right regained by mission playground youth to areas that youth frequent most and [inaudible] adult permitted play, playgrounds frequent the most and extended lighting hours so youth have a safe place to play later in the evening and staff at the playgrounds so there are adults supervising the youth so they're safe and we want accessible signage and every resident here in san francisco know exactly what they're reading, what they see and we want them to know there are programs and scholarships available for them in the different languages that they can understand. i would like an equity analysis as well when rec and park creates their budget. with this we would like to see the youth population, the low income population using the different parks in san francisco, the geography such as hours available for people in the city limited english

preefficiencies in the neighborhoods and we can also see language accessible for the people. we thank you for scheduling this at a youth friendly time and enact our policy. we hope to work with you in the near future on these recommendation that the commissioners brought up today so thank you very much. >> thank you so much commissioner chin. are there any other youth commissioners that are here? seeing none let's open this up for public comment. i have a number of speaker cards but i see there's a number of youth i should call first before the community representatives. [calling speaker names] . from the chinatown campaign academy. if you could come forward and line up on the right side of the room. [calling speaker names]

. if there is anyone else that would like to speak please come forward as well so go ahead. >> good afternoon. board of supervisors. i am baifd and from chinatown community development center campaign academy. i am a resident [inaudible] and even though my neighborhood has been historically known as a dangerous neighborhood many kids go to play play basketball and do anything they want, but as we know ever since that hertz playground incident many groups that i went to avoided that neighborhood for a long time ever since that incident. the reason for it even though they avoided it go further parks and other parks didn't have the same resources as that playground.

that park had [inaudible] basketball courts and baseball field and we resorted to a smaller park where they couldn't do these activities so we want you to create more adult watchers so kids will feel safe going there and you could create more resources in other parks so they can have fun doing the things they want to do and thank you and have a good day. >> thank you. next speaker. >> hi good afternoon board of supervisors. i am andrew and a resident from chinatown so we have three parks and they are really crowded, so when i was little elementary school student every time i went nearby to the parks in chinatown my mom would yell at me for doing anything around them because she thinks the sand pits were hazardous so

everything was was dirty and i noticed there wasn't a cleaning staff or any regulation of the sand pits and this discouraged me and many other kids from approaching public parks in chinatown, and -- yeah. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker. >> hi. my name is ja and a resident from soma. even though there are parks in soma i enjoy parks in my neighborhood. however, safety has always been a concern for not only the parents but the youth too so many have been teens have been bullied and there are

drunks in the park to and brought safety to this public space. sometimes they bring violence or dangerous to the youth and prevent us from going to parks. the park near by house i was dragged by a drunk person and he's asking me for money. that experience prevent me from going out for a long time. when i was on my way home i was so scared and not to leave the home on my home. however park staff can prevent this from happening whether bullying or abuse from drunk people. when there is a person to look out and take care of that behavior or activities it makes the youth feel more confident to go out for youth safety there should always be some staffing in public parks. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker. >> i am a resident from d3 and

i live in an sro and it's 8 x 10 feet room shared by a lot of people. the building is shared by 100 people and we share the same kitchen and bathroom and no where to hang out and have fun so a park is important to children and youth. it would serve as our living room and we could do fun activities. but there's one thing that discourage me from going there because there is a lot of homeless people and people smoking. when i go there i feel like i was effecting by others people habit of smoking and i don't feel the environment very healthy and also the homeless people make me feel uncomfortable and hang around and some are drunk so i rarely go to those parks. i feel very

uncomfortable and not safe. so here i want to say i want to have more staffing and have more people to help us manage the parks so all the sro children and youth can go there and have enjoy the open space especially. thank you for the time. >> thank you. great recommendations you guys. next speaker. >> good afternoon chair mar and supervisor christensen and supervisor campos. my name is alex howard and the youth advisory committee coordinator to services and offers programs and services to the homeless in the city and it's an opportunity to advocate for their rights in our organization and also within the larger san francisco community. and i am speaking on

behalf of these advisory board this afternoon. many times youth experiencing homeless is omitted but there was 1902 homeless children and youth in 2012 and we provided services to over 300 homeless youths and we believe that this population needs to be considered in formulating this right of rights. this is why the youth advisory board supports the commission's request of a supplemental document explaining what it means for children to sleep under the stars and where children will be able to do this because the population we serve who often have no family to turn to and no home to sleep in oftentimes resort to sleeping under the stars, but they face trouble from police, fines and

even at times arrest for doing so. the youth advisory board of larkin street services supports the idea of having an childrens' outdoor bill of rights and sensitive to all children and youth in san francisco. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker. >> good afternoon supervisor, supervisor campos, supervisor mar, supervisor christensen. i am the policy manager for the economic agency and i am impressed with these youth commissioners and youth and larkin street forally the analysis they have done. i know they wirked with the mission playground youth as well in meetings and i am impressed with their astute recommendations so metahas a policy -- the san francisco latino community has one of the highest obesity and health rates so park access is really critical. a lot of the

open space park investments have not been going to the mission like they should have so we want to make sure we have equal access to the playgrounds. it's our mission to ensure access and affordable opportunities for youth for playgrounds is met. given some of the things that came out of the outdoor children bill of rights and i agree with the assessment there is need for a supplemental to really bring a little more efficacy how the document can affect their lives and there are playgrounds with payment setting and deficient in signage as far as multilingual signage and access and safety. the youth have told us they want increased safety and monitoring and increased police any type of protection to access the parks so i am that you

take consideration. they're well thought out supplemental and have additional information to make this bill of rights more of bill of rights and not a bill of talking points. we want to make sure that youth can access these playgrounds safely and they can do so at night and also i would -- some of the work workshops that we did to connect the youth to the park programs make sure that we have more than good will translate on the website and have it in other languages. thank you very much. >> thank you very much. next speaker. >> good afternoon supervisors campos, mar and supervisor christensen i am a district 9 resident. and i am here actually today because i don't think that this resolution goes far enough. what i would really like to see is that the board of

supervisors really take this opportunity and to create and codify binding law that will create opportunities for the youth of san francisco to continue to have access to playgrounds and to have a healthy place to play. i really would like to -- i thank the gentleman who presented the slides and discussed about the benefit of physical activities and team sports plays. i am a living proof of everything he said. playing on teams, winning champions and losing games is part of my character and allowed me to be person speaking to you today and i want to urge that the board work with supervisor farrell and really fake this opportunity to. >> >> take this opportunity to create codified biepding law to

create access in parks for children. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker. >> good afternoon. i am from bay view district. -- >> [inaudible] >> hello. i am from the bay view district. before i moved to the bay view district i lived in the portilla district and i thought it was safe to go to public parks and other public areas. however, after moving i felt that the lack of security makes me uncomfortable in areas and i felt that changes would be needed. moreover i think that the parks are not reaching full

potential as not enough residents are attending the parks and events of the parks, and i think there should be announcements to reach residents about park events and other services. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker. >> hello again supervisor. i just wanted to -- >> colleagues let me say we have already heard from the commissioner, and i think it's okay if she continues her comments if you don't mind. there is no objection commissioner. >> okay. well i just wanted to talk about my positive experience with one of the rec and park parks -- boedecker park that the one that is in the tenderloin and i believe that everyday there is roughly around 50 to 70 young people that go there and the reason is there is adequate staffing and a lot of

police officers are there and i asked the people about the experiences with the park and they have told me they felt safe because of the police officers that are stationed there and actually being in community with them in the park, and i strongly believe that boedecker park is a perfect model for other rec and parks to kind of follow through so they can ensure that young people are safe and also enjoying the company of other young people. thank you. >> great suggestion. next speaker. >> hi good afternoon supervisors. my name is michelle lee and a resident of district 4 and at local high school and chair of the youth commission. thank you for having us today and at this time. we definitely support the bill of rights and a laudable goal to connect youth with nature and we see it definitely as a need especially in the

urban city of san francisco, but as you see there are many concerns over this bill of rights and the youth commission does ask that when considering this rpd can draft a supplemental that is more able to practically describe what the points of the bill of rights actually mean, and also we hope that when drafting the future budget for rpd that they do take into consideration all of the concerns that we heard today. thank you very much for your time and we hope to work with you in the future. >> thank you. next speaker. if there is anyone else that would like to speak please come forward before we close public comment. >> i am david yang. i go to high school and i want to talk about my experiences with parks, and how i feel about them, so i understand that parks are important and it's a great place for children to socialize but as a teenager myself i always feel

very uncomfortable when i go to parks. i feel very excluded from all of the children who play at the play structures that i cannot go on and whenever i go to parks i know it's unintentional but i feel the eye s stare at me and think that teenagers like myself are just loitering at the parks and look suspicious and i hope you guys can help and include both children of all ages. yeah. thank you. >> thank you. next speaker. >> i didn't know we were going to talking about parks and gardens today but this is a

picture that shows you leisure life in the park. >> you want to mention your name? >> i am larry ed mend -- juicy edmund and i'm a park advocate. i like outdoors. i was at golden gate park on martin luther king's birthday and i want to show you not too long ago we didn't have gardens -- there we go. we don't have gardens in park we suffer. i live in an sro in the tl and we don't get a chance to -- i call it the concrete jungle but i want to show you walking in the haight when you go out to the park but one day i was in golden gate park and birds and butterflies came and i wrote this on one of the my lucky dollars. it says in memory of

lois p [inaudible] -- memory of her father james p bronxon 1952. a hummingbird came up and hit the sign and how great it was showing me something so we don't have parks. you don't get to see hummingbirds and butterflies. a lot of people don't know you put your face down into the grass and get refreshed so we must have parks. as the city builds up parks are part of nature and bill of rights for our kids in parks. thank you. >> thank you. anyone else to speak? public comment is closed. supervisor christensen. >> so this is a dear one to my heart. before i was a supervisor i was a community advocate that worked hard on the parks in district 3 so i'm

pleased to see the youth from my district because it's for you guys that i put in all of the extra hours. i think this is not only about childrens' rights. i think this is human beings rights. a lot of times when i worked on the parks in the neighborhood people assume today was about kids but it was also about our seniors and a lot of adults who live in the sros and in small apartments in north beach and knob hill. i went to a park planning group years ago and we talked about play and the director asked each of us to close our eyes and think of the place we played as children and asked how many were outside? everybody's hands go up. how many were outside of eyes of adults? they all went up. how many had things to change and logs and branches and in the dirt and grass and everybody's

hands went up and he asked how many have a place like that today to play? and very few hands went up and it made me sad. my husband grew up in golden gate park making tree forts. we asked the kids at the pool how many had seen the ocean and more than a third hadn't seen the ocean growing up in san francisco so i think those speakers who mentioned the need to take action it's an important part of this. joe dimaggio playground in north beach was one of the first in the city built for children. we had the carousel out at golden gate park but before 1900's parks were for grownups and in 1907 the city of san francisco set aside money for parks for children and

north beach because of the 10aments were designated one of the two most needy sites in the city and that hasn't changed and over a hundred years and still some of the neediest neighborhoods when it comes to open space so unfortunately i can't promise the children grass and sand and trees and a place to get away and dig and plant as much as i would like but i can promise i would like work with some of the youth commissioners and some of the children that have come here today. i would like to work out to figure out as your supervisor my staff and i can help connect the youth of district 3 with programs that can help open up some of these opportunities for them. i know there's a lot of good programs already in district 3, but i would like to see how we can do a better job

of corporate sponsorships of opportunities and i know certainly the presidio offers many of those. i know you can go camping on alcatraz and so rosa and the rest of you if you would work with us let's make a plan to figure out to help you and help your colleagues in district 3. thank you very much for being here today. >> thank you supervisor christensen. i wanted to ask if our presenters mr. rafa or ms. burton from the rec and park department could respond to some of the comments that the young people and suggestions. that would be helpful for me to understand if the presidio trust and the coalition that looking at strategies to fully fund safety accessibility, free and/or affordable programs expanding scholarships and a lot of the other recommendations, and then clarifying sleeping under the stars as a right, but

also sensitivity to various homeless and sro youth and others, but i know those were concerns raised, and making sure that a compact is something that could be put into practice that is fully funded and that is made real as well(paused).

>> >> and unfortunately all i can do is really offer my moral support and as a colleague of those working in city parks to be supportive of making the changes necessary so that you all feel safe and welcome in city park lands regardless of their status whether city or state parks. i wanted to start with that. regarding some of the suggestions making it a little more real so we created a

poster that was intentionally somewhat simple, something we would like to see in public places all over san francisco from school classrooms to libraries to pediatricians offices, perhaps to the walls of city hall. we absolutely do not want it to be symbolic. we are ready taken steps in response to what we heard from you at the last commission meeting. and what an map would look like with internet activity and select one of them and go in san francisco and have the experiences. one thing we clarified at the last youth commission meeting it's

not teen, it's child, and our steering comment response to that was wow we might have over looked an important audience here. what about the teens? and some of the experiences listed on the childrens' outdoor bill of rights and they're more children oriented and we can be honest about that and our response is let's work together and come up with a youth version, a teen version, like a part two over time that can deliver effectively on some of the things that you guys are concerned about that you want to see. i'm going to look over to my colleagues if i forgotten about any of the things we're planning do in the year ahead. language access. okay. i

actually was a little unclear of that. i think what that means in public parks the signs that are there can be read experienced meaningfully by people that don't speak english. is that accurate? >> [inaudible] >> so can i just say that we're going to try to wrap up in a >> >> and translation and signage and other ways so that everyone who speaks english and others that speak other languages are treated equally and about language equality and we are all required to do that and rec and park is one but i wanted supervisor campos to weigh in on the conversation but i

appreciate it. >> and the posters are trilingual at least and have spanish and english and chinese on there. >> thank you. i will be brief because i have to go to a meeting. i want to thank the youth for coming out and speaking. i am always impressed by the caliber of the comments that come from young people. we have a lot to learn from you and we want to make sure that you know that your opinion really matters and it makes a big different. i want to thank supervisor farrell for his leadership and of course to ms. stephanie for all of the work that went into this and i know they're going to continue to push for this very important issue, and supervisor farrell is the chair of budget so that's a good alley to have on your side as the budget process begins.

and i always want to thank larkin and all of the organizations, meta that have been here and of course adele and allen who do a incredible job with the commission and it's important to make this a priority and i think having a bill of rights makes a great deal of sense and we want to make sure it's not just words only but actually a real thing so i look forward to working with you. thank you mr. chairman and supervisor christensen and look forward to working with you guys. >> and to ms. burton from the rec and park department and mr. rafa from presidio trust we will follow up with you and work with supervisor farrell on some of the great ideas from the young people and thank you very much to catherine and stephanie from supervisor farrell's office for being here. i wanted to mention one point