and merrill lynch and i want to say a special thank you to bank of america for sponsoring this event today so we can celebrate. we have a board member that hasn't hasn't arrived yet. is dennis here? this is a well designed building that fits into this urban care. there are things that you might not know that i will share with you today and you may have all of this history. this site used to be a good will warehouse and damaged in the 89 earthquake and was vacant for a

long time. in about 2007 the parcel was programmed for affordable ownership housing but unfortunately because of the economic downturn and the mortgage melt down it was reenvisioned and fortunately then into affordable rental housing. that was coupled with the incredible demand for renters in the city of san francisco and allowed the project to move forward. the site is very small. you wouldn't quite know it considering there are 50 affordable units on this site but it's over a quarter of a acre, .27 acres and shaped like a t and wide top and skinny handle and from a design point of view it's challenging and from a staging construction view difficult. we're lucky and

grateful to the team that met the challenges and came up with an amazing design and able to build the building and i don't know if you know this but we're excited they were honored with innovation award with design build issues and i have to say that was an incredibly well deserved award and congratulations to the team for getting that award. [applause] so demand for rental housing in san francisco really all of the bay area but especially san francisco continues to sky rocket. our leasing team receives more than 2800 applications for the 60 units here and while we are excited to welcome the 60 households that are residents here our work is not done. there are many, many households searching for affordable housing opportunities here in san francisco. but again as i say we're very excited about our new residents and in fact you will be hearing

from one of wally gilbert and tell about the importance and for the residents this is making a tangible difference everyday. affordable rents means that families can pay for other essential items such as food, health care, transportation, education, child care and this is really important of course for the residents but it's really important to us as well. our work goes beyond the bricks and mortar and even though it's a beautiful building we're proud you but this is opportunities to connect with each other and programs and service that help them thrive so with that on with the program. it is my pleasure to introduce the next speak are, the executive director of the san francisco community and investment and infrastructure

tiffany boheath. [applause] >> thank you anne. i am thrilled to join all of you this morning as we commemorate the shared vision, mission and valued. this incredible housing department for 60 low income families located in the heart of soma is really a testament to that shared vision. it is has been 20 years since we first acquired this site for affordable housing and through the last seven years and bridge has been our partner to build these homes to stabilize lives and improve this neighborhood by doing so. 474 that toma wouldn't have happened without the leadership and support of our mayor, mayor ed lee. the mayor set a city wide goal of 30 housing units by 2020 with the majority of the homes within

reach of lower and middle income families. with this development and the other city funded developments [inaudible] also by bridge down the road and trans bay and hitler gardens in district 10 the city is well on the way to meeting that goal and this is no accident. this is due to the mayor's commitment and tireless effort that will help ensure san francisco remains a vibrant city for all san franciscans. i want to acknowledge and thank kim ki -- supervisor kim and this is backed by her vision and leadership by the district supervisor that we push ourselves and we push our development partners like bridge to provide quality housing for those in need. certainly we owe a tremendous thank you to bridge. it's been a long and

windy road when you were selected as developer in 2007 but it was worth it as we stand here today. working through the complex process and san francisco and the economy was wavering then demonstrates your commitment to affordable housing that improves the economic status of residents and advance the revitalization of this 6th street corridor. certainly this day wouldn't be possible without the advocacy and the stewardship of the south of market project committee and i'm not sure if i see any members here today but really unsung heroes. without them our community partners in this district we wouldn't be here today. they supported the former redevelopment agency's efforts really to develop in the last 10 years many units of new

construction, the plaza apartments, even rehab hotels in san francisco. it's really because of their stewardship and advocacy and certainly i wanted to take a moment to acknowledge the work and dedication of the commission of community investment and infrastructure, our chair is here today along with our commissioner and former redevelopment commissioner. today would not have happened and our district 6th representative commissioner as well. thank you commissioners. today would not have happened without the commission's work and dedication to building sustainable and thriving communities. consistent with the commission's objectives and goals 474na toma provides needed housing and create jobs for san franciscans. i am proud to say

this development with bridge and contractors have achieved business participation for the professional services contract and well over 1/3 of the very people working on this building are from san francisco, and certainly lastly i would like to acknowledge, and i know there is an acknowledgment component as part of the program but these folks that worked tirelessly day to day on the city side deserve acknowledgment and we wouldn't be here without olson lee who serves with the mayor lee of community development. i think you involved with this for 20 years -- 18 years. pretty close. i think that takes it and the mayor lee staff and kevin, anne romero and takes a village at least on the city side because it's taken so long and our housing staff, george bridges with contract compliance and focialer agency staffers who

aren't here today and deserve a shout out and michelle davis and others and certainly i see my colleagues in the city and paula johnson from the mayor lee on disability and she did the disability check on this building, certainly a labor of love and because of the mayor's charge our director has his hands full but he moved this along and certainly the planning department which permitted it and i want to thank you all the for your participation and i will introduce our site development leader with bank of america. [applause] >> good morning. what a beautiful day for our grand opening. i am ari. i am here

representing bank of america merrill lynch that invested in the land of over $32 million to make this beautiful, beautiful project. i would like to thank bridge housing for your hard work on this, the community on office investment and infrastructure -- did i get it right? >> [inaudible] >> the city of san francisco, and the many, many organizations and people that worked tirelessly to get this beautiful project built. today we're celebrating 60 new homes that will be permanently affordable to the great and diverse residents of san francisco. bank of america believes that we are better when we are connected and it's true. we are better, stronger city. we live not only next to the founder who created a huge company or the software engineer that works there or the lawyers or the bankers but also

next to our teachers and our firemen and the many families who are having a hard time living in this extraordinarily expensive city. that is why we at bank of america are one of the largest investors and lenders into affordable housing. just here in san francisco for the past 10 years bank of america has invested over $400 million and 27 projects to make this a better city. those investments have leveraged over 1.2 billion dollars, created $54 billion in jobs for people that live here. the bank supports the mayor's vision of building many more units in san francisco including 10,000 permanently affordable units, and we look forward to working on the preservation aspect of

that plan also. i am personally happy and honored to serve on the mayor's task force and we work to innovate and build those 30,000 units. we are honored to work with amazing organizations like bridge housing and the many people here that built this housing and do the good work and fight the good fight so congratulations on building these 60 wonderful homes, and i look forward to many, many more grand openings, and now i would like to invite and the reason why we built this housing wally gilbert to come and speak. [applause] >> thank you ari. good morning

everyone. i am really so honored to be here with you this morning. my name is loli gilbert and live here. i am a certified nursing assistant or a cna. i am self employed and i also work on call duty with the clients. most of my patients are older people who have dementia. i totally appreciate working with seniors because they have so much wisdom. a year ago i lost my husband to cancer. before that we were living a block away from here in a room or a shared place with a friend. i kept praying for a place of my own where i could

enjoy some peace and quiet and privacy. when i had opportunity to move in this building it was an answered prayer. i went to the door of my new apartment for the first time and i had ashes of my husband. i cried and i cried, but they were tears of joy. everything is here. i can walk to all the places i want to go to, to the church, to the farmers market, and to the main library. thank you for everything you have done to make this happen. this is the best place i ever lived. thank you very much. [applause]

>> thank you loli for your account. it really makes our job so much more meaningful hearing stories like yours. good morning. i am project manager at bridge housing. thank you for taking time today to celebrate the successful completion of the beautiful development. this development has been a painstaking labor of love for bridge, the mayor's office of housing and icii and the team of architects, engineers and contractors and consultants who stuck with the project against all odds. i would like to thank several people who have worked tirelessly over the past seven years to get us to this milestone. i want to

congratulate my core team members, mimi, code and chris hunter and richard stacy and staff with stacy architects and our general contractors. thank you so much for your hard work and unflinching commitment. i want to add a special note of thanks to bill moffit who is in the back and the construction manager. this was a challenge and we couldn't have done it without your guidance and perseverance. thank you very much. i would like to thank the constructional engineers and our landscape architects. [inaudible] and casey moore with waterproofing consultants, [inaudible] with applied

materials engineering, [inaudible] engineers charles and associates, treadwell [inaudible] and luke and associates. thanks to several of the project engineers and consultants our auditors and attorneys, many who are listed on the acknowledgment card in the program handout. i want to thank lynn for assisting in the process and the art work and catherine wagner for the creation that compliments the exterior facade and thank you for helping to achieve green certification. we really appreciate mayor lee and his staff and [inaudible] at ocii for providing financial support and assistance and thank members of the south of market project advisory committee and the san francisco planning commission for their support and thank

others and our lender bank of america and thank you to the committees for providing tax credits and bond allocations to the project. thank you to the bridge property management and our finance and accounting department and a big shout out to our marketing team ellen and lynn for putting a wonderful event together. i would like to thank cynthia and others and the leadership team at bridge for their support and guidance and last but not least i want to extend a special note of appreciation to the staff and there are others on the list that were critical to the development. i would like to thank all of you for your efforts. i would now like to invite supervisor jane kim to

say a few words. thank you. [applause] >> if you department think it took a village to build this i think she did an excellent job listing the actors and players that were involved in building the affordable housing in this neighborhood. i live half a block away so i could see all of the construction happening and was so excited about this going up. a couple months ago a number of our residents on mid-market were afraid of getting evicted from their units and they came to our office and one of them that did work with us in the tenderloin said i really need to find other housing. every night i am anxious i don't have a place to live if he raises the rent or evicts me so we et cetera canned

him with an organization and. >> >> and a couple of months later he came by and said he wanted housing here and he came by my house and cried "i didn't know what it was like to have a real home." these are the personal stories of why we do the work that we do and getting paid less so we can get projects like this to the residents of san francisco. i met another woman that grew up like loli and lived in the neighborhood and went to betsy carmichael before it was the actual school and wanted housing here also and how amazing is that that residents that live in the south of market their whole life are able to find equitable homes they can call their own and i can't wait

for the hotel to go up next director lee. project that we have talked much about. we all know how important affordable housing is here in the city. i came out of chinatown community development center, another organization that helps to build affordable housing but also building healthy and complete neighborhoods. it's more than just housing that makes a community healthy, safer and stronger. this is one component in it along with the nonprofits that provide the services to our residents when they are in place. but it is also my honor to work with a mayor that had made affordable housing his top policy priority. maybe some of the mayors will argue about who has done more for affordable housing but i think we can all safely say this is our only mayor that has authentic and meaningful relationship to affordable housing units actual work experience before he came

an official and working in chinatown and with residents and as an attorney helping low income residents. that experience is imcomparable to just saying this is your priority. you have worked with the people that you know will benefit from it and you have lived in affordable public housing and it is my honor then to introduce our mayor, mayor ed lee. [applause] thank you and thank you to bridge housing for your tremendous work. [applause] >> well supervisor kim thank you very much for that introduction. i'm going to join with all the of the comments and certainly acknowledge our long lasting partner bridge housing that you're going to hear more of. they're helping me rebuild public housing as we speak and

reinvision with us. i want to also say in light of supervisor kim's comment about my work previously i have also been a customer of bank of america for 50 years so it's great to see that pay back for the interest. [laughter] -- really good --. i am over joyed to be here to join loli and the residents that will be here in their new homes. we understand the struggles that people have in the city. it is incredibly expensive and it's also we're faced with many other pressure points that cause people to live in some level of concern and fear whether they can be here in the city, whether their jobs will be there for them or the residences and i join with supervisor kim in acknowledging the level of anxiety that exists in the city, and that's why i have to make sure that the city family of

agencies from ocii and the great leaders and the commissioners are working closely with dbi and the house -- office of housing and the incredible resources and niby brothers and working with the office of engineers to the office of disabilities to make sure they're for the residents here and only when they feel comfortable is our job to rest for a minute but we're not resting. i think today is both a celebration but yet another call to action just like last november under construction when we announced our aggressive goal of 30,000 units and 33% affordable but also over 50% of

the housing we're going to build will be reachable with work force that are here that are also feeling a lot of pressure as well. we've got to build more housing and we've got to do it more aggressively and when you look at the numbers here and all of the complicated things we put together whether tax increments, using the ocii's abilities, using acquisition in a creative way working with financial partners you will discover it's incredibly expensive to build affordable housing. you do the math and how are we going to get to the other units for the other thousands of people that are waiting like loli had waited for years to get in and feel more comfortable in this city. it is not only the pressure points in d6. it's all over the city and

we need to produce better and faster so we're going to challenge ourselves. olson you're on the front line for that but you have friends and tom and i and others and ocii have a lot of history to build on but we have to ask ourselves how can we build faster, do more, and build it in the lifetimes and career times that people have so they feel the city is for them as well? so we are and i am saying "we" as the supervisor and i wrestle with not just goals of the city but practically how to do it utilizing the strengths of the economy, the people building market rate housing, how they can contribute more. i suggest that office builders need to understand their link to housing as well, so that they're not just building office buildings or just building market rate units. they all contribute along with the city to make sure we're all contributing to the

building of long lasting sustainable beautifully designed affordable housing like this is. this is yet another call to action and therefore i will always arrive early on these openings where we're handing keys out and celebrating people here because we have an agenda that is a real agenda in the city, and you will read about the struggles that we will have to try to get there. it is my job to make sure that nothing disturbing the resources that we need to build and build faster. we will have things that might distract us, but we will always come to the ultimate conclusion what does it take to build to preserve affordable housing, to build more of it and all the other things that allow people to be successful in this city? i want this city to be for the 100% and i know that they're going to be price points that

price people out of the city. that's why we have to be aggressive in our affordable housing. i need all of you to commit yourself in celebrating this let's do more, be faster and more creative and more risks in this area. that's why we put $96 million in the two year budget to take more risks. we have the ability to do it and do it faster. let's keep working together so more loli's can feel great about the city it is a great city and i am so proud to be the mayor of it. thank you very much. [applause] >> please join us now for the ribbon cutting follow by

refreshments on the ninth floor.

one, two, three, five, four, three, two, one. >> yeah! [applause]