are department of san francisco, i'm tired of all the human suffering that i don't see getting addressed and i want a chance for a board president who is going to look out for all of us. i leave my job site today for a cup of coffee and i see a guy on the ground in his underwear getting arrested. i walk over here and i have to find a police officer because there's a guy with a bat about to attack somebody in the bathroom on larkin and grove. there is a lot of human suffering. i go out my door where i live and there are memorials to young men who have been murdered in the last couple weeks and i want a board president who is going to take all these issues into account and represent the city as a whole, represent my district because i don't know that we always get the representation that we deserve. so, i'm going to urge you to please delay the vote. there is no need to do it today. you deserve a participation of a full board. thank you. >> next speaker. hi, my name is dana rosea.

i spoke at the meeting october 28th and i talked about the high rates of breast cancer in the bay area, especially in marin which has the highest rates of breast cancer in the world. in marin when people learned about hormone replacement therapy, synthetickest throe genoa causing high rates of cancer, heart attacks and strokes, usage plummeted in 66%, in two years invasive breast cancer went down 33%. a 2 to 1 ratio, an astounding drop. suggesting that hrt was playing a significant role in half the cases of breast cancer. the drug companies have been told by leading scientists and medical organizations that synthetic estrogen should not be put on the market until it was thoroughly tested. research from jonas hopkins,

yale university, northwestern university, university of chicago showed that estrogen was causing cancer, blood clots in animal testing. and well might do the same in people. the drug companies chose to disregard this advice and managed to get an fda approval and stayed on the market untested for 60 years. at one point 30 to 50% of post menopausal american women were taking it. it was the most profitable drug in history. and the cancer it caused was very aggressive. it -- women had a 96% greater likelihood of dying from it. it promotes cell growth. i go to marin and around the bay area, talk about these issue, i am getting enormous harassment for doing so. cancer in most of our major diseases are largely

preventable thev thank you very much. >> thank you. next speaker. ~ good evening, i'm theresa [speaker not understood] from north beach, and i'm here to beg you, please, not to make any vote today without a complete full board present. i also want to thank norman yee, supervisor yee for, one, bringing up the issue of free muni for our seniors, working with sda. i see that as a real need. people are too much in isolation right now and this would enable them to use their precious dollars for food and other things while traveling to be with other groups of people and not be alone. i also want to say i didn't know about paula, but i have her recipe for cheesecake that is amazing, but i've been making for 25 years since my

son was in paula's preschool. so, thank you for honoring her and [speaker not understood]. >> next speaker. good evening, president chiu, honorable members of this board of supervisors. frank martinez campo. i'm proud, proudly served on the san francisco labor council, speaking in that capacity. i rise in unison with all the previous labor voices, they eloquently offered their thoughts. i would like to add another one. it appears to me that after the november 4th elections, it's very clear that a very rigid and cold wind has swept this country and that includes san francisco.

that feeling exists amongst the working people in the communities of san francisco. moving forward, i think would increase the feeling of a government that no longer listens to its people and, in fact, rules from above. a thoughtful process to ensure that we're reconciling rather than heating up and accelerating the conflicts that have already been seen so clearly throughout our nation and here in san francisco [speaker not understood] we would like to see after all in conclusion, if our children that were making decision for the kind of society they will live in, and if we delay the vote, have a thoughtful process, we are creating a

better life, less conflict, more security and more legitimacy for those that represent us and ourselves. >> thank you. can i have the next speaker? bobby coleman, san francisco tenants union. and naturally we encourage on item 45 a continuance. of course, doing it in the standard way is going to instill more confidence in this body and in the government process in general, and for that reason the tenants support a delay in the deliberations until the full body can convene. thank you. >> next speaker. i am [speaker not understood] from the tenderloin. i imagine it's hard to elect a president, having seen it done a few time, it's pretty awkward. if you're elected to this body naturally you can do thing for the city. certainly you must imagine you yourself would make a good president.

so, therefore in order to elect one, you have to set some number of, at least, ten out of 11, have to step aside to support somebody else. i imagine it's a difficult thing and certainly it's a decision for you as a board to make. as far as when you make it or when you're not, don't make it, you know, i sat here through the mayor's thing and i was pretty much set up, much more set up than i imagined it to be. if you've got it all set up who the next president is going to be and you have the six votes, save us all some time. i disagree with the progressives sometimes, although i consider myself one to be. it's just a matter of efficiency. >> thank you. next speaker. i'm becoming aware you guys are in need of assistance for a management role. i just want to let you know if you guys need any hope, i'd be happy to help you. my name is kyle and i'm here.

so, if you need help, please let me know. >> thanks for the help. next speaker. good afternoon, mr. president and members of the board of supervisors. i would like to speak about number 45. i believe we should go forth and have the meeting of the whole so you can elect another president of the board of supervisors. i think that president chiu has done an excellent job and i see no reason why the city of san francisco business should come to a halt because a member of the board of supervisors has chosen to be absent again. thank you. (applause) >> are there any other members of the public that wish to speak in general public comment? please step up. good evening, members of the board. i'm peter war field, executive

director of library users association. first of all, i think on item 45 you should find a time when all the members of the board are here. whatever one thinks of the candidates, certainly the one who is not here got a very large number of votes in the highly contested election and clearly has a lot of city support, at least in that election. second, so i recommend you not go forward until the full board can be present, as many prior speakers have just said. second, congratulations to the president of the board for his election and best wish he for serving the public in sacramento starting december 1st. third, i hope that the supervisors -- i would ask the

supervisors to think about any future president of the board and board procedures that follow more closely democratic principles than have come to be standard. a number of ideas with respect to improvements, first of all, to reinstate the three minutes that are legalery required under the sunshine ordinance for public comment rather than the two minutes that have been so long in practice. second, to stop pulling the plug on the microphone when speakers are finishing up what they have to say. third, not to call the sheriff deputies on folks who are peacably making public comment. and instead arresting them, removing them or even just reminding them, all of which are highly intimidating to the folks and certainly the general public. and finally not violating the sunshine ordinance.

>> are there any other members of the public that wish to speak in general public comment? okay. seeing none, general public comment is now closed. [gavel] >> madam clerk, could you go to our adoption without committee reference calendar? >> item 45 through 50 are being considered for immediate adoption without committee reference. a single roll call vote may enact these item if a member object, that matter can be removed and considered separately ~. >> colleague, would anyone like to sever any of these items? >> i would like to sever item 45. >> okay. can we take a roll call vote on the balance of the adoption calendar, items 46 through 50? >> mr. president, i believe supervisor kim has an amendment to make to item 49. >> okay. so, let's do item 49, if we can take a roll call vote on the balance, items 46, 47, 48 and 50. >> supervisor kim? kim aye.

supervisor mar? mar aye. supervisor tang? tang aye. supervisor wiener? wiener aye. supervisor yee? yee aye. supervisor avalos? avalos aye. supervisor breed? breed aye. supervisor chiu? chiu aye. supervisor cohen? cohen aye. supervisor farrell? farrell aye. there are 10 aye. >> those motionses are approved. [gavel] >> before we tab item 45 let's do item 49 quickly. >> 49, mr. president? >> yes. >> okay, item 49 is a motion to schedule the board of supervisors to sit as a committee of the whole acting in its capacity as the successor agency to the former redevelopment agency to hold a public hearing on november 25th, 2014 to approve actions by the commission on community investment infrastructure to subordinate property interests and the site designated for affordable housing in the transbay redevelopment project area. >> supervisor kim?

>> was supervisor avalos before me on the roster? >> supervisor avalos on item 49? >> i want to speak on item 45. i'd like to just resolve item 49. >> thank you. on item 49 we are submitting an amendment which sets the date which we sit on the committee of the whole on the interim finance for the transbay center. so, this amendment nearly sets the date of the committee of the whole tuesday december 9 at 3:00 p.m.. >> okay. supervisor kim has made a motion to amend the motion, seconded by supervisor avalos. without objection, the motion to amend passes. [gavel] >> and on the cubed lying motion, colleagues, can we take this item same house same call as amended? without objection, this motion is approved as amended. and now i want to go to item 45, madam clerk. >> item 45 is a motion that the board of supervisors convene a committee of the whole today, november 18th, for the purpose of receiving public comment on nominations and to open the

election for the office of board president to fill any unexpired portion of the vacancy remaining in the term that ends january 8, 2015 at 12 p.m. >> supervisor avalos. >> colleagues, i am totally fine to sit as a committee as a whole to vote for the person who will be serving as the interim president of the board. but i'm not interested in doing that today. i don't think today is the right day to do that. we have one of our colleagues who is not going to be here today and actually represents a district that will not be able to have their voice heard in the interim president vote. and i don't quite think that's right. i don't think that's the kind of board of supervisors that we have been purported to be, one that's democratic, one that's civil, one that's collegial. i don't think it's very

collegial to exclude one person from the vote when there isn't really a pressing need to get this settled on today. i do believe it's also important that the full contingent of the board of supervisors who will be serving with this president of the board can vote on the nomination and elect this interim president of the board. it could though well be [speaker not understood] could leave december 1st. we'll have the district 3 supervisor set and sworn in at that time to actually vote on december 9th. that day seems like the best day to actually have our vote for the interim president. there was a story i saw just tweeted to me a couple hours ago at nbc, story saying how

there has been a work by president chiu to heal, help heal this city, especially healing the city with, you know, a race for the assembly that was actually very heated, very contested, often, you know, what was well beyond what we expected. people who had worked together for many, many years at city hall, to actually stage the vote today when that colleague is not here is not healing. it's about taking away the right we should all have to take part in making democracy happen in this very chamber. and, so, colleagues, i really hope that we do not vote today. i do not think it is what we should be doing. it's not collegial. it's not working out. i think next week one of our other members, i believe cohen is not going to be here. we shouldn't vote next week either because i don't think malia cohen and her district

should be excluded from having a determination who is going to be the interim board president, but it makes sense is ~ that we are all going to be here next week to vote. i don't think we should send this to committee. i think we should continue this item to the ninth, but send it to committee so we don't vote on it at all. i hope you join me in this effort. to have this vote today doesn't bode well for what this city is about, what this board represents as an institution that cares for collegiality, civility, and democracy. i hope you join me that we can send this to he committee. >> i understand, supervisor avalos, you're making a motion to send this item to committee? okay, is there a second to that motion? second by supervisor mar. discussion? supervisor wiener. >> thank you, president chiu. i will not be supporting the motion to send it to committee.

i think we're ready to elect the board president today and we should move forward and elect that president today so that we can have a seamless transition when president chiu takes the oath of office in the california assembly at noon on december 1st. rather than having eight days with no board president and convening on the ninth with no board president, we'll have a board president ready to go. it makes all the sense in the world to do it now. and i have to say, i know there's been a lot of rhetoric and drama stirred up by some people about the scheduling of this vote. it's a very standard political tactic. if you don't agree to say that some sort of nefarious plot going on, there's something undermining democracy. there's something not being

collegial, that is absolutely no basis for any of that. the fact is that supervisor campos today chose to go on vacation instead of coming to the board meeting, to leave the country on vacation instead of coming to the board meeting. i would love to leave the country and go on vacation today, but i'm here at this board meeting. he had every right in the world to do that. he just went through a very, very heated and i'm sure exhausting race for the state assembly. he had every right in the world to choose to take a well deserved vacation. but to suggest that because one colleague chose to take a vacation instead of attending the board meeting that somehow it's nefarious or not collegial or anti-democratic for the board to proceed with the people -- with the business of the people, i just don't agree with that. and the fact is that between

now and the end of the year, it is highly likely that we will be operating with only 10 supervisors for each and every meeting. we know that next week. but in addition, i don't want to predict what the mayor is going to do or what time he's going to pursue, but it may very well be the case that president chiu's appointment or successor is not appointed until january, in which case we will be short one supervisor in the month of december as well. and, so, that means that no matter what day we hold this vote there is a high likelihood that one district will not be represented. and, so, to suggest that this has something to do with disenfranchising supervisor campos is just completely disconnected from the reality of the situation because any day that we schedule this vote, there will almost certainly be one district that is not

represented that day. and i'm all for doing it at a time when we'll then have a seamless transition since we have to choose one of those days, why not do it so that we can seamlessly transition from one board president to another. that to me is good government. that is democratic. that is collegial and that's how i will be voting today. >> supervisor yee. >> thank you, president chiu. so, this is my opinion. it's not based on rhetoric or anything. it's how i feel. we have a situation -- it's an odd situation and we're faced with it. and basically we have ten members at the board of supervisors here today. we're probably going to have ten next week and if we were to do an action, a similar action the first thing in december, we're going to have 10.

my feeling about this is that, yeah, we might have 10. the 10 that i prefer to have vote on this would be the 10 people that are going to be here in january and february and so forth. it's not that take away from president chiu or anything, but the fact that we're going to have to work with whoever the president is, that's my preference, that we get the 10 people that are going to be here in january to get to a vote. the issue of whether or not it's seamless or not, you can argue whether it what seamless. however, when somebody wins an election and they happen to be lehmaning ~ leaving office as a president, there's usually no -- there could be an empty seat for a while until you get to january and actually vote for the president.

so, i'm comfortable with that. there is a.m. only a few days we're actually not doing any business for us to vote on a president in december. so, again, i don't want to have this be labeled as if i'm thinking more of is it really campos or is it somebody else? it doesn't matter to me whether this individual that's not here today. it could be somebody else i could say the same thing. and i feel strongly about that. >> supervisor avalos. >> i'll stand up. so, let's just say it's a fact, exclusion of david campos, hegoing to vote for interim president of the board and david campos can't take part in it and we have the ability to

actually schedule time when we can actually have the vote with him present, then we should do that. that's democratic. that's collegial. you can say it's not democratic what we're doing today, it's not. there is an opportunity that we had to show a great deal of grace today about how we're going to have a vote for the board president. we can vote with grace so we can vote without grace. and i actually on the fence right now deciding myself whether i walk out in protest because one of my colleagues is being excluded from voting when we should be voting all together. and if he's going to be excluded, maybe i'll walk out and not vote either. it's not a statement about anyone who could win or didn't have a voice to win. i don't even think david campos voting creates an advantage for anyone in particular. david campos would choose to vote for. but i believe it's just more

about fairness and democracy, civility, and collegiality. i'm considering walking out. [speaker not understood]. >> thank you. supervisor breed. >> thank you. i won't be supporting the motion to send this item to committee. today in the transportation authority plans and programs committee, supervisor mar and i waited 15 minutes in order to have a quorum to start the meeting. as a supervisor, we get these schedules and we actually approve the schedule for the meetings that we have and to make the public wait because we're late or to not move forward with doing the public's business because we decided to take a vacation during a time when we have a board meeting? i mean, just like supervisor

wiener, i would have loved to go away during this week rather than be here dealing with some of the challenges of the job which we all deal with on a day-to-day basis. but the reality is i plan my schedule around my responsibilities as a member of the board of supervisors. and, so, whether someone chooses to take a vacation during the day that a meeting wad scheduled or not, i'm not judging them for doing it. but i am not willing to put the people's business on hold in order to wait till someone comes back from vacation. and the second thing is i think it would be more responsible for us to make this decision today or make this decision next tuesday, but definitely this decision should be made before david chiu leaves the presidency period. there should never be a time where we don't have a member of this body acting as president

to carry on the business of the board of supervisors. so, i won't be supporting the motion. >> supervisor breed, i just wanted to say as the chair of that committee this morning, one of our colleagues had a legitimate health issue and these things come up. but this is an incredibly important decision that we have to make that i'm in agreement with lots of my colleagues that we should be really paying attention that all of us should be here. but let me go to president chiu. >> supervisor mar, i understand, but it's not the first time that it happened, and it happens on a regular basis and it is frustrating, not from just me, but members of the public as well. thank you. >> president chiu. (applause) >> thank you, mr. chair. colleagues, i believe that a vote today to select an interim board president is important for the board as suggested by our board clerk angela [speaker not understood], to ensure a smooth transition on december 1st. if we don't select a board president this week or next, there will be no board

president between december 1st and december 9th. and i do want to respond to supervisor avalos's perspective. we did try to find a date that would work for everyone. unfortunately there is no such date that's going to work. there are ongoing board president duties and while hopefully a vacancy will not have a significant impact, it could, and i don't see why we should take that risk. choosing before hand also allows one of our colleagues to prepare to chair the december 9th meeting and i do think it is our responsibility to consider this question before the board today. and from my perspective as a representative for district 3, i think it's important also to represent my district. we also know, colleagues, it takes six votes to have someone selected as their board president so the fact that we do not have a colleague does not impact that vote total. we still need to achieve that vote roll. so, with that i will not be supporting the motion to refer

this to committee. >> so, colleagues, we have a motion on the floor. shall we have a roll call on that, madam clerk? the motion, supervisor avalos? >> i'll make my statement about it. i've been saying for over a week now before david campos had left that this should not be scheduled, we should not be voting today. this is not -- if we were actually to delay the vote and there was a gap between having a board president of a few days, that is not going to create a hardship for the city. i think that the clerk's office can still function without having a board president, but i think what's important overriding is having democracy and believing we are working the way the public expects us to work and we expect to work with one another. and i think that we're giving that away today by forcing a vote on ourselves when one of

our colleagues cannot be here to be part of it. and i do believe that to me it's also important that the people who will be serving on the board take part in the vote to elect the interim president. it could very well be on december 9th that we'll have a new supervisor in district 3 to take part in that vote. and certainly when it comes to january 8, that can happen as well. and the mayor has the greatest advantage to appoint someone because we couldn't get on the ballot measure to have a vote for appointments, having it go to the people. the mayor is going to have an appointment. he has the advantage to decide who is going to be the board president by selecting that perp. ~ person. i don't think it's going to be disenfranchisement of district 3. with that, let's vote. >> supervisor mar? >>