> here. >> we have a quorum. >> next item. commissioners item no. 2 is presentation of the small business commission certificate of honor requisite nighing a local small business r & g lounge as part of the sbc small business recognition program this. is a discussion item only.

>> on this monday march 11, 2013 the city of san francisco's small business commission is proud to recognize r & g lounge for their contribution to the vitality of chinatown and the city of san francisco. open since 198 5, over the past 27 years r & g lounge has served innovative yet traditional dishes to local and visitors alike. growing from 50 to 250 seats. owner wong provides employment for youth, local residents, new immigrant and low-income families. mr. wong has an esteemed reputation in the community county as a great

philanthropist, supporting many of the local non-profit organizations by donating money or gift certificate for fundraising events to organizations such as chinese hospital, chinatown community development center, self-help for the elderly and many others. mr. wong and r & g lounge are truly pillars of the community and the small business commission is pleased to present this honor to this deserving business. congratulations. do you want to say a few word? >> i'm happy, very happy today. i will try do my best. thank you. >> any commissioner comments? >> yes. >> go ahead. >> i just wanted to say i'm a native san franciscan and have

been coming to your restaurant for many, many years. my favorite dish is your salt and pepper dish. >> i would like to say it's my favorite restaurant in chinatown and your staff is awesome. like i told you earlier, lucy, who works the lunch shift knows me and she is like my favorite employee there, too. but you have the best food. i love it and your staff is great. so thank you. this is an honor. >> thank you.

>> next item. >> commissioners the presenter for the next item is not here. if you would mind for one moment while i give a phone call to the presenter or do you wanted to move to approval of minutes. commissioner 3 is approval of the january 14, 2013 meeting minutes, exemplar tory document draft january 14, 2013 minute? >> i move. >> second. >> all in favor? >> aye. >> next item. item 4 approve the january 28, 2013 minutes. explanatory documents draft january 28, 2013 minutes. >> motion? >> i move. >> second. >> all in favor? >> aye. >> next item.

item 5, approval of the february 11, 2013 meeting minute. explanatory documents draft february 11, 2013 minutes. >> do we have a motion to approve? >> motion to approve. >> second. >> all in favor? >> aye >> thank you. next item. >> commissioners item 6 general public comment this allows members of the public to comment generally on matters within the commission's purview and suggests new agenda item for the commission's future consideration. public comment is limited to 3 minutes and i believe we have one speaker card that i'm aware of. scott hagy. >> welcome scott hagy >> small business california, i think most of you may be aware does a survey every year of small business positions and we just finished our 8th annual survey. we received 1300 responses, a little over 1300. and with my received responses

from every county in the state. this is used to set our agenda and a copy of the survey goes to every state assembly person, senator and to the governor's people and it's also used by staff in the staffing some of the committees. so i think you have all got a copy of the survey. i am just briefly going to hit on some highlights real quickly. as i said we look at issues, and for the 8th year in a row the access and cost of health has come out no. 1 after the economy. the economy is a little bit broad to deal with. that was no. 1. but health was came as far as something that we can do something about. the interesting one for no. 2 and this is the third or fourth year in a row that the quality of public education came out no. 2 and i think when people talk about small business issue, they don't think about that one.

no. 3, no surprise, regulations. no. 4, taxation. no. 5, this is another one that i find can kind of interesting. last year it was actually no. 4, but infrastructure. small businesses are concerned about infrastructure, and it's been borne out again by the survey. as far as some of the interesting specifics of the respondents, 48% provide health insurance, 52% did not provide health insurance. interestingly enough and maybe i will talk a little bit more, 74% almost had never heard of the small business tax credit. 63% had never talked to their state senator. their assembly person or to the governor, which i think is a little scary and it's something that hopefully you as a commissioner will re[tpo-rpbs/] that we reinforce to our

representatives. those who did need capital 2:1 and those who couldn't get capital versus those who can't get capital. so it's clearly a problem for those who need it. when you look at the hiring. almost twice as many people decreased their employment as increased their employment and as far as revenues, more people had decreased revenues in last yeah, versus increased revenues. looking this over, it's a little sobering, because there is a certain amount of frustration and negativity, but i thought those numbers would have improved given the economy. thank you for the opportunity to talk to you. >> scott, i want to say thank you for everything that you do on behalf of small business california and small business san francisco. i think it's amazing and this is a testament. >> thank you very much.

>> any other public comment on items not on the agenda this evening? seeing none, public comment is closed. next item. >> commissioners, the next item on your agenda is discussion and possible action to make recommendations on the board of supervisors file no. 130018, planning code deleting the sunset provision of the excelsior alcohol restricted use district. the presenter is not available, and i did make a phone call to the desk and there was no answer. so i'm not sure, director if you have a recommendation on how to proceed. i did confirm on friday. >> i would say let's maybe hold and hear other items first, in case the presenter is running late. and hear it later. >> okay. does that require a motion? or

would we -- >> we would probably take public comment? >> yes. >> i think not necessarily. only if we're going to move it to later in the item, we'll just rehear it >> okay. >> and if for any reason that the presenter doesn't show up and we need to re-agendize, it we'll take a motion. >> okay and we'll do the same with item no. 8, mr. president? >> yes. >> okay. commissioners that placed us on item no. 9, presentation and discussion on the affordable care act and how it overlays with the healthcare security ordinance. we have a presentation by tangerine brigham, department of health and we have matt goldberg of the office of labor standards and enforcement available for questions and answers and we have scott hague small business california who has analyzed the affordable care act and to do questions

and answers and i don't know if you have any introductory remarks, director? >> i do, i want to extend my appreciation to tangerine brigham for the conversations that both our office is having with the department of public health, and her willingness to work with the commission and our office to start taking a look at this early and as i think in the last week, i have come to understand that this is a lot subtle and complex than i initially realed and i really want to extend the appreciation to her to provide some education and information for us. because this is something that we're going to be dealing with over the next several months, and for us to really -- for the commission and for the department and staff to really get a good solid understanding

of what the affordable care is? what covered california is? how is that going to work? how is it going to overlay with our employers from one employee to the 99 employee, which is our purview. and then eventually how that will overlay with the healthcare security ordinance? so i just want to extend my appreciation for really taking the time and helping us think through this. >> welcome, tangerine. >> thank you, commissioners. thank you so much regina. so before getting into the intersection between the affordable care act and the health care security ordinance, i wanted to give a brief, as brief as possible synopsis of the affordable care act and the provisions around health care expansion. so the affordable care act requires many, but not

all individuals in the united states to actually have insurance, or pay a penalty. that is what you will hear referred to as the individual mand yet. mandate. there are other requirements, people who are incarcerated and people who have religious exempt ions, but for the most part individuals in the united states will get coverage as a result of the affordable care act . people who don't comply pay penalties you and the notion is that penalty will be the inducement to get coverage. there will be three ways in which people get coverage. they will get coverage through other medicaid, which is called medical in california. they will get coverage through an exchange, as an individual purchasing it and i will talk about that. that is called "covered california." or they can get

coverage through their employer. either medium sized employer, small employer or large employer. so there was a question raised about the income threshold for the medicaid program. the medicaid program is based on what is called the federal poverty level, which changes on an annual basis. it takes into account, the number of individuals in a household and also income. it is adjusted every january by the federal department of health care services and currently for 2013, for the continental u.s., 138% of the federal poverty level is just under $16,000 a year. so anyone with income at or below $16,000 a year will be able to get their health insurance paid entirely by the federal

government and state governments and they pay nothing in terms of premiums and or co-pay. in california it's an almost estimated 3 million people will get their health insurance through that vehicle alone. the next vehicle is covered california, which is the individual marketplace for coverage. the federal government establishes what is r called health benefit exchanges, there is a separate exchange for individual and a separate exchange for small business and i will talk about that in a bit. so for covered california, an individual will be able to get coverage. the income threshold is essentially anyone who is not eligible for medicaid. so if your income is above that $16,000 a year, you would be able to get coverage through

covered california. now for certain individuals that coverage will be subsidized such that the coverage they had to pay for premiums has been reduced by a federal subsidy. the income threshold for those individuals is essentially for one person, anyone between $16,000 and about $48,000 a year will get care that is subsidized through the exchange. individuals with income above the $48,000 limit for one person will be able to get health care through the exchange, but with no subsidy from the federal government. the benefits that are created for the exchange are standardized. there are certain essential health benefits that individuals will pay through the exchange. they will get an option of what you heard of as "precious

metals." so it goes from platinum all the way to bronze. and based on essentially the precious metals that they select and can you can think of it as the more the precious the metal, so platinum, the more health care costs are covered by the health plan and therefore, the more expensive that individual would have to pay for premium costs. so the rate at which someone participates will really be based on what their comfort level is in terms of income and what they can afford to pay, based on, as i said, the bronze, the silver, the gold or platinum. there is a second exchange and that is what is called shots and it's essentially for small

businesses and just like the california exchange for individuals, it really is an area where small employers will have the opportunity to actually purchase and compare potential health plans, if they so desire. so what is the requirement of an employer? the first is that employers are not required to purchase health insurance. the affordable care act does not require any employer to purchase health insurance. however, the affordable care act does state if you are an employer, with 50 or more full-time equivalent employees, then you will pay a penalty if certain things do not occur. essentially, if you fail to provide a health benefit that

meets the minimum qualifications of essential benefits. or if the health benefits that you provide require your employee to spend more than a certain amount in out-of-pocket costs. you pay a penalty. and if you don't provide coverage at all to your employees, and one of your full-time equivalent employees actually gets coverage through the exchange, subsidized coverage, then you pay a penalty and the penalty varies from $2,000 to $3,000 per employee after a certain number of employees are exempted, 30. so it's really for employers with 50 full-time employees or more. so small employers, small employers is defined as

"employers with 0-49 full-time employees." are exempt from the affordable care act and they are exempt from the penalty. at the same time, there is an interest on the part of the federal government to help small employers, if they are interested, provide health insurance for their employees. and the exchange for small businesses is an opportunity to do that. the federal government has created an opportunity for small businesses, a subset of small businesses, those with 0-25 employees, where the average salary of the employees overall is less than $50,000 a year. those small employers can receive a tax credit equal to 50% of the cost of providing health insurance. and they can get that through

the exchange. and so it's an opportunity for small employer, even though they are not required to take any action under the affordable care act, if they are interested in doing so, allowing them to do. so because it's clearly the understanding of the federal government and the state that one of the reasons that small employers have been unable to provide health insurance is because affordability and the tax credit makes it more affordable for those employees to offer health insurance that really on par with what a large employer might be able to offer their employee. so that is in a nutshell the key components of the affordable care act. let me first say before delving

into some of the questions, there are still a number of unanswered questions around the intersection between the two. the mayor's office, along with the office of small business, department of public health, the office of labor standards and enforcement, has started meetings with city attorney's office to really get legal opinions upon what the intersections should be. and may be as a result of what are two very important pieces of legislation. one at local level and one at the federal level around expanding health care coverage. until we have received those answers from the legal perspective, there certainly will be a number of policy questions that at this point we are unable to provide definitive information on. but certainly we'll be able to come back to this commission

when there is clarity on the legal aspects and then the policy positions that fall from that. i understand that a few of the issues relate to no. 1, whether or not the health care security ordinance and its provision with health reimbursement accounts will be modified and certainly that is something that we're looking at and certainly the office of labor standards and enforcement and matt goldberg can certainly respond to any questions that you have on this issue. we are looking at -- we do know that under the affordable care act stand-alone hras, health reimbursement accounts are not considered to meet the mandate of providing a health insurance product.