working, commuting during off side peak hours, peak hours, resources -- back at that time there wasn't so much working from home, but there needs to be a new version of that. so, the demand management side is something that especially as the city is planning to grow much more into soma, we need the demand -- new demand management tools and the capacity expansion. so, those are a few things that i wanted to highlight and the themes are also summarized in this sheet. everything is on our website. and we're looking for feedback on the investment scenarios and the policy recommendations. >> great, thank you. any commissioner questions? commissioner dooley. >> i wanted to check back in on the proposed congestion pricing. in the northeast corridor, i work with a lot of the merchant associations in that area and i would really recommend you take

a closer look at that and not be sweeping such a large area and because the hours proposed are when all the businesses and restaurants are getting deliveries, they're all going to be having to pay surcharges. it's a heavily residential area also, so, you know, residence are not going to be real happy that they're going to have to, you know, pay a toll to go in and out of their own home areas. i really -- you know, i understand the congestion pricing and i think it's a good idea, but i really would urge you to kind of go back to looking at perhaps points that commuters that come into our city during the day, say from marin, oakland, somewhere on the southern border, could be captured more accurately and not catching so many people in such a large corridor. i think that that would be

something that we would all in that northeast area would be interested in working with you on to make sure that it really achieved its purpose and does not penalize a broad group of business and residents. >> thank you very much. i really appreciate that and really well put comment. just want to explain how the idea of congestion pricing appears in this plan, this long-range plan. it's one of the techniques for demand management that we analyze. so, we asked the question, looking at san francisco's goals for where we want to get between now and 20 40, what would it take to achieve them. so, we created some so-called aspirational scenarios where we said, okay, this is san francisco's locally adopted greenhouse gas emission reduction goal. this is san francisco's most split goal, the mta board has a [speaker not understood] goal. this is sort of the condition of our pavement infrastructure now and the city has an adopted

goal for payment. so, what would it take? what we were finding is it had to take both increases in supply for the new transit as well as the demand management. and that was what i was mentioning before. and i think as folks in the commission know, congestion pricing is peak period congestion pricing is one of those demand management types of tools. it's not the only one, though. so, i guess what this plan -- the message that this plan tries to put out is to let our board know and let san franciscans know we need both sides to get towards our goal. so, the next step of identifying the right demand management tools at the right time is an ongoing work item. so, congestion pricing we identify as one of those tools in the bag that we should

continue to consider when we need it, or as we're growing and where it's needed, and that gets to your point, kathleen, or commissioner dooley, excuse me. and there are other tools. so, our board, for instance, when they adopted the congestion pricing feasibility study, one of their recommendations was look at a parking alternative. look at some other alternatives. and that -- the parking work, parking alternative work is funded and it's underway. i think it's just -- i think it's sort of the beginning stages of that study. i'll mention to that team that this came up today in your comments. other work as far as advancing idea of congestion pricing is a funded activity within our budget. so, it's just that parking alternative that's being studied. that's what this plan says about congestion pricing. >> i sympathize with it also. i live and work near the levi's

plaza area and i am unfortunately very aware of how many commuters come in every single day and take up all the street parking in that area. so, you know, obviously the other part of that will have to be getting those folks that are commuting in from outlying counties to get out of those cars. >> yes, yes. and make sure that they have, you know, reliable alternatives that people actually want to take. >> any other commissioner questions? let's have public comment on item number 8. do we have any members of the public here? seeing none, public comment is closed. well, thank you for your overview today, and i'm sure we'll be talking a lot. >> i hope so. i'm going to be back regularly and appreciate your time. >> great, thank you. next item, please.

>> item 9, presentation ~ presentation and discussion on findings from surveys administered to the city's neighborhood economic development organizations and 10 city departments. this is a discussion item. and we have a presentation by ken stram, 2bridge communications who is the consultant that undertook this experiment work. >> good afternoon, mr. stram. >> good afternoon. [speaker not understood]. my name is ken stram. i'm the president of 2bridge communications, we're a public relations and small business consulting firm. i was hired to conduct customer satisfaction surveys of neighborhood economic development organizations, the nidos and also city departments to get their feedback on the operations of the office of small business and small business assistance center. the he occasion for this was, you know, the fifth anniversary of the office of small business. we thought this would be a good opportunity to gather feedback from people about the performance. so, we met with -- there was a lot of planning that happened before the survey took place. we met with the staff on

numerous occasions to discuss the goals of this survey, and in particular the protocol reaching out to city departments. and we ended up -- we reached out to all the organizations at least three times, i think much more than that. we ended upped talking to 10 nidos in 10 city departments and the lists are contained in the report. we'll get to them in a few minutes. so, in general, the summary, to super summarize it, there was very high, high satisfaction with professionalism, the customer service, and the knowledge of the staff at the office of small business and the small business assistance center. and there was somewhat lower feedback on the communications and referrals. so, what i'm going to do, so, you have this document in front of you, it's a 25-page document so i'm going to quickly run through the different pieces of the department and spend a little bit more time on the -- some of the charts and then the recommendations.

so, the questions, we have similar questions to the nido city department on page 22, we had a few extra questions for economic neighborhood organizations. we started with departments and nidos to gather feedback and also to refresh the office of small business about the role that these different organizations play with small business [speaker not understood]. some of this information, i think, is really helpful so we asked the neighborhood economic development organizations and the city departments why do small businesses come to you or the top 3 to 5 reasons they come to you. what are the common areas of confusion, and also what do the small business owners need to do to be prepared for successful meeting with you. ~ nedos and, so, let's -- if you can go to page 7, i realize i have limited time. i'm going to fly through a couple of the graphs. this is where the nedo feedback

begins. again, if you see overall customer satisfaction, these were very high. we asked the questions based on a scale of 1 to 5, 1 was very dissatisfied. 5 was very satisfied. so, for the most part they scored very high. when it came to whether the small business assistance center, office of small business understands your organization, and also the quality and appropriateness of the referrals, lets that scored a little bit lower. if you flip the page, you can see that, again, most of the organizations were satisfied with these areas. there were one or two outliers. and referrals was i think particularly sensitive issue with the nedos in particular. it was my experience working at one of the neighborhood economic development organizations, i think the ones that are removed, more removed or sort of geographically

removed, frankly, they fell a little bit out of the loop and they felt they weren't getting as many referrals as the other organizations. one person said very dissatisfied. so, that dropped down the score. and again you see for year 3 on page 8, the overall customer satisfaction and with professionalism, it was a 4.8. so, it doesn't get much higher than that. on page 9, now we're getting into communications. so, with general customer service the organization scored very high. with communications they scored a little bit lower and so there are a lot of neutral responses. one of the questions was are you satisfied with sbc's communications and a number of people indicated they do not regularly receive information from the sbc, office of small business and the small business assistance center. so, that's very easily fixable. and the chart figure 5, basically we asked about whether they received the newsletters. and a number of people said they know other people in my organization receives the newsletters, but i don't receive it. i haven't received it for

awhile. we're going to recommend refreshing the e-mail list and make sure people receive the e-mail newsletters. that's a quick summary of the nedo responses. if you go to page 12, this is where the city department feedback begins. and, again, looking at figure 8 at the bottom of the page on page 12, you see that the understanding -- here the department felt that osb had higher understanding than the nedos of the role the department plays. and overall satisfied and very satisfied for all these answers. if you turn the page again, at the bottom of page figure 10, professionalism, they scored a 4.78. you can see the city departments feel the office is very professionally run. we also collected,s again, it was a confidential survey, but we did gather some wonderful verbatim feedback.

few call outs where we had verbatim responses captured. so, you can see again from straight from the horse's mouth on page 14 how the city departments felt that the office of small business and the assistance center benefited with their work. in particular, i realize i've been around a long time, i realize some of these people, they joined -- they started their position after the office of small business was founded. so, but the people who had been around longer than four years definitely recognized how conditions improved after the office of small business was started. and i think -- so, one of the things with the nedos, there is a culture of referrals. so, that question made sense to them. they were happy because they got the referrals or maybe they were disappointed because they didn't get as many referrals. with the city departments, the question of do you make referrals to the office of small business if you have a small business owner in front of you who you think needs more information, that sort of came

as a little bit from left field. and, so, a couple people said, no, we don't do this, we don't refer people back to the office of small business, we don't ask if they've already been to the office of small business, but they would be happy to do that if there was a protocol in place. there is a pretty easy fix that could increase referrals to the office of small business and making sure the city departments start to engage in this culture of referrals. , and so, i just want to go through the recommendations again very quickly, starting on page 3. so, i think if these were customer satisfaction problems, then i wouldn't be able to make strong recommendations. but since they're mostly communications issues that need to be addressed, we just have a couple of very simple fixes i think which would improve all our customer satisfaction. so, again, the organizations that interact less frequently with the office of small business, they're the ones that had higher dissatisfaction rates. so, just having more regular communications, both for the

nedos and for the city departments. for the nedos it would be the regular newsletters. get on a regular schedule, refreshing your e-mail as to make sure you have everybody covered who you're working with. also the importance of making referrals to those outlying organizations i think just to make sure that a few times a year you check in and make sure that they're going to be referrals and it's not always just the squeaky wheels that are getting the referrals. so, one of the interesting things that regina wanted us to explore at the bottom of page 3, which is she wanted to know in particular with nedos if they understood the roles the different organizations in city hall that supported small businesses, were they clear on what those different organizations did. so, we asked them to describe their understanding of the office of small business, assistance center, and small business commission and owg. those responses were

confidential, but we did capture the responses. they're on page 2. it was clear the neighborhood of economic development organizations are really leery about where osb stops and where the commission starts. so, again, i think just as a communication strategy to maybe include some e-mail newsletter content just to describe the roles of these different organizations, that would be very helpful. and, again, just communications with city departments. there were a couple departments that only -- i think the ones where it was more complicated conducting the interview or city departments where they only have one form they fill out that affects small businesses, or organizations where really they only deal with small businesses a couple times a year. having an annual visit to each department would help a lot and also i think just, you know, including these city organizations newsletters or reaching out to them and saying, we'd like to describe your organization and the role you play in our next newsletter. so, that was a very fast

presentation, 25-page survey. we really enjoyed this project. again to summarize, the objection levels were very, very high. people loved working with -- they knew everyone that worked in the organization by name. and one director in particular i think had good experiences working with regina when they had to work their ada issues, when they worked on policy issues, they were always very pleased with the relationship they had with the office of small business. >> good. commissioner questions? this is a great report and you always do such good work. this will help me. i'm taking this home. >> me, too. >> i really appreciate, you know, your outreach on this and you really did touch city with the nedos on this. i appreciate this. you did a good job. >> thank you very much. >> do we have public comment on this item? seeing none, public comment is

closed. are there any other commissioner questions? any other questions for ken? great job, ken. next item -- can we switch and do [speaker not understood] first before the next item? >> i think rob is -- >> we have to skip item number 10 in order to call number 11. >> commissioners, would you mind if we reversed items number 10 and 11? >> no problem with me. >> no. >> no problem. >> we have a motion? >> i move. >> second. >> all in favor? >> aye. >> okay, let's switch 10 and 11. >> that brings us to item number 11, presentation of a small business commission certificate of honor recognizing rob black, executive director of the golden gate restaurant association, as part of the sbc's "small business recognition program".

>> so, thank you, commissioners. i'm honored today to recognize rob black, but somewhat on a sad note. i don't know if you're all aware, but rob is going to be leaving the golden gate restaurant association. and, so, i thought we have to recognize him for all the work that he has done as executive director. and, so, on this monday, november 18, the small business commission is honored to recognize rob black as the executive director of the golden gate restaurant association as the executive director, you've worked tirelessly to promote san francisco's restaurant industry ~ as a strong and essential part of san francisco's economy. as an executive director, you have been excellent at articulating the needs and repairing the reputation of the golden gate restaurant association and the restaurant industry to san francisco's city government.

you have also been an invaluable partner to the office of small business and the small business commission in advocating for reasonable public policy discussions and the betterment of regulatory conditions for restaurants. for these reasons, the small business commission commends rob black for the contributions that you've made during your tender tenure at the golden gate restaurant association ~ and wishes you continued success in your new endeavors. (applause) >> commissioner white. >> rob, as you know, this is a very sad for me, being a restaurant owner here in san francisco. although i do wish you well, i know you're moving on to bigger and better things. however, i wanted to personally thank you for the work that you've helped us with, david and i with 1300. without your leadership and the

ggre, we certainly could not have gone through the obstacles that we went through. and i know you've been a big support to all restaurants in san francisco and i know this is a very sad moment. you've done the job very well. >> thank you. >> i'd just like to comment as well because i worked with you, rob, on many, many items here in the last -- lots of years actually. and i know you're going on to do bigger and better things. you're still going to be around so we still have some battles here. but with the golden gate restaurant association, you've done an awesome job. we talked earlier about entertainment and late night, you know. restaurants are part of that and the reputation san francisco has on restaurants, i mean, you carried that mantle. so, i can't thank you enough for all your help you've done with small businesses. you've done an awesome job and i wish you continued success. >> thank you. >> hopefully we'll see you up here again. >> yes. and one more thing to add. we're still going to be calling

you. regina and i have already discussed this. [laughter] >> absolutely, absolutely. well, i'm truly touched, commissioners. regina, thank you so much. it means a lot -- it means a lot coming from the folks who i have spent, since my time at city government, working for alioto, ggra, a decade working on behalf of. so, i'm very honored that you would take the time to honor me. it just, it really does -- it's very touching. i have had the privilege over the last three years to represent what i would term an entrepreneurial artist in restaurantures. while they're an ornery bunch at times, they are a beautiful part of what makes san francisco special. and when taken in the ag he re

gate, what you see is the restaurant industry, all of those 4,000, 5,000 small businesses he help make san francisco the tourist driver and build its economy. ~ aggregate tourism and hospitality is really our number one economic driver and san francisco, it's the primary driver of that economy. i've been honored to work on behalf of those people and this beautiful city and the bay area's restaurant industry. but also one of the things, it is while i think we've had difficult challenges and i feel like the association and the board of directors of the ggra have taken those challenges on in a very positive and meaningful way in really trying to do right by the city in my time at the association, so, i've been very proud of what

we've been able to accomplish. you do have to look back at the end of the day and think about what makes san francisco great in that particular job that i had, and at the end of the day my job was to make sure you were well fed and well drunk in san francisco. i can't do that, i might not be doing much of anything. so, we've had great partners to work with. regina has been such a great partner. i've known her since her time at the board of supervisors as well. we were aides together. and to watch her growth on behalf of small business in the city, and to have played a small role in making to make sure this office was properly funded and staffed so that we could do this work in the city, that's another area where i'm very proud. so, thank you for this. it truly is a very special thing to me and i appreciate it very much. and i continue -- i look

forward to continuing to work with many if not all of you in the future because i will be working around and doing community work and doing -- part of, you know, part of my new responsibilities will be a broader sense of systemic sustainability and how you can integrate economic sustainability within communities. and part of that aspect is working with small business -- working with small businesses to invest in those because that's how you build that social and economic fabric. so, i look forward to continuing to work with you in the future and thank you very much. >> thank you. >> thank you.

[speaker not understood] >> [inaudible]. >> okay, next item. >> that brings us back to item number 10, discussion and possible action on preparation for and documents to transmit to the sfmta board of directors in advance of a joint meeting of the small business commission and sfmta board of directors on december 9, 2013. this is a discussion and possible action item. >> so, commissioners, we have

our joint meeting with the sfmta scheduled for december 9th. so, i wanted to take the opportunity to review with you -- to get some of your goals and objectives of what you would like to accomplish with the hearing. we did have the one meeting in may 6 with sfmta director ed russ kin. so, outlined in your packet ~ are a list of those recommendations. we've color-coded them. there's been other recommendations that have been put forward. the yellow are the recommendations. and then in listening to the small businesses in other meetings, there's additional recommendations that are listed after the blue section which are some questions. so, i wanted to find out from you -- we have the list of

recommendations. the one that aren't at the top of the page, are you interested in moving them to the top of the page to present to the sfmta board, some of the reasonings for the recommendations? i've put some bullet points for some of the reasoning for the recommendations based upon comments that i've heard. do those reflect what your recommendations are? and then, christian, may i borrow your packet? i'm missing my section of -- i'll share -- >> actually -- >> we've got it. >> and then also -- so, there is for the sfmta, what would you like to have, some questions -- what question do you have? what presentations would you

like to hear from the sfmta staff and what discussions would you like to have with the sfmta board as we have this joint meeting? and, so, i think for me it's a little more clear on, you know, what we -- what some of your questions and issues you want to present. now, the sfmta board, you know, most commissions or many commissions, they have municipal codes of which they govern themselves by. they have different things, you know, that we have the san francisco's transit first policy that govern them self-by in terms of making decisions. ~ this commission is an advisory body so we don't quite have that same sort of structure. so, i'd like to hear if there are things that you would like to have presented to the sfmta board either for reading materials or as a presentation regarding small business to

present at that joint hearing. so, we don't necessarily have to answer every -- you don't have to provide absolute answers today, but this is kind of an ongoing discussion. we will be meeting -- we will start meeting with the sfmta's board secretary to start orchestrating the meeting and getting the list of presentations that need to be had to allow staff on both sides to be able to prepare for that. so, i just want to open it up and get your feedback and direction on what you would like to accomplish. >> commissioner ortiz. >> first of all, i want to thank both of you for comprising that. i read that, it's very thorough, a lot of ideas we've had, seen them on paper, that's awesome, thank you. as i started reading it, i started seeing that we started like kind of focusing maybe on

like certain things that are more like specific detail specific. one of my things that just popped up and it never came to my head when we were, you know, having these conversations, is when i was in business i was part of the lbe program and my experience with sfmta with the lbe program was excellent with their off-street parking division. so, i know now, you know, working with a lot of community organizations and small businesses that the sfmta is one of the biggest contractors in the city because they say muni and various other departments. i was just wondering since my experience was good and i hope my business to grow back then ~ helped my business to grow back then, i was wondering if that's the case for other departments in the mta [speaker not understood] lbe [speaker not understood], requirements and municipal codes can be very daunting. is there resources like in the off-street parking division with the sfmta to --