the funding in place and there's a possibility of a the funding in place so at this point in time we have a plan that is more thought out and more comprehensive than most that we've had in the history of the department and we're in a gook and projected and to and we're on good track. >> yes, commissioner. >> can you go, oh yes back to this diagram, you realize this

looks like the digestive cycle don't you? [laughter] >> maybe these are kidneys. [laughter] >> i do want -- you are learning our language. maybe it's just conscious. >> commissioners, you've been with greg now for probably almost an hour and so i do want to recognize that the depth of his knowledge of all of these areas and his leadership in this area and we've worked hard at ensuring the stabilization of the department around capital pieces it's a sharing economy in the department where we really want to focus on our service system so our patients and our staff will have safe building and we've also given up three times our ability to move this building to ensure that people

here also have than opportunity so i think we're the closest because one of my jobs was moving out of this building when i first started over 20 years ago and again it's a volatile sometimes process and especially if the economy changes but i think we're very, very close for having this solid plan for this and i am very hopeful that we can and to all this planning we're doing but i want to acknowledge all the staff who behind us are doing some incredible lifting and right after two hospitals being built wore back right at doing more capitol projects and we're getting better at the management of those and also really managing the financially so i just wanted to acknowledge greg 's leadership our c.f.o. regarding that relationship. >> it also does and i sit on the committee that reports out all of the city capitol projects and ace watch you know some of the

departments we're very highly regarded of our ability to operate all of our capitol projects and getting them out the door so we hope it continues that reputation so that we'll be seen as an project to move on and having people in safe buildings is a real goal we all have. >> can i follow-up with one last question, first of all, no rest for the weary but thank you so much and i really appreciate all the work and answering our questions and you've been getting us to this point with so many projects like the a.h.r. so with regards to capitol projects , how much are we at risk with regards to the operational budget if there are building capitol over runs are we responsible for the whole projector just the operational aspects of decan'ting buildings and the staff or if the building costs 10 or 20 million more than

most does it come out of our general fund allocation because i want to know how much risk we have around the building. >> interview: so the short answer is we're not going to put ourselves in a scenario where we have to face that decision. it's a real issue and we learned that the regard way overtime over starting with the san francisco general hospital bonds and we put a lot of oversight in place to make sure that we don't end up in a situation where we go out and borrow money through a geo bond and run out of dollars to complete the scope that we said we were going to complete so our approach and our policy now is that we make an investment up front to do the planning and the estimating and we appropriately size the geo bond if our ambitions are higher than the dollars available and the bond we scale back our

ambitions and so the other piece that we have in place is we have oversight process and structure that i think is barely strong and we have executive committees barbara garcia herself chairs the a oversight committee and we have controls in place if there are changes to scope or to costs for us to review those, we review those changes as they come in so we have a lot of controls around the process with the goal of not putting ourselves in a place where we hit that situation and where we're over budget and we have to deal with it. >> the risk to volume our department because there's d.p. w. involved and other divisions where they are the

lead constituent or the lead interest. >> yeah, we worked very closely with d.p.w. so d.p.w. is our partner in delivering all the capital programs with us from beginning to end so we work with them very closely and in the event that we do get to a point where we have a challenge in the budget or we have an unforeseen cost that arises, ultimately the financial responsibility for that would be what the department of public-health because d.p.w. is our implement er and we are the lead sponsor or the lead constituent as you say of the project so it really is on us to manage the projects from the beginning and as we foresee or as we experience problems as we go along for us to take ownership and manage the solutions. >> thank you, very much. >> just to make sure just to let you know we are starting quarter ly meetings with d.p.w.

to ensue we're coordinated with them as well. our. >> saphia: is but executive level we will meet shortly for our first quarterly meeting with the executive director of d.p.w. >> yes, that's absolutely correct, i think we've gotten a lot of experience both on our side on the d.p.w. side through this work with the vendors and how to hold the vendors to accountability so yeah it's a good point. >> i do think there was an example back when we were building laguna and it was commission that needed to listen to what was happening and then the department the directors and finance people and so fourth

working with the mayor's office to workout what was going to happen and that day up with of the issues was steel of course and that drove the cost of the project far higher than project ed and there were a number of other controls that probably should have been in place but we've learned from that experience and did much better at the sfgh rebuild but we did have to work i mean working closely with the city so it's not that you are responsible and cuts half the people off the clinics but how do we do this and the ultimate was to remove one time and it then butts it back within the budget and so it's a collaboration because city cannot just have you also default on the project nor could

it actually want to sustain taking away patients' needs related to this but this is part of the -- i think the due diligence that we have to have to work with the department and with the administration to be sure that things do stay on budget and when they don't, then earlier rather than later the answers need to come a lot more transparency which i believe the department has really come up with now over the years in order to give us the information and so that's why i'm looking forward to being able to do that and i think we need something similar on our capitol projects right because that is another bond issue we're following in terms of the seismic renovation at five and our other clinic buildings so we're model it similarly although not as

complex as the e.h.r., right. >> it's interesting because when you look at what is under that building 5 program, there are -- the team here knows it from experience but there are dozens and dozens and dozens of moving parts different clinics relocate to go different areas so there is the bit of complexity to this but we will continue to report to you with the kind of summarized version much like we did with the bond. >> ok. >> thank you. >> other questions commissioners on this particular part? sorry to make you keep going. >> the last slide on the marathon. [laughter] financial data nightmare. [laughter] so risks and uncertain tease this is the last subject that

the commission requested that we touch on. so the two biggest as no surprise they have been for quite some time is the federal environment, the policy environment and state and the economic changes possibility so recognizing of course that anything that happens there could be big enough it really changes the numbers that we projected out here in fundamentally changes the environment we've been looking at so we've been conscious of that and we've been talking about at this commission for most essentially the entire time i've been here and before but also at this city level trying to put ourselves in a position where when something happens we probably won't be able to mitigate it entirely but we can at least buy ourselves some room to deal with it so we're not kind of thrown in to react mode

immediately when something happens so a couple of the initiatives that are core to that strategies the reserves on the d.p.h. the management reserve that we created we have $92.2 million that's built up from zero not so long ago so that's a lot of progress and that is i think a big deal helping us sleep a little bit better at night and in addition in the budget that was adopted over the summer, there's a 50 million-dollar place that is in a central city reserve to mitigate impacts of changing to the a.c.a. or other federal cuts so that is helpful reserve if there's action again it wouldn't

be enough to just make those a nonissue but it would be enough to help us mitigate the impacts and have time to develop a response to whatever may come. on the e.h.r. project i showed you that large project budget over ten years. we have been funding that in pieces overtime and we have in the '18-'19 budget the the the last lump sum appropriation for the first three years of implementation so we have those funds set aside in a project budget and this is a question that has come up here and in other settings on the e.h.r. as how are we going to make sure that we have the funds in place to deliver it this is been our approach in our strategy and to make sure that we actually can execute and we have those funds

that are segregated and a project they don't close out at the end of the year and it's a project that continues overtime so the funds will remain available and they have the ability to manage that project so we through the work of the last several budgets pre funded that project with we had good news and it's a good practice of saying when we have good news let's put an end to investment that is capital investment that will payoff over the long run and lastly the general fund we talked about there is the city's general fund reserve and this has been the work of the city and the controller and the mayor 's office and over the last many years the city and the board of supervisors adopted the policy to increase the size of the city's general fund reserve it used to be $25 million total for the general fund and that

reserve has grown overtime to about 8% of general fund revenues from a fraction of 1% that puts us in more of a standard range where we have re serves that are more proportion at to the size of the city's revenues so that should provide some question with one of these big changes. and then let's see of course revenue generation is our other strategy for mitigateing any of these issues and the more self reliant we have on our revenues and the less we rely on general fund dollars or we're reliant on good news from the state or federals, the less susceptible to those changes so that that's got to be our policy for in sul eighting ourselves from the swings of the financial world so

that is all i've got. [laughter] >> well, that was really very commendable. [laughter] >> recognize aside from having to stand. by itself it's difficult. >> it's good for my back. >> i mean obviously the work behind it in the way that you and jury staff has recognized it as assisted the commission to understand where we're moving forward and ask the commission if you have thoughts now commissioner gardner. >> good.

>> you have done a good job and he is at this point that this is a lot of money and it's going and you reached also and. >> thank you, very much and i just want to save the i've seen a change in culture and ownership of the financial situation that has been pretty profound and we have if you look at our financial steward ship is an element and integrated in to the planning in the other areas so all of the leaders in the network and on the population health division and i think the

leadership is really coming from the divisions to drive the changes that end up on my spread sheet so focus on financial management in the department outside of the finance division is really strong. >> i would ask add to the chair that the rights of passage if we can give you triple honors, again, it's really been a fascinating just watching you and listening to everyone working and come in with the qualitative data in a way you can understand and review and see it's astounding so really honor is ours, thank you. >> commissioner. >> this might be a monkey wrench question, when i look at this

has been a really clear and education at presentation and the question in my mind is when we talk about contingency planning why aren't earthquake part of it because a lot of the work that we are going inform move forward with with the seismic retro fit and you know and moving like the departments, it's really contingency important that no other natural disasters happen at this period of time. the last big earthquake is 1989 and there's no predictions when the next one is. like has the department actually talked about having a contingency plan if like in three years there's a earthquake and that was before we actually

moved any of the departments, you know, what would happen? >> well, we consistently have drills in terms of how we're going to respond to any kind of disaster and continuity of operations is part of our planning and we do practice what would happen if we did have any disaster of any kind and it's hard to predict but continuity is a core foundation of prepared ness and so we have a plan and we consistently look at that plan and that means also success is of who is in charge if something happens if our own city recently so we are pretty prepared and they can't prepare for everything and everything but you have a operation of operations plans and they would

look at services and how we responded so as an example if our community clinics wentz down we would probably open up the types of facilities and we're getting pretty good at pop um clinics and so we have contin duty plan and the doctor is in charge of that and as part of the preparedness response. >> so i appreciate reminder in terms of emergency response and you have done a great job in like organizing and planning and i'm really curious not concerned yet but this gives me a lot of concerns and all the natural disasters and how it hit and in the east coast and how some of the really emergency services it's paralyzed and it happened

in puerto rico so that actually thought that i have in the questions that i have it's kind of fiscal impact with that have and for us and it's not so much ho how we respond to if and that is for us and how how we sort those impact. >> we should add on this list of federal and state or economic we should add that and you are right because that could happen significant impact that i don't think there's anyway to answer that question because etch type of event is it's own type of event and for seen and they're a whole a lot of potential risks that could come with that and as part of our disaster prepared ness exercising and working with the and on our

process for the extent there's a disaster that allows us to recoup funds and federal or state governments and our structure and process ready to respond that so that is a financial upkeep initiative and that would be part of it and the seismic safety of our buildings is probably the most obvious mitigateing event if we did have a big seismic event that disabled one of our buildings and we had to move staff or services out that would be a financial cost and it would be productivity cost and it would also be really problematic if those people are supposed to be responding to other people's emergencies so i don't know how to answer that question but she think about it as we plan for

financial contingencys that's one of them. >> out of the contingency plans that would be one that is still manageable for us you know, that is compared to some other possible scenario because of this year's political climate and which includes relationships with north korea so i think that to really be able to plan some of these or have these discussions ahead of time like maybe i'm just like negative nancy, i don't know. >> not at all. you know the city wide we do this process all the time several times a year we are doing different kinds of scenarios and so city wide we practice as well because the department is not going to be able to do this on their own the department of emergency management is the conveneer and coordinator of our responses

city wide but what we can do shortly and one of our next meetings coming for the new year we can kind of go over some of the disaster trainings that we have had city wide and to be able to discuss that as you can remember fleet week is one of those areas that we do real major disaster response in terms of doing training and activation s around drills and so we can share the network city wide and the work on the department so just recently with our heat, we did have our hospitals being greatly impacted by that so there were conversations and some of us sitting and talking about what would happen if one one of our hospitals due to heat and the machinery going down what it terms in terms of evacuations in terms of the the hospital and so we can all practice, practice, practice, practice, you can't always predict but you can always be prepared so i think we

can bring that forward to you and show you the work we've been doing in the last couple of years. >> and mr. wagner said we'll add to that the risk and uncertain tease is a good point. >> thank you. >> yes, commission commissioner bern. >> just with regard to the disaster planning, does that take in to account mutual aid from surrounding counties and are they in place? >> yes, they have been in place and we've actually used them not so long ago and at times to bring on ambulances and a lot of times it goes the opposite direction so for north base buyers and we've sent hundreds of police over 100 individuals from our department so we have several more layers of mutual aid and everything from ambulance to we have one non

profits that responded to the earthquake but never really got funded and is the non-profit sector and how important they are during this period of time and we have them in memorandum of understanding so they can respond and as you know they are on the ground in their communities and we want to make sure of that so it's. >> it sounds like we get a little discussion about the nerd program too and how well it's doing in the neighborhood so it's struggleing off and on and with that so we'll schedule a presentation on the emergency disaster program as the department finds it has the or we have the time for it.

further questions at this point? i want to thank you for what everybody here has said is i believe in extraordinary presentation on behalf of the department here and i think the only changes from what you have heard before in trying to and agreeing with you to stay within the budgets in terms of increasing the budget well not increasing our percentage and i do not hear anybody thought we should change that guideline and we would continue with that and continue trying to of course meet the contingencys of the future and you've certainly

built the reserves up even more than we had last time and i'm hopeing the general funds two types of general fund are much clear to people and it look at it and i in the little colors of railroads po art aren't some are grown and some are yellow but i think it's very important and people get confused. would you like to provide any last words? >> thank you for spending the afternoon with me. [laughter] >> so let's thank mr. wagner and his staff. [applause] our next item 10 otherwise business. >> commissioners -- do we have other, we are not going to have a meeting on january 2nd. >> because of that some items

have been pushed and mr. wagner mentioned the capitol plan presentation bumped to march 6tn and take a look at the calender in front of you. >> we'll be here, we're doing the calender. we can move on to item 11 joint conference committee report there hasn't been a meeting since the last health commission meeting so there's no report and item 12 is committee agenda setting which you just referenced with the calender and so we can move on to consideration of votes for closed session. >> were there any public comments concerning closed session? no public comments. >> no motion for closed session is in order. >> so moved. >> second. >> all those in favor a aye. >> opposed. commission will now go in to closed session. thank you. those who are not part of the closed session should vacate the room.

>> please stand by say aye. >> we will not disclose the discussion and ready for a motion for adjournment and the second. all those in favor. please a aye. >> dr. chow. >> i'm sorry, i'd like to move we close in memory of mayor ed lee. >> i will accept that and we will close in memory of mayor ed lee. all those in favor. please a aye. >> aye. >> all those opposed this meet asking now adjourned in the memory of ed win lee.

this is the recreation and park commission with commissioner buell? here. commissioner lowe? here. commissioner mcdonnell? here. just to remind everyone, we request that you turn off any electronic sound producing devices that could go off during the meeting, so cell phones, if you could please turn those off

or on silent. we request that you take any conversations outside. if you would like to speak on an item today, please create a blue card. unless otherwise nounszed by the president, each person will have three minutes for public comment on each item. if there is an item of interest to you that is not on the agenda and is under the subject matter jurisdiction of the commission, you may speak under general public comment. that is item 4. it will be heard for 15 minutes and then continued again at item 12. please address your comments to the commission during public comment on items in order to allow equal time for all. neither commission nor staff will respond. the commission may ask questions

after public comment is closed. if the fire alarms activate, you must evacuate using any exit. please note that elevators will return to the first floor and are not available for use. if you do need assistance out of the building, make your way to the closest area refuge across the hall from the men's restroom. inside the restroom is a speaker box, press it and city hall security will answer it, let them know where you are and they will assist you. item number 2. the president's report. >> president buell: thank you. let me begin by simply saying no words can possibly express the sadness that we all feel in this department and this commission for the very tragic loss of our

mayor ed lee. there simply aren't the right words to do it, but first, we will adjourn in his memory. and two, as someone very high up in washington said in a text to me, in troubling times, he was a very, very decent man. and so we will remember him with sadness. with that, that concludes my president's report. >> clerk: anyone who would like to make public comment? being none, we are on item 3. the general manager's report. >> thank you commissioners and president buell, i didn't realize how hard this was going to be. yeah, i mean, we're all heart broken. and so today, rather than run through a typical general manager's report, i wanted to

highlight the mayor's commitment to parks. for us all. and in honor of the mayor, i'll try to be short, because i am short. [laughter]. he was just -- we're going to let the slide show run here, but he was such a champion of our parks. and certainly understood the importance of making them accessible to all residents. there were probably no single statistic related to parks that he was more proud of than being the first big city mayor to be able to brag that 100% of residents that lived in the city he led lived within a 10-minute walk of a park. he would almost every event since we reached that honor, mention it right out of the gate.

and that was because of how much he cared about infrastructure and investment. and during his tenure, under his leadership, we have invested over $350 million in parks. including voter-approved bonds in 2012. the implementation of a bond in 2008, and although that was before his mayoral tenure, if you go back a little further, the mayor city administrator was the author of the city's 10-year capital plan, which laid very much the groundwork for all of investment. parks that were reopened during his tenure include chinatown, delores park, glen canyon

playground and recreation center, lafayette park, reopened the sunset recreation center, reopened the joe dimaggio playground. opened a new plaza where town square on 24th street. acquired open space out of india basin, francisco reservoir, st. mary's which opened under his leadership. under his leadership voters approved proposition b in 2016. which really has been a true stabilizing force for us and will be even more valuable as we head into rockier budget times. just in last year since proposition b, we have

resurfaced total of 15 tennis and basketball courts, most of which are in underserved communities. he understood the importance of public-private partnerships and through you are partnership with the city field foundation we've renovated 21 soccer fields, added 80,000 hours of play. through our partnership with trust for public land, we opened -- renovated bo decker park, balboa, the amazing playgrounds that have sprung out of the ground, right in our front yard of this building which will open on february 14th, have his fingerprints all over them. i remember vividly meeting in his office with my good friend jackie and folks from the trust

for public land and we excitedly showed him the design and he said light, there needs to be light. and light he got. and light he will get. when these playgrounds open, you're going to see a brand new energy and face out at civic center. one of the things that i really connected with him and loved him for was how much he cared about our kids and how much he cared about active recreation, whether it was the mayor 3 on 3 hoops tournament, coming to crabfest, promoting the scholarships, whether it was supporting the summer camp programs, whenever he was around kids, you would see him smile and just light up. he loved sports, loved sporting events, loved community. he created his -- the mayor's annual ping pong tournament which started and runs

throughout chinatown. golf. whether it be the first tee and teaching kids who have never picked up a golf club the importance of the game, or having the world's best come to harding for the president's cup. am ex championship, the president's cup, all brought to san francisco because he was our park champion and he loved golf and the pga knew he loved golf and knew he would make it work. he always came out to the events. never missed a tree-lighting. in fact the last time i had the honor of being with him was at our tree-lighting this past year, where again, he bragged being the first mayor in a country where 100% of us lived

within the 10-minute walk of the park. we've increased scholarships to san francisco families. we've run the teen outdoor experience seven years in a row, which was his vision to bring kids who touched the juve nil system, up to mather for a long weekend when it was just theirs. he provided over the greater and greener parks conference where we brought the nation's park leaders and some of the nation elected officials to show off the park system. we presided over the centennial. he presided over the summer of love celebration. he led pride parades. giants and warriors championship parades that ran through our

parks and facilities. he welcomed the world cup to civic center plaza. and there may have been no bigger san francisco deltas fan. although they were only around one year, they made significant investment into our stadium for generations of folks to enjoy and they won the north american soccer league championship their one and only year. i could go on and on, but i'll stop there. i wanted to say how much i'm going to miss him and how grateful i am, how much he truly loved and cared about parks and the city's kids. to that end, we have some really, really special kids. i thought this was the right way to end today's otherwise sad general manager's report. i want to welcome the young

people's team music theater company to our commission. they are a performing arts company devoted to bringing quality and professional level theater to young adults in the bay area. this is your program. this is a san francisco recreation and park program. they offer quality instruction in drama, voice, acting, dance and technical theater. founded in 1984 by diane price. they are selected by open audition only. this past month, under the amazing leadership of nicole, they won first place for the second consecutive year. they performed excerpts from their upcoming production of bat boy, the musical, this production will revisit the first show ever put on my

nicole, who is celebrating her first anniversary with us as director. [applause] the show -- [laughter] the show will take place on january 26-28 and february 2-4 at the museum. and in honor of the holidays and our beloved mayor, i invite them to perform now. [ ♪ ] [ ♪ ]

♪ has come from the cold ♪ [ ♪ ] [ ♪ ] ♪ it's a joyful moment ♪ may the joyful noise

♪ make some noise ♪ make some noise ♪ sing it proud ♪ all night long ♪ make it noise, noise, joyful noise ♪ ♪ make some noise ♪ praise god ♪ so like the prophets we're told in the days of old, make joyful noise my soul ♪ ♪ make joyful noise my soul ♪ make some noise ♪ make some noise ♪ hallelujah

♪ all night long ♪ make joyful noise ♪ of joyful noise [applause] [cheering] >> well, that's a pretty awesome -- >> wow. >> -- way to end the year in the general manager's report, in honor of our beloved mayor. >> president buell: we found a new way to open every meeting, that's terrific.

>> mr. president, can you join me for a picture? how about we all go? >> president buell: the whole commission down, come on.

[applause] >> commissioner, she's on the way out of the door, but i want to celebrate chris boettcher, who oversees all of the music programs, including this one, so thank you, chris. [applause] >> is there anyone who would like to make public comment under the general manager's report? ok. [laughter] seeing none, this item is closed. we're now under general public

comment, is there anyone who would like to make general public comment? ok being none, richard? ok. >> what would our meeting with without? >> can you sing, richard? [laughter]. >> good morning, everyone. i just want to make a few public comments, i try to speak a little bit about phil but what happened every time i walk around in chinatown park and i see something wrong. one of the things has to do with the new, brand new, restroom facility. and one of the doors always locked, the one with non-gender, family use, and everything else. is that ever going to be open? that's a very simple thing to do, open it. the room to whatever is holding it up. the other thing that i looked at, currently the location is

going to be under a lot of renovations. i was thinking if it would be possible to get a temporary fix. i walk through there, i see the pot holes, they're probably dug up by rodents, or unwanted rats. they have traps around there. could they do something like, use soil impact, hanging around the temporary fix and top it off with some of the broken up bark so it doesn't look so -- because at night it gets spooky and it makes different sounds in the park. i think the -- [inaudible] a good job because a long time ago i had spoken when he, lee, his wife, she wanted her name left off, but she, herself has

passed on and was a great sponsor of park activities throughout the chinatown areas, basketball namely. so of the interest, there was the slope in front of the park on the cray street side and she had shown me pictures of it. it looked awful because it wasn't cared for, there wasn't much maintenance done. i asked the maintenance about it. i don't want to fall down, it's a very steep slope there, maybe even get a stick or something, break it a little bit. that's how i remember edie. and then ed lee and those other people, who have already passed on. i hope i'm not going to be catching up with them. thank you very much. >> president buell: thank you.

>> clerk: anyone else wants to make general comment? seeing none. >> president buell: before i entertain a motion on the consent calendar, we have a request to speak. we welcome you and send our regards to supervisor yee. >> today i wanted to speak on 5-c, the west portal playground and i'll read a letter that the supervisor included in the report. i'm writing to express my support for the prioritization of the west portal playground renovation project. west portal playground is one of the most utilized playgrounds in district 7. due to the playground state of disrepair, the failing playground's task force identified it as a priority for renovation and is classified as

a tier two approximating playground of the lets play sf tt initiative. since 2014, my office has been working in collaboration with the recreation and park department, san francisco parks alliance and the friends of the west portal playground to continue driving this project forward. while the project has stalled at times, my office has continued to work closely with all stakeholders, particularly with the community members to raise funds and donor recognition ideas. to maintain the project's momentum. the community as represented by the friends of the west portal playground, greater west portal neighborhood association, west portal merchants association and students from west portal elementary school, totalling 160 community members are deeply invested in seat playground renovations completed on a

timely schedule. it has been three years since my office first started collaborating on playground renovations and we want to see the project remain on schedule. i hope the capital committee will approve -- the commission will approve the concept wall design to the members can enjoy a safer and engaging playground. this concludes the letter. >> president buell: thank you very much. >> clerk: any public comment? richard? >> i would like to follow up on the west portal playground design. i seen the particular model, i see the dragon, everything else,

what i didn't see was the kids chasing after the big train, maybe they could have dragon hands or whatever else. there wasn't very much for younger kids. even though it's designed for them, it's a lot of open spaces. where they have the dragon, i was thinking about, a lot of the parks have a spring, you got a little seat on it and the kids can chase after the dragon, or running along with the dragon. that was one thing i liked add onto the concept design. i liked the idea, a nice little park, portion dealing with growth [inaudible] -- plans, so on other issues, on the geneva community gardens, as

well as the other geneva car barn, i believe that the -- i read the contracts between mta, there is something about locking in the 7-year with the rooms that are going to be rented out at low cost. i wanted to include a possible addendum to that where there would be possibly interconnected rooms and it would be a display of earlier iconic type of structures, for example, even the -- i can think of the portals of the past out there. and that used to be on sacramento street before the great fire. throughout the city here, we have a lot of iconic artifacts that would be beautiful. there was a place that people can visit.

and it would be like a recreational park area. i hope to keep it open so that you don't just totally lock in. [inaudible] commissioner lowe, but possibly locking in on the 7-year space. i like to keep the addendum option open. thank you. >> president buell: thank you, richard. >> clerk: anyone else would like to make public comment? seeing none, this item is closed. >> president buell: chair entertains the motion? moved and seconded, all those in favor? so moved. >> we're on item 6, the san francisco zoo. >> thank you, good morning, tanya peterson, director of the san francisco zoo. we support the supervisor's

efforts in regards to the west portal and appreciate it. i want to add our thoughts about our wonderful mayor. i first met him when he was at dpw and i was a board member for the zoo. the zoo is a public-private partnership as the general manager discussed. way back when we were just little people, young people, we were charged with raising funds for our new education center. and as things go, there was a lot of value engineering, budget cuts, et cetera, but one thing was really important to ed lee at this point, the little door handles that had squirrels and things on them, ed thought it would be so great fort kids to open the doors when they saw the squirrels and other animals. we kept those in the budget and he personally screwed the door handles in himself. so here we are years later, he's the mayor and i'm the zoo