celebrated not just in america, but all over the world and i'm honored that we are kicking this event. i would like to thank the mayor for bringing arbor day back to san francisco. this is our 8th arbor day. i will welcome mayor lee to the stage. >> thank you the dpw, the recreation department, to all of those who helped us in working today. arbor day, it is an annual celebration that we have struggled very hard to make sure this city appreciate because the trees are part of a great answer and solution to

reducing carbon emissions and be sure we have greenery and beautification for our citizens. a lot of my friends celebrated chinese new years in china and this year for chinese new years, wilhelm wundt wilhelm wundt of the one of the gifts they gave to the employees is an air mask. if you don't start contributing to its purification, you don't get the kind of air like you do in san francisco. this is why trees are so important to our nature and this is what i love about the city because when it comes to our environment, we do make some serious investments, whether it's green buildings, waste management or going into

electric vehicles or getting everybody to change their habits, one of the habits that we want to continue having is planting trees. and so every year for the last 8 years, we have select a signatory to plant and we have taken the liberties of honoring people that have contributed to the quality of life for all of us. in past years, people like rosa parks, caesar chavez, people that we know and are familiar with, along with people that we are not that familiar with but have made some great contributions. today we thought we would take this opportunity to celebrate an icon of san francisco. the brown twin sisters have been with us for many decades. mary is here today, she's here in

celebration and memory of her sister as we all are and we want to take this opportunity to use the arbor day to have a cedar tree, a tree that will grow taller than mary or i. it will grow to be a hundred feet tall. it will be a tree that will be celebrated here in san francisco for generations to come and we thought it would be not only appropriate, but we thought it would be our honor by planting this tree in recognition of vivian and her wonderful contributions to our city. and we are especially blessed with maryann honoring

us with her presence. it's not that easy for her to get around these days but she has and continues to be part of an incredible twin sisters. but now she's also missing vivian as much as we are and we felt this would be a proper way to create a celebratory atmosphere on how we miss vivian, how much she meant to us and take this opportunity for arbor day to plant this tree in her name. how is that, maryann for a great celebration? >> wonderful. i know my sister from heaven is watching. >> all right. she said vivian is up there applauding us and we have a great time of celebrate. ing. with that, supervisor lee, you should

know, it's always been under dispute as to who is supposed to be responsible for this piece of land. was it the highway folks, the residents who built their homes here, was it dpw, we are trying to gift it to rec's and park for nothing because it's an incredible responsibility. look at how beautiful this place it. we do keep it up. it does barrier the intense traffic that we deal with here. i travel quite a bit and everyone i know always glances here and takes a breath of fresh air a midst all of this traffic. this adds beauty and value to this

area. i would like to give this proclamation to maryann and have her treasure this and the permanent memory of her sister and how we celebrate people who are part of our culture as the brown sisters have been and also have been on literally every page of our wonderful visitors galleries, they have been in movies, commercials, they have become a part of what we see in san francisco and how we advertise ourselves around the world as a great place to live and work in. with that, with this proclamation, declares today to be vivian brown tree day in san francisco and also appropriately names this california cedar to be the tree for vivian brown in san

francisco. >> beautiful. thank you all for coming. >> all right. like the mayor said, this is a california tree. the tree bark was used for making medicine for people with stomach aches. it's also been used as a wind break and been used in many many parks. tree comes from the cypress family and the botanical name. i'm happy we are adding such a tree to san francisco and to honor the vivian brown sisters.

now like we've done in many of our events, it's always an honor to introduce the supervisor of the district and like he said, we are very familiar with this piece of land. this land has had many trees that act as a buffer to the neighborhood and the neighborhood appreciates it but we are still trying to figure out who is the legal owner of it, but in that process, dpw and the neighbors always join and the one thing we do know is we need to take care of the trees and we do that with that, i introduce the supervisor norman yee. >> thank you, i'm just one of many san franciscans celebrating this day, arbor okay for vivian brown. i'm so glad that we have an opportunity to have a celebration in this district 7

to be able to celebrate more intensely this great icon of san francisco and i just hope that i get to see the tree when it's a hundred feet tall. thank you very much. [ applause ] >> thank you. also as part of our partnership as many of you know we partner with many of the non-profits i see san francisco beautiful here. welcome, kristin who is a great partner with us and we also partner with other great cities. i would like to ask mr. -- to come up and talk to us if you would. >> thank you. it's an honor to be here to celebrate arbor day with you. this is an okay to celebrate our trees, in 4,000 open acres of our city we are

able to enjoy and benefit from over 140,000 trees and a couple interesting facts on arbor day, there are trees and responsible for the creation and monterey pine and different types of trees which you can find in the panhandle which was a laboratory to find what best trees can grow and they settled on those three specific trees. what i would like to say and i can thank another partner mohammed a friend of the forest who cares for the city so well. i also want to give a big shout

out to the men and women who take care of our trees, the gardeners, laborers. mary, i would like to end, did you read the book about a tree that gives and gives to a person who started out as a young boy and all throughout life he came to visit that tree and took a little bit from that tree until the tree had nothing left to give. i think you and your sister have given so much to this city and have contributed to its spirit that there is nothing that is more fitting in honoring the two of you than planting a new tree to give and give back to the community. so congratulations and i'm over joyed to be part of this honor. >> san francisco [inaudible]

you take care of people and that is wonderful. we have always enjoyed living in san francisco. it's you people, people that make this world. what would this world be with no people. so we love san francisco. never leave your heart in san francisco. always come and find it here. [ applause ] . >> okay. and also as part of my job being responsible for many trees and i can tell you that this has become one of the harder parts of my job and we have gone out and tried to get people more involved and between the right of way there are about a thousand trees and

from the parks about other 120,000 trees. we are working very hard to make sure we preserve that asset. many of our trees have aged and we need to start a process of reforestation and it involves good planning. i will ask the veteran of the department who has the policy group to advise us on what we should do as the city. melanie. >> thank you. good afternoon, everyone. it is an honor to be here on behalf of the department with all of to you celebrate arbor day. this is a department of the environment, one of our favorite days. what

we support is the climate program. we look at what is our carbon inventory and where is our carbon emission come from. we know it comes from the environment and we are working very diligently to mitigate the carbon sectors. we know that many trees is the answer to reduce the carbon emissions further. in addition it's critical to our adaptation strategy thinking about if we can't ward off, trees will continue to help us with storm waters and they boost property value where they have a robust

urban forest. i wanted to mention when i first moved to san francisco, i lived on russian hill, i would sometimes take the cable car and i would often see you and your sister see both of them smiling and the warmth they shared as twins, it brought a smile to my face everyday. as you said before you started your sister is smiling down today and it will live on for both of you, thank you. >> we are going to lower the tree and plant the tree in honor of vivian. miriam i'm so happy that you are here with us today >> i have glad to have seen all of you and hope you have a

great day and never forget the beloved city of san francisco. >> we should turn around and get the shovels. after 3. 1, 2, 3. all right. [ applause ] . all right.

okay. everyone ready to get started? first i would like to thank everyone for coming today. it's an important day. before we get started i would like to bring the mayor up and talk about the importance of this contract and these hotel members, the team and the city of san francisco. it's a very positive day. so mayor, c'mon up. >> thank you, michael. first, i want to thank all the work force that are standing behind me, the men and women who make this hotel a success for the city and i would like to thank you for your leadership and last time i was in the same room with mike casey we were

announcing the warriors deal. a lot of good paying jobs. today is about our no. 1 industry? san francisco which is tourism and the hotels and their conclusion with the labor union to come to an agreement that extends perhaps 5-and-a-half years of agreeing to a labor contract for all the 750 union members working in this hotel. you know, san francisco is incredible. i just came back from the international city cities of cork ireland, paris, france. they marvel at how well we have done things here in our great city and keep it going and remake it. they also have a sense that anytime their members come here, they are experiencing a huge amount of

warmth from people who serve them. i know the quality of our hotels is one of the main stays of why we are such a really and successful tourist center for all over the world, not just in san francisco or california, but all over the world. these workers who have in past years probably didn't have such smooth negotiations in the past, we are reminded of that through some couple of decades where everybody struggled, but it's quite apropos that we have stressed the important collaboration of talking with people and making sure we understand their needs and necessities early on that not only are they going to have wages but a health plan and pension for years to come. when

you have hotel workers, working class people who can take care of their family and themselves and have contributed in the workplace contributed to the quality of the whole city and affects other industries as well. i know that being the mayor of the city for two years. i know with repercussions that this agreement has with other hotels and other industries that want to be successful in the city. you have to treat your workers with the highest quality their deserve and when they are happy, we are all happy and i'm happy. that's the goal of being in san francisco is that you have to have a happy work force, you have to have them looking that they don't have doubt and they are taking care of their families and taking care of visitors. this hotel is the largest hotel in san francisco, 1900 rooms and we

are going to use them up is as much as we can when we invite organizations like the warriors to come or america's cup or the super bowl bid that we are putting together. this is going to be one of the center hotels and i will be the first to say that i'm very proud of this work force, of what you have done today for taking care of not only yourselves, but your families and that you are willing to take care of this city and my kudos to mr. casey and mr. dundey. and how important it is that we do find our way forward in agreements particularly significant agreements like this labor agreement between the hotel workers and the hotels themselves. this is an incredible part of our economy, but also an incredible part of who we are as a city. the hotel

is really the first thing that a lot of visitors against -- get a sense of the warmth that they feel everyday. i have felt that going to hotels world class hotels. you find people working with a smile because they have confidence that they are taking care of themselves as well. congratulations, everybody. congratulations to the city of san francisco, too. >> we'll have the team members. i just like to say on behalf of the mayor and local team members, this deal is good for city of san francisco. it takes care of our team members, it takes care of our guest. but what's going on, the building, construction, the new companies coming to the city, our goal is to welcome them and if we have labor peace, we have a positive

contract for our team members, they will feel comfortable coming in time and time again. if anyone hasn't seen the cranes coming into the city, we want to welcome them as well, the hilton san francisco union square. we want to welcome them and be a part of it and the city. thank you. >> i'm mike casey, president of the united local, i want to thank you mayor for the leadership in not just creating and bringing new jobs to san francisco but making sure they are good jobs, quality jobs, where workers can retire in dignity for their families. mr. mayor you have been showing that leadership since you have

been appointed. we want to encourage you in advancing those principles. thanks very much. and then to the hilton, mike an did dunne and the leadership who took a chance here. they took quite a rest while the rest of the industry was actually preparing for a major war with our union over the course of the next, what would have been probably the next year or two, the hilton corporation said maybe there is a way we can avoid the drama and turmoil that is brought to this city all too frequently because of concessionary bargaining that some employers try to impose on the union. so, after several months we have reached an early agreement, our contract doesn't expire until august 2013, so the hilt on and

our union reached and agreement. i think this shows a commitment to go the highroad. often there are too many hotels in this city that want to go the low road, the meridian and the hyatt corporation have been notorious for the way they treat their workers. mike dunne has shown corporations there is a better way of guaranteeing customer service and for workers that provide that customer service. this contract provides three things: no. 1, addresses food and beverage issues that is going to be an

issue with this hotel where we have to get some of those under control and make sure those restaurants are successful. no. 2, this agreement strengthens and secure our job provision in the contract. strengthens the language called success or ship which guarantees the workers keep their contract and jobs. no. 3, most importantly what it does is provide within the term of the contract in each of the next 5 years, the right for the union and the hotel to make sure that workers are going to get fully paid health care, pension, spare wages. the way that that will come about is we have negotiated $6.92 for the term of the contract that averages about 4 percent each year of the agreement. the way the agreement operates is the

union will convene meetings with our rank and file leadership each year and prior to july 14th of each year, the leadership after following up on meetings with our members will determine how much money is appropriate for health care, how much money is appropriated to other benefits, how much money will be appropriated for pension and how much money will be allocated for wages. so, this contract secures all those things, but above all else what it does is it allows our union in 6 cities toronto, boston, chicago, los angeles, hawaii and san francisco, it gives those 6 cities where we have labor peace. this is a 6-city coordinated effort where we have negotiated with the hilton corporation for a 5 year

agreement that will allow all those cities and elsewhere to focus on the unorganized. there are thousands of workers that do this work. unfortunately those workers don't have health care for their families, those workers don't have a pension or retirement security and are often minimum wage. this allows to us focus our energies and resources to give them the kind of voice that workers and union properties have. that's the main reason why this local too has embraced this effort and i want to thank the rank and file hilton.99 percent workers voted to ratify this. thank you for being here. [ applause ]

>> what i want to do is introduce amy wong who is a room cleaner, she's one of the leaders of the hotel, jacob is going to speak, he's a doorman and guadalupe chavez who is a room cleaner and a member of our executive board. >> hello, my name is amy win. i have worked as a housekeeper for many years. health insurance is the most important part of the contract for all of us. first this contract we can keep our family health care. now that we hilton workers have a great contract, we are going to start with the other hotel workers in san an