run but where do you think our short-term strategies that move us more to bridging the divide? >> chair mar i think that back to the question supervisor christiansen asked, getting to the affordability issue, a city subsubsidy program or the city negotiating with the internet service providers and internet essentials right now is provided to school district students and their families doesn't have to be limited to just that this would take negotiation obviously with the providers but the city is in the position of dealing with these companies and certainly negotiations can take place to offer more affordable programs and in terms of low hanging fruit that does require negotiation but there's other funding options and hardware to assist families first they need the hardware and the the city can support it's not very could

costly to provide free hardware or refush re-furbished hardware. >> supervisor christiansen. >> listening to the connection noises that supervisor mar played for us, are there things that we that we should be doing to pave the the way literally for this to happen in the future talk about retro there's lots of neighborhood in the in the city that still have overhead wires and i know that there are plans that the city has to put conduits in streets that are torn up that sort of thing and are some of those programs potentially helpful down the line if we ever get to a point of becoming better wired? >> yes supervisor christiansen i think those opportunities

would definitely help and the city of santa monica is a good example they have a program now called incremental municipal broadband and they are doing exactly that so as other projects are executed and streets are dug up they are putting in their municipal fiber network and it's going a little bit at a time but they get another couple of blocks in and there's more premises that can be wired with high speed so that is certainly one approach, it would you know take longer but that's something that could be wooven in and certainly keep the cost down. >> thank you. thank you so much mr. br u.s. so i wanted to ask if miguel gamino or brian roberts wanted to have any comments or responses you don't have to but thank you for being

here too and thank you for presenting to our office the connectivity plan as well i definitely see different parts of this within our plan. >> sure good afternoon miguel gamino thank you for the opportunity to comment on the plan, the research and also kind of i think it's an opportunity for me to help connect the dots for a bad pun between our ict plan the connectivity plan and how i believe it begins to help enable addressing the digital divide it does not -- supposed to address it in its entirety but helps create the conversation and enable the foundation for moving some of these things forward and i think the report accurately

captures this broader picture of internet use and identifies vulnerable populations and the role should be to provide infrastructure as we are with the proposed expansion of our fiber network sf wifi services previously discussed etc. and my role should be to promote pervasive gig byte services in every neighborhood and an opportunity to creatively looking at funding opportunities and different ways to make this available for people in all areas of the city regardless of their socioeconomic situation. so i wanted to address a couple of things -- the connectivity plan and what we talked about yesterday, is not absent of a municipal network vision. what it's focussed on right now

most prominent ly is the fiber backbone that we want to create to connect primarily our municipal facilities right? that's the obvious urgent need that we have and that's a pretty easy thing to understand and to invest in for its immediate return. but by doing so, we're also creating a significant fiber footprint that can then be used to enable these fiber to the to the home discussions and delivering on that vision and you know the article and some of the things -- just to clarify -- that we are absolutely creating a municipal broadband network but how how far we go into actually the you know the the residential premise is where that last mile is the topic of debate right because that's where all the expense is driven by.

>> so in looking at what chat anoogo was doing looks like they have a freeway with a whole bunch of off ramps potentially to residents and we're creating the off ramps to other places but not necessarily to all of the different residents. >> right not in this phase but that freeway that gets built those off ramps and intersection points exist and i think we have a strong role to play as as an enabler and an asset and that 5 hundred $500 million number is fairly accurate that you talked about but will be significantly reduced by our proposed investments in the municipal use fiber network we're building first and these are building blocks not things being done in silos or absent a

broader vision but addressing in the connectivity plan the things we know right here and right now that we can be very responsible with investing in because we have an you imagine an urgent use for them and how that will play into this broader discussion so the connectivity plan as you and i spoke previously has 4 key components the fiber implementation or expansion and the implementation of the ordinance and those are fairly well defined so we we know what kind of dollars we're talking about and time frames and our connectivity plan actually calls up a 3-year plan to connect all of those city facilities for a dollar amount in the neighborhood of 5 million $5 million and that's a real tangible thing that we can move forward with that can

play significantly into this broader inclusion or fiber to the home discussion and also getting conduits in the ground is the most expensive part in some cases and certainly the most difficult in terms of road closures and construction etc. getting that conduit in the ground will make that 500 $500 million number reduce significantly and the speed to deploy will be increased once we get to that conversation and the plan is cognizant of this greater vision and the digital inclusion inclusion needs but specific to the role in in the current opportunity to invest in that tangible infrastructure so in fact you mentioned or someone mentioned

santa monica i think and suzanne crawford applauded us for taking this approach to very strategically and methodically look at this bigger picture and how to begin to execute this greater vision and clearly the bigger discussion about the details of how we get fiber into every home in san francisco which would be a personal dream of mine but how that gets done is different than just doing it ourselves right and getting it done is different than doing it ourselves. >> so another couple of quick comments on sf wifi, i think it's been a good start. you know this came up in discussion yes, sir. yesterday so i want to take an opportunity to address a couple of those things we've been significantly improving that network and also acknowledge that digital

inclusion and access to the internet it's not sufficient to just turn on an access point or check the list so to speak and say yeah we have internet there and disregard the quality of it and the feedback i got yesterday i very much took seriously and i looked and we have completed significant upgrades to that network as recently as earlier this month and we have significant additional improvements scheduled for next week and so we'll see that significantly improve and i want the board of supervisors and the community at large to know we're very much cognizant of the fact that if it doesn't work well, it's as good or worse than not existing at all so i put that out there that we're very much focussed on that and it's an ongoing effort and the reality is we have to constantly

manage that but it's an example or something for you all to consider as we go down this path that even our current relatively small sf wifi foot print requires maintenance ongoing and support to address questions and concerns and expanding that sort of responsibility to every resident in san francisco is not just an expensive under taking but a significant responsibility if we're going to stay focussed on that quality of service piece which i think is paramount to really stake the claim to having solved this problem substantially so we're getting speed tests you were talking about speed tests? we are testing on our wifi network on market street sometimes as high as fifty megs multiples over

what was recently established as the benchmark and certainly leading the way and i think that's something we we can be proud of as a first step and build on and continue to invest on and phase 2 of the connectivity plan that you and i spoke about is to really flush out the last 2 sections of the can of the connectivity plan and talk more about how to expand and properly sustain the public sf wifi service and also how to establish that call to action or again getting it done as opposed to necessarily out right assuming we have to do it on the gig options to the home. >> mr. gamino supervisor campos had a question. >> thank you for your words and i'm certainly happy to hear about some of the ideas and the

progress that is being planned with the connectivity plan and i also know that based on what mr. br u.s. o was saying that we're doing better as a country as a whole and better than the state. that said, i am a little surprised by sort of -- there's a certain element of commitment in terms of -- you know, the -- the division that's coming out of the city you know i think that most people would be people would be surprised that we are not being as aggressive as other cities because you know in san francisco we have certainly some folks here have gone out of the way to roll out the red

carpet for technical for technical as an example and not doing as well as you would think san francisco being the leading tech city in the country perhaps the world, so why the sort of such a timid and incremental approach and why not go all out and say you know we have a goal of closing this divide and it is -- we have an objective that by x date we will you know close the gap and you know, if you look at district 3, that you know if district 3 is at 83 percent and district 8 is at 94 percent we have this goal to close this

gap i mean that's the sort of -- that's not to criticize the work being done but certainly there's progress but seems very timid to me. >> i appreciate the feedback i think that i would characterize it more i think we're being pragmatic and doing a couple of things in parallel and again the connectivity plan we published and the work that i'm working towards to flush out that gig a city plan what i think you are looking for in terms of an aggressive call to action and a vision and you know establishing where we want to be and when we want to be there i think that will come to you very soon but in parallel, rather than just wait on that planning effort, at least within my sphere of influence

i'm in parallel moving forward with what might seem like incremental steps but there's things i can do that are going to push in the right direction while we flush out a much broader and stronger call to action and things that we're doing with public wifi and things we're doing with -- we're focussed on hope sf sites with public wifi and making sure that the wifi that's there is not just there but it actually functions and is properly maintained and we're taking steps to closing that gap and very very conscious of that issue so yeah maybe we need i need to do a better job of communicating with you the progress we're making towards establishing that aggressive call to action and how the

things we're doing now work in parallel and ultimately in concert with what will be an aggressive task and i think i agree with you that san francisco should lead the way in this area and we are in several circles leading that conversation from a thought leadership standpoint so there's a lot of work being done behind the scenes and i think now with this opportunity we can surface the progress that we're making and press forward with that. >> i certainly appreciate that and we know that the tech companies created -- mr. mr. con way created sf city a tech company chamber of commerce and certainly very active on a number of fronts in city hall. we certainly hear from them

around the discussion that's happening and they are not shy about being engaged, are they doing anything to help with this? >> the way i understand it, this was a little bit before my time in terms of how it occurred occurred but i believe that sf city was involved in the google relationship that manifested in the 32 parks wifi i'll tell you that right now like i said we're working very hard on this gig a city plan with our own departmental colleagues and during the connectivity plan process we engaged with some some of the private sector and plan to do a lot more of that engaging with the community to make sure that we're properly addressing all of those needs and the community concerns along the way. >> do you know what the involvement of sf city was

relative? >> not specifically i can follow up for you but not specifically. >> yeah i would ask sf city and mr. conway to help. they are not shy about telling us when they need help we need help here. . >> what i will tell you on that level i will tell you i've been very hope about our desire to engage in public-private partnerships and solving the funding issue to help us solve this bigger issue, right? i'm clearly acknowledging i don't expect to publish a report and come here and ask for 500 million $500 million and have and have and have that be an easy road we need to be creative and thoughtful about how we can get it done without bearing that responsibility entirely ourselves. >> i would hope that if you

have as much power as mr. conway has you would use that power for the city as well thank you. >> i really appreciate your reflections on mr. br u.s. so's report but i think his emphasis we lack a comprehensive approach to addressing the barriers to digital inclusion and i'm trying to frame it positively and there's so much to show us how many hundreds of thousands of people in the city being left behind but i'm hearing more of a comprehensive approach in phase one and two of the connectivity plan and i share supervisor campos's concerns and hope that their stronger

work with the tech sector and i will say as mr. br u.s. o highlighted that chat anooga has been challenged legally with lawsuits along the way with certain tech industries that might not be supportive of a municipal fiber network and i know there's those contradictions as well and i appreciate you being here and working with you on ensuring that we have digital inclusion as a part of our plan and strategy for the future. >> if i can i'll say a couple more things. you know, i think that we're at a point in time with connectivity that other utilities were at some point in history and i do believe that pervasive gig a bit speeds to everywhere in this community

and country and world doesn't just mean your netflix working faster when the electric grid was expanded it maybe started with powering more light light bulbs but manifested and the capacity and network was significantly increased like the electric refrigerator and i think connectivity will evolve that way and i think pervasive connectivity is going to manifest itself in life changing applications that that we can't even predict today and i think we do need to be comprehensive in our discussion about digital inclusion and talk about that issue so we're moving forward and addressing it but i'll also tell you as the tech guy i don't pretend to be able to identify all of the proper applications for how we're going to close that gap, right?

my job is to enable that and make sure the connectivity question is off the the table so that the discussion can happen productively about how to actually make this work for people or work to change people's lives so there's a but a bunch of people that will never adopt so to speak internet access they won't use it or sign up for it because they don't want to browse but in a world not too far in the future those that don't adopt the internet will consume connectivity in other ways in their lives and that's where i think we're showing leadership in that discussion. >> thank you. supervisor christiansen. >> my father grew up in rural south dakota and didn't get

electricity until after ww 2 and some of my friends in the industry you make a good point we're not talking about movies but perhaps the way you send and receive medical information or you know other forms of connectivity so i think that's something as we look forward we want to look for that hundred percent if we can do it. >> but i know from the media alliance and others as they identified what a vision of digital inclusion was it's not just access but access to affordable hardware and training and tech support and multilingual content and transparency and local ownership and sustainability of a system.

>> i'm going to do what to do what i can to press that forward. >> thank you. there's a couple of people i was going to call up first. colleagues, can we open up for public comment? hopefully brian roberts is

still here from the department of technology as well. >> good morning afternoon supervisors. i'm the director of the community live campaign here in san francisco and i really wanted to thank you for asking this report be prepared in a way it breaths new life into the resolution 5410 passed so many years ago but at that time the city's commitment to bridge the digital divide and that report you just received provides a clear explanation of the neighborhoods served and the broadband options and puts a spotlight on the little known survey that documents this reality that over a hundred thousand san franciscans are

not connected to the internet and we know all too well without the internet connection that individuals are not connected to their families and the possibilities for long-term lifelong learning and many of us who are connected take for granted so it's it's a good place to start to bridge the digital divide and many of the priorities are echoed in the material that you have just received however you missed the opportunity i think to acknowledge the pioneers in groups like self-help for the elderly and the technology center and the senior center and computer labs and access and those have gone on to on to help themselves and to help

others so we're here as organizations who care about this to say we want to be part of the solution. seniors and people with disabilities are passionate and committed to being part of the solution so we stand ready to help you move these recommendations forward and keep us connected campaign. >> please help us understand what sf connected is and how we can support it. >> just keep us connected is a broad umbrella of groups. others are secure funding in other ways the campaign itself has 4 priorities and that's what i gave you copies of and we're saying nothing about us without us and we're here to advocate that seniors and people with disabilities not be left behind and things like training and support and access in different languages and

assistive technology those are all part of the things that that can be done now. >> thank you so much for the great work and bruce wolf from sf public net. >> i wanted to express some of the same sentiments but he had to leave. >> i'm bruce wolf with san francisco public net a highly educated experienced coalitions of many residents and community organizations and professional technologyists that work with wireless networks and very knowledgeable about what's happening. there's so many comments some some of the comments i heard today were great and some appalling i could not believe what i was hearing. i think that that should be referenced as a way to open instead of dealing with

what's closed we're considered the tech center of the world now and i agree with all of your supervisors sentiments mr. br u.s. o is on point infrastructure has got to be first but it it can't be just for government only we are not in the neo lithic period as as with chat anooga, it it can be done. much of the city facilities are already covered especially with the fiber network that's already in place housing authority almost all of the low income facilities and the libraries all the police and fire departments, just so much is already wired up already but residents and local businesses need it now. our taxes are paying for this