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tv   LIVE BOS Rules Committee  SFGTV  December 8, 2016 11:00am-2:31pm PST

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>> all right, thank you for your
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pairings everyone, welcome to our rules committee meeting of december eight, 2016, i'm katie tang, the chair of this committee, and to my left is cohen and i believe that mar will be joining us and we are joined by john avalos and our clerk -- sorry? >> to the far left. >> yes, to the far left of me. >> and sfgtv, mr. clerk, do you have any announcements. >> silence all cell phones and electronic devices and completed speak cards should be submitted to the clerk. >> thank you, and i know that just as everyone has a heads up, we do have a special rules committee meeting on next monday starting at is 11:30, so there may be a couple of items continued. if you could call number one.
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>>hearing to consider appointing nine members, for two-year terms ending february 28, 2019, to the balboa park station community advisory committee >> there are nine applicants. >> i am going to kick it off to avalos. >> in committee has set up in 2010, and set up ain a way as an aftermath of creating the balboa park plan that we would have citizens residents of the area who can help to steer the development and how we would manage our transportation needs, and transit needs in the area. and just to make sure that we have this plan that is years in the making, in terms of design and how we move forward with the area, that the residents are involved. and make sure that the plan can move forward rapidly. and it's also a seat that plays an advocacy role.
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often, we have multiple jurisdictions that are in conflict with each other. or are waiting for one jurisdiction to go forward or the other to manage and projects. and it is really important that we have people on residents in the area, through this complitty that can actually hold our department accountable the time lines and also to effective collaboration and also to priorities that the community has identified. not just through the station area plan but on top of the station area plan that was approved in 2009. for me, the largest priorities have been to build an affordable housing project on the balboa station area, right on the upper yard side, which is at the south west corner of gene va and san jose, and this also is akos the street from there is the office
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building and it is another site that was formally an mta office building and now it is under rekr, and park it is a piece of property and the committee also has been involved in helping to bring that project forward. and it is a big priority in my office that that moves forward as well. we also have incredible transit needs in that area. we have about 30,000 people a day who use the transit station, muni and bart and of course, a lot of people are dropped off even from the 280 freeway and so the different jurisdictions need to have the strong residents to help direct them and in terms of how they meet the needs of residents in the area. and where there is a huge basic conflict that happens with all of these priorities that we have the mta sees the station as a
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place where the maintenance of vehicles happens. residents see this as a place where they need a pass through to get to where the destination is. and the people who are using 280 are just trying to get through, and we have the people who want to develop the land and so this is a real critical function for this body to exist and to help and untangle things and make sure that things will move rapidly hless than slowly in the area. so, with that, we have about 9, we have nine seats and we have nine people who are applying, and actually i am excited by the number of people who are applying and we will go through each one who are here, one by one, and what i want to do is since we have two rules committee meetings to make-up the final committee, i will not make all of the decisions until we make them all at once, which
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will be on monday rather than setting up some of the seats today. because some of the people can apply to different seats and i just want to make sure that it will be easier that way. so if we can, if we are not approving you for a seat today that does not mean that we are not going to approve you for a seat in fact i expect everyone who is here who has come forward will be getting a seat on the committee. but i will make the final decision until monday. and that will be approved by the full board on tuesday. okay. so with that, i know that one of the persons here has a time constraint and hopefully my over talking has not gone past that. and that will be faye denise. lacanilao. >> hello, good morning, i just wanted to briefly introduce myself and i have written it so it is going to be concise.
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i have been living in san francisco for nearly ten years. and i have been an ak vift in the philippine know community for eight out of that. i was at the university when i was an under graduate and serving in the community, and the immigrant community in san francisco ever since. and i also you know i worked we pi filipino center and i started working in the walk san francisco. and it is like my second day. hence the time constraint. but i always wanted to highlight that i have lived here since 2011, the balboa bart station is my every day commuter base. it is sort of like my home. so the construction has been kind of fun to weave through each week.
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but you know it is a very important place for me and in the community that i work with and that i serve with. my commute consists of the same immigrant working class families that are organized with, the people that i work with struggling to build a brighter and a better future for, and these same people that i want to you know, be able to represent, the ones that keep me safe in my journey home. and in the citizens advisory committee, and to you know, be able to represent them means that i get to guarantee the representation and insure that their rights and welfare is upheld and that includes affordable housing and safety and safer streets and healthier, you know, environment for the communities there. so, yeah. >> thank you. what is your position on the project on the upper yard? >> i used to be the case manager
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for -- so i don't have -- i'm no longer at the filipino community center. but i am still sit in to the chstuff and i used to work in the upper yard meetings when i was working with ally active leadership for advanced youth. >> great, thank you. >> no problem. >> thanks. >> thank you. >> and if there are no further questions we will bring up the applicants actually in roughly the order that they came. raffaella falchi. no? >> okay. all right, let's move on to robert muehibauer. >> and if those folks who are not here they will be coming on monday. >> hi, committee i'm robert. i don't know whether to put my
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glasses on or off. >> you are wearing the right shirt. >> yeah. i applied for seats 5, 6, or 7, but i see that i am showing up here as seat 9 and that is actually probably a better seat for me all in all. i miss read it, i thought that it said that you had to be currently involved in the public sector, non-profit. i did spend almost 30 years in public and non-profit affordable housing. but more so than that, i am a 40 year res of the omi and i also have the ingleside shirt. i am a graduate of san francisco state university, that is why i am here in the city, my wife is a graduate. i got two kids one is a master's degree and graduate and another one going through it. we also go to the city college, we have keep roots in this community. i currently serve on the balboa park station committee. i am the past chair.
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and i am also serving on the balboa reservoir, citizen's advisory committee and i endeavor hard to try to cross communicate between the two committees because they are both working according to this same plan. although there are book ends of the same plan. i have had a long career in neighborhood preservation, and affordable house and adaptive reuse for historic preservation and that is what i did when i was working. in fact i have had a hand in building affordable housing in this neighborhood of balboa, tar aces when i was working for the non-profit sector on another lifetime ago. so, i would be honored to serve on this committee again, there is a lot of work to be done in particular, john mentioned the affordable housing. i think it's a real opportunity here to make something out of this intersection, the gene va
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and the san jose safety study, looking at how we can best make a democracy of the competing demands of pedestrians, bicycle, hover boards, skate boards, everything that goes through there, not to mention cars and buses. so not everybody is going to win all the way. but i think a good balance is possible. it is best as we can do. i mean this is san francisco. this is what we do. i'm an active pedestrian. i mean that i have walked this city and since i have retired since 2008, i put about 25 to 30 miles a week a walk in this city, not to mention the cities around the world and so i have a good perspective of that and that is kind of a vision of what i would like to see happen out here, so that is why i am really excited about the next term for this committee, and there is a lot of work to be done and i would be pleased to serve. so, thank you. thank you, for hearing me out. >> thank you very much.
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>> if you have any questions i am here too. >> luis licea. >> good morning. i was born and raised here. and i work for the ocean avenue association as a small business program manager. i do reside in district eleven border between district eleven and seven. right across the street. i did my main means of public transportation is bart, and ok, and i also walk because ocean avenue is so close for 40 years, i do know the obstacles of the
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pedestrians do face, i have a family as well. and my kids go to mission prep. and we do take public transportation, you know, going downtown because i only live, probably two and a half blocks away. and so i do know all of the dangers that you know like the m, and how it just terminates on san jose and how the pedestrians have to walk, you know. across those streets, even with on coming traffic. and also, i know that if you are going from city college going to balboa is bart station and the 280 on-ramp going to jdcd is a major, you know, danger because the cars just seem to go don't give the right away to the pedestrians. i do walk ocean avenue. you could see me there, and mostly every day. talking to small businesses.
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so i'm going for seats five through nine, because i do qualify for all of them. i want to do the park through the neighborhood and i just want to be involved, i just don't want to be one of the people that the city should do this and that, and or this, and might as well, you know, go and work roll up my sleeves and actually advocate for the people taking it to insure that i could contribute to my neighborhood. that is it. >> great, thank you. you hit all of the points i think that we are really important to hit in terms of the real difficult spots for pedestrians. and where thank you for serving and we will make a decision on
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monday. and i am sure that you will be one of the members. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> and the next applicant that we have is aaron good man. >> it looks like he is not here. >> okay. >> could someone who is not on the agenda. >> those are all of the applicants that we have listed. >> we have one more tiffany who is here. >> but she will be for monday, but she can present today. question. >> great. >> hi everyone, high name is tiffany, and i recently, applied for the representative for the advisory committee, i applied for a variety seats and i could lend my voice on beat half of young people, pedestrian and riders and neighbors, i live in mission terrace, and i have been involved in a variety of
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community given projects. and it will be a great candidate for it because i just value the space that honor and prioritizes the committee and informed decision making and by liin. gual and allows me to connect to neighbors and i am committed to seeing the improvements in the neighborhood because i live and work in this area with my family. and i'm a community organizers at the chinese organization, that serves chinese immigrants, and i worked with the diverse group of members and many of who live in the park area, and this year, i helped to coordinate the community out reach project in partnership with the mta to gain the community input on the proposed line changes. and this project helped me to gain a lot of insights about the needs of the neighbors who ride the mline to the area. and i also have been involved in a few survey projects one of them being the upper yard affordable housing project and also focus groups of the
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neighborhood allowing me to build a lot of relationships with young people and seniors. and i also have a lot of strong relationships with a lot of different community groups in the neighborhood who serve other immigrant communities. >> yeah, and so i'm really excited and i will be honored to be part of the cac, let me know if you have questions. >> thank you, that was great. >> thank you. >> thank you very much. >> are there any other applicants who are here for the cac who may be on monday's agenda? >> okay. seeing none. then i will throw it back to you supervisor avalos. >> so great, thank you. i think that we can go. >> public comment. >> at this time we are going to open up public comment. >> we have one card, if anyone is here, feel free to come up, tina, and i am sorry if i miss pronounced the name. >> hello, good morning, i work at the filipino community center and i have been working there for five years. and i have been working in san
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francisco for over ten years. and with faye out of those ten years i realized that i have known her for eight years. and have been working alongside her in the service aspect through scc and also in building and the people's movement and in solidary with other immigrants communities. and throughout san francisco. i am here to vouge for her and say that you should really pick her. because she is dedicated to advancing the rights and welfare of fill pi and the other communities, and the role is advancing the particular needs of residents including their housing rights and workers rights. she is contributing to the
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livelihood of community members and addressing their issues as she come in through our doors. she is genuinely concerned about the every day matters as residents, including their transportation matters including their ability to be able to go to work and come home to their families. she is also a co-parent in her household and a non-practice dishal household which is a queer household and also shares responsibility in bringing her god child to school at long fellow every day. >> any other members of the public that wish to comment on the cac >> seeing none, public comment is closed. >> thank you, so everyone who has come here today including tiffany, who was not on the agenda, i will be appointing but since we have particular seats for particular expertise, i will make all of those decisions
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based on who is all come together on monday. but thank you everyone who has agreed to be on the committee. i am really excited by the folks who have come out. and it looks like a great invig ration of the work of this committee. >> thank you so much. >> supervisor avalos and i concur that there is a lot of great applicants this time around and looking forward to that on monday. do we have a motion to continue, item, 1, 2, the special rules committee on monday? >> yes. >> so moved. >> thank you. >> madam chair, i would like to say, supervisor mar? >> what a great group of applicants coming from grass root organizations with great expertise in all of the different areas that this committee will over see, and i just want to say that in support of aaron good man, i know that
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with the park merced he has been great as an architect and a watch dog, i think that he also is an excellent choice for seat 7 or 9. but, what an amazing group of applicants good luck supervisor avalos in filling the last couple of applicants for these seats. >> thank you. i also want to thank beth for helping to attract a great group of folks as well to be applying for these seats. >> great. >> so supervisor cohen just made a motion to continue this item to the special rules committee meeting on monday and we will do that without objection. >> all right. item two, please? >>hearing to consider appointing three members, terms ending november 21, 2018, to the citizens general obligation bond oversight committee. there are three seats and four applicants and i would note that on the agenda for the seat qualifications for seat number
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one, states that it is a labor organization seat and that should be active in a business organization representing the business community located in the city. >> okay. great. and we are still allowed to move forward with that. okay at this time, we have again, four applicants. so we are going to go off the order, brenda kwee mcnulty. >> madam chair. supervisors, mar and cohen, good morning. thank you for entertaining my second application. i remember about a year and a half ago i appeared before this same committee, submitting my first application to sit on go boc and thanks to your recommendation, the board of supervisors appointed me and i have served one term. i am here to apply for a second term because i feel that the work of this committee adds value to the city and this is
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one of the few citizen's over night committee. and i have served for a year and a half member and earlier this year, i was appointed vice chair of the committee. and doing my tenure, i was assigned to be the liaison of the whistle blower program, one of two. and liaison to the recently passed mtr geo bond recently, was 2015. i just want to give you a highlight, the whistle blower program presents regularly to the board, to the committee. and it also posts all of its quarterly and annual meetings and annual reports on the website. it is run by the staff of five investigators and staffed
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including two lawyers. and as the oversight representing the citizens, we, my colleague and i have found them to be very professional, and very efficient, and carrying out the work according to the mandates of the whistle blower program as it is currently written. and just to give you some brief statistics, in the fiscal year 2015 to 16, we opened -- we more than 325 new cases, we closed 309 cases, and alluding to the efficiency, i think that these are good statistics that we were able to close about a third of our cases within 30 days. and 75 percent of our cases in 90 days. so, i'm pleased that i was able to serve and hope to continue to serve.
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and obviously, supervisors you understand probably better than me, that there has been a based on a report that is penned by the civil grand jury, that suggests the certain changes or improvements to the whistle blower program. and the active and conversations between the civil grand jury and the ethics committee. ethics commission which really addresses and is in charge of the retaliation act that of this program. and so when and if these changes are brought to the board of supervisors and eventually it gets changed through the enactment of legislation, i am sure that myself or the liaison, over seeing this program will be very pleased to help in doing whatever transition is necessary. in addition since i'm now chair, co-chair of the committee, i would like to just share with
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you some of a new idea and something that we are going to be doing. this past fiscal year was the first time that we, this committee using our own funds have commissioned an independent audit of select payment transactions, and we did this obviously with the help of the controller's office and we looked at or the auditor looked at two specific bonds. one is a 2010, easter bond. it was 248 million, and obviously it is still a relatively new bond, they are ongoing expenditures and the other one was 2011, rss bond, the parks and rec bond and that was 86 million and i am very pleased and we were pleased to get the findings that for these two bonds the first one, the findings were scored in 99.9 percent and the second bond scored, 100 percent.
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findings and satisfaction. so it is our plan with the help of the controller, to continue to do these select bonds and do it over rotational period. so in the period of time, either it's two years or three years, each and every one of the bonds that are alive, would have been sublt to this audit, and this specifically is a payment audit. and in addition to very many levels of audits that currently conducted by the controller's departme department. without further adieu i would like to be happy to answer any questions that you supervisors may have. >> thank you so much for your very thorough presentation and you answered all of my questions that i had for you. i think that you have taken this responsibility just by storm. i mean you are amazing with your
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finance background i knew that you would do a great job. but i have heard also really great things from people who get to work with you in this careful and i think that if any tax payers have questions or concerns about how it is that we are spending our geo bond dollars, i think that we should turn them over to you. because i do feel very good knowing that someone like you is watching over our geo bond expenditures and how we are spending our tax payer dollars. >> thank you. >> all right, so at this time, colleagues any further questions or comments, seeing none, let's see if alexander tonisson is here. >> if i heard correctly, he is going to be later. >> let's move on to kristin chu.
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>> the left the committee because we moved out of town at the time, and it was a very great experience for me at the time. during my three years, there, we oversaw, a lot of the bonds that are still being over seen by the committee today, because of the nature of the way that the bond money is spent. and so do i have some experience with some of the work that it is actually doing right now. and we also dealt with a variety of issues, that were not specific to construction. like the 2008, financial crisis on bond revenues and the challenge there. and we also at the time were dealing with challenges regarding the privacy of the whistle blower complaints which it sounds like the current committee has working on also. and obviously that has led to some significant issue and hopefully some action there. i am here because i am
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passionate about the good government. my work has included more than 15 years of the voters and both here and in new york city. and i working mostly on the voter education at that time. i also was the league's member on the sunshine ordinance task force here in san francisco for four years, including some time as the chair. i think that my broad experience including business and operations work at ucsf recently, a masters in finance from the san francisco state give me the unique skills to do the work of this committee and i am sure that you know and as brenda just talked about, the work of the committee is often focused on building and construction projects but the actual issues, are not necessarily specific to how you put up a building. and they are about accounting practices, and they are about auditing and they are about steel prices. and they are about equitable use of the bond funds. and so having a broad background, like i have is important, for the members. finally, i want to say on a peshal note, i have an
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eleven-year-old daughter and i thought that this was going to be the year that a woman was in the white house and i thought this was going to bring in a new vision for her of woman's leadership. and that didn't happen. and i think that we all -- i struggled after the election and thought well what can i do? and i think i am here today because i want to do something and i do think that it is important for a committee as important as the bond oversight to have more representation and female representation besides two out of nine. >> do you have any questions for me? >> no, thank you very much. i want to thank you actually for your previous service in this particular capacity and glad to see that you are interested in turning thank you very much. >> supervisor mar? >> yeah, thanks also for being active at the school, and i know that the school is mourning the loss of one of our amazing talented students.
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but also tremendous experience on a number of committees but especially go bac as you call it, but thank you for your service and being so involved with so many of the activities in our city government but also at the school level too. >> okay. >> thank you. >> thank you. so seeing no other names on the roster, we are going to move to preston lam. >> good morning and thank you for your consideration of my application and the bond oversight committee, and again my name is preston lam and i would like before i continue i would just like to summarize a couple of items from the application, and hey lighting the qualification for the service on the bond oversight. firstly, my application is given by the vibrant communities and that the massive interest in the public service and five years of experience working in community development and capitol project
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finance. i am currently a project manager with the china town development where i manage multi housing projects in this role, i will develop the budgets of the housing stock, and as such, my professional experience, provides me with an understanding of the capitol project finance, and administration and the lend for the bond oversight committee to have over seeing the public infrastructure projects. and my goal is on the bond oversight committee, and personal and professional, personally while i was born in china town hospital i am i rather recent transplant from the east bay and i am looking for opportunities to participate in public service, specifically tailored to the interest and planning. also interested in applying my professional experience working in housing, and expanding that experience to include, the capitol finance projects at the scale of the city.
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should i be appointed to insure that the projects meets the need of san franciscans and i also hope to leverage my professional experience to inform how the city capitol planning process can help to address, san francisco deep housing affordable crisis. thank you. >> if you could elaborate more on what you would like to see happen with the go bac and there are four applicants for this particular seat three. so i just wanted to hear a little bit more. >> all right one of the things that drew my interest to the bond oversight committee is specifically prop a, and the bond funds that are going to be administered for the housing
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project and so that is really motivates my application here today. >> okay. all right, colleagues, any other questions or comments? >> i have a question. >> supervisor cohen? >> thank you. >> mr. lam have you attended any of the meetings? >> i haven't, i actually again, i was born in san francisco, but i was raised in richmond and so i just moved out in june. >> so that is not -- i heard that part already. >> i wanted to know if you knew what they do, their function, outside of reading a description on a website. if you have actually attended a meeting or have had any kind of an informational or spoken to anyone that sits on the committee? >> i haven't. but i do know some of the bond that are being over seen by the committee include the park bond and the street improvements with the mta. yeah. >> thank you. >> okay. thank you. >> and supervisor mar?
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>> yeah, i know that there is over 5 years of experience with china town cdc on many different projects and leadership positions but i think the small sites program is so critical for maintaining affordable housing kind of in our nardz and neighborhoods, and i also wanted to acknowledge your leader with the united states association and i know that is not an easy task as a chair person of the asian pacific coalition as well and being on the board of usfa to me shows strong leadership from the national level to local with you. i did have one question, your registered to vote in contra costa but you are a resident of san francisco. >> yeah, it is a little confusing there. so you know actually before moving out to san francisco, i was actually planning on applying for the richmond
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planning commission and that plan has been tabled for now, and i am actually looking and i will be a voter next year in san francisco. >> okay. >> thank you. >> thanks for the clarification. >> all right so seeing no other names. then we will go to public comment for this item. anyone would like to speak come on up. and unfortunately we don't have mr. alexander has not arrived. okay. well, we might have to continue that particular seat then. but right now, i have whitney jones as the public comment. >> good morning supervisors. whitney jones, and i am the director of housing for cdc and i have known preston lam for six years since he was in the china town urban institute program that trains young people about land use issues and you are
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urban policy, he is a concerned person who has worked to have fair housing and access to housing for the low income and the disabled residents throughout his working career. and he has been working at china town, as a housing developer and as the supervisor mar noted on the small sites program in particular, he is familiar with the bond financing and its impact on communities, he would be a dedicated member or in formed member of the committee on a healthy selective. >> thank you. >> thank you very much, any other members of the public that wish to comment on item two? >> seeing none, public comment is closed. supervisor mar? >> i just wanted to say that i do know of the work of alex from local 21. i think, i think he's also succeeding michael who is also active in local 21. but for alex's work representing
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city staff, but also other staff when i was on the bridge board to others, he is very professional and i think really good attention to detail in his work in labor and management relations. but also on difficult and complex economic and human resource policies at least when i have had to work with him, but i think that he would be a good appointee to seat to for the body and i know that seat two must be active in the labor organization, but i would strongly urge support for him even though he is not here today. >> okay. thanks. i just hadn't received any sort of correspondence or anything. i just don't know this individual. i just want to throw out there, would there be a quorum issue if we had to continue seat two for whatever reason? >> no. >> maybe if miss mcnulty if you would not mind answering and
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letting mo'o he know if there would be a quorum issue. >> could you repeat that? >> for the current committee? >> yes, if we had to for some reason, to continue seat two would there be a quorum issue? >> will you have enough people. >> our quorum issue. >> yes. >> i think that we would be fine. meaning that it would be deferred to another meeting to fill that seat if it is came to be. so instead of three seats, it would be two seats. >> or i mean would your committee be able to meet so for example, you need i don't know how many members. >> yeah, i think that i'm thinking it is fine, i misunderstood your question. i think that we would have quorum with if two seats are filled. >> okay. >> thank you. >> so, i mean i will defer to my
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on colleague as well, i don't know this individual but i do have the application in front of me and i do take supervisor mar's comments into consideration, and so i don't know if supervisor cohen has a preference? >> i am happy and actually came in prepared to listen to the conversation. and at this point i would love to support alexander. >> all right. >> so we have four applicants and three seats, and so i don't know if any of you want to make a motion then on any of these seats? >> i will make a motion to appoint brenda kwee, m nullity to seat one, and alexander to seat two, and to support kristin chu, for seat three. >> thank you. >> and do we have a second or a different opinion? >> supervisor mar. >> actually i will second that. but i will say that i think preston lam i think that kristin
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is extremely experienced and i support the motion, i just want to encourage preston to continue to apply for committees. i think that your expertise and strong leadership and work would be really valuable. but i do think that kristin has much more experience and rejoining the committee at this time would be very good for the oversight committee. but i still strongly encourage preston to stay active and apply again. >> thank you. supervisor mar. >> i definitely concur with your comments. i think that both miss chu and mr. lam bring you know different backgrounds that would be beneficial, but at this time i would be comfortable is supporting miss chu and there will be openings that will come up i am sure in the future, and encourage you to maybe sit in on some of the meetings and see how its run, and develop some experience with that over time. >> supervisor cohen? >> thank you. i also wanted to speak directly to mr. lam and association
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myself with supervisor mar mentioned not moving forward not to discourage you but it is to encourage you to get in there and roll up your sleeves and to get active and attend a meeting and become in many ways a subject matter expert. okay. >> thank you mr. lam. >> and thank you colleagues. >> there was a motion and seconded and we will do that without objection, congratulations. >> madam chair. >> just for clarification on the motion was that a motion to forward as the committee report to the december 13th? >> yes, sorry. so yes, why don't we clarify that is to as a committee report to december, 13th. >> okay, thank you. >> thank you. and congratulations. >> and item three, please. >>hearing to consider appointing one member, term ending april 30, 2018, to the police commissi commission. there is one seat and four applicants. >> so we are actually planning on having a special rules
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committee meeting on monday. and where this will be one of the items that we will consider, and given that there was a late application that was received last week that we wanted to include as part of the mix so at this time, if any of the applicants are here as well as public comment, we will entertain discussion today. so, i see miss soo, any others? i don't think so. why don't we go to miss soo. >> thank you, commissioners. tang, mar, and cohen. i expected my other applicants to be here except i have people who are here supporting me today. i expect others on monday and i would like to present today. you have before me my background and i would just like so reiterate that my family has been here for four generations on my mother's side. my father was an immigrant and my father had a distinguished
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career as a civil engineer and spent the majority of his career serving the city and county of san francisco. retiring as the head of the structural section for the department of public works. his initial job was out at the bay view hunter's point naval shipyard and i think that that was key to my childhood that i grew up with a diverse background and that is when we had a solid working class working out at the shipyard. >> i have the academic training in math statistics as well as a lawyer, and while i may seem very analytical, it has given me the tools to serve the community and i have also been a news reporter for asian week and gathering the people's stories and seeing what other needs there are in the city. i also have national affiliations with the national agency of the american bar association. and i also serve the local bar, and the benefit of me serving
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nationally is finding out the best practices and finding out issues. but everything is local. and i am really at heart a city girl. and i appreciated hearing kristin being an example for her young daughter and that is why i feel a strong obligation to serve the city when i have the capacity to do. i have had great examples from my own family as well as community mentors. >> i am coming in to this application with eyes wide open. and i have served on the commission on the status of women since 2009 and i served as president and i am well aware of the constitutional problems that we have right now, with the police department, and dealing with our community. in studying the report as well as the blue ribbon report, there are now 94 findings and over 400 recommendations. while that may seem like an unsurmountable task, we need to methodically go through those
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and build the community trust and get through those. it's not very different from we addressed the family violence and the domestic violence homicides. i think that the height of when we started really addressing the domestic violence homicides was the clear choice case. and for years, we had an excess of a dozen domestic violence related homicides per year. the domestic violence homicide, hit a particular nerve because there were so many. and joyce did everything right and she got a retraining order and filed the police report and yet she was murdered in front of her two young children. this really prompted not only as the justice encourage panel in identifying problems and how we would solve them, but it has made me believe in whatever we do requires a multi pronged approach. we now have the family violence
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council and so that means there is law enforcement members of the judiciary and even the control, because when there is violence against animals you find the violence in the household. meeting there is not to shift the responsibility point fingers or anything. what is the most important to to hear from the community and the people that we serve, so they often say that there is well meaning, and the doctors and law enforcement who want to help them but they are not connecting with them because they are not really using the particular language or really understanding what is behind particular issues. so, you need to build a trust with the people that you really want to serve. and that is the core of the problem right now between the police department and our
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communities. and particularly the communities of color. we now after the family violence council report and working on the domestic violence, we were able to have zero homicides for almost three years, and it was unprecedented. sadly we have had a couple of more in the last year. but that just means that no matter what we achieve, we always have to reassess and we always have to be diligent and vigilant in continuing to look at accountability and to reassess programs as necessary. i have also served on the hospital board at the saint francis board, and that has been very instrumental in really reaching out to our vulnerable communities and under served communities. no one can do it alone, no one agency can do it alone, and no one institution can do it alone, but some of the key examples
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that i am proud of is partnering with glide memorial and helping a vulnerable members of the community who become ill and hospitalized if they don't have the stable housing, prior to relea release. what makes the police work difficult, is that we don't have the adequate health services i was noting that we don't have as many inpatient beds that we needed in our hospitals any
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more. and we have psychiatrists that are retiring and that makes it more difficult, and it makes it difficult for family to reach out to seek the help for their loved ones and they often are in the streets and the police and end up having to deal with that and often, with the tragic consequences in violence, and we also will be more attention to helping people with substance abuse and so, those are other issues to look at in terms of trying to solve our problems. >> i am very hands-on. given you the academic training i still believe that there is no substitute for first hand, going out and into the community. often times, the people that we serve don't have the time to come to city hall or in tim dated by city hall. and while i was president of the police commission, i made sure that i went out into the submission, and china town. and in the mission, i found out that even the men who are convicted of domestic violence and fulfilled their probation
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going through the 52 week program, often times there was still a need but if you, approach it as further anger management training they were very resistant. however, particularly for the immigrant families, they are very amenable to attending classes if it meant that it was strengthening the family structure, in china town we pulled together various asian communities service groups and i had no idea that the language lines were very intimidating and not accepted by the communities. and one of the large issues we have is language accessibility, while it may sound great that we have the language lines and now, mostly officers are doing the carry the pocket cards that they encourage someone who needs help that is not english proficient that they do call an interpreter. but, i feel that there is no substitute for an inperson, bi lingual person and absent that,
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the language line may be a substitute, but it is inefficient, and i am looking into ways and perhaps, the tablets so that there is some kind of face time so that someone in need of interpretive services actually has a trust relationship and seeing someone else interpret face-to-face. and furthermore, while we were in this more digital age, and people are less apt to look at individuals and i think that body advantage also, means a lot. and having grown up here in the city, too, with the immigrants and many of the immigrants come from the homogenus society and that could be a conduit in building, the relationships. many immigrants come with preconceived notions or stereotypes about the particular communities. when i grew up.
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i have had the experience when there is a distrust for a particular agency, i watched one of my mentors retired justice harry low serve with distinction, he was upon his retirement he has been called to the human rights commission as a police commissioner and served when there has been constitutional problems certainly one of the bigger tasks is when the department of insurance was painted by the clock and bush scandal and i joined there after and he wadz there and his primary roll was to bring back the public trust and trust is the most important thing according to the doj report, no one is safe actually in the city unless there is mutual trust between the community and the police. and the police are less safe if they don't engage the community and lchl a work with the community, and the people that they were designed to protect
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and serve. i think i work with a great number of different people. we may disaagree on an approach, when we have a common goal it is easier to reach consensus, i worked for the democratic party and often times people have disagreements over what should be in a particular document, but, my goal has always been to build consensus and have a document that we can be proud of. that being said, with a plan going forward, the blueprint with the department of justice report and the blue ribbon report, paper in itself is not effective and it is about the implementation. and i see my role as being a facilitator, but also, holding the police department accountable, but i hope that the public will also hold me as one of the commissioners accountable, because i am there to serve and make sure that
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things get done. i want to see more accountability on bench marks and so, with these statistics and if, and maintaining the statistics, i think that that is the only way that we can measure progress. i had a conversation with supervisor avalos earlier today. and he said well, it seems like we have not had a shooting since mario woods, and you know we had six instances in 2015, alone, that may be koint coincidental and i think that we have identified problems and i think that the leadership has made a concerted effort but that might be coins deny and we need to have the best practices and i will leave this with you and open up to questions, i really in particular like the tag line that the saint francis memorial hospital has come up as part of dignity health and that is that medicine cures, but human kindness heals and we do need a lot of healing and building of trust before we can be a very
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effective and safe city. >> thank you, miss soo for your very thorough run down of your background. and for sharing your thoughts with us about the police commission. so at this time, i am sure colleagues have a lot of questions and supervisor mar. >> i know we are going to go through this again on monday. but i just wanted to say wow, what amazing hef rootedness in the community and all of the work that you have have done not only from the history of chinese americans but more of a pan asian support and i know that your awards from korean american journalists to as highlighted by the blue ribbon report and how
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you will focus on the findings and the recommendations and what i really, and i am a reader of your asian week column, and many, and for many years, and until the paper sees to exist and i just want to say, raising the clear choice, and the case that was in the richmond district, and awareness of the domestic violence and how it hits, not just the asian american and the filipino communities but everyone, and how the police commission could play more of a critical role in addressing those issues to the human trafficking leadership and sharing the city's efforts and you even point out your experience with actual arial, sciences and pension plans which we need to a police commission, and all of the anti-asian violence and the racial violence, and the tensions and the leadership work that you have done, and i think that you have really highlighted what an amazing person you would be on the police commission. i know that this is a challenging decision for uls,
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because other mentors i think that we have many of the same mentors. but other mentors like bill firmly from the asian law caucuses is supporting bob hirsch. and the equal justice society, and i know that bill who is a mentor to a number of us, in immigrant rights and justice, is also on the body or applying and then we also have john hamasaki strongly recommended by our public defender and many in the criminal justice and racial justice reform work. but i will just say that you would make a tremendous commission commissioner even with the competition, and i am pleased that you are applying. >> thank you. and i think i just would like to point out that i think that it is important to fill the seat with a chinese american. right now, the community does feel ignored when they make reports they don't feel that the police have been very
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responsive. but also, language issues may also be issues and often times, things are not reported. and that also includes young children riding public transportation to schools. and if they are robbed or something, that they are afraid to tell their parents. this is again, multi pronged approach, but i think in the school district or some trusted adult in schools, where the students could report that they were a victim of the crime and feel free to confide in that individual. >> thank you. >> thank you. supervisor mar. >> supervisor cohen? >> thank you very much. >> good afternoon commissioner and thank you for your interest in this position. how often do you attend a meeting. >> i haven't attended since actually in 2012, when i was president, and i called for a joint police commission meeting to look at domestic violence response. >> okay. >> and the delay in implementing the justice system and however i
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need to say that i am in touch with sitting commissioners. and we do work together with the commission on the sat status of women, particularly on the domestic violence and the human trafficking and they are part of the committee and so i have not gone to those, and i have worked with the police department. >> i understand that. and what is your level of involvement, around the discussion around the policy changes that the commission is dealing with right now. with the use of force. i have studied them and i saw the resistance. i am hoping that i could try to be a bridge fresh set of eyes working with the police officers association. i don't like to see flames put into the fires at resistance to change, and accuse type of press releases lobed at supervisors, and the commissioners who are trying to make a positive change for the con stit you ents.
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>> you mentioned that you want to be a bridge from where to where? if they are not comfortable and there is not the diversity that reflects our city and they can't work together, that is not a way to build public trust. >> do you reach out to those officers? i have not yet reached out to those officers. i did reach out to some or a
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classmate of mine in law school who had formally been an officer. and so i have heard from some of the officers who actually do the training. and so part of it is actually looking for officers. what have you heard? when you say that you have heard from officers? that the officers feel intimidat intimidated. and reporting things and to me that is unacceptable and we nighed to identify the problems >> when something goes awry there is a team of quality leaders and they look at the root cause to make sure that things don't repeat themselves. >> so you say that you want to look for the root causes >> what are some of the roo the
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causes for the challenges that are going on in the community. >> i don't think that they could ignore that there has been constitution alia constitution, bias. there is a culture and things are no the reported in a timely basis, and part of that is intimidation and even the rank and file are afraid to report on one another. structurally, i see an issue and given that we are a sanctuary city, i expect that we are going to lose the funding and we have to work smarter not harder, we don't have a separate policy person for the commission and a person to do an independent analysis. and even to the public, the police economics is listed on the web side under the police department and that does not give a casual browser, a member of the community to know that the police commission is independent. and even when they make the recommendations it has to go through the poa. the office of the police
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accountability, they need to be fully staffed, in order to handle the complaints. and it is no doubt that we aren't handling the problems because there are so few complaints that actually get reported. and let alone trickle through, the disciplinary process. >> and so how would you define community policing? >> i define community policing with the officers actually being out there meeting regularly with the community. that the officers actually have more foot patrols and know the community and they were trusted members that they felt that they could have conversation and even if the things did not rise to the level of a crime and just to report, the troubling instances but, in my montra has always been, you could be a good leader if you know about your community, but you could be a potentially effective great leader if you are immersed in the community, and one of the
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difficulties is that the fewer police officers do leave in our city. and as we are recruiting we need to look at that as well. and i think that it makes. >> i am just going to cut you off because there are laws that prohibit us from making those requirements. >> i understand, and that is one of the identifications of why i think that we have lost sight of the xhupt policing and the old fashioned policing that we used to have. >> what engagement do you feel the public as well as the poa need to -- what engagement do you feel that the public as well as the poa need to be engaging in order to move forward with the police reform in our city? >> i think that to have the honest dialogue, and without being inflammatory and i know tensions are at an all time high and it is hard to have a lot of civil discourse. and i see that role as the police commission trying to really make sure that they gather enough information and go
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back and forth. right now it's the public does not have a direct dialogue with the police officers or the poa. but they, the police commission has called for public forums. i think that a good start was at least in our consideration of who is going to be the next police chief that they were community meetings. and that the public expressed what kind of qualifications they were looking for in an efs effective police chief. i would say that it, and the things come from the top but there has to be a buy-in and the officers actually executing and living the particular practices so that it builds confidence in the community. and it's not going to be a fast process. it is going to take, i would say years, but you know, we need to start now. >> all right. the department of justice has made recommendations and you mentioned to it a little bit in your presentation earlier, about the findings and.
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>> there is trust, and there can't be community policing without trust, first of all, and then we looked into the use of force, our use of force policy is right, and the use of body cameras now, has been implemented and i think full implementation will happen in january. and third, is really, and along with the use of force, i'm talking about over all training. retraining of police officers, regular training. and then third, is actually the recruitment. >> so do you support the current policy that is being debated now that officers should not be allowed to shoot into a moving vehicle?
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that is not a blanket answer, if a vehicle is fleeing, i don't think that they should be allowed to shoot, as i red the policy on first blush it is only if a person is actually using a weapon. and then the officer can use weapon under that new policy. that is currently debated. >> right. >> that is the clear definition, do you affirm it or do you not? >> i think well i do affirm it because we are a very dense city, even freeway shootings that have happened in the east bay, are dangerous to be shooting at a moving car because there are potentially innocent victims and even a lot of jurisdictions have changed policies on car chases and pursuits because it is a danger to the public chl. >> including our own. and so i think in closing you have presented a deep understanding and knowledge and relationships that exist within the asian american community. but i want you to describe your relationships with the
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communities that are disproportionately affected, the samoan and how would you be a voice to them. >> i have actually gone out to support when the black lives matter had a presentation, and i thought this is a first something that seems high brow but to have a panel on black lives matter and have the ashaen community support. and i have known the bay view and sadly some of the older members like soffy max well mom have passed away. and i am in touch with reverend townsend, and brown. there is a grant now a federal grant to study the effective out reach on and response to domestic violence in the bay view specifically. but, i would like to improve relationships between the asian community immigrants and in particular who don't always mingle with their neighbors too. >> i can appreciate that but
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that is not the role of the police commission to improve relations between african americans and asians and a lot of work already around there through the commission. and the immigrant commission. excuse me pond's office as well as the bay view stations and the iin. gelside i think that it is important to point out that the african community and latino does not stay in the bay view, we are talking about relationships that are happening also in the fillmore. >> right. >> and in public housing. so, you know, aside from having a relationships with the figure heads, where else, how do you advocate on behalf. >> i was going to say, i understand that might not be a defined role of the police division, and i feel like i can't be effective unless i am in the community doing my field trip and known to the community and as a resource, i want the people to feel comfortable in
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calling me. so, for instance, with our local asian american bar as well as the national american bar we do have what we call the unity bars, and so that would be the latino community, and the african american, and the asian bars working altogether. and identifying issues, and how we could all work together. and there are very many similar issues that effect our communities but there are differences and we have to recognize that and we can't be effective unless we really taylor our out reach to particular communities. but i want to hear directly from the people. that is the only way that we will know if we are effective or not. >> thank you for answering my questions, tough ones i realize but thank you. >> inturp mar? >> yes, thank you for grilling
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her. but, i did want to say that i think one thing that makes miz soo stand out is the deep and thoughtful relationships with many different communities she mentioned reverend townsend, and brown, and others that i know when different incidents of tensions occur between the chinese and african americans, julie was miss soo was really actively engaged with building better interethnic relationships and understanding and i do want to acknowledge too that your work in promoting the equity, especially racial in the workplace as the president on the commission on the status of women was really significant. and i did want to say that you mentioned that this should a chinese american should be strongly considered for the seat. and i know that we had ivan lee, from the chinese, citizen, and pan from the chinese affirmative
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action and angel la, and i think that you would follow in that tradition of well rooted asian american but with ties to other communities of color as well. not just shallow ones, but really deep relationships. i also just wanted to ask though, i don't agree, i think that the police commission needs members that have strong relationships with the chinese american community. and knowledge and sometimes non-chinese american might even have better relationships and understanding of the chinese community than a chinese american might. let me just ask why would you be chinese, but also to represent. >> you don't have to look like somebody to represent somebody
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but it is also building trust and i have been known in the chinese american community. i have cantonese skills. >> i am sure that you are better than me. >> i am fair and just sxh that i will roll up my sleeves and go the work, for instance when the city hall offered the classes in spanish and i regretted that i took french, but i had a basis, and i asked the instructor, she said proficiency in cantonese, like a good lawyer, but i made myself go on and take that 60 week course and i too being myself out of the comfort level and made myself go to a radio and television show to talk about domestic violence, because i never want any kind of
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cultural barrier, or a language barrier for someone from seeking help and when i mean the culture it goes back to if someone is a survivor and tle said, it does not work when you ask us these questions, you know, we are not comfortable and that is why i wanted to take the time to actually talk to survivors who come to our commission or if i have been out in the field to say, what resonates with you when wi want to help you? and how do you, are you able to see help and are there barriers to seeking help? and i would like to look at things at a wholistic approach and hope that answers your question. >> one last one, and i know that supervisor cohen been extremely tough with entrenched old boys networks in the police department. and i know that you are extremely principaled and can be very tough too.
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but i know from the task report, to judge core dell statements about theal fant in the room, the police officers association strangle hold on preventing and the watch dog with the entrenched old buys networks like that. >> i will have a conversation with them. and i think that it is the commission's role to actually repo report. for the additional pressure, and one difficult, and we are a union town and i believe in unions and i belong to a union myself, and the state attorneys and the hearing officers, and one difficult is that we could have the other recommendations disstilled through the police commission from these particular reports but it still has to go to a vote through the poa. and so, i would want to go out
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as an individual, and talk to the poa, and understand that they have to have the particular legitimate reasons why they don't want to implement something, or why there was -- change is hard. even going on a diet, if people go on a diet, it is hard. but it is also positive reinforcement, if a doctor said that you need to lose 20 pounds and you go and you only lost five and you only met 25 percent of your goal that is very negative. but you know what? you only have 75 percent more to go. you are almost there. you have cut one fourth of the way through. so it is a step by step process, and even with the domestic violence and the hurt families i didn't know if we could trim down, the goal was to trim down the domestic violence homicides, but to get down to zero for four years was amazing and so given that we have had a couple more, i think that we can reflect back on what made it work so that they were at zero. >> and i don't want things to be by chance, i want it to be
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because we had a concerted effort and a group effort and hopefully, a couple of years from now, we can be with the police department and the community can celebrate, that they help build a police force that really meets their needs and that we feel like we have a safer city. >> thank you very much. >> okay, so colleagues, i know that we are going to be continuing this discussion on monday. so at this time, then, seeing no other names on roster i am going to call or open up public comment, i have a couple of cards here. wilson chu, rebecca rotman, and commissioner greg chu and christopher chow. and terlito, and sulu, i am sorry. >> okay, yes, i couldn't read the handwriting, come on up. >> okay. >> don't be shy. >> better? >> please. commissioner? >> thank you. >> wow.
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what a presentation by miss soo. good morning, actually good afternoon supervisors cohen and supervisor mar supervisor tang, chair tang. my name is greg chu and as a commissioner since 2004. first asfy ill m commissioner and second as a human rights, protecting human and consecutively rights for all of the citizens of the city and currently since 2009 now as the arts and culture commissioner at large, champion and investing in arts, for the city, as you can see now, i am here to talk about julie soo and her no doubt, deep interest in her appointment to become the next police commissioner. >> when i heard from about this, i wanted to support her, for her
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on the status of women and of course, her on the status of women and she works on the human rights issues that i have and she works on a multitude of domestic violence issues and she works on the elder abuse issues and human trafficking issues and but this experience. and finally and more recently, aside from what commissioner soo has been involved in, and with her experience, she made a film a film documentary about the constitution of the united states called the 14, the 14, it is about a most important timely issue in our era. and the film doc ex-mroerz who has a right to be an american sit enunder our 14th amendment and that person that is born and naturalized in the u.s., are the
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ones to be therefore, citizens. it is a chinese american art who fought for being a u.s. citizen in a troubling time. it was case won by the u.s. supreme court and changed american history. so as commissioner chu as i am. i want to move forward to support diane, julie soo in becoming the next police commissioner. >> thank you. >> good afternoon. supervisors. i am rebccaa rotman and i am here to speak in support of julie soo. a remarkable woman and a member of the community. i have known julie soo, for over 20 years. before actually, before i ran for the san francisco democratic council central committee where i won and served two terms
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including in the executive committee. i have met her father, her late father, her late mother, and her brothers. i have observed julie's work in the community and her work ethics. no one in the community i believe, who would have not heard or known of the name julie soo because i have seen her work tirelessly with the different members of the communities. having been born and raised in san francisco, and deeply i could understand supervisor cohen's passion in making sure that the commissioner is the set of really understanding and compassionate individuals, because it is a very, very and i don't want to say very, very,
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because it is important. it is a critical commission and i understand her passion because commissioner cohen is also a native born and raised in san francisco. julie soo has been born and raised in the city and has seen san francisco evolve. and under and she represents, she em bodies what san francisco stands for which is for caring, compassion appreciation, and embracing diversity of all people from all walks of life. she represents that. she has demonstrated that in her many, many years of work in the community. and with her community experience her education and her professional work as an attorney, without a doubt, she would be a tremendous asset in the police commission, thank you very much. >> thank you. >> next speaker please. >> board of supervisors, thank
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you for the opportunity to talk about a candidate i think that is well deserving for the community as well as the police commission. julie has worked with me, and the other things, and really were disconnected from but now we know, along with supervisor cohen, and we have been able to move closer to the goals which is unemployment, and dealing with crime, and samoans only make-up one and a half percent of the total population, and we make-up 10 to 12 percent of the justi juvenile population and not to mention the hard core cell at sanquitin, brothers united and i think that she will be an asset to us, because there may be alternative programs that we can look at. and we have worked with
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supervisor and our district, and trying to bring in the closes through the issues and supervisor cohen will tell you that one of the other mrajz that we have out there, is trying to get the pacific islanders on board to less the violence and deal with the issue u.s. around crime and first offenders, because they are not fully represented. i think that judy would be that voice for us. and we need that voice at the 850 bryant, especially and here at city hall. when we are talking about crimes, and issue of that nature. and i hate to see these young brothers and sisters go he to jail for minor things. and most of our crimes are around assault and violence. and dealing with fight and stuff like that. so, i think that she would be an asset. and along with some of the work that supervisor cohen has done out in the 60 ten area, with he would like to expand that to city wide. so, i vote for her would help us
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tremendously. thank you for your time. hope that you have a happy holiday. >> you too. >> thank you, commission for your kind words. >> did you have a question. >> no. >> >> good afternoon, chair tang and supervisors cohen and mar, and i am here today and i am carol, and i am here today to support julie soo for the vacancy on the police commission, i have known julie for only 20 years and have worked with her on a broad range of community issues and i strongly believe in her selfless commitment in the leadership quality to have recommended her for two other important positions on the commission on the status of women, for which i served under three may ors and as a trustee to the board of saint francis memorial hospital and it was part of our succession plan to be sure that we have representation on both of those bodies. being a fourth generation, san franciscan, julie has displayed an outstanding commitment to participate in matters concerning equity and access.
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and to our city services especially for the committees of color and the immigrant and for those who first language may not be english. both areas critical for the police commission to have sensitivity and concrete hands-on experience in finding solutions. i think that the work that she mentioned about cosw is come mendable and i was on the commission, 25 years ago, when domestic violence was along shot of a priority for the police department. we helped to collaborate with the police commission to change that. julie and following commissioners and it is sustained that commitment where we have had those four years of zero domestic violence, the domestic violence murders was number one in the 80 and 90s of all homicides in the city, i believe that there were 16 that first year. so i believe her work and her leadership there is in terms of results. because of collaboration with the police commission. as a trained attorney and ter life experience in the community, julie has also
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displayed meaningful value thought and, her former journallism work has given her the hands to get the facts and report as accurately as possible. what her efforts have afforded her. at this critical time in our city is imperative for this appointment to be a person with a track record of being trusted, and a commitment to move the department forward with the pro-he posed changes they have been challenged with. thank you. >> thank you. >> next speaker please. >> madam, my name is chu and i am the president of the chinese american democratic club, i would like to thank the opportunity for madam chair tang as well as supervisor cohen and mar for the opportunity to speak on behalf of julie soo. her candidacy for the police commission. there has been a lot of people
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and a lot of discussion and a lot of things said about julie's qualifications and expertise. but i also want to be aible to provide a situation in which her assets and knowledge would be able to help effect change on the police commission. such as having those particular relationships where when there could be stand stills between the commission and the rank and files of the poa and whether resolving that through the soft skills that she has or being able to go out and being able to rally public opinion against the support of policies that the poa would want to implement or is challenging to critical asset, as well as implementing the
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agenda. and i also believe that there is going to be a vacancy with victor and there is no longer going to be an ashaen american representative and i think that is going to be important to have somebody that not only understands the individual communities of the other communities but also, understand the issues within the asian american communities, i think that there was a lot of times and there is many times where asian americans issues are no or ignored and not addressed. and so i think that with that said i received a letter from one of the former president or the member, eddie chin in
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support of mike young, i believe. but you are saying that cadc baksz julie soo. >> yes, right now there has been a discussion that we do support michael young as a member of cadc as well. but our relationship with julie goes very deep it has been long. and i think when michael comes in front of the board we will choose to support both candidates. >> thanks, supervisor mar for that clarification. >> and next speaker, please. >> hello, chair person tang, supervisors mar, supervisor cohen, my name is christopher chow. i have lived in san francisco all of my life. i have had the opportunity to
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serve the city of san francisco when i was with the -- i was the second employee of the commission and the department of environment back in 1997, when it was formed. i have also served the city as a direct of the village of the beacon center, which is a youth center based at washington high school in roosevelt middle school. i am also have known julie soo for oh, i guess, more than 20 years or so going back to our days when we both worked on asian week. and on other matters concerning the asian american community. but i want to voice my very strong support for her on the police commission because i believe that she possesses the qualities that we would want in
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a new commissioner. on that var important body. without casting any apersions i would describe her as a bull dog. she is a bull dog on causes that she pursues. she is a bull dog in investigating and getting down to the facts and getting down to the nitty gritty and getting down to the truth and trying to find so solutions she is a bull dog in up holding what she believes is right. and i think that these are qualities that would enhance the police commission. her also to, just the fact that she can converse in chinese. she not only represents the chinese american community well, but because she has also demonstrated out reach abilities and the commitment to the out reach to all in a given con stit you entcy, i think that speaks
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well for her. and also, too, if i may, indulge me. she would be a leadership model on the commission for many members in the ranks of a force. because her commitment to fact finding and her commitment to speaking up and her commitment to listening to all sides would, i think, empower many members of the force to do the same and i think that that is an important change for our society. thank you. >> thank you very much. >> next speaker please. >> good afternoon, supervisors and my name is russ low, and i have spent a quarter of my career working for the united states senate. senator cransetn some of you may
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remember, senator fine stien but before that i started with a group called chinese for affirmative action. this was in the late 70s and at that time, language access was an issue. it has not changed. and i have known julie for over 20 years. and we have discussed a lot of issues. and what impresses me is that she never backs down. she is not entim dated by challenges, or chal jers. you cannot pigeon hole her. and i think that is good, because a commission, the police commission especially, is going to be under a microscope lots of pressure. i would like to see her on the commission and i think that we are going to see progress, and we are kind of in a stalemate
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and the reports are out there and the recommendation and now we need to do something, about you there is a new challenge in the wind as you au know. the occupant on pennsylvania avenue has changed. and we are going to face challenges that we have never imagined. not only on the citizens but on the justice department and the police department and there is a big challenge and i cannot tell you what it will be, but we need the people there that are prepared and can handle it. thank you very much. >> thank you very much. >> any other members of the public would wish to comment? >> and i see supervisor mar has a question for you. >> i just wanted to thank russ low and other speakers chris chow. and commissioners eto, and palogi and chu. it says something to have people of such stature from our asian and pacific islander communities standing up behind julie soo. and i just wanted to thank them.
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and i think that it is significant that so many community leaders are out here in support of her, thank you, russ. >> thank you. had so seeing no other punl or last chance. thank you for being here, we are going to close public comment. but we are going to actually have the item again, before us of the special rules committee on monday. and so i don't know if there is anything else that the colleagues want to add we will save our discussion for then. thank you for coming out. mr. clerk next item. >> sorry, madam chair, did we take action to continue it? >> i am sorry, i guess that i need to have a motion from a committee member. to continue to the special meeting on monday. >> thank you, chair tang, i will make a motion to continue to our special meeting schedule for monday, december 12th, at 11:30 a.m. >> okay. >> and we will do that without objection. >> this item is continued. >> next item. >> our last item is ordinance
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amending the administrative, campaign and governmental conduct, environment, health, municipal elections, police, and public works codes to make nonsubstantive changes. >> thank you, and i will turn it over to the city attorney and the non-subtantive ordinance, nice title. >> every year, we compile the various typos and errors that we have found in the code over the course of the year and put it together in a non-subsnaive clean up ordinance and submit it for you for the approval, and so the code looks good, as the title suggest and makes no changes in the law other than cleaning up the code. and that is it. we ask for your approval. >> great, thank you for doing that. >> and do you have any members of the public that wish to comment on item four? >> seeing none, public comment is closed motion on item four. >> so move approval of item four. >> okay. >> and as a committee report, for december 13th. >> with positive recommendation.
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>> okay. >> we will do that without objection. >> all right, mr. clerk are there any other items before us today? >> no more items. >> thank you, this meeting is adjourned. -
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>> san francisco is known worldwide for its atmospheric waterfront where spectacular views are by piers and sight and sounds are xhanl changing we come to the here for exercise relax ball games entertainment, recreation market, exhilaration a wide variety of contributions easily
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enjoyed look up the bay the waterfront is boosting for activities boosting over 25 visitors every year the port of san francisco manages 7 may have million dollars of waterfront from hyde street and fisherman's wharf to the cargo terminals and name shoreline the architecture like pier 70 and the ferry building is here for the embarcadero and a national treasure the port also supports 10 different maritime industries alongside with the recreational attractions making san francisco one of the most viable working waterfronts in the world but did you think that our waterfront faces serious challenges if earthquake to
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damage the seawall and the embarcadero roadway rising seawalls will cause flooding at high tides and major repairs to a safe many of the piers the port is at a critically turnl point time to plan for the future of san francisco's waterfront this year the port is updating it's marts plan the plan working group to invite a wide variety of poichdz from the city and bayview and other advisory teams to share their expertise if intense and maritime operations the waterfront land use plan has guided the use and development of the lanes for the last 20 years major physical changes take place along the waterfront and now is the time to update
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the waterfront plan to continue improvements that will keep our waterfront vibrate, public and resilient the biggest challenges facing the waterfront are out the site an aging seawall along the embarcadero roadway and seawalls that will rise by 21 hundred to provide and productivity of tides seawall is built over weak soils and mud the next earthquake will cause it to settle several feet without the urgent repairs that will damage the promenade and other things we've been fortunate over the last hundred years less than one foot of seawall over the next hundred years scientists say we'll have 6 feet of seawall rise imagine the pier 30/32 will
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be floated, the embarcadero will be flooded our transportation system is fog to be heavy impacts unfortunately, the port didn't have the financial resources to repair all the deteriorating piers let alone the adaptations for sea level rise. >> it is clear that the port can't pay for the seawall reinforcement or deal with the sea level rise on its own needs to raise money to take care of the properties at take care of the maintenance on the properties no way absent anti funding the issues of sea level rise or the schematic conditions of seawall can be development. >> as studies talk about the seawall challenges the working group is look at the issues please come share our ideas about recreation, pier
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activities, shoreline habitat, historic preservation and transportation issues and viral protection. >> we know this planning process will not have one question and one answer we need the diversity of the opinions how people feel about san francisco waterfront and want to hear all the opinions. >> the challenges call for big decisions now is the time to explore now and creative ideas to protect and preserve san francisco waterfront. >> now is the time to get involved to help to shape the future of our waterfront. >> we need the debate please come forward and engage in the process. >> this is your waterfront and this is your opportunity to get involved be part of solution help san francisco create the waterfront we want for the future. >> this is really to dream big
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and i think about what our waterfront looked like for all san franciscans today and generations to come. >> get involved with the planning process that will set the fraction for what is coming at the port. >> find for in upgrading dates on the ports website. >> (ship blowing horn in >> (ship blowing horn in distances) - working for the city and county of san francisco will immerse you in a vibrant and dynamic city that's on the forefront of economic growth, the arts, and social change.
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our city has always been on the edge of progress and innovation. after all, we're at the meeting of land and sea. - our city is famous for its iconic scenery, historic designs, and world- class style. it's the birthplace of blue jeans, and where "the rock" holds court over the largest natural harbor on the west coast. - the city's information technology professionals work on revolutionary projects, like providing free wifi to residents and visitors, developing new programs to keep sfo humming, and ensuring patient safety at san francisco general. our it professionals make government accessible through award-winning mobile apps, and support vital infrastructure projects like the hetch hetchy regional water system. - our employees enjoy competitive salaries, as well as generous benefits programs. but most importantly, working for the city and county of san francisco gives employees an opportunity to contribute their ideas, energy, and commitment
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to shape the city's future. - thank you for considering a career with the city and county of san francisco.
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>> we broke ground in december of last year. we broke ground the day after sandy hook connecticut and had a moment of silence here. it's really great to see the silence that we experienced then and we've experienced over the years in this playground is now filled with these voices. >> 321, okay.
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[ applause ] >> the park was kind of bleak. it was scary and over grown. we started to help maclaren park when we found there wasn't any money in the bond for this park maclaren. we spent time for funding. it was expensive to raise money for this and there were a lot of delays. a lot of it was just the mural, the sprinklers and we didn't have any grass. it was that bad. we worked on sprinkler heads and grass and we fixed everything. we worked hard collecting everything. we had about 400 group members. every a little bit helped and now the park is busy all week. there is people with kids using the park and using strollers and now it's safer
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by utilizing it. >> maclaren park being the largest second park one of the best kept secrets. what's exciting about this activation in particular is that it's the first of many. it's also representation of our city coming together but not only on the bureaucratic side of things. but also our neighbors, neighbors helped this happen. we are thrilled that today we are seeing the fruition of all that work in this city's open space. >> when we got involved with this park there was a broken swing set and half of -- for me, one thing i really like to point out to other groups is that when you are competing for funding in a hole on the ground, you need to articulate what you need for your park.
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i always point as this sight as a model for other communities. >> i hope we continue to work on the other empty pits that are here. there are still a lot of areas that need help at maclaren park. we hope grants and money will be available to continue to improve this park to make it shine. it's a really hidden jewel. a lot of people don't know it's here. . >> working for the city and county of san francisco will immerse you in a vibrate and dynamic city on sfroert of the art and social change we've been on the edge after all we're at
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the meeting of land and sea world-class style it is the burn of blew jeans where the rock holds court over the harbor the city's information technology xoflz work on the rulers project for free wifi and developing projects and insuring patient state of at san francisco general hospital our it professionals make guilty or innocent available and support the house/senate regional wear-out system your our employees joy excessive salaries but working for the city and county of san francisco give us employees the unities to contribute their ideas and energy and commitment to shape the city's future but for considering a career with the
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city and county of san francisco
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