they presented this. >> could you repeat the title. >> it was just budget action. >> it says budget action, mine. >> and she will tell you that she can get copies for everyone. >> thank you. >> and i asked that question. >> what i have recognized. >> just a minute. >> was there someone more. >> yes. >> commissioner would like to ask a question. >> could we get it from the website? >> well, i would not know you would have to go --. >> maybe you will take a look on your document. >> sherine i just picked things up and i was at the

meeting, but anne is on that committee and she can tell the commissioner ow. it is very likely that it is on the c4 a website. www.c4 a.org. >> and you could look there and it is very likely that it is there, but brig et will get everyone and get copies to everyone also. >> and cathy, we are not finished with you yet. >> can't you see that i am a senior. >> i just told the commissioners that we are going to be gentle to seniors. >> i am just wondering is this something that anne is on the legislative committee

and i am just wondering, is this something that to share with the legislative committees? and at some time to have her share that our members of the legislative? >> you mean our legislative committee? >> yes, anne comes into our meetings at times. >> yes. >> but to tell you the truth i thought that anne would be here and reporting on this and not me. that i could, but as far as getting details of these. i thought that she would be here doing that and but the fact is, anne is there and we can get all of the information, you know, she is always very generous about helping us. >> okay. >> did i legislate that you wanted to -- >> we did, anne did bring us up to date on the finalization of that report, and that they were working on a platform, and that trying to get all of those things

pieced together, and looking also, at folks that fall through the cracks, some, and we were able to, and san francisco was able to move the money around but a lot of other jurisdictions lost those moneys and so they are looking at trying to get some of those moneys back. and they are looking at, and they were looking at the resources and data in that report. and she had promised to share the document with the legislative committee when it was complete. and so i would expect that we can report on that i will add it to my list for now. >> i am sure that we shared it with the legislature. >> thank you very much. >> you are welcome. >> thank you. >> next, we have the case reports. >> good morning, commissioners. >> good morning. >> i'm patty with the catholic charities here representing a case and i want to let you know that we had a very robust group of people get together for our

training for our advocacy platform last friday and we had 76 members, both staff and community, members, program participants and volunteers, to kind of move our advocacy platform forward and we have a couple of phases that we are working on and it is the post guard campaign and the individual meetings with the supervisors and a meeting with the mayor and then, really trying to explain the platform that was presented to all of you in january to the rest of the supervisors that are mayors and the important of of needing them to have the need of the seniors and the aging disability population that is here in our city. >> more to come on that, i am sure that you will be hearing a lot more from lots of people in the community. and our next meeting is on monday, march 9th, at 3:00, and it is at project open hand on the second floor which is 730 polk street, and the contracts will be there and we are going to talk to him about the problems and

challenges that we are having getting contracts pushed through the department and just trying to understand the process and see if there is a way that we can work together at stream lining it and making it a smoother process for everybody and so we have the helpful hints for the community members also to help to make it a more complete budgetary process. and that is what i have for you, any questions? >> questions? >> any questions from the commissioners? >> thank you, very much. now, age, we have a presentation by mark nesle and i hope that i am saying the last night right. park? >> madam president. >> and thank you. and madam president and members of the commission, i am very glad to be here and i am the con stit you ent director and jackky spear and i came here and i was asked to speak a little bit about what is happening with the va but i wnted to kind of start

off what we actually provide in terms of services. and my main responsibility in the congressman's office is to help the veterans with their claims and if you are familiar with the va process if you have a service connected injury or if you have for example, a cancer that you think was associated due to your service, you could potentially could apply for what is called a service connected disability claim. and how the va works is the rating from the 0 to 100 percent equals to your monthly compensation, and unfortunate there is a huge backlog with the va and oakland and was considered one of the worst regional offices in the country, a few years ago, they had 30,000 cases of backlog and according to the va, they have reduced that and our office helps and we need with the con stit ent and we find

out what particularly they applied for, and what i have found out in terms of the va is that these veterans have applied for these benefits and waiting 2 or 3 years before the claims are even given a decision, so what i do is draft the letter on behalf of the congress and submit the letter to the va and i follow up with the va to ask, what is happening with this particular case? what is missing from this case, how can we expedite this case father and they will say that we need these document and i will grab them and send them to the va and push the va to make sure that they process the claim, as quickly as possible. and now, i can't have half of the congress and need to do this and this and there is an actual process for it and we have actually partnered with several, veteran organizations in san francisco, and a few years ago, we actually held an event called the fix it event. and where we actually had a regional director of oakland come along with the western regional director and we had

them twice and the first time that we did it we had 500 veterans show up and while there was a town hall going on, about 100 veterans met with about several va representative and they were able to find out about what was happening with their claims. and they saw by the 100 of those veterans and the following year we did it again and there are about 400 veterans that showed up and the same process and 100 veterans were able to see the va service rep and able to learn about what is happening with their case. and so, i am happy to report that in the last, four years, our office has recovered close to five million dollars, in va benefits and this includes, monthly benefits and also retroactive benefits. but this is just a drop in the bucket, and there is a lot more work to be done with the va and as many as i have read, and there was a report in the chronicle about 13000 cases that were found, that are having been worked on and i have a little statement

that i want to read regarding that. we are conducting an independent investigation, and replacing the special emphasis on the claims for the compensation increases and whether the veteran died before the claim was acted on and the widow may be eligible for the increased survivor benefits and we are not confident that the inspector general for the va has reviewed all involved employees or relative documents. and we are waiting for official response from the va. and we are also concerned that the va has attempted to cover up the handling of these claims, that were discovered in 2012. and that were from the period of 1996, through 2009. and a veteran and a member of the staff, is heading up the investigation, and so richard and i are working together about this and there, and we have been contacted, by someone at the va, about these missing documents, and due to the ongoing

investigation, i can't really go into details about what they found or told us but i can tell you that we are on top of this and we will, present something to the ig's office in terms of evidence and hopefully we can get an answer in terms of what happened to these undiscovered claims, and but our office is here to help the veterans and just recently, we helped the veteran who was actually at d-day at the battle of the bulge and he received all of these medals but he never received it and he waited a very long time to recover these medals, and he had a lot of pride he did not want to do it he just said i have done my service, but, the governor forgot about me and that really got to me, this 90-year-old, world war ii veteran was asking for help in terms of trying to recover his medal and i was happy to present him his medals along with the congress woman and we actually did it in a special way where we have a academy night where the high school students who are

interested in applying for the military academy learn about the process and we introduced this veteran, and we presented his medal to them for the very first time, and you can see, the pride that he had in receiving those medals and they stood up and gave him a thunder applause because he deserved it and i am happy that i can answer any questions that i can and if you know the veterans who were in need of assistance, contact our office, 651-342-0300. thank you very much. >> 650-342-0300. >> okay, you have two veterans here. >> yes. >> and so, commissioners seruna. >> thank you for your service. >> thank you for your presentation. >> does the veteran's administration recognize same-sex couples that are

married in california or the state? >> i have to get back to you on that because i did work on a opm case, that is different than the --. >> the office of personal management and that dealt with same-sex marriage in terms of benefits. i don't want to say yes or no and i have to research that and get the answer to you. >> thank you. >> commissioner ow? >> i think under the va service, the homeless veterans should be on top of the priority. >> yes. >> and find them a home and a job and if they need training they should be trained for the next job. >> absolutely. fe. what is your office and how much resources do you spend time and effort into help the homeless veterans.

>> our office has put together an event called job hunters boot camp where we actually bring together 40 or 50 companies organizations that are actually hiring and the last event that we had in the county, we had about i would say, 60 companies, including bio tech and the service jobs and i can't remember, but there were over 60 companies and i would say about 800 individuals, showed. and we made an emphasis on hiring veterans. and so we actually asked all of those companies if you are looking for a veteran, please let us know and what we did was the congress woman actually walked with the veteran to the business, and to the hr manager and said that this is a veteran and you should hire them since you are looking for a veteran and i do know that some were hired and there is actually one who is a woman, who was

actually homeless vet who we met at a shelter, the congress woman and i and she went to our vet and she met with several companies who wanted to bring her back for a second interview. and one of the companies actually asked me to give a reference to her. so, i was more than happy to do that and so it looks like there is progress that we are doing in terms of homeless vets but there is more that we need to do and i believe that maybe some of the commission might remember bash, which is a spin off of section eight, vouchers but specifically for veterans and there is a criteria for that, and but there is, chronically homeless, homeless, and at risk homeless, and a veteran would be categorized in one of those three category to receive a voucher, and unfortunately, all of the vouchers were given out just recently and there is

unfortunately a huge waiting list for those vouchers but we are whenever those vouchers are available, i tried to let or i tried to let the veterans who i know that are interested in applying to contact the counselor which actually is in the san francisco va, and or lap, alto if you know any that are interested, contact me and i am more than happy to give that information to them. >> i have another point and i can see and another point is that we heard, san francisco we are a lots of public housing. and >> then it turned into a non-profit, to run it instead of hud and i hope that jacky from your office will see to it that the after they repair and then that they have a new list, and i think that the veterans should be giving some sort of priority to move

in. >> absolutely, it is actually a great point and one of the things that we have talked about and actually has been brought to our office and what do we do with the property that is owned by the city? and there are property that are owned by the city that is actually talked about converting them to public housing and there is actually the va hospital has actually broke ground on a permanent homeless housing where the veterans would be able to live on campus, and through the va, and it was a, great event, and i believe that the housing units are about 30 housing units potentially, which, again, that is, there will still be a lot more to be done and i know that in the county that there are about 30,000 veterans and i tried to look up in san francisco, and it was not, an accurate figure, and when there were about 60,000 veteran and whenever i went

over 30,000 and i was not quite sure, but i know that in our office, veterans are a priority and if you are familiar with the congress woman's background, and she is not a veteran, but she did go to jones town and she was shot, and several times, and one of the things that she remembers and then in the experience is that when she was rescued she was wrapped and when she was taken to the plane and they were taking care of her, they put a blanket on her and she felt like the american flag was wrapped around her and she experienced ptsd and a lot of the veterans do have ptsd and so that is one of the issues that we are looking at. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> any other questions? >> commissioner? >> i saw the new head of the va interview recently the guy from the consumer products company and he was quite bold about saying that they had managed out, i don't know

900 or 1,000 people from the organization who were under performing and there are several hundred others under review. and performance review, have you seen the effects, locally of the transition of management and leadership and consumer facing personnel through that transition under his leadership? >> i would say, i would say, i have seen, a slight improvement in terms of response times with the va. and there is now a new director in oakland, who took over for the previous director who unfortunately was in kind of set backlog was under his watch and so that was replaced with a new director. and in terms of claims i have seen some improvements in terms of the processing

time, i know that at times they transfer it to the other va units across the country that don't have a backlog, and so, i have seen a responses in terms of processing claims that way. i have also seen the reduced number of calls coming in, in terms of assistance with the va, in our office, and so, it does not mean that the veterans are not looking for assistance, it just seems that they have not been calling us as frequently as in the past when there has been a huge backlog, and so there has been kind of pro-categories that there are initial claims and appeals and right now the va has taken priority on the initial claims and these are veterans who are returning from afghanistan and iraq. >> yeah. >> thank you. >> okay. >> thank you. >> thank you, >> thank you very much. and thank you for inviting me and i hope that you can come again. >> thank you. thank you. >> and now, we are going to old business, and no old

business, and new business? >> item a,a. requesting authorization to modify the grant agreement with kimochi, inc. for the provision of community services to seniors and adults with disabilities; during the period of october 1, 2014 through june 30, 2016; in the additional amount of $112,500 for a revised total grant amount not to exceed $500,674. (staff: monte cimino will present the item). >> >> could i have a motion to discuss? >> so moved. >> second. >> okay. >> you are monte? >> good morning, commissioners, and director, we seek your approval for the community service for the grant modification, and the community services consist of activity and services that focus on physical, soci,

psychological and economic, and educational recreational and or creative and persons with disabilities and older persons, and it is provided in the community center and throughout the community, specifically with kimochi looking to bring on an assistant to the program director at 0.7 fte and this will be a korean speaking staff member and the primary function of this job will be to assist the program director in supporting all agency programs with administrative contract and reporting functions as well as providing support for fund-raising and event and out reach activities for the agency including doing translation and social services in the community services program. additionally, looking to increase, some of their service units throughout the fiscal year and looking to increase the activity hours from 500 to 600 hours annually and looking to include the service hours

from 1250 hours to 1500 hours annually and excuse me and, looking to increase their translation hours from 300 hours to 500 hours, annually. and over the last two fiscal years, fiscal year, 12, 13, 13, 14, they have seen a 37 percent increase in their korean seniors attending their programs which is why they are looking for a korean speaking position here. and we urge your support for this grant to the community service and happy to answer your questions and please note that executive director steve was also here to answer the questions if needed. >> any questions? >> okay, commissioner loo? >> yeah, i am just looking at the budget summary, the second and the third years, seem to be especially the third years, july 15, july,

1, through june 16th. and 15 to 16, and it is 374, that is quite a big jump, why is that such a big jump? >> for. >> on the 16th. >> but also on the operating? >> yeah, so my understanding is that this fiscal year they are getting part and next year it will be full and this year we are starting october one and so we are starting throughout the year and so the number is prorated for the fifth of the remainder of the year. >> okay. >> and then, coming to the operating expenses. and there is again, that year is high. >> and also, what is the 5,000 outside of the services?

>> steve? >> thank you very much, director, and in terms of the specifickalty of that allocation, i need to contact our program director and our controller who specifically wrote that piece. and i know that we have a lot of outside agencies, support, and that we utilize, but i don't have the specific of that and i can have that answer back before this meeting ends. >> okay. >> and also, why the telephone is quite a big jump from 3,000 to 7,000, are they getting cell phone

or what? >> our transportation program, the drivers and the dispatcher, we have always had a system, or a phone system, communication if you will, and it seems that just more appropriate and accurate if we have those cell phones and then the administrative staff in terms of all of our meetings and connections like now, trying to contact back, and that is part of it and we think that this will be attributed to that cost. >> thank you. >> we will get back to you. anything else. >> hearing none, all in favor. >> ayes. >> ayes have it so the motion carries. >> next item b, request the

authorization to modify the grant agreement with on lok day services for the provision of health promotion and physical fitness, to seniors and adults with disabilities, during the period of october 1, 2014, through june 30, 2015, in the dishal amount of $40,000, for a revised total grant not-to-exceed $731,285. >> and could i have a motion to discuss? >> so moved. >> we ask an increase for this year and the main purpose is for us to pilot and develop a pilot to see

the feasibility of having this program that can be received and reimbursement from medical and be certificated organization, and so, the project is for to do a research and the develop, and then implement and then also, evaluate a community based diabetes self-management program and this program is, developed by stanford university and this project will help us evaluate what the program feasibilities are and if there are recommendations whether we can do this and at this program, and as part of the house promotion programs that we provide currently and the biggest advantage of course, is being able to draw funding from medicare. and part of the services we will get with this pilot program is to offer a

workshop, and this diabetes self-management program that meets all of the programming requirements for reimbursement. and trained for additional leaders facilitaters that can lead these workshops and graduate at least, 10, participants from this workshop. the, you have to budget with the details, indicated in the packet, and i am happy to answer any questions that you may have. >> commissioner, loo? >> i have seen, and operating expenses, and all of these contracts, where they were in the san francisco and the san francisco senior service, what kind of service are we buying from them? >> i think that the column to really look at is the column that we separated out for diabetes self-management and this budget includes other

health promotion programs which is not being modified at all and the only piece that is modified is the column that you know, the diabetes self-management, and so, what is your question, again? >> my question is, what kind of service are we buying by giving the senior center, 59,000 for three years? >> i am looking at the operating expenses, detailed. are they talking about the same thing? >> what page are you looking at? >> i am looking at, and it does not have a page number but i am just looking at the operating page. >> yeah. >> the last page. >> yeah. the last page. >> okay. >> and all right. san francisco, senior center, the university of san francisco. >> right. >> that is actually, the health promotion program, and those are not being modified and they are not under today's request for the

40000. >> okay. >> okay. >> i have a question. how is this different than the regular health? and are they going to be directly about the diabetes? i am just, and because it looks like it is just extra --. >> no. >> and so, what is different about this -- >> what is different in this, than in the staff has and, this one. >> correct. >> so, this particular diabetes self-management program that we are trying to pilot, has actually more strict requirements, and one of the specific and it is targeting for the people with diabetes, and part of the requirement is that there is a dietician who will be offering the counseling to the participants in helping them to better manage their diabetes and also, the participants will be required to provide authorizations and